“Sign it, Zarek. Or the new guy gets fired.”
My boss slid a sheet of paper across the desk and set a pen beside me. My name appeared under “responsible for the error.” I recognized the figures right away: they were the same ones he had ordered us to copy. Now he wanted me to sign a document that put all the blame on me.
“You asked for those changes.”
“Then sign it and prove you’re a team player.”
He didn’t even hesitate. His graying hair was slicked back, his shirt was spotless, and he had the calm of someone who wouldn’t be dealing with the consequences. I had rent to pay. I looked from the pen to the paper, trying to find something I could say without making things worse.
Aleks watched me from the next desk. He had been with the company for three weeks and was still “the new guy.” He had a slight build, light brown hair, and gray eyes; he was only 1.62 meters tall. Our boss had already taught him to lower his gaze whenever he approached.
I picked up the pen and signed before Aleks could try to apologize. I didn’t want to hear him say he was sorry for an order neither of us had been able to refuse.
Once the boss left, I caught my reflection in the dark monitor: black hair, dark eyes, and bags under them that I no longer bothered trying to hide. I was 1.78 meters tall. Even so, I had felt pretty small in front of him.
“You didn’t have to do that…” Aleks murmured.
“You shouldn’t have to lose your job, either.”
I set the document aside and pulled my chair over to his desk to explain how to fix the formulas. When it was his turn to try on his own, I had to resist the urge to take the mouse from him. I would have finished faster, but he needed to learn, and he already had someone breathing down his neck, making him doubt everything. I let him work through the column at his own pace. When he got the right result, he looked at me with a smile that made the morning a little easier.
At noon, he left a sandwich beside my keyboard.
“I brought you one. You haven’t eaten.”
I almost asked him what he needed. I caught myself in time, though it took me too long to thank him. I had spent so long expecting every favor to come with more work that I struggled to accept something so simple. I unwrapped the sandwich and made room for it among the papers.
The afternoon slipped away as we corrected figures. At six, just when I was thinking about leaving, the boss asked for the original copy of a contract.
“We have a scanned copy,” I tried to explain.
“If I have to find it myself, don’t bother coming back tomorrow. Take the new guy. And I’m not paying either of you for those hours.”
Aleks offered to go alone. I stood before he could insist. He had spent the day second-guessing even where to click; the last thing he needed was to hunt for a contract with a threat hanging over him. We crossed the hallway and entered the records room.
We had to move several boxes aside to make room for the stepladder. The blue folder was on the top shelf, wedged beneath other documents. Aleks climbed two steps while I stayed nearby, looking for somewhere to put whatever we needed to take down.
The first creak made me look up.
“Wait!”
Aleks pulled on the folder. A box slid and struck the shelving. I saw one of the brackets starting to pull away from the wall and forgot about the contract.
“Aleks, get down!”
He reached for the box. I grabbed his shirt and pulled with all my strength. He fell beside the door, clear of the shelving, and I tried to follow. My foot wouldn’t move. One of the boxes had pinned it down.
I didn’t have time to pull free. The metal tipped toward me, and I raised my arms on instinct.
The impact knocked the air out of me. Then the rest of the weight came down, pinning me to the floor as I tried and failed to breathe. I tried to move my legs, push with my arms, do anything to get it off me. All I managed was a weak struggle beneath the shelving.
Aleks got up with blood on his forehead.
“Zarek!”
He crouched beside me and searched for somewhere to grip the frame. He lifted it a few centimeters. The pressure eased enough for me to think I could draw a breath, and I tried so desperately that I bit my tongue. Then the metal dropped again.
I tried to scream. All I managed was a gasp.
“I can’t…” Aleks pulled again. “I can’t move it…”
I watched him struggle and wanted to tell him to stop, to get help. I also wanted him to know it wasn’t his fault. He kept looking to me the way he had when he was waiting for me to explain the next step in the formula, and this time I couldn’t tell him how to fix it.
He pulled out his phone. His fingers fumbled as he tried to unlock it, and he had to try again. The screen lit his face; I had never seen anyone look at me with that much fear. I tried to say his name to reassure him, but blood came out instead of words.
I looked at the space between his shoes and the door. It was clear. I had gotten him out. If I kept my attention on that, maybe I could stop thinking for a moment about my chest, about the air I needed and couldn’t get.
Aleks’s voice began to sound distant. The pain took longer to fade. I kept waiting for the pressure to ease, for a chance to breathe one more time. Some time passed. Then more.
When I tried to open my eyes, I no longer knew where they were.
There was only darkness. I couldn’t find the floor, the shelving, or my own body. I tried to listen for Aleks and waited for him to call my name again, until a line of light appeared before me and widened into a window.
[Zarek, you have died. I would have liked to open this presentation with better news.]
It was a female voice. She delivered the announcement with such solemnity that it sounded rehearsed, but I could barely pay attention to that.
“Aleks… What happened to Aleks?”
I didn’t know whether I had spoken or just thought the question as hard as I could. The voice answered anyway.
[He was still alive in your last memory. You pulled him clear of the shelving!]
“And after that?”
[I have no access to what happened afterward.]
I waited for her to add something. That help had arrived, that he was all right, anything. The window stayed in front of me while I kept trying to breathe out of habit, unable to find anything to breathe with.
[If I could show you that moment again, I would choose the part where you saved him.]
I had pulled him clear. I could still remember his shoes beside the door, away from the shelving. I clung to that image because it was all I had, though it was hard to stop waiting for an answer the voice couldn’t give me.
“What’s going to happen to me?”
[Your first life has ended. Fortunately, my presentation has a second part.]
Behind the message, I could make out other windows, still unlit. I didn’t know where I was or who was speaking to me. If she had something else to offer, I needed to hear it.
“Can I go back?”
[Not to your previous world. But I can offer you a new life in another.]
I read the message again. A life. A moment ago, all I had wanted was a breath of air, and now I was being offered the chance to start over.
“Would I still be me?”
[You would keep your name, memories, and consciousness. I have prepared a magnificent welcome, but I need you to want to attend.]
Two options appeared beneath the question.
[Would you like to reincarnate?]
[Yes]
[No]
I stared at “Yes.” I wasn’t finished living. There were still too many things I hadn’t done, however small they might be. I hadn’t even finished the sandwich Aleks had brought me. I wanted to have days ahead of me again, even if I didn’t yet know what I could do with them.
“Yes. I would.”
[Request accepted!]
The darkness filled with golden lights.
[Welcome to your second life! New possibilities! An extraordinary future!]
Something burst above the window. I tried to pull away before I understood what it was, but I had no body to respond to the impulse. A shower of little sparkling scraps of paper began falling in front of me.
“Is that… confetti?”
[The welcome loses its impact without it.]
A golden streamer passed through the place where I felt I was. I watched it keep falling, and it took me a moment to find something to say.
“Is anyone else here?”
[No.]
She had prepared all of this for me. I had just died, and now I was attending my own welcome party, complete with a hostess who seemed very pleased with the decorations.
[Activating the Awakening skill.]
A bar appeared, accompanied by a triumphant melody. I watched it fill, trying to understand what exactly was supposed to be awakening.
“Is that necessary?”
[The skill, yes.]
“I meant the music.”
[I have prepared a very good finale.]
The bar stopped at ninety-nine percent. The music kept building, getting closer and closer to a spectacular moment that never quite arrived.
“It’s stuck.”
[It is building anticipation.]
I waited. The melody reached its end without the bar moving. Only then did a new message appear.
[Process complete.]
[What would you like to reincarnate as?]
[Races]
[Creatures]
[Weapons]
I paused at the last category. Until then, I had assumed a new life would include a body more or less like my previous one.
“Weapons?”
[A category with tremendous potential!]
“Can I be a person?”
[Of course. Select “Races.”]
I was about to when the third window lit up. A golden sword appeared above it and began to turn slowly.
[Swords deserve a chance, too.]
“You have a favorite, don’t you?”
[I should not admit any preferences until the selection is complete.]
I looked at the sword, which kept turning in front of me.
[The illustration was already prepared.]
I opened the category. I could look before deciding; it was my next life I was choosing, after all.
[Sword]
[Spear]
[Axe]
[Bow]
The last option made me pause.
“Does the bow include arrows?”
[No.]
“And what happens if they run out?”
[You will need to get more.]
I imagined myself waiting for someone to stop by a shop so I could be useful again. I hadn’t agreed to another life just to become an expensive stick, so I went back to the sword.
[Wonderful to have you back!]
“I’m just looking.”
The illustration began spinning faster. I tried to ignore it and read the four skills that appeared beneath it.
[Durability.]
[Evolution.]
[Consciousness.]
[Communication.]
The last one interested me more than I had expected. Being trapped inside a weapon already sounded complicated enough; I didn’t want to add being unable to ask for help.
“Will I be able to talk?”
[You will be able to communicate. A sword with something to say! What a wonderful debut.]
“And move?”
[At first, you will need someone to wield you.]
I looked at the illustration again. While I had been thinking about the advantages of a durable body, the part about depending on someone else was starting to take up a lot more space in my thoughts.
“What happens if no one picks me up?”
[You will wait.]
“On the floor?”
[You could also be on a table. They usually offer better views.]
“The views aren’t what I’m worried about.”
A mountain landscape appeared behind the skill panel. The voice removed it before I could object.
[Understood. Back to the features.]
For a moment, I felt like laughing. I was trying to decide whether I could stand a life without moving, and she had thought showing me some mountains would help. The absurdity distracted me long enough to read through the options again with a little more patience.
I paused at “Durability.” I remembered the sound of falling metal, the brief relief when Aleks managed to lift it, and how quickly the weight crushed me again. I didn’t want to go through that a second time.
“Could I survive what killed me?”
[A sword can withstand much more than your previous body. It can still break.]
I appreciated the clear answer. She wasn’t offering me something indestructible, but she was offering a chance I hadn’t had beneath the shelving.
“Could Evolution let me move?”
[Yes. You will have to evolve first.]
That changed things. Needing someone at first still scared me, but at least I wouldn’t necessarily have to stay that way forever. Before I could get too excited, I thought about what it would mean for someone else to hold me in their hand.
“Could someone force me to do whatever they wanted?”
[You will retain your free will. What you can do will depend on your abilities.]
The “Races” category was still available. I could go back and choose something else. No one was putting a pen in front of me or threatening to fire Aleks if I refused. It was my decision, and that was exactly why it was so hard to make.
I wanted to live. I also wanted to be able to help someone if they needed me again, without ending up on the floor while they tried to lift a weight off me. A sword could break, and depending on whoever wielded me was going to be a problem. But I would be more durable, I could communicate, and I would have the chance to evolve.
I went over the four skills one more time.
“I choose to be a sword.”
[An excellent choice! Elegant, durable, versatile!]
“No music!”
A single note sounded before everything went quiet.
[Do you confirm your selection? Once adaptation begins, you will not be able to change it.]
“And I don’t want applause, either.”
The applause that had begun behind the window faded. Judging by how much she had already prepared, I suspected I was spoiling a very important occasion for her.
I took another moment. I couldn’t be sure it would work out, but I still wanted it after thinking it through.
“I confirm.”
[Preparing reincarnation.]
[Warning: a side effect has been detected.]
My attention went straight to the last message.
“What side effect?”
[Let us discuss your grand debut!]
“I asked about the side effect.”
[And what an excellent question! Would you prefer a solemn farewell or an unforgettable farewell?]
She had answered when I asked whether a sword could break. Now that I had confirmed, she seemed much more eager to change the subject, and that worried me a lot more than the warning itself.
“I’d prefer an answer.”
[Solemn it is.]
Golden curtains covered the warning. I tried to keep reading, but the fabric hid the message completely.
“That’s not an answer, either!”
[Attention! The moment we have both been waiting for!]
“One of us.”
The curtains opened amid fresh lights.
[Adaptation complete!]
“Don’t you dare throw any more…”
Confetti fell. On impulse, I tried to grab one of the scraps, as if I could push it aside and demand that she take me seriously. I couldn’t touch anything. I still didn’t have a hand, and she still hadn’t explained what she had just done to me.
“I’m going to be a sword. Will I be able to cut you?”
[I am reviewing the entrance music.]
A glowing arrow appeared beside the window and began shining more brightly.
[Preparing transfer.]
“Wait. Where will I appear?”
[Your adventure will begin in a random location!]
I forgot about the music. We had discussed what would happen if no one picked me up; I needed to know just how much worse that possibility could get.
“How random?”
[A forest, a cave, an armory… Even the bottom of a lake!]
“Rule out the lakes.”
[Your destination will be determined during transfer!]
No confirmation appeared to show that she had ruled anything out. I tried to focus on the window, searching for an option that would let me choose, or at least keep my second life from starting underwater.
“Even parcels have a delivery address!”
[And you have a fine edge! Everyone has their advantages.]
I couldn’t see what good that edge would do if no one ever found me. Before I could press the issue, the arrow opened into a circle of light. The windows began folding away one after another.
[Bon voyage, Zarek! And remember to land on your feet!]
“I’m going to be a sword!”
The voice paused.
[Then point first! An entrance worthy of a great legend!]
“No, wait…”
[Let your incredible and wonderful new life begin!]
The circle of light filled everything I could see. There were no windows left where I could ask about my destination or that side effect. I was going to be a sword in another world, and I still had to get someone to pick me up. I just hoped I wouldn’t end up stuck in a stone, forced to wait for the “chosen one.”