“Reka, can you take care of this?”
One of his coworkers placed a stack of documents beside Reka Saputra’s right hand before he even had the chance to unwrap the bread he had just bought.
“Reka, this one too, please.”
Before Reka could answer the first request, another voice called from the desk across from him.
“Reka, the printer in the meeting room is jammed again. Can you check it now? The directors are about to go in, hahaha.”
Reka stared at his computer screen as it finished turning on, then glanced at the bread still neatly wrapped on his desk. The clock in the corner of the screen read 8:07 a.m.
“Yeah... yeah, give me a minute,” he answered quietly, almost by reflex.
He could no longer remember when words like those had become the answer he used most often.
At twenty-nine, Reka worked as an operations staff member at an IT company. His job sounded impressive enough whenever he talked about it with other people. A tall office building, air-conditioning that was always too cold, access cards, and a modern-sounding company name made his work seem far more interesting than it actually was.
During all his time there, however, Reka had never once worked on a project that truly mattered. He wasn't a programmer, a system analyst, or one of the people who spent hours sitting in meeting rooms discussing product development. Most of his work consisted of filling out reports, cleaning up data, printing documents, preparing meeting rooms, and occasionally becoming the office's emergency IT technician whenever something stopped working.
In many cases, that last responsibility amounted to nothing more complicated than unplugging a cable and plugging it back in.
Even though Reka had a degree in IT.
“Reka, take care of the meeting room first. This is important,” his supervisor called from behind him.
“Yes, sir... hahaha, I'm on it.”
Reka forced out a small laugh as he stood. He left the untouched bread on his desk, grabbed a small toolbox, and headed toward the meeting room.
The printer everyone claimed was broken turned out to have only a single sheet of paper jammed inside it. Reka removed it, checked the machine, and watched another page slide out without any problem.
“That's it?” he muttered with a small smile.
Five minutes later, the printer was working normally again. By the time Reka returned to his desk, however, two new tasks were already waiting in his inbox.
That was how most of his days passed. Someone called his name whenever they needed something, Reka answered and did whatever they asked, then returned to his desk until someone called him again.
When lunchtime arrived, he went with a few coworkers to a small food stall near the office. The place was crowded as usual, and the sound of conversations from nearby tables mixed with the clatter of plates and utensils.
“Rek, why don't you try moving to the development team?” one of his friends asked between bites. “You have an IT degree too, right?”
Reka chuckled softly. “Hahaha... I haven't coded in years, bro. I've forgotten everything.”
“Then learn it again.”
“Yeah... maybe later,” Reka replied while scratching his head.
Later.
That word had appeared far too often in his life. Without Reka ever realizing it, something that had once been nothing more than a convenient excuse had slowly turned into a habit.
By evening, Reka was heading home aboard a packed commuter train. His body was squeezed between strangers from every direction, yet his mind felt strangely empty. Sometimes he even laughed to himself whenever the passengers began pushing against one another simply to gain a little more space.
“Damn, we're like sardines with a pulse,” he muttered before chuckling quietly.
Once he finally reached his rented room, Reka dropped onto the bed. After changing his clothes and eating whatever he had available, he usually spent the rest of the night scrolling through his phone without any real purpose.
Every now and then, he opened a programming tutorial because he genuinely intended to start learning again. Unfortunately, that determination usually survived for only about five minutes before his finger wandered toward another video.
“I'll do it tomorrow,” Reka said with a small laugh, even though there was no one else in the room to hear him.
The next morning, everything began again. He went to work, came home, ate, slept, then woke up to repeat the same routine the following day.
In truth, Reka's life could not exactly be called bad. He wasn't starving, he could still afford his rent, and he was even able to send money to his parents. He had no enormous debts hanging over his head and no serious illnesses threatening his life.
That was precisely why he felt as though he had no right to complain.
Even so, whenever the sounds outside his room began to fade at night, a strange feeling always returned. It felt as though Reka had left something behind somewhere in the distant past and had spent so much time walking away from it that he no longer knew how to return.
There had once been a time when he promised himself that he would become a great programmer someday. Unfortunately, he had spent most of his teenage years playing games instead.
“Just one more level, then I'll study,” the younger Reka had told himself again and again.
The problem was that whatever was supposed to come after then never truly happened.
His habits didn't change much when he entered college. Reka attended classes when he had to, finished assignments when the deadline was already breathing down his neck, and repeatedly convinced himself that everything was still fine.
“Relax, there's still time,” he would tell himself whenever worry began creeping in.
Meanwhile, his friends had already started building projects, securing internships, and even finding jobs before graduation. Reka continued taking things easy until graduation finally arrived and the panic he had managed to avoid for years began catching up with him.
He had no portfolio. The skills he had once learned had become a disorganized mess in his memory, and most of them had already been forgotten.
His first job interview taught him one simple truth.
A diploma couldn't answer technical questions for him.
In the end, Reka accepted the first job offered by a company willing to hire him. After that, he stayed there because starting everything over from zero frightened him more than remaining stuck.
His career, however, wasn't the only thing he regretted.
There had once been a woman who loved him. She was willing to wait whenever Reka was busy, listened whenever he complained, and continued believing in him even after Reka himself had stopped believing in where his own life was going.
But Reka left her.
At the time, he had delivered his decision calmly, as though what he was about to say were simply the most reasonable conclusion they could reach.
“I don't think we're right for each other.”
The woman remained silent for a long time after hearing those words. Her hands trembled while her fingers locked tightly together, as though she were desperately trying to contain something threatening to burst from inside her chest. Tears gathered in her eyes, yet she still attempted to smile, as if keeping that smile intact for a little longer could somehow stop everything from falling apart.
Reka saw all of it.
For a moment, his chest tightened, but he didn't step closer or try to take back what he had said. He simply stood there and waited for the moment to end, much like someone standing beneath a roof and waiting for the rain to stop.
Eventually, the woman slowly nodded. The smile she had struggled to maintain collapsed halfway through, and not long afterward, Reka walked away.
Now, whenever he remembered that moment, all he could do was let out a small, bitter laugh.
“I really was an asshole back then... hahaha,” Reka muttered one night inside his empty room.
The sound resembled laughter, but in truth, it was little more than regret hiding behind one.
Back then, Reka had been completely certain that someday he would find someone more suitable. After she left, however, there was no one else.
It wasn't because Reka never had another opportunity. He had simply become too lazy to start everything over again, too afraid of being hurt, and too aware that he had once been the person responsible for hurting someone first.
Sometimes he wanted to contact her. Her number was still saved on his phone, and every now and then Reka opened the contact and stared at it for several minutes.
His thumb always stopped before he managed to type anything.
“Probably too late now...” he would mutter with another small laugh.
Then he left it alone again.
Just as he always did.
Two years passed without any meaningful change until, one day, Reka was called into the meeting room.
This time, there was no broken printer waiting for him and no stack of documents that needed to be handled. There was only a brown folder resting on the table.
“Reka, the company is making cutbacks,” his supervisor said.
Reka understood immediately.
“Oh... haha. I see, sir,” he answered quietly, his voice slightly awkward.
“We have to terminate your contract.”
The explanation that followed covered severance pay, administrative paperwork, and his final working day, but most of it entered Reka's ears without ever truly settling in his mind.
Strangely enough, his first reaction was relief.
“Seriously? Hahaha... so it finally happened,” Reka muttered without realizing it.
That feeling disappeared the moment he walked out of the office building.
No one called his name anymore. There was no longer anyone asking him to take care of something or help with another problem.
After spending years hearing his name called from every corner of the office, the silence that followed felt far more real than Reka had expected.
During the first week, he treated his unemployment like a vacation. By the second week, he began sending out job applications, and during the third, rejection messages started arriving.
By the second month, instead of becoming more determined to find another job, Reka had somehow become even lazier.
Then he found an online novel.
At first, it was merely something to read while passing the time.
“I'll just read a little,” Reka said when he first discovered it.
A little became several hours. Several hours became days, and before he realized it, those days had stretched into months.
The novel was absurdly long, containing thousands upon thousands of chapters. Its world felt alive in a way Reka found almost impossible to ignore. There were kingdoms, wars, magic, betrayal, power, and nearly everything that had never been part of his own ordinary life.
Yet there was one particular thing about that world that felt strange to him.
Everyone seemed to have a purpose.
When people fell, they stood again. When they made mistakes, they continued moving forward. Even characters who failed miserably still seemed to possess something that pushed them toward whatever came next.
Reka envied them.
“Must be nice to live like that... hahaha,” he muttered one night.
Time continued passing until Reka finally reached the last chapter.
He read it more slowly than usual. For some reason, finishing that chapter felt as though he were truly bringing something to an end, despite the fact that the story had never belonged to him in the first place.
Eventually, he reached the final line.
The End.
Reka scrolled downward, expecting an author's note or perhaps some final message to the readers.
There was nothing.
Only one strange question remained on the page.
Would You Like to Live a Happier Life?
If Yes, Leave a Comment Below.
Reka stopped scrolling.
His grip around the phone slowly tightened. Without realizing it, his fingers pressed harder against the screen as something that had been buried inside him for far too long began rising from his chest toward his throat.
“...fuck.”
The word came out quietly at first.
Then, only a few seconds later, everything that had accumulated inside him finally overflowed.
“WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS?!”
Reka laughed, but there was nothing light or amused about the sound. It resembled air being forced out of a chest that had already grown too tight.
“I FOLLOWED THIS SHIT FOR 5,296 CHAPTERS, AND THIS IS WHAT YOU ASK ME?! YOU THINK LIFE IS SOME FUCKING GAME?!”
His hand began trembling. It wasn't because of the cold but because all the frustration he had accumulated for years suddenly felt too large to contain.
“YOU THINK I CAN BE HAPPY JUST BECAUSE I LEAVE A COMMENT?! IF IT WERE THAT EASY, I'D HAVE BEEN HAPPY YEARS AGO, IDIOT!”
Reka finally stopped and drew in a heavy breath. After several moments, another laugh escaped him, although this one sounded much quieter and emptier than before.
“...damn it.”
He opened the comment section.
There wasn't a single comment.
Reka stared at the empty text box for several seconds before he began typing without thinking too carefully about what he wanted to say.
Fucking author. What kind of story is this? Way too damn short. You think everyone has time to wait for a life that never fucking ends? Asshole.
He stared at the message for a long time before finally pressing send.
A small click sounded as the comment was posted.
Afterward, Reka leaned back in his chair and fell silent. For some reason, the room suddenly felt smaller, quieter, and heavier than it had only a few minutes earlier. A motorcycle passed somewhere outside, its engine briefly cutting through the silence before fading into the distance.
Reka looked at the screen again.
The question remained exactly where it had been.
Would you like to live a happier life?
Reka chuckled softly.
“Hahaha... who wouldn't want to be happy?”
His laughter quickly disappeared.
He remained silent until the hand that had been trembling gradually relaxed, as though he no longer had enough energy left even to stay angry.
“If I got another chance... what would I even do?”
Reka raised his head and stared at the ceiling.
After a while, he spoke quietly, his tone almost playful despite the thought behind his words.
“If anyone's listening... I think I'd like to start over.”
Another laugh escaped him.
“Hahaha... this is so stupid. Who the hell would even be listening? And if someone is, they're probably some bastard god.”
Reka raised one hand and pointed his index finger toward the ceiling. Although the gesture looked almost joking, traces of his earlier frustration remained clearly audible in his voice.
“If there really is a god in this world, then you're a fucking bastard!”
Nothing answered him.
Strangely enough, a few seconds later, Reka actually felt satisfied. It was as though some of the weight that had been pressing against his chest for years had finally loosened simply because he had allowed himself to say those words aloud.
He stood from the chair and slowly walked toward his bed.
“Whatever... I'm going to sleep.”
Reka had barely sat down on the edge of the mattress when a violent impact suddenly shook the entire room.
BRAAAK!!!
The floor trembled beneath him as a powerful earthquake struck without warning. The ceiling light swung wildly, the walls shook, and several objects crashed onto the floor.
“What the fuck?!”
Reka immediately jumped to his feet.
“An earthquake?! Shit!”
He ran toward the door, but before he could make it outside, an enormous cracking sound came from somewhere deep underground. A terrifying roar followed, so loud that the entire room seemed on the verge of splitting apart.
Then the floor directly beneath Reka's feet collapsed.
“WHOA, WHOA, WHOA?!”
He lost his footing and fell together with the rubble into a darkness that seemed to have no bottom. Dust, dirt, and the thunderous sound of the collapse swallowed everything around him while his body continued dropping through the debris.
For several moments, Reka's mind went completely blank. Before long, however, a strangely ridiculous thought entered his head.
Only moments earlier, he had openly cursed at a god.
'Don't tell me this is karma?' Reka thought.
After considering the possibility, he somehow smiled instead.
Inside the darkness, he laughed quietly.
“Hahaha... so you really are a fucking bastard of a god.”
His vision gradually darkened until everything around him disappeared.
At first, Reka felt nothing. There was no light to see, no pain to feel, and the deafening sound of the collapse that had swallowed him had vanished completely. Only absolute stillness remained, leaving him unable to tell whether he was still falling, had already reached the bottom, or had simply died.
Then, slowly, a voice reached him.
It was faint and distant, as though someone were calling from behind an impossibly thick wall.
“...rd.”
Reka didn't respond.
“Ord.”
The voice came again, slightly clearer this time.
“Lord.”
The darkness surrounding him slowly began to change. Something warm touched his hand while the voice grew closer until it sounded as though someone were speaking directly beside his ear.
“LORD ZELDRYYNN! PLEASE WAKE UP!”
Reka opened his eyes.
Bright light immediately stabbed into his vision. He narrowed his eyes and drew in a deep breath, his chest rising and falling rapidly as though he had just surfaced after spending far too long underwater.
“Huh?!”
The first thing Reka realized was that he was still alive.
The second thought that entered his mind was considerably more ridiculous.
'Don't tell me this is punishment for insulting a god?'
His vision remained blurry, so Reka blinked several times until the first thing above him gradually came into focus.
It was a ceiling, but clearly not the ceiling of his rented room.
The one above him was extraordinarily high and covered in golden carvings. Floral patterns and circular lines spread outward from the center, surrounding a massive chandelier decorated with dozens of clear, crystal-like ornaments.
There were no water stains, no peeling paint, and no tiny holes where geckos occasionally crawled out at night.
Reka continued staring upward for several moments.
The ceiling of his rented room had a hole near one corner. Whenever heavy rain fell, he had to place a bucket underneath it to stop the leaking water from soaking his bed.
What he was looking at now resembled something from an expensive hotel he had only ever seen in videos.
“Where am I?” Reka muttered.
He tried turning his head to the right.
“AGH! What the hell?! That hurts!”
Pain immediately shot from his neck to the back of his head. Reka instinctively raised one hand and touched the painful area.
A thick bandage was wrapped around his head.