Chapter One: Bumper to the Afterlife


    I always thought if I were to die young, it’d be something dramatic—saving a child from a burning building or maybe heroically choking on a chicken bone during finals week. Never, ever, did I think it would involve a car and a complete stranger’s inability to figure out where the brake pedal was.


    The day had started so mundanely. College classes had dragged on as usual—three hours of lectures where the professor’s monotone voice could have been weaponized in a war zone. I walked out of the campus gates feeling as free as a bird until I realized I had an entire evening of assignments waiting for me.


    “Oh well,” I muttered, stretching. “At least the air smells like freedom.”


    Freedom, as it turns out, smelled a lot like roasted peanuts and exhaust fumes. The streets were their usual chaotic selves. Vendors yelled about discounts, kids darted around like caffeinated squirrels, and somewhere in the distance, a dog barked in disapproval of the universe. I shoved my headphones in and shuffled down the crosswalk like any other college student, half in my own world, half wondering if ramen or instant noodles would be tonight''s dinner.


    That’s when I heard it.


    “OH, SH—MOVE! MOVE! DAMN BRAKES!”


    The shout ripped through my earbuds like a banshee on steroids. My head snapped up just in time to see a gleaming hunk of metal charging toward me like an angry bull at a matador convention.


    “What the—?!”


    My brilliant survival instincts kicked in. I froze. Like a deer in headlights. Perfect. Great job, brain.


    The driver, a middle-aged guy with a face redder than a ripe tomato, was leaning halfway out of the window. His hands were flailing, and his curses were so colorful they could paint the Mona Lisa all over again.


    “GET OUT OF THE WAY, YOU IDIOT!” he screamed, yanking at the wheel.


    Now, this might sound weird, but in that moment, my brain decided to focus on the most random detail: his mustache. It looked like two fuzzy caterpillars doing a jig. What an odd thing to notice before dying.Unauthorized usage: this narrative is on Amazon without the author''s consent. Report any sightings.


    Time slowed to a crawl. Or maybe it sped up. Who knows? One second I was standing, the next I was flying. Not in a majestic, superhero way—more like a ragdoll tossed by an angry toddler. The world spun, and all I could think was, Wow, this asphalt is going to ruin my jeans.


    When I hit the ground, everything went black. Not the kind of “black” where you close your eyes and it’s dark but comforting. No, this was the void. No light. No sound. Just... nothingness.


    “Hello?” My voice echoed like I was shouting into an empty cave. “Is anyone there? Did I... die?”


    No response. Figures. Even in the afterlife, customer service is nonexistent.


    I tried to move but realized I wasn’t standing, sitting, or even lying down. I was just... floating. Suspended in some weird limbo. So this is what it feels like to be a marshmallow in hot cocoa.


    Time was impossible to measure. Minutes? Hours? Years? All I knew was that I had way too much time to think. And by “think,” I mean panic.


    “Okay, let’s reason this out,” I muttered, waving my nonexistent arms. “I got hit by a car. That’s clear. But where’s the light at the end of the tunnel? The pearly gates? The big guy upstairs? Heck, I’d even take a paperwork line in the underworld. But noooo, I get... this.”


    My voice grew louder with every word, my frustration bubbling over. “Is this a budget afterlife? Did I not accumulate enough karma points for the premium package?”


    I snorted at my own joke, but the sound faded quickly into the void. I wasn’t even sure if I was smiling. “Maybe this is just purgatory. Yeah. A timeout for the soul. Makes sense. I’ve been late to class so many times that even the universe decided I needed detention.”


    Just as I was getting comfortable with my sarcastic self-pity, the void shifted.


    At first, it was subtle—a faint pull, like someone had hooked a string to my chest. Then it wasn’t so subtle. The pull turned into a yank, dragging me like a fish on a line.


    “HEY! What the—?! I’m not a kite!” I yelled, flailing. Not that flailing helped. The force was relentless, spinning me faster and faster. It felt like being sucked into a cosmic toilet bowl.


    “WHOEVER’S DOING THIS, I HOPE YOU STEP ON A LEGO!”


    And then, just as suddenly as it started, it stopped. The darkness shattered like glass, and I was slammed into... softness?


    "Wait it''s not fully soft... It''s kind of hard and cold... By any chance is it ground? I could feel it in my cheeks, it''s really mud.. . For a moment I thought I went to accident scene.


    But air feels different, it''s not like anything before, how should I put it''s fresh, unlike the usual air full of pollution, clean- with the slight smell of herbs I think.


    I blinked. Once. Twice. My head was pounding, my body felt weirdly light, and my vision swam like I’d just gotten off a rollercoaster.


    When the world finally came into focus, I realized I was staring at a unbelievably blue sky.


    “Wait... Unbelievably blue sky? Herbs?” I mumbled, sitting up. “Did I wake up in a traditional medicine shop? N-no how could a sky pop out a medicine shop?”


    I looked down at my hands and froze. They weren’t myhands. Gone were the slightly calloused fingers from years of video games and cheap pens. These hands were smooth, slender, and... dainty?


    “What. The. Hell.”


    I scrambled out , my heart pounding like a drum. The person staring at me had a sharp eye which was genuinely no matched with his old face features, long white beards , and an a air that practically screamed, “Wuxia drama character.”


    “What kind of discount reincarnation is this?!” I yelled, “I didn’t sign up for this! Who do I talk to about a refund?”


    “Young Master, did you wake up?” a young voice called.


    I stared at the him, my mind spinning. Young Master? Oh no. Oh no, no, no. I’ve read enough novels to know where this is going...


    And thus began my second life—thrown into a world I didn’t recognize, in a body that wasn’t mine, with the overwhelming realization that things were about to get a lot weirder.


    ***