If someone ever came up to me and told me a day would come when I would so despise my own creations... I would call them an imbecile.
I wouldn't even consider that a possibility, not even for a second, as I once loved it so dearly.
Jake Darwin.
That was my name.
El_Adonis.
That was my pen name, a name I whipped up when the platform said someone else already used the name Adonis.
I was a writer, but that only happened after I had literally watched a server's worth of movies, books, and web novels. I can't remember what got me into it in the first place. Perhaps boredom... or just the novelty of bringing my ideal story into reality. There were a lot of books I read in my life, 80% of them with endings that made me want to slap the author. In fact, I came to have a sort of phobia for endings—once I noticed a story was nearing its end, I would drop a review and leave, so I wouldn't end up hating the book... or movie.
Perhaps that was the main reason: wanting to see what sort of ending I would like a book to have. That was my motivation.
So I joined the platform as a writer with that pen name. I dropped a chapter ten days after getting that account... What was the name of that book again...?
Um... Yeah, I remember now. How could I even forget?
Records of Atlantis.
The first chapter came with just staring at a blinking cursor on my phone, the next three chapters the same story but with a lot of staring at my ceiling. Three months later, the book became a hot topic. Not to brag, but even I read every chapter twice after publishing.
I didn't even know I had it in me. All my life I was just... odd. It wasn't about my looks, ability to keep a conversation, or whatever introverts struggled with. The problem was, I was always disconnected. Even when having a conversation with a group of friends, there was always this hollow feeling of being a spectator.
The feeling of viewing my life from a third person's perspective.
So I never once felt genuine emotions like people around me would.
"Did you hear? That guy's mom just died."
"Oh... that's bad."
There was no empathy, just the pretense of one.
I knew I had a problem—I always did. But I didn't create myself, so I could only live with it... and adapt. But for once in my life, I felt genuine happiness, and that was when I realized people loved my creation.
I earned a lot from it, so much I didn't even know it was possible. But that money was secondary. What really mattered to me was the fact that I was important... I don't know what brought about that idea. Maybe it was the fact readers thanked me with each chapter they read, gifted me, or straight up praised me in a review. I just felt... important.
One day, a day just like any other day, I received a text from Emy, a girl who I think I liked... Yeah, I was surprised as well. For the first time in... forever, I actually looked at a girl and I felt...
Anxious.
At first I thought it was the usual heart problems I had, but... it never stopped. I always felt nervous around her.
With some deep research and totally normal reconnaissance, I realized I was just attracted to her. And people usually felt that way, so it wasn't anything new... The problem, however, was the fact that she seemed to hate me for some reason.
When our eyes met, she would instantly look away. She constantly ignored my existence, and I, on the other hand, was subconsciously trying to get her attention. With time I gave up and played her game. However, I think my TOTALLY normal disinterested act might have ticked her off, and she literally confronted me and blew everything out of proportion one day. Well, she might have shot herself in the foot that day, as everything backfired and she ended up embarrassing herself.
From that day, she suddenly became friendly. I knew she was up to something, and her fixation on me was a ruse to get me down. So I did the smartest thing I could do—I bounced her. I mean it was hard given these foreign feelings I had, but it was nothing a good motivational video on the art of stoicism couldn't take care of. With time, the opposite situation began to play out, just this time she was actively chasing me and not even caring about what everyone was saying, which I won't lie was disturbing. Like, why would she go through all this just to hurt me? She hated me—even an idiot could see it—so why waste your time on revenge?
With time, it got worse... like a whole lot worse.
A public confession which I rejected.
Another public confession, this time with a professor still in class.
A third public confession on a literal road, filled with people.
From that moment I knew she was crazy... so I started skipping school.
...Where am I even going with this...?
Oh, right. On a certain day she had invited me to talk out of the blue. I was dead bored and had hit a literal wall of Jericho in my novel, so I thought it was a good idea...
I shouldn't have gone.
I wish I didn't.
Because it was on that day, while in a restaurant—no, standing at the transparent door of it and watching her waving—that I heard the loud screeching of tires and the loud screaming. At first I was confused. It was only when I saw Emy screaming and rushing towards me that I knew something was wrong... That moment I turned back, all I saw was a tumbling van, and that was all.
I died.
I mean, I must have, to have ended up in this world.
So yes, I transmigrated.
At first... I cried.
I cried so much I felt suicidal at that point. But as though dying prematurely wasn't bad enough, things got even worse when I realized where I was, and who I was...
Artemis Snow.
Or rather.
Riley.