Every time night fell, a strange cold sensation enveloped me.
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The initial shock of entering the human world was, to say the least, overwhelming. It's not just the sights and sounds - although the noise of the bustling streets is certainly overwhelming to a creature as accustomed to the echoing silence of the underworld as I am. The real challenge lies in deciphering the complexities of human interaction. A case in point is my skeleton, which is surprisingly adept at assimilation (thanks to a partial modification of my bone structure), but offers little protection against human vigilance.
For example, the concept of 'personal space' remains a mystery. People seem to have an invisible, oscillating bubble around them, an impregnable area into which I have unfortunately intruded. My appearance next to them often resulted in startled screams and panicked runs. My attempts at friendly gestures - a slight nod and a bow - have been misinterpreted as threats, or worse, preparations for some extreme action. My current attire - tattered, dishevelled, the black colour that characterises the darkness - leads so-called adventurers to mistake me for a dangerous criminal on the run. To most others, I have become a preaching psychopath, and my story has become a prominent topic of conversation among drunkards everywhere.
Another part is social rituals. Elaborate greetings, silent conversations, subtle changes in body language - it all "swam" before me, a chaotic sea of social rules. I'm sure I've mastered them (though not perfectly), but why am I still so different? I tried to find the answer by observing people in restaurants and cafes, meticulously studying their interactions. I watched them closely as they exchanged small, flat objects. Maybe I lack them - coins are called money, which is an extremely important element in human social interactions. I decided to give it a try - I spent a whole day walking around the rubbish dumps, under bridges, looking for something that could mimic coins, grabbing some small river stones and scanning them yellow.
I ventured into a bakery in a deserted alley, a place that looked like it was about to collapse, with a sign broken in half. It was a place that specialised in recycling old bread and then smuggling it onto the black market, and the shopkeeper was rumoured to be a 'dangerous baker'. I hoped to get the first roll of bread of my life.
The result is predictably unsuccessful. The baker, a fat man with a beard and a sloppy flour-covered apron, stared at me with red eyes. He gritted his double, stinking golden teeth, muttered curses for a moment before reaching for the nearby pestle...
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I spend most of my time in the library reading books and thinking - why are human emotions so complicated? Joy is expressed in loud laughter and excitement, sometimes slightly out of control. It was the perfect contrast to the melancholy, almost emotionless and abnormal state of my previous life. My sadness was simply a silence - a sombre sadness. Once I saw a young woman sitting on a bench by the side of the road, crying quietly, her shoulders shaking. I approached her cautiously, making an appropriate bone-noise (a gesture I had carefully learnt and practised from observing human funerals), with the intention of bringing her comfort.
Contrary to my expectations, there was an immediate muffled scream that sent countless pigeons flying in panic. She shoved me, her frightened face running for her life to the nearby guards, pointing at me. I didn't know what she was saying, but a moment later the glowing swords in their hands were pointed at me.
Anger, in my opinion, is the most volatile of human emotions, completely unpredictable. A sudden increase in volume, clenched fists and harsh words can explode from the humblest of people, often over trivial things that I can't understand. Once I accidentally bumped into a man carrying a stack of precarious wooden barrels. The eruption of anger that followed - a stream of curses and accusations - was terrifying, even for a creature as calm to death as myself. I learned, albeit belatedly, after he hit me, that apologising by raising my hands in a gesture of surrender is still a more effective response than shrugging your shoulders (I probably wouldn't have broken so many bones if I hadn't shrugged during the bread-buying incident).
Even simple things like eye contact can be very confusing. Prolonged eye contact is often interpreted as challenging, while too little can be seen as dismissive or unreliable. This is how I made an enemy of the thugs in the alleys. A flogging was inevitable, and the hard kicks to my side still hurt.
Living in this place makes me feel like a poor person, lost in the maze of social protocols, constantly stumbling and bumping uncontrollably into walls I can't see.
But there are truly magical moments. I have witnessed acts of kindness, small gestures of human compassion through the complex layers of society. A woman sharing her bread with stray cats, a young man helping an old lady pick up dropped objects, a group of friends laughing and sharing stories from their outings. These seemingly small actions have a power and significance that challenges my initial understanding of the human world. It suggests a depth and colour far beyond its superficial chaos.
Over time, I began to see gaps in people's behaviour and to understand the underlying motivations behind their actions. My initial attempts at communication, clumsy and often unintentionally offensive, gradually became more subtle. I listened more than I spoke, observed before I acted, and chose my words (and bony gestures) more carefully.
I learned to see the people around me in their own way, and then realised that people are not really incomprehensible, unpredictable entities, but individuals with their own hopes, dreams, fears and desires.
Once I was in a busy market, lost and overwhelmed by the overload of senses. An old woman with a wrinkled face noticed my confusion. Without saying a word, she pointed to a quieter corner of the market, to a small stall selling spices and herbs. She offered me a cup of warm tea, with calm gestures and a soft whisper that was in every way different from the feelings of alienation I had experienced in the past. It was a simple act, without overly complicated gestures, but with a kindness that touched me deeply.
Honestly, the human world is like a new language, a language that is not only spoken, but also communicated through gestures, facial expressions and body language. Although it was a challenging world, it was a journey that erased the line between my skeletal form and the human heart. I'm a skeleton, yes, but I also understand what it means to be something more - something that resonates with people.
My journey has just begun, a difficult but colourful one. My chance encounters, both positive and negative, have become magical experiences of empathy, one of the first important steps towards understanding the meaning of life that I so desperately crave. Every interaction, every stumble, every kindness brings me closer to a piece of the puzzle of human existence. This place - this world - is a giant jigsaw puzzle that has just opened up, and I'm going to solve it, one step at a time.