Chapter Five: The Exploratory Journey

A month had passed since Xenia first set foot in this strange world... a world that seemed to be written in a language she did not know, In the beginning, all she understood was that she was the wife of a man named Edgar Remision, But with each passing day, the heavy truth that lay upon her chest began to unravel, She discovered she was the daughter of a bankrupt merchant, sold off for a pitiful sum, a worthless commodity traded to settle his debts.

Her husband, Edgar, was a man of the common folk... a carriage driver by day, a barfly by night, A man allergic to stability, vanishing for days on end, returning reeking of alcohol and contempt, as if he'd bathed in both.

The place she now inhabited was a wooden shack, built upon cheap land at the outskirts of the city, a dilapidated hut surrounded by wild grass, its walls rattling under the weight of the wind, and its insides offering little defense against the brutal chill of night, True to his miserly nature, Edgar had refused to rent a proper house, preferring to erect this miserable shelter and save his money for gambling.

But Edgar wasn't just a bad man... he was a product of decay, He lost his father at an early age and was raised by a reckless mother who drifted from one lover to the next without shame, He grew up in depravity, absorbing every vice she had to offer, He married Xenia not out of love, but out of lust and dominance, He fathered a child with her, then slipped back into the arms of taverns and dance halls, Arrogant with the weak, groveling before the powerful.

Their child, Agony Remision, fared no better, A boy of barely five and a half, already burdened by neglect, He loathed his father, pitied his mother, and felt nothing but shame for his bloodline, He hated everything in his life... until Callista appeared.

Callista, Edgar's daughter from a former mistress, whose mother died giving birth to her, A four-year-old girl marked by innocence, despite the neglect that shaped her. She never knew warmth from her father, nor affection from his wife, Yet with a child's unfiltered heart, she saw a mother in Xenia, and loved the family, despite the pain, Perhaps because she knew no other, She clung to Agony, hid behind him like a shield, and dreamed of one day becoming rich enough to give them both a better life.

As for Xenia, she was lost between two times... a past life where she had lived in a hollow silence, tasting happiness only as a fleeting ghost, leaving nothing but longing in its wake... and a present where she now resided in a crumbling, frozen hut, Once, the original Xenia had been a princess in her own right... daughter of a wealthy merchant, pampered in a grand villa, with a room of her own, private tutors, and servants who met her every need. Life was a dream... until she awoke one day, and it had become a nightmare, her father had gone bankrupt and morphed from a loving man into a bitter gambler, selling everything... even his daughter, Her trust shattered, Nothing remained of her but a body walking the earth, while her soul had been inhabited by a stranger, A spirit groping blindly through the broken mirrors, searching for her own reflection, trying in vain to piece together the shards before memory forgot her entirely.

For three weeks, Xenia gathered glimpses of the truth, She found the original Xenia's journals tucked into the cracks of the wooden walls, along with fragments of the past... like old brainstorming strategies she once studied in grade school.

But even as she read them, no sense of familiarity stirred within her, No spark of recognition, No flicker of nostalgia.

' In the novels I've read '

She thought,

' the hero always feels some sort of fusion, a spiritual melding... So why do I feel nothing? Nothing but emptiness... '

She whispered, staring up at the wooden ceiling:

" I suppose it's fate "

Xenia believed in fate. She believed that while humans have the freedom to act, divine knowledge surrounds them, encompassing all choices... foreseen but never forced, She never viewed angels or demons as gods, but as entities beneath the Creator's will, For that, she had scorned those who denied the divine in her previous life.

She had never longed for immortality like the heroes in stories, She simply desired a long life, rich with experience and filled with small moments.

There was a time she wondered if she was part of some experiment... a lab rat in an elaborate test, But she never dared wander too far, She had only ventured once, with Calli and Joe, to the nearby river. After that, she chose to remain.

With time, she began to care for herself again, indulging her old obsession with beauty, She resumed her skincare routine and did secret workouts, always careful not to be seen, These were habits from her former world, where she feared the emptiness and sought to fill it with hobbies, Back then, she would write, read for hours, cook, sew, and even translate online novels... doing anything to keep her mind from falling into the abyss of thought.

She had always procrastinated, spinning in the spiral of delay. But here, in this silent world — without phones or distractions — that fog of procrastination began to lift, A spark reignited within her, A will to live, even if in this desolate place.

---

One evening, she sat still, folding her heart around a question that had haunted her:

' How long will I remain trapped in this hut? '

She pondered, She planned, She decided.

Tomorrow at dawn, she would leave, Her courage was gathered!

She told herself:

' Fear of trying is weakness!! I saw a dagger in Edgar's room... I'll take it and return before nine AM, He's not home, and he won't notice, And if he does, I'll deny everything, This exploratory trip will be marvelous... smooth and swift, I'm only afraid this world might hate women... Ah, I'll take my dagger... and let anyone try to stop me! '

At first light, she awoke sluggishly. She washed her face with cold water, shocking her sleepy skin awake, The air was foggy and bit at her with icy teeth, She donned a man's hat to hide her hair, crept into Edgar's room, stole the dagger, and dressed in a man's suit she had previously tailored to fit her frame, She wrapped her chest tightly to hide her feminine curves, and smeared clay on her face to create light freckles, Her disguise was flawless.

She tucked a few old coins into her clothes and tiptoed out, Her steps brushed the dewy grass, light as whispers, She moved between the tiny shacks where the poor lived, Silence ruled here... the only sounds were the whispers of morning and the scent of dew thick in the air, clinging to her skin like a cold veil.

The world was still dozing. No voices, only the breath of night's last hour and the drone of an unrelenting insect, As she walked on, the surroundings shifted from utter poverty to something resembling life... scattered stone buildings, half-paved roads, drunk men leaning against walls with their women, the stench of alcohol mixing with mildew, suffocating all who passed and leaving them changed.

And yet – amidst it all – she smiled.

She had finally stepped out... into her first adventure.