"Blergh!"
The instant I regained consciousness, I realised I was missing something every living being desperately needed.
Gaah! I can’t breath!
I was submerged deep underwater.
Darkness surrounded me from every direction as my body continued to sink at an alarming speed.
Instinct took over.
I kicked my legs frantically and pushed myself upward with everything I had.
Thankfully, my body still responded despite the accident. Within seconds, I broke through the surface with a desperate gasp.
"Huh?"
As I looked around, confusion quickly replaced relief.
This wasn’t the bridge where my car had crashed through the railing and plunged into the river.
Instead...
What the hell?
The only thing I could see was the distant moon hanging impossibly high above. Reaching out, my fingers brushed against a damp stone wall enclosing me from the sides.
There was no doubt about it.
Somehow, I had ended up inside a well.
But how?
I clearly remembered driving at nearly one-eighty before the crash. Even if my car had been launched into the air, there was no way I could have flown this far only to land inside a well.
"Guh... I need to get out of here first."
The damp stone walls were coated in foul-smelling mould, and I hated the clammy feeling of my soaked clothes.
Fortunately, a wooden bucket floated nearby, its thick rope disappearing into the darkness above.
I gave it a cautious tug.
It held firm.
The rope was thick enough to support my weight, giving me the confidence to trust it.
Taking a deep breath, I wrapped it tightly around my right hand, drew my legs in, and locked them around the rope.
I had taken acrobatics classes before, so climbing a rope wasn’t difficult.
At least, it shouldn’t have been.
With my weight, I had expected every pull upward to be a struggle.
Instead...
My body felt unnaturally light.
I started climbing, steadily closing the distance between myself and the edge.
Then my wet hands slipped.
"Guh... fuck."
Cursing under my breath, I quickly reached with my left hand to secure a better grip.
"!!!"
Instead, my fingers smeared across the slick moss clinging to the rope.
The last bit of support vanished.
"Aah!"
I plummeted.
At that height, the fall itself would hurt. Worse, I was close enough to the stone wall that my head could easily smash against it on the way down.
Then, something impossible happened.
My eyes widened.
The world drained of colour.
Everything became black and white.
At the same time, the flow of time itself slowed to a crawl.
The flakes of moss drifting from the rope...
My own falling body...
Everything moved in agonisingly slow motion.
This wasn’t panic or an illusion.
It was real.
[Quick, grab the rope.]
A translucent message flashed before my eyes, jolting me back to reality.
I was still falling.
Taking advantage of the slowed world around me, I thrust out my right hand and seized the rope.
Tng
"Aah!"
Time snapped back to normal.
A sharp jolt tore through my arm as my entire body came to an abrupt halt, suspended by nothing but my right hand.
I sucked in a painful breath before letting it out slowly.
"What the hell was that?"
I hadn’t just witnessed time slowing down.
There had also been a blue screen floating before my eyes, just like the system windows in video games.
No.
Now wasn’t the time to dwell on it.
My grip was slipping again.
Refusing to rely on another miracle, I carefully resumed climbing, making sure that I checked every movement before advancing upward.
By the time I neared the top, my breathing had turned ragged.
That caught me off guard.
I knew my stamina was excellent.
Maybe the crash had left more damage than I realised.
Or maybe...
Something else was going on.
Finally, I reached the edge of the well and grabbed the concrete rim.
"Mmm!!"
Gritting my teeth, I hauled myself over the edge.
Thud
I collapsed onto the ground, lying flat on my back as I stared up at the night sky.
My breaths came in ragged gasps, and the pounding of my heart echoed in my ears.
Fuck...
What a nightmare.
Who would have thought a routine late-night drive would end with me climbing out of a well and hallucinating impossible things?
"Haah... let’s see how far I have..."
My voice died in my throat.
My eyes swept across the surroundings, and my mind went completely blank.
I was standing atop a small hill overlooking an entire town.
There were no towering buildings.
No streets lined with cars or scooters.
Instead, rows of wooden and stone houses stretched across the settlement. People travelled on horseback or simply walked along dirt roads. Beyond the town lay a vast forest that reached all the way to the horizon, its dark canopy swallowing the distant landscape.
Not a single trace of the modern world remained.
"Just where am I..."
"Agh!"
A violent throb exploded inside my head.
My knees buckled, and I crashed onto the ground.
The pain was unbearable.
I clutched my skull with both hands as though trying to stop it from splitting apart.
Then, without warning, foreign memories surged into my mind.
Countless fragments flooded my consciousness, crashing into my own like a raging tide.
My thoughts grew hazy.
My sense of self began to blur.
Little by little, darkness swallowed my vision.
"Fuck..."
"What... in the world..."
.....
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