"Ahh"
"My head hurts."
"Why did I wake up with this horrible headache in the middle of the night, for fucks sake
Why can't I move my body? Don't tell me I'm experiencing a stroke?"
"I am just 32 years old, this can't happen to me now."
Panic clawed at Theron's heart as he woke up from his sleep in the middle of the night with a deep, splitting headache that tore through his skull. His eyes snapped open in a faintly illuminated room. Time stretched endlessly, seconds felt like minutes, minutes like hours. At last, his fingers twitched. With great effort, he dragged his right hand upward, eventually brought it before his eyes.
Theron froze. His hand looked so different from what he remembered; it was small, delicate, more like the arm of a teenager than of a thirty two year old man who spent the last decade working like a slave.
"What..what the hell"
It took many hours, or maybe mere minutes that felt like hours before he managed to sit up,
only then did he finally look around the room he was in. Instead of the cramped apartment bedroom with barely any space to put another furniture, he was surrounded by a sight out of a history book.
The room exuded wealth and 17th-century nobility. Theron's heart raced, "Am I dreaming?" Stumbling to his feet, he walked unsteadily before noticing a mirror. Its bottom was made with wood, with gold and violet patterns of sacred beasts carved into it.
A stranger stared back at him. The boy in the mirror had long hair the color of pure silver, his eyes glowing with an unnatural shade of violet. His skin was too pale and his frame was lean and elegant. His height was more than six feet.
"D-did I transmigrate?" Theron whispered hoarsely. He had read such things before on web novels and manhwas, stories about how souls were flung into new worlds and reborn into new bodies.
Before he could process what was going on, a firm knock echoed against the door. Foster's heart turned cold. With unsteady steps, he hurried back to the bed, climbed under the covers, and took a couple of seconds to still his frantic heart. " Come in" he called.
The door opened with a soft creak, and a mature woman stepped in. She looked to be in her mid-twenties, with chestnut brown hair pinned neatly, framing a face both graceful and warm. Her figure was full, voluptuous beneath a modest servant's dress.
She curtsied deeply. " Good morning, your highness. Did you sleep well?"
Confusion clawed at Theron's heart, but the moment his eyes met hers, he felt a strange warmth in his chest, as if her presence was familiar. Then a name surfaced in his mind, clear and certain.
"Elara" he called out without realizing. She lifted her head and smiled gently. As they conversed briefly, fragments of memories that didn't belong to him began to flicker through Foster's mind. The name of the body he transmigrated into is Alaric Draven, the son of a powerful Duchess and a prince of the royal family who ruled the Valedros Empire.
Elara eventually bowed again. " Your highness, the Duchess has requested your presence for breakfast. Shall I prepare your bath and attire?"
Foster forced a smile, still dazed but slowly regaining composure. "No, I can handle it myself today. I'll be down shortly."
"As you wish, your highness." With a graceful bow, she turned and quietly closed the door behind her, leaving Foster alone with his racing thoughts. Foster let out a long sigh, sinking back into the softness of the bed. "So… I really died huh." The weight of it settled on him like a stone. He always knew, deep down that his body was a ticking clock. Blood pressure rising and pounding in his skull nearly every day, the endless stress of his job, the empty takeout boxes scattered across his lonely apartment.
He had joked more than once that he wouldn't make it past fifty. Still, he never thought it would be thirty two. His chest tightened, "Mom….Dad…" A pang of sorrow stabbed through his heart. They poured so much into raising him and his elder sister, and he never gave them anything in return. No grandchildren. No stable family of his own. Just a son who worked himself into an early grave. At least his elder sister would still be there for them. She had always been stronger and steadier than him.
Exhaling shakily, fragments of memories slipped through his mind. Indulgence in luxury most will never see in a lifetime, wicked deeds that would make Jeffrey Dahmer piss his pants.
"Damn, this Alaric was really some villain, no wonder he died."
Eventually, Theron shook his head, forcing his chaotic thoughts to the back of his mind. He stood up and walked across the room. He opened an oak carved door and entered into a luxurious bathroom with paneled wall and a massive porcelain bathtub in the middle. Inside the bathtub, filled with warm water carrying the scent of lavender and herbs, he continued skimming through the unfamiliar memories.
The world he transmigrated into was not merely some alternate medieval earth.
"This world has cultivation." For a long while, he sat in silence, water lapping gently against the sides of the tub.
Finally, he clenched his fists beneath the water. "I wasted my first life, but not this one. If this world really gives second chances, I will live to the fullest and carve out my own path, no matter how Alaric was in the past."
Thus began Requiem of blood, a tale of sin, power and endless conquest.