I'm Gonna Be a Wizard When I Grow up Again!

A man sat in a hospital bed. His name… did not matter. After all, he was about to die. Though he was about to die, he had no major regrets. He chuckled to himself and thought, “Well, maybe that I didn’t become a wizard.” Not that that was a possibility. After all, there was no magic. Just like there was nothing that could save him from death that night. In the end, age will get to everyone. Finally came the time for him to go, and he breathed his last breath, with no strong regrets.

Well, he was not entirely without regrets. He was not good with people, and had never married. His relatives had already passed on. He wished he had some people here with him in his final moments. However, since he was not very good with people, there was nobody. It didn’t hurt that he spent a lot of time dwelling on the impossible.

Although his life wasn’t up to his ideal, he still didn’t have any major regrets. He would have liked a more engaging and fulfilling career than office worker. Like being a wizard. He’d really wanted to be a wizard. Well, sadly, that was impossible. Finally, he really did take his last breath, with no regrets that could have been fulfilled. If only wizards were real.

-----

The man found death to be more eventful than he had anticipated. Instead of nothingness or a lack of experience altogether, he was in a noisy, cramped room. That was as much as he could tell. He felt an odd sensation, as if he were floating in something. He was beginning to think with all the sounds and feelings that maybe he wasn’t as dead as he’d assumed he was. Maybe he had just fallen unconscious. The doctors sounded like they were working unnecessarily hard to save him. He wasn’t really sure why it was dark. Was he blind?

For the next hour or so, he was very confused. He tried to move, but his body didn’t seem to respond. It was still dark, but he could hear muted voices all around him. Then, there was a strong pressure on his body, and he felt himself moving.

He came into the light. Although he tried to speak to the doctors, no words came out. He squinted his eyes against the sudden and unexpected light. Then, he was startled as he noticed that the people around him who he had assumed to be doctors appeared more like giants. That was his initial thought, but as he thought about it more carefully, he realized it was him who was small. That didn’t make much more sense, but he accepted it. The giants, well, people, didn’t look like doctors though. Their clothing was strange, for one. He also didn’t understand their speech. Even though he thought he was pretty good at such things, he couldn’t even guess what the language was.

He was picked up and held in someone’s arms. He couldn’t see well, but was comforted by it for some reason. He wondered if it was okay to take comfort in the touch of a stranger, but soon stopped worrying about it. He went to sleep.

Of course, an outside observer could have seen a very different story from what the man experienced. There was, in fact, a doctor among the perfectly normal sized people in this room, although his garb did not reveal that. The words that he did not understand were used quite often in similar situations.

“Almost there, just a bit more!”

“Push!”

“Breathe!”

It was quite obvious, from a different perspective, with different knowledge, that there was a woman giving birth. Family and the doctor crowded around during the process. Then, the baby was born, and held in his mother’s arm. Although they had never seen each other before, one’s own mother can certainly not be considered a stranger. Indeed, it was the most natural things possible to take comfort in her arms.

-----

Upon gaining further understanding of his situation, the man’s logical side wanted to believe he was hallucinating. Indeed, having followed his life so far, there would have been no reason to believe what he was experiencing. However, in this case, what dominated was not the rational side, but the emotional side. The part of him that liked things that he would term “awesome”. Things such as reincarnation. The man accepted that he was a baby, and that he was no longer on the Earth he knew.

A normal person may not have accepted similar circumstances so easily. However, he had imagined such things in his world, even though he had not believe in the reality of it. In his current circumstances it would not be entirely sane to disbelieve it as reality, since he had evidence all around him. He also acknowledged that things that were true did not require him to believe in them, they were just true regardless of belief. Many people would not change their beliefs even if confronted with evidence to the contrary, but he liked to think he was better than that.

The man, well, the child now, was excited for the possibilities. Although, there wasn’t anything particularly thrilling about being a baby. There wasn’t much to do, even less than when he had been retired. However, he was excited for the potential that this world held. Basing his hopes on fiction books may have been illogical, but he firmly believed the chances of him entering a world that had magic was very high. If the world had magic, then it had wizards, or something like them. Therefore, he could become a wizard! That was the main thing that excited him.

Reining back his enthusiasm somewhat, he also was appreciative of the chance to live another life, even if this wasn’t a magical world. He’d be disappointed if there were no magic, but that was no reason for him to be disappointed in living a new life. Well, there was still the chance that he was hallucinating. After all, he could be having a stroke, and currently dying. However, he doubted that hallucinations would be so vivid and enduring. He really hoped this was real.