When I woke up today morning, I did not expect to end up dying. Then again, who would? It's not that exactly just pops up into your head out of nowhere.

…

Well, depends on the person.

Anyways, enough dillydallying and let me just tell you how it happened.

Tale of Excalibur

Reborn

The light shone through my blinds as birds were chirping and people were moving around.

At least, that's what I wished I would have woken up to.

Instead, it was raining inside like hell from a busted window and my drunk ass dad was fighting with the landlord in our living room again.

We had been struggling ever since my mother left. She was the main source of income for the family. My dad hadn't been able to find a job for the past 5 years and my mom had just had enough.

She didn't even bother to consider taking me with her.

What a bitch.

I guess the landlord had had enough as I heard a loud smack and a thud on the floor followed by: "You have 2 days."

Great. Eviction. Just what I needed.

I got up from my wet mattress on the floor as I sluggishly walked to the only corner of the room which hadn't gotten wet from the rain.

The busted window I mentioned earlier had been like that since last month. My dad simply didn't bother fixing it and the landlord couldn't care less as long as he got the money.

Which is why we were getting evicted in the first place. The begging on the streets wasn't enough to keep us in a house for the rest of our lives, we both knew that.

"Well great." I muttered to myself as I put my clothes on that smelled like shit. I waited for a bit before going to my bedroom door.

I went to our living room and saw my dad sitting on a chair and holding his hands up on his forehead.

"Guess we're moving." I said as I waltzed over to the fridge.

"Don't bother there's nothing there." My dad said, defeat in his voice.

My dad wasn't in the best condition. He was overweight from all of his drinking, he had started balding (he had one of those old man haircuts), the white shirt he was wearing had sweat marks all over it, etc, etc.

If I started mentioning every single one of his flaws we would be here for too long. But, in the end he was still my dad. We had pretty much been through hell for the last four years and in the midst of all the chaos our bond had somehow only gotten stronger.

Which is why the next words he said were the most shocking ones I had heard in all of my life.

"I'm putting you up for adoption." I nearly dropped to the floor.

"What!?" I nearly yelled in shock. I couldn't believe what he just said. Was he joking? No, the punchline would have already come by now.

"We're going, come on." He said as he got up and put his old flip flops and torn jacket on. He was waiting for me at the door.

Just as fast as he had dropped the bomb on me, he expected me to recover from the blast.

"What do you mean 'I'm putting you up for adoption'? You can't just make that decision by yourself, you bastard." I said angrily as I felt tears form up in my eyes.

He sighed and just said: "You know I don't have the money to keep the both of us alive. Trust me, I don't like this either." He walked over to me and put his hand on my shoulder.

"This is the only choice."

I hated those words. So many times, they had been repeated to me. Over and over again.

"No, there has to be another way." I said while trying to fight back the urge to cry. This bastard had been keeping me alive this whole time, without him I would have died by the age of 11. I couldn't just leave without repaying him. I refused.

"Come on now. Men don't cry." He said as he wiped my face with a handkerchief. "In times like these the only thing you can honestly do is stick up and deal with them."

"It's better if you have a smile on your face." I said as I recalled the countless times my dad had said that to me to cheer me up. I looked up at him with a forced smile on my face and he just smiled back.

"I'm gonna miss you, damn old bastard." I said as I hugged him for what felt like the first time in forever.

He hugged me back and it felt like forever before we finally let go of each other.

"Let's go."

The walk to the adoption center was a quiet one. With rain falling down on my head harder than a bag of bricks.

This was typical of my father. He never wanted to beat around the bush too much with anything ad got straight to the point. Acting fast, giving me no time to react whatsoever.

We arrived, and the air was tense. The adoption center close to us had 0 fees for putting your child up for adoption for birth parents. Even more of a reason to get rid of me. It was free, god damn it.

I was still angry, sad, confused, you name it. There were so many emotions running through my head that I ended up feeling nothing at all.

I heard that my dad was a psychology major at one point. Guess that explains how that works then.

We walked in, and I instantly noticed the disliking of us by the employees. That was understandable, they were trying to get rid of kids, not more of them. Screaming brats were heard running around somewhere in the back as we walked to the front desk.

"I'm here to put my kid in for adoption."

I noticed the lady at the front desk eyeing me suspiciously as she typed down something on a computer. People born into richer families tend to get angrier easily, as if they've got something to be angry about. The richer they are, the worse they get, huh.

I was too deep in my thoughts to even realize the adoption had already been completed and the employees were pulling me towards a room in the back.

As I was being directed towards a door to the side I look back to see my dad walking out, with a sad expression on his face. He didn't turn around to face me as he walked out of the door.

"Damn it." I quietly muttered to myself as I felt more tears start to form up in my eyes.

Needless to say, I didn't sleep well for the next few days.

Every single emotion on earth all hit me like a truck, one day at a time. At least that's the excuse I want to use for looking like a zombie.

Really it was just my stupidity and lack of understanding that led me into this situation in the first place. If I had only realized sooner what bad situation my father was in and tried to apply for a job, maybe it wouldn't have come to this.

Maybe I would have had another choice.

On the third day in that hell hole, I realized that you can't just up and drop your kid off at an adoption center and be done with it.

I had been thinking about how fast the whole thing went, and finally came to me the realization that my dad had been planning this for weeks, maybe even months beforehand.

Maybe that's why he was in a rush. The whole thing had already been set up and there was no going back. He just wanted to get rid of me as fast as possible after it.

Honestly, I was going crazy at that point. The whole "getting put up for adoption" shit was messing with my mind and making me think things that were absolutely ridiculous.

"Oi." I suddenly heard come from above me. I was sitting in a corner just chilling and thinking to myself.

I looked up and saw a guy looking at me.

"What do you want?" I said a bit angrily. The rest of the kids in the whole place had soon realized after my arrival that I was not someone who wanted to be bothered.

The first day some shitholes came up to me and tried to start a fight. Needless to say, when you've lived in a house with an alcoholic, crackhead dad you kinda learn a few things about fighting, so they all got black eyes for breakfast

Of course, the employees took their side in the whole shebang. They clearly weren't too fond of me. Even though they did feed me, get me some better clothes and such, none of us were any closer to getting along than at the front desk.

"There's a show coming from the TV, wanna watch?" He asked me in a curious manner. I had been sticking to myself this whole time and the everyone else seemed to be scared of me. What was wrong with this guy?

The adoption center had different "sections" for age groups. There were the babies, the toddlers, the preteens and the teens (where I was). There were also some other, irrelevant ones that I can't bother myself with to explain.

Every single little "section" was divided into their own rooms at free time. Every room had some books, toys, board games and a TV.

This place was by far not the poorest adoption agency.

I had in all honestly been bored out of my mind for the entirety of my time there and it was making me overthink about every single detail.

"Sure." I said as I got up from my corner and sat on the couch near the TV. The rest of the shitheads huddled around the couch quickly scudded further away from me, some even preferring to sit on the floor.

Except for that one guy.

He had light brown hair and green eyes. He was extremely skinny and was wearing the same red shirt and tan shorts as most of everyone else was.

Apparently, some grandmas had all come together and knitted the red shirts for the center for Christmas, and there were so many of them that now all of the other clothes are drowned out somewhere in the midst of all the red sweaters.

I had one too, of course.

"I heard it's a Japanese animation." The guy said as the constant advertisements that were playing on a screen came to an end when he switched the channel to some Japanese one.

The instant he switched it the screen lit up with bright colors and a picture of a completely normal neighborhood. It cut to a kid with weirdly colored hair standing in front of another kid.

"That's mean Kacchan."

"Oh, just another one of those boring bully stories, huh?" I mentally sighed as I kept watching. Even if it was a generic thing you've seen like a trillion times, it was still much better than sitting in a corner contemplating your life.

"If you keep going, I-I-I'll never forgive you!" The green haired kid said as he put his fists up.

"Welp, I can guess what's going to happen next." I thought to myself again as I kept watching, uninterested yet interested at the same time somehow.

These types of shows never interested me. An underdog getting more confident and whatnot and then showing the bad guy some mercy. Heard before, done before.

The show then cut to three other kids, presumably the bullies. There was a blonde kid standing in the middle, presumably the little 'boss' of the group, an overweight kid over to the right and a skinny weirdo with a cap on to the left.

Suddenly the show got a lot more interesting when the fat kid grew some demon wings out of nowhere and the capped one's fingers grew longer.

"Even though you're quirkless…" the blonde one suddenly began.

"The fuck's a quirkless?"

…you're pretending to be a hero, Deku?"

"Huh." Was the only thing that came to my mind as I kept on watching the show.

"Pretty interesting." The brown-haired kid from before said to me.

"Yeah. What's your name?" I asked him as I turned my head to face him.

"Jerry, what's yours?" He asked me back. I took my hand out from my pocket and went in for a handshake.

"I'm Zach."

The next few weeks I spent watching that show. I later learned that the name of it was "My Hero Academia.''

The world in which the story took place in was a weird one. 80% of the population had these superpowers that they called "quirks" and heroes and villains roamed the streets in a never-ending war of sorts.

The main character was this kid called Izuku, who didn't have a quirk, but gets one from the #1 hero, All Might by eating his hair.

Yeah, I know it's weird.

All and all, the show was pretty damn good though.

Then again, it was the first even remotely interesting thing I had seen in a long time, so I had zero idea if people actually loved it or not on the internet.

Meanwhile, Jerry and I got closer to each other as with every new episode that came out there was a lot to discuss between the both of us.

He was the only one who reached out to grab my hand, pretty much saying "I got you."

I appreciated that.

One day though, as I was watching the show…

"Ahh!" Jerry let out a slight gust of air as he was kicked again.

"Shut up you piece of shit!"

"Yeah as he said!"

Apparently, the little shitheads didn't like the fact that Jerry was trying to help me get through, so they decided to try and break him.

"Oi, you bastards." I said in a pissed off voice behind them.

"Shut up! You come in here and try to be the big boss. I've had enough of your bullcrap!" A fat one said as he began walking towards me with his hand in a fist.

I just walked a bit closer and gave him the death stare. That sure shut him up.

All of a sudden I feel something hit me in the back of the head and my vision goes black.

When I came to, I couldn't see anything. I had something in front of my eyes. I tried to move my hands but they were restrained by something.

I could hear the engine of a car and suddenly getting thrown around. A throbbing pain soon introduced itself as well as I got thrown from one side to the other and hitting the walls like a ragdoll.

"Am I in a car?" I thought to myself, panic starting to set in.

"All I can remember was getting in a fight with a load of shitheads and…." I started before suddenly I hear something click from the outside and a door open.

"Oi, you awake?" I hear a female voice say, trying to sound imitating.

It was one of the employees of the place. What was she doing?

"Doesn't really matter if you are. I'm gonna be rid of you soon, you piece of trash. Damn useless scum." She scoffed as she banged the door close again.

"What the fuck is going on!?" I mentally screamed.

I hear her talking to someone outside, so I try to focus a little more.

"I'm sure you can do something with that. You're a resourceful man after all." I heard the employee say.

"The fuck do you expect I'm gonna do with a brat that isn't even good for anything? Are you out of your mind?" I hear a rough, Italian voice say in a deep tone.

"Look, all I'm asking you is to get rid of that no-good son of a bitch. Come on, he's free and everything." I hear the employee say again.

"Wait is this a….." Thoughts started racing in my mind as I hear the Italian man's next words.

"Tsk, fine. At least he'll make a good slave."

"oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck oh fuck!"

The realization that I'm getting sold off to a slave trader was as horrifying as you'd expect. "I HAVE TO GET OUT!" Was the only thing my senses were screaming as I hear the front door open and the engine start.

I tried to kick the back door open but it wouldn't budge. My legs were weak and the pain in my head was getting to me.

The last thing I heard was: "Oh he's awake." as I blacked out with tears falling out of my eyes in a panic.

When I came to again, it was hard to breathe. I was waving around from side to side again, but instead of hitting metal and banging my head every four seconds, there was a fabric around my whole body.

"I'm in a bag?" I realized. Someone was carrying me. I tried to kick the person, but all I got in return was a swift punch to the gut through the bag.

"Behave yourself." A deep voice said in a broken English. It sounded like he was from an Asian speaking country.

My mother used to teach me other languages, because she wanted to make me bilingual. As a side effect I can easily tell what country/continent a person is from just from the way they speak.

Kind of a weird skill, but it comes in useful at times.

I was thrown onto a hard rock floor out of the bag and I got kicked straight in the face. I screamed in pain and the guy grabbed me from my hair, managing to pull off some of it.

I didn't get a good view around me because the pain from was messing with my vision. Also, the pulling of the hair made my eyes reflectively squint.

From what I could figure out, I was in a warehouse. I didn't know where it was, since the area around my city didn't have any big or noticeable warehouse locations. I'm pretty sure there were actually none of them, but I couldn't think straight in the moment.

"Do I make myself clear, little boy?" He said in the creepiest tone possible. I open my eyes a little more to see an Asian man with a crazy look on his face, black hair, dirty teeth and the most horrifying look in his eyes.

Those eyes screamed murder.

He hit my head against the ground as I let out a gasp of pain. I felt him throw me back in the bag, but my body was already going limp again so I didn't register the whole thing.

I also noticed that instead of wearing my usual clothing I got from the adoption center, I was wearing a dirty torn up robe and I had a pair of thick metal cuffs around my arms.

The bag I was in got thrown into something metallic. My vision was starting to go blurry again, but this time I managed to hold on to my consciousness. I managed to open the head of the bag, crawl out and stand up, but barely.

I looked around to see myself in a container.

I collapsed on the ground as tears began to freely fall down my cheeks and onto the hard, clod metallic floor of the smelly container.

"GOD DAMN IT!" I yelled out to nobody in particular as I hit my ow head onto the ground in an attempt to make the emotional distress from getting to me.

My attempts were in vain though, as it only caused me to panic and cry more.

I wasn't sure if it was day or night. All I know is that I fell sleep in a cold sweat, crying and screaming for someone to help and trying to break free.

But it was no use…

I woke up in a daze. I was confused at where I was at first, before I remembered everything that happened last night. It caused me to go back into a state of panic and distress.

I hear a loud bang from outside and jump in fear as the door of the container swings open and the scary Asian dude walked in with a crowbar.

"Go back to sleep." He said in the creepiest tone he could manage as he jumped on me and hit me with the crowbar until I was bleeding and barely conscious.

I couldn't do anything. The guy was a 7-foot beast and looked like a bodybuilder. Even if I tried to struggle it would have been meaningless.

He seemed to think that I was knocked out as he pulled out the same bag from the previous day and threw me in. This time though, the inside of the bag was stained with blood.

"How many people…" I managed to croak out of my throat as I felt a burning anger lit up inside of me.

"HOW MANY PEOPLE HAVE YOU KIDNAPPED!" I yelled out as I managed to break free. This caught the giant guy off guard and his crowbar came clanking down on the ground.

I quickly grabbed it as I slid past him. He quickly fixed himself and tried to catch me, but I had the upper hand this time.

I swung the crowbar at him as hard as I could. Even with some broken bones and a fucked up nose I still managed to cause a little bit of harm to his face as he grabbed it.

"Kuso yarō…" He said as he wiped a bit of blood off from his face.

"Japanese, huh? Explains how your punches are so weak." I teased him. He got up looking like he was going to rip my head off.

I didn't know where the sudden urge to fight back came from. I was terrified a minute ago, but as soon as I realized that I was not the only one there, my body moved faster than I could react.

Just like in the show, heh…

He jumped at me, but I managed to dodge to the right. I swung the crowbar down on his head as hard as I could.

He fell on the ground with a loud thud and the crowbar slipped from my hands. I felt like I was on top of the world after that.

Though, the pain from exerting my broken bones and internal bleeding started to get to me finally. I fell on the ground and had to hold myself up with my arms as I almost puked my guts out.

I then felt a sudden, throbbing pain on my back.

I manage to look back and I see a guy wearing a mafia outfit with a cigar in his mouth. He was poking a knife through my heart.

The shock wore off and I collapsed on the ground and spat up some blood.

"We can't have you killing our guards here you know…"

He walked a bit closer to me: "YOU DAMN BRAT!"

He then kicked me with all the force he could muster and I flew at least a good few feet before collapsing on the ground.

My vision started forming black spots on it as I started to feel the control of my body slip away from me.

"Is this how I die? In a fucking warehouse in the middle of nowhere in smelly ass clothing like a pig? I'M NOT HAVING IT!" I thought to myself. With the last of the power I could muster, I stood up against a wall. I look up with anger burning inside my eyes.

Too bad it was pointless though, as the guy pointed a pistol at me.

The last words I heard were: "Sorry kid, this is my only choice." before a loud gunshot echoed and then…

Nothing.

There was absolutely nothing. That's where we are now.

There's absolute nothingness.

Just… nothing.

It's not just complete blackness, no. It's nothing.

It's a weird thing to try and put into words, but I don't know how else to put it.

I can't feel, breathe smell… Nothing.

My last words echoed throughout the nothingness.

"This is my only choice."

Those damned words.

Every single time something bad happened, it was those very words that were said before it.

Every. Single. Time.

"So, what do you think?" I suddenly hear booming through the empty space of nothingness.

I'm sure if I had a mind, or even a consciousness for that matter, I would have panicked.

But, this voice… it was somehow calming and embraced me with a warmth that I couldn't feel back when I was alive.

"Are you ready to make another choice?

After I somehow registered those words, my eyes were blinded by a light out of nowhere, before…

Absolute coldness. It was absolutely freezing. I was shivering…

Then I felt something warm wrapped around me, and I felt like I was in the air.

"Wait, shivering? I thought I couldn't feel anything!" I thought to myself as I realized yet another thing.

"Hold up, I'm thinking? How?!" My mind was racing with questions all the way from, "Wait, I have a mind again?" to "I can breathe!"

I tried to open my eyes. They felt heavy as all hell, but I eventually got them open, even if a slight bit. There was an ominous dark figure.

"Wait…. AM I ALIVE AGAIN!?" I tried to say out loud. All that came out was a painful gust of air and a little hiccup.

I felt my eyes starting to water up. This was all hitting me too fast, I couldn't react properly. So, I cried. And cried I did.

I felt like I was being carried now that I thought about it. My senses were still numb, but when I focused on it I could clearly feel two hands holding me up.

I felt being passed onto someone else. I opened my eyes again to see another shady figure.

"This shit is fucking terrifying." I thought to myself as the other figure started waving me around like I was a baby.

Wait…

"AM I A BABY"

The realization hit me harder than a bulldozer. It all made sense now, why my senses are numbed, why I couldn't see anything, why my emotions are running so wild and why I felt so small.

It's because I was a baby.

I tried to focus a little bit more on my hearing and managed to make out a sentence.

"Daiki…. wa anata no namaedesu….."

I didn't know Japanese, so I had no idea what the fuck this person said.

All I could figure out from that was that I was in an Asian country and the person speaking was a female.

Was she my mother?

I tried to focus on seeing. I managed to open my eyes a bit more, and I saw a beautiful Asian woman with black hair that reached down to her shoulders. Her eyes shone like emeralds as she smiled down to me when she saw me looking at her.

I was starting to feel fatigued out of nowhere. I felt like sleeping, so I did.

So, there you have it, the first chapter is done.

New chapters should come out every Saturday, so if one doesn't show up then you should all spam my PM's with "Make more chapters you dipshit" until I get the motivation to do so again.

Well, that's all from me this time, see you soon!