His eyes fluttered open once more, but this time, he found himself floating in an even stranger place.
It was dark and endless, closely resembling the void he usually read about in web novels.
And this time, he was not alone.
There were two glowing humanoid figures floating in the void right beside him, one on his left and the other on his right.
The two snapped their heads in his direction simultaneously.
"Floki?"
They both called out at the same time, and shockingly, he recognized their voices.
"Noah? Magnus?"
They were his two best friends.
The two of them floated forward and came to a stop in front of him, their glowing forms steady as they scrutinized him from head to toe.
"Dude, why the heck are you only arriving now?"
Magnus asked, his usual aggressiveness clearly present in his tone.
Floki understood his personality well enough to ignore the sharpness behind his words.
Even so, he was still stunned by the meaning hidden within that question.
"How long have you guys been here?" he asked.
"We cannot really tell the actual time, but it should be at least an hour."
Noah responded calmly before continuing.
"What happened to you?"
Floki paused for a moment.
It seemed his friends had arrived in the void immediately after that black mass swallowed them.
Unlike him, who had entered an entirely new world and met new people.
It appeared that after blacking out there due to the sudden migraine, he had been sent here instead.
But why?
That question echoed silently within his mind.
"You're not answering."
Magnus' voice pulled him back to the present.
He looked up to see the two of them staring at him, their expressions filled with expectation.
He told them everything he had experienced, hiding nothing and leaving out no detail.
The two of them listened attentively, their reactions restrained until he finally finished speaking.
"What!!"
The moment his narration ended, their reactions exploded.
They began asking several questions at once. Magnus spoke out of confusion and agitation, while Noah asked out of pure curiosity.
But before Floki could begin answering any of them, a powerful suction force suddenly emerged out of nowhere.
The force latched onto the three friends at once, dragging and pushing each of them in different directions.
"What is happening!"
Magnus' voice echoed through the void as the force pulled him farther away from the others.
Noah's screams could also be heard, growing more distant with every passing second.
Neither of them knew what fate awaited them.
Floki, on the other hand, did not react as violently.
He only let out a startled yelp as the force suddenly tugged at him as well.
Unlike his two friends, he had a subtle understanding of what was about to happen.
He kept his eyes fixed on the void, watching as his two friends grew smaller and smaller due to the increasing distance between them.
Then, in an instant, they vanished, never to be seen again. Each of them had been sent somewhere unknown, to do something unknown.
He felt a sharp tug within his chest.
A realization slowly dawned on him.
That he might never be able to see them again.
The situation, despite being supernatural, was not difficult to grasp.
Being pulled in different directions meant they were being sent to different worlds altogether.
In such circumstances, meeting one another again was almost impossible.
His mind then resurfaced with the image of his lovely mother, whom he never had the chance to say goodbye to.
How would she react to his sudden disappearance?
She would definitely be heartbroken.
His chest ached even more, and warmth gathered in his eyes as tears slowly began to fall.
"Maybe… we might be able to see each other one day."
That was the final thought that surfaced before the void completely faded away.
===
"What is happening?"
"Is he going to be okay?"
"If only our herbalist was still alive, he could have helped our young chief."
He was awakened by the worried voices surrounding him.
When he finally opened his eyes, he saw several unfamiliar faces hovering above him, each one carrying deep concern in their expressions.
The three muscular men who had taken him out of the room earlier were also present.
"He is awake!"
"Young chief is awake!"
Their worries vanished almost instantly, and they began to jubilate in loud and cheerful voices.
However, their voices sounded blurred and distant in his ears due to the strange phenomenon occurring inside his head.
New memories had surfaced.
Fragmented memories belonging to a young man named Floki Ironside began to emerge. More precisely, the original owner of the body he was now inhabiting.
The memories showed his childhood, along with the brutal training and strict tutoring he had endured under his father, Ragnar Ironside.
His father had been killed in a war six years ago.
As a result of his death, Floki naturally became the next in line due to the crystal of authority his family possessed.
However, news of his father's death soon spread across the neighbouring villages, turning him into a target.
A particular village, Blackstone Village, ruled by a chief whose crystal of authority granted him the power of a powerful knight, eventually struck.
They took over Floki's village by force.
The chief subdued them easily, and in exchange for sparing their lives, he took more than half of the village population as slaves.
He did not stop there.
Every two weeks, he would return to collect harvest tax, taking almost everything the villagers had worked for.
The village slowly fell into starvation.
Yesterday, Floki had attacked one of the soldiers sent to collect the loot and was badly beaten in return.
This morning, he was confirmed dead.
This evening, he was meant to be buried.
That was the reason the villagers were so shocked to see him alive.
"This…"
As the fragmented memories ended, he finally understood his identity and situation far better than before.
There were other revelations within the memories as well, such as the unique abilities granted to each leader who possessed a crystal of authority.
Some leaders could summon knights and divine beasts.
Some received fertility blessings for their land.
Others even gained supernatural boosts to their physical strength.
But before he could dig any deeper into these memories, several holographic windows suddenly appeared in front of him.
[ Congratulations, you've been transmigrated. ]
[ You've received a hell-level difficulty mission. ]
[Special Talent: Infinite Reward Multiplier has been added. ]
[ … ]