Somethings break your heart but fix your vision
.....
I have always been patient at least, that's what I told myself for as long as I've breathed.
But patience feels like a cruel joke when your very existence is dragged into question.
The sting of being insulted not just for what you do, but for who you are, is a wound that doesn't heal.
It's as if the world looked me in the eye and asked,
"Do you even matter?
Is anything you're doing truly meaningful?"
And no matter how loud I scream inside, the silence that answers me is deafening.
That doubt it doesn't just haunt me.
It consumes me.
It claws at my thoughts, tears into my soul, and leaves me wondering if I've ever truly lived at all.
My entire life was painfully ordinary a washed-up story, echoing the silent cries of millions just like me.
Nothing unique.
Nothing grand. Just... existing.
Vahel was right.
Her decision to kill me, as twisted as it sounds, was a blessing in disguise.
Because in those final moments
when the world began slipping away I finally thought about myself.
Whenever I stepped into a temple,
a church, or any place people clung to for hope or answers,
I'd feel this hollow stir inside me. Sometimes I'd even stare into the mirror and whisper,
"Is this the right path?"
But the reflection never replied.
It only watched, tired and uncertain.
I hesitated to speak my truth, to let the weight off my chest, because I cared too much about the people around me. I wore a smile for them.
I carried their pain, while mine festered in silence.
But after death… the first sensation that washed over me was relief.
Relief that I no longer had to wake up every morning and drag myself through a routine I couldn't control.
Relief that I didn't have to fake a smile or drown in the emotional debris of others just to keep going.
My work was genuine.
I served people.
My profession mattered.
But what I lacked was the emotional strength to survive the weight of the world I tried to carry.
Even when I decided to hear Lynn's story, I wasn't searching for meaning anymore.
I had long stopped believing my presence made any difference.
But still, I listened,not for me
but for him.
I just wanted to give him a fragment of hope, something he could hold on to… something that might steer him back toward a life worth living.
One that didn't end up like mine- quiet, dim and constantly overshadowed by a sense of never being enough.
I don't resent Vahel. Or Lynn.
They didn't drag me into some elaborate plan against my will.
No they chose me.
And for the first time in my entire existence, I wasn't invisible.
I was needed.
Not as a placeholder or a listener or a caretaker. But as a pillar.
As someone whose soul could bear the weight of another's pain, even when mine had already crumbled.
What surprised me most wasn't that I was part of something bigger
it was that it stretched beyond death, beyond this world.
I mattered... across worlds, across timelines...
And in that brief burning moment,
I wasn't just alive,I belonged.
Even if I was meant to perish after all of this, I would've accepted it without flinching.
Hell, I probably would've thanked whoever did it. Because truth is I never really cared for myself. Not enough to fight for me.
But then Lynn shared his story.
And somewhere between the cracks in his voice and the weight of his words, something unfamiliar started to rise inside me.
Not hope. Not purpose.
Just a damn question that wouldn't shut up:
"Was I really meant to be unimportant? Even across worlds?"
Is happiness too much to ask?
Just once. Just in one reality.
Can't a man like me -plain, average, damaged catch a break?
Lynn said he was looking for a better version of himself.
The strongest one.
The one who survived what no one else could.
A version who carried the unbearable and still kept going.
And then... he said it.
That version....was me.
Me?!
The guy who faded into the background of his own life?
Who smiled through other people's pain while silently drowning in his own? The one who never felt seen, never felt enough?
He said I was that version.
The best version of him.
And that's when it hit me like a cruel joke dressed as destiny.
That can't be true.
Because even that "better" me,even that version, refined through lifetimes of torment and trial wasn't happy.
Not just unhappy.
He was broken.
Screwed over in not one but two lives.
How is that fair?
If even my strongest self gets nothing but suffering then what's the damn point of being strong?
At first, I told myself it was just a mistake.
Maybe Vahel killed me thinking I was someone else.
Maybe calling me "pathetic" was just an unfortunate coincidence in words thrown out in the chaos, a slip of some twisted tongue from another world.
I tried to let it go. Tried to believe it was just senseless violence, not personal.
But then... it started feeling personal.
It wasn't just the killing.
It was the way she looked at me as if I was already nothing.
As if my life, my identity, my existence were all just some failed prototype.
A scrap version of someone better.
I wasn't just collateral damage.
I was an echo
A fate handed to me like a recycled script.
A tragedy already lived by another… and now passed down to me.
This wasn't an accident nor wasn't an confusion.
It was design.
There's a sickness in this treating lives like drafts, swapping names and faces like costumes, rewriting fates like fiction.
There has to be a problem.
But it wasn't Lynn.
He's not the one pulling the strings. He's caught, just like me, just more aware.
Like he's seen behind the curtain but still can't stop the play.
He wanted a better version of himself. But what if the "better version" was never the goal?
What if the goal was control?
And maybe… just maybe…
My death wasn't the end.
It was my cue.
What really shattered me… was Lynn.
This man,this other me who came from a world people like me used to dream about.
Magic. Mana. Demons. Cursed blades and ancient prophecies.
The kind of universe where you matter just by existing. Where destiny clings to your name and power answers your call. A place where the rules of reality are bent by will and emotion.
Anyone would kill to live in a world like that.
And yet… he was ready to die.
Not in a blaze of glory. Not defending the innocent or fulfilling some grand destiny.
No,he was handing himself over.
Quiet. Willing. Like death was the only thing left that made sense.
And the worst part?
He said he was me.
He has infinite chances to be someone more.
Someone legendary. Someone seen.
And still… he broke.
Just like I did.
He welcomed the end.
That hit me like a curse I didn't know I was carrying.
Because if even he is this powerful, magical version of me that couldn't find a reason to stay alive…
Then what the hell does that say about me?
I thought he'd be the proof that I could've mattered. That maybe in another life, with different rules, I would've been enough.
Instead, he became a mirror. And all I saw was a cycle of pain and silence wearing different skins.
And for the first time… I didn't feel hopeless.
I felt furious.
That was the moment I made the decision.
If I had to live in Lynn's place, inherit his aftermath, walk through the ashes of his choices then fine.
But this time, I'd make some damn sure change in it.
I've spent years to understand what my life was supposed to mean.
Waiting for some sign, some spark that told me it all mattered.
And the only truth I found?
Life is just a slow crawl toward death, disguised as a search for purpose.
Everyone's just trying to find something, anything to keep breathing for. Some are lucky enough to start with joy and lose it.
Others suffer early and chase redemption. And then there are people like me...
Who never even got a proper chance.
So when Vahel looked me in the eyes and mocked me.
She called me pathetic but I knew,
That was my opening.
Lynn doesn't even realize what's creeping behind him, what's moving beneath the surface of his world.
But I do. I see it. And I'm going to find it even if I have to do it without magic, without strength, without any of the
so-called gifts he was born with.
My terms with Vahel were never going to be simple.
I knew if I even hinted at what I was planning, she'd play me like a well-worn instrument just like she did with Lynn. Smile in her voice, blade behind her back.
She doesn't act without purpose.
No one in this world does.
It was a setup from the very beginning. I saw the trap the moment she let the word "system" slip.
In every fantasy I ever read, no system is ever truly free… or friendly. It doesn't gift you power - it owns you through it.
It tracks, molds, reshapes, and eventually... breaks you.
A true system doesn't just hand you power but it writes your narrative, frames your decisions, and convinces you it was your choice all along.
When Lynn told me the system gave him tasks, I felt it. That chill.
He thought they were random. Helpful, even. Level up. Kill this. Save that. Classic hero package.
But there is difference,
You don't need chains when the prison whispers to you like a friend.
That's the genius of it as it doesn't force you. It suggests.
Pushes. Rewards compliance, punishes deviation, and calls it "balance."
The system molds you until you forget what it felt like to think for yourself.
And Lynn deserves the truth.
He deserves to know where it all went wrong.
I'll find it—for him.
Because even though I died… he was the reason I didn't disappear.
Even as a dead man walking, even in a world that was never mine...
I'm still here.
And that means someone, somewhere, made a mistake.
Now it's my turn to find out who.
If this world wants to be cruel?
Let it.
But I swear, I'll carve my way through it.
And if I'm meant to die again…
Then this time, I'll do it on my terms.
.....
I slowly opened my eyes.
Whether the deal with Vahel would actually work… I wasn't sure. Part of me expected to wake up to nothingness or worse, to Vahel's grinning face saying, "Nice try."
But no. It worked or at least,something did.
One of my terms had been clear: Lynn's soul stays with me, locked inside my mind, until my little trip through this so-called Wonderland reaches its end.
Vahel wanted his soul. Maybe that's what Lynn meant when he said he'd sold it off.
And if Vahel can drag the dead across worlds, grant cursed systems, harvest souls like apples off a tree, and pull off magic like cheap party tricks then fulfilling my terms shouldn't be beyond her reach.
Still, I was doubtful. Always am.
When I made the plan to vanish with Lynn, I knew it was reckless. A gamble. A desperate move from someone who had nothing left to lose.
But it worked.
Because he's here standing right in front of me.
Lynn.
And the look on his face?
Like someone just ripped his favorite toy out of his hands and smashed it. Hollow. Bitter. A little betrayed.
What's his problem?
Maybe he can feel it,that shift.
Maybe Vahel felt it too. A glitch in her grand little system.
And I have no idea how she'll react when she figures out what I really asked for. When she realizes I didn't just accept her game ,I rewrote the rules the moment she blinked.
Honestly?I think her face when she realizes it…
Will be hilarious.
Lynn's voice pierced through the silence, laced with confusion and something close to fear.
"You're still thinking. About what?
Why bring me here? And where the hell are we?"
I took a breath and looked around.
"My mind," I answered calmly.
"This… is my mind."
No one really knows what their mind looks like. Most people go their whole lives never needing to.
But now, I the honored one, the unfortunate soul who bargained with death have been given that rare, twisted privilege.
I guess I always imagined something different. Peaceful, maybe. A forest bathed in sunlight, vibrant colors dancing through the trees.
A place that whispered hope and childhood nostalgia.
But instead...
I stood in the middle of a dried-up waste land.
An endless stretch of cracked, hollow seabed. No water. No wind. Just dust.
All around me, broken statues lay scattered half-buried, eroded faces peering out from the ground. Some were strangers. Others... hauntingly familiar. People I knew. People I lost.
The sky hung low, a sickly shade of twilight. That eerie not-quite-night where everything feels paused waiting for something that never comes.
Even the ground beneath my feet was fractured. Great, gaping pits where something powerful must've once stood,now dried, empty. Forgotten.
Lynn stood a few steps away, staring at the scene in stunned silence.
"What… happened to you?"
he asked, voice barely audible.
I gave him a tired smile.
"Nothing happened."
"This is just what it looks like… when you stop pretending you're okay."
"Lynn, just stay here and enjoy a little vacation"
I said, flashing a half-smile.
"I'll handle the body-swap business trip into your fun little nightmare world."
He stared at me like I'd grown a second head.
"Just what exactly did you wish to happen?This isn't how things were supposed to go."
I smiled. Couldn't help it.
I knew he'd say that.
"Things never go the way we want, Lynn. That's the universal rule whether regardless of which universe you're in. So just sit back, relax, and watch the rest. I'll take care of it."
He looked pissed now.
"Take care of what, exactly?"
he snapped.
"You're stepping into a foreign world, hijacking my half-shattered body, with nothing but your life to offer."
"I used to be the best mage in my age" he growled.
"The best. Even those chosen brats had to scramble to keep up with me."
"And now you, a guy whose idea of a plan is playing dead until it gets interesting, think you can just waltz into my world and change everything?"
"That's not courage. That's comedy."
I just shrugged.
"Then let's hope it's a tragicomedy, Lynn. Those always get the best endings."
Lynn looked deeply uncomfortable. Not angry. Not frustrated. Just… quietly unsettled.
I knew that look.
It wasn't about me anymore.
It was about what I'd done about her.
I had a pretty good guess why he was hesitant. Pride doesn't bend easily. Especially not when it's being handed off to someone else with a smile and a shrug.
So I said, "When you told me your story, Lynn, I thought you trusted me."
He put a hand to his forehead like the weight of what was coming finally cracked through.
"It's not that " he muttered.
"I'm just trying to warn you…"
He looked up at me.
"You may have pissed off Vahel."
I paused.He wasn't joking.
"She's not just powerful ,She's ancient. A being that rewrites rules, not follows them. I don't even know what she is. I used to think she was bound by the system but now?
I think the system is bound by her."
That stuck with me.
I tried to laugh it off. Tried.
"Well," I said, forcing a grin
"that's the beauty of being stupidly unaware of how bad things can get. Blissfully bold."
Lynn didn't return the smile.
I glanced to the edge of the mindspace the dry ocean, the shattered statues and for just a second… something shifted. Like the air quivered.
Like something else was listening.
"Don't worry"
I said quickly, shaking it off.
"I've taken precautions. For one year, nothing should happen.
"How are you so sure?" Lynn asked, his voice laced with disbelief.
"And why one year? "
Then he looked around again, hesitant.
"And this… this is your mind?"
That one, at least, was easy to answer.
"Yeah," I said, gesturing to the cracked horizon, the scattered statues, the stillness hanging like mist.
"Welcome to my brain. Unfiltered, unedited, slightly apocalyptic."
"Just walk around"
I added, more softly now.
"The mind's endless. You might find something good… something fun, even."
"Or you might stumble into something awful. I'm not making promises."
He didn't respond. Just looked at the ground, the ruins, the emptiness.
"Look Lynn, I've done good things.
For people who were grateful. For people who weren't. But a lot of those people? They didn't deserve it."
Maybe this is what it looks like to give too much to the wrong people."
I looked out over the distance and smiled, faint but firm.
"Still... I'm pretty damn sure my mind isn't a bad one. There's got to be something beautiful buried here.
Some little corner I never noticed."
"So go explore. Dig around. And if you find something I didn't know about myself"
I glanced back at him
"tell me. I'd like to know what I've missed."
Then, trying to lighten the mood, I added with a grin
"And when you're bored, feel free to peek in on me, too. Could be entertaining."
I meant it as a joke.
But I could feel it in my gut the creeping edge of uncertainty.
Because as much as I acted confident…
A small, anxious voice in the back of my mind whispered:
What if Vahel is just letting you run free to see how far you'll fall?
Lynn's voice cut through the quiet like a blade.
"Are you sure Vahel won't take action?"
And there it was -the question.
The one that had been echoing in the corners of my own mind.
But I didn't flinch.
"I'm confident"
I told him, steady and sure maybe more than I actually felt.
"She can't touch me. Can't touch us. Not if the terms I wished for really went through."
"Then we're safe. For one year."
Lynn didn't look convinced.
He folded his arms, eyes narrowing.
"Just what were these terms, exactly?"
"How can two or three demands change anything? You're dealing with something that bends reality like a child playing with clay."
He looked away, bitter.
"Nothing in my world works without mana. And you still don't have it.
Not a single drop."
I nodded.
"Yeah. I know."
I looked up at the still, gray sky of my own broken mindscape.
"But sometimes it's not about power. It's about limits.
You can't break a rule that was never written."