Reincarnated in a depressing erotic world but living a normal life (right?) The Echoes of the Ash

In the midst of the darkness; like a dense, tactile, and heavy presence that seeped through the corners of his existence...

(Where… am I?)

In that state of diffused consciousness, Shija did not know if seconds or millennia had passed since he let go of the silk hilt.

(... This... familiar feeling is...)

He did not feel the weight of his body, nor the volcanic pain in his shoulder, nor the rhythmic beating of his heart.

(... Just like on every occasion)

Everything had been reduced to a monochromatic mist, a limbo where his identity frayed like old cloth under water.

(...Drip... drip... drip...)

But then, suddenly, a rhythmic sound began to pierce the absolute silence.

(Water...?)

A constant and fine dripping, an invisible rain falling upon the surface of his mind, began to resonate.

(... Now that I think about it... it’s the first ti... that I can feel in this state...)

Each drop that impacted his diffused consciousness brought with it a fragnt of sensation: the coldness of tar, the scent of dead flowers, the echo of a whisper that did not belong to him...

(Yes, now I rember!)

Thanks to that, the scenes of his mory returned to him while, little by little, the darkness ceased to be a solid mass to beco liquid and transparent, like the water of a deep well at midnight.

(...Drip... drip...)

Amidst the constant dripping and the abyssal blackness, his consciousness erged like a bubble of air trapped in mud.

(How much ti has passed...?)

And in that state, his thoughts moved with a leaden heaviness.

(The doors... lioris... the chains...)

He rembered the pain —that volcanic and absolute pain— that had brought him to his knees, and the snakes of his tattoos pulling at his flesh like threads of a broken puppet.

(I am sure I heard her voice...)

Each image passed before his mind's eye like a burnt slide.

(But... what does she intend to gain from all this...? Or rather... why did I never resist... No, I haven't even stopped to doubt since I arrived in this world...)

At that mont, finally free from the "influence" that lioris subtly exerted over his being, Shija wondered how much of what he felt was his own and how much was the influence lioris had used to lead him to where he was.

(Was it really ... who let go of the sword...?)

He reflected on lioris's voice, that cynical invitation to stop fighting, and how, finally, he had let go of his only anchor.

(No... at least I can be sure she isn't the kind who snatches away freedom... Besides...)

The reflection extended into the abyssal silence, a necessary introspection before the final collapse of his sanity.

(