Leon slowly opened his eyes to see three blurry women looking down at him.
He felt confused and disoriented. One of them said, "Is he alive?"
Another replied, "I don't know..."
Then the third woman called out, "Sixto!"
Leon tried to sit up, feeling the cold water still dripping down his face. He managed to mumble, "What happened?"
The women looked relieved to see him awake. One of them explained, "You fainted. We were worried." Leon looked around, trying to remember how he ended up on the ground.
As his head cleared, he couldn't recognise the women, "am I dead?" He whispered.
"You will be if you won't get us out of here!" The woman in long blond wavy hair shouted at him.
Confused and disoriented, Leon stood up to see three women staring at him.
They seemed worried about him. One of them spoke, "don't you remember how you fainted?"
He didn't and he couldn't even remember how he ended up on the ground.
As he tried to make sense of the situation, Leon felt like he was in a strange dream.
He looked around and saw an endless sea and a distant ship.
When he checked his arms, he noticed unusual tattoos of octopuses and krakens glowing in a bright light.
Suddenly, a voice from the sky froze time around him,
[Welcome, Host]
"Wha-what?" His voice stuttered.
[You've been chosen to reincarnate into this world for your past sins.]
"What sins?"
[As you ended your life before your time, you've been forced to continue surviving until the very end of the book]
"The book?" Leon furrowed his eyebrows, "what book? What the fuck are you talking about?"
The system continued.
[In order to gain the sympathy and likes of the higher being, you must prove yourself trustworthy in this world. In failure to do so, you will suffer with a never-ending cruel fate.]
"What is this? What fate?"
[Your time here is limited. Stay alive until the last page, and you will be rewarded.]
"With what?"
[A chance to live a normal life.]
"A normal life-?" Before he completed his sentence, a flashback of memories went through his head.
His wife, Monica… the baby inside her, the devastating loss, the sadness and loneliness, the drugs and his own death.
"So I actually died…?" He lowered his head.
[No. Your soul is being held hostage here in order to decide your real fate.]
"What will happen if I stay alive until the last page? Will I be able to restore my life?"
[Yes.]
"Then what world is this? Who am I here?"
[Information:
Character: Sixto
Age: 23 years old
Skills: Hand Combat
Occupation: A side villainous character, robbing ships and killing the rich.]
"Sixto…Sixto…Sixto!" Leon shouted, "is this book perhaps called 'That Trash King Wants Me Dead or something?'"
[Yes]
"What the heck? So I'm destinied to die here…it was my wife's favourite character, and I remember her crying over his death for like a week…"
[You must survive and in order to do so, you must kill a certain someone]
"Who's that?"
[You will find out later: now, choose one skill]
"I can…I mean, what skill?"
[Skills:
Mind reading.
Wave Control.
Kraken.
Seduction
Jumping ]
"These skills are really weird, you know…why would I need seduction and jumping here?"
[You have 3 seconds to choose. If you fail to do that, you will leave with no extra skills.]
"Why so fast?"
[One…]
[Two…]
"Okay! Okay!" His tone hurried, "I choose one, the mind reading or whatever it was!"
[Skill is chosen: the extra skill was added to the character Sixto. Goodbye]
And with that, the voice vanished into a thin air.
"Where did it go? Heey! Come back!"
"Sixto, are you crazy? We're the ones who are trying to run away from them! Go to the wheel and get us out of here!" The blond girl shouted.
"What? This is not what I meant…did you not hear the voice?" He asked them.
"Soon, you will be hearing the voices when I throw you out of this ship. Get us out of here!"
"…but how…?" He asked in a desperate voice.
"Are you mad? Did you lose your mind or something; the wheel!"
"What wheel?"
"The one to control the ship!"
*bang!*
Leon jumped, startled by the sudden bang.
Turning around, he saw a large, grizzled pirate clumsily landing on the deck, tripping over his own feet.
The pirate quickly got up, brushing himself off as if nothing had happened."Yarrr, I meant to do that!" the pirate declared, trying to keep some dignity.
Leon looked at the women, then at the pirate, "Was that supposed to scare us?"
The pirate, now joined by more of his kind jumping onto the ship, each landed more comically than the last, looked around, slightly embarrassed.
"We be the fiercest pirates of the seven seas," he proclaimed, though his voice lacked conviction, especially since one of his mates landed face-first into a barrel.
"Really…?" Leon replied, unable to keep a straight face.
One of the pirates, trying to intimidate Leon, pulled out a sword, only to realise he had grabbed a wooden spoon instead.
"Uh, prepare to meet yer doom!" he said, waving the spoon.
"With what? Are you going to cook us to death?"
The women looked at Leon, "what are you doing?" One of them whispered.
The pirates, realizing their attempts at intimidation were failing miserably, started to look at each other, confused and unsure of what to do next.
The grizzled pirate captain, trying to fix the situation, stepped forward. "Enough! We be here for yer treasure!"
Leon, still trying to understand his new abilities and role in this strange world, decided to play along.
"Treasure? Oh, right, the treasure," he said, pretending to think.
The pirate captain's face turned as red as the setting sun, he stomped his foot. "Yarrr, we'll be taking your ship then!"
"Good luck with that," Leon said, glancing at the ship's wheel. "Considering none of you seem to know the difference between a sword and a cooking utensil, I'm not too worried."
Just then, a small wave splashed onto the deck, causing several pirates to slip and fall in a domino effect.
Leon couldn't believe his luck; it seemed even the sea was on his side.'I will survive easily…'
Look," Leon said, trying to offer an olive branch, "how about you leave now, and we forget this ever happened? You don't seem to be bad people, just... incredibly bad at being pirates."
And just with that, Leon didn't notice how one of them came from behind his back and stabbed him, "goodbye, Sixto."
[The host has been killed.]