The slums were alive with misery. Narrow alleyways teemed with filth, the air reeked of rot, and the cries of desperation echoed endlessly. Among the refuse and broken dreams, Yohan walked alone, his thin frame hunched against the cold. His clothes, little more than patched rags, clung to him like a second skin, stained with grime and sweat.
He didn't remember the faces of the family that had abandoned him, nor did he care to. What kind of people left a baby to die in the gutters? Yohan had long since learned the world didn't care about fairness. If it did, he wouldn't have spent his entire life scavenging, fighting, and bleeding for scraps.
His stomach growled as he sifted through a pile of trash behind a rundown inn. He found a half-eaten piece of bread, its edges hardened like stone. He bit into it anyway, his teeth aching from the effort.
As he chewed, his mind drifted to the one person he'd ever trusted—a boy from the slums named Jin. They had been inseparable, surviving together, stealing together, dreaming together. Yohan had thought of him as a brother.
But brothers didn't sell you out.
The memory was as vivid as if it had happened yesterday. Jin had convinced Yohan to help steal from a local merchant—a daring job that promised enough coin to leave the slums behind. Yohan had gone along, his heart racing with hope.
The job had gone wrong. Guards ambushed them in the dead of night. Jin had escaped without a scratch, while Yohan had been beaten, chained, and thrown into a cell. He later learned that Jin had tipped off the guards to save his own skin.
The months in prison had broken something in Yohan. When he was finally released, he was no longer the naïve boy who believed in friendship or dreams.
Back in the present, Yohan spat the last of the bread into the dirt. His appetite had vanished. He pulled his tattered cloak tighter around him and began to walk, his destination unknown. The streets were quieter than usual, save for the distant shouts of drunkards and the occasional cry of a baby.
Then he saw them.
In a nearby alley, a group of men surrounded a little girl. She couldn't have been more than eight, her face streaked with tears. The men laughed, their voices cruel as they toyed with her, blocking her attempts to run.
Yohan's first instinct was to walk away. It wasn't his problem. It wasn't his fight.
But his feet refused to move.
"Damn it," he muttered under his breath, stepping into the alley.
"Hey!" he shouted. His voice was hoarse, but it carried enough weight to make the men turn. "Leave her alone."
The biggest of the thugs sneered. "And who's gonna make us? You?"
Yohan didn't answer. Instead, he grabbed a broken plank from the ground and swung it with all his strength. The wood cracked against the man's head, and he went down, cursing.
"Run!" Yohan yelled at the girl.
She hesitated for only a moment before sprinting past him, her sobs fading into the distance. Yohan felt a brief flicker of relief. Then pain exploded in his side.
The remaining thugs swarmed him, their fists and boots hammering into his body. Yohan fell to the ground, shielding his head as best he could.
"You think you're some kind of hero?" one of them spat, kicking him in the ribs.
The world became a blur of agony. Blood filled his mouth, and his vision darkened.
As he lay there, broken and beaten, Yohan's thoughts drifted. No one would mourn him. No one would remember him. His life had been nothing but suffering, and now it was ending in the same way.
"I hate them," he thought. "The ones who abandoned me. The ones who used me. I hate them all."
The darkness closed in, and for a moment, there was peace.
Then a voice, soft yet commanding, echoed in the void.
"Do you want a second chance?"
Yohan's eyes fluttered open, but all he saw was an endless expanse of light. The pain was gone, his body weightless.
"Yes," he whispered, the words escaping before he could think.
And then, the light consumed him.