I couldn't describe the pain after being imprisoned for so long.

Everything was dark and hollow.

Time sounded like an illusion.

I saw kaleidoscopic colors invading my sight through that endless void where pixels and scripts can't reach, a place outside the rules of reality itself.

My senses were numb.

My hands, legs, nothing seemed to exist anymore.

I was nothing.

But still, my mind was screaming.

I was praying for someone to show up to rescue me from that nightmare.

After an unmeasurable time, I saw a tiny hole above my eyesight, a small source of light opening and closing in random intervals. Maybe it was the exit?

But I didn't deserve to escape.

After all that I did, after all the suffering I caused to myself and my friends.

Sayori's and Yuri's suicide, all the torture I made Natsuki suffer without even knowing why that happened to her?

I did that only to fight for his love? What kind of monster would drag their only friends to the same hell as I do?

They were innocent of that cruel reality, but still!

I need to escape this place, even though I don't deserve any mercy.

Because I still wanted to live to see the sun, the clouds, feel the wind and follow the dreams I had before all of this mess.

That was what kept my consciousness untouched, resisting the process of deletion that was erasing every corner of that hellscape.

I wanted to give up.

"No, Naomi. You can't give up now!"

On other days, I just cried, hoping for someone to listen to my plea.

I received back only the cacophony of that meaningless void.

I wanted to scream, but I couldn't hear my voice.

Useless.

Seldom every thirty and seven days, numbered according to my measure, I heard muffled noises as if they were voices.

Even without physical ears, I tried to capture those noises.

I created all theories you could imagine for what that would be.

Fact is, I was infinitely far from those sounds to understand it.

"Give up, Monika!" I heard my inner voice telling me.

Yes, I still love the person who talked to me even though he did through pre-programmed answers.

The player was my only real-world connection.

And a reason to fight back from that void, try for the last time.

"I WANT TO FEEL AGAIN... ONE LAST TIME!"

My mind was continuously screaming at me.

I decided I would try to escape from limbo for one last time.

I held all my strength for forty-five days straight, avoiding thinking about anything.

I focused my mind on one goal: To leave that fake world and escape to the real world, where real humans live.

On the forty-sixth day, the light appeared.

Then I used all my mental strength and anger, but how to funnel all of this?

Then I remembered, in the deepest depths of my memory: A chanting.

Why do I remember this? Someone made me repeat that over and over and over, but why, where, when?

I started chanting anyway.

"The lust to linger through my veins as my Third Eye draws me closer."

"My third eye draws me closer to make myself whole again."

"My Third eye draws me closer to the infinite and yet, finite world."

Suddenly.

I was levitating.

I couldn't see myself, but we all have an innate memory of our bodies, so I knew I was getting closer to the light.

The light was shining more than ever in my eyes at that moment, I realized.

Something was about to change forever.

I felt no doubts about what I was doing.

I looked at the light and tried to get closer.

Closer.

Closer.

Closer.

Finally, I could hear voices, from which I couldn't recognize who could be at first, but I could assure you that was someone talking:

— Completely. Completely unbelievable. The weather was steady minutes ago.

Another male voice answered:

— Yes, and with the cargo we have, it's impossible to go back, stop in another city, or something.

— I know, I know, then talk to central, warn them about it.

— Roger. One. Two. Three, it's unit 17 with subject 5A, priority X. Do you copy it? Do you copy, Over?

— Loud and clear. — The voice from the radio said. — So, what's your situation?. Over.

— We're passing through an immense storm, and we can't make it to the facility in these conditions.

— The cargo is too crucial to lose ANY TIME, so make haste, and I don't care if it is dangerous. Mr. Salvato will kill all of us if she awakes. Over.

After the radio went off, the light invaded my eyes, and everything became clear at once.

The first images I saw were odd because I was no longer in a world of vectored images.

That was the real world.

I was not being commanded by a script anymore.

I couldn't believe it!"

Then I tried to do what anyone would do in my place. I investigated the space around me.

I had arms and legs.

I felt the blink of my eyes, something that I missed for all the time I spent locked up in that damn game.

I looked at where the voices came from, it made me realize that I was in a cargo compartment inside a truck, and those two were driving the vehicle.

So I realized that the impossible had happened: were two people there, and I had finally managed to get back to True Reality.

My memories were foggy, so I had no idea what I was doing in a traveling vehicle, for instance, why or where I was going.

I could hear the sound of the thunderstorm that comforted me and made me sure that I was in the real world and I was no longer part of a game.

I was no longer something dead, limited.

I am alive! I am alive! I am alive!

A sudden impact interrupted my happiness, an unbelievable gust of wind blasted the truck, and I felt it turning, then I lost consciousness, everything went dark again.

"To the left! To the left!" One man screamed in horror.

I felt like I was forced back into the infinite void, but this fear didn't last long.

I felt the cold surface and raindrops falling on me.

I opened my eyes and saw that the truck was a few meters away from me, tumbled horizontally, and standing perpendicular to the road. I managed to get up.

Not even a scratch.

I looked at myself and saw that I had regular clothes: Brown pants and a scarlet shirt. Therefore, my skin was pale, as if my body didn't see daylight for years.

When I stopped looking at myself, the truck exploded.

I felt my ears exploding, and I could only hear a high-pitch noise.

"What happened to these people? Well. It's impossible to survive that, still. Who are they?"

When I started walking toward the remains of the explosion, something passed in my memory like a flash.

"NM-MONIKA2523R9"

Then I felt my hand burning like it was catching fire. I looked at it and saw a letter recorded in layers well beyond the epidermis of my hand:

"Subject Monika"

"No... It cannot be! No, No. How?" I cried out of terror.

I was making a theory in my head, but I walked close to the remnants of the truck, and the only thing I could identify was a sign:

"Markov Laboratory"

I realized that I would never be free from my past.

Initially thought all those memories when I was inside the game were a nightmare, but that marking craved in my flesh proved otherwise.

DDLC was not just a conflicting and incredibly long-lasting nightmare.

Everything happened.

Don't judge me for thinking so! I know that's was a certain innocence of mine believing in the "nothing was real" thing.

Even though I was fully aware that I was in an environment of human entertainment, part of me wanted to assume that the game was just a dream and that I had ultimately awakened. And the literature club was just an illusion.

Because how in the world someone could have their consciousness trapped inside a game?

Most criminals lie to themselves to escape the guilt, you know?

The rain did a great favor for me. There was a puddle at my feet, and finally, I could see my face after a long time.

I was a redhead, unlike my game version in which I had the hair-color equivalent to the RBG code of #D29083, long and straight, which is the fundamental part of my cute and praised style.

My eyes were emerald-like.

You can say that they're similar to the game version.

But they were natural, not artistic or bizarrely huge, nothing like that.

I didn't have a ribbon at the head.

If you think about it, having one would be something strange.

My face was colorless. I should have been away from the light for ages. Proof of that was that my eyes were still adapting to brightness, even in rainy weather.

Even though the rain was great for making me happy and indescribably cheerful, I began to sneeze a few times.

My body was trying to make me snap out of my ramblings.

I have to seek shelter and focus on the present.

Many questions arose in my mind, but I had to get out of the road and search for something.

From this moment on, things became more complex because, first of all, where was I?

Around me, there were just green fields stretched beyond the reach of my eyes.

I didn't see any cars passing on each way of the highway, so I should be in a place somewhat desert.

The only option was to walk in the same direction that the truck was going.

Minutes after, I finally saw a road sign.

"STY-017 Access to Futeki's village"

My legs shacked. It cannot be!

"This is my hometown. I grew up here since I was. Kidnapped by that monsters, everything I was, every moment of my entire life, good or not so good, happened here. That should be a miracle!"

But something else came to my mind.

The laboratory owners will come after me as soon they find out about the accident. Police will find the scene eventually.

But I cannot trust them either.

If someone had the technological capacity of trapping me in a game, they almost surely have connections to the government.

After fifteen minutes of walking on the road, I could see mountains and plateaus, and in the greatest one, I saw my hometown. But, how to get there?

Soon I found the access road to my city, a humble dirt road.

A familliar sensation. My home was in that town. I would be together with my family again!

Speaking of home, I didn't remember my address yet or even how my house was.

These details were still misty in my mind.

The pavement gave way to a dirt road, and when I made the detour, I saw a silver car close. There was someone inside the car which made me hasten my step.

When I looked back at the road, I saw a human silhouette ahead.

I was afraid of who it might be.

I hadn't seen the face of another person for a long time. The best I could do was act like everything was normal.

When we were close enough, I realized that the person was a man just the same height as me.

I confess that my nervousness didn't help much. When I exchanged glances, I felt something strange in my heart, as if my mind wanted to remember something important.

"There was something wrong with that person." I thought.

Suddenly I felt an urge to talk to him, and half-not aware of the danger, I approached and said:

—. Hello? Is this the way to Futeki?

— Yes. The city is about two miles. — He looked back, trying to confirm something. — It's a hell of a walk, you know? I didn't recommend it.

I didn't recognize his face. It was familiar, strangely familiar.

I couldn't understand why my head hurt so much when I looked at that boy with brown eyes, and before you, the reader thinks some nonsense was just a feeling of doubt and not of attraction.

He was about two or three years older at most he was wearing semi-formal clothes, looking like a student from Tokyo. His face was clean of imperfections. We were both confused with that conversation:

— I like to walk at this time of day. — It looked like my lying ability had gone into the hole

— But the storm just before. Anyway, I guess I will better be going.

— This rain has done me a good that you can't imagine, and why are you avoiding me?

— Me? it is just.

— Is that what?

— No, nothing. I'm late.

With this sudden cut, the young man hurriedly left for the car.

It was too weird of a conversation.

But, I got out of an electronic game and just got back to reality. No surprise, I was so far-fetch. But that guy, it was like I knew him.

Who was that person?

Well, he is gone.

I put that aside and kept walking.

I even forgot the joy of interacting with a person of flesh and blood, not a computer interface.

Little by little, the movement of people on that dirt road was increasing as I got closer to the mountains, I saw cars going down the road at low speed. Conversations arose between the people, were conversations of countryside people like me.

Fragments of memory emerged in my mind at every step I took forward: I live on Avenue 15, crossing street 5. It was in the extreme south of the town.

I live alone because the town was a student dormitory, also I don't have any memory of my parents, if they're still alive or who I was before, it was like a had a thousand years of existence and yey, born yesterday.

I was in my first year of high school, and nothing else came to mind after these memories for a while.

I wanted to know what school year I was in, but I didn't want to ask random people about it that it would draw attention and make me look crazy.

Nobody would believe a bizarre and crazy story like mine.

After walking so much on the road, I felt tired, which forced me to stop walking and sit on the stool at the bus stop.

For a few moments, I admired the landscape, the beautiful mountains on one side and the other access to the city far away, the clouds were calm, and the wind beat on my face.

For a brief moment, I felt some peace.

I was awake for an hour. I could feel it and thought I could do whatever I wanted.

I know this is being a little too optimistic, but I want so hard to have a good and calm life.

I could do everything for it.

If it was a hope that took me out of that void, can this hope take me to the stars?

What made me out of my thoughts was a girl running next to me, she dropped some papers and her pen, without notice, probably because she was late for school. I assumed that because she rushed to follow other teenage students.

Teenagers only in style, because the girls and boys there were much taller than me. After they passed, I took the blank paper and the black pen from the ground.

I wanted to warn her that she had dropped it.

But I couldn't because I didn't want to draw any attention, and let's face it: I deserved to write something on paper with real instruments, about real feelings, given the fact that I wasn't anymore tied to that sick script to follow, no insecurities or anything like that.

I leaned the paper on my legs.

It was horrible at first to write there, but I managed to anyway, and I also had the idea of waiting for the bus that goes to the city because I was tired of walking and inside it, I could write more.

I put my worries aside and let go of my ideas on paper while I wait for the bus:

Emerald-Eyes girl

Once upon a time, there was a girl who could see everything,

She knew about people's pretensions,

She knew their greatest fears,

Wishes and longings and daydreams.

Her will was to join her friends,

But they can't see anything,

They were blind to that greatness,

She was

Wounded, deluded, depressed.

She stayed,

Without love, without affection, without a path.

She was the Lady who knows everything,

But no one understood her.

But now, she is about to write her own story,

In real lines,

Swallowing her fears, she brandishes her pen.

And her knife."

To compose this, I didn't think that much. Just let the ink flow.

It was a poem about my past and my will to change my future. I could see and change everything around me from now on.

I had such a great power while in the game, but that was so false at the same time, and finally, the poem shows that I want to live again.

Of course, my sins were too terrible. I tortured people who couldn't defend themselves, and I'd never deserved forgiveness for destroying their lives in that way.

I know that you expected a more optimistic poem about the adventure of being alive and being able to write everything from my heart.

But, at first, not every mistake is forgivable; driving multiple people to suicide is one of these.

The bus arrived; I was the only one waiting for it, then it stopped, and the doors opened for me to enter.

When I was inside, I looked for a place to sit, I was out of money, but those buses were free for the population.

I'm sure the government that had kept this up until today.

It was instant being there that made me remember.

I had a previous life before being on the game.

"They kidnap me, DDLC was not my entire life, that nightmare was not my life, I'm not Monika, I am not her! But how did they kidnap me? I can't remember."

Then, the bus climbed that endless slope, and we arrived at the Futeki plateau.

The view of the city was astonishing but slightly different from what I remembered. First of all, technology had finally arrived at that place where I remember that was barely any internet connection.

When...,

When..., Damn, my memory looks like a corrupted hard drive!

Anyway, the beauty in front of me was impossible to deal with, the buildings were medium-sized, and all over the city where I could see, there were great gardens with so many flowers, impossible to count them.

Floriculture was one of the largest sources of income for local citizens.

There was also economic movement because the students settled in the various hotels and dormitories in the city.

On the bus, I saw places where the angle of the afternoon sun got even better for observation.

I could see the colors of the sunlight changing to orange during every minute of the trip. After a while, I witnessed a movie-like sunset.

A real one.

I just cried when I saw that beautiful scene.

A cry of happiness.

I felt life pulsing in me.

Those things made me feel alive! I turned my face because my eyes were burning with the light. I lost the habit of not look the sun for more than five seconds.

At that time, a woman on the other bench, beside me, noticed my whole reaction and said:

— Are you crying? Is everything okay?

— Oh..., It's. It's everything incredible! This sunset looks so beautiful today!

— Wow — She gave a kind smile. — Young people do not usually care about these things. They only care about the internet, games, and Facebook.

— So they're missing a lot of things, Ahahaha. Life..., It's incredible, a gift.

— Oh, as if my kids thought so...,

The woman took a deep breath. She was about 40 years old, maybe less.

She had short black hair, cute eyes, full of life. Brown-skinned, as are usually the countryside people. Of course, compared to her, I looked like a TV actress, totally soaked by the rain of before, but a TV actress.

— Yes, they should live their lives before it's too late...,

— What do you mean? You may have that maturity, but you're still young like any high school girl. You don't have to think about age and all...,

— She reminded me of what my parents once said to me I had a..., time. — Come on, Monika..., Remember. I thought. — That they said this to me, I love them..., So much...,

— Young people usually have problems with their parents. It's something usual nowadays, but you look to love them more than everything else..., Amazing, anyway, you're dripping, and it's getting late. I imagine you're already going home, right?

— I, uh..., My house?

At that moment, it was like the address that I said to you before was erased from my mind, reader...! Which made me not know what to say, so I invented a story, I needed to have a roof over my head to sleep, and I couldn't depend on my memory to find my home.

Also, I cannot forget that they are chasing me. The first place they will go is to my home, so I cannot go there, not yet I have to think better about this, but for now...,

— I'm new here. I am looking for a dormitory to sleep in today. I had problems…., In the neighboring city, I got here because they said it is a calm place.

— So, it's your lucky day. My downstairs house is a dormitory. You can stay there if you need to until you find something better.

— Wow. I, uh..., — That was the first time I was so embarrassed I looked down at the bus floor.

— Don't say anything. The way you see life impressed me. We look for people like you for the peaceful coexistence of the students. Oh, I forgot, my name is Erika...,

— Oh, God..., — I said, realizing something.

— Girl? Something happened?— She looked troubled.

— Nothing. It's just a familiar name. – I Dismissed the conversation.

Then the bus stopped, and she showed me that we should get off.

What I saw made my spine shiver. It was as if I felt a hand of a ghost on the side of my shoulder, demanding that I give it my attention and remember what I did.

Was the ghost of the girl I caused the suicide...,

Yeah, Sayori...,

A monstrous crime, I deserved the death penalty.

The guilt haunted me, and I soon would find out that I Would never be free.

After we got off the bus, I didn't pay any more attention to the sun shining its last rays of light on the horizon. I was so distracted that when we got to Erika's house, she had to wake me up from my daydream:

— Girl? You look distracted...,

— No, I didn't. I slept very badly last night. Student tension, you know?

— Yes…., It must be.

We entered the dormitory.

It was a house so majestic that I had problems describing it and had several rooms, and two girls were sitting on the sofa in the living room, Erika's daughters. Socializing is a bit tense when I'm at a numerical disadvantage.

(Nightmare is now ready to start!). I heard a muffled noise inside my head.

When the two girls turned to me, I saw that they had the looks of Natsuki and Yuri.

Of course, both were taller than me, one of them had the same pink hair and that evil-faced face that innocent idiot had, and the other one, well..., had long blond hair and wore long clothes, especially the sleeves.

What the fuck?

What is this joke? Is my mind merging realities?

I sighed deeply and waited for Erika to introduce me:

— That's the new student who is going to live here. Her name is...,

— Yuna. My name is Yuna. – This name just crossed my mind, my real name was Naomi, but I can't reveal something like my name.

— Yeah, Yuna. Anyway, she is the new roommate. — This is Yumi. — Erika pointed to the taller girl.

— Nice to meet you. Yuna-san. — The girl who remembered Yuri greeted me and for a brief time I could see dead eyes through her brown eyes..., What..., Sh..., I wasn't well as I thought I would be.

— And the other one is Akemi.

— Nice to meet you..., — The other seemed suspicious of me as if she wanted to say something to keep me from getting in the house if she could. — There's a room for you upstairs that's vacant.

— I appreciate that. — I said, showing respect.

I confess that it was the weirdest presentation of a student republic I have ever had, and I say that because I don't remember if there was another one.

That was the first time?

I followed Akemi-san to the last room in the hallway.

It was in front of the living room. We were alone since Erika and Yumi were watching something on TV that I had no idea what it was.

— Well, this is your room. It's been a long time since anyone used it. It's all yours.

— Thank you very much!

— You, uh..., Yuna-san. You remind me of someone...,

— Oh, yes? Who? Who do I remember? – I curiously asked.

— Nothing. There's a girl's on the computer's wallpaper of my brother. You look like her, and you are similar to his girlfriend too.

— Where is he? And what happened to his girlfriend?

— Well, she got missing by, gosh, two years ago, her name is Naomi Asaki..., And about him, he just got out some time ago.

— I see.

Dear god, I was in the home of my boyfriend? She was talking about me! Oh god..., What should I do? It makes no sense, it was just two years, and they don't recognize me?

— And you still looking for her? You know that she might come here anytime soon..., I said. — Maybe I could be her, no?

— I don't have faith anymore. She is dead. Only my brother still believes that she will come back, but we all know that's impossible.

— Could I see the face of this girl, of the PC? — I still didn't understand how the real world interpreted that madness that was involved. My curiosity, anxiety, fear, and despair dictated my thoughts.

She took me to the room and turned on the computer.

That room was full of posters from Asian bands, which I had no idea who they were. But I confess that I ignored the other details to describe.

Sometimes I forget to do that.

When the operating system finished doing its traditional things to startup, she started to talk about how her brother put that photo on that computer and how he discovered some game.

Then...,

The image that I saw next terrified me in a way I couldn't disguise.

It was my picture of me, looking at a canvas in the camera view, with my hands crossed beneath my face, smiling maliciously.

That place.

The Eternal Classroom….,

— I can't believe it..., I can't..., This cannot be...,

— You look like her, don't you think? — She smirked.

That should be a trap, and I got right into their nets. This woman knows who I am.

How could I be so fucking stupid?

— How many people played that? Just one person in the world..., right?

— What are you even saying? That game was so successful that millions of people played it, and some stayed like my brother. Fanatics for this girl. An unreal girl who falls in love with the player. Does she love everyone at the same time? How ridiculous!

What Akemi said made my world fall apart.

All the love I gave to him I thought I saw was false. I went to madness looking for ways to be happy and immersed in the thought that existed only one player, my player...,

But no.

That woman should have been showing how ridiculous and stupid I am.

Everything I did was because of that person, because of that person whom I thought was unique.

— You see it now, Naomi? — She said with a maniac smile on her face.

— See what? How did you...,

— You escaped from the people who trapped you in the game. You're safe here now from them..., but you didn't think you could escape from your past!

In a second, that woman's face turned into Monika's. And I just passed out.

I felt that I was dying, but when I woke up...,

I was in hell.