At eighty-eight years old, the world had already finished with Elias Crowe.
His body knew it first. The ache in his lungs, the brittle protest of his bones, the way his hands trembled when there was nothing left to be afraid of. He lay in a narrow bed in a room that smelled faintly of disinfectant and dust, listening to a clock tick with the patience he had never shown anyone else.
No one sat beside him.
No voices whispered reassurances. No hands squeezed his own. There were no flowers, no photographs, no memories strong enough to fight the silence. Just the hum of failing lights and the slow, steady realization that this—this emptiness—was the final sum of his life.
Elias had never been cruel in grand, dramatic ways. He had simply been… unkind. Dismissive. Sharp when softness was needed. He chose pride over apology every time. Work over people. Being right over being loved.
Friends drifted away first. Then coworkers stopped inviting him to lunch. Family calls became holidays only, then nothing at all. Elias told himself he preferred it this way. That people were exhausting. That solitude was peace.
Now, as his chest tightened and the edges of his vision darkened, that lie finally collapsed.
"I should've…" His voice cracked, the words dissolving before they could take shape.
Regret was a heavy thing to carry at the end. It pressed down on him harder than age ever had. Regret for every door slammed, every bridge burned, every moment he could have chosen kindness and didn't.
The clock ticked once more.
Then, quietly, Elias Crowe died.
—
There was no tunnel of light.
No chorus of angels.
No warmth.
Instead, he felt himself falling.
Not physically—his body was gone—but something deeper, something essential, was slipping loose. His thoughts stretched thin, memories peeling away like layers of ash. Time fractured. There was no up or down, only descent.
And in that endless plunge, regret followed him.
A voice echoed—flat, emotionless, vast beyond comprehension.
"Notice: Individual has reached the end of their lifespan."
Elias tried to scream, but the sound never formed.
He kept falling.
Faces surfaced in his mind—people he had pushed away. Words he never said. Apologies that died before they were born. The loneliness he had insisted was choice now wrapped around him like chains.
"Notice: Strong emotional residue detected."
The voice wasn't judging him.
It was observing.
"I was wrong," Elias thought desperately. "I didn't want to be alone."
"Notice: Condition met."
"Skill Acquired: Regret Accumulation"
The fall accelerated.
Pain bloomed—not physical, but existential. The crushing weight of self-awareness, of finally understanding who he had been when it was far too late.
"Notice: Profound self-recognition confirmed."
"Skill Acquired: Self-Awareness"
Elias felt something else stir within him.
A longing.
Not for youth. Not for power.
For connection.
For the chance to speak kindly. To listen. To be needed, even once.
"Notice: Intense desire for interpersonal bonds detected."
"Skill Acquired: Loneliness Resistance"
"Skill Acquired: Empathic Perception"
The emptiness around him warped.
Darkness thickened, pressing inward as if the world itself was closing its hand around him.
"Notice: Soul compatibility confirmed."
"Notice: Initiating reincarnation sequence."
"No—wait—where am I going?" Elias thought.
There was no answer.
Only descent.
—
Pain.
Sharp. Immediate. Real.
Elias gasped and dragged air into lungs that shouldn't exist.
His eyes flew open.
The sky above him was wrong.
It wasn't blue, or black, or anything a sky should be. It churned in sickly shades of crimson and bruised violet, clouds hanging low and motionless like rotting flesh. The air tasted metallic, thick enough to feel with every breath.
He pushed himself up, heart hammering, and froze.
His hands—no, claws—were long and black, faintly glowing with veins of dull red light. Shadows clung to them unnaturally, writhing as if alive. His body felt heavier, denser, packed with coiled strength that made the ground beneath him hum.
"What… what is this?" he said.
His voice echoed back layered, deep, and inhuman.
He stood slowly and looked around.
Desolation stretched in every direction.
The land was cracked and dead, as if burned and left to rot. Skeletal trees twisted upward, bark split and oozing dark residue. In the distance, jagged ruins clawed at the horizon—remnants of something ancient and violently erased.
No birds.
No wind.
Only silence.
Elias stepped back, his heel crunching against something brittle.
Bones.
Far too large to be human.
His breath hitched. "I died. I know I died."
"Notice: Reincarnation complete."
"Status: Greater Demon Race."
"No…" Elias whispered. "This has to be hell."
The shadows responded to his fear, swelling outward. The ground fractured beneath his feet as raw magicules surged instinctively from his body.
He collapsed to his knees.
"I didn't ask for this."
Laughter—hoarse and hollow—escaped his throat. Of all fates, he had been given another life. Not as a man. Not even as something small or harmless.
But as a demon.
Alone again.
The irony was merciless.
Elias bowed his head as darkness pooled around him like a cloak. Yet beneath the power, beneath the fear, something else remained—unchanged even after death.
Understanding.
He had died unloved because he never learned how to love back.
And now, reborn in a world ruled by strength and fear, he carried skills forged not from ambition—but from regret.
Elias Crowe lifted his gaze toward the endless decay of the underworld.
This time…
Would he repeat the same life?
Or would this monstrous second chance finally allow him to become something better?