Click-clack
The sound of clacking filled the dark room, lit only by the computer's light. Someone was sitting in front of the monitor, repeatedly hammering the keyboard with enough force to shatter it.
Sometimes, he also used the mouse in between, clicking while chugging the energy drink and snacking on the chip packet.
After a few hours, the person, Karl, tapped the Enter key with a huge force before sighing and backing away. His head hung on the backrest of the chair as his red eyes stared into the darkness.
"God, I am not taking another work from this asshole."
His voice vibrated in the dark and silent room. But the hesitation in it told something else entirely.
'I said the same thing last time, too. Didn't I?'
Chuckling, he stared at his trembling hands. The hands looked like those of some patients. Seeing this, a bitter feeling drowned him.
Karl felt quite miserable and pathetic. He didn't like to work for this guy; well, in general, he didn't even like to work.
But if he didn't work, how was he going to live and cover his expenses?
So, he worked, suppressing his inner laziness, which whispered to him to quit and simply throw himself on the bed.
But even though he worked, he worked as a freelancer due to his circumstances.
The condition of the room, filled with a rotting smell and skittering sound of things, told the story of Karl. The desk he worked on was also covered in cans, chip packets, instant noodles, and so on, which he didn't bother to clean.
Yes, Karl was a NEET, a 20-year-old one.
There were reasons behind it, behind him becoming a NEET, but he didn't like to reminisce about them.
Anyway, working as a freelancer was hard. It was like a guessing game, in which he had to guess whether he was going to get work or not.
Most of the time, he won the game, as he didn't get to work, despite begging for it.
And when he got it. They were mostly assholes who thought of him like a slave, making him work harder and paying him less. Sometimes, he didn't even receive the full payment, and sometimes they literally scammed him.
But deluding himself that he was doing all this to build a good portfolio, he always got ready to endure this pain.
However, it didn't mean he didn't try out other options.
Karl did. He tried to get work on freelance websites, but as a new person, it was hard to stand out among thousands of others.
'Maybe, today...'
Thinking that, perhaps, just perhaps, he would get lucky today, Karl opened the freelance websites that he did, like, every hour.
And...
"Sigh, I should just drink."
He closed the tabs and running applications and started to stand up from his chair. Thinking about his current circumstances had started to make him depressed.
And what was the best way to fight depression and anxiety?
Yes, alcohol.
Well, for Karl, it was.
As he stood up, the hunch on his back became apparent, looking like the result of chronic hunching over the computer and not correcting his posture. His malnourished features also got highlighted in the light of the monitor.
Even though he was only twenty years old, Karl already looked quite old. His black hair had started to gray and fall out, and his thin, hunched body—together with those deep, black, lifeless, hollow eyes—made him appear much older.
Tik
Switching off the computer, he moved away from the desk.
Due to switching off the device, which was the only source of light in the dark room, it became hard for him to navigate.
"I am fucking dumb."
Cursing, Karl tried to move in the room filled with the filth of garbage, which he hadn't cleaned in months.
If he wanted, he could have just started his monitor again or searched for his phone, which he had kept somewhere.
But of course, he didn't.
'It's just a few steps to the door.'
"Ow!"
"Fuck!"
Moving, he also exclaimed and cursed, which seemed to be the result of getting pricked by the things he had thrown.
'I will clean this, I swear.'
While groaning in pain, he also made a fake promise to himself, which he always made whenever he got into dumb situations like these.
The walk didn't last for a long time, as at last his hands touched something wooden.
"!"
Relief and happiness flooded his veins as his hands found the door hinge.
"Thank G—"
Muttering thanks to the god whom he abused whenever he cursed his life, he opened the door.
Creak
But instead of seeing the living area of his small-ass apartment, he saw...
A truck.
Rumble-rumble
It was barreling towards him at a huge speed, enough that, before he could even make fucking sense of how the fuck a truck came into his apartment, which was on the 7th floor of the building, he was hit by it.
Crash
The truck tore through the cheap wooden door, destroying the brick wall, as it crashed its grille into Karl, smashing him against his own desk and killing him.
Karl couldn't believe the unbelievable scene of the truck before he died, with a strange expression etched on his face.
The darkness consumed him, and the picture of the truck in his destroyed, filth-filled room became the last memory of him from this world.
***
Blink
'W-what?!'
Karl's eyes blinked open, and everything looked blurry. Moments later, the blurriness decreased, giving him a clear view of the surroundings he was in.
'Is this dream... too?'
Karl questioned himself internally as his eyes roamed over the lavish place he was sitting in. The place looked to be a dinner hall, which he had only seen or read about in fantasy movies, anime, or novels.
Why the dinner hall, especially, though?
Well, it was because deliciously smelling food, enough to make his mouth water, was served in front of him.
First the truck, then this weird place.
'Quite a strange dream. Did I fall asleep on the desk?'
As he was thinking, he felt a presence beside him. A mature, beautiful woman was standing in a maid's dress, just next to him.
"..."
Karl's mind immediately went blank.
He hadn't even talked to a man face-to-face in years, and here a woman, and quite beautiful at that, was standing next to him.
What the hell was he supposed to do?
The strangeness of the situation completely vanished from his mind because the presence of the woman in the maid's outfit short-circuited his brain.
Then...
He felt something soft and jiggly in his hands. And when his eyes adjusted properly to the woman, he realized that he was groping her ass.
"?!"