The World Cataclysm

Knowing what to expect, Dave quickly tried to suppress growing excitement in his heart as he knew that keeping a calm state of mind was the best course when sudden fortune befalls on someone. Plus, mediation was closely related to his mind, so he needed to have the right state of mind before everything, or he could miss this opportunity.

Breathing in the air to his lungs, Dave entered into a trance as he grew calmer. He felt as his senses became sharper, feeling every sensation much clearer and hearing his own heartbeat which grew slower over time.

He felt his mind becoming crystal clear, empty of any thoughts and distractions. And, he felt...something entering his body, getting an entirely different feeling of mana. If before, he was feeling something non-existent entering his body like dust settling on his skin than now he felt as something formless was entering his body, similar to water and gas, yet being none of them...like it was more unite...like some sort of the pure energy.

Sitting cross-legged, not moving even for an inch, Dave had lost a sense of time as he immersed himself in that feeling. He thought he was starting to understand mana clearer than before. It was soft and gentle, more giving a neutral feeling to him and he felt...as it got more submissive.

If he had felt some sort of resistance from it before, than now, it felt like he could easily control it with his will as he had gotten into a much deeper link with it than before. His speed of mana absorption was only going higher, increasing several times of what was before.

Losing himself in that feeling, Dave sat on his bed cross-legged absorbing mana around him like crazy. He wasn't sure how much time he was meditating, maybe an hour or even all night, but he understood that he needed to seize a moment, so he concentrated on sucking mana around like a madman.

...

An unknown time later, Dave felt like his absorption speed was slowing down. He clearly understood that he had little time before he leaves a deep meditative state, so he gave his all to absorb as much mana as possible.

However, he sensed something unusual...on his body...like something was off with his body...or his mind. And he was quite sure about it since it was his third deep meditation and something was different from than the previous two times. He didn't notice it since he was too caught up with new sensations of mana, but coming to the end of his deep meditation, he couldn't help but notice that something was off.

Trusting his intuition rather than thinking he was paranoid, Dave slowly stopped absorbing mana around him. If he had done it abruptly, stopping suddenly, he would have harmed his body since mana he was absorbing would have gone into disarray, causing light internal injuries. It was the same if someone had disturbed him while he entered deep meditation. For that reason, he was truly thankful to Adam with whom he was sharing the room, even though he didn't know why his friend didn't wake him up out of worry.

As he severed the mana flow entering him, Dave concentrated his senses on his body. He checked his limbs, internal organs, skin and other parts of the body, yet found nothing. He checked his body again, yet found nothing again.

Running out of time, he decided to check his brain for whatever he searched for, and surprisingly, he had detected something deep in it. And going deeper into it, he had come to some sort of...an empty space?

It was pitch dark in it, at least he didn't sense anything around it with his mind, and it was so silent that he had thought he was dead. Moreover, that space was seemingly filled with something or he had thought so since he felt like he was deep down the sea.

Next, his attention had shifted toward the countless bubbles floating around the space and shining with a slightly dim light that it was hard to notice in all the darkness. As he touched one of them with his mind, he had seen a memory from his childhood when he had his first fight in elementary school.

'What the hell? What is this space?' Dave wondered inwardly as he checked upon other bubbles around him, and each of them had shown a single piece of his memory. And when he reached for another bubble, his mind shook slightly as mumbled softly, 'Dad...Mom!'

He saw a pair of a man and a woman. The man had coal-black hair cut into a businessman hairstyle and coal-black pupils, closely resembling Dave in his facial features, except for scars. The woman next to him had gotten slightly lighter hair and hazel pupils which shined brightly as she chuckled softly.

Suppressing his emotions which had gone in turmoil, Dave drifted slowly through empty space as he hoped to find another piece of memories about his parents. It was aged that he hadn't seen them, and he felt nice to just get a glimpse of them.

Finding other bubbles with memories of his parents, Dave stumbled upon another one, but it wasn't a happy memory he wanted to recall, precisely just because it had shown the scene of his parents' deaths.

Reminiscing about that night, Dave sighed softly as he approached other bubbles. If space had only stored his memories and was a part of his Regression ability, he just wanted to go through over his life.

So, one by one, he checked all the bubbles on his way. Some of them had happy memories, some of them sad ones, while others were related to Adam and his parents. Also, he had gone over the memories when he was hospitalized after the car accident...and which were especially dark ones.

After the accident, he was stuck to a wheelchair and was moving by it. As other doctors had said, he had gotten damage to his spine, though the minor one. Usually, he wouldn't have lost an ability to move due to that, yet later he was also told that it had more psychological source than a physical injury, so he had regained his ability to walk after a year only.

However, the inability to walk by himself was the light trouble he had to deal with in the hospital compared to damage he had received to his nervous system. As he was diagnosed, he had gotten his reaction speed lower than that of a normal healthy human.

That was...truly hellish 6 months he had to endure as a child before he went through surgery under a famous neurosurgeon, seemingly fixing his problem, though his reaction speed was still slightly lower than that of a normal person, yet the difference was negligible so not to interrupt his daily life. It had also gone higher as he proceeded with his life later on. However, his view of the world was never the same as before.

He would never forget those 6 months. It was like the world was sent spinning in his eyes, like he was ripped out of time, like he was seeing glitches in life itself. Informed of his parents' deaths and going through that shit, he had also thought of killing himself at that time, and he had thought he had every reason to do it. Thankfully, he was stopped timely by staff members in the hospital since he was sure his parent would have wanted him to live.

It was hard to adapt to ordinary life after he had his reaction speed fixed. First, it was like a breath of fresh air, yet later, it was still hard to get into his past ways. Well, he had already gone through a rehabilitation period and resumed studying, directly going to high school.

Following the trail of bubbles, Dave reached perhaps the most bright area of the dark space. It was illuminated by the six runes, four with metallic luster and another two with bronze colour. Concentrating his mind on them, he thought inwardly, 'What the hell?!'

He clearly recognized those runes since they were related to his past life, precisely, they were skills he had learnt with the help of the System in his past life. Their colours showed their grades. He was stunned to see them here since they were a part of his soul from his past life.

Taking his time to process it, Dave clearly understood that it was somehow related with his Regression ability. Well, it also transferred his experience from his past life, so perhaps, it still hid some surprises he needed to unravel!?

However, as he was thinking about it, he felt strong repulsive force driving his mind out of the dark place. Driven back, Dave thought, 'Damn! Should be the end of my deep meditation.' A moment later, he opened his eyes as he sat cross-legged on his bed.