In a sterile hospital room, frantic movement could be seen as a team of doctors and nurses tried their best to save a little life.
A ten year old boy had been in a horrific car accident with his parents and was the sole survivor of his family.
An old man sat completely alone just outside the room.
His posture remained precise and sharp, a habit of a lifetime of service, but his face that was constantly facing the ground and his fists that were tightly clenched on his knees completely betrayed his inner anxiety.
“How is he, Doctor?” the old man asked a doctor who had just exited the emergency room.
However, the old man was entirely ignored by the doctor, who scrambled past him toward some nurses standing nearby and began shouting frantic orders.
That was answer enough for the old man.
The boy was still in critical condition and fighting desperately for his life.
Knowing this, the old man found it prudent not to disturb the hospital staff while they were doing their best to save the boy’s life.
He had just sat back down for only a minute when a nurse approached him.
“I am sorry, Manager Han.
But you will have to wait in the Surgery Waiting Room,” she told him directly, pointing down a hallway to a room located not too far from them.
The old man opened his mouth to protest, but the words died down in his throat.
He just gave a crisp nod before doing exactly as he was told.
By night, the boy laid still in his hospital bed, various machines constantly beeping around him as they monitored his broken body.
The ECG monitor beside him formed weak, shallow lines, indicating the boy’s life was currently hanging by a single thread.
That thread seemed to have been completely severed at some time after midnight as the monitor flatlined, emitting a solid, continuous tone.
Only to show sudden movement the very next moment as the machine recorded strong, surging electrical activity in the boy’s heart.
The boy’s eyes opened in a sudden start as he tried to breathe through his mouth, but his airway was hindered by the plastic breathing tube that had been inserted past his vocal cords.
The boy gripped the tube with his own hands and pulled it out of his mouth grotesquely, taking deep, desperate gulps of air as he looked around the room in absolute confusion.
He then proceeded to lean over and throw up all over the floor, though nothing but bitter bile came out since there was absolutely nothing left in his stomach to be ejected.
He looked ahead, still breathing deeply, when the door of his hospital room flew open.
A crowd of nurses entered the room frantically before they started helping him get back on the bed again.
He had just laid back down on the pillow when he passed out again, leaving the nurses and doctors to scramble around the boy to stabilize him.
In his dreams, the boy stood in an empty, formless void reminiscent of the one he had just escaped as a floating soul.
Five pulsing red eggs floated quietly around him.
Slowly, images and memories of a young life cut short started playing all around him.
It was the life of a boy named Kang Si-woo.
He was born into a wealthy Korean family, raised by two loving parents and one loyal butler whom the boy had always considered more like a grandfather.
Then flashed another, much more recent memory.
A family of three sitting in a car, then sudden, blinding lights accompanied by loud, deafening horns, followed by absolute darkness.
The boy sighed at the tragic memories before looking down at his little hands in the dream.
They seemed to be the exact same age as the hands in his previous life at the time of his death.
“I feel like I am desecrating a body,” he muttered out loud into the empty space.
“It’s okay,” another voice sounded from right behind him, sounding exactly like his own.
The boy turned around to see the previous owner of the body he was currently occupying.
A magnificent sun disc of golden fire burned brightly behind the original Kang Si-woo, accompanied by two ethereal, white wings resting on his back.
“The dragon visited us.
All three of us,” Kang Si-woo started, referring to himself, his mother, and his father.
“He told us he was incredibly sorry his child will be using my body, and he gave me, mom, and dad these,” he added, pointing to the wings and the glowing sun disc.
The tragic family had received angelhood as a personal apology from the ancient dragon god Luxarion.
“Still, aren’t there people you will miss?
People you care for here?” the boy asked, still feeling a lingering sense of guilt.
“Well, it’s not like Luxarion killed us himself.
Just take good care of grandpa.
I know he will find a way to blame himself for the accident,” Kang Si-woo said as his figure started fading away into the light.
The new Kang Si-woo placed a hand over his heart and nodded solemnly before the original smiled warmly and vanished completely.
The next day, the entire hospital was in a loud buzz because of the miraculous, overnight recovery of a boy named Kang Si-woo.
“You know, Doctor Park was not even sure he would survive yesterday.
And today?
It’s like he just had a minor fall,” one nurse whispered to another as an old man entered Si-woo’s room.
The old man walked with soft, hesitant steps and sat on a seat beside Si-woo with a tired grunt.
Though he sat right there, his eyes never left the ground, as he was now completely unable to look at the boy out of sheer shame.
“Your parents…” the old man, Han Do-yoon, started, his voice cracking.
“I know,” Si-woo interrupted softly, indicating he already knew his parents were dead.
The boy then turned his head toward the old man as a long, heavy moment of silence passed between the two.
“I also know that, in the past two days, you must have somehow found a thousand ways to blame yourself for all this, grandpa,” Si-woo added gently.
The old man flinched visibly at how the boy still naturally referred to him as grandpa.
“I…
I was the one who was supposed to be in the driver seat that night,” the old man rasped out, his knuckles turning white.
“Would that have made the truck driver any less drunk?” Si-woo countered calmly.
He had overheard some nurses talking earlier that it was a heavily drunk truck driver that had caused the head-on accident.
“On top of that, I was the one who asked Mom and Dad for an ice cream trip that evening.
If we are playing that game, I am more at fault than you are.” The boy added the words as the old man looked up at him with a sudden jolt.
It was the first time in the entire conversation that Do-yoon had looked directly at Si-woo.
“No, young master.
Don’t you dare blame yourself for that,” Do-yoon whispered in immediate surprise and worry.
“After you,” the boy whispered back with a small, knowing smile before turning his head toward the large window of the hospital room.
He knew exactly where he was now.
He was in the Solo Leveling world, as that is what he had wished for before leaving the void.
And, from the original body’s remaining memories, he also knew that the gates have not appeared in the world yet, though it will be happening very soon.
“What do you think of us moving to an apartment, grandpa?” Si-woo asked softly, his gaze still fixed on the bustling city outside the window.
A/n: I know the first two chapters were slow so we will have a time skip straight to the beginning of Solo Leveling in the next chapter.