I had died quite a miserable death.
My earliest memories are of my time in the orphanage—a boy of four, made to scrub the floors just to receive a minuscule piece of dry bread. As I grew older, the other children ganged up on me, bullying me relentlessly.
One day, they went too far. I ended up paralyzed. My body stopped responding to me, yet my mind remained aware—I could see and hear everything as they dumped me in the trash.
I was still alive. I was still alive when the ants came, then the cockroaches.
It was a hellish feeling—being terrified and disgusted yet completely unable to move. Not even when they crawled into my ears and nose.
It was hell.
Then came the dogs, both stray and pet. Being eaten alive was excruciating. I wished one of them would just bite through my neck and end it, but I wasn't that lucky.
When the blood flowed, more animals arrived. Crows and vultures circled above—the last thing I saw before they gouged my eyes out.
It was hell.
It felt like years, but I was dead by the time the sun set.
Yet even though I had died, I could still think. I could no longer see, hear, or feel, but my mind remained intact.
As if my consciousness had been severed from my body, leaving only my thoughts behind. It was a new kind of torment—I wanted to stop thinking. I wanted it to be the end. What was the point of this existence? Why was I still aware?
Time passed, though I couldn't measure it. Seconds or centuries—it was all the same in that endless void. Nothing happened.
Then, one day—light.
I was reborn.