Mildly rotten

Inside a room with a rotting, a man was curled up in a corner. He wore a dirty black robe that resembled a blanket. The robe was dirty and in tatters, some mold had already begun growing on the shoulders. *BANG*, the only window in the room was struck by lighting, stones and branches flew inside, mixing with the shattered glass. The man shuddered and moved closer into the corner, as if hoping he would go through it. "Bloody hell, this is the tenth time in a row", his voice was hoarse and his mouth dry. His eyes were currently shut tight and he was clutching his head. He was bald, yet had a lot of hair sticking out his nose and ears. *BANG ! BANG! BANG!BANG! , a quiver of lightning struck the room repeatedly. After a few seconds it it finally settled. The man eventually mustered up the courage to stand up and approach the broken window. He looked outside and was met with too much fog to discern anything other than vague silhouettes of distant mountain ranges. He stuck his head out and looked down, he could tell the room was high, but could not judge by how much. He retracted his head and began examining the room. The room was small and had a wooden floor with stone walls and a stone ceiling, it was dark with odd spheres in every corner of the ceiling, seemingly containting fire. There was a bed in the corner with a small table next to it. The table had a lot of a bunch of pills and what seemed to be bandages. The walls were lined with bookshelves except for the wall with the window. There was a stone desk with a stone chair next to the window, unlike the rest of the room, the desk was neat having only a bottle of ink with a quill. In the next to the desk was a wardrobe with a mirror on the door.

The man first looked at his hands which were old with long nails, then approached the mirror. " Oh dear..", he muttered while looking at his reflection. In the mirror was an old man who looked to be in his early 50s. Although he had grey eyes they were not foggy. Other than his disgusting rob, nails, and unwelcomed hair sticking out of his nose and ears, the man looked normal. " Oh dear", the man muttered again. " Oh dear oh dear oh dear". He began pacing back and forth while occasionally stopping and staring at the mirror. Eventually, his breath got heavy so he set down on the chair next to the window. 'Is there no eternal rest? Or was I simply that wicked?' the man thought to himself. Tlou had come to the conclusion that he had died. ' Should I be happy or sad? That life had no hope anyway', but not long after having that thought, his eyes steeled and he abruptly stood up. 'No, there's no such thing as a hopeless life, I won't adopt that same mentality that led to my ruin'. After calming down he sat down again, closing his eyes. ' Although mildly rotten, this is indeed a new beginning, at least for me. This body is old, I don't know how much time I have left, but I don't intend to waste it too much. I need more information about this place, I'm clearly not on Earth anymore. I'll decide my next set of actions after making sure I'm safe'. With that in mind, he stood up and started searching the room. There really was not much on himself here, he could only guess that he was sick and poor judging by the pills next to the bed and the ragged robe.

The books had varied topics but mainly history, geo, astronomy, and astrology. He couldn't understand the foreign language at first but he realised that the more time passed the more he understood. Eventually being able to decipher a good portion of the words on a page and understanding the titles. ' At this rate, I'll probably know most of the words in a few hours, I'll come back to them later. This kind of solves my predicament of being clueless, hopefully these books are up-to-date. He touched his face and pinched his cheeks. *Slap!*, he gave himself a painful smack, though not too painful. "This is real..", he rubbed his painful cheek. He let out a sigh of relief and started crying tears of joy before laughing heartily. He wiped his tears but he still had a smile plastered on his face that just couldn't be wiped.

A second chance, who would entertain it? Tlou had enough regrets to know better than most that second chances are things of fantasy. 'But it would be more accurate to call this a new beginning rather than a second chance. If people were to know that after death there is another life. Many might be in a rush to die. Though this is really unforgiving, instead of being born again I am instead some old man. A sick one at that, I just might kick the bucket in a few minutes! This rotten fool didn't even leave a record of himself or a journal. How inconsiderate! Who could be so rude as to not make preparations in the emergency that their body is taken over by someone from another world? Rude!'.

After some time Tlou decided to leave the room. After a few steps towards the door, he stopped. 'My back..' he rubbed his back and slowly sat down on the floor while rubbing his back. His rapid movements have taken quite a toll on him. 'This guy can't even walk', he looked around the room, picked up a branch that was brought by the storm and used it as a cane. He stretched a bit and walked towards the door. The door was wooden with metal straps. He held the cold metal handle and froze for a bit. He was scared, what if there were others in this house? This old man's family? Roommates? Masters? Or maybe there were dangers that he couldn't handle. *Huff* he took a breath and slowly started pulling the handle. ' I can only hope for the best', he tried consoling himself, he opened the door and bravely took a step forward. 'Huh?' , there was no floor. And he was now falling. "AAHHHHH!!!", he started flailing about, trying to grasp for anything. He fell through cold fog and as quickly as he began falling he hit the ground.