Author's Reincarnation in a Fantasy Setting

Chapter 372 Pain [2]

Akumi's breath stopped for a second when his right leg suddenly got pulverized as if a huge boulder had fallen onto it. Its shape was completely distorted. Rather than a leg, it looked more like a chunk of meat and blood.

Scream was all Akumi could do. He lay there on the ground, covered in a pool of his own blood.

Zero came close and stood next to him, then he held his Requiem sword and pointed it at Akumi's chest. He pressed it against his skin and then slowly pushed it further. The blade pierced through his skin and stabbed inside his body, cutting through his bones and muscles.

"Tell me, do you feel pain?" Zero asked as he twisted the sword inside Akumi's chest. He screeched in agony and horror and was clearly in no state to answer that question.

"Come on, don't be so cold to me," Zero said nicely. He pulled out the sword from Akumi's chest and then stabbed it in his stomach, twisting it afterward.

"Do you feel pain?" he asked again. "I mean, if it's as you say and this world and everything within it is fake then you shouldn't feel any ounce of pain. And if you aren't feeling any pain then it shouldn't matter how much I do this, right?" while twisting the sword he pushed it further deep inside Akumi's stomach.

"I'm sure you must be familiar with this quote. 'Those who do not understand true pain will never understand true peace.' Similarly, if you can't feel the pain in this world that means this world is fake.

"On the contrary, if you do feel pain then that means this world is real, and everything else in it is as well. And that means, I—the one providing you with this pain, is also in fact, real."

Zero then again pulled out the sword and stabbed Akumi near his shoulder, twisted it, and pulled it out again. He repeated the process a few times and asked him the same question again and again.

After a moment Akumi stopped screaming. He was alive and was aware of all the pain being inflicted on him, but after losing so much blood and screaming for so long he simply did not have the energy left to scream anymore.

"W-W…W-Who…a-are…you?" he asked in a low, cracking voice. His eyes looked dead as if all the light had been stolen from them.

"Who am I huh?" Zero repeated the question as he looked down at him. He took a step back, raised his right leg backward, and then struck Akumi with a kick hard on his face.

"I am the one asking questions here," he said and then crushed Akumi's face with his feet, breaking his nose.

"Do you feel pain?" he asked yet again. Akumi didn't say anything, he looked like he was dead. He was breathing very slowly and his eyes were almost closed. But then his lips moved a little as he tried his hardest to say something.

"Y…Y-Y-Y...…Yes...I-I do…feel pain," he replied.

"See, you do feel pain after all!" Zero said. "And the fact that you feel pain means this world is real, and everything else in it is real, and I am real."

"Now if only you had acknowledged it earlier we wouldn't have had to waste so much time on this," saying that Zero snapped his fingers again.

However, this time Akumi's body wasn't destroyed. Instead, he found himself standing on his legs with all his body parts intact, as if they had never taken any damage, to begin with.

He was confused, surprised, and baffled, but more than anything he was relieved. He fell on his knees and held his chest tightly as he then felt up his body, touching his hands and legs that had previously been sliced apart.

"Do you get it now? Zero said to him. "You are not the only one who's real in this world. Everyone and everything is. There are no side characters or even characters to begin with.

"Every person you see here is a human, a real human. They have their own life, their own consciousness, their own heart, their own family, and their own story.

"Just like you and me."

Akumi slowly raised his head and looked Zero in the eye.

"What? Do want me to prove it to you again? Zero asked, pointing the Requiem sword toward him.

"Huh? No! Never! I get it! I totally get it!!!" he said instantly and backed away like a scared animal.

"Oh I see, you do get it after all," Zero mumbled.

"I-If you don't mind me asking…" Akumi said in a low voice. "Can I ask who you really are?"

"You still haven't been able to figure it out huh," Zero said. "Well, I am just like you."

"What do you mean?" Akumi appealed.

"What I mean is, I am also someone who got reincarnated into this world. Just like you did." Zero stated.

"WHAT?! ARE YOU SAYING THE TRUTH?!" Akumi exclaimed, surprised by what Zero had said.

"Yeah. And to make things more clear for you, lemme go through the situation once again. This is a real-world that is based on a novel written by loli_pop. All the events happening in this world are the same as the novel along with the characters, except that they are real people now.

"I am someone who is originally from the same world as you. I died there and found myself reincarnated in this world as Anya's brother, Zero," Zero explained.

Akumi was in awe. It was clear from the look on his face that he had been expecting none of this. It was more or less understandable as well since the feeling of finding another reincarnated person in another world was similar to the feeling of coming across someone from your homeland in a different country.

"Now your turn," Zero said, looking at him.

"Huh? My turn in what?" Akumi asked, a little confused about what he had to do.

"It's your turn to tell me everything about yourself. How you died and how you were reincarnated, and everything else you were doing in this world," Zero clarified.