Chapter 100: New Game+ (Patreon)

[Warning: Heavy Themes]

In the game of life, there were losers and winners.

Some people were just born with the fate to succeed while others were born already hated by life itself.

Being gifted at athletics, being born into a loving financially stable family, being smart, being lucky, having a sense of art, being charming, a unique talent. People born with those traits were usually those held by winners. There were opportunities ready for them, even with minimal effort they could carve out a place for themselves. They had a place in life.

They were winners.

On the other hand.

Those that weren't born with any talents, they weren't that smart, or that strong, those that are unlucky, whatever talents they did have were smothered by life, never letting it be discovered or let bloom. Even with their best efforts in a world that didn't want to give them a space in it the best they could hope for was mediocrity. They did not have a place in life.

They were losers.

Life was such an unfair game like that.

Adam Gray was one of those losers.

A$+@' leaned back onto the bench, taking a long drag of his cigarette while looking up at the setting sun, the chilly autumn winds licking his skin.

Immediately after he started coughing violently, so violently he started spitting blood.

He knew how dangerous it would be for someone like him to smoke but he couldn't help himself.

'What does this make it now? The sixth job I have been fired from?'

He wouldn't make next month's rent.

He looked at the blood covering his hands and the stinging pain in his lungs. Forget next month's rent he would be impressed if he made it to next month at all.

That's probably the reason he took up smoking in the first place, hoping that perhaps the smoke would kill him before everything else did.

Adam Gray was born a loser.

Life had marked him for failure from the start.

He was born with a congenital lung disease, funny the only thing he got from his father whom he never met was a disease that would almost certainly kill him before he fucked off the country to avoid child support.

To put it simply he was dealt a bad hand.

In contrast to his father his mother was...

His mother... was a good person. A too good of a person really. She was a bleeding heart. She would rather get hurt to not see someone get hurt.

'Maybe that's why you never could do anything to Asia. She resembled mom too much.'

She was the type to starve herself for others. And she always preached to me the importance of honesty and diligence. That if I just worked hard enough that my problems would go away.

Honestly, our life wasn't that bad, we weren't starving, Mom often worked until very late night, but she never failed to give me attention. She genuinely loved me and I loved my mom back she was the only one I had and the one I looked up to. We did not have much money, maybe we would have had more and she would have had to work less but...

But...

She used a lot of her money to support that... thing. A bleeding heart. If only she was more selfish my life would not have ended up like this.

'Kindness and empathy gets you hurt.'

She died.

I watched as she pushed me out of the way as a truck came barreling toward us and bam. What was once my mother was now a smear of gore on the road. The sight was engraved onto the eyes of my 10-year-old self.

After she was dead, I was taken in by her brother.

The root of my problems. A raging alcoholic with a penchant for drugs and gambling. He got by with my mother's money and now that she was gone and the government mentioned that he would get monthly payment for taking me in he readily accepted.

A cramped, dirty, mouldy room in his apartment was my new house. He wasn't my new parent or guardian. He was the man who was forced to keep me alive with the bare minimum. To him I wasn't his nephew, I was his chore.

I am being generous with the bare minimum, I was going to school, eating and drinking. He was a petty, dirty, shitty bastard. If he was having a particularly foul day he would take it out on me by just not feeding me for the day. I had to learn to take bits from his wallet and cook for myself.

He was at least good at appearing like a competent guardian to the government agents.

Of course, sometimes he took his anger out on me but he was good at making up excuses and did it infrequently enough to not make it stand out.

But despite all of that. Young me tightly clung to my naive mother's idealistic promises. I studied relentlessly in hopes that I would carve a way out of my current life. Ride on a scholarship for high school and college to get a high-paying job.

But I was cursed with yet another fuck you from life.

Perhaps the worst curse of them all.

Mediocrity.

I didn't lack the effort. No, I lacked the natural gift needed to excel. My 8 hours of studying was less fruitful than a talented kid studying for 2.

I failed PE due to my frail body which couldn't build up muscle or stamina due to my failing lungs. Running until exhaustion was a trip to the hospital.

Funnily enough, I was always just barely not enough. If the grade to get the full scholarship was 90 I would get 87.

I had no time for any other hobbies because of my hard work, no friends, no hobbies nothing. No childhood to reminisce about.

My only hobby was escaping from my own reality by reading books, watching anime, and playing games.

I got that man to finally buy me a laptop after threatening to kill myself and showing that I was willing to go through with it.

That was my main way of escaping reality, watching shows and playing must have been my only reprieve. My only lifeline that I grew attached to.

It's funny, despite all of that, not to toot my own horn but I was an "exemplary person".

Whatever money extra money I had I gave to charity, I was happy with scraps, if I saw an old lady struggling to cross the street I helped her, if I saw a homeless man on the street I gave him my last quarter.

I think I did that as a way of honouring my late mother. I took her words to my heart and lived by them because in my eyes she was the best person I should be like.

'Caring about others was your greatest curse.'

My fucking uncle took all of my inheritance, used the child support for gambling, barely fed me and I fucking thanked him.

When he gave me a plate of cold Mac and cheese I thanked him.

I was turned to pushover. A dog on the sidewalk that would thank you for spitting in its mouth.

'It was my love her that cursed me. Maybe if you didn't love her you wouldn't have ended up like this.'

'Love is the greatest curse of them all.'

I prayed daily.

But what came of it?

What came of all of it?

Nothing.

No, less than that.

I wasn't given a trophy for being a good person, my hard work didn't amount to anything.

No, I had my kindness spat on, my hard work wasted, my charity exploited. My tolerance abused.

All because life had chosen me as a loser.

And at some point, I snapped.

I still remember the exact moment.

It was when I received my college rejection letter. My uncle laughed in my face upon seeing it, mocking me for my efforts.

"Hahaha! You little bastard did you think you would actually get in? That's hilarious, did you really think you would be so someone? You aren't going anywhere you stupid bitch. Now go and get me some beer."

I didn't say a single word. Just taking the money he gave me and leaving the house.

I bought him his beer and powerful roofies.

And I beat him to death with my weak body as he cried helplessly unable to conjure any strength.

It took him three hours for him to stop moving altogether. I had broken both of my hands on his face. He had cried, begged, pissed and shit himself as I beat him to death slowly. In his death, he had no remorse, just fear.

After that, after the brief sensation of satisfaction, I felt nothing.

I just left his body in his room and went to my part-time work.

I never bothered to anything about the body, it stunk up the apartment from decomposing I only checked up on the room occasionally to spit on his corpse. It just laid on the bed, decomposing day after day as I watched it.

Nobody bothered to check on him, after two months I trashed the body, nobody cared.

Funny, my mom if she knew of this would break down and beg me in tears to not do something like that. Hell, she probably would have done anything for me to not raise my fist against him.

Me of yesterday wouldn't have even thought of it.

But I failed to care.

The only person who cared about his death were the loan sharks. According to them, it was my job to pay off his debts and they did not take no for an answer.

So I spent my life aimlessly, working job after job getting fired for random reasons outside my control. Just waiting to die from my lungs giving out, taking up smoking just to give them that little push to go faster.

I wasn't living, the body and soul were there but the mind wasn't.

Truthfully...

Adam Grey died when he mocked me for all my efforts, my entire life, my entire belief. When he mocked me for the life he forced on me. When god mocked me after forcing this life on me.

And when the beliefs that he embodied and idolized, that he built his entire life around crumbled apart, there was nothing left. Just a shell of a person. A Deadman walking.

Then one day, I finally.

When the thugs were harassing me for a late payment once more after I had just been fired I decided that for once, I would take the wheel of my life into my hands.

I didn't care if it was stupid. I didn't care that it would get me killed.

I swung my fist and hit the man squarely in the face.

Of course, with my feeble body, it did nothing and immediately after they promptly beat me up badly, leaving me in an alleyway where I coughed to death as my lungs collapsed.

But for once I had taken charge in my life.

...

'And after that, you were born, weren't you?' A%&! turned to the figure on the bench sitting next to him a mirror image.

After his death, his soul had ended up in the void. Where it was given another chance.

But by then, the void had eroded most of his memories. So someone new was born.

Out of that empty shell of a person whose entire life had crumbled, someone who was only left with malice, resentment and negativity "Akira Gojo" was born.

Akira was just what was left of a person.

He was what was left of a person after everything had been taken away from them. A scared, paranoid newborn. A half-baked piece of shit.

That pride he had clung to was just an excuse.

It was never pride.

You were never prideful.

You were just scared.

You were scared of being a loser again. You wanted to prove yourself no matter what. You were scared of ending back there again. You wanted to prove you were better. Without even knowing you acted to refuse who you were. So you instead strive to become who you weren't.

Cold, calculating, ruthless, cruel, selfish.

The figure took a long drag of his smoke again, he didn't know if it was what the memories manifested as, a repressed version of himself or what. The figure then gazed at him and smiled wryly.

"We really got a second chance and wasted it, didn't we? A dream come true, a world where our dreams could have come true where we could live. But we messed it up, didn't we? We didn't even life." I laughed too with a sad smile.

"Yeah, I really did."

"You were given so much love yet you couldn't return it."

"You were scared to."

For Akira Gojo, love was a curse.

Caring about others was what ruined your life.

Akira Gojo refused to care about others. No, he, as the remains of a broken person did not how to.

Akira Gojo did not know love.

"You simply did not how to enjoy your new life, constantly paranoid of everything and everyone, the need to prove yourself, the refusal to let your guard down, you weren't driven by the desire to live your life you were driven by the desire to not lose it."

"Would it have been so bad to have enjoyed your life?"

"No."

Visions of all of the girls raced across my eyes. A scene filled with warmth as we laid under the blanket just watching shows together.

"Well, it's too late to regret it now right? You refused to live your life now you won't have a chance to. You never accepted your death so you never were able to accept your own life either."

...

"Do you regret it?"

...

I do.

The scenes of everyone flashed before my eyes. But more importantly, the scenes I could have had with them flashed across my eyes. The life I could have lived.

The life I had refused to live.

Moisture began to build up in my eyes.

"You were fighting against dying, not for living. You didn't want to live, you wanted to not die."

I hung my head down.

"You refused to accept yourself, living as just a broken reflection of yourself. It was you who held you back, not anyone else."

Tears started dropping from my eyes.

I regret it.

"Let me tell you Akira, for you, love may be the worst curse that ruins your life but..."

"Without love is there even a life to ruin?"

For the first time since I had become Akira, I cried.

"But what am I even talking about right? After all, it's spilled milk, no use in crying about it."

...

"Let me ask you now, if you had another chance to live. Would you take it?"

I wiped my tears away, raising my head.

Are you stupid? Of course, I would. I would do anything for another chance.

"Hahahah! I guess that was a bit stupid. But I want to know, are you saying that because you don't want to die or because you want to live your life."

The meaning was clear to me.

Do I want another chance because I don't want to go back to the void or because I want to live the life I never got to live?

I knew from his gaze that there was no use in lying.

...

I want to live.

"Do you really? Even if it meant dying? Even if it meant going back to the void all over again? Would you still choose to live then?"

The memories hit like a truck an eternity in the void. A torture beyond human comprehension, deprivation of literally everything. A pain on the mind beyond measure enough to fracture it.

Yet it was also the void that had given him another chance.

Without dying, he wouldn't have had a chance to live.

The figure smiled.

"It seems like you have made your choice."

I have.

I want to live my life.

I want to learn what love is.

The figure next to me started dissipating, a trickle of memories returning to my mind. Those weren't my memories, but they didn't need to be. That's who I was, not who I am now. I won't run away from the person I used to be.

"That's right, you can't move past it without accepting it. After all, you aren't someone who would let some curse hold you back. Isn't that right? Akira."

The figure dissipated fully and I was left behind on that bench. My figure was fading slowly too, I was running out of time. I was dying, but not dead yet, I was in the process of doing so.

Soon I would be back in the void.

Instead of trying to resist the pull of death, I let it take me. I felt oddly composed, determined, and focused.

I felt resolve.

The last embers of my life faded into ash. Leaving me in the void once more, I was without limbs, body, senses, I had no mouth to cry out in pain, my mind with no input to register ran endlessly.

[You Died]

[Game Over]

But I reigned it in. I did not let my mind wander, I did not let myself fear.

I felt the pull of the void tug on my brain like meathooks yet I did not falter. I held onto myself with everything I got. I would only truly lose against the pull of the void if I gave up.

'Game over?'

'Who are you to decide that?'

It felt like pulling against millions of tons. As if thorned chains bound every inch of my being as I pulled against them. It was a herculean effort beyond anything I had exerted before.

'What a joke.'

I will no longer my death hold me back. I refuse to let my fears, insecurities and doubts write my story for me. The chains of death have no hold over me.

'You are my ability.'

'You don't decide my fate.'

'I do.'

Even in the void that tried to claim my soul, I felt myself move. By mere centimetres at a time my body inched forward, every step felt like running a marathon but I endured. Even as my soul tried to crumble into nothingness I managed to touch my chest with an open hand where my heart was.

I forced my body to move. I willed my abilities to work.

[é%^+'/+%!^é+/'453"13%/'/%^é1]

My eyes pierced into the fragmented broken text, forcefully piecing it together piece by piece.

['%/N!%^/(E'?('!  G)(y ½$]{[A/(%/&+%%+^&]

Just a little more.

The opportunity was never given to me.

So I just had to make my own.

_____________________________

              [New Game+?]

[Yes]                                   [No]

_____________________________

Yes.

A/N: Akira finally confronts the root of all of his problems, himself, his very existence. Without acknowledging your problems you can never move past them. And so Akira was never able to. Until now.

After all, Death does represent the end of cycles and new beginnings.

For once, Akira wants to live, not stay alive.

Also for those that may ask this is not restart of the series of anything Akira is still in this fight.