Chapter 148.

I was... somehow outside the door to my apartment. 

How did I get here though?

Kkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkkk.

With a sudden loud static noise, my thoughts became disorganized into a jumbled mess as I remembered a slew of memories that lead up to the present. I retraced my steps in those memories and deciphered how I’d gotten here. The disorganized memories ran through my mind rapidly, but there was still a gap between them and how I’d gotten here.

After I was shot… was I really shot? I’m not even sure, but several events transpired after that. Eventually, I reached my limit and I chose to return home regardless of what Val said. When I chose to return home I deeply mulled over all the events that had happened to me and at some unknown point, I found myself outside my apartment. That was what led to me returning, but between when I saw Val last when I was together with Reine and now there was still a gap.

When I turned around I saw the same familiar scenery of the cityscape below that I always saw whenever I left my apartment to go to work. With the scenery I was accustomed to, there, I confirmed this was my apartment and not just a door and passage that looked the same.

My gaze returned to the door. There was no sign of Val or Reine anywhere in sight. From the memories I had, I realized I’d previously mistaken the spelling for her name when I first heard it; it was spelled Reine, not Rain. She’d corrected me on it when it was just the two of us alone together.

Though right now, the spelling of her name was the least of my concerns if my memories were correct. For the time being, I was completely alone with neither of those two women to be found. The real question was whether this was reality, or whether this was all in my head again. 

It wasn’t just those two that were gone, there was no sign of anybody in my immediate vicinity and I felt a strange sort of unsettling dissonance. It was my home, right? This was where I lived and it wouldn’t turn out to be someone else’s place when I entered, right? Random doubts ran through my mind as I settled my on edge nerves.

I took out my keys with my unsteady hand. When I tried to insert the key for the door in the keyhole, I stubbed the key on the lock and accidentally dropped it. I immediately picked it up from the ground then this time carefully inserted it and opened the door. What greeted me was a dark room with the lights all off. I flipped the switch by the entrance to turn the lights on, but immediately discovered there was no power. 

Had I forgotten to pay the electricity bill? Did they shut me off or something?

Just as quickly as I mused over that thought, the light flickered momentarily before it released a short buzz and died out. A faulty bulb was the cause?

I entered the room and retrieved a new bulb from the closet beside the entrance. I unscrewed the light bulb from the socket and hurriedly replaced it. It lit up for a moment before the exact same process repeated itself. 

Was there a short that caused it?

However, right before the light bulb went out again, I noticed something I didn’t recall leaving on the table before I left. It was only for a brief second and I even doubted my eyes when my brain finally registered its appearance. It was gold with a metallic sheen. I vaguely understood what it was, but I couldn’t figure out why such a thing was there. I certainly didn’t own one, so how did it end up on the table in my apartment?

Amidst the darkness, I approached the table as I extended my hand out curious as to whether it was truly there. When I touched it, an electrifying tingle ran down my back. Cold, was my first thought when I touched it. I was certain, it was a gun.

I picked it up and made out the shape through touch while I relocated to the balcony to get a better look at it with the illumination from outside. When I was a few feet away from the balcony, my eyes shrunk; I... recognized the gun. It was the same one the person that shot me held when I opened the door back in the hotel. 

Why... was it here?

I’d lost my mind. The theory in my head this time was even crazier than all the others before this. Was the world trying to tell me I shot myself? Am I supposed to kill myself for some reason? What the hell? 

Why... 

Why...

Why would I do that? 

I... killed myself? How? I can’t logically comprehend such a preposterous sequence of events. Was I the one tormenting myself rather than all this being caused by someone else? Not my exes, nor some ghost?

If I take the gun and kill myself now, would I understand anything? How can I understand something by performing such an idiotic act? There will be no time to understand anything if I shoot myself. I’d simply turn into a corpse devoid of life before I even have a chance to formulate a single thought.

A chill ran down my back as my gaze instinctively shot up from the gun to the balcony. With wide-open unblinking eyes, I looked blankly in front of me as something ethereal and semi-transparent phased through my body from behind. What I saw was... me? 

Holding the gun, the other me stood there and looked over the edge of the balcony. He slowly lifted the nuzzle up to his chin ready to blow his head off with resolution. He took a deep breath in and out as he braced himself. His finger slowly pulled down on the trigger until-

Bang!

I reflexively blinked from the loud gunshot. The instant before my eyes shut fully, I blood splattered up into the air like a fountain. I even felt the droplets of warm blood that landed on my skin when my eyes were closed. When I reopened them, I saw a completely contradictory scene. The apparition of myself that’d just blown off his head, who previously faced away from me, now looked directly at me with the gun pointed in my direction.

I broke out into a sweat. Of course, I was naturally nervous. 

BaBaBaBaBaBang!

Without any chance to react, he pulled the trigger six times in rapid succession. A cacophony of noise explosively rang out loud and overlapped constructively as my brain was rattled from the aftershock. The bullets traveled along trajectories as if in slow motion, but I still couldn’t move out of the way to avoid them. It was like my brain could process it all, but my body had no way to react.

The bullets passed directly through my body, the only strange thing was... I felt no pain from any holes punctured through my flesh. Instead of a body full of holes, they’d cleanly phased through my body similar to how the apparition of myself phased through my body earlier.

When I turned around and followed the path the bullets had traversed, I saw-