I winced as a stinging heat crept across my face. Slowly opening my eyes, I blinked repeatedly, trying to adjust to the sunlight. My hand reflexively moved to block the light.
Huh, my hand? I can move?!
Finding that I could move, I jerked upright, afraid of losing this moment. I'm finally sitting up! After experiencing paralysis last night, moving like this felt incredibly relieving—a major achievement!
I let out a sigh of relief…
I looked at my own hands, which now seemed unfamiliar: small and covered in scratches. Never mind that for now—I moved my hand to touch something obstructing the view from my right eye.
The feel of the fabric was like… a bandage? Did I just have an accident?
"Ouch." My head throbbed again, especially at the back. I guess so.
While enduring the throbbing in my head, I looked around—the room that was my shelter had walls made of stacked dark grey stones. Hanging on the walls were many landscape paintings using muted pastels, then a dark wooden wardrobe with traditional yet elegant carvings. Essentially, the design of this room looked medieval, like what I'd seen in movies.
So why am I here? My mind tried to find a logical reason for all this, hoping it was just a dream, yet… All this felt too real to be a dream because I had experienced the four senses: the touch of my hand on the plush mattress, the sound of the room's silence, the scent of flowers, and the bitter taste of wine still on my tongue.
Eh? I just remembered—wasn't there a woman who kissed me last night? I instinctively looked at my white bed. The woman was gone; all that remained was an indentation on the bed beside me, still warm, with a few long black hairs shed.
I couldn't fathom why she kissed me. She was crying, her face looked shattered as if she had just experienced something terrible. Did she see me as an outlet?
Uh, set that aside for now. I need to find out what happened to me and where I am. I moved my body to get off the bed and, with unsteady steps, approached the mirror.
What I saw in the reflection shocked me; my heart pounded wildly.
This isn't me—not my body by any characteristic. This was a person with a pale face, hair as white as snow, with silvery eyes like a blind person's. His body looked thin beneath a plain white shirt; his cheekbones even protruded! The bandage wrapped around this head had large blood stains.
I paused for a moment, trying to interpret what had really happened, until I reached a conclusion that made my hair stand on end.
"Did I transmigrate?" I whispered without thinking. "W-why?!" I took an unconscious step back.
My thoughts raced, and then I remembered Park Ji-hun! From before all this happened. I invited Park Ji-hun to my house to play PlayStation. He came… but he brought a faded black book that he said he got from an old man. According to Ji-hun, the book contained a chant to summon ancestral spirits that would bless us if successful. I refused because it was weird: "Times are advanced; why do you still believe in that stuff?" But he stood his ground. He pressured me as if he were hypnotized and obsessed with that book. Having no other choice, I reluctantly followed the ritual, just to prove his foolishness. I turned off the lights and lit candles surrounding us. We muttered the chant together; I forgot most of it, but what I remembered most was "Luna And Mora." After that, the floor we were standing on suddenly disappeared, replaced by an expanse of stars.
I gasped. Damn! Now it's all clear—I transmigrated! But for some reason, I can't accept it; I want to go home!
Park Ji-hun… Oh right, him! He performed the ritual with me, so did he transmigrate too?! The idea just popped into my head, and it's highly likely Ji-hun also transmigrated because when the floor suddenly vanished—we fell together, then were separated by a tunnel that sucked us each away.
Ji-hun—he must be somewhere in this world! I have to find him, but first, I need to learn about this world, and it seems I also have to accept my new identity now.
I approached the mirror, touching its cold surface. "So this is me now? Asta Ravencrest…"
Suddenly, I felt my head being stabbed repeatedly. This was the same pain I felt when I received the wave of memories. I have to accept it this time!
I no longer saw myself in the mirror, but… I saw a field of faint purple flowers—those were Nightshade flowers! In the midday sunlight, I bent down, picked the flowers, and put them into a basket. Then there was someone in front of me… my mother? No, it's this body's mother. She was a woman around twenty-five with brown hair covered by a straw hat. She looked at me after picking a flower and then smiled… A gentle smile that made my heart feel warm; that was my first impression.
I found myself nodding as I realized something while the memory played out: Asta and his mother Silvia were apparently makers of perfumes and medicines from plants. So that's why I knew about Nightshade flowers and Ebony wood; it was Asta's set of memories. And it felt so heartwarming to see a mother-child interaction like that, or was it just me who never had an interaction like that? Again, it felt incredibly heartwarming.
Then another wave began to attack; I gripped anything I could reach. This time, I didn't see a field of flowers, but… No way.
I was standing in front of a gravestone inscribed with the name Silvia. Asta then placed a bouquet of Nightshade flowers that he had actually prepared for his mother's twenty-sixth birthday. But a day before that, his mother Silvia had passed away…
My breath caught because of this sudden change, trying to process it. The sense of loss stabbed deeply into me even though it wasn't mine.
Then everything changed: the green field of flowers, the bright sun was replaced by overcast clouds, full of mist, and barren, dry land. This was Rusty Village—the villagers there looked skinny to the bone; no water, no food; this village was neglected.
The next wave came, but along with a sudden anger that surged into my heart. I saw myself being dragged by someone while Asta's father just played with his bag of coins that he had just gotten from selling him. Asta didn't just stay still; he kept struggling to attack the person who sold him and killed his mother.
Asta swore to himself that he would kill him with his own hands, that he would make him pay for everything; his tears fell incessantly.
He ran towards his father, but after just half a step, something seemed to hit the back of his head, causing his body to collapse, and finally, everything went dark.
I returned to myself in front of the mirror, letting out the breath I had been holding. My body was sweaty, and my tears were pooling.
I instinctively stepped back from the mirror in shock, my mind in chaos. "W-what the hell is this? No one told me that transmigration also means inheriting another person's inner suffering?!"
I swear it felt like it was my own. This isn't like the transmigration I imagined. I realized one thing about transmigration: when you take over someone's body and obtain their memories, it's not just like reading a book. You feel them as if they were truly your own memories. Because you use the same brain to think, the same heart to feel. Every wound, every loss, every anger stored within this body now becomes yours. Because memory isn't just a static picture to be read or seen. Memory is something alive—as whole as the experience itself.
The reason I know the scent of Nightshade. The sound of Asta's father's coin pouch rustling, almost mocking. The physical pain when my head was hit by something Asta might not have even fully felt before passing out. Now it all belongs to me?
The problem is… when you're constantly surrounded by memories that aren't yours, your original self begins to fade. The boundary between "Me" and "Him" slowly merges into one. You will find it incredibly difficult to distinguish which pain is yours and which is his. Which desires are yours and which are his vengeance.
Who am I if I feel the inner world of another person?This is terrifying, more than anything, and difficult to put into words. Essentially, this isn't a gift of memories; it's a collision of two life experiences—between me, Kim Dae-ho from South Korea, and Asta, a citizen of the Veridia Kingdom. It's utterly confusing. Am I Kim Dae-ho from South Korea moving Asta's body? But why can I feel Asta's emotions? Or am I just a guest watching the life of Asta, a citizen of the Veridia Kingdom, unfold? Who is moving this body?
Me! Me! It's still me! "Kim Dae-ho!" I only received Asta's memories -- my primal consciousness is still Dae-ho. It's just that Asta's reasons feel so strong right now because there's nothing I can hold onto as an anchor. A place like this is very familiar to Asta, while I don't see a single thing that validates that I am Dae-ho from the modern world of South Korea.
I stared into the mirror. Looking in the mirror also made this worse. If I drown in Asta's identity, then I will become a sad, angry, and vengeful boy. No! No! I shook my head vigorously, convincing myself that I AM Kim Dae-ho. In a situation like this, if I were fully controlled by Asta, I would take actions that could put me in danger because it seems Asta is a very reckless boy.
"You are not Asta, okay? You are Dae-ho. Yes, you are Kim Dae-ho!"
I bit my lip hard, trying to bury Asta's identity in every fiber of my being. Realizing it wasn't working, I hurriedly looked around, trying to find a distraction and some fresh air that might calm me down. I walked towards the large stained-glass window and looked down. The place I was sheltering in had high wall fences with a green yard and a stone path; then I lifted my gaze.
My eyes instantly widened; all I could see from beyond the window was a vast expanse of green trees—no other civilization as far as I could see.