The air surged violently into my chest, as if something had torn the void inside me suddenly.
A sharp gasp escaped my throat, harsh and painful, as if my lungs were working for the first time in my life.
My entire body shivered, not from cold alone, but from astonishment, sheer shock.
I opened my eyes violently.
But… there was no ceiling.
No piercing ambulance lights.
No terrified faces looking down at me from above.
Only the sky.
A strange, vast sky, unnervingly expansive, gray with a bluish tint, unlike any dawn or dusk I had ever seen before.
Its clouds were not still; they moved slowly in an unsettling manner, twisting around themselves, expanding and contracting, as if they were a living being breathing silently.
"Huh…?"
The sound came from my mouth, hoarse, faint, barely audible, as if my throat itself was uncertain of its existence.
I tried to move.
My body responded… slowly, cautiously, as if it were not entirely mine.
I leaned on my elbows and sat up, every movement accompanied by a strange awareness, not of pain, but a sharp consciousness of every detail.
I looked at my hands.
They were clean.
Unreasonably clean.
No blood.
No scratches.
No fractures.
Not even a tremor from the shock.
No trace of the collision that logically should have turned me into a lifeless corpse on the cold asphalt.
My heart started beating hard, faster than it should.
That violent rhythm in my chest was the only familiar thing.
I extended my hand hesitantly to my chest.
I felt my heart's location.
Pressed.
Breathed deeply.
No pain.
Not the sharp agony that pierced me moments ago.
No overwhelming sense of shattering.
No weight of death.
But… how?
The last thing I remembered clearly was the truck.
The sound of the engine.
The light that flooded everything.
The cold… that cold that swallowed me from within and extinguished my thoughts one by one.
I was certain.
No, more than certain.
I knew, with an unquestionable certainty, that I was dead.
I stood on my feet hesitantly.
I expected my legs to betray me, to fall, to feel dizzy or weak… but it didn't happen.
The ground beneath my feet was black and smooth, like polished stone, but unnaturally warm, as if it held an ancient heat deep within.
That warmth was not comforting, but unsettling.
I raised my gaze.
Around me stretched a vast, endless plain, its monotony broken by broken stone pillars scattered randomly, some standing at a tilted angle, others fallen and shattered… I looked in all directions…
No roads.
No buildings.
No trees.
No humans.
No sign of life… or death.
I was alone.
"This… isn't a dream."
I said it in a whisper, as if I feared lying to myself.
In dreams, things are unclear.
Fickle.
But here… everything was more real than it should be.
The sound of the wind.
The cold on my skin.
The beat of my heart in my ears.
I touched my face with my hand, checking again.
"I… am alive?"
The word did not feel right.
Because I knew what had happened.
And I knew that what I felt was not an illusion.
Death was not just fear… it was reality.
I raised my head to the sky again, and said in a low, weary voice:
"If I am dead…"
I paused for a moment, then continued with difficulty:
"Then why… am I still breathing?"
No one answered.
I stood there for some time, observing the space around me, silent, strange, with no sign of life. My heart was racing, but my body felt frozen in place…
Finally, I gathered courage and took the first step, trying to see where I was and comprehend everything around me.
With each step I took, my thoughts raced: why am I here? Am I truly still alive? Or am I dreaming a hyper-real dream?
A strange feeling of fear and curiosity drove me forward, even though everything inside me wanted to retreat.
After walking a few steps, I suddenly felt something watching me. I raised my gaze, and there, far between the broken stone pillars, I saw something huge moving slowly.
It was a monster.
Its body enormous, massive, its bones seemingly protected by thick skin. Its eyes glowed with a strange color, and its head—I don't know how to describe it—was a mix between a wild beast and a human roar, its mouth slightly open, as if whispering a silent warning.
A chill ran through my body, and all my thoughts shook: run… stay calm… don't move too fast…
I couldn't think clearly, as if my mind had completely frozen. At that moment, I stood rooted in place, unable to move any part of my body, while a cold shiver crawled through my veins. My body began shaking uncontrollably, a shiver I could not control, as if fear had fully taken over me.
Then, my eyes fell on its large ears, moving slowly in my direction, as if they had detected my presence. Moments later, the monster turned toward me, and only then did I realize the magnitude of the nightmare I was in. Its sight was terrifying beyond words, I felt as if death itself was staring at me directly through its eyes.
It did nothing…
Just looked at me.
But that gaze alone was enough to make my breaths catch, my heart almost leap out of my chest. Then it slowly opened its mouth, revealing a row of sharp teeth stained with blood, a sight that froze the blood in my veins. In that moment, only one feeling dominated me: I would die.
The monster began moving toward me, step by step, and with every step, the terror increased. Inside, I was screaming silently: run… run…
But my body betrayed me. I could not move, as if my feet were rooted to the ground.
Suddenly, it was right in front of me.
It opened its jaws wide and lunged toward where I stood. Instinctively, I managed to dodge at the last moment, falling to the ground hard, while a terrifying sound echoed behind me.
Shattered.
I turned in panic to see its teeth sink into the rocks, crushing them as if they were mere crumbs, as if they were worthless heels. The scene was so shocking that I forgot fear for a few fleeting seconds.
Those seconds… were enough.
I regained focus finally, and after seeing what it did to the solid rocks, a single thought infiltrated my mind, making my heart tighten with terror:
If this is what its teeth do to rocks… what will it do to me?
I summoned every remaining ounce of strength inside me and finally decided to run. I ran as fast as I could, my feet moving without feeling pain, as if fear itself was pushing me forward. My breaths came in rapid succession, my heart pounding violently, every beat screaming inside me: run… run before it kills you!
But the monster was not far, it needed only a single moment. It moved with a speed I could not have imagined a creature of that size capable of. I felt the cold engulf my body as I saw it surge toward me, as if the ground itself split open before it.
I had no chance, and in one moment, the monster pounced on me. My scream was not enough to attract anyone's attention, and there was nowhere to hide. I felt its teeth sink into my shoulder, a force impossible to resist. Pain erupted through my entire body. I tried to scream, tried to resist, but all my movements failed.
Its fangs pierced my body, and at that same moment, the pain inside me exploded like nothing I had ever experienced before.
It was not sharp pain that passed quickly, but a sweeping wave that surged through me entirely, as if my whole body was screaming at once. I lost the ability to think, and only one feeling remained in my mind: this is unbearable.
I begged it with a hoarse voice, barely leaving my throat:
"Please… stop…"
There was no courage or dignity in my plea, only a desperate cry from a human who had nothing left but his voice.
But the monster did not stop.
It began sinking its teeth slowly and deliberately, movement after movement, as if ensuring the suffering would not end quickly. Each new bite opened the door to a deeper pain, a pain that gave the body no chance to get used to or endure. I felt as if time itself had slowed, as if every second forced me to live the entire pain without mercy.
Screaming was no longer possible.
The pain was greater than any sound.
Some time passed—I don't know how much—I lost the ability to count moments. All I knew was that I was still conscious, still feeling, still suffering. Then my plea changed; I no longer begged it to stop… I begged it to end it.
"Kill me… please… just kill me."
Those words came from the depths of a completely shattered person. I no longer wanted to survive, no longer dreamed of escape, all I wanted was a quick end to relieve me from this slow torment. But the monster, as if its cruelty knew no limit, ignored my plea and continued torturing me with terrifying coldness, as if my suffering was merely a passing moment with no value.
Over time, my body began to betray me. A strange heaviness settled in my limbs, my vision became blurred, and the sounds around me faded gradually. The pain was no longer as it had been at first, not because it eased, but because I had emptied myself of the capacity to feel. As if my very consciousness had begun to withdraw slowly, leaving behind only a broken body and a drained soul.
And in the end…
After a long suffering, I died again…