Duck's Note: If you haven't already, please feel free to go read the prologues as they set the stage for the first chapter and give some juicy exposition about the characters's backstories. Go on, get to it.
In a deep, bottomless abyss stretching on for a seemingly infinite distance, a single blue light shone as a beacon in the endless darkness, brighter than anything Bryce had seen in his life. As he reflexively reached out, he managed to grab ahold of it. Then, radiating from his hand, up his arm, and to the rest of his body, an inexplicable warmth began slowly flowing into him.
As the feeling slowly crept along his body, Bryce's consciousness properly returned as memories of his life flooded into his mind. He remembered everything, from his birth to his childhood to his death at the hands of an armed robber.
"Is this the afterlife?" "What's happening to me?"
Before he could properly assess his current situation, he felt an otherworldly force suddenly drag him somewhere at incredible speed. He found himself stunned by the sudden shock, unable to ascertain what was happening.
As he came to, he found himself in a dark room; he could barely make out rows of what seemed to be seats all around him, as well as a large cinema screen occupying most of his field of view.
Soon, after he regained his bearings, the screen began to show a downpour of images as a cacophony of sounds filled the otherwise empty room. Strangely enough, Bryce could comprehend all of the images and sounds that flashed before him; he felt as if he were gaining years worth of information in the span of mere minutes.
The screen told tales of tragedy, pain, and loneliness; it counted the stories of a young girl, forsaken by the world before she was even born, who grew up to abandon all of her feelings in favor of pure hatred. Before he knew it, Bryce had earned intimate knowledge of the life of a certain Kedra Deslandes, who, despite being a complete stranger to him, now felt closer than ever.
"What... is this?" "Who is this poor girl?" Bryce asked question after question, but to no avail; the only semblance of a response he felt was the darkening of the room as the movie faded, along with his consciousness.
Bryce awoke from this experience in a cold sweat, staring at a rotten wood ceiling. The torrent of information he had just been subjected to was still swirling in his head. His body felt fine, much better than it felt after being shot, and yet an unbearable feeling of disgust washed over him.
It did not help that the girl who's life he had just witnessed was the spitting image of the late Alice, with deep red hair and emerald eyes. He lamented the conditions of the poor child he had seen being subjected to such terrible treatment; he pitied the young girl and burned with the same rage that she had felt for all of her life.
As he calmed himself, he felt his heart beat and his lungs fill with air.
"W-What ? Putting aside what I've just gone through, I'm alive! I'm really alive again!"
As the words left his mouth, something felt amiss. His voice was much higher than it was in the past, and as he got up and back onto his feet, he noticed he was much shorter than he used to be.
"What the hell happened to me?"
Searching through the unknown room he had now found himself in, he spotted a cracked mirror in a poorly lit corner. As he approached, his jaw dropped in astonishment and confusion.
"Is that supposed to be me? I look like... like the girl, like... Kedra."
In the mirror, Bryce did not see his once athletic frame; instead, he saw the girl whose story he had just been a witness to: Kedra, the bastard child of Deslandes. His mind was filled to the brim with a whirlwind of thoughts. He had an increasing number of questions, yet no answers were in sight. As his confusion reached its climax, a sharp pain in his side broke him out of his trance.
"Ow... I guess this isn't a dream, huh, and now that I think about it, she—I mean, 'I' really am badly beat up."
Bryce decided to put aside the questions for the time being; the various wounds covering his new body were much more concerning to him at the moment.
He also needed to find out more about his current situation. Though he knew what Kedra knew, since she was shut in her room for most of her life, the only pieces of information he could piece together were that she was an unwanted child belonging to a powerful duke and that the world around him was no longer the one he used to live in.
'What am I going to do now? It's not like this child had access to books; wait, she couldn't even read! Seriously, what am I going to do?" This world's language was completely unfamiliar to Bryce; luckily, thanks to Kedra's memories, he had a rudimentary understanding of it, but if he couldn't read, it would be impossible for him to learn more about his current predicament.
'I suppose learning more can be put aside for now; my next step should be to wrangle respect from those goddamned maids. No matter how I do it, if I don't get access to decent food and care, I won't last much longer.'
'Now that I think about it, if that damn father of hers wanted to hide her so badly, I doubt he'd bother sending anyone to investigate a missing maid or two.'
Bryce found himself slightly shocked by his train of thought; he was treating the idea of killing much too lightly, though after a moment's thought, he concluded all too easily that they deserved it. Perhaps being in Kedra's body had altered his perception of things, but now was hardly the time to worry about his old world's morality.
'When I'm caught in such an unfamiliar environment, I guess my only option is force, huh? I've never been all that great at critical thinking after all...'
Bryce stared intently at himself in the mirror, trying to get used to his new form. His mind was racing with hundreds of needless thoughts, and he looked deep into Kedra's green eyes, accepting them as his own. Every second that passed was another thought cleared, bringing a clearer mind. She took a deep breath.
"Alright, Kedra, I'll be borrowing your body for now."