Chapter 25
The air was a mixture of numerous odors.
The fact that I was still alive shocked me.
The air that flowed into my nose was bringing in an abundance of information. First came the stinging smell of disinfectant. Then came the smell of sun-dried cloth, the sweet aroma of fruits, and the odor of my own body.
I slowly opened my eyes. For a moment, it felt like two powerful white beams of light pierced deeply into my mind, so I quickly shut my eyes again.
Sometime later, I hesitantly tried to open my eyes again. A myriad of colors danced across my pupils. It was only then that I noticed that there was a large amount of liquid covering my eyes.
I blinked in an attempt to get rid of them. But the liquid kept flowing out. They were actually tears.
I was crying. Why? There was a fierce but deep feeling of pain and loss within my heart. Voices continued to echo within my ears, as if someone was calling my name.
I squinted my eyes against the strong light and finally managed to get rid of the tears.
It felt like I was lying on something soft. I could see something akin to ceiling tiles above me. There were rows of smooth, beige colored panels, several of which shined softly as if there were lights behind them. From the edge of my vision, I could see a metallic vent, where air was being blown out with a low sound.
An air conditioner... in other words, a machine. How could something like that be here? No smith could make a machine no matter how high their skill stats were. If what I saw was really a machine— then this place wasn't—
It wasn't Aincrad.
I opened my eyes widely. My mind was fully awoken from just that one thought. I hurried to raise my body—
But my body wouldn't listen at all. I couldn't apply any strength. Although my right shoulder went up by a couple of centimeters, it immediately fell back down.
Only my right hand managed to move. I raised it onto my body and then brought it in front of my eyes.
For a moment I couldn't believe that this emaciated arm was mine. There was no way I would be able to hold a sword with this. When I inspected the sickly white skin more closely, I could see countless tufts of body hair covering it. I could see the blue veins below the skin and the wrinkles at the joints. Everything felt frightening; it was so realistic, so biological that it felt abnormal.
On the inside of my wrist, a piece of tape held a needle in place, which had a long cord connected to it like it was used to inject something. My eyes followed the cord and came upon a transparent package that was held up by a silver stand. The pack was still two-thirds full with some orange liquid, which dripped away at a steady pace.
I moved my left hand and tried to grasp my sense of touch. It seemed that my entire body was naked and lying on top of a bed made of some high density gel material. Because its temperature was slightly lower than my body's, I could feel its coldness slowly creep up to me. Suddenly, a memory surfaced in my mind; I once saw on a news broadcast that this type of bed had been developed for patients who couldn't move. It had the ability to prevent infections to the skin and break down disposed bodily wastes.
I looked around at my surroundings. It was a small room. The wall was of the same plain white color as the ceiling. There was an extraordinarily large window to my right with white curtains drawn over it. I couldn't see the scenery outside, but I could see the yellow sunlight shine straight through the fabric. A four-wheeled metal trolley parked to the far left of the gel bed, and a rattan basket laid on top of it. A bouquet of plain-looking flowers was inside the basket, which seemed to be the source of the sweet aroma. Past the trolley was a closed, rectangular door.
