Chapter 1

`Where am I´ This was the only question roaming in my head. Well, with good reason too seeing as all that surrounded me was pure darkness. I couldnt see where the darkness ended. Hell I didnt even know for how long I had been stuck here.I had been trying to search for light, any source of light, but it havent been successful in any kind of way. I had also spent a lot of time remembering the last thing that happened to me before I found myself in this place.

- Flashback

My name is Joanna Helix. I am twenty-three years old and a graduate of New York Film Academy, or NYFA for short. I had been working towards my goal to become a movie director ever since I saw my first movie as a young girl, but so far had no luck in my endeavours.

I had been applying to many different movie studios since my graduation, but there werent many that wanted an unexperienced director. While I could understand their sentiment, if they wouldnt give me the experience, then how would I get it? It was the same problem with many other jobs too, experience, experience and even more experience, but no-one willing to give it. It actually made me a bit mad at times, but thats life I guess.

I was walking down the street towards my small apartement after another rejection, but had to stop as I noticed smoke rising from a building. There was no-one at the scene so I called the station and told them the location. I waited for multiple minutes, and by now other people had noticed as well, forming a crowd outside.

Flames suddenly bursted out from a window on one of the middle floors and we could hear screams from inside, the screams of children to be exact. I once again looked at the clock on my phone and saw that it had been almost ten minutes since I called it in, and no signs of them arriving, hell, not even a siren could be heard in the distance.

I heard the screams get louder and could no longer hold myself back. I ran to the door and swung it open. It was a bit of a hassle to run in heels, but I managed by sheer miracle. I ran up the stairs while searching room after room in the building. It wasnt until I reached the third floor that I found someone. It seemed to be a family of five, four children and a mother. The mother seemed to be unconscious on the floor with three of the children fussing over her. The fourth was only a toddler and had no understanding of what was transpiring around him.

I ran up to the woman and checked her pulse, she was alive, but had inhaled quite a bit of smoke while shielding her kids. I looked at the kids who looked at me with hope in their eyes.

"You three, grab the smallest and help him out. I will take your mother." They hesitated but I just spoke again. "Now!"

This seemed to have woken them up from their thoughts as the one I would assume to be the eldest grabbed the toddler.

"Put your heads down and try not to breathe the smoke." I said and they nodded.

I slung the woman onto my back and crouched a bit before I started to lead them outside. We managed to get to the exit and could see the light from outside. I started to hear creaking, and then, black. I saw nothing else.

- Flashback end.

I kept thinking for a while that I was in some sort of comatose dream world, but after a while I dropped that idea. Mostly because the time I spent here felt like decades. Are comatose dreams supposed to last that long? I wouldnt know, but one thing I did know was that the silence was killing me.

I spent more time after I finished my thought. What felt like decades, became centuries. Centuries turned into millenia. Time passed, and I still couldnt find a way out. I also seemed to become a bit crazy seeing as I started to talk to myself. Well not exactly talk, but think. I didnt have a body anymore after all, hahaha.

As I was slowly losing myself to my inner madness, I saw a light that seemed to approach at a fast speed. It took a while seeing as it was so far away in the beginning, but it soon engulfed me. It was so bright that I had to close my non-existant eyes for that split second. When I opened them again, I was located in a white space, much like the black one. There was no change other than the black changing to white. I just sighed and prepared myself to stay here for just as long, but a blue screen appeared in front of my eyes, and I noticed that my body had returned somewhat. It was only see through, but I was still happy that it was there. I once again looked at the blue screen.

"Welcome to the new life program. On this screen you will be able to choose your appearence as well as asking for up to three boons to take with you in your new life. Have in mind that the world you will enter will be shown, so base your boons off of it. This means no superpower in a normal world and such. Please enjoy."

New life? Boons? I had read multiple mangas as well as fanfics about the subject, but had never thought about it happening to me. But this also finally answered my question about what happened to me. I must have been crushed under a beam or something. That would also explain the creaking sounds I heard before everything went black.

During my thoughts the screen had changed. It now showed multiple tabs noted as hair, color, eyes, skin etc. I quickly looked through it while slowly creating my new body.

I chose a more gothic style. I chose pale skin, lips with green lipstick. Shoulder-length hair dyed in shades of green. The outfit I chose to start with consists of a corset-like black top with blue and green sleeves, a black and green skirt, black nylons, knee-high black boots and a choker necklace.

Having put in my appearence, I was brought to another screen with three input lines. I suspected they were for the so called boons, so I wrote what I wanted. On the bottom however, I noticed a line of important info.

"Notice: Once chosen, a boon cannot be altered. Also keep in mind that you will enter a normal world, much like your original, however, the world is also inhabited by people you once thought of as fictional."

This had my attention. Now that I knew what kind of world I would enter, I wrote down my three wishes so to speak. (A/N They will be revealed at a later date.)

After having written my wishes down, the screen changed one final time with a small message.

"Thank you for having cooperated with us. Now, go and enjoy your new life."

I barely managed to read it before it vanished, and once again everything went black.

I woke up on what I could only assume was a soft bed, a very soft bed. Opening my eyes, I was met with a room with blue walls. I laid there thinking if everything was a dream, when I heard a sound in my head.

"Ding: Welcome to your new life."

"Well shit...."