Lucius's Past Life
(The reader who became a piece)
My name is Lucius.
I lived on a normal Earth. Too normal.
Days passed one after another, identical, gray, empty. Life was a succession of meaningless routines, and I… simply existed.
My only motivation was a novel.
I found it by accident, buried among thousands of mediocre stories. It told the life of a reincarnated man named Alex, a human thrown into a world full of mana, wars, and impossible races. It was not just entertainment: it was escape. As I read, I felt that the story had something different, as if it were calling to me.
And then, the world broke.
Strange portals appeared on Earth without warning. The sky tore open like a gaping wound. Monsters emerged from them.
The government fell in weeks.
The army was crushed.
Modern weapons were useless.
When everything seemed lost, the miracle happened… or the curse.
Humans began to awaken powers.
Psychic, mental, elemental abilities. Some could create fire or electricity; others ran at impossible speeds, saw beyond the human spectrum, or possessed monstrous strength.
I was one of the chosen.
My power was psychic.
I could enter the minds of certain monsters, as long as they were mentally weaker than me, and manipulate them. At first it was terrifying. Then, addictive. Every battle made me stronger, more confident, more arrogant.
I quickly became a hero.
People admired me. They needed me. I felt that I had reached the top of the world. That, for the first time, my life had meaning.
Until I died.
Not in combat.
Not to a monster.
I died by betrayal.
The woman I believed I loved, the only person I truly trusted, stabbed me in the back when I let my guard down. Her ambition was greater than any oath.
Before dying, I did not feel hatred.
I felt regret.
Not for my life.
But for something much more trivial… and much more painful.
I could not finish my favorite novel.
The apocalypse took it from me.
I thought that would be my end.
But I woke up.
Not in heaven.
Not in hell.
I woke up inside the novel.
Not as the protagonist.
Not as a hero.
Not even as an important character.
I was an extra. Just another background figure. Disposable.
But it did not affect me.
Because I knew the plot.
Because I knew how the story ended.
And, most importantly…
My power followed me.
My psychic ability crossed worlds with me.
With that knowledge and that power, I did not intend to simply observe. I did not intend to be a pawn. I did not intend to accept the destiny written by the gods.
I would become the strongest in this world.
I would break the board.
And I would stop, no matter the cost, the gods' conspiracy against humanity.
After all…
I was not chosen by them.
I was a reader who knew too much.