I walked down the path with my umbrella extended up above my head, shielding away the pouring raindrops.

The park I was in was a favorite of mine. Beautiful, Quiet, and Relaxing. For me, it felt like the safest place for me to be. A place I'd go to unwind all of my pent-up stress built up from daily work. Telemarketing is an aggravating line of work for me. Though I suppose a guy like me who has no marketable skills hasn't many other options.

6:00 pm this late into the fall. Of course, it would be dark. A younger me might've been deathly anxious about such an environment. But, now whatever may have awaited me, I just didn't care anymore.

I kept walking down the dimly lit path. Carelessly splashing through puddles that tried to obstruct my path. Everything was dark and the only source of light was fading dim deep-orange lights that looked to be on the verge of flickering out forever.

-Pointless.

I had finally arrived at my favorite bench. It was wet warped wood that was ashen black and rotting away. I liked it for those very reasons though. I had no idea how much longer it would be there before it was thrown away and replaced by something new and shiny.

If I were the bench I'd want someone to miss me when I was gone. But, truthfully that is just a reflection of how I feel regardless.

I sat down on the bench ignoring the cold feeling of water drenching my sweatpants. Though it was discomforting, it wasn't enough to grab my attention away from the puddle halfway submerging my soaked feet.

Within the puddle, my face was reflected at me in a dim orange discoloration.

My pale face was a discolored orange shade and my black hair was tinged brown. I looked disgusting. Unpresentable. My parents would've been ashamed to have raised me had they seen what I had looked like these days. Not that it would've had any effect on their already soured view of me.

It was in that moment of regret and shame that I began to cry like a baby. It was something I had been containing for many years.

My fattened dirty face was once a slim beautiful one. I had once been attractive, fit, and popular. I was looked at as the star of my school. Somehow I had made it out in my head that I was some sort of divinely perfect person with no flaws. I was such an irredeemable asshole. I'd pick on anyone I didn't like, or thought would make for an easy target.

My reign of terror was one day ended when I was made fun of by someone who I had thought was my friend. I remember quite vividly the embarrassment I felt in the classroom that day. And the next day all my supposed friends had flipped sides against me.

From that day on the constant beatings and humiliation I'd receive was ruthless, and because of my history, no one had any pity for me. Not my friends, teachers, nor my victims.

I began skipping school to avoid being around the people who thought of me as less than trash. This eventually had led to me staying home all day as I had soon found there was no place where I was wanted by anyone.

I wasted away the days with videogames, anime, and masturbation. The only three things that would make me forget my deserved misfortune even if for only a few fleeting minutes.

I had grown into a fat lazy slob 18-year-old when I was promptly kicked out by my indifferent mother. Once I began my downward spiral she grew to see me as an unwanted pest that wasted her money.

Feeling thoroughly discarded I had gone to a nearby park to think about what I'd do in order to survive.

And now I once again found myself in that very same park. On the very same bench crying for the first time in 18 of the 32 years that I had been alive in this world.

I averted my eyes away from the puddle that had triggered such a painful outburst of my emotions.

-Please

"Please…" I whisper aloud.

Abruptly, I jumped up from the bench dropping my umbrella unto the puddle beneath me.

Looking up to the sky my voice roared with all the might that my disgusting weak body could muster

"God, Please! I want to try again! Please, God!"

My throat tightened into a painful knot.

Nothing…

-Of course. That was to be expected. How foolish.

I fell to my knees soaking my lower legs in the puddle. Though I had become unequivocally sad, another emotion had set in.

I busted out into a fit of laughter.

-My whole life up to that point had been so ironic. It was my karma. Why would God help some piece of shit bastard like me?

I laughed while simultaneously crying. I smacked the ground both in the amusement of the cosmic justice at work and from the anguish of it all.

[All tutorial requirements have been met proceeding to the next phase.]

Suddenly I heard a female voice in my left ear spooking me out of the mental state I was in.

A flurry of embarrassment drowned my consciousness. I had just shown a stranger my weakest moment in almost two decades.

Awkwardly looking around to see who was there in robotic movements, I attempted to crawl back onto my feet in the hopes of reclaiming any shred of lost dignity I could scrounge from the embarrassing predicament I found myself in.

Just as I got to my feet and had turned to peer into the darkness for the source of the woman's voice I had felt as though I had suddenly lost my balance.

Tripping, I fell backward onto my butt. Looking down I saw the puddle underneath me had begun to flow into a hole in the ground. which had, conveniently for Lady Karma, also caught hold of my foot.

"Shit!" I yelled out as a subconscious reaction.

Trying to pull my foot from the hole had further cracked it open. The hole exponentially expanded underneath me causing me to fall through into the dark depths of the abyss underneath.

Swallowed in pure darkness, yet still falling I looked up to see the hole ever-shrinking from the distance until it lost all visibility whatsoever.

-Why?

-Why is all this happening?

-How did I die like this?