Nihility [ Isekai • Dragon Evolution ]

I squeezed my body through the bathroom with trembling limbs until I was partially inside the shower area, which I opened up and let the cold water fall to my head, washing away the bile and the rest of whatever was in my stomach when the loop resets that stayed on my face after I threw up yet again.

I had lost count of my loops already. I knew that I had at least twenty loops, but I couldn't be certain anymore.

I placed one hand on my face, right where Jack's blade cut through my head at the end of the last loop. I could still feel the moment the sword cut through me, and although the physical damage was reverted, the psychological wasn't.

I was feeling phantom pain in various places of my neck and on my head, even on my chest, from my first interaction with him, though it wasn't as bad as the others.

In some loops, I was able to trigger the temporal strand, but in the majority, I simply freeze when the pulse Jack releases reaches me, too fast for me to do anything against. When I notice his blade is already halfway through me.

"This sucks" I said, looking to the floor and the water that flowed around me and splashed onto the floor before rushing down the drain. I kept staring at it for several minutes.

After that, I tried to get out but without being able to use [Genetic Dysphoria] all I managed to do was cause panic from the populace, which resulted in me being caged by the city guard and then mercilessly killed by Jack when he arrived two days later by driving his sword into my face.

I was back at the shower, staring at the floor. When I saw water dripping onto the floor, I was left confused for a moment, as I hadn't opened the shower yet, but when I placed my hand on my face, I felt my tears rushing down my face and dripping onto the floor. I was crying without even noticing.

I didn't know how well the walls were soundproofed, but I quickly turned the shower on before I started sobbing. I couldn't keep it anymore.

It felt awful to cry right now when I knew this wouldn't be over for a while, but I simply couldn't help myself. I was feeling utterly powerless, and it seemed my life was in the hands of those who mistook me for a different species and didn't want to even listen to me.

"I tried!" I shouted as I punched the wall, only for it to crack, and small drops of my neon green blood dripped down into the water before being flushed down into the drain.

I had tried to talk with him multiple times, but he simply didn't listen to a word I said. Every time I tried to plead for him to not kill me, he looked at me with disgust before doing something that immediately triggered the loop.

"I just–I just don't know what to do," I said between sobs.

My weak limbs had completely given up, and I fell to the floor, too weak to lift myself or even close the shower.

The situation was, for the moment, hopeless. But I would not give up. I simply couldn't, even if those loops were literally torture, not a single thought about giving up passed through my mind.

I needed to incapacitate Jack if I wanted to live, or at least explain my side of the story, but it was easier said than done. Jack was stronger than me, even without the soul burn I had that debilitated most of my stats and skills.

For that, I needed to understand the protection on his clothes first. If I weren't able to damage him, any defense I tried to come up with would be for naught.

Making up my mind, I manually triggered the loop. Everything reverted back to the start of the loop, and that's when I activated [Genetic Dysphoria]. Immediately, I felt a wave of pain in both my soul and body, but I needed to get out of my room, and this was the only way for me to do it.

The transformation took longer than normal, all the while it felt like my entire being was set ablaze as my entire body melted and slowly reformed. I could feel I was straining my already damaged soul to do it, but I had also activated [Soul Damage Resistance] and was relying entirely on it to at least take the edge off the damage I was causing to myself.

I had to bite a pillow to muffle my screams. It was the worst pain I ever felt, it was on par with when I had originally died on Earth, with my body being broken apart by nothingness. But eventually, my body transformed into that of a black cat person.

I was left panting for at least an hour as I recovered both mentally and physically from the trauma. With ragged breaths, I opened my status and saw that they were even worse now that I had transformed.

My physical attributes were awfully low, almost on par with those before my naming and evolution. The magical ones didn't change, they kept the same amount from my true form.

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It took me another hour and a lot of effort to be able to get out of bed and to stand upright, still, I needed to keep my hand on a solid surface for balance and support, or else I would fall to the ground.

With slow and short steps, I was able to move from where I was to the door. I opened it and exited my room, and then made my way down the corridor and stairs to the front door. The whole process took at least half an hour, when I normally took a minute or two doing the same.

Several people saw me having trouble and offered me help to get into a medical place in the city. I almost refused, but on second thought, I actually needed the help, so I accepted.

During the travel to their equivalent of a hospital, I was able to see a larger sample of the magicule pulses that every person seemed to have constantly around them, but differently from Jack's, theirs didn't seem to cause me any problem, it was only Jack's that did. I wondered if it was a skill or something like this.

It took another three hours to get to the medical facility. It looked like a mix between a hospital and a small pharmacy. It wasn't exactly like Earth's hospitals, but it wasn't that far off.

The person helping me walk placed me in a chair inside the– I'll call hospital because it's the closest word I could associate with the place. Then they gave me a document and something that looked like a crystal pen that used magicules to write on the paper, which had a weird texture as well. They said the hospital staff would help me if I needed anything else and then left.

I looked at the document and began reading it. The words took a moment for me to properly understand them, which was only now that I realized [Humania Language] was the only skill that hadn't been deactivated. Ignoring that small fact that didn't help me, I read through the document entirely. My mom had always said that you need to read everything before signing anything, something I was doing even now.

The document was a basic form for me to write my name, level range, from 1-25, 25-50, 50-75, any resistance skills they might need to know, my symptoms, and if there was anything in the status section of my status screen. There was even a small contract of confidentiality between me and the hospital staff that would be enforced through magic, it seemed.

I had nothing to lose, so I answered everything truthfully. In the worst case scenario, the loop would reset, and I would know to not come here next time, but as it was my first time here, I might as well see if they could help my situation.

After waving a clerk over so I wouldn't need to walk to the counter, I gave them the document. The moment they took it over and read it, their eyes widened and they said for me to wait a few moments before rushing towards a set of doors to the patients area, if I was reading the signs properly.

I honestly didn't understand their reaction. I mean, yeah, you could take a look at me and see that I was badly hurt. There was a sharp pain every time I moved, but other than that, I wasn't actively dying. My HP wasn't dropping, but it also wasn't going up, which was concerning.

It didn't take more than a minute before an entire group of medical staff was on top of me, placing me on a kind of wheelchair and driving me to a room filled with potions, crystals, and objects that shone to my senses. I was also bombarded with several questions by the staff, so much that I wasn't able to answer any of them.

They placed me, carefully, on a bed and a bunch of them started to move through the room, preparing equipment and touching some of them on various parts of my body. It all happened so fast, I wasn't able to react, and I couldn't resist even if I wanted to, I was too weak currently to do so.

"On a scale from 1 to 10, how much pain are you feeling?" One of the medical staff, a dog person, asked me.

"Currently?" I asked before answering without waiting for an answer. "About 6."

It was true. It wasn't the same debilitating pain I felt when I used my skill to change form, or when the loops started, but I was still in pain.

"Were you outside? Did a magic bolt hit close to you?" She kept asking questions as the other medical staff rushed to examine my body, flooding it with several skills that I could sense but couldn't do anything to block.

"I think? I don't remember," I was answering truthfully. I didn't understand their rush, but I knew better than to lie to a doctor, especially one who was currently treating me.

After they all finished doing whatever they were doing with me, the doctor who asked me some questions asked me to wait a few moments, and they left the room.

I was currently baffled as to what had transpired. Was soul burn that serious? What was I saying? Just a look at my status and how much pain I was in when I first woke up in the loops was enough for me to know it was very serious. Though I didn't understand why they asked me if those lightning bolts made of magicule hit near me. I was pretty sure I was hit directly, and not close, but I also wasn't sure if that was the case.

After several minutes, the doctor came back into the room holding a clipboard and one of those crystal pens I used earlier, and came near me before explaining.

"I really don't know how to say this," she started. "But by all accounts, you should be dead now."

Her words came like knives, cutting through any illusion of security I had.

"What?" I asked, confused. I was clearly not dead, so what did she mean by that?

"The preliminary exams we did on you showed severe soul burn, and there are signs of magicule overload all over your body. The kind of overload a magic bolt from the storm outside causes, but those hit by them tend to not live to tell the tale."

"But I'm fine?" This more or less confirmed that I was directly hit by one of those lightning, but I was still fine– I mean, relatively speaking.

"Yes, that's what makes your case very strange," she continued. "Your soul roots showed signs of degradation, the kind that could kill someone. I assume you're still alive thanks to your [Soul Damage Resistance], still, the damage is severe."

"I imagined it was something like that," I said, and I meant it. Ever since I gained the skill and my first ever soul damage, I can somewhat judge how messed up I was. And I was pretty messed up right now.

"The good news is that it seems the damage isn't progressing, which is also weird. When tissues are this saturated with magicules that they pass through the Rozemyne Limit and go directly into a Rozemyne Cascade, the damage to the soul keeps increasing until it either breaks entirely or Death comes to help them pass." She said.

"But mine isn't?" I asked.

She looked like she didn't want to confirm or deny what I was asking, but eventually she answered. "Initially, it seems that this is the case. We are unsure as to how or why. We will be making more exams to figure out more."

I sighed. It's not like I could be anywhere else at the moment with this much damage to my soul that I could barely walk.

I would be using this loop to stay in this hospital. If I learned how to deal, or even start healing this damage, I could use this in the next loops and deal with Jack earlier, at least that's what I hoped.