My Seventh Suicide Triggers a System

When the real son, Henry Sylvester, is finally brought back to the family, I, the non-biological child who's taken his place, am already prepared to pack my bags and leave. Instead of letting me go, Henry calls me up to the sixth-floor terrace of the villa and pushes me over the edge. "You've stolen my life for 18 years, Marcel. You should be grateful." I don't struggle. In fact, I deliberately fall headfirst. At that moment, I believe I'm destined to die, but I end up surviving. The doctors even call it a miracle. A fall from the sixth floor should've been fatal, yet I only suffered minor bone dislocations and no other serious injuries. When the Sylvester family asks why I jumped, I tell them the truth about Henry pushing me. Instead of believing me, my elder brother laughs in my face. He shields the meek and frightened-looking Henry from me and warns me not to slander his real brother. The Sylvester couple looks at me with nothing but disappointment. They're convinced I've brought this upon myself and even ask why I haven't chosen somewhere higher to jump from. Frankly, their suggestion makes sense. So, I go to the tenth floor, ready to jump and start my life over. Suddenly, a mechanical voice rings out in my head. "Marcel, this is your seventh attempt at suicide. Are you really going through with it?" Chapter 1 When I opened my eyes again, I saw the same orthopaedic surgeon who had treated me the last time when I fell from the sixth floor. He adjusted his glasses, staring at me with a look of sheer disbelief. "Young man, you still have a long life ahead of you. Sure, your body can handle a lot, but this… this isn't the way to test its limits. You jumped from the tenth floor and still survived! "It's truly a miracle. Your ancestors must've done everything they could to save you." Before leaving the room, the surgeon reminded me again to cherish my life. I wanted to tell him that it was just my life—it didn't matter. Besides, dying was something I had a hard time executing. The next second, the hospital room door was pushed open with a bang. Leon Sylvester, the eldest son of the family and Henry Sylvester's biological brother, walked in. Beside him was, of course, the innocent-looking Henry. "Marcel, are you insane? If you want to die, just do it somewhere else without terrorizing Henry! He still has to prepare for his SAT!" Leon shouted at me. I was helpless, too. If I could, I would've chosen to die immediately. The first time I was close to death, the system found me. It refused to let me die. Instead, I was supposed to find hope in living again before I could have a normal death. I lied to the system and told it that I desperately wanted to live, but it saw right through me. That explained how I walked away almost unharmed despite jumping from the tenth floor. I looked up at the two brothers standing together, their bond seemingly unbreakable. I got out of bed and solemnly asked, "Leon, can you tell me a way where I can die for sure, then? Can you kill me again, Henry?" Perhaps a homicide could be exempted from the system's rule. My question seemed to frighten Henry. He yelped and hid behind Leon. "Leon, w-what's he talking about? He's freaking me out. Is something wrong with him? I-I mean, I can't even kill an ant. Why is he asking me to kill him? "Leon, I'm scared I'll have nightmares from this and that it will affect my performance on the SAT." He was so terrified that he started crying, struggling to catch his breath. Then, I received a slap. When Leon's hand struck my face, I remained so calm that all I could think about was dying. I asked the system, "Tell me, how am I supposed to find the desire to keep living when these are my circumstances?" The Sylvester family could've simply let me leave, but for the sake of appearances, they kept me as their adopted son. Without even realizing it, they kept hurting me again and again. The system didn't answer, and I was used to it. It only ever appeared when I was about to die. My lack of resistance caught Leon off guard, as if he regretted hitting me so hard. But the moment he heard Henry's sobs, the anger returned to his eyes. "Marcel, you've made mistake after mistake. This time, I want you to go home and reflect in the basement!" "Okay," I said obediently. After returning home, I went straight to the basement without uttering a single word. When the last bit of light above my head disappeared, all I could see was darkness. According to what I'd read, a person could only be driven to the brink of death after going seven days without food or water. Thus, I hoped they would lock me up for seven days. That way, I should be able to bypass the system and finally die. Every day, I relied on the voices outside to determine the time. By the sixth day, I was already so weak from hunger that I could barely move. The basement was filled with the stench of my own waste and the musty smell of the poorly ventilated space. The system had yet to appear. Was I finally going to die? Just then, the basement door creaked open, and blinding sunlight poured in, enveloping my body. It was my adoptive parents—Alan Sylvester and Margot Sweeney—and Henry. When they saw the filthy, disgusting state of the basement, they turned around and vomited. Only after that did they look back at me, lying there, barely alive. Henry's voice came from above. "Mom, Dad… I messed up. I forgot that Leon had had him locked up in the basement." Chapter 2 The other day, after locking me in the basement, Leon went on a trip. Henry was busy with his studies, so his forgetting about me sounded perfectly logical. Alan and Margot didn't blame him. Instead, they shifted the blame to me. "Marcel, why didn't you ask for help? Were you trying to die in the basement and drag our family into a scandal?" To them, my death would become nothing more than a scandal. I curled up in the last clean corner of the basement, my eyes hollow. "Can you lock me up for one more day, please?" Just one more day, and I would die. Unfortunately, I didn't get my wish. Alan and Margot looked at me like they had seen a ghost. They immediately had someone carry me out of the basement. After six days without seeing sunlight, I had become sallow and thin, looking more like a dying tree than a high school senior. They fed and nurtured me until I gained back a pound, and only after that did they send me back to school to prepare for the SAT. Henry and I were both in the senior class. When our homeroom teacher, Mr. Freeman, saw me, he frowned and pointed to the seat in the very back corner. "You've been gone for a long time. I thought you'd given up on the SAT." I gripped the straps of my backpack and stated the truth as if I were talking about the weather. "My family locked me up in the basement." Then came Henry's wailing. "Marcel, what are you talking about? If this is because you're upset I'm back, you should just come at me! Why would you slander our family in public?" I had to say, Henry was much smarter than I was. He had only just transferred here a short while ago, yet he had already become the favorite in the class. So, the students who liked him all turned against me. They decided that, as an adopted son, my very genes were flawed and that I was twisted inside. Frankly, I didn't know what I had said wrong. After all, they really had me locked in the basement. Was that not true? Amid the endless accusations, I looked at Henry calmly and said, "You guys really should've kept me locked up for another day." I was only one day away from dying. If I died, my suffering would finally be over. For some reason, Henry seemed terrorized by my words and cried even harder, looking more wronged than ever. In the middle of the chaos, Mr. Freeman tapped on the blackboard and silenced the class with his sharp gaze. "Silence! Marcel, come to the office with me." I left the classroom under my classmates' mocking, gloating stares and followed Mr. Freeman out. The office was quiet, leaving the two of us alone. He sat down and gestured for me to speak. "Tell me exactly what happened while you were away from school." I froze and looked at Mr. Freeman. His gaze was sincere. I had always thought teachers were like gardeners, nurturing and guiding their students. I believed he was the only person who cared enough to check in on me after Henry returned to the family. Thus, leaving out the system, I briefly told him everything that had happened during that time. After listening, Mr. Freeman picked up his phone and pressed the button to stop the recording. He no longer looked at me. Instead, he turned away and called Alan and Margot. I stared at him for a long time. Once the call ended, I asked him, "Were you just tattling on me to my adoptive parents, sir?" Alan and Margot were respected business people who, naturally, cared about their reputation more than anything. If people learned that they had locked me in the basement, it would affect their business. They would never allow something like that to spread, but none of it surprised me. To them, it was perfectly normal. The sincerity in Mr. Freeman's eyes vanished, displaced by a sense of righteousness. "Marcel, I wasn't tattling on you. I'm just asking them to pay more attention to your mental state. You're acting like you have some kind of issue." Oh, what a coincidence. I, too, felt like something was mentally wrong with me. I nodded and no longer pressed the issue. Instead, I waited quietly for Alan and Margot's arrival. Chapter 3 When Alan and Margot arrived at Mr. Freeman's office, I saw them slip an envelope into his hand. Only then did I realize that Mr. Freeman had been doing this for money. The three of them looked at me as if I were a sinner. "Marcel, we've taken good care of you all these years. Why are you trying to get back at us?" "You may not be our son, but you've always had the same food, clothes, and shelter as Henry. What exactly are you still unhappy about?" Their words rained down on me without mercy. Mr. Freeman, beside them, seemed to think they were being too harsh, so he stepped in. "Mr. and Mrs. Sylvester, don't rush to blame Marcel. I suggest you take him to the hospital for a check-up. "If there's something wrong, it's better to intervene early." As he spoke, he pointed to his head, implying that there was something wrong with my mind. However, Alan and Margot didn't seem to care at all. They chose to believe that my unusual behavior stemmed from jealousy of Henry. So, they ignored Mr. Freeman's words. After leaving the school, they never mentioned the incident again. That night, I saw Leon return from his trip. He had brought back souvenirs and was happily handing them out to everyone in the family—except me. "Henry and I sent you to the basement so you could reflect on your mistakes," he said. "But look at you. Not only didn't you learn anything, but you even became more audacious, spewing nonsense in class." "So, why didn't you just lock me up for another day?" I asked stubbornly, refusing to let it go. "I told you guys then that if you'd just locked me up for another day, I would've died the next day. You could've buried me anywhere, and no one would've known." I watched their expressions shift with every second, assuming that they were worried others would discover my disappearance. But I quickly dismissed that thought. No one in this world truly cared about me. "Don't worry," I told them. "I don't know my biological parents. No one will report me missing. Why don't you put me back in the basement now? We can do another seven… No, make it ten days." Ten days should do the job. I waited for their response, but the luxurious living room fell into a long, suffocating silence. Margot came over and gently cupped my face, her eyes filled with unmistakable tenderness tempered by a hint of caution. "Marcel… Do you really think that way?" Great! They finally realized that I wasn't being sarcastic! I nodded frantically, yet what came next was a warm embrace from Margot. She pulled me into a bear hug. "Marcel, you weren't like this before. What happened to you?" I grew up surrounded by the Sylvesters' love. I was cheerful, optimistic, and full of life. Everything changed the day Henry returned. He shared their blood and, without doing much, had won their favor. When Henry said that I had stolen the reunion gift meant for him, Margot pushed me down and warned me to stop being greedy. When he said I had told him to get out of the family, Alan made me kneel outside the door for an entire night, saying I had no right to bully his son. When Henry claimed I had led the class in isolating him, Leon personally came to confront me outside the school gate, demanding to know why I had behaved like a street thug. … Whatever Henry said, the Sylvesters believed. The drama was endless. I leaned into Margot's embrace, listening to her pounding heartbeat, and shifted uncomfortably. Then, I pushed her away. She was stunned to see me react that way, and her arms hung awkwardly midair. My gaze swept across everyone in the living room before finally landing on Henry. "See what I just did to your mom? Now, can you stop thinking I'm trying to steal them from you and stop badmouthing me to our classmates?" Chapter 4 I was a person, not an emotional punching bag. If Henry's cruelty could help me reach death, I wouldn't stop him. Our classmates served no purpose other than making my life at school miserable. "What are you talking about?" Henry stared at me, immediately denying everything. His eyes reddened as he looked like he was about to cry. "Mom, Dad, Leon, don't listen to him! I've always told everyone in class to be nice to him!" Here came another performance from him. Honestly, I was bored by it. I just wanted to settle everything at once so I could head upstairs and rest. "So, how do you want me to apologize to Henry this time?" I asked. "A verbal apology or a physical punishment?" I had done both, so I thought they would make a decision quickly. Strangely, for the first time, Alan and Margot didn't ask me to apologize to Henry. They simply told me to go to bed. As I closed my bedroom door, I heard Alan's stern voice from downstairs. "Henry, be honest with your mother and me. Have you been bullying Marcel this whole time?" Oh. Were they finally going to see Henry's true colors? It didn't matter, anyway. The fact that they had been so easily fooled by Henry made me certain that they wouldn't actually punish him. In the end, I would be the one to suffer. As expected, Henry approached me after swimming class the next day. By then, the teacher and the other students had already left, leaving the pool deserted with only the two of us. "You've got some nerve to show up to school, Marcel. Because of you, Mom and Dad tore into me last night." I straightened my clothes and looked at Henry, trying to read his emotions. There was fury… Good. That was a good thing for me. I replied calmly, "As long as I'm alive, I still have to come to class." My words seemingly enlightened Henry. He glared at me, then looked around the pool. When he turned back, his expression had visibly softened. "You know what, Marcel? I've decided to make peace with you. I won't cause Mom and Dad any more trouble because of this." "Sure," I answered lightly. He continued, "To show you my sincerity, I'd like to give you a gift. Stay right here for a moment. I'll be right back. Don't move around, okay?" I nodded again and stood still, waiting for him, just as he wanted. When I saw Henry enter the small surveillance room connected to the swimming pool, I couldn't help but smile. I knew he wouldn't disappoint me—he was planning to kill me. A few minutes later, he returned empty-handed. I pretended not to know anything, saving him from any questions. He pointed toward the deep end of the pool, as arrogant as ever, as though he were doing me a favor. "The gift I prepared for you is right at the bottom of the pool. Take a look." I didn't move, not because I was timid but because I was worried the system would consider this an intentional suicide attempt. Henry got angry. He stepped forward and shoved a hand against my back. "I thought you wanted to die, Marcel! Go on! I'll help you! From now on, I'm the only one Mom, Dad, and Leon have! Soon, no one will remember that someone named Marcel Sylvester ever existed in this world!" I couldn't swim. I sank straight to the bottom without struggling even once. Through the rippling surface of the water, I saw Henry leave. He had done something wrong and was too scared to stay, so he ran away with his tail between his legs. Water rushed into my nose and mouth. The suffocation was overwhelming yet satisfying. I asked the system, "This time, can I finally die?"