I realised, at some point, that I was alive even though my eyes were already open.

I could not remember when I opened them, or for how long there were open. My first thought when I 'awoke' was but one thing: why am I alive?

Or perhaps I was not.

I turned to look around me and wondered if I was in some sort of afterlife. I was suspended on seeming emptiness, but around me lay masses of colour, innumerable shades of purple, that filled the entire space around me, stretching out into infinity. I realised then that it was the same space as whenever I met the White Tiger, my guardian god.

Then the memories came back. Like a weightless tsunami crashing over me, everything came back. My first wish with the White Tiger. Yulbi's death. My anima training. My battles with the Black Turtle's contractee. My friends dying. My failure to change destiny during my second wish. Harin's sacrifice. My third and final wish. And, of course, the price that came with it. Should have came with it.

I felt like I stopped breathing, yet in this space, breath was not necessary. The memories settled back into me like a missing puzzle piece fixed back into place and I found myself back to my first question: why am I alive?

As if on cue, a familiar sensation washed over my senses, a light tingle that ran across my skin. Colour swirled and coalesced until the White Tiger appeared before me in an unmistakeable yet nebulous form of colour and light with a pair of piercing feline eyes looking at me.

"I'm sure you're wondering why you still exist," the White Tiger spoke.

Though 'speaking' was inaccurate. It manifested as a voice in my head, as if coming from all directions while in that space. A voice neither feminine nor masculine, neither aggressive nor friendly. If there was any word to describe it, it would be simply: ethereal.

"Yes," I responded, "I know what the price was. Why am I still here?"

"My contractor," the White Tiger enunciated, like it was measuring its own words, "even I have never before been in such a situation. By right, your existence was forfeit once your third wish was granted. Indeed, there's but only one way you could continue to exist. However, while I may be the guardian of time, I don't have the ability to foresee possible futures like the Blue Dragon. I could not have known this would happen."

The White Tiger paused and closed its eyes. Even though it was a tiger's face, one that could not produce the same gamut of facial expressions like us humans, its mien of concentration looked as if it was weighing the world in that moment.

Then it opened its eyes again. Pale blue eyes bored straight through me as it declared, "Your life was saved by the child of the Red Phoenix."

I was sure I would have collapsed in that moment if I could. I simply felt too stunned to even mount any response while the White Tiger continued, "The child you helped before you fought the contractee of the Black Turtle, was the child of the Red Phoenix, mere days prior to awakening."

I suddenly remembered the small kid who fell down by the lighthouse, who I helped with my anima so that he could return safely home. While I knew that it was there where Black Turtle's contractee would have obtained the Phoenix, I had no idea that that was the kid. The child of the collector's older sister who died. I had no idea what to call it, luck or mere coincidence.

But regardless….

"How?", I asked, my voice barely a whisper, "I thought there was no way for me to return?"

"If it was a wish made to any other god, even any of the other three horrid beasts, it would've been impossible. But the Red Phoenix is the guardian of life...and of rebirth. It is the only god who could grant such a wish to reverse the normally irreversible, and bring back an existence which had vanished entirely."

My mind was still frantically trying to grasp what had happened, but it led to one implication which frightened me to the core. "Please," I blurted before I could scare myself into ignorance, "what was the cost?"

The White Tiger's eyes softened as it replied, "Fear not, my child. The wish that was asked of the Red Phoenix was an incredibly huge one, but the price was that the child will not inherit the anima of the Phoenix, and instead shall remain as if a child of a sparrow."

I breathed a huge sigh of relief as I settled into a wide smile. I did not know who or what to thank for that. Of the countless wishes that people have made, and the costs which have caused such tragedy and regret, I was just glad that that kid did not really suffer for the wish he made.

"Be that as it may be, my contractee," the White Tiger continued, "due to the child of the Phoenix's wish, you shall be returned back to your world as if nothing ever happened. However, now I shall present you with a choice."

I arched an eyebrow as I focused my attention back onto the White Tiger.

"This is an unprecedented situation, and I don't know how to act. I can tell you now that no harm will befall you regardless of either choice you make, for it's a choice, not a wish. The price for your third wish was your very existence. Now that your existence is returned to you, you can return either as you were previously, with the anima of the White Tiger, or as a completely normal human being without anima at all."

I could not believe my ears for a while. Without anima at all. That meant I could return to myself before I even made that first wish. I could just live out my life normally. I will never have to worry about any of the horrid beasts ever again. I will ever have to fight with my life on the line ever again. I will not have to be depended upon by so many again. I could just live my life, free from any of that. Yes, I could finally live just for myself.

But therein lay the problem.

"If those are the choices, then I would return with the anima of the White Tiger."

The White Tiger reared back its head for a moment. Then it dived forwards, bringing one of its huge eyes right next to my face as its slitted pupil tightened in scrutiny.

"You will choose a life with anima?" It asked, bewildered. "Although it has caused you much grief? Even though you have cursed it so often? I've never understood humans, but your actions are baffling even by human standards."

I smiled, I was surprised myself that this was what I chose. I could clearly remember all those times I thought to myself: what a better life I would have had if I had not made that wish, if I did not have the anima of the White Tiger. It even sounded weird coming out of my mouth.

"You're right, I've long hated this power I did not want." I gazed out to the vast expanse of colour before it, content in admiring it for a while, "I would've been fine without having any gods in fact. Better that than the temptation of a wish. However if I returned without anima, I would only be returning to my self before I made that first wish, caring only for me."

The White Tiger pulled back as it asked, genuinely curious, "What's so wrong about that? Many humans live by their own selfish desires, it's nothing unordinary. You made, what any human would consider, a martyr's choice. A selfless choice. By willingly sacrificing your very existence, you prevented a future marred by death and tyranny. You even denied your personal happiness. What's so wrong about living your life selfishly after that. Do you think you have not earned it?"

I snickered a bit. "A selfless choice, eh? I guess you could call it that. But what was running through my mind when I made that choice wasn't just about saving others. It was about penance."

The White Tiger's eyes narrowed slightly while I bowed my head, looking at my hands.

"It was all my fault that such a future even became a possibility in the first place. If I had not made that first wish, none of that would have happened. Ninety percent of all people would not have died, or that of my closest friends and their families. I created that future. I was responsible for it. I don't think I could have lived on freely knowing I sacrificed all those people just for my happiness. Harin also couldn't..."

I looked up, staring straight into the White Tiger's eyes as I proclaimed, "I haven't really done a single selfless act out of my own will. All I've done is retracted my single selfish one. That's all I've done. That Phoenix child. He was selfless. He could've wished for anything, for any wish imaginable, and of all things he wished me to come back..."

I paused as my vision blurred. It was the sudden realisation that I could see all those friends I have left behind again. Everyone. Friends and family alike. Harin.

I began shuddering, frantically sweeping my face with my arms as the tears refused to abate, easily streaming down my face.

"I-I", I began stuttering uncontrollably, "all I did was h-help him go home. H-he couldn't have known what w-would happen if he stayed, yet he...he..."

I could not stop the torrent of emotion any longer by that point. Relief. Gratitude. Sheer unadulterated happiness. They all flooded my body that seemed to translate to open sobbing. All the while, my heart shuddered painfully like it wanted to leap out of my chest. I did not know why I was crying so awfully, it was the single happiest thing that happened to me. Soon, I began laughing as well, like my body short-circuited and did not know what physical reaction to let out, so it let out all of them in one huge contradictory mess. I was so happy and so so grateful, I simply could not put it into words. I felt I did not deserve this second chance.

It took a while for me to calm down, and I eventually eased the crying to just the occasional convulsive gasp. One emotion followed hot on the heels of the other though, as heat then erupted across my face. I could not bear to look at my guardian god after what I just displayed.

"W-well anyway" I continued, staunchly averting my eyes, "the world is still an unfair place. There are still many who only think of anima as power to abuse. I want the sort of future like the principal wanted. Where you did not have to be scared of others. Where it does not matter what god you got. Where people don't step on those weaker than them. I don't want to live just for myself anymore. Since I've been given this second chance, I want to help others. I want to change things. I can't do that if I just seclude myself, content only in living my own life. For that, the influence and power of the White Tiger's anima will help."

I sneaked a peek at the White Tiger, who merely looked on impassively like my outburst never fazed it. "Interesting. So, in order to make the most of this second chance that the child of the Phoenix has granted you, you want to 'truly' begin acting selflessly. To better the unfair world you humans are in. Power for the sake of others. But how are you so sure your actions will result in a better world, my contractee? You are not the first to hold such aspirations. To be honest, it surprises me that you'll go so far. Are you truly the same human that I once met?"

I chuckled a bit though it sounded more like abortive breaths. "As for your first question, I can never be certain. That's not the point. I intend to try nonetheless. If I can even help just those around me, I think that'll be worthwhile. As for your second question, well...humans change. They can change at any time, and many do, all the time. I simply decided I'm going change for the better. From a small act of kindness, that Phoenix child, even if he did not know it, saved me. I can never hope to repay him for what he did. If a child is capable of acting so selflessly, I don't see why I or anyone else can't do the same as well."

The White Tiger merely looked on, evidently unimpressed with my snot and tear-covered face. It maintained such an air of indifference though, I briefly wondered if it heard what I had said.

Soon, the White Tiger simply said, in a tone neither pessimistic nor optimistic, "Then, I shall bear witness to what your efforts will accomplish."

White light, emerging from nowhere yet everywhere at once, filled the space, erasing the White Tiger from view, and purging my consciousness away.

I awoke, this time having to open my eyes first, on rough-hewn rock with the lingering smell of the sea tickling my nostrils while waves crashed absently around me. I lay supine, lazily gazing at the clear blue sky overhead populated by fluffy clouds, for some time, my mind a blank slate until I realised what had happened. I shot up, breathing hard, as I snapped my head left and right, confirming to myself that this was, in fact, the port city I grew up in. Its familiar sights and sounds echoing around me, reminding me of its tangibility. Of reality. I had returned to the world of the living.

Picking myself up, I found the lighthouse standing tall behind me, and saw that I returned near where I had fought my last battle with Black Turtle's contractee. I smiled a bit as I dust myself off before starting to walk back to town.

I have my whole life ahead of me now. I am a different person than I was at the beginning. This was a new start. A whole new experience lies before me. A time to rekindle friendships, heal wounds, and find happiness even while I extend my hand to others searching for the same thing.

I have many things to do before I could see my vision of the future realised. I know that I will face many obstacles. I have a good suspicion I will be fighting in many more battles, literal and otherwise, in the future. But at the same time, I know I will have friends I can fight with. People whom I know I can trust, even though I will technically have never met them before.

I have learnt so much, enough to know that so long as I keep going, as people keep going, they will find a balance, even against the "fate" dictated by the gods. After all, we have coined a phrase that nicely sums up the power of human will even in the face of adversity:

"I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul."

Author's Comments

I have always wanted to write a fanfic after the ending of the Flow manhwa (which you can find for free on LINE Webtoon). It was a great manhwa and certainly leaves a lot of potential for imagining the future of the characters. I created this one-shot as a sort of take on what happened before Irang came back to life. I was especially curious as to whether he would have his powers again and so created my own answer.

Thank you for taking the time to read my story. I hoped you enjoyed it. All reviews are appreciated.

Sincerely,

The Raven Voltaire