When I open my eyes, I'm back on the clouds.
For a long moment, I just lie there. Staring up at that perfect, impossible blue sky. Breathing. Feeling my chest rise and fall.
My chest.
My intact chest.
My hand moves on its own, pressing against my hoodie. Feeling for the wound. The hole. The place where the pickaxe punched through my ribs and into my heart.
Nothing.
Just fabric. Just skin underneath. Whole. Unpierced.
But I remember.
God, I remember.
The squelch sound it made when the metal pierced me.
The wet, tearing sound.
The explosion of pain that lasted only a second before everything went cold. The taste of blood flooding my mouth.
The feeling of my heart struggling to beat around the foreign object embedded in it.
Renna's face looking down at me. Apologizing. Meaning it, even.
Sorry... You did a good job today.
And then pulling the pickaxe out. The second wave of pain as it withdrew, blood pouring from the wound, my life pouring out with it.
I remember dying.
I remember my heart stopping.
I remember the darkness closing in, final and absolute.
And now I'm here.
Alive.
Reset.
Like it never happened.
Except it did happen. It was real. The pain was real. The death was real.
My hands are shaking. I hold them up in front of my face and watch them tremble. I can't make them stop.
Three times.
I've died three times.
A child stabbed me. Poison killed me. A woman I trusted drove a pickaxe through my heart.
Three times I've felt myself die.
And I'm going to die again. And again. And again.
Until I complete this impossible game. Until I lose everything. Until I go insane.
Or until she gets bored and discards me.
I feel something building in my chest. Something hot and tight. My breathing gets faster, shallower.
I think I'm having a panic attack.
"You're back!"
The voice cuts through my spiral like a knife.
I jerk upright, my head snapping toward the sound.
The goddess is standing by the Wheel of Fate, maybe twenty feet away.
Still in that obscene showgirl outfit, all glitter and exposed skin.
She's holding a teacup—delicate white porcelain with gold trim—steam rising from it in lazy curls.
She takes a sip, watching me over the rim with those golden eyes.
The panic in my chest transforms into something else.
Rage.
"You're back so soon!" she says, her voice bright with amusement. She lowers the cup, examining it thoughtfully.
"I barely had time to brew my tea. Three deaths in one day, Kaito. That's impressive. Most people at least make it through the first day without dying."
She takes another sip.
"Then again, most people don't run face-first into every death trap in the starting town."
The casual way she says it. The amusement in her tone. Like my deaths are a source of entertainment. Like my suffering is a joke.
Something in me snaps.
"STOP!" The word tears out of my throat, raw and loud, echoing across the endless clouds. "Stop fucking playing with me!"
She raises an eyebrow, the teacup pausing halfway to her lips.
I push myself to my feet. My legs are unsteady, but fury gives me strength.
"I'm done!" I shout. "I don't want this anymore! I don't want your game! I don't want your missions! I don't want YOU!"
My voice cracks on the last word.
"Send me back to Earth," I continue, my hands clenched into fists. "Send me back right now. I don't care about your rewards. I don't care about any of it. Just let me go!"
For a moment, she doesn't move.
Doesn't speak.
Just stands there, holding her teacup, watching me with an expression I can't read.
Then she smiles.
It's not her usual playful smile. It's something else. Something smaller.
Almost... pitying.
"Oh, Kaito," she says softly.
She sets the teacup aside. It hovers in the air for a moment, suspended by nothing, before vanishing completely. Just... ceasing to exist.
And then she vanishes too.
I blink.
One moment she was standing by the wheel, twenty feet away.
The next, she's in front of me.
Right in front of me.
So close I can feel the heat of her body. So close I can see the individual gold flecks in her eyes, the way they seem to swirl and shift like molten metal. So close that if I breathed too deeply, my chest would touch hers.
But it's not her proximity that makes me freeze.
It's her eyes.
They're not playful anymore. Not teasing. Not amused.
They're something else entirely.
Cold. Ancient. Vast.
Like staring into an abyss that stares back. Like looking at something that existed before the world began and will exist long after it ends.
Something that understands suffering on a scale I can't even comprehend.
Something that has seen civilizations rise and fall, has watched countless souls break and burn, and has felt nothing but mild interest.
This isn't a woman. Isn't even a goddess.
This is something wearing the shape of one.
I can't move.
Can't breathe.
Every instinct in my body is screaming at me to run, to get away, but I'm frozen in place like a rabbit staring at a snake.
"Listen very carefully," she says.
Her voice is different. Still hers, but without the playfulness, without the theatrical lilt. This is her real voice.
Low and quiet and absolutely certain.
"You cannot quit this game."