My parents could tell how excited i was by the way my breathing turned to giggling as i reached for the baptism pool. My mother actually had to reach out to hold on to me, fearing that i would lean and fall out of my sling. I could tell from how she reacted to the first baptism that she could see the strange energy.
From the way she laughed while trying to manage me, i could also tell she knew i could see that power as well.
If my body and facial muscles had developed to a point where i could properly control them, i would be asking questions instead of trying to experience for myself. As it was, my only choice at the moment was to practice patience. Eventually i would get to have a turn in this holy water and later on i would be able to ask all the questions i wanted.
When it was finally my turn to get dunked and prayed for, i found myself held rather simply and unceremoniously from under the arms by Father. The old man lowered me slowly just like all the other babies, praying fervently as my feet touched the surface of the water. Then, slowly but surely, the rest of my body was being lowered in.
By the time my chest entered the water i went ahead and took a deep breath, fighting with the reflexes of an infantile body to continue breathing up until my nose and mouth were submerged. I could not yet feel anything taking place, but i could see the waves of divine energy rising up from the pool around me.
Then, a second or so after my head was fully submerged, i was lifted out of the water. My gown shirt clung heavily about my body and my skin actually felt itchy as though hundreds of small insects were crawling over me all at once. i would have started screaming and crying like the other babies if i was not so curious about what might happen next.
As the visible waves of divine energy died down, so too did the itch of my skin that seemed to seep into my muscles and bones. By the time i only radiated the same faint signatures as the babies before me, my body felt normal and my clothes had even dried up for the most part. It was, honestly, rather anticlimactic.
There was no explosion of power, no divine being was summoned, demons did not suddenly start pouring out of hell, and no high ranking religious figure suddenly received an oracle about my life. So much for generic, this was just plain boring! I had hoped something cool would happen, like i might randomly achieve an enlightenment or skill about magic.
Instead, i just got soaking wet in water that was more parts oily nonsense than water while surrounded by strangers and old people. Yeah, this is exactly what you should be doing with your infants. What if somebody pissed in the water? Now all of us babies are being dunked in holy piss water.
Has this world ever heard the word, 'sanitary'?!
As i was passed back to my parents, both of them could tell i was unhappy about what had taken place by the emphasized scowl of my face and brows. Cooing gently as if to console me, my mother says, "Its okay, Chuck, you'll get to have more fun another time. Alright?"
I simply looked away and flippantly raised a hand, waving away my mothers attempts at comforting me. My father, however, gave me a wry smile and says, "You might be able to get away with that as a baby, but once you get old you'll have to start showing your mother some proper respect. Don't think we don't know you know what we're saying, you have a Divine Translation ability."
Pursing my lips while turning my scowl on my father, i find myself competing with the man on how angry i could make my eyebrows look while he glared back at me. To the outsider looking in, it was probably terrifying to see a giant of a man looking at his own child with what could only be described as murderous intent. On the other hand, if the outsider were to see the baby giving the giant of a man that very same look they would not know what to think at all.
After a brief battle of wills, we both broke into a combination of loud guffaws and impish wailing giggles as the first ring of babies were baptized. Everybody took a uniform sidestep outward from the ring and at the same time the ring behind us made the opposing move. Two more times did we spiral-step before reaching the outside of the formation.
Even i had to admit, the casual yet perfectly timed coordination of everybody at once was pretty impressive. It had come as a bit of a shock, suddenly jostling to one side while still being held out but even the other babies who were almost all crying never even wiggled. I, on the other hand, grabbed onto my sling with enough strength in one tiny hand to simple gouge through the thick cloth.
That was probably for the best, though, because it provided the perfect handhold to steady myself.
My parents noticed the event and shared differing looks with one another. My father gave my mother an openly relieved expression that was hinted with pride, but my mother was frowning with worry. She soon demanded my carrying sling and my father meekly complied.
With no changes in my status window, i simply closed it and worked my little legs slowly to push myself higher up in the sling. Once my mother complied by cradling me with one arm, i could comfortably view the rest of the proceedings. There was not much else to see, though.
Not far from where we stood at the pool there was an altar and podium area near the back of the temple center. The altar was similar to those in churches with a central tabletop for settings and ceremonies and long low kneeling areas off the the side. On the tabletop was several large books of varying types and ages.
One of these books was even bound in darkly tarnished copper with brittle wooden pages. The rest were bound in leather and wood with mostly vellum pages. One book in the front array actually had paper pages, but this paper was thick and stiff.
With my current eyes, i could not make out any actual words over the distance on the pages, but there were some larger characters or runes that stood out clearly from among the others. They seemed somehow attractive to me because of their geometric configurations, but from this and the setting i found them in i could only assume they were religious icons. Or magical.
I wanted to try drawing my parents' attentions to the books on the alter so that i could learn a bit more about them, but the other outer rings were becoming restless. It seemed like the current inner ring that was even larger than ours was already nearing completion. At least i had managed to memorize a few of the icons.
Our stretched out ring of bodies was already on the outside, so we did not have to trade positions again, but we did all take a small step back. Once the larger ring of people that had gone after us was comfortably positioned in front of us, things went back to normal once again.
This process continued for an unnecessarily long amount of time as the rings continued to grow larger. By the end of it, at least, all the other babies were too tired to cry anymore. I was pretty close to passing out, myself.
"If all of the first time parents would please come forward," the elder priest called Father requests of the gathered people while making his way toward the altar and podium. "We will be holding tithes, shortly, so all you other parents are free to go. After tithes," he added with a wizened chuckle, which drew forth more than a few laughs from the crowd.
This must have been his personal joke for basically all their lives, my parents had probably been born hearing it. I bet this dude actually used the same line at every ceremony.
'Tithes' turned out to be the passing of a collection bowl into which all of the fathers deposited random coins of different metals. I had no idea where the coins came from because i did not see anybody carrying anything on their persons, but after every father paid nearly half of the families left. My parents stayed behind for the sermon, probably for my benefit more than anything else.
The sermon turned out to be a short explanation of what had taken place. It seemed like common sense that the baptism pool was a well of 'divine essence', but hearing that for the first time was news to me. It looked kinda like a vat of ether with all the waves of energy coming off of it, but that was probably just me.
After having our status windows opened, we were thus named and acknowledged by the gods of this world. After being dunked in the holy piss water, we were purified and protected against dark magic and unholy entities. Apparently undead were a thing in this world, that was kind of cool.
The end of the sermon was a short session of communal prayers and even a few songs of praise. I immediately decided that, gods or not, i did not want to spend so much of my second life in temples. My first life had been pretty much godless and look how it turned out, I'm starting my second life.
I never got close enough to the altar to read any of the books, but i got to see all of the icons that they had to offer. They were more interesting than the sermon, to me. There was not much else to do and see while we were there, though, so it was not long after my parents finally turned to leave that i went straight to sleep.
*