41
I opened my eyes.
I was back in the white room.
'So I died again,' I thought.
Suddenly in front of me, a man appeared. He was dressed in a black robe and had a mask on.
'Welcome to the Room of Null. You are our guest of honor, Mr. Adam.'
'I am Sabastian, an Apostle of the God of Death and I will be your host.'
I couldn't fully understand what was happening.
'What guest of honor?' I asked.
'When all the living beings are dead, they then come to this room before departing for hell or heaven. I am a grim reaper who will guide you to your afterlife' he said.
I had seen such things in many TV series.
I now understood the purpose of the white room. This room is the place where judgements are passed on.
Suddenly two chairs came out of nowhere.
The guy sat on one of the chairs and asked me to sit on the other one. I took his offer.
'So Mr. Adam, I can see that you have lived quite a miserable life and in the end, you have committed the great sin of ending your own life which the Great God of Life had bestowed upon you.'
I was ashamed.
'It is decided. You will proceed to go hell.'
I was shocked. Committing suicide was a sin? I didn't know that. I had never harmed a single soul nor committed any other grave sin. This punishment seemed too harsh to me.
But the past few months of my life had made my mind numb.
I had become used to living in pain.
'Going to hell would not be much different,' I thought.
'Alright I accept my sins,' I said.
'Oh! Aren't you brave Mr. Adam?' said Sabastian.
'Believe me, hell is a lot worse than you can imagine. The hardships that you have faced in your life will seem insignificant in front of the punishments of hell.'
'But there is a catch.'
'You also belong to the list of few chosen humans who were a part of The Apostle Project. You have earned the favor of the gods. We have a proposal for you.'
'What the hell is The Apostle Project?' I asked.
'I am sorry Mr. Adam. I cannot comment on that right now. I am not allowed to tell humans about the details of The Project. But I believe our proposal has a lot of merit for you.'
'Ok then. Tell me what it is?' I asked again.
'We will give you a chance to live your life again.'
'A better life this time. A life where you will meet all your desires.'
I stood up upon hearing this.
'Are you sure? Is that possible?'
'Yes Mr. Adam. That is truly possible. But there is a condition.'
'What?'
'After the end of your new life, you will have to become an apostle of the God of Death. You will never be sent to hell or heaven. You will also lose the right to rebirth.'
'You will become an entity like me with the sole role of serving the God of Death for eternity.'
I took a step back. Thought for a minute and then asked him.
'What would be the role of an Apostle?'
'Apostles are also called the grim reapers. It is us who decide whether a person goes to hell or heaven or will be reborn.'
'Souls cannot travel to the room of null on their own. It is also the job of the Apostle to bring the lost soul to this room. This is the job that is allotted to us to be done indefinitely.'
'So tell me Mr. Adam what is your decision? Live a new life and become an Apostle or go to hell and serve your sins.'
'This cannot be so easy. What is the price of becoming an apostle?' I asked.
'Aren't you quite perceptive? So we apostles, have the task of taking away the memories of living beings after they go to their afterlife or next lives. All of their happiness, sadness, fortune, misery, goods and sins are born by us. It's quite a big task actually.'
I thought and made my decision.
I'll become an apostle.
Sabastian then presented a written contract and asked me to pour a drop of blood on the paper.
I did as asked. The contract was now complete.
A door appeared in front of me.
Sabastian asked me to exit through the door.
'See you again Mr. Adam. Please live your life to the fullest this time,' he said.
I exited through the door.
42
I opened my eyes. I was back again.
I immediately looked at my phone and it was 10 pm, 3rd January 2021. I have again come to the start of the last term of my 3rd year. This was the third time I was back at this point in time.
This was the same term when I had met Irena in my very first life. But I wasn't sure whether Irena was there in RIT or not.
I swiftly looked through the list of the students for my batch but there was no girl named Irena in the list.
I was shocked. I also checked for Iris. She was also not there. 'Did the Apostle lie to me?'
I then thought of searching for Irena on social media.
As soon as I opened my account, I saw that there was a notification and an unread message in my inbox.
I opened the notification and saw that Irena had accepted my friend request which I had sent yesterday. She even messaged a 'Hi' as a reply to my 'Hey' which I had earlier sent to her.
Tears of joy started flowing from my eyes.
I felt it took me countless lives to get her reply and finally it was here.
I ran in the corridor to apologize to my friends and see them again but the reality had again changed.
And changed a lot actually.
* * *
September 2076:
Many decades have passed.
I am now a 76 years old man, lying down on my death bed.
I was old, weak and diagnosed with cancer. The doctors had given up. Probably today was my last day. I had accepted my fate.
Beside me sat an old, same aged Irena in the nearby chair. We have been married for the past 51 years. We had 2 kids of our own who now themselves had grown up kids.
I felt an excruciating pain in my stomach which was expected as I had advanced stomach cancer. The doctors' therapy and treatments had failed and I finally chose to live my remaining days in peace along with Irena.
She held my hand and I looked at her. I knew this was the end.
I was grateful to her for my entire lifetime and felt glad that she was so close to me in my last moments.
'I was content with the life I had. I had riches, I had good kids, my business flourished and most importantly Irena was my life partner who remained with me for almost my entire lifetime. What more could I ask for?' I thought.
The only thing that was missing in my new improvised life was my college best friends.
Ethan had remained the same. We had been friends all this time and he passed away last year as a healthy old man.
But Charlie and Seth were not the same.
Like Iris, they had also disappeared from the face of the earth. From the day I came back to this life again, only Ethan had remained behind in RIT. Both Charlie and Seth had vanished.
There were no records which stated student names Charlie and Seth and even their social media accounts had also disappeared completely.
Charlie used to live in the same city as me but when I went back to see him, his flat was occupied by somebody else. The people there also confirmed that they didn't know a person called Charlie.
I was shocked. I tried to find them but it was all in vain.
As time passed by, we got busy with our own lives and eventually forgot about them. The promise of the Apostle was fruitful and I did live a life of my desire but now my time was up.
I saw Irena one last time and closed my eyes.
The old successful man, Adam finally died at the age of 76 in his family home.
43
I opened my eyes.
I was back in the white room/the Room of Null as they called it.
My body had gone back to being 21 years old and I was already sitting in a chair. Sitting opposite to me was a familiar face. It was Sabastian in his black robe and mask.
'So we meet again Mr. Adam,' said Sabastian.
'Yeah, looks like finally, I am dead again. Is this the time for the fulfillment of the contract?' I asked him.
'Yes sir that's true. It's time.'
'Alright.'
Suddenly a black door appeared.
I remembered that the exit door was always silverish in color. But this door seemed different.
'Where will this door takes us?' I asked.
'You will know very soon sir.'
Both of us entered the door and there was a brilliant flash of light.
When I opened my eyes, we were in a different place altogether.
It looked like an assembly court of a king. There was a big throne in front of me. There were some other men in black with masks standing in the court. While the rest of the room was totally empty.
'These guys must be the other apostles,' I thought.
'I have brought him, my Lord,' said Sabastian as he knelt down.
Suddenly the pressure in the air changed completely. I felt that the gravity in the environment had suddenly multiplied. I could feel my body literally sinking into the floor.
And then finally He came.
The most important person appeared on the throne.
A man dressed in a similar black robe with a similar mask on but with an entirely different aura than Sabastian.
To my surprise, my legs knelt down in His honor on their own as if my body knew this presence and it instinctively bowed to the great man.
He was none other than the God of Death, Zord. One of the two supreme deities that have been revered from the start of time in our universal religion of Cosmism across the globe.
'You can get up human,' He said in his baritone.
'It seems that you have been a successful candidate from the Project. Do you accept to become my Apostle as per the ancient contract?' He asked.
'I accept sir,' I said.
'Good. You have fulfilled the conditions for becoming my apostle. But before that I need you to get rid of all your humanly emotions.'
I knew I had made a deal with the devil.
I enjoyed a great life thanks to the contract and I knew that the cost of it would also be great. So the price is to lose my emotions. 'Not that bad,' I thought.
'Alright sir I understand,' I said.
'As per the old traditions I need to tell the Apostle candidate the truth of his life before becoming an apostle.'
'Adam! I am going to tell you the truth. After hearing it whatever emotions you feel towards me, just let them out. Don't hold back at all.'
There was silence for a few minutes. Zord just stared at Adam and Adam stared at Zord. Neither of them said a word.
'My Lord! Is there a problem?' asked Sabastian.
'Problem you say? Hahaha,' Zord started laughing.
'It's been a really long time since I have met a human like you kid. Is there a need for me to tell you anything? Don't you already know everything?' said Zord.
There was silence in the court after Zord's statement.
'My Lord! What do you mean?' asked Sabastian.
'I mean what I just said.'
'What does he exactly know? And rather how can a mere mortal like him know anything? Aren't apostles unaware of the truth? That's the reason we have the condition to reveal the truth in the contract. Isn't it?' asked a baffled Sabastian.
'Sabastian! That is the reason you are only ranked 6th.'
'An apostle only gains the ability to read minds when they turn 10000 years old. If you had this ability then you would have known that this kid is special from the very start,' said Zord.
'My Lord! Please enlighten this foolish apostle of yours,' requested Sabastian.
'Did you really think I was able to read this kid's brain? The answer is No. I didn't read a thing. It's better to show you.'
'Now see from my eyes,' said Zord.
He shared his ability of mind reading with Sabastian.
Sabastian could now read minds.
He tried the ability and to his shock, he couldn't read the minds of just two people in the room. One was obviously Zord but the other one was the weakest person in the room, Adam.
'My Lord! How can this be? I can't read this human's mind.'
'You have learnt our ways from Zayne (Rank-1). Even though you don't possess this ability but you still should know how it works right?' asked Zord.
Sabastian thought for a second. He then turned to Adam.
He immediately knelt on his knee and bowed to him.
'You fools. Bow down in front of this great man,' he shouted at other apostles.
They also bowed down without knowing what exactly was happening.
'You are young but you do seem to have a good head on you. Tell me Sabastian, why do you bow to me?' asked Adam.