1943.
Germany was still locked in relentless border warfare. Along the occupied Polish territories, near the Eastern Front facing the Soviet Union, another battlefield burned with gunfire and death.
This was where Othmar Bollmann stood.
He was a soldier—one of many—forced to fight for what the regime called glory. But Othmar never believed in it. He wasn't there for pride, nor for ideology. He was there because he had been drafted, just like everyone else who didn't have a choice.
And now, he was part of the war in Poland.
Inside the trench, Othmar's body trembled. Gunshots echoed without pause. Soldiers screamed. Blood soaked the mud. Corpses lay everywhere.
He didn't want to be there.
But war did not care.
Suddenly, a colonel appeared in front of him, his presence sharp and terrifying. His voice cut through the chaos as he shouted in German:
> "Worauf wartest du noch, Mann? Geh da raus und kämpf! Oder ich lasse dich das persönlich bezahlen."
(What are you waiting for, man? Get out there and fight! Or I'll make you pay for it myself.)
Five seconds.
That was all Othmar had.
Five seconds to hesitate.
Five seconds to accept his fate.
Then he grabbed his rifle—a Karabiner 98k—and charged forward into the battlefield.
The moment he left the trench, hell revealed itself.
Bodies littered the ground. Limbs were torn apart. Flesh and blood stained everything. The sky was gray. The world was gray.
Death was everywhere.
And then—
Far from the German lines, hidden deep inside a foxhole on the Polish side, a sniper watched silently.
His scope locked onto Othmar.
To him, the German soldier was nothing more than a target.
The trigger was pulled.
The bullet moved faster than thought.
It pierced Othmar's head instantly.
Pain exploded inside his skull.
It was violent. Absolute. There was no time to scream.
The world slowed.
His body collapsed, unresponsive. His vision blurred, stretching into slow motion as the battlefield froze around him.
In that suspended moment between life and death, a single thought echoed in his mind:
> "Das soll also… das Ende sein?
Werde ich wirklich so sterben?
Das Leben war sehr unfair zu mir…
und ich sterbe genau wie all die Soldaten um mich herum."
(So this is… the end? Am I really going to die like this? Life was unfair to me… and I will die just like all the soldiers around me.)
Then—
Light.
A blinding, overwhelming light filled his vision.
Before it consumed him completely, Othmar forced out his final words:
> "W-was ist das vor mir?
Was ist das am Himmel?"
(W-what is that in front of me? What is that in the sky?)
The light swallowed him whole.
His body felt as if it were dissolving, vanishing into nothingness.
Yet his consciousness remained.
Awake.
Aware.
And as the light consumed everything, Othmar felt it—
Something was changing.
Not only his body…
But his very existence.