Is there anything worse than being a forty-two-year-old NEET virgin suffering from morbid obesity?

  Hell yeah, there is!

  A sudden death in a muddy alley, at the hands of a group of hooded thugs fueled by alcohol and drugs. I never would have thought that a simple evening walk would put an end to my pathetic existence.

  Anyone watching from a distance would have seen nothing more than a fat, unkempt loser with a greasy beard, choking on his own blood as he lay dying in a puddle. That worthless failure was me — Oskar Zelek, an economist by education, a NEET by fate. I had lived with my parents for twelve years, avoiding people and work whenever I was forced to.

  I remember the day of my death clearly.

  Rain tapped against the window, and the wind swayed the tall willows behind the fence. From downstairs, I could hear my siblings talking with our parents — sounds I quickly drowned out with music blasting through my headphones. A TV series played on one screen, pornography on some other live-destroying stuff. While my parents entertained their grandchildren and my brothers and sisters talked about their lives, I sat slouched in my old chair, empty cans littering the filthy floor, my stomach pressing against the edge of the desk.

  I had wanted to go to the store, but it was already past ten. Closed. Of course. Always late. Always something going wrong. My fingers trembled as I scrolled through yet another trashy show, my other hand fumbling for the last bite of cold pizza. Life had become a series of these failures: missed opportunities, unpaid bills, ruined relationships, and a rotten mind addicted to distraction.

  I didn’t know when I let myself fall this far. My reflection in the monitor, distorted by the glare of the screen, reminded me of everything I hated about myself. A lazy, weak, disgusting waste. Every plan I ever had had failed. Every small dream had died quietly in my chest. I was a burden, a shadow in my own house. No woman would ever want me. No friend could tolerate me for long. No future awaited beyond this room, this chair, this cycle of games, porn, and alcohol.

  At first, it all seemed harmless. I had done decently in school, drifted forward year by year, wasting time on games and trashy shows. I barely graduated high school in a larger city in western Poland. Later, during university — which my parents forced me into — years of accumulated stress finally crushed me. Depression, anxiety, and eating disorders took over and stayed with me until the day I died.

  I knew perfectly well that what I was doing was a trap. I knew games, junk food, and porn were poison. My brain screamed at me to get up, find work, do something meaningful. But my body, one ninety kilograms of weak muscles under layers and layers of fat, refused. Every step hurt. Every breath was a labor. My legs, short and pudgy, felt heavier than stone. My spine ached, my knees protested every movement. I had intelligence enough to understand I was wasting my life — but that knowledge didn’t change anything. I had surrendered.

  The world slowly blurred.

  Days passed in a haze, and I became a shadow of who I once was. That fateful day, just before Christmas Eve, my monitors burned brightly into my eyes. I felt weak. Mixing energy drinks with beer hadn’t helped. Pizza boxes and fast-food wrappers littered the floor. From downstairs came the voices of family members I had long since pretty much cut myself off from.

  To them, I was nothing. A failure who had only himself to blame. Our connection had thinned over the years to the point of near-invisibility. I barely existed in their lives anymore, and they barely existed in mine. Perhaps that was some small mercy.

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  I couldn’t stand the suffocating atmosphere any longer. I needed air. I needed distance from the smell of old beer, the hum of the TV, the constant reminder that I was falling apart. So I decided to go out for a walk — not to think about solutions, not to fix myself. That was beyond me. I just needed to move, even if it was aimless.

  I slipped out through the back door, throwing on a jacket that barely zipped. I grabbed the first pair of shoes I could find, bent down to tie my laces, and wheezed with the effort. Every motion reminded me how weak I was. My body was a prison, my mind a torment.

  The cold rain immediately soaked me, cutting across my skin. I wanted to disappear into the night, to vanish from everything.

  That's when I saw her.

  Mrs. Kowalska, our neighbor, a small, stooped woman with silver hair tucked under a scarf, was standing near the fence. She had a habit of checking on everyone in the neighborhood, always with a cup of herbal tea or a few kind words.

  "Oskar?" she called softly. "Out for a walk, are we? The weather isn’t great, but at least our health’s holding up. That’s the main thing, isn’t it? One body, and there’s no replacement, haha. How’s your mother doing? And you — are you doing well? I've heard from your mother that you are actively looking for a job, huh? I guess that damn government makes it hard for youngsters nowdays"

  I froze, my chest tightening. Her voice was so normal it hurt. She really treated me like a human.

  "I… I’m fine," I muttered, barely above a whisper.

  "You look pale, dear. Don’t overdo it. Keep moving, don’t catch a chill. And say hello to your mother for me, hmm? I hope you have a pleasant day now. Remember, life’s too short to waste. Take care of yourself, Oskar."

  She smiled, with that patient kindness, then shuffled down the street. I watched her go, rain dripping off her scarf, and felt a pang of shame so sharp I wanted to sink into the ground. Even now, someone cared. Even now, I was seen as more than the pile of failures I had become. And yet… here I was, soaked, broken, alone, and utterly unworthy.

  The park was empty. I often came here to cool my mind. To grab some peace. To rethink stuff.

  I walked maybe for fifteen minutes, rain poured in sheets. And then… I saw her. A young woman I didn't recognised, maybe nineteen or twenty, with a thin frame and dark hair plastered to her face by the rain. She was clearly outnumbered, shoved by a gang of rowdy young men, her umbrella abandoned on the wet pavement. Fear shone in her wide eyes, and for the briefest moment, I felt something familiar — a reflexive, human instinct buried under years of self-loathing.

  I thought about walking around them, avoiding trouble. But my frustration, my anger at everything, boiled over.

  "What the hell do you think you’re doing!?" I shouted, my voice hoarse, uselessly projecting authority from my limp body.

  One of them — huge, built like a truck, rage burning in his eyes — charged at me without hesitation. He grabbed and shoved me, trying to tear at my collar.

  "You got a problem, fatass!? Want to get wrecked!?"

  The others joined in. I landed a punch on one of them, but then a glass bottle smashed against my skull. My vision blurred. Kicks and blows rained down. I was drowning in pain and fury, and yet the hooded girl escaped while they were busy with me.

  And then a strange thing happened. Even as I gasped for breath, battered, half-blinded, something inside me felt… calm. Accepting. There was no fight left. I realized I didn’t care about surviving. My life had been a series of failures, disappointments, and missed chances. This could be the end, and I didn’t even mind. I was tired. So very tired.

  My strength faded. Sounds became muffled. The last thing I registered was the sharp crack of breaking glass — and then darkness swallowed me.

  I drifted in blackness, stripped of all senses. Endless boredom gnawed at me, broken only by my own thoughts. Fear, yes, but also a strange relief. Relief that maybe, finally, the weight of everything would be lifted.

  Then… something happened.

  A passage appeared — a tunnel of blinding light. I felt my body dissolve, torn apart by a force beyond understanding. Resistance was useless. My consciousness screamed inside my head as warmth and bliss washed over me.

  And then — darkness again.

  Cold, fear, and a foul stench replaced the light. I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t walk. Something soft squished beneath me. I was on all fours. I had four legs… and a jagged, unfamiliar mouth.

  This was definitely not my fat human body.

  Fear, yes, of course, but also a wild curiosity.

  Is this really happening?

  Can I go back?

  Or am I like this forever?

  I remembered stories, novels I had read — isekai tales where someone is transported to another world. Like the Pevensie siblings in The Chronicles of Narnia or Rimuru in Reincarnated as a Slime.

  Then it struck me: had I… been reborn? Really!?