"Change this place... change this world of death."
Jakub woke to the whispers in his ear, he was in a white room with nothing and no one in sight. The room seemed endless in his eyes but when he stepped it felt like he was moving nowhere.
"My vision is a little blurry... where... where am I? Is this heaven? Hell?" He uttered to himself
"I would say it was more of an in between, a purgatory if you will."
Jakub quickly turned around.
A floating man about five feet tall covered in a black robe with a hood on appeared behind Jakub. He started to stare at the man and vision was clearing up. The man held a tiny scythe in his hand about one fifth the size of a normal one and he had a face that was a smiling skull.
"Nice mask." Jakub told the man
"I assure you this is not a mask, this is indeed my real face. I'm what people of your world would refer to as a reaper. I am from another dimension that would technically be a future version of yours. Our Princess sought you out from your world right after your death."
"Wait... I'm dead?" Jakub asked confused
"Ah yes... you have forgotten the incident, it happens sometimes. I shall show you it if you would like."
"No I think I rather not watch myself die... can you just tell me what happened."
"Hmmm I suppose I could. You were walking through a park with a rather lovely young lady when she went in to kiss you. You leaned in to initiate also and BOOM! You were stabbed in the back by some guy that was rather upset."
"Why the hell would someone randomly stab me in the... ohhhh Michael... That son of a bitch. It all makes sense why he seemed like he hated me, he had a thing for Lizzy. Well I'm dead now so what is this proposal?"
"Walk with me and I shall explain it all to you."
Jakub looked around the room confused, there didn't seem to be anywhere that they could go.
"You're probably wondering, ohhh but there's nowhere to go. But there is you just have to follow me."
Jakub shrugged and the two began walking in one direction specifically. The man informed him that he had been killed but that wasn't to be the end for him if he so chooses. The Princess chose him for a special task in this other world. The world governed by death and ruled by evil. The two had been walking for what felt like hours until they arrived in front of a giant door.
"Here we are!" Spoke the Reaper.
They walked up to the door and waited for a few seconds. Two average sized double doors opened in front of them and not the giant door.
"Are you kidding me? What's with the giant door if you don't even use it?"
"Under maintenance? I don't know. Honestly I couldn't tell you, I don't think it's ever worked." The Reaper shrugged.
It was the entrance to the Princess's office in which she sat at her desk waiting for Jakub to sit. She was stunning, long white hair, shining blue eyes through a black Venetian mask, pale skin and black wings coming off her back. In the corner of the room sat a scythe taller than Jakub with rigid black metal right under the blade.
"Please, sit." The Princess spoke.
Jakub took a seat and the Reaper floated to the Princess's side. He noticed that her voice sounded familiar.
"I am Elena Mortem, Princess of the afterlife and daughter of Pluto Mortem, the king of the afterlife. This is my Grim, Servus, I hope he was no trouble."
Jakub feeling intimidated by her presence was hesitant to speak.
"Your highness? I think that's right? Um, why exactly did you pull me from my world."
"Reapers of our world have had the ability to pull one person in their lifespan from another world if they so please. Me being royalty am able to bring two people over and I've done so once already. It was a beautiful young girl named Emily Herth. That would make you the second person I sent over. You hear me speak for a moment and then the process of summoning you here begins."
"So what is it exactly you want from me?"
"I'm only able to check in on Emily once every few months or so. She has been going through hell over there. It's Lotte City, same as where you were but in the far future. Civilization has advanced a lot and with new technology comes more danger for you humans.
Unsure of what's even going on Jakub still had many more questions.
"How far into the future would this be?"
Elena sighed as if she knew he was going to like the time hop.
"It's about 200 years ahead of where you were. Humans have seemingly unlimited potential and have discovered the soul."
"What do you mean they discovered the soul?"
"Look we don't have time to explain everything. My main point in bringing you here was because I want you to stop my father from stealing the souls that have gained power."
"Souls that have gained power?"
Elena sighed another time, "The gist of it is that human souls had latent power forever. Humans with the actual discovery of the supernatural force known to them as Dark Matter, is known to us as mana. Humans discovered that the color of ones soul determines their abilities and just how powerful they'll be able to grow. Sadly our summons are supposed to have their hearts removed but I didn't do it for Emily nor you."
The room fell silent for a minute and Jakub just stared in shock at the Princess from everything he was hearing.
"So... what you are saying is... I get to go to future version of my world and have super powers?"
Elena stared right in to Jakub's eyes and spoke.
"I'm not too sure, Emily's powers never showed. That is why I went to get a second person. Emily has what they call a black soul, to them it seems to have no power and they're a rare type. She was going to be the one I chose for this task originally but that soul has caused her significant troubles. She has been going through a very rough patch and I was hoping you could join together."
Jakub began tapping his foot thinking and was very interested in a second chance at life, especially in a new world.
"So you want me to try and help her stop your father from stealing souls."
"Yes and no. Yes I want you to help her but no you wouldn't be stopping my father directly just the reapers under his control. The Heartless."
He continued thinking, still tapping his foot on the floor.
"I'll do it. I mean I have the chance at super powers why would I not."
Elena smiled with excitement.
"Thank you for accepting to help her highness and Emily. I'm sure Emily will be happy to have a friend." Servus spoke.
A friend? Jakub thought. What exactly does he mean by that?
"I will send you as close to Emily as I am able. I can sense where she is but not exact location."
Jakub still had a question, "What about the Heartless? How will we even find them?"
"Reapers can sense other reapers. Humans will just see you as you but reapers will see your familiar behind you. These familiars are known as Grim's and everyone's is different. I can try and pair you with the ideal one if you'd like."
"Well yeah that'd be nice and honestly probably would have been nice to know about sooner. Wait you mentioned Grim's earlier, I think you called Servus your grim. Can they do anything special? Like can I have one that's ideal for heightened sense maybe? Cause I totally don't want to get stabbed in the back again."
"You are asking a lot, I've never sighed so much in my life. Yes he is my Grim and yes I can make you a Grim for that exact thing one moment."
Elena stood from her desk and stepped to the side Servus floated around in front of her, put his scythe away and stuck his hands out. A black orb began forming in between both of them it grew to about three feet in size. And popped. Almost making the sound of a bubble popping.
"Well that was anti climactic..." Jakub said.
Elena sighed once more at Jakub.
"It worked, your Grim is just going to take time to wake itself and appear."
Jakub smiled happily and excited. "Sweet I get a little minion."
"Okay, I'm going to send you as close as I can like I said before. It looks like the university she likes to hangout on the roof there it's a pretty tall building now. Good luck! I'll contact you as soon as possible I have to inform father of my last summoning."
Everything went dark and then flashed bright white lights in Jakub's eyes and he fell. Knocking over brooms and hitting lockers, he put his hand in a bucket of water trying to get up.
"Are you kidding me? She dropped me in a Janitor's closet? What the hell..."
Jakub walked out of the closet and all the students were walking around talking. They walked past Jakub staring at him because he was still wearing the clothes he had on in the other world. His fashion style had been out of style for about two hundred years. Wearing a long sleeve button up, khaki fit pants and sneakers. The students had on clothing that looked as if technology was weaved into it. Some had long sleeve shirts similar to his but glowing skeletal like hands on the back of their own. They head on ear pieces that reminded Jakub of cyborgs, he was clearly out of place. Deciding to ignore it for now he looked for the stairs and started running up them.
Floor 10
"Tenth floor what the hell? This place had like 3 stories before."
Lotte University, the same University Jakub was attending in his previous life in his past world still stood. It still stood even taller, two hundred years in the future in a whole other world.
Floor 20
"Okay you've got to be kidding me. Why the hell is this school so big now? And this only one building!"
Floor 30 The Roof
Completely exhausted and gasping for air he opened the door. He saw a girl standing on the ledge of the roof of the roof her arms tattooed from the elbows up. Her hair was dyed purple and the wind blowing it back you could see her ear piercings. Jakub though, that has to be her.
"Emily!" He shouted
She turned around to see who had called her name.
"Beautiful.." Jakub said.
"What..?" Emily said embarrassed and as she said it she slipped.
Emily started to fall backwards off the roof when Jakub had grabbed her arm just before she fell. He started to pull her up when she saw him. Jakub's grim a little black floating spirit about the size of a volleyball speeding around his body.
"You're a Reaper?"