"Dad, the transfer's confirmed. Manchester City wants me there by Monday."
Ethan's voice floated in from the kitchen, where he packed his belongings into cardboard boxes that would carry his childhood into a new future. Jake sat in his home office, surrounded by tactical notes and memorabilia from European finals that chronicled three seasons of extraordinary achievements.
The Europa Conference League trophy occupied a corner of his desk, its golden surface reflecting the lamp light that had been casting strange shadows for the past hour. Jake had noticed the oddities earlier but dismissed them as fatigue from weeks of media obligations and celebrations.
"Your mother's taking you to Manchester tomorrow," Jake called back, his voice heavy with exhaustion that ran deeper than physical tiredness. "It's an early start, so get some sleep."
Emma appeared in the doorway, car keys jingling in her hand. "I'm heading to the mall for groceries. Do you need anything?"
Jake shook his head, focusing on the tactical analysis across his desk. Preparing for the Premier League required a different approach than Championship football. The system window would provide insights once he activated it, but tonight felt like a moment for human reflection rather than algorithmic prediction.
"Don't wait up," Emma said, kissing his forehead before heading toward the garage. "You need rest more than you need more tactical notes."
The house fell quiet, save for Ethan's movements upstairs and the television playing highlights from their European final victory. Jake had watched Richter's header dozens of times, each replay revealing new details about the movement patterns that had created space for that decisive moment.
He leaned back in his chair, allowing himself a rare moment of satisfaction. European champions. Premier League bound. His son heading to Manchester City's academy. Success is measured in ways that surpass every reasonable expectation.
Yet, something felt off about the room's lighting.
The lamp in the corner cast shadows that didn't align with the other light sources. While his desk lamp created precise, defined edges, the corner fixture seemed to warp reality around it. Shadows moved independently of their objects, defying physics in ways that made Jake's analytical mind uneasy.
He stood and walked toward the lamp, studying its placement and angle. Nothing had changed since Emma arranged the office three years ago, but the shadows it cast now seemed to belong to entirely different objects. His bookshelf projected the shadow of a filing cabinet, while the tactical board's shadow resembled a window.
"What the hell?" Jake muttered, reaching for the lamp's switch.
When his fingers touched the metal, the shadows moved purposefully rather than randomly. They flowed across the walls like liquid darkness, creating patterns that suggested meaning without revealing it. The room felt unstable as if reality were constructed from materials too fragile to withstand close examination.
Jake's vision blurred. The tactical notes on his desk seemed to shift and rearrange themselves, formations morphing into incomprehensible symbols that hurt to look at directly. The Europa Conference League trophy flickered between existence and nonexistence, its golden surface sometimes transparent, sometimes entirely absent.
"This doesn't make sense," he said aloud, but his voice sounded different—younger, unfamiliar.
The television played highlights from the European final, but the images moved strangely. Players ran in reverse, and the ball curved in impossible directions. Richter's header sailed over the crossbar, and Newcastle celebrated victory instead of defeat.
Jake stumbled backward, but the floor felt unstable beneath his feet. Each step created ripples like he was standing on water rather than carpet. The walls pulsed with his heartbeat, expanding and contracting as if the room were alive.
The lamp's shadows reached for him, stretching across the floor with an intent that transformed furniture into unrecognizable shapes. His chair morphed into a hospital bed, his desk became medical equipment, and the tactical board shifted into a heart monitor displaying rhythms that synchronized with his increasingly erratic pulse.
"None of this is real," Jake gasped, but even his certainty felt hollow.
Reality fragmented around him like glass breaking in slow motion. Each shard reflected different versions of the truth: Bradford's European triumph, his family's celebration, and his son's transfer to Manchester City. But there were also darker reflections: empty stadiums, failed tactics, dreams that remained forever unfulfilled.
The shadows engulfed him completely. The last thing Jake saw was the Europa Conference League trophy dissolving into pixels scattered like digital snow across his fading vision.
Then came darkness—complete and absolute.
Consciousness returned gradually, accompanied by sounds that belonged to a medical rather than a domestic environment: steady beeping, hushed voices, and the whisper of air conditioning that struggled to mask the antiseptic odors.
Ethan Carter opened his eyes to a ceiling of white tiles stretching across a sterile space, interrupted only by harsh fluorescent lighting. His body felt strange and lighter, like years had been stripped away from the bones and muscles he remembered being older.
He tried to speak, but his voice emerged cracked and uncertain. "Where... what happened?"
A nurse appeared beside his bed, clipboard in hand and a look of professional compassion on her face. "You're awake. That's excellent. You've been unconscious for eighteen hours."
Eighteen hours? Ethan's mind struggled to process this information, which clashed with his memories. He recalled Bradford City, the European finals, his wife Emma, and their son. But those memories felt distant now, like scenes from someone else's life.
"What year is it?" he asked, the question slipping out before he could think.
"Two thousand and four," the nurse replied, concern creeping into her voice. "You suffered a severe concussion during football training. Do you remember what happened?"
Two thousand and four. The numbers felt significant yet wrong. Ethan attempted to sit up, but his reflection in the bedside mirror stopped him.
The face staring back was his own, but younger—much younger. No lines around the eyes formed through three seasons of tactical pressure, no gray threading through hair that had aged under the stress of European campaigns. His twenty-five-year-old face, unmarked by the years, felt real despite its apparent impossibility.
"This can't be right," he whispered, touching skin that felt smooth where scars should have been. "I was just... we just won the European final."
The nurse's expression shifted to one of professional concern, suggesting that psychiatric evaluation might be necessary. "You're an assistant coach at Aston Villa. There was no European final. You're confused from the head injury."
Assistant coach at Aston Villa. The title felt familiar, like clothes that had once fit perfectly but now seemed alien. Ethan remembered that role, but it felt like ancient history compared to what he had achieved with Bradford City.
Except Bradford City's achievements belonged to someone else—someone named Jake Wilson, who had guided them from England's fourth tier to European glory. But Jake Wilson was him, wasn't he? The memories were too vivid, too detailed to be mere products of concussion-induced hallucination.
He was Ethan Carter, the cursed coach who had never won a match in ten years of management. He was the man football had forgotten, whose name had become synonymous with failure rather than achievement.
But he was also Jake Wilson—European champion, father, husband, and tactical genius who had transformed Bradford City through methods that redefined football's possibilities. S~eaʀᴄh the NovelZone.fun website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.
Both sets of memories felt equally real and equally impossible.
"I need to see myself properly," Ethan said, swinging his legs over the bedside. The nurse protested, but he was already moving toward the bathroom mirror that would either provide answers or confirm his descent into madness.
The reflection was unmistakable: Ethan Carter, at twenty-five, wearing hospital clothing that emphasized how young and uncertain he looked. No Bradford City, no Emma, no son—just the assistant coach who had never achieved anything significant in football.
But as he stared at his reflection, something familiar materialized in his peripheral vision.
A translucent blue window floated beside the mirror, like a digital overlay on reality. Text began to appear across its surface, letters forming words that carried the weight of destiny rather than mere information.
WELCOME BACK ETHAN
WELCOME TO THE FOOTBALL MANAGER SYSTEM
The interface looked just as he remembered, though it was simpler than the advanced version that had guided Bradford through European competition. Two options glowed softly beneath the welcome message, gently contrasting the hospital's harsh lighting.
[YES - CONFIRM RESTART]
[NO - CANCEL AND REMAIN]
Ethan's hand trembled as he reached for the floating interface. The choice felt monumental as if one option would shape his future and redefine the very nature of reality.
Was Jake Wilson's life real, or merely an elaborate simulation created by this system? Were Emma and his son genuine people or sophisticated constructs designed to provide an emotional context for tactical development?
The system waited patiently, its blue glow steady and inviting. Behind him, the nurse called for a doctor, concerned about the patient who stood motionless before the bathroom mirror.
Ethan Carter stared at the two options that would determine everything that followed. His finger hovered over the YES button, trembling with anticipation and uncertainty.
Eighteen years stretched between 2004 and the European final, which he vividly remembered winning just days ago. These were eighteen years filled with possibilities, chances to build something extraordinary from nothing.
Or were they eighteen years of simulation, artificial experiences crafted to teach him lessons about football management that no traditional education could offer?
The choice was his. He could return to being the cursed coach who had never won anything, now armed with knowledge that might change everything. Or he could remain in this reality, accepting that Bradford City's achievements belonged to dreams rather than history.
Ethan Carter pressed YES.
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