His eyes flickered open. The dim light from a lamp was the first thing he saw, but his sight was blurry. He blinked a couple of times to clear it. Finally, he could make out the figure of the lamp after a few blinks.
The lamp stood at the edge of the table. It had a metallic base and a metallic cylindrical top, but unlike other lamps he had known, this one had a warm glowing crystal inside it.
"Huh? A crystal lamp? I've seen this exact lamp," he said and tried to get up, but was hit with a splitting headache.
"Arghhhh!" He cried out in pain, moving his hands to rub his temple slowly, his eyes going back to the lamp.
"I've seen this. I know I have, but where?" he asked, struggling to remember. He looked over the rest of the table.
It was a small table with a stack of thick-covered books on one side. A piece of paper lay on the table, completely stained with blood. As his eyes met the paper, he flinched back in shock.
"What the hell?" he said. He moved forward carefully and picked up the paper. There was something imprinted at the top; half of it was covered in blood, but he could make out the first four letters.
-Blac.-
When he saw those letters, a memory popped into his mind: the lamp, this table, this stack of books. He quickly picked up one of the books and read what was imprinted on the cover.
There was an insignia on it—a wand and a sword crossed over a shield depicting a vermillion bird.
And under it was written in bold letters: BLACK PHOENIX ACADEMY.
"What the hell?" he yelled out. "This... this academy was from the novel I read before bed," he said. He let go of the book and stood up. The chair behind him toppled to the ground.
"Is this a prank?" he asked himself, but then he recalled that he lived a lonely life, with barely any close friends or people to talk to.
He picked up the lamp from the table and tried to take a look around the room. He tripped on the chair that had fallen in his rush, but he quickly got back up and picked up the lamp.
He looked around under the dim light, struggling to see the full outline of the room. He could tell immediately—it was the outline of a standard bedroom in the academy.
"What is happening? This can't be a dream; I felt pain when I fell," he said. He drew a deep breath and tried to calm himself down.
"Could it be? Did I enter the novel? Is that possible? It looks to be so," he said, thinking about how crazy it was that he could possibly be in the novel.
Knock Knock.
He paused. He didn't even know who he was yet; how was he supposed to respond to whoever that was? He decided to keep quiet and let them think he was asleep.
Knock Knock.
He still didn't respond. He watched the door like a hawk and said nothing.
"I'm pretty sure you aren't asleep yet, Raze," a male voice came from behind the door. "I just want to inform you that a full investigation is going to be launched.
Annabel almost died because of you, and if it's found to be true, you'll be expelled from the academy, and you'll lose everything.
Your scholarship, your privileges, your pride. Your jealousy has brought you to your end."
The person finished speaking and started walking away. He could hear the footsteps as they got farther and farther away.
"Raze... he called me Raze. I remember that character."
___________
Inside a small room, holding only a single one-person bed, a small table, and a laptop on it, a young man in a black T-shirt and ripped jeans sat at the table, engrossed in what he was reading.
His name was Nathan, a jobless college dropout who, rather than find a job, decided to read novels and play games.
Nathan leaned back on his chair and stared at the ceiling. "This Raze character reminds me of myself. Dropped out of school because of an issue that happened by accident.
But he didn't have to try and kill the girl in such a crude way to cover his tracks. If he hadn't, that simp of an MC wouldn't have killed him.
But the writer just had to make him a disposable villain that the MC used to show how good he is. Bullshit, if you ask me, to be honest," Nathan said. He slowly closed his eyes, drifting into sleep with the thought of how Raze was treated unfairly when you looked deeper into it.
This had been his third time reading this book, and every time, it felt new to him. His understanding of Raze was always the same.
His eyes shut completely, and he fell asleep, never to wake in that world again.
___________
"Raze... he called me Raze. I remember that character," he said.
"Wait, I am Raze? The small villain that gets killed the day he tries to assassinate the girl that could get him expelled? Shit, what a way to enter a new world," he said, but then a thought came to him.
"Raze was wronged in the story. That was what made him into a villain. He was the top student until the protagonist came and started getting favored.
All that Raze fought for and built by himself was taken away by the protagonist, and in anger, he started to do some things that were questionable.
I never liked the decisions that Raze took. They were rash and rough. He never had the makings of a long-term villain.
But that changes now. I'm Raze now. I can actually be a better villain than him—not one that gets expelled tomorrow and has nothing, or the one that gets killed, but the one that actually thrives and wins this."