As I floated through the darkness that was surprisingly familiar, images flickered in the void, ghostly anchors I felt I’d never see again.

  Mom appeared first, her voice sharp with complaints about my chores while she showered my genius sister with praise.

  When I teased my sister for fun, she’d run to Mom, and I’d snap that she was making it a bigger problem than it needed to be.

  Dad would drift into view, silent and buried in his work until the arguments turned chaotic. He’d only chime in to kill the fire by distracting us with some random thought about the house or the weather before retreating.

  Even that idiot friend flickered by, the one who always shoved me into a bad situation while whispering, "do this for your bro."

  All these memories flowed through my mind in the quiet, heavy with a finality I couldn't grasp. Not even knowing why I was feeling all this sadness, I continued to float.

  Eventually I somehow reached that monolithic tower again, my eyes locking onto the clock face above.

  999 days, 1 hour, 22 minutes, and 35 seconds remaining.

  With every snap of the second hand, more microscopic cracks splintered across the tower's surface, just before the deafening bell struck again.

  Clang...! Clang...! Clang...!

  The agonising pain struck my skull, the sheer shock tearing me from the dream as my eyes snapped open with hard breaths.

  Hfffff.....!

  I stared up at a ceiling bathed in dim, flickering light. A jolt of memory forced me upright, and I quickly realised I was lying on a sofa beside a crackling fireplace.

  I scanned my surroundings; I was inside a room built entirely of wooden walls. A massive arsenal of weapons was showcased on every side.

  There were swords, spears, axes, bows, and arrows, it seemed a weapon of every kind was mounted there. Yet, surprisingly, not a single one was forged from metal or carved from wood; they were all meticulously crafted from bone.

  Taking in the grim armoury, my senses abruptly returned, and the burning question of where I was hit me. With it came a question,

  What the hell was that recurring dream of the fractured tower and the countdown clock? I had seen the exact same vision the last time I passed out, but I hadn't cared, dismissing it as just another nightmare.

  Now, having the exact same hyper-realistic dream again, what did it actually mean?

  My mind was swarming with these questions when the brutal memory of my last waking moment crashed over me. I was lying in the dirt of an alleyway, my body punctured, simply waiting for death to claim me.

  Fully realising I should be a corpse right now, I looked down at my half-naked torso. Instead of gaping, fatal knife wounds, there were only pale scars that had almost completely healed over.

  Although my muscles flared with a dull ache when I moved, suggesting I still needed a little time to fully recover, it was nothing short of miraculous to realise I hadn't died.

  It was then that my newly sharpened mind locked onto the time I had just seen on the dream clock before waking up.

  I quickly realised that if that countdown was accurate, only about 23 hours had passed since I had last opened my eyes.

  This realisation shocked me even further, my brain firing on all cylinders. If I first woke up in the jungle around 10 o'clock based on the sun's position, it should only be 8:30 or 9 o'clock the very next morning.

  How the hell was my body almost fully healed in a single day, does time work differently on the clock? And more importantly, how was I calculating the time gap with such terrifying speed?

  It was the exact same hyper-focus I had during the wolf attack, a cold precision that was entirely unlike my old self.

  Just as the questions threatened to overwhelm me again, a loud, hollow sound broke the silence. Grrrr..!

  It was my own stomach twisting in knots. I was starving; after all, I had no idea when I had last eaten, considering I couldn't even calculate the exact moment I was originally kidnapped from my home.

  But just then, a gravelly voice broke through my thoughts.

  "Dhrd hghfhf ahsha?

  The sudden voice of an old man from behind me sent a shock through my system. It wasn't just the stealthy approach that startled me, but the impossible fact that I could clearly understand the alien language.

  I whipped around to find a middle-aged man holding a steaming bowl in his hands. He had just asked me, "Have you woken up?"

  Staring at the stranger, the rich aroma of the food hit my nose, causing my stomach to grumble once more. The old man simply held the bowl out to me.

  "Sit down comfortably and eat. We can talk later,"

  He spoke in the exact same unknown, harsh syllables, but somehow the translation perfectly registered in my mind.

  I was so blinded by hunger that I took the hot food from him without a single question. But right as I raised the spoon, a chill ran down my spine. I suddenly remembered the last face I saw hovering over me before I lost consciousness in the alley.

  It was this man's face. Utterly failing to understand how he fit into my near-death experience, I forced my hunger down and stared at him, my eyes filled with suspicion and doubt.

  That simply made him chuckle.

  "Hahaha, are you wondering if it's poisoned?" he asked, a knowing look in his eye. "You do realise that I could have killed you when you were asleep, right?"

  That blunt logic was all I needed to hear to drop my paranoia.

  I sat down comfortably on the sofa, gripped the spoon, and finally started eating.

  When I took the first spoonful, the broth tasted remarkably like a rich mutton soup, loaded with potatoes and sharp spices. Yet, the instant the food coated my tongue, I felt my mind racing to deconstruct the ingredients.

  Shifting through every culinary memory I possessed, I reached a surprising conclusion. Although there was meat and several spices similar to what I had eaten back home, absolutely none of them were a 100 percent match with anything I had ever tasted in my life.

  I was genuinely shocked by my sudden ability to think and analyse flavours with such terrifying speed.

  However, because of my ravenous hunger, I pushed the mystery aside; I didn't care what alien meat it was, since I had just survived a brutal stabbing.

  I devoured the entire bowl within five minutes. Wondering if the man could actually understand my spoken words, I finally asked him a question.

  "Where do I wash the bowl?"

  Even though I could have just left it on the table, I had an ingrained, strict habit of always washing my plates, a result of my mother's relentless conditioning back home. So, I decided to stick to my routine.

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  The old man seemingly understood me perfectly. He simply pointed a finger at the only door leading out of the room and spoke.

  "Go left from that door. The kitchen is the first room on the left, down the corridor,"

  Following his instructions, I stood up and navigated to the rustic, wooden kitchen. I quickly scrubbed the bowl in a wooden sink, placed it neatly with the other utensils inside the cupboard, and made my way back to the warmth of the fire room.

  I sat back down on the couch directly in front of the old man. He settled into the seat on the opposite sofa, taking a slow, deliberate drag from a thick cigar clamped in his mouth.

  I looked him in the eye and asked him the most important question.

  "How am I still alive?"

  He exhaled a cloud of smoke. "I used a mid-ranked healing pill to save you. You are mostly healed and just need a few days of rest,"

  This deeply shocked me, leaving me wondering what the hell a 'healing pill' even was and how that even worked. But knowing the exact mechanics wasn't important right now, I moved on to the next pressing issue.

  "What language are you speaking and why can I understand you?" "If you can understand me, why are you speaking in an unknown language?"

  "The language I'm speaking is my native one. I don't actually understand your language, but since you are within my spiritual domain, I can sense your intentions to understand what you mean," he explained calmly. "Right when I talk, I manipulate your intentions to mirror my own. That's why you can understand me."

  He shocked me even further with his casual explanation. 'First, it was mid-ranked healing pills, and now he's casually throwing around terms like spiritual domains, intention reading, and manipulations?' 'What are these crazy things?'

  'Don't tell me the obvious guess I've been desperately trying to ignore from the very beginning is actually right, and I am truly stuck in a different world.'

  I thought all this in silence, genuinely terrified to ask him out loud. I forcefully controlled the spike of fright I felt when entertaining the thought that it was all true.

  If I really had been dragged to a different world, asking too many weird questions would only give him clues about my true origin.

  Even if this strange man was a good person for pulling me from the brink of death, who knew how he would react upon realising I was an anomaly from another world?

  Would he continue to show the same kindness towards me? Or would he view me as some sort of evil being invading from beyond? I quickly weighed what was safe to ask before finally speaking up again.

  "Where exactly am I?"

  "You are at my home in the central city, inside the walls beyond the village where you got hurt,"

  This straightforward answer gave me the exact geographical understanding of my location.

  Yet, it felt distinctly like he was feeding me this specific answer because he inherently knew I needed exactly this much information to understand my bearings.

  If this guy could read intentions, could he read my inner thoughts too? Did he already know something about our sudden arrival here?

  Just then, he turned the tables and asked a question of his own.

  "If you are done with your questions, can I ask something?"

  Feeling a slight spike of fear that he might directly ask where I was from, but remembering I owed him my life, I nodded.

  "Go on, mister. Ask me what you want to know,"

  He leaned forward. "How old are you?"

  This was absolutely not the question I had been expecting. I answered honestly.

  "Me? I am 16,"

  "What were you doing in life before coming here?"

  "Studying. I was a second-year student at high school!"

  My response made him pause for a long moment before he followed up with another,

  "Are the others with you the same?"

  He asked, making me take aback for a moment.

  "Others? I almost forgot about them. Where are they?" I enquired, my mind flashing back to the teenagers.

  "Don't worry, they are well and good. Staying in the central training field," he reassured me. "You can meet them after we are done here."

  "Oh, okay. About the others, although I don't know exactly, I think we are the same age. They might be students too,"

  "Then how did you get here?" he finally asked.

  He had dropped the most important question in the room, the very mystery that even I was desperate to uncover.

  "I don't know. I was at my home and suddenly got a headache which intensified enough to make me lose consciousness," "The next thing I knew was that I was lying in a forest here."

  I deliberately added this specific detail, rationalising that sudden fainting could happen regardless of whether we were from the same world or not.

  Hearing my explanation, the man stopped smoking his cigar. He stared at me with the exact same searching look I had worn when I desperately wanted answers.

  The piercing gaze continued in silence for a few long minutes before he finally spoke.

  "Well, that's all my questions. If you want to see your comrades, then come. I will tell you the way, just follow it,"

  He concluded abruptly surprising me since he didn't ask much, as he got up from the sofa, but just as I was about to follow him a thought hit me, prompting me to ask one last thing.

  "Mister, can I know who that person was, who tried to kill me and where he is now?"

  Hearing that, he offered a simple, eerie smile before answering.

  "He is just a stranger who likes hurting others. Don't worry. I have taken care of him. So he won't be hunting anyone anymore," he stated smoothly. "It's better if you just forget that."

  Hearing his casual tone and feeling the coldness he hid behind that polite smile, I instinctively knew that the murderer's fate had not gone well at all.

  Not wanting to push my luck and ask for gruesome details, I stayed perfectly silent as the old man continued.

  "Now get up and put on the clothes I have kept beside the sofa. After that, come to the hall,"

  Saying that, he turned and left the room.

  I quickly found the folded clothes and noticed they were a product of weird, archaic fashion, entirely made of heavy leather.

  Having no other choice, I put the strange garments on before stepping out of the room. I walked straight down the corridor to the main hall where the old man was waiting.

  Once I stepped into the hall, which was decorated with the same array of bone weapons all across the walls, the old man spoke up.

  "Ready to leave?"

  "Yes. Also, I'm sorry, I didn't ask your name, even after all the help you have done for me," "I forgot, since too much was going on in my head."

  "Hahaha, it's fine. I understand," he laughed warmly. "As for my name, you can call me Old Smith."

  His name was definitely pronounced differently in his native tongue, but 'Old Smith' was the translated meaning my mind could comprehend.

  " My name is Ray. And thank you very much for your help, Mr Old Smith," "If it wasn't for you, I would have died in there."

  "It's fine. Just some help I could do," he nodded.

  "But, remember. Don't always expect help from others in danger, and be ready to face them by yourself, because in life, you are always on your own." "It's the advice of an old man who survived till now by following it. You can choose not to take it to heart if you don't like it."

  "Thank you, Mr Smith. I will definitely keep it in my mind,"

  Saying that with understanding and genuine gratitude, I followed him out the door. Stepping outside, I saw a huge front yard paved with a surprisingly fine floor.

  He then calmly explained the exact directions to where the other two guys were located.

  Normally, my old self would have asked for the path details to be repeated many times just to be sure.

  But feeling like I could memorise absolutely anything now due to this newly enhanced mind I happen to possess now, and noting that the path he explained was both simple and close, I simply listened once, nodded, and prepared to leave.

  I walked purposefully through the sprawling front yard, pulling open and firmly closing the heavy wooden gate before moving onto the street.

  Mr Smith watched me from afar with a kind smile, and as I slowly disappeared from his sight, his smile slowly faded into sorrow as he turned back into the house and closed his door.

  ***

  After passing through a few winding alleyways, I walked confidently through the streets of the so-called central city.

  Throughout the bustling street, I observed several double-floored wooden buildings lining both sides, hosting many shops that were mostly selling raw meat.

  The entire setup looked remarkably just like the local meat market back in my hometown.

  Passing through the commercial hum, I soon reached a massive gate flanked by armed guards on both sides.

  The imposing guards who saw me approach didn't ask a single question; they simply hauled the heavy gate open for me.

  Wondering if this was some sort of public area, I walked right through the open gate.

  After taking just a few steps inside, when I reached the intended location, I froze. The sweeping view in front of me was so surprising that I was struck by a wave of shock and an unreasonable amount of joy.

  The massive area in front of me was structured like a big stadium, complete with tiered places to sit all around and a massive plain field right in the middle. But what truly shocked me to my core was the fact that there were hundreds of teenagers swarming the stadium floor.

  All of them looked confused, frantically discussing something with each other in tight clusters.

  Scanning the diverse crowd, I realized that every single one of them was from Earth.

  Knowing I wasn't the only one trapped here, for the first time since waking up in this hellish place, I felt somewhat at peace and safe.