A lost dream

Life is like a triangle with three important values – like a secret code in a computer program. At the very top, you've got Hard Work. Then comes Intelligence on one side and Ambition on the other.

This is the truth. At least it was for Axel. Everyone's top and bottoms priority could be different but for Axel hard work was the key for life to go every steps.

Living in this world can be tough for an average person. Imagine putting in all the effort and hard work, but still not reaching the destination your ambition aimed for. Everything turns blank, like a field covered in snow. For someone who puts hard work as their top priority, the first failure might be enough to make them give up.

They settle into a routine dictated by societal pressure, investing their time in a company and receiving a monthly salary. Living this robotic life without chasing dreams feels like having a nutshell without any nuts.

Society promises with enough effort you can live a good life a better life is obviously full of lies. A lie that was inherited from one generation of losers to another. A lie made up by the business man to stop you to go further, to chase the dream you always dreamed about to success.

Ambition, which should be our first priority, often ends up being placed third, directly or indirectly.

The truth is, society doesn't want middle-class families like us to taste success. It's a harsh reality.

Not all people are made equal and neither does enough effort equate to success. All we can do is fight for survival and try again and again to be successful.

After all hope is nothing but a wish. There is only bad luck nothing is lucky for the person who aren't born intelligent, smart, strong or even rich.

Axel is living representor of the unlucky person. An average person. He gathered knowledge as much as he can to lead a good life.

His luck in genetic pool was bad, giving him a frail body. He didn't even had the luck of having rich and supportive parents. Which caused him his ambition. But after all of this with his slightly Above-average brain and understanding in human, he held on, trying to survive in this Dog-eat-dog world.

Like everyone else, he went to schools, college, university, got a computer science and engineering degree, and became a corporate slave like every ambitious computer science students. Like the majority of the people, making the rich richer. But still, the poor became poorer. A perfect balance created by the hierarchy of society.

At a certain point in his life, Axel realized how meaningless everything had become. He felt like a failure, and no matter how much effort he put in, he couldn't escape the pit he had dug for himself. Unlike most people, he decided to quit his job as soon as he came to this realization.

He wanted to make things right again, but all he saw in front of him was darkness.

Taking a break from all of this nonsense, he moved back to his old home in the village to do whatever he wanted, just like the experiments he dreamt of in his youth. Living on a farm and growing new, modern crops allowed him to rediscover the path he once envisioned, although it was now shorter. The grand vision he had might never be possible, but despite that, he found happiness.

Today was special for him. The first thing he wanted to do to celebrate was to gaze at the twinkling stars that were invisible in his city life. After all, what could be a better treat than seeing countless worlds in the sky?

Driving his old bashed-up second-hand car, he went to a hill nearby his village with least amount of light. He was sure that the stars would be visible there. As expected, he could see the tiny specs of light twinkling in the night sky.

As Axel lay under the night sky, watching millions of chemical reactions, he felt tiny. His whole lifetime seemed like a grain of sand—insignificant and unimportant. As he was about to fall asleep, he noticed some light flickering in the sky, brighter than the stars, leaving trails behind.

"Are they meteors?" he wondered, or perhaps satellites falling from space debris? Regardless, they looked pretty. Without realizing it, he wished for another chance, a chance he'd never give up on, no matter what.

Just as he made that wish, light from the meteors intensified. Rather than going across the earth atmosphere and burning into oblivion, one of the light came crashing down toward earth, slowly increasing in size as it neared Axel.

Axel was perplexed to see this. He wanted another chance in life, not an easy death. After scrambling to his feet, Axel ran to his car to start its engine. For some reason, the car stalled and the meteor crashed into his car, Destroying the Car and everything in the vicinity the smithereens.

Axel who was inside the car too died in that event.

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"It's so cold, no, I'm freezing," Axel thought as he woke up from a nightmare. He breathed heavily, looking around to see where he was.

When he looked at his right hand, he noticed something strange wrapped around it. It resembled two pieces of wood with brown cloths wrapped around his hand like a sandwich. It felt rough and coarse.

"Where am I? What happened to my right hand?" Axel pondered; his mind filled with confusion. He closed his eyes, attempting to recall the events leading to this moment.

He knew he was on a hill near his home, but then what happened? How did I end up here? Did the asteroid really hit me? Is this a lucid dream? He thought while making sense of the situation.

But as expected, nothing changed. He was inside a dilapidated room with dim lighting with a broken hand. It was extremely cold and everything around him was foreign. If that wasn't enough, his right hand twitched from time to time.

"Anyway, it's better than getting smashed into smithereens by a meteor." With this thought Axel slowly standing up. The wooden flooring creaked and made a screeching noise.

Axel felt soreness all over his body while standing up. Yet it didn't stop him from moving around. Even though everything around him was unfamiliar.

He knew this scenario playing around him. "This is just like a game. Just think this as a game." Axel barking in his mind to calm himself.

Being cautious he began to observe the world around him. The dilapidated wooden cabin was small and dirty.

There was leather and fur stacked on the side of the bed and a tiny oil lamp could be seen lit near him on a clay pot. Clothes that he was wearing were also made out of some kind of animal leather and it covered him completely. Providing him with ample warmth.

"This place is definitely not from Earth. And in the country, it's impossible to hunt a wild animal," Axel concluded, his mind racing with thoughts. Carefully, he peered through the window, revealing tall trees and a blanket of snow covering the entire area. It seemed like he was looking from a high vantage point.

"This wooden cabin is on a tree!" Axel thought, feeling a bit frightened. As he noticed different cabins in various trees, Axel had a startling realization – he was indeed reincarnated in an ancient civilization on a different world.

The problem was evident – Axel was inside someone else's body, and he had no memory of the body's original owner, contrary to what one might expect. Surprisingly, Axel felt relaxed when he realized this. It was beyond his control, and there was no point in worrying about it anymore.

"If I'm dead, I'm dead. What more can I do about that?" Axel thought, accepting the situation. He lifting his broken arm to ensure it was alright despite moving it around. With a determined spirit, he made his way toward the door, curious about what awaited him beyond.