I Want to Die, But I Am Immortal-Chapter 34: Futile Rescue

Complete darkness. A familiar, empty void surrounded Adam’s consciousness. The system window materialized before him, its blue light a stark contrast to the blackness.

[Host Adam has been killed. Sending to respawn point.]

The words were a cold, final punctuation to another failed life.

His eyes snapped open. He was back in Sophia’s bed. This time, there was no confusion, no moment of disorientation. He acted instantly. He swung his legs out of the bed, his movements so silent, so fluid, that they didn’t stir the sleeping girl on the floor. He crept to the bedroom door, opened it just enough to slip through, and then closed it behind him without a sound.

He rushed down the stairs, his enhanced speed and agility allowing him to move with a preternatural quietness. His mind was a maelstrom of thoughts, but one memory was crystal clear, a horrifyingly vivid tableau burned into his brain.

He remembered what he had seen in the last loop. When he had reached the shop, the three masked men were already there. And on the floor, just in front of them, was the body of Sophia’s mother. They had killed her first. That was the thud he had heard. He had to hurry. He had to get there before they pulled the trigger.

Just as in the previous loop, as he reached the bottom of the stairs, Sophia’s younger sister stepped out of her room. She saw him, a strange boy rushing down the stairs of her house. But before she could even form a question, before she could scream, he was gone, a blur of motion down the corridor. He heard her footsteps start after him, but he didn’t have time to worry about that now.

He moved towards the shop at the front of the house, the small business that connected their living quarters to the main road. He knew Sophia’s mother had opened the shop early this morning, a part of her daily routine.

In the previous loop, the three men had entered the shop suddenly. Sophia’s mother had been surprised, but she had maintained her composure. She had tried to talk to them, to ask them what they wanted. It was then that the man standing at the very back had raised his silenced pistol and shot her without a word. Her body had fallen to the ground with a soft thud. That was the sound he had heard as he was fumbling with the side gate. The timing had been a matter of seconds.

All of this raced through his mind now, a high-speed replay of his last failure. He reached the end of the corridor, the entrance to the shop just ahead. He peered around the corner. He saw Sophia’s mother. She was alive. She was standing behind the counter, a look of confusion and fear on her face, but she was talking to them. He saw the three masked men, standing just inside the doorway. And then, just as he had remembered, he saw the man at the back slowly raising his pistol.

Sophia’s mother, who was talking to the man in front, caught the movement out of the corner of her eye. She began to turn her head, her face transforming from confusion to pure, undiluted terror.

But this time, Adam was there.

He burst from the corridor with incredible speed. He threw his arm forward, wrapping it around Sophia’s mother’s waist. He pulled her back, away from the counter, and lunged to the side.

The masked man fired. The bullet, which had been aimed directly at her forehead, missed its mark.

It passed through the space where she had been standing just a fraction of a second ago and slammed into the wall behind the counter. And just like before, the shot was completely silent, a soft, spitting sound that was barely audible.

As he jumped, Adam spun, pulling Sophia’s mother with him into the relative safety of the corridor. He took cover behind the small, jutting wall that separated the main hallway from the one that led to the kitchen, the bathroom, and her parents’ bedroom. He held her there, his heart pounding in his chest.

Sophia’s mother was in a state of complete shock. First, she was shocked by the sudden appearance of these three strange men in her shop.

But her biggest shock was the fact that one of them had just tried to kill her. She had seen the gun at the last possible moment, just before this strange boy had appeared out of nowhere and saved her life. She turned and looked at the masked face of her rescuer, her eyes wide with a mixture of fear and gratitude. "Who are you?" she asked, her voice a trembling whisper.

Adam was about to answer, to try to explain, when a new voice, filled with panic, echoed from the other end of the corridor. "Mom! There’s a thief in our house!" It was her younger sister, Anastasia. She had followed him down the stairs.

A new, more potent fear gripped Adam. Sophia’s mother screamed, "Anastasia, get away from here! Run!"

But before she could finish, Adam’s greatest fear became a reality.

The masked man standing at the front of the group, who had been focused on Adam, turned his attention to the new voice. He raised his pistol, aimed down the long corridor towards Anastasia, and fired without a moment’s hesitation.

The shot was silent. Anastasia, who had been running towards them, stopped dead in her tracks. A small, dark hole appeared in the center of her forehead. She fell to the ground instantly, her body hitting the floor with a heavy, final thud. 𝒇𝙧𝙚𝓮𝔀𝓮𝒃𝙣𝓸𝒗𝒆𝒍.𝙘𝒐𝒎

Seeing this, Adam froze. His mind went blank. He couldn’t think. He couldn’t process what he had just seen. A child. They had just killed a child. At that moment, Sophia’s mother, driven by a primal, maternal instinct, broke free from his grasp. She ran out from behind the wall, out into the open corridor, towards her fallen daughter. She was placing herself directly in front of the three masked men.

"No!" Adam screamed, lunging desperately to stop her. But he was too late.

Just as Sophia’s mother was about to reach Anastasia’s still form, the man at the front fired again. This time, there was no one to save her. She was killed instantly, her body collapsing to the ground next to her daughter’s.

Adam stared at the scene before him, at the two bodies lying motionless on the floor. He realized with a chilling certainty that these men were not common thugs. They were professionals. Their shots didn’t miss. And they had no mercy.