A cool, humid air flows around me.
No, it's not that…..
Is my skin wet? I don't know, I can't tell
The sensations I currently feel after having woken up in this dark place, some place I didn't know nor recognize as I couldn't see anything in the entire pitch black surroundings.
Am I just blind? or are my eyes closed and I simply did not know and realize?
As I was thinking that, I touched the ground ... .no, it was more like I was already on the ground, and only felt it just now.
'What just happened right now? Hell, what the hell happened to me?' The weird sensations were making a mess in my head.
I simply stood here on the rocky ground, at least that's what it feels like, wondering all by myself.
Just a few moments ago I felt....heavenly, like something in my body had finally left me, like a slave having their chains broken, finally having their taste of divine freedom, but why did it feel that way?
I try to remember the last thing that happened to me, I think-
*Honk* *Tire Screeching* *Honk*
"Outta the way!!" *Honk* *Honk*....
*Crash*
*Fwoosh*
*Thud*
Right.....I see, I got hit by a truck, I was just walking on the side of the road looking at my phone from time to time playing Gacha, I was planning to go home, when suddenly out of nowhere, and for a split second I felt the immense pain of an impact from behind me.
I finally remember everything at that moment, all the sounds, and sensations I had felt before waking up in this place, from the screeching tires of the truck before colliding with me, then going forward from the immense force of the impact transferring to me, cracking my bones.
Everything in my immediate surroundings felt slow, like a cinematic moment
It was indeed painful, and yet it also felt liberating, like I was finally free from something, whatever that was.
The low heat from the orange sunset with its light shining in front of me, blinding my eyes as I was forced to stare at it in that seemingly frozen moment
'My pets, what's gonna happen to them?', I thought worriedly, hoping that my family would take care of them
'I hope they take care of them' I remember my pets, a tarantula, a snake, and lastly, my most prized possessions, a female and male lizard, what once was the dream of a newbie reptile owner, came true when I finally got my first paycheck.
'What am I doubting them for? I think they will." I try to comfort myself with the memories of when they both arrived, My family immediately fell in love with the little skinks, my pets, who were a male and female Red-eyed Crocodile Skink (Tribolonotus gracilis). The species was a small armor-plated lizard with striking orange-red rings around its eyes, and along its back were ridged scales that looked somewhat similar a crocodiles back, hence the name, the reason why I even longed to have them was because they looked like what I thought a ground dragon would look like.
"Wow they're so cute! Can I hold them?"
"They won't bite right?"
"Woah, just put some DIY wings on them and they'd look like actual dragons"
"Does the little guy get any bigger? It's pretty small not gonna lie"
"Can I feed them sometimes?"
"Yeah me too I wanna feed them…wait, how do you even feed them bro?"
"Well you feed them by…."
'Yes, they definitely will' I reaffirm my thought before letting my mind drift back to this dark place
'Well, where the hell am I?, is this the afterlife?' I thought as I moved my head around, trying to discern my surroundings, looking around to try and find something, anything that can bring me back to reality.
I tried to get a feeling of my body, and see if there was anything wrong with it, and as I was doing that, I saw something
A small light ahead just up ahead.
I instinctively moved towards it, I mean anyone would, right? And so I stepped forward
'Something feels off here, my body's got a bit of a weird feeling to it' I thought but I didn't dwell on it too much
I tried to ignore the feeling but then I noticed something even weirder.
'What the? Am I walking on all fours?' I thought to myself, so I tried to stand up
'Hmm? Why is my butt touching the ground now?' completely puzzled.
"What in-" I complained a bit, however, that was when I heard low growling, with a little bit of a hissing sound to it, and even though I was only a newbie in herp keeping hobby, I could tell it was reptilian, specifically the sound somewhat belonged to a large lizard class like Komodo's and Crocs due to my experience of watching YT videos, whatever that amounts to.
The sound boomed quietly and close to me, my spine tingled in fear, despite my love for reptiles and all, who wouldn't be afraid of a giant lizard right there with them in the dark? You may not see it but they can definitely see you.
And all my alarm bells were ringing, my pessimistic brain immediately began to think of a conclusion at lightspeed.
'There's something in here with me!!!' I screamed in my mind
"Holy shiiit! GOD HELP MEEE!!!" I heard the sounds again, but this time, It was now a full-blown roar, the sound reverberating in the dark rocky place
I was running towards the light like my life depended on it, but before I could go any further, my brain finally registered the sound, which for some reason I could understand and had a strange familiarity to it.
Having 'Understood' the sound, all my fears of having a reptilian predator that seems to be targeting me, evaporated in an instant.
I stopped my running actions entirely
"Wait a minute" I speak again, the sound of the animal echoes yet again, like it was coming from my-
Then it finally clicks.
"Oh Heeeelllll No, no no no no no no no no" repeating the words like a broken record player, I run towards the light, fearing but not believing the highly probable possibility in my head
Immediately reaching the light, I pounced outside, which was a bad idea because it temporarily blinded me
"Gaaahhhkkk, my eyes!!!!" I heard the roar again
'No, please no, I wanna be a human dammit!!' The denial was obvious
I tried covering my face, specifically, my eyes, to get them acclimated from the blinding light outside, it was effective.
I quickly let my eyes get used to the light, creating a small opening through my fingers whilst turning my head around, looking for a spot to shade, but when my eyes returned their vision, I was stunned.
My fears, anger, confusion, and all other emotions disappeared. My eyes laid itself on the magical landscape in front of me, I was high up on top of something that was for sure, it was a sort of a half crescent-shaped cliff, at least from what I could tell based on where I was facing, and I was in the middle of it too weirdly enough.
A thick forest blessed by the warmth of the yellow sun hugging it's entirety, a giant blue-y body of water a bit far ahead, across the forest which was just under the cliff face, and then a river that was winding over and piercing through it like a snake, disappearing somewhere in the cliff I was in.
I could see another large body of water, like a relatively tiny but long crack that was filled with it, in the green and grassy fields that had a plethora of colorful flowers but the latter assaulted my eyes more beautifully, and so I welcomed it.
The fresh cool air blankets my body, air so fresh it screamed "No Pollution", I inhaled it into my body and it embraced my lungs in its coolness and purity.
Having lived in the concrete jungle of human ingenuity for most of my life, you tend to forget that the outside world was also beautiful.
It is beautiful, so beautiful that it stopped me from thinking, completely making way for my eyes to treasure and feast upon the beauty of Mother Nature.
*Tak!* *POW!*
A sound captures my attention, my eyes landed onto the grasslands, a bald patch of green on the forest, and there, stood a herd of giant hairy oxen, there were some of them with gigantic horns that formed a pair, each pair butting heads with each other, and with each clash, a loud clap could be heard, I could see the nearby air in their vicinity getting pushed back, forming a sort of air explosion
*Pak* *POW!*
"Woah" I spoke, but all I heard coming out of my mouth were the same animalistic sounds that I had heard earlier in the cave, and so that snapped me from my trance.
I looked down on my body, and then to my short, stubby but stubby-looking but meaty arms, not like the skeletons I used to have.
I was scaly, pitch black skin, with the scales on my body of the same color, along with some sharp-looking, but disturbingly bendable claws that almost acted like fingers mounted on my hands.
"Haaa~" I helplessly slam my hands down to the ground, my face staring at its rocky surface, exasperation evident in my voice. It seems my fears were not unfounded, unfortunately.
"Just what the fuck is happening to me?" I say to myself, rising up and sitting on my tail like a make-shift chair, contemplating my situation.
"So the sounds I heard earlier in that cave were mine huh?" looking at the cave that I just escaped from, then to my "hands".
Now that I hear my voice, especially now that I've somewhat calmed down just a bit, It was indeed my voice.
It took me that long to realize it, how embarrassing, or is this normal? I don't know.
I've never had a reference to compare, sure some Fanfics and other Isekai stories might seem realistic but that's all that they are, realistic fiction, they're not real.
And yes, I've dreamt about going to another world many times during the lows in my life, but actually going there?, it's a lot to take in, not that I had blood relatives left anyway, my current family was just a group of guys and gals I grew up with in the Orphanage, and yet I still wouldn't trade them for anything.
We were all close family, but as we grew up, we didn't get to spend much time with each other due to life banging on each and every one of our doors, but we tried to connect every once in a while throughout those times, but life has different plans for each of my siblings, some were successful in their endeavours, others? Not so much, unfortunately I was one of them, and judging by the pitied looks they gave me at the reunion, I was probably the one who had it worse compared to all of them.
I didn't want to remember the lows in my life, so I forced myself to forget about them, but If there were things that I do remember about it, it was the feeling of helplessness, the emotions, feelings of wanting to end it all, it all stuck with me.
My brother Jon, my 2 sisters Kendra and Miya, were the top 3 most successful siblings I had, at least in my eyes, so they had some money to spare for the other poor brothers and sisters when we were at our lowest. If it weren't for them, I wouldn't have been able to pick myself back up, I am forever grateful for their loving help.
Jon gave dirt-cheap rent to the apartment houses he let us rent out, he had inherited the business from the family that adopted him, it was just one building at first but he had expanded his business exponentially, he's basically a millionaire.
The apartment houses was more so a giant mansion with big rooms the size of an apartment inside it, so it had a communal area where all my other siblings would see each other every morning for Breakfast and at night for Dinner.
I had occupied one of the rooms in that house and planned to leave once I had become financially stable, the other struggling siblings thought the same but Jon said he didn't mind us staying permanently, and we asked him why, he replied simply
"It's nice to have the family close to me, you know? Besides, Family should stick together, I am not leaving you guys behind again" We-, I truly didn't deserve such a loving sibling was what i thought at the time, and I still do.
Kendra and Miya both helped us with the connections they had in their line of work, which made it easier for us to find jobs, nepotism at its finest I know, but the world runs on connections, rarely do people get hired if they had no connections, and even then the climb to the top is harsher for them.
But enough about my past, after all, I've just been reincarnated.