Darkness came. That was all there was. A hollow void, endless and suffocating, filled with silence so heavy it seemed to crush his very soul but also erasing it at the same time.
Evan could not feel his body no warmth, no breath, no heartbeat. Nothing at all.
For the first time in his life, he felt true terror. A fear greater than death itself.
A few moments passed.
"What's happening? I can't see anything, it's was all black. This… this feels like nothingness, like I don't even exist. As if my very origin was erased or concealed."
Evan tried to blink, forcefully even though he wasn't sure if he still had eyes at all. Once. Twice. Again and again, he tried his best, but desperation came at him first, until even the sound of his own thoughts seemed to fade.
Silence came.
"Am I… really dead? Is this the place people go when they die?" Evan's mind whispered. "I die because I just touched that strange leaves"
For a fleeting moment, he accepted his fate. "So… I died just like that."
But then, the darkness began to shift away, It wasn't sudden it bled away slowly, like a mist dissolving under the sunlight. His vision returned in fragments a blur at first, then shapes, then colors. And then a dim of light seeped in his sight. Until he could see a blurry images.
One by one, his senses began to return.
First came his sight, the blur of shifting light above him.
Then his touch, the coarse roughness of mud pressing against his palms.
Next was his hearing, the faint hum of insects, the whisper of wind brushing through leaves.
Slowly, his sense of smell awakened, the scent of damp wood and wet soil.
And finally, his taste a faint bitterness, as if dust and earth clung stubbornly to his tongue.
And with all off that came pain.
A dizzy, splitting pain that rattled through his skull like it was about to shatter it.
"Arghh… damn it," Evan groaned, his voice hoarse and low. "What… what is happening to me?"
His sight sharpened little by little. At first, all he could see was brown dark, endless brown. He turned his head left, right, forward still brown.
Only when Evan tilted his gaze upward did he catch a shade of deep green colors.
Finally, his vision cleared.
What he saw was not the narrow stone path he had always walked to school. There were no cars sounds, no chatter of people in the distance, no smell of the city air. Nothing.
Instead, he stood in the middle of an massive forest. Towering dark oak trees surrounded him on all sides, their roots tangled in muddy soil and tall grass. The silence was broken only by the occasional buzz of insects.
Evan's heart sank.
"So… this really isn't the place I remembered anymore."
He thought back to that one leaf, the golden one he had touched without a second thought.
"If I hadn't touched it… none of this would've happened."
A second thought crept in Evan. "Could it be… transmigration? Another world perhaps? Or maybe Another dimension?"
It sounded ridiculous for him, yet everything around him screamed of impossibility.
He had read countless books and novels where the protagonist was thrown or dragged into a new world after some mysterious event happened. Was this situation is his turn now.
Evan checked himself. His face, his body. Nothing seemed different. His uniform was the same, though now dirtied and wrinkled from the mud. His black slacks and shoes were ruined, but still intact.
Evan slipped a hand into the pocket of his black slacks and pulled out his phone.
On its dark unlit screen, his reflection stared back at him the same familiar face unchanged, as if life itself refused to offer anything new to him.
"No changes… I'm still me, Evan. Just in a place I don't familiar and I don't know."
Determined not to collapse into despair and confusion, Evan steadied his breathing to calm himself.
"I need to find someone. Anyone. A group of people. Something that could help me, maybe a path were people could be walking right now." After a few minutes of scanning Evan didn't find anything that could help him.
Then, suddenly, an idea struck Evan. He reached for his phone, realizing he might be able to use it in his situation.
Evan tried his phone. Pressed the button once. Twice. Again. Nothing. It was lifeless, as though the device itself had been stripped of its purpose.
"Useless piece of junk!" Evan snapped into frustration, hurling it into the mud.
A few seconds passed.
But regret struck immediately. He stumbled forward, clawed it out from the mud and dirt, and clean it using his bare hands and, Evan shoved it back into his sling bag. "Maybe I'll need it later. Just in case."
Evan decided.
He began walking. Straight ahead, in hopes that direction alone would eventually bring him somewhere. Hours passed. His legs trembled, and exhaustion setting in, until he finally leaned against a massive oak tree. He brushed his dark hair back, sweat dripping down his forehead.
"What… a tiring day," he muttered. His eyelids grew heavy. Before long, he drifted into sleep.
The setting sun broke through the canopy, casting a warm glow across his face.
Time passed.
Evan stirred, slowly waking. He yawned, stretched, and murmured, "That was… actually a good sleep."
But the air had changed.
It was heavier now oppressive, like the forest itself was holding its breath. His instincts screamed at him. Danger.
He scanned the area. Then he heard it.
A sharp sound in the distance. Branches snapping on it's own. Leaves rustling together. And then the birds suddenly burst from the canopy from the trees, fleeing in the opposite direction of his gaze.
Evan thought to himself, "Birds... it's just birds." Why are they flying like that? It's Odd… it almost looks as if they're fleeing from something dangerous.
And then, a defining roar echoed in whole forest.
"ROAR!"
The sound tore through the forest, rattling the earth beneath him. Evan's ears rang, his eardrums aching. A chill shot down his spine.
From the shadows, it emerged a massive brown bear, its bulk towering body, its eyes burning with raw hunger and murder intent.
"Shit… shit shit shit!" Evan's thoughts spiraled. "A bear? A massive one at that! If I don't escape now, I'm dead for real this time!"
Evan's instinctively saying to escape and run for his life.
He bolted, sprinting in the opposite direction we're the birds fly earlier.
The bear lunged at Evan, crashing through the trees, leaves and branches fall, hissing and roaring at the same time, and its footsteps shaking the ground.
"FASTER!" Evan's mind screamed. "If I get caught, I'll just be food with this beast!"
But the bear was relentless. It wasn't chasing the birds. It wasn't prowling for prey at random. It was after him. Evan alone.
His lungs burned. His legs felt like they'd collapse any seconds. Evan sweat poured down in his face.
Then impact.
The beast's claws tore into his back, ripping through his uniform and then his flesh. Then blood sprayed everywhere. Evan's body was flung like a ragdoll, crashing against a thick oak tree. His ribs cracked under the heavy force.
The impact was so strong that several branches snapped off the tree, scattering along with a flurry of green leaves that rained down to the ground
"Aaaghhh!!" His scream echoed across the forest, raw and desperate.
He collapsed lying down, barely able to move, every breaths is agony for Evan.
Evan could fell the exruating pain.
His vision blurred, colors fading at the edges.
The bear's heavy footsteps grew louder and louder, closing in Evan's lying body.
Evan's trembling hand groped the ground. He found a branch near him, pathetic compared to the beast, but it was all he had now. Die or not die.
The bear loomed over him, sniffing Evan body, bloods coming out, its shadow blotting out the dim light covering Evan's body.
Evan Summoning the last of his strength, he then thrust the branch upward, stabbing at its massive furry neck. It does not pierced in the skin of the beast.
The bear roared in fury, slamming him down many times with its claws and raw strength. Pain exploded through his mind and body.
Evan couldn't even scream anymore.
Only his thoughts raimain.
"I tried… I really tried…" Evan's thoughts blurred. "But… I'm still gonna die… like this… pathetic."
Evan's thoughts "Now I would never gonna see my mom or my little sister, even my two idiots friends" he chuckled in his thoughts.
Darkness began to swallow him again.
But then something stirred inside him.
Deep within his chest, from the core of his being, something is awakened.
A low hum filled the air, vibrating through the forest. The atmosphere shifted the weight of death itself seemed to vanish.
The bear's body withered. Its strength drained, its life was dissolved into nothing.
In moments the mighty beast collapsed beside him, reduced to more than just a husk.
And Evan… Evan lay unconscious, yet alive. His wounds, his broken ribs, torn flesh, bloodied back, slowly mended. Skin knit itself, bones realigned again.
It was a miracle to think. A regeneration no human should possess.
As if… the injuries never existed.