Pain.
Pulsing waves of pain started at the tips of his fingers, concentrating on the back of his hand before gnawing at his wrist. That, along with a heavy weight pressing on his chest, matched all the signs of Dreamcatcher—a small, iron-scaled, snake-like Beast of God of Forgery—feasting on him.
Not good. If Dreamcatcher's venom made its way to his brain, he would be forever trapped in a dreamland. He needed to—
Wait. Dreamcatchers? Didn't they go extinct years ago after the raid destroyed their nest?
Wait, deep breath... Take a few steps back.
He transmigrated into the third-rate novel he wrote ten years ago. Then, he guided the main characters of a once-romance novel, holding their hands through the sudden genre shift, with the world ending on a random Tuesday. Finally, during the final boss battle, he had sacrificed himself to pave the way for a happy ending.
Indeed, he'd died alone in a corner just moments ago.
But dead men don't think or feel.
A steady beeping bounced towards him at a leisurely pace, with a soft electronic hum filling the gaps in between. The sound was as real as the tangible pain he was feeling. He'd died, and now he was alive again.
Where am I?
He mustered what little strength he had to focus on the pain at his fingertips. Slowly and strenuously, he strained his sore muscles until he managed to move them.
As he pushed his body past its limit, his mind raced. Reviving the dead was impossible. But what if they found a way to bring him back after he died?
Hell, no. I'd rather become a slave in the underworld.
A rush of urgency gave him the adrenaline he needed to finally break through the boundary between dreams and reality.
Niles strained to open his eyes, slowly blinking through a world of pale white. Pain became more lucid along with his other senses—the sudden brightness stung its way into his eyes. Sharp, chemical-laced air invaded his lungs, but the air was clean—nothing like the smoky battlefield where he'd fallen.
Everything was overwhelming. Even the subtle background noises began to irritate him. He turned to see what inconsiderate thing was making so much noise beside a dying person.
Beep—
Beep, beep—
The beeping accelerated as he froze at the sight of a heart monitor—a machine that didn't exist inside the novel and probably didn't exist in the underworld either.
Hurried footsteps burst into the room. A group in blue scrubs and white coats circled around his bed, each one checking on his vitals. One approached, flipping on a penlight to check his pupils.
"You're in a hospital. You've been unconscious for some time. Can you blink or nod if you understand?" the silver-haired doctor asked gently.
Nile nodded, opening his mouth to reply, but he was stopped before he could force anything out.
"It's alright. Don't try to speak yet."
A nurse moistened his lips with a swab before offering small sips of water. As the doctor finished checking his reflexes, the door slammed open and an elegant woman entered.
Well-kept hair and poised posture made her seem youthful, but the grief in her eyes from long, heavy days dulled her beauty. She took quick steps to his bed, not caring to remain graceful.
"How are you feeling?" Her voice strained as she reached for his face. "Are you in pain?"
Nile reflexively moved away from her. "Who are you?"
The woman froze, a subtle flash of hurt in her eyes, before turning to the doctor. "Is this normal? Is he confused...or is it memory loss?"
"It's not uncommon after long comas. His mind needs time to heal. Recognition may return gradually—"
He didn't have memory loss, though. A decade might have passed for him, but he remembered everything about home. He even remembered the soup base of the hotpot he'd eaten earlier on the day he transmigrated. Just then, realization hit him, cutting their conversation short.
"Mom?"
The doctor gave the woman a small nod before he left, taking the others with him and leaving the mother and son alone.
Nile looked away, embarrassed. In his defense, he hadn't seen his mom since he was 18; adding the decade in another world—and if his math wasn't wrong—it had been 16 years since he'd last seen her face.
While his memory of her appearance had gotten fuzzy, he still knew her well enough to remember she wouldn't easily start a conversation—especially with him.
"So, how long have I been out?" he asked, pretending to have great interest in the fluctuating lines on a heart monitor.
"About a month," she replied, voice tight with controlled emotion as always. "Car crash."
He nodded. "Sorry about the emergency contact thing. I forgot." He said, finally looking at her to show his sincerity—only to realize how unfamiliar she had become.
"It's fine." She hesitated. "I never changed mine either. You're my only family relation."
A strange but comforting silence crept between them, the same old friend the two had lived together with for eighteen years, as he struggled to find anything else to say.
She stood abruptly. "You should rest. Take as much time as you need to recover. I will help you when it gets to that."
"Alright, thanks..." His words trailed off, unable to get the word mom out a second time—he never felt like he should.
As silence settled in again, she interrupted it with her lighter footsteps, then the creak of the door opening and shutting. The sound of her heels faded down the hall, and the room fell quiet once more.
The room was clean and spacious—the sterile smell unique to hospitals surrounded him. The IV line was still connected to him to his vein, dripping with faint rhythm.
"I'm back." Nile confirmed to himself. He really had returned.
No more fighting against cosmic gods and their cockroach-like followers who just kept coming back no matter how many times he smashed them. No more babysitting the main characters and villains—whose combined mental age was ten.
Most importantly, he no longer had to go days without bathing like everyone else. When people only bathed once in a blue moon, only the main characters would be magically smelling good, instead of smelling like they belonged to a dumpster.
"I don't even want to think about the damned bread and water porridge for every single meal."
Thinking of the fact that he'd soon get to eat hotpot and ramen again, Nile almost teared up. He never wanted to go so long without the luxuries of a modern person.
"I will never, ever write a novel again in this life. Never."
On the topic of novel, Nile wondered what had happened to it. Sitting up halfway, he supported himself on one hand to look around. He quickly spotted his phone within his reach and tapped the screen—100 percent charged. Perfect.
A simple lock screen flickered to life—white text on a solid black background reading a quote from one of his favorite web novels: "Your ■■ is …"
The screen light strained his eyes, but when had it ever not?
He lay back down on the bed as it swallowed him in its soft embrace. Of course, he ignored the discomfort in his eyes and his slightly shaking hands weaker than they had ever been. He tried the fingerprint unlock, but his hands were too unstable, forcing him to type in his password instead.
Holding his phone in both hands, Nile went straight to the web novel website where he'd uploaded his novel.
> 8 Total Chapters
> 10,000 Words
> 8 Followers
> Average of 22 views per chapter
The stats were exactly the same as when he left them. Nile stared at the author dashboard, unblinking. He had expected two situations: the novel would vanish, leaving no trace of his transmigration experience; or it would be magically completed, concrete proof of his physical meddling in the story.
Neither happened. The novel had remained unchanged at the chapter eight, where he'd delivered the world a grim fate. Nile briefly noticed his trembling hands growing worse—it was from more than just physical weakness. Something he couldn't name.
He clicked on the last chapter post as if possessed.
The short thousand-word chapter was written from Rainard's point of view—the cold male lead of the novel. It took less than three minutes for Nile to reach the last few paragraphs, where Rainard first came into contact with System. Poor guy probably thought he'd lost it from stress, struggling to accept the strange floating glass—especially when he couldn't touch it, let alone prove its existence, as no one else could see it.
Nile's scrolling stopped as he reached the end of the chapter. He read out the final sentence under his breath, where Rainard accepted the System's existence. The male lead being the male lead, he was quick to accept the absurd and moved on to figure out what it meant.
'The strange screen emitted a soft blue light, matching Rainard's cold eyes, as a string words unfolded across it: Congratulations on becoming an Astir chosen by the World Will System!'
Just as Nile finished reading the last word, a ripple passed through the air between him and the phone, warping the edges of the screen. Then, without warning, a thin transparent layer of emerald shimmered into existence, casting a green hue over his pale face and trembling iris.
「 Congratulations on becoming an Astir chosen by the World Will System! 」