Reborn 단편 소설 & Independence Superpowers 소설

I was the second princess of the Phoenix Court. And I fell in love with a lowly black serpent. In my past life, just to be with him, I purposely picked that black serpent during the Sacred Bonding ceremony when we each chose our companion beasts. After that, we spent every night together. I didn't care what the whole clan thought. I was determined to marry him. But on our wedding day, that same serpent I'd given my heart to drove an arrow straight through me, killing me while I was three months pregnant. As I lay dying, I heard him hiss bitterly in my ear, "If it weren't for you, I'd have been with Seraphine by now. You should've died a long time ago." That's when I finally got it. All he cared about was power. And he'd been in love with my older sister all along—the sister who was next in line for the Phoenix throne. When I opened my eyes again, we were back at that same moment—the Sacred Bonding ceremony. Before everyone, he dropped to his knees and confessed he loved my sister. He begged not to be bound to me. The whole clan looked at me with pity. But I only smiled and pointed to a small white serpent resting quietly off to the side. That black serpent thought clinging to my sister would make him powerful. What he didn't realize was that only the one I chose would become the true heir to the Phoenix Court.

I set fire to my painting in front of the entire academy. Thunderous applause erupts from the crowd as everyone thinks it's some kind of performance art. Unlike them, Willow Laurent is distraught. She rushes up and grabs my hand, questioning in a shrill voice, "Cassidy Seymour, have you gone mad? This is your only chance to prove yourself!" I shake her hand off me coldly. My only chance? No… What she means is that it's her chance. In my past life, I created this masterpiece with all my heart and soul. But she stole it from me and submitted it as her entry first. Whether it was the composition, the colors, or even my original dot-stippling technique… She replicated every detail flawlessly. Then, she won the National Young Artists Gold Award, signed with a top gallery, and became a rising star. And what about me? I was condemned as a shameless plagiarist. Insults and curses gradually drowned me. "You shouldn't be an artist!" "Plagiarists are scum! They should just die!" Her fans stormed into my studio, smashed my art supplies, and broke my right hand. As I saw no end to the hell that I was living in, I jumped down from the top floor of my studio. When I open my eyes again, I'm back to the very day she first accuses me of plagiarism.

My husband is from a wolf pack with a throne to inherit, but despite all my efforts, I can never give him a son. He finds it shameful that I only give birth to daughters, forgetting how I risked my life to save him. So, he begins an affair with my sister. Later, for the sake of the male offspring in my sister's belly, he brutally throws my daughter to her death and made me cough up blood until I die. Now that I am reborn, I no longer want any connection with him and avoid the path where I save him. But I never expected that my reborn sister would rescue him instead. They smugly mock me for being unable to bear male heirs. But she doesn't know that the ten-thousand-year-old Creator Goddess bloodline flowing through my veins has already been quietly awakened. My daughter will inherit the power of the goddess and become the ruler of the new world.

My adopted daughter, Phoebe Marsh, possessed an evil ability. Whenever she got hurt, the pain would also be inflicted directly on my biological daughter, Maisie Shaw. She deliberately hurt herself, covering her body with wounds and bruises. Then, she would turn around with cold eyes, watching Maisie writhe on the floor in agony until she passed out from the pain. With no medical solution available, I broke down and held Maisie close, begging my husband, Brandon Shaw, to send Phoebe away. However, he would erupt in fury. "It's obviously Maisie who's been faking illness for attention, and you're making up this ridiculous story to get rid of Phoebe. She's just a fragile, helpless child. How can you be so vicious?" After that, Phoebe escalated her self-harm even more viciously. Meanwhile, Maisie spent every day curled up in the corner of her bed, refusing to let anyone touch her. On Maisie's birthday, Phoebe threw herself from the fifth floor. Just as Maisie was blowing out her candles and making a wish, she suddenly began bleeding from all her facial orifices, and she died instantly. Yet, Phoebe only suffered minor scrapes. I died from overwhelming grief shortly after. When I opened my eyes again, I had returned to Phoebe's first day in our home. Maisie was playing with her Legos when she suddenly clutched her ankle and started crying. This time, I grabbed the broom from behind the door and swung it toward Maisie, shouting, "I'll beat you up for faking illness and seeking attention!"

After checking my final exam results, I hand the bottle of water given by my mother and the amethyst bracelet given by my childhood friend to the school bully with AIDS. In my previous life, my exam score of 1250 was swapped with the score of 600 of my younger adopted sister, Adelia Quentin, right after I drank that bottle of water. My health immediately deteriorated in the following days. I had a high fever and kept on coughing up blood. I was even nearly bedridden from severe pain. On the other hand, Adelia miraculously recovered from her stomach cancer. I begged my mother to send me to the hospital. But not only did she refuse, but she even mocked me and accused me of faking my illness. She then locked me in the basement. They celebrated Adelia's enrollment in university while I writhed helplessly in pain. In the end, I died in the basement all alone. After my death, Adelia used my exam score of 1250 to study at a renowned university. She also officially started her relationship with Thomas Haynes, my childhood friend. It was only then that I finally realized that the bottle of water my mother handed me had been cursed. My exam results would be swapped away when I drank it. Meanwhile, the amethyst bracelet Thomas gifted me would swap my health condition with Adelia's three days after I wore it. I'd get Adelia's stomach cancer and die a painful death. Just as I open my eyes again, I find myself back on the day I checked my exam results.

In my previous life, I was born at the stroke of a cold, pitch-black midnight on New Year's Day, an omen the old town whispered about. They called me a Deathbringer's child, destined to guide the souls of the stillborn to rest. From the age of six, I carried small coffins alone to the graveyard by the church, burying them in silence. Each time, when I reached into the velvet shroud that wrapped the tiny casket, I would find a golden coin resting inside. My mother sold those coins for money, buying my brother a grand mansion, while leaving me behind in the crumbling family house to keep doing the work. No one expected the world of Haunts to descend. However, those coins turned out to be tokens of command, keys that bound the Haunts of the apocalypse to my will. With them, I became the Empress of the End, feared by all, ruling with every resource at my command.

Grandpa died, and we immediately went for each other's throats over the inheritance. Then a blizzard hit, trapping us all in the family estate. An app appeared on our phones: [THE LAST ZOMBIE: FINAL RECKONING]. We had to pick a hiding spot. The last one standing—the last human standing—would inherit everything. I chose the dark, silent recording studio in the basement. Away from them all. When it was time to pick special powers, my family chose powerful weapons or pocket dimensions full of supplies. I chose Bio-Stasis. It slowed my cells to a crawl, and my body along with them. My stepbrother's fiancée, Chloe, called me an idiot. "Hiding from your family and picking a useless power? You're on a suicide mission." They threw a zombie-slaying party upstairs, already celebrating an inheritance they hadn't even won. Until, one by one, they turned. And started tearing each other apart. What they didn't know... was that I'd rigged the game from the start. The only way to win was to stay completely silent.

The day I found out I was pregnant with my second child, the impossible happened: the baby in my womb spoke. "Stupid sister, are you even listening? Mom said that as soon as you graduate, she's selling you off. That money is for my future wedding!" My daughter went still. She didn't say a word, didn't confront me, didn't even cry. She just quietly applied to study abroad. And from that day on, I never heard from her again. My husband, seeing how devastated I was, moved to comfort me. But the baby's voice cut through the silence once more. "Comfort her? You're the biggest fool in this house! When I'm born, I'm not calling you 'Dad.' My real dad is that handsome guy from the bar!" The color drained from Sean's face. Before I could utter a word of explanation, he dragged me straight to the hospital for a paternity test. The results came back quickly—my best friend had pulled some strings to expedite them. And there it was, in cold, clinical print: NO PATERNITY BIOLOGICALLY ESTABLISHED. He didn't let me speak. He filed for divorce immediately. In a panic, the baby's voice cried out from inside me again, "Why is the idiot backing out now? Did he finally figure out Mom tricked him? The one who saved his life all those years ago wasn't her—it was her best friend!" That one sentence shattered my entire world. My husband turned his back on me and married my best friend. As for me… the shock and grief hit me like a physical blow. I felt a hot, sudden gush of blood. Before the doctors could save me, I died on that cold hospital bed, my hands clutching my swollen belly, my mind still reeling, unable to comprehend how my life had unraveled so completely. It wasn't until I was reborn, and once again heard the treacherous little voice inside me, that I finally began to understand the truth.

After my family and I are dragged into a roguelike horror simulation, they favor my cousin, Julian Clark, over me. In a lobby of blood-soaked players, he always manages to stay spotless, earning their praise as someone who has "kept his humanity". He's unlike me, the brute who willingly throws himself into melee combat and hacks down monsters just to keep everyone else alive. During one dungeon run, a terrifying entity targets my younger sister, Millie Larsson. I draw my blade and move in for the kill, but Julian stops me with a sorrowful smile. "Every creature has a soul. Gabriel, if you kill it, you'll only enrage it and burden Millie with the sin of bloodshed." Millie believes all the nonsense he says and begins resenting me for interfering. Later, when a veteran player steals Julian's life-saving loot drop, I nearly die reclaiming it for him. Instead of thanking me, he takes pity on the woman robbing him and hands the item back to her. He condemns me for being too ruthless, claiming I know nothing about showing mercy to women. Then comes the advanced raid. Cornered by the final boss, I beg Julian to activate the high-tier talisman I've given him, buying me just one second to escape. He recoils from my bloodstained hand in disgust and turns to my parents instead. "Gabriel provoked the boss himself. He's too violent. I can't risk wiping the whole party just to save him." In the end, I die in the boss' jaws. Julian steps over my shattered bones and blood to clear the raid, eventually becoming the server's most celebrated player for being the Untainted Saint. But fate grants me a second chance. I awaken once more in the game's central lobby, right before everything begins. This time, I want to see how long their precious humanity lasts in a world overrun by horrors when the blood-soaked blade that always carries their party is no longer there to protect them.