“Until when are we doing this?” Standing right beside me was the god, poking me with a spear as I waited for my foot to heal. It was unkown to me how much time we spent training, but I did know that I was getting better. Just slightly and I didn’t even dodge one spear, but I was definitely getting better.

As soon as I was ready again, I smiled towards the completely bored god, stood up and walked away from him, completely and utterly unrecognizable because of the dirt that was basically everywhere. The staring duel began anew. I was incredibly tense, watching his every movement.

The first sign that something was different was his left hand moving up towards his face. The spear didn’t move at all, but that didn’t help to relax one bit as he could throw it in under a second if he wanted to. His mouth was already opening before the hand could cover it and his eyes closed.

“Are you serious?” He was yawning right in front of me. I knew that I didn’t pose much of a challenge, but I still found it somewhat disrespectful. Maybe he expected me to have lost my concentration, maybe he was just too confident in himself, but either way, he threw the spear towards me without even opening his eyes. This time though, I already expected such rude behaviour.

I threw myself to the side and the spear barely missed my belly, just scratching my clothing. Even in the air, I was already overjoyed. I did it. Who knows how often I failed to dodge, who knows how often some limb was detached from me. It all accumulated at this moment.

The first hundreds or so times, I learned to stop thinking about dodging. He always read my mind and predicted my movements. The next hundred times, I learned not to get distracted by anything he did and was just so short of succeeding. From then on, I improved my movements, although it was still very far from perfect.

And this time, I did it successfully. Luck certainly played a role in it and the god´s boredom as well, but that didn’t stop me from feeling so accomplished. Even as my neck was blown to pieces by another spear, I still wasn’t dispirited in the slightest.

Although I already experienced beheading several times, it was still weird to see a rapidly spinning view of your body a few metres away, naturally headless. Soon afterwards, the god grabbed my hair and put me back on my shoulders where both pieces started to reattach to each other. I was back on my feet quickly and grinned happily. Was I crazy to think that not being slaughtered for the hundredth time was a feat? Probably so, but I blamed this place for it.

The god on the other hand was seemingly upset with something. It was probably that he missed a complete beginner once, but I didn’t care much. He didn’t teach me much during that day, but I still learned something and I would never be hit by the spear that brought me here again.

“Alright, now we are done.” I felt like I got what I wanted and noticed that being beheaded too often would probably be bad for my mental health if it could get any worse at this point anyway.

“Quit grinning, it doesn’t suit you… or just continue like that, you won´t have many opportunities to be happy soon anyway.” What was that supposed to mean? Did he just wanted to ruin my mood or was there actually some plan that I missed completely? Even if I wasn’t the best at escaping right now, I would certainly get even better the next time I was here and it didn’t seem like he was able to change me that drastically very fast. My victory was nearly in sight, but I felt that I missed something I shouldn’t. In any case, he completely ruined my mood as I had to think about my future again. “In any case” he continued and snapped his fingers “off you go!”

I lost contact with the ground again and started to float towards the sky. It was new to me that he had this much control over when I was getting reborn which was quite scary. On the other hand, he could just know when the time was right and make it look like he was in control. In any case, I was happy that I finally left this place and with my newfound skills, I thought that I would be able to survive just a bit longer. After that, I would train even more and more, until one day, I would be able to survive in that hellish place. I was even somewhat looking forward to meeting the bats and smiled as I lost consciousness once again.

As I realized that I was reborn, I immediately stood up and started running towards the bats. At least, that’s what would happen in an ideal world. Instead, I felt like I left one prison which is purgatory, just to be trapped in this new body again.

I felt the stone beneath me and was even able to see the hallway somewhat, but I just couldn’t make this stupid body move at all. Instead, I felt so tired like I haven’t slept in years and struggled to even open my eyes properly. I wanted to scream, trash around, beg for someone to help me, but I was unable to do anything as I was just so short of falling asleep again.

Last time, this exact situation happened as well, but I blamed the poison for my weakness and not my prior death. I struggled even more and did my best to not give up, but I also lost my motivation rapidly. There was just no way out of this as nobody here would help me. The woman I met previously already showed that she was scared of me and didn’t want anything to do with me. Anything else around here was either ignoring me or trying its hardest to go after my life.

I heard wolves howling in the distance and at this point, I just gave up completely. It was already depressing enough to struggle without any hope of succeeding, so I didn’t want to add being eaten alive on my list of things I should forget as fast as possible. Thus, I drifted into sleep and thankfully died before the wolves found me.

Whistling woke me up from my sleep. I was laying in the bed once again but hugged a human-sized pillow this time. Immediately, I closed my eyes once more and tried my hardest not to cry.

“Twenty minutes. You held on longer than expected.” The god, seemingly ignoring my mental state once more, said it as it was an achievement. This number crushed me even more though as it meant that my chances of finding a helper while I was awake were basically null. I hugged my pillow even closer, trying to find some comfort in its presence. Still, tears were streaming down my face and I sobbed weakly.

“Why… why … why?” I didn’t even listen to the specific answer as I knew that in a sense, it was his fault. No matter how hard I tried, he would always manage to somehow turn the tables on me when I thought that I had a chance. I was stupid to think that I could in some way beat a literal god while he could read my mind and my memories. The only thing I could bet on was my luck and honestly, I had the worst luck of all.

He shook my shoulders, but I just buried my face even deeper in the pillow. I was so done with this life that I simply gave up completely. All my motivation, my plans and my determination were thoroughly crushed by the evil god. At some point, the god walked back towards his chair and waited for me to calm down. Even when I stopped crying after several minutes, I still didn’t react to any of his words at all. Sometime later he left the room and as soon as I felt a bit more secure without him around, I fell asleep.

“It is time.” A familiar voice penetrated the darkness, shaking me awake. I immediately guessed what he wanted to say with that as I felt the comfortable mattress leaving me. Depressed, I didn’t open my eyes like usual but rather wept in self-pity once again. I didn’t feel the house as I passed through it, but I didn’t care about that stuff anyway. I just wanted to die forever and escape this horrible fate once and for all.

I was getting reborn again, but this time, the wolves were even closer than before. The thought of being eaten alive scared me, but honestly, it was even worse than expected. Without going into too much detail here, it is one of the worst deaths possible, in particular when you are quite hard to kill and don’t lose consciousness fast enough.

Once again, I found myself hugging a pillow after the god fiddled with my soul. But this time, I had a clear mind.

“I lost.”  It was a simple statement, yet it had so much meaning. I could say goodbye to who I am if I was unable to change anything. I knew that as soon as he finished doing with me what he wanted, I wouldn’t be myself anymore. Still, I was far from giving up completely, even when I had lost all hope for the other world.

“It seems that I underestimated you. I thought you would immediately get depressed, but apparently, I was wrong.” Did he think that he could bring me down that easily? I grinned as I finally had proof that this god in front of me wasn’t perfect in the slightest. I pushed the pillow away from me, threw the blanket away and stood up with a smug smile on my face.

I lost all hope for a happy future, but I would be damned if I gave him whatever he wanted. As far as I was concerned, there was only one path forward for me, as sad as it was. I wouldn’t be able to see my friends again this way, but at least I wouldn’t pose a danger to them.

“You cannot kill yourself.” I cursed him, twirled around and stared into his eyes. I was repeating that he should just die over and over in my head which he was unsurprisingly extremely unhappy about.

“And why should I believe that?” It was obvious that this would be quite bad for him and thus made me quite sceptical about his words.

“Have I ever lied to you except for a joke?” Now that he said that, no he didn’t, at least not to my knowledge. But there was always a first time, so I could never be so sure about him.

“Then tell me, is there any chance for me to escape this place?” I was already walking towards the door again, aiming to get a kitchen knife to stab myself over and over again.

“There is, but it will only happen after I show you promise me one thing.” I stopped. Why did he tell me such things? I was basically done for, so why giving me hope or even showing me a way forward at all?

“What is it?” I continued walking towards the door, expecting a deal I could never accept, but strangely hopeful as well.

“I will show you my reasoning behind all of this in the near future. I want that you watch and listen carefully when the time is right.” What was this? Did I miss a few words? That sounded so unbelievably easy that I just couldn’t accept that this was it.  

“That’s all?” I raised an eyebrow as I looked towards him, concerned about my hearing and his ability to make deals.

“That’s all.” I was still incredibly suspicious that I missed something, but it was the best opportunity I had. Stabbing myself with a knife wasn’t that fun and I didn’t see how I was getting killed by that.

“I´m in. How do I get out of here?” A magical transportation device? A way for me to get reborn full of energy? I could accept all of them, but his way stupefied me. Not because it was bad, rather because it was so unbelievably stupid.

“We wait. Things are moving in the other world quite favourably for you.” I lost. Once again, I made a deal where he wouldn’t lose anything and I had to do some extra stuff. It wasn’t much, but I also wondered why he didn’t demand more from me. No matter his explanation, I wouldn’t accept that he fiddled with my soul so why did he demand something like this?