"This is bullshit."
The woman sitting across from Rafael looked up from the notebook resting on her lap.
"What is?"
"This." Rafael gestured between them. "All of this."
Rafael leaned farther back into the chair and looked toward the window instead of at her.
"I’m going to die, but instead of letting me live whatever time I have left, I need to sit here and talk about nothing."
The woman didn’t answer immediately, and that just angered Rafael even more.
"I have cancer. I’m going to die. We both know that." Rafael looked back at her. "So why the fuck am I spending part of whatever time I have left sitting in this room with you?"
"Because the hospital thought it might help."
Rafael stared at her.
"Help with what?"
"With what you’re going through."
He laughed.
"Unless that notebook can cure cancer, I don’t think you’re going to be much help."
The woman slowly closed the notebook and placed it on the table beside her.
"You have no one by your side, Rafael, and patients in situations like yours sometimes try to end their suffering before it happens naturally."
Rafael’s expression didn’t change.
"I’m here to make sure you don’t have to face any of this alone. Whatever you want to talk about, whatever you need help with, that’s why I’m here. You can even just sit there for two hours and we’re done."
"Help, huh?" Rafael leaned back in the chair. "I’ve accepted it. All of it. I’m living my life."
The woman let him continue.
"The government pays my rent. They even give me money because I can’t work anymore." Rafael laughed. "This is the best I’ve ever had it."
"You really believe that?" she asked.
"Why wouldn’t I?" He shrugged. "It’s like an exclusive dying package. If you’re going to die anyway, at least live well before you do."
"You make it sound like you’ve won something."
"In a way, I have."
"You have terminal cancer, Rafael."
"And?"
The answer came so quickly that the woman paused.
"I don’t have to worry about getting a job. I don’t have to worry about a mortgage, retirement, any of that shit." He shrugged again. "There is no future to prepare for."
"And that doesn’t bother you?"
"Why should it?"
"Because most people your age are only beginning to build their future."
Rafael’s smile slowly disappeared.
"I know."
For a moment, neither of them said anything.
The woman picked up her notebook again, but instead of writing, she looked at him.
"What about your old life?"
Rafael glanced at her.
"Before all of this. Do you miss the military?"
His expression changed slightly.
"You even went on a peacekeeping mission."
Rafael remained silent for a moment.
"I was a cook."
"And? You said it like it was something to be ashamed of." She tapped the pen against her notebook. "So you’ve never killed anyone, right?"
Rafael shook his head.
"No. Unless throwing potatoes and bags of rice at people counts." He smiled, but the smile slowly disappeared as his eyes settled on hers. "But to be honest, I would kill right now."
Her pen stopped.
There had been no hesitation in his voice, no nervous laugh afterward, nothing to suggest that he was exaggerating.
"You would kill now?" she asked, her pen moving across the page again.
Rafael remained silent for a few seconds, but his expression didn’t change, and there was no nervous movement, no shifting in his seat, not even an attempt to avoid her eyes.
"If someone gave me the chance to have my life back, to be healthy again, I wouldn’t care what I had to do."
He kept looking directly into her eyes.
"A gun, a knife, my bare hands. It wouldn’t matter."
Another brief silence passed.
"I would kill for it."
[Teleportation Complete.]
Rafael appeared in front of Tim’s house, but his feet had barely touched the ground before his stomach twisted violently.
"Ugh—"
He stumbled forward, dropped to his knees, and vomited onto the grass.
He tried to breathe, but another wave hit him almost immediately, forcing him to gag and vomit again.
The front door suddenly swung open.
"Rafael!" Tim immediately extended his hand toward him. "Greater Restoration!"
A pale glow burst from his palm and washed over Rafael’s entire body, causing any exhaustion or pain to disappear almost instantly, but the vomiting didn’t stop.
Rafael remained on his hands and knees, gagging and retching until there was absolutely nothing left for his body to throw up.
"Eyes of Cyails!" Tim shouted, pointing directly at Rafael.
A translucent window appeared in front of him, and Tim’s eyes quickly moved across Rafael’s status.
There was no poison or curse, not even a single negative status effect that could explain what was happening to him, but then something else caught Tim’s eye.
[Player Kills: 4]
At that moment, Tim understood that whatever Rafael was going through wasn’t the result of an attack, poison, or some kind of curse.
Or maybe... it was a curse.
The girl’s face wouldn’t leave Rafael, especially the fear in her eyes and the way she had desperately tried to protect herself once he came after her.
He tried to push it away, telling himself that she had attacked him first, that he had only defended himself and hadn’t had a choice, but his mind kept finding new questions.
How old had she really been?
Her voice had been young, almost disturbingly young compared to the character she had been trapped inside, and it reminded him of Leila, whose voice didn’t fit her character at all either.
Fifteen? Sixteen?
How old was the person he had actually killed?
The way she hadn’t even known how to properly strike with the sword, the way she had kept saying sorry, and the fear in her eyes suddenly felt completely different.
What if she had really been just a kid?
Rafael lowered his head and pressed both hands against his temples, but instead of disappearing, the memories became clearer.
Her voice. Her apologies. The fear in her eyes.
The way she had gagged on her own blood after he pushed the blade into her neck.
"Get out of my head..." he muttered as his fingers dug into his hair.
But it wouldn’t stop.
"Get the fuck out!"
He closed his eyes, pressing his hand against his face, trying his best to push it all away, bury it all down... but all it did was bring up the past even more.
"You really think you could kill someone?" The therapist’s voice came as she looked into his eyes. "You said you would kill if it meant getting your life back," she continued. "But saying that is easy. Do you actually believe you could look at another person and kill them?"
"Yeah."
There wasn’t even a second of hesitation from Rafael.
"And afterward? How do you think you’d feel?"
"I don’t know."
"You’ve never thought about it?"
"No." Rafael shrugged. "Why would I?"
"Because killing someone doesn’t end when they die," She said while still keeping her eyes on Rafael, looking for any signs that could tell her something.
More so she pressed on.
"You’d still be alive afterward. You’d remember their face, their voice, maybe the last thing they said to you. You might wonder who they were or how old they were."
"You’re trying to make me feel guilty about—"
"No," she cut him off. "I’m asking if you could live with it. What if they begged you to stop?" she asked. "What if they were terrified?"
Rafael seemed to think about the question, but then he glanced to the side and immediately lit up.
"This was the best session so far, but now it’s time to go." He slowly stood up. "Six sessions are mandatory, and this is my sixth. We’ll never see each other again, miss."
For a moment, the woman smiled because Rafael meant it as a dark joke, not just a farewell... they would indeed never see each other again.
But before Rafael left he turned back.
"My answer to your question is that I would deal with it. Take a life to have a life. Seems like a good deal. So yeah, I would deal with whatever comes afterward."
The memory disappeared, but the words didn’t.
"Shut up..."
What if they begged you to stop?
"Shut the fuck up."
What if they were terrified?
The girl’s frightened eyes stared back at him.
"Stop..."
"Tim, you can’t do it!"
Leila’s voice came from behind him as she stared at Tim, who stood with both hands pointed toward Rafael on the ground.
"I need to."
"You can’t!" Leila shouted again. "He needs to agree to it!"
"Look at him, Leila!" Tim shouted back. "He’s losing it!"
Rafael was still curled up on the grass, his fingers digging into his head as if he could physically tear the memories out.
"He is the only one who can help us!" Tim shouted. "Rafael knows the game mechanics. He knows how broken it is. He could be the one who saves us all!"
Leila’s eyes widened, not because of what Tim said, but because he truly believed it.
"I’m sorry, Rafael."
"Tim, don’t—"
The light between Tim’s palms grew brighter.
"Level Six, Forbidden Magic."
The moment Tim activated the spell, even the pressure in the air around them changed as the ground began to tremble and the trees shook violently, while a massive magic circle appeared beneath Rafael and its symbols spread farther across the grass.
Tim’s veins bulged across his arms and neck, his hands shook uncontrollably, and blood was already running from his nose and between his lips.
"Heart... Heart of the Forsaken!"
As the words left his mouth, blood suddenly burst from Tim’s nose, mouth, eyes, and ears.
The magic circle erupted as dark figures began crawling out of the ground around Rafael.
Knights covered in broken black armor rose first, followed by mages wrapped in tattered robes whose faces were hidden beneath deep hoods.
More and more emerged until Rafael was completely surrounded, and then, all at once, they reached for him.
Rafael screamed, but not from pain.
Something far worse was happening... and then it all disappeared.
The Forsaken vanished, the magic circle faded beneath Rafael, and the crushing pressure disappeared.
Tim immediately collapsed onto the ground, blood still running down his face, while Rafael remained still for a few seconds.
"T-Tim..." He slowly turned his head. "What have you done to—"
[WORLD EVENT]
[You have been selected as a Participant.]
[Teleporting in: 5]
"No..." Rafael stared at the notifications. "No, no..."
[4]
[3]
"I-Impossible..."
[2]
[1]
[Teleporting]