Why does life feel so hollow?
Maybe I'm too tired to answer my own question. Or maybe — and this is the part that stings — I already know the answer, but I'd rather keep asking just so I have something to think about.
Day after day, working without a soul. No work means no money. No money means living on the streets. So I show up. I clock in. Shift's over, and like always, these legs carry me back to the small apartment I call "home" — the one place in the world that asks absolutely nothing from me.
My name is Six. Male, black hair, the kind of face nobody bothers to look at twice. Why "Six"? I genuinely have no answer.
My feet stopped in front of a convenience store at the corner of an alley — one I was almost certain hadn't been there yesterday. No name above the door. Just a crooked wooden sign hanging at an angle, swaying in a wind that wasn't blowing.
I went in. Cigarettes were gone, lighter nearly empty. I just needed one.
The shopkeeper was an old man, his face hidden beneath shadows that made no sense for a store this small. I placed a crumpled five-ringgit note on the counter. He returned the change without a word.
One coin.
I held it. It was large, heavy, and dull silver — the kind that felt too old to exist in anyone's pocket. On its surface, instead of the usual design, two crescent moons were carved overlapping each other, intricate and precise, like the work of someone who'd spent years on a single piece.
"What kind of coin is this?" I asked.
The old man smiled — thin, unhurried. "Keep it. That's the fare to a place that doesn't need a full soul."
I frowned. Too tired to argue with an old man who might just be senile, I dropped the coin into my pocket and headed home.
Back in my room, I tossed the coin onto the desk, grabbed my phone, and lay down. Comics, novels, webtoons — all of it looked more alive than the reality I was sitting in. Sometimes I wondered — if I could step into a world like that, would this hollow feeling disappear too?
But that was just the daydreaming of someone who read too much.
I set my phone on the charger, pulled the thin blanket up, and let my eyelids fall shut.
Might as well sleep.
[####]
A sound rang through my head — sharp and foreign, like a radio tuned to the wrong frequency.
On the desk, the silver coin began to shake violently.
[ DETECTED: HOLDER OF AN INTERDIMENSIONAL TICKET ]
[ ENTITY EMOTIONAL STATE: HOLLOW ]
[ SUITABLE HOST LOCATED — BINDING INITIATED ]
A faint blue light began pouring from the carved twin moons on the coin, spilling across the entire room. The shadows on the walls seemed to come alive — stretching, crawling, swallowing every corner of the space one by one.
[ SYSTEM BINDING COMPLETE ]
[ INITIATING TRANSMIGRATION TO ANOTHER WORLD ]
Zaaasshh—!
A violent gust of wind erupted from nowhere. The air itself seemed to crack — actually crack — like old glass finally giving way under too much pressure. White light poured through the fractures, striking my body like a wave.
I felt myself lift off the ground, pulled inward into a luminous void.
And that hollow, boring world of mine…
…finally disappeared.
Whooosssh—