Death did not arrive with thunder.
There was no scream of pain, no dramatic collapse, no final words hanging in the air. It came quietly—like a breath forgotten halfway out. One moment I existed within time, and the next, time loosened its grip and let me fall.
At first, I thought I was dreaming.
I could still feel myself standing, yet my body no longer belonged to weight. The ground beneath my feet was solid but unfamiliar—cold stone etched with faint lines that pulsed like veins. Above me stretched a sky that was neither dark nor light, but something in between, as if dawn and dusk had collided and refused to separate.
I tried to breathe.
The instinct remained, but the need was gone.
That was when I understood: whatever had ended was not my awareness. It was my life.
I looked down at my hands. They were mine, yet altered—sharper somehow, more defined, as if reality had removed all softness. No scars, no aging, no sign of the years I remembered carrying. I felt stripped down to an essence I had never learned to name.
Ahead of me, the path split.
One direction descended sharply into a chasm glowing with deep crimson light. Heat rose from it—not burning, but suffocating, heavy with memory. Shapes moved within the glow, twisting slowly, as though the ground itself breathed in agony.
The other path rose upward, paved in pale stone that reflected a blinding radiance. The air there felt thin, precise, almost sterile. Tall silhouettes stood motionless in the distance, watching—not with curiosity, but with certainty.
Hell below.
Heaven above.
The words formed uninvited, carved into my mind as if I had always known them.
I waited for a voice to explain. A figure to appear. A judgment to be announced.
Nothing happened.
No angel stepped forward with a ledger. No demon reached up to drag me down. There was only silence—and the unbearable realization that I was expected to choose.
Memories began to surface then, not as images, but as weight. Regret pressed against my chest. Justifications whispered excuses. Moments I had buried clawed their way forward, demanding recognition.
I wanted to ask the sky a simple question:
What was I?
But the sky did not answer.
Instead, the ground beneath me trembled, and the path I stood on began to narrow, as if indecision itself was a crime. I understood then that standing still was not an option. In this place, hesitation carried its own punishment.
I took one step forward.
Not toward light.
Not toward fire.
But toward the truth I had avoided my entire life.
And somewhere deep below, something noticed.