Ow!
It hurts so much!
My head is killing me!
The strange, whisper-filled dreamscape shattered abruptly. Zhou Ming Rui, still half-asleep, felt an excruciating pain in his head, as though he'd been struck repeatedly with a pole—or rather, as if a sharp object had pierced his temple and twisted!
In a daze, he wanted to turn over, raise his head, and sit up, but his limbs refused to move, leaving him utterly immobilized and helpless.
It feels like I haven't woken up yet. I'm still in a dream. Just wait and watch me 'wake up' again... Zhou Ming Rui, being no stranger to such disorienting experiences, tried to concentrate his willpower and calm his mind, striving to thoroughly escape the shackles of darkness and haze.
However, in this half-asleep, half-awake state, his will was as insubstantial as a wisp of drifting mist—hard to control, difficult to gather. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't stop his thoughts from scattering and disordered thoughts from arising.
Why on earth does my head hurt so much in the middle of the night? And why is the pain so intense? Could it be a cerebral hemorrhage or something? Damn, am I going to die young just like that?
I need to wake up now!
Wait, suddenly it doesn't seem to hurt as much as before. But it still feels like there's a dull knife slowly scraping inside my brain.
Through waves of throbbing pain, Zhou Ming Rui slowly gathered a semblance of strength until finally, in a single burst, he sat upright and opened his eyes, thoroughly shedding that half-asleep and half-awake feeling.
At first, his sight was blurry. Afterwards, there was a faint cast of dark red over everything. He saw in front of him a gleaming wooden desk, where an open notebook with coarse and yellow pages was perfectly centered. At the top of the page, in a bizarre script, a few words had been written in deep black ink that caught his eye.
By the notebook's left side, there was a neat and tidy case of books—about seven or eight.
On the wall to their right were inlaid grey-white pipes and one wall lamp connected to them.
The lamp was in a classical Western style, about half the size of an adult's head, with transparent glass on the inside and black metalwork around the outside.
Diagonally below the unlit lamp, the brilliant reddish light fell over a black ink bottle.
In front of the ink bottle, to the right of the notebook, lay a round-bellied pen, glistening next to a shining brass revolver.
A revolver? He was completely dumbfounded. Everything in front of him was strange; none of this remotely resembled his own room.
In a profound stupification, he realized that the desk, notebook, ink bottle, and revolver were all covered over by a filmy reddish 'veil' of light coming in from the window.
He raised his head and looked upward, where in the sky's black velvet curtain hung a quietly radiant crimson moon.
It can't be... He felt inexplicably terrified; he stood up abruptly, but his legs did not straighten out and his brain continued to throb, which caused him to lose strength and fall off balance into a wooden chair.
Thud!
He propped himself up with his hands on the table, stood up again and turned around in a panic, examining his surroundings.
It was a small room with a brown door on each side and a wooden bunk bed against the opposite wall.
Between the bed and the left door was a cabinet with two open doors and five drawers below.
Next to the cabinet at about the height of a person was another grayish-white pipe connected to a strange mechanical device with some exposed gears and bearings.
In the right corner of the room near the desk were items resembling coal stoves, along with soup pots, iron pots, and other kitchen utensils.
Across from the right door was a dressing mirror with two cracks and its wooden base had simple and plain patterns.
The revolver, the classical Western decor, and the crimson moon are all different from Earth's.
C-could I have transmigrated? He guessed.
He had grown up reading web novels and often fantasized about such scenarios. But now he finds it hard to accept.
Calm down, calm down... After taking a few deep breaths, he tried not to panic.
At that moment, as his mind and body calmed down, memories began flooding, slowly appearing in his mind:
Klein Moretti, a citizen of the Northern Continent's Loen Kingdom, Awwa County, City of Tingen. He is a recent graduate from the Department of History at Khoy University.
His father was a sergeant in the Imperial Army who died in a colonial conflict on the Southern Continent. The compensation money allowed Klein to attend a private grammar school, laying the foundation for his university admission.
His mother was a devotee of the Evernight Goddess. She passed away the year Klein passed the entrance examinations to Khoy University.
He also has an older brother and a younger sister. They live together in a two-bedroom apartment.
Their family is not wealthy, even struggling. They are currently supported by his elder brother, who works as a clerk at an import and export company.
As a history graduate, Klein had learned the ancient Feysac language—considered the source of all languages in the Northern Continent—and the Hermes language often found in ancient mausoleums related to rituals and prayers.
Hermes language? He looked at the open notebook on the desk. The text on the yellowed paper went from strange to familiar, until it became readable.
It was text written in Hermes.
The words on the dark ink said, "Everyone will die, including me."
Feeling inexplicably horrified, he instinctively leaned back, trying to distance himself from the notebook and the text on it—but was so weak he nearly fell, only managing to grab the edge of the table in a panic.
The surrounding air felt turbulent, with faint whispers echoing around him. He shook his head, telling himself it was just his imagination.
He shifted his gaze from the notebook and took deep breaths. This time, his gaze landed on the shimmering brass revolver, and a sudden question popped into his mind: With Klein's family situation, how could they afford or even get a revolver?
While deep in thought, he noticed a red handprint on the edge of the table.
A bloody handprint? He turned over his right hand that had been holding the edge of the table, and looking down, he saw his palm and fingers covered in blood.
At the same time, the throbbing pain in his head had weakened a little. He turned around and walked towards the cracked dressing mirror. With a quick glance, he caught a glimpse of himself—a medium-built figure with distinctly scholarly air, average features with a deep outline, black hair, and brown eyes.
Is this me now? Klein Moretti?
He paused for a moment. Due to the dim light, he couldn't see clearly, so he moved forward until he was just a step away from the mirror.
Under the crimson moonlight, he turned his head to check the side of his forehead. The clear reflection in the mirror showed a wound with burn marks around his temple—the area was stained with blood, and grayish-white matter slowly wriggled within.