After peering into the swirling madness for what felt like hours or days the lost soul who was once Sal noticed there were patterns in the madness around him. He could see things that made no sense, things that hadn't happened in his lifetime, or perhaps they had? One moment he was witnessing streaks of a war torn battlefield in some ancient setting, the next a blurry window showing Hitler in front of a damaged Washington Monument in what could only be an alternate reality where the Axis won World War II, then newspapers claiming humanity had gone to space in the 19th century instead of the mid 20th century and other things he knew weren't true. He felt shudders of terror as news footage showed a reality where humanity had gone down the darkest path and had allowed corporations to become the rulers of the planet in service to an unholy dark power, something many of the few uncorrupted military and civilian powers of Earth had strived to expose and defeat decades before he had been born. The utter chaos and insanity took hold deeply in his mind, he couldn't look away or close the eyes he no longer had. He didn't even notice the mad probabilities of alternate timelines had stopped shifting when it all faded out to silence.
He broke out of his panicked thoughts as he realized everything in front of him was black, including the wispy appendages he thought may have been his hands. He could tell they were there, he tried to wiggle them and found himself too weak to manage it. His sense of self was still intact but somehow stretched thin as he tried to process what had happened to him. He had been so focused on the insanity that surrounded him that he wasn't sure what had just happened or even how long it had been since he died. More disturbing than all of that though, he could not figure out who he was. Who am I? He just knew he had to get out of this place before she came back, that purple witch. A strange electric hum began to build in the darkness, but he couldn't tell what was causing it. The humming stopped suddenly and gave way to a playful chime as a rectangle appeared in the darkness, wreathed in shining purple, decorated along the corners with skulls and thorny flowers that could have been roses. They looked similar, though the petals were very tightly packed into a dense bulb and the few leaves that showed had a toothed look like many razor thin saw blades all poking out of the stem. He hadn't heard of a flower like that in his life… had he? He wasn't sure what he was even doing there anymore, wasn't even sure if his memories were based in reality. He remembered his death, being thrown into this place through a tear in reality, and of course, her, the purple woman. Occasionally bits and pieces of his life flew into his mind, but he was never sure if he was remembering or imagining them. The process of trying to keep it all straight in his mind made him anxious and terribly uneasy. How do you figure out who you are when you have doubt that anything that happened in your life was even real? He chose to focus on the rectangular display again. It featured what looked like a skeleton sitting with its back against the left side, tangled in the thorned stem of the plant closest to it. Inside the box appeared lines of text and numbers, counting down with an ellipses before the number would change and the cycle repeated.
Continue? 20…
Continue? 19…
Continue? 18…
Continue? 17…
What the hell? A continue screen? Like in a video game? Continue what? Living? But what life could he be going back to? Did he get to choose? Or was it going to send him to an afterlife? No, the cackling bitch didn't send him here just to send him to another afterlife, this must be one of her tricks.
Continue? 11…
Continue? 10…
Continue? 9…
Continue? 8…
Now after number ten, every further number was accompanied by a thundering beat in the air itself that he couldn't pinpoint. The spirit began to panic, knowing he didn't want to figure out how the countdown ended if he didn't choose, but how?! As if in response to his thought, more text appeared
1. Yes 2. No
That made it easier. He focused on each option, and a small outline of an arrow appeared beside the No option he wanted, it started to fill up with purple light, and then winked out before the Yes option had a similar arrow outline appear next to it, staying hollow. Bullshit!! The frustrated spirit thought, I don't want to continue with her stupid games! His focus zeroing in hard on the No again, which filled halfway before the arrow winked out and the No option fell apart in pieces with a sound like shattering glass
Continue? 5…
Continue? 4…
Continue? 3…
Continue? 2…
The pounding noise was almost unbearable, the lost soul decided to throw caution to the wind and threw the whole of the will he could muster onto his only option, Yes. The light in the arrow filled up faster than the No had and the countdown stopped.
1..
All was silent, he had a sudden feeling of dread, like he had just made a choice he should have left alone. Suddenly the text box in front of him changed, chittering with every letter that was being written inside, just like the video games he had played where the characters communicated to the player through text boxes instead of voice acted cutscenes.
Congratulations! You finally made the correct choice after 2,564,778 attempts and over 25 years have now passed since your arrival in the Chaos Nexus. You may now meet The Boss! Happy rebirthday, you stubborn bastard!
As if on cue, a moment after he finished reading that, the skeleton beside the text box turned its head toward him, its eye sockets glowing purple as it pulled out a party hat and a party blower from the cavity under its noticeably shattered ribs, the sight of which evoked a feeling of choking and the memory of the taste of blood while it took a breath and blew on the tip of the party blower with a spray of confetti appearing around it before returning to the original position it was in against the text box. The spirit was stunned, unsure how to process what just happened to him, much less what he had just read. He had done this before? When? And how many times did it say he tried to do it? For HOW LONG?! The tortured soul wanted to scream, to punch something, to cry...but he couldn't. He could just sit and wait, panic started to set in as he considered the thought of being stuck in this dark prison for centuries longer doing whatever the purple woman wanted him to do. He had surely just signed his soul to her, there was no question in his mind as the anticipation of her arrival filled him with dread.
Luckily he didn't have to wait long, within moments the black void before him filled with hues of purple and started to resemble a room like a game show stage, complete with monitors surrounding the space like walls. As these formed, he realized his field of vision consisted of a 360° area around himself, the entirety of which consisted of monitors currently shifting through a pink and light purple gradient except the floor which was a solid reflective surface that looked dark purple. The lost spirit himself was perched on top of some sort of pedestal, and a comfy looking maroon leather chair sat across from him a few feet away. The sickening feeling of utter dread he had held onto gave way to confusion. Where in the hell was he? The lights dimmed and a drum roll started from...somewhere, while spotlights with no clear origin shone onto the chair. When the drum roll stopped, a puff of smoke covered the chair and the being that had thrown him into this madness was before him, the only difference being that she now had bright purple horns curving up out of the top of her head. "You!" he tried screamed at her, though it came out as more of a disembodied and faintly echoing whisper drowned out by a laugh track.
"Hmm? What was that, sweetie? You're gonna need to speak up if I'm going to be able to hear you." She grinned and the canned laughter resumed with vigor as a microphone winked into existence before him, into which he yelled
"You trapped me in here for 25 fucking years? Why? And how come I can't remember doing that stupid text box thing millions of times?" The woman transformed into a young girl, the same one he had gotten run over trying to save, the one that he now knew was her the entire time.
"I wiped your memory, dummy! Over and over and over. It wasn't hard, I basically set the prompt up to wipe your recent memory if you said no or didn't pick a choice. If you said yes, you would summon me here like I am now. This time however, I got bored of waiting and watching you freak out and decided to rig the game a little. Whoopsie!" She clapped her hands and kicked her feet in a fit of giggling that would have been infectious if he wasn't shaken to his core with...fear? Anger? How does one name the feeling they get when the Devil stands before them and casually admits to torturing your spirit beyond death? How do you express the feeling of being killed and toyed with for the punchline of some supernatural being's joke?
"So, tell me: what do you remember from your last life? You've finally accepted my offer so now I have to get you up to speed so you don't destabilize and blink out of existence forever" Still a little sore that she had tricked him, but also impressed that he held out for so long with memory wipes every time he refused her, he thought back to what he could recall. He remembered that he had died in a car accident, that he had tried to save the little girl in front of him without knowing she was some kind of witch, necromancer, demon, or whatever she is. He could remember precious little of his personal self. Some childhood memories playing with his friends whose names he couldn't remember, his mother and father recording him when he opened toys at Christmas alongside his siblings, a couple birthday parties. In all of these he knew people were saying his name, but he couldn't figure out what it was, or what he looked like!
He knew he was a man, he knew what his family and close friends looked like, but names escaped him entirely and any reflections he had came back in his mind as fuzzy and blurry. He remembered random facts, trivia, history, songs, games, TV shows, movies, even the name of celebrities. All the stuff he knew about and that made him himself, including most of the knowledge he had memorized. But he couldn't remember anything that personally identified him. It was like filling in the blank, but everytime he tried to fill in the blank that was about his name, his appearance, or his physical attributes he ran into a wall. A wall that hit back like a heavyweight boxer. Before he could speak up through his daze, he realized everything he had been thinking about was being shown on the screens around him. A couple of them turned into a scene from a movie he had seen where the main character was in a similar place in a white room instead of a purple one, versions of himself screaming and calling on tv screens.
"I see, you remember quite a bit! Impressive, little pawn, you might have some potential. Looks like my memory wipe was a little too thorough in some areas though, you don't seem to know anything about yourself personally. Your sense of self is strained to its breaking point. Hmm, what a shame," her smug smile made his nonexistent stomach turn, she had intended it that way and he knew it. This whole thing had been part of her plan, how would he even know if she weren't lying to him about this whole thing? He may have only been here a few days and he'd never know. "you know, this might work out better, you'll have a little less resistance to-"
"Shut your fucking mouth, I don't even know your name and you're talking to me like I've already made the decision to join in on whatever batshit game you're playing. You just said it yourself, you wiped my memory, what the fuck am I even doing here?" The woman in purple's mouth practically dropped to the floor, stunned before she started to laugh again
"Well, damn! You know what? I take my pity back, you actually have quite a bit of mental fortitude. To snap back at me in my own domain, despite not even knowing if the memories you have here are your own? Yes, I think I know exactly what I want to do with you" She withdrew a deep black crystal from somewhere behind her that swirled with an amethyst energy all throughout the interior, her small hands having to both hold on to handle it properly. She peered inside and began to chuckle to herself like a kid who just set up the best prank they'd ever thought of, her eyes glowing a more intense and bright purple than they had been.
"Alright, you poor, poor little puppy," she put her crystal ball out ahead of her and it began to float just beside her head in a slow orbit as she jumped off of the chair and strode towards the pedestal. "My name is Entris, goddess of discord and entropy, the chaotic one, the trickster, the… well you get it, right?" she smiled at him as waves of unease spread over his incorporeal form "and this place is the Chaos Nexus, or what you would call the astral plane or limbo, at least my little corner of it. Not all the gods live here, but I like to. The uncertain nature of this plane of existence makes for a good pairing with my power over chaos and fate. Time and space are very fluid here, you probably saw windows into different realities on the way to this chamber, right? Even if I kept you here for a thousand more years I could just travel back in time to torture you more. There are some limits of course to my form of time travel, but they don't apply so much in my domain. So, as for what I want you to do? Well, I want you to cause chaos! I need you to become my champion, an agent of my will on other planes of existence where I don't have as direct an influence. Many higher beings have similar arrangements with various mortal creatures like yourself"
She shifted around on her heels a little bit, annoyed at something she was thinking about, then she stomped her feet and unleashed a torrent of colorful sparks underneath her feet while her hair started to stand on end with purple electricity. "But as a goddess of fate, I usually don't need champions to do my will for me, I can usually influence things just fine myself. You might remember the string of misfortunes that led up to your death? How that car you were killed by couldn't steer properly? Even the arrival of that annoying girl you were visiting, the spiritually sensitive one? That was all my doing," Entris proudly pointed to herself and puffed out her chest while a seething rage built up deep within the lost soul, threatening to burst out "Of course, I wouldn't have needed to do any of that if I didn't need a champion. You see, my sister, the goddess of order, Kelaya, is making plans and putting things into order in this world far, far away from yours. I don't like that, not even a little bit. I'm not going to spoil her endgame for you, my pawn, but-"
"I am not your fucking pawn, Entris!" his anger boiled over at the stupid nickname he had been given. He didn't care about her stupid plans or those of her sister, he just wanted to dissappear and rest in peace. "My life is over, even if it was ended unnaturally by your fucking meddling, so why should I care about any of this? I don't want to be dragged into a petty squabble between two stupid goddesses, and I definitely won't be your goddamned champion! You're already jerking me along in my afterlife, why should I get put back onto another planet and have you guide me by puppet strings for a whole other lifetime?! Just let me fucking die!"
Entris looked a little uneasy now. A few beads of sweat started to form on her brow and she took hold of her floating orb, peering deeply into it again. Something was clearly not going the way she thought it would. Even as a goddess of chaos, this seemed to upset her. "You… shouldn't be able to talk to me like that here. Something is really wrong. Look... I just realized how much you're annoying me" she said with a huff, trying to regain some of her composure "I won't call you my pawn anymore, at least here. I just want you to leave and cause trouble for my sister. But the question is, what do I call you? You forgot your name because of the memory wipe, so you need to give yourself a new one"
She snapped her fingers and a text box like the one from earlier popped up into his view. He tried to turn away from it, but it was always with him in his field of vision, as if it was a part of himself he couldn't get rid of. How annoying. But she was right, he does need a name. He thought back to names he could remember from his past life, all fictional names or names of people he never met personally. He could remember with a mild headache names from video games he had played that he had made for himself, but what good would those be? Why did he want a name so badly anyway? He just wanted to permanently disappear not even a few moments ago.
"Entris, what happens to me if I pick a name?" the strange goddess was still focusing on something in her crystal ball, shaking it furiously from her chair like a magic 8 ball that kept giving her the wrong answer "Entris? Hello?" She looked up, slightly startled.
"Eh? Oh shit, you're still here, that's right. Uh, what happens if you pick a name? Well it will get bound to your soul as your sense of self has been warped by my um… tampering" She shook the ball some more, whimpering over whatever she saw inside that kept worrying her, "and then I'm going to put you onto the mortal plane where I wanted you, but you won't be under my control. I wanted to control you, but something isn't working right with my stupid control over you. I won't be able to… well you'll be marked as a champion, but you won't be mine, or Porya's. I guess that's good? But it shouldn't happen like thi-" She gasps and drops the crystal, crashing directly onto her foot and causing her to hop on one leg while she fought back tears.
'She has an oddly human amount of clumsiness for a goddess'
"Y-you you idiot! Why didn't you tell me?!" She growls at the unnamed soul and throws her crystal ball across the room, which promptly does a U-turn and comes right back to her in orbit around her head once more "You're already a champion! Who did you sign your allegiance to?!" He had no idea what she was talking about, he couldn't have signed his allegiance to anybody, he doesn't have a name to sign with. Actually, now that he thought about it, does he really need a name to sign contracts with incorporeal beings? There was a lot here that was very alien to his limited understanding. But the fact that he wasn't going to be controlled by either of these goddesses, one of whom he hadn't even met, was a breath of fresh air and a small weight off his metaphorical shoulders. The other question he had was, who did have control over him? He wasn't a fan of being somebody's plaything.
He decided it would be best to not worry about it and try to think of a name so he could get out of here, even if that means living again. Anywhere was better than being stuck with this nutcase. He thought hard to come up with a name that would appeal to him. What did he want in a name? Something simple, or complicated? Something that hit with power, or something that let him fly under the radar? But what did any of this matter if he didn't know anything about where he was going to be dumped off? For all he knew, his name could end up some kind of swear or slur in their world. Again, he was overthinking things. He focused on the text box in front of him
What is your name?:
The nameless soul stared at the box a while, no countdown to pressure him this time, just a small blinking cursor. Then it came to him, like a flash of memory he couldn't recognize. He started to sound it out, taste it on the lips of his very being, the sounds coming out thick and with great effort like he was speaking through a mouthful of honey. "Agrun...my...my name is Agrun" The text box listed the name, put a checkmark next to it, and disappeared with a fanfare that sounded like something straight out of a 16-bit RPG.
Agrun, as he was now called, felt much stronger than he had before as a nameless soul. He could feel his awareness and sense of being stabilized and become more defined now that he had a name. The wispy nubs he had before were now very pale and transparent arms, he now sat naked on the pedestal he had been occupying before. From his view of the monitors, many of them tracking him, he could tell he had no hair, empty sockets where his eyes would be, and no ears. Entris looked up again from her chair where she had been waiting, having noticed the buildup of energy that he had accumulated.
"Well, your sense of self is humanoid at least, so that makes things easier. Kinda hard to be an effective champion if you're not a member of a sentient race from the start" she chimed in "So, Agrun, you probably should know where you're going. You're going to be somebody's champion on the world of Erisith," He looked at Entris quizzically
"Erisith?"
She sighed and hung her head
"How is it that you looked smarter before when you were about to blink out of existence?" She started to think a little bit then snapped her fingers "Alright listen up, here's how things normally work: as a champion you are supposed to be called to adventure and then learn your soul name, your true name that you just picked, along the way. You are different. You will be allowed to keep some of your memories here, including your true name, which is incredibly risky" she smiled, a dangerous glint in her eye as she no doubt imagined something terrible happening to Agrun while wearing a smile like she just ate something sweet, he had no doubt about what would make this sadistic being happy after his apparent champion status had been found out, and it would be nothing less than to destroy his new life. "So you will know your name but you shouldn't give it out to anybody you don't trust completely. If anybody uses your soul name for any nefarious curses, it could have an even worse effect on you than even they expect. You should also know that while you normally have to be born naturally, you are going on a slightly different path. To be fair, it is one that I picked for you, but the problem is you won't be under my control and I can't change that even if I wanted to."
Agrun tensed up at the idea of coming into a world other than by being born into a body, he didn't even know what that could mean, or why it bothered him on an instinctual level "Um, Entris, what do you mean I'm not going to be born into my body?" She cracked up laughing, kicking her feet all the while before settling on that same sadistic grin she had given him when he pulled her away from the happy afterlife he was going to have in his last life.
"Well you see, my sister had manipulated a certain person into being killed by necromancers to serve her plan, because he could have gotten in the way of things. However, I thought I could throw a wrench in her plans by putting a champion under my control in the body of the man she killed! The necromancers would think they were the ones who did it, but it would in fact be me putting you into the same body!" Her expression fell a little as she was snapped back into reality "Of course, you're not my champion...but I already have some worshippers in place within the necromancers who will serve the same purpose they would have even if you were mine. It would be a waste to just have you enslaved to some demon cult after going to all the trouble to put things in place for you to fuck up Kelaya's stupid vision of order" She huffed and rolled her eyes, bitter annoyance plain on her face.
"Okay so listen here, I have a few more important things to mention to you before I use my power to shove you into the dead guy's body and have one of my puppets meet you. First of all, in the world you're going to, the people there are affected by an incredibly magic heavy atmosphere due to their planet's position in the galaxy. The way things are set up, magic is a huge part of that planet. It's no accident that you're being put there, magic heavy planets are where the gods have the most influence at any given time, and the way the living beings there work is by metabolizing magic energy in certain ways that when combined with their willpower, can permanently change their bodies or allow them to affect the world around them. You've probably seen it on TV or in video games, how wizards and witches cast lightning and fireballs from their fingers? Well that's kinda how things can get on this planet, if you really work towards it"
Agrun perked up hearing this, it was like a dream come true! In his past life, he would have loved to experience something as thrilling and powerful as real magic!
"How does magic work?" He piped up after being silent for so long
"Well, it depends on you, but you'll have some magic to start off with, don't worry about it too much. Just try to feel what comes to you naturally, it should already be etched into the body you'll be blundering about with" Before he could process those instructions she snapped her fingers and the pedestal Agrun was on shot forward before coming to a dead stop just in front of Entris "Now there's something else you should know, the metabolism thing I was talking about before? Every piece of meat, vegetable, and every liquid on Erisith is infused with magical energy to some degree. So if prepared properly, anything can be an ingredient for a potion, and the food you eat can help your magical power recover a little bit. Some foods and herbs are even so full of magical energy that you can heal your wounds with them"
The newly minted champion chuckled at the thought of fending off enemies with one hand swinging a sword and the other munching on apples and bread to bring his health back up like certain games he had played where merely pausing and munching on a bag full of apples, cabbages, cheeses, and soups would undo the damage of a tough fight. Things probably didn't work the same way in this world, but the thought still brought a smile to his face. Magic, magical energy, really existed, just like in the imagination of people the world over. This naturally begged the question: "What is magical energy called?"
The small goddess blinked for a moment and then spoke again "That's what you wanted to ask? Out of all the hundreds of thousands of things? 'What does magic do to animals and monsters? How different are the people? What kinds of non-human races inhabit this world? Are there even humans?' but no, you pick 'What do people call magic?'" She spat out that last phrase with an obnoxious mocking tone, then exhaled deeply and drew in another breath, "If you must know, it's called Mana. Yes, yes, just like all the games, 'how stupid, how dumb' you might think, well it's the facts. You didn't think it was called that for nothing did you? On your planet it's even mentioned in a holy book. Truth is, your world was once like Erisith, rich with mana and it was something lots of life relied upon," his mind was racing with possibilities. Earth once had a huge supply of mana? How could that be? Magic didn't exist on Earth! But then, the idea had to come from somewhere… maybe it once had, and once the mana dried up, people couldn't use magic anymore? But how does mana just go away? What happens then? Before he could open his mouth, Entris started talking again
"So, when Earth and its star left the influence of the mana clouds it had been drifting through for millions of years, all the people there started to become weaker, some got sick, some started dying. There is a reason you don't see elves, goblins, and other magical beings on Earth anymore. They couldn't live without much mana, their numbers either thinned out or they interbred with the humans who could adapt to low mana conditions. Humans are a very strange species like that. Created by the influence of mana just like any other sentient race, but when the mana goes away time and time again, you guys continue on. Sure you're weaker as a whole afterwards, but you don't rely on high ambient mana to function or reproduce without tons of complications. Outside of the normal problems present during life and childbirth, you people just work"
She continued, "Think about all the random mutations that can occur amongst people on Earth, some of those are the result of mana reliant races interbreeding with humans over centuries to gamble on the chance their offspring would adapt to the conditions. Of course, it isn't like humans and non-humans don't mix anyway. It just isn't as common on worlds where the only common options open to people are to be with someone of your own species, or those who understand your culture in the cases of some types of elves or dwarves who have wildly different comforts and needs from say humans, orcs, or merfolk. For this reason they often live apart from each other in their own lands where they're comfy, not exactly always for hatred or disputes. Of course humans, being annoyingly persistent, have settlements all over the world and only the most remote and isolated races do not know of them or live nearby to a human city or settlement"
This was a lot of information for Agrun to take in at once. Some of it was really obvious stuff he could have picked up on his own, like the idea that different sentient races were comfortable in different places, and as a former human he could understand the drive for humans to explore absolutely every corner of the planet that they could. But the idea that Earth was once a place full of magic that just floated too far out into a less magical part of space? That sounded absolutely ridiculous, as if magic power was just like an aspect of the climate. You have mana, you can do magic; you don't and almost everything except humans and presumably whatever else is found on Earth dies off. Thinking a little bit it's hard to tell who got the short end of the stick. The magical type beings live in a world where reality can be bent to their will and feats otherwise impossible can be achieved with an exercise of magical power. But then you take that away, and humans are the only ones that make it out okay, albeit without the advantages magic affords these worlds.
No use dwelling on what-ifs and what abouts. I've got one chance out of this place, so I might as well get on with it, he thought with a sigh before he spoke up, "Alright, so what do I need to do to get out of this nut house?"
"I was afraid you'd never ask. Apparently I can't force you out of my domain because you're not under my control, but you aren't actually bound to a higher being that I can identify. There's something about you that doesn't make any sense. Either way, I have to do the ritual to activate your champion mark. Maybe something will turn up. Come with me"
Entris clapped her hands and her chair started to float away towards the massive screens. They had been sitting idle for some time, the pink and purple gradient having returned to their surface. As the goddess of chaos went forward, the screens she was heading towards seemed to ripple and quake like a strange mix between the surface of a body of water being disturbed and gelatin being poked by a massive invisible fork. Agrun suddenly realized he had no idea how to move. He tried to move his legs, but they wouldn't budge, same with his arms. What happens if he is stuck here while she moves on? He resolved not to be stuck like before, he wouldn't be a prisoner of this bitch goddess any longer than he had to! He tried to reach out but all he can do with his paralyzed soul is look around in 360 degrees! The panic began rising up in him and he almost expected that stupid pop-up box to come ask him to continue again… hang on, how did he get the cursor on the box to move without using his limbs before? He thought really hard about it and it moved to where he wanted it. His willpower! Was everything in this place just about thoughts becoming actions? It makes sense, nobody would have a body here, just incorporeal streams of consciousness. He willed himself forward with a little strain, then a lot of strain. Right as Entris started to leave his view, his spirit shot up into the air and went zooming forward after her.
"Oh man, you're gonna wanna work on that astral body control, that's gonna get real old, real fast for both of us" The purple devil kept moving at a steady pace even as he zipped past her, screaming from the ridiculous speed of his soul! He put his effort into stopping again, and had a much easier time coming to a dead stop, a very counter-intuitive idea considering how acceleration worked on the physical plane, though those rules didn't seem to matter here. The joy he might have felt from flying was overshadowed by the fact that everything around him was now a churning void of colorful nonsense like when he first got thrown into this hell. He was getting ready to cry out when Entris whacked him on the head with her crystal ball, which floated back next to her head when he stopped focusing on the insanity everywhere around him in the "corridor".
"Seriously, just stick near me. We'll be there soon if you stop trying to get lost in the weave of fate like an idiot" He took a breath. It occurred to him he probably didn't even need to breathe, and before he was left behind he caught up to and slowly floated beside Entris.
The pair made it to a room that looked like some kind of church, except it was made almost entirely of amethyst, purple like everything Entris seemed to control. Why she chose that color was beyond him. Did her sister have a special color she liked too, or was she more normal? Perhaps that isn't the right word, since presumably immortal beings were likely outside of his ability to properly understand. Maybe the color gave her power? Maybe it helped her torture her victims easier? Or maybe she was just a big fan of a purple aesthetic. His musings suddenly stopped short with Entris' chair. He smacked into the back of it, an odd feeling since he thought of himself as a ghost, but then even ghosts must have objects they can't go through.
In front of them lay a black stone altar with a glossy sheen. Was it black marble? It was beautiful but somehow it gave Agrun a strange ominous feeling being near it. Whatever it was, it stood out from the rest of the cathedral. "Stand on top of that altar, right in the center" Agrun floated onto the stage-sized altar cautiously, unsure of what he was about to do. This thing felt powerful, ancient.
From his position just above it, he could see the design of the altar was split up into a pattern, each piece of the pattern had a different symbol inside a circle at the end of a bigger circle. He hovered just above and outside of the pattern to get a better look.The circles each shone with a certain color. The symbols inside cleared up almost immediately what those colors meant. There was a symbol of an open flame to the bottom left, shining with an orange light like that of a campfire. A symbol of a droplet of water, shining a deep sapphire blue stood across from it diagonally on the top right. Above the fire, stood a storm almost like a satellite view of a hurricane if it was drawn from memory and wreathed in shimmering white. Across from it and below the water symbol was what appeared to be a mountain, shining a pale light brown like dirt in the light of a noon sun. The last two, however, were what interested Agrun the most. A shining golden sun above the storm symbol, and a bright purple light around a dark black hole under the mountain symbol.
"What is this? It feels so strange" he called out to Entris, who was banging her feet against her chair the whole time like the impatient brat she apparently seemed to be.
"It's a magic circle representing the basic elements of magic. Fire, water, ground, air, dark, and light" she pleaded with him while she put on her best pouting puppy dog face "please step into the center so you can get out of my house, please, please, please!"
"Hold on, is this purple one, I'm guessing darkness, where you draw power from? It's purple like everything you have here"
The small form of the goddess took a pillow out from behind her back, buried her face in it and screamed as loud as she could, causing the walls of the cathedral to shake, then replaced it properly behind herself on the chair "Yes, I represent darkness to a certain degree. No, purple everything doesn't mean it's my one and only source of power, I just really like that color. Can you please just stand in the stupid circle?"
Agrun quickly floated over to the inner central circle and stood upon it. Another electrical humming sound began to drone around him like when he was presented with the continue text box earlier. The humming gave way to a slight vibration and a beautiful chanting as if from angels. The light in the cathedral dimmed heavily and Entris stopped moving, not even blinking. A rainbow light glowed around the circle he stood in and a text box completely devoid of the decorations he had expected appeared in black outlined with plain white. Text started flashing by rapidly until it remained on one phrase and then slowly followed with more.
DNA verification in progress, standby…
DNA verification error, soul blueprint tampering detected
Soul name change detected
Guardian dispatched, please stand by...
What the hell? Is something wrong? Why am I getting a really bad feeling about this? Agrun thought to himself. His feeling was confirmed as the humming around him became more intense and a dark figure started to melt into view before him as if it was walking out of a thick, invisible fog. It looked inhuman and massive, with wings that stretched out more than 10 feet from the tip of each wing. Whatever he did to deserve getting punished by this thing, he was certain it was overkill to the highest degree. The beast began shrieking and clicking, seeming to pause to evaluate him before it decided whether to tear his soul to shreds, breathe fire at him, or pick him up to drop him into some pit of eternal torment.
And then the noises stopped, even the ambient hum of the process he was undergoing was gone, an uneasy but far less hostile stillness fell over Agrun and this "Guardian" being the display sent to him. The shadowy winged creature regarded him a little longer, then its body began to hiss and change while emitting a thick black smoke, as if it were being dissolved like some kind of creepy sculpture made of dry ice that had been dipped into warm water.
When the smoke cleared, what stood before him was no longer a monster, at least from what he could tell. Instead, he saw a young girl, looking to be no older than 7 or 8 by her size, with wings that were now a bright white and were feathered rather than a shifting mess of shadows, and wearing nothing else. She floated without so much as flapping her wings and looked deep into Agrun's eye sockets. She moved her straw blonde hair behind one ear and then opened her mouth as if to speak, but stopped awkwardly like she didn't know how. Agrun tilted his head and relaxed his shoulders, now more confused than afraid.
He decided now would be a good time to end the silence and see what this was all about.
"Hello?" he began
"HELLO!" Agrun jumped back a little, startled at the sudden exclamation that came from the girl before he even finished his first word. "I AM A CELESTIAL GUARDIAN sent to ascertain the nature of your soul tampering and guide you on your development," Whatever that meant, it was clear she figured out mid sentence that yelling is not normal in spoken conversation. Was she not used to speaking out loud? How quickly does this strange being learn? "Unknown Being Agrun, please state your purpose and energetic alignment"
"What the fuck? I have no idea"
"Noted, Agrun: alignment, neutral. Purpose, unknown. Guide protocol activating. Unknown Being Agrun, have you ever incarnated to the mortal plane before?"
'Holy shit, this is really creepy. Angels aren't supposed to talk like robots...are they?'
"Yes, I have. I was human before I died and ended up here. That bitch over there threw my soul in here and wiped my mind"
"Noted. Correction, Goddess Entris is not a canine, she is a minor celestial force with influence over the mortal realms. You claim she has tampered with your soul and DNA?"
Agrun burst out laughing at how literal this angel was, but also noted how she was able to grasp the English language and its slang almost immediately. Did she steal it from his mind? Or perhaps a single word was all she needed to learn the whole thing? That doesn't seem possible no matter how you sliced it, so chances are she literally read his mind. Right on cue, the cherub piped up to answer his question
"My apologies, I did have to read your mind to learn how best to communicate with you and to know what form to take so you would not be afraid. I understand this feels like a violation to your concept of privacy, but you are not currently receptive to telepathy. If you would like, I can teach you how to use this skill after some more questioning"
"Oh uh, thanks. That would be great actually. Can I use it once I'm put back in the uh...mortal realm?"
"Yes, you may, so long as you have a being or object you can telepathically communicate with. I repeat my inquiry, has Goddess Entris tampered with your soul, DNA, or your being?"
"Yes, in fact I'm only dead because of her. She even tore me away from the afterlife" The angel clenched her fists at this and a deep frown developed on her face, which had been fairly neutral up until now.
"This is unacceptable! Do you have any indication or clue as to why this took place? This is a violation of the natural order. While we give gods and goddesses some flexibility to affect events, they are not to pluck beings from the cycle without permission"
Agrun thought for a moment "Well, she did say she wanted me to stop the plans of her sister. Kelaya, was it?"
The angel cocked her head slightly and paused, as if checking something.
"Curious. We do not have a record of any plans or events being influenced by Goddess Kelaya, yet much upon several realms has been altered that would be consistent with a goddess of her influence. Perhaps Goddess Entris is not entirely at fault. Perhaps Goddess Kelaya needs to be questioned as well as her sister. Goddess Entris will still be punished, you will not. You are an unwitting pawn in their schemes, a victim of their meddling. I see you are in the middle of a registration ritual for soul assignment. Would you like my help to continue this ritual before you learn telepathy?"
Agrun absorbed the implications of what he just learned. These goddesses were in violation of some higher law, a law that he is luckily not breaking willfully and so is off the hook on whatever consequences could be brought against the goddesses. That was a relief, but now that he had an agent of the universe with some authority, perhaps he could finally seek some rest? "Actually miss um… What was your name again?"
"I am a Guardian Guide, I have no name. Would you like to assign me a name for ease of conversation?"
"Oh uh, I guess I'll call you," he thought for a moment. How does one name an angel? She doesn't need some crazy name. Why not something simple? "Sophia?"
"Noted, in future conversations with Agrun I shall be known as Sophia. Profile pattern created, personality seed generated" A blank look waxed over Sophia's eyes as she slumped over in midair. Before Agrun could reach out and shake her, she stood back up at attention, flapping her wings in an excited manner, with a high pitched voice that matched her youthful appearance. "Hi Agrun! I've decided you aren't such a bad guy, so I'm gonna help you out! Let's be friends, okay? I'm gonna help you with your reincarnation now!"
"Sure Sophia we can be friends, but could you actually do something else for me? Could you take me out of here and just return me to the afterlife I was going to go to? I'd rather not get involved with this 'champion' nonsense. I would rather just stay dead and not have to care about all this stuff"
The little angel slowed down her beating wings and contrary to the morbid nature of his wish to receive a proper death, Sophia showed no sign of shock nor expression of dismay at his request. "Sure thing Agrun! I just have to clear this with my superiors before I can wipe you from existence and recycle your energy! I'll be a moment, please sit still and prepare for death!" She held out her hands and a very threatening ball of orange flames appeared between them, aimed straight at his face while her face gained that distant look she had earlier when she heard about Kelaya. So, this was it, huh? This is how his end really comes about? Getting blown to smithereens by an angel just doing her job? There are worse ways to go. Besides, she's gonna send him to his afterlife...right? She didn't say those exact words, but that's what was going to happen, right?
A moment later, Agrun's doubts disappeared with the orange flames, and Sophia's default personality briefly came back to inform him of her decision.
"Tampered Champion Agrun, this unit regrets to inform you that your request for death and commitment to paradise has been denied" Agrun's ghostly brow creased in confusion as Sophia's new personality took over again to explain. "Sorry, Agrun!" the little angel looked down at his feet and put on a convincing pouting face "I can't re-kill you right now, you have an active champion mark on your soul. You have to be reincarnated as you agreed and then die in the course of those duties to be released from your mark. I also cannot help you to die directly, I have to try to help you fulfill your duty"
"Uh, what is my duty as a champion exactly? This was never explained to me. Entris says I've been marked by someone else other than her or Kelaya, but I have no idea who that would be"
"Let me see here. Huh, that's funny! Your mark isn't showing up under a champion request, and has no associated higher being, yet your mark still applies. What a strange mystery! Your objectives are unknown as well. Would you like to see your mark?"
He hadn't thought of it before, but he was kind of curious what this mark looked like, so he nodded and Sophia took his left hand gently in hers and traced a perfect circle on the back of it with her right. A blue glow followed her finger until the circle was done and then a series of webbing or cracks filled the interior of the circle and shifted around to create an image of a burning sword with what could have been barbed wire around the blade. For only being an outline in an ethereal bright blue energy, it was a very detailed image. "What the actual fuck… what is this?" Agrun's jaw was stuck open in shock as Sophia giggled and the blue shifted to a bright orange, as if the mark were made of fire.
"It's a mark, silly! Your mark! I don't know who gave it to you, and this mark tells me nothing about who placed it, which is strange given that most gods and goddesses like to use their symbols in their champion marks and omens, but this seems to be pretty unique and anonymous. I guess you have to wait and see if you get called by the issuer of your mark once you incarnate. Do you know where you're going to be born?"
"Uh, actually Entris said I wasn't going to be born, she said I was going to be brought back in a reanimated corpse" Sophia's face dropped into a look of disgust.
"Ew, that's gross. Sounds like something Entris would plan though, especially if the target is related to her initial plan for you. Well necromancy isn't traditionally how this is done, but it isn't exactly frowned upon. You're in luck too, since being summoned in that way by a higher being is actually a much better deal than being summoned to a body by a mortal mage! You have free will within the bounds of your mark, and once your wounds are healed and your body acclimates to life again, you won't decay like a normal undead. You'll basically be a living being, except for a few things you don't need to worry about right now"
Agrun felt like this would be information he would like to know, especially if it was something that would make life more difficult for him, but before he could ask about it, Sophia touched his forehead and the dim shadows of Entris' cathedral frozen in time were gone. Now he found himself in a grassy field bare of anything on the horizon as far as he could see save for a single massive tree stretching out to meet the starry sky peeking from behind rushing amethyst clouds overhead.
"Where are we? This isn't that weird Limbo anymore, is it?"
"Nope, this is a representation of the world tree, Yggdrasil, drawn from your memories and imagination. It's not quite Limbo, but it isn't quite what you would call reality either. Can I do anything to make you more comfortable?" Agrun hadn't thought about that before, scared out of his mind that he was going to be tortured earlier when Sophia was in her creepy beast form. But taking stock of his surroundings, and seeing as he was technically little more than a human shaped ghost. A naked, human shaped ghost to be exact, he figured he could change that real quick. "Now that you mention it, can I get some clothes? And could you put some on too, if it isn't too much trouble?" While Sophia was clearly a ridiculously powerful being, the form she chose to take was still a young girl, and it felt really awkward for Agrun to stare at a naked girl if another more normal option was possible. Sophia giggled and snapped her fingers. A long white dress with a blue trim and faint gray outlines of constellations appeared on her body, with an open back to allow her wings out. Much better. But he was still naked. "Uh, how do I do that?"
"Just think of what you want to look like, you can change your body too if you want, to a certain point" Oh man, that's another big decision.
"Can I do that any time I want to, or only now?"
"Whenever you like! As long as you're in the astral realm and have control over yourself, you should be able to change your appearance" He nodded and scratched his head, more as a habit than out of any physical need to scratch an itch. 'I can look however I want. But how do I want to look? What should define me?'
'I can decide later, better to start with the basics. Eyeballs and comfy clothes' He thought for a few moments, focused on himself. He gave himself some eyeballs, deep blue irises that were human-like, more defined ears, and a long black robe with a small gold design of his mark displaying prominently in the center. Wait a second, what? "Uh, why is my mark on my clothes?"
"Oh that's gonna stay on your astral form now until you're released from the mark. It looks nice though! So do you wanna learn telepathy or what? I'll take you to the tree after and you'll be sorted back into reality. First though, you need to give yourself another name so you don't give everybody your true name"
'Oh fucking great, another name I have to come up with' Agrun thought with a sigh.
"Alright, is this permanent too or what?"
"Nope, it's just a precaution, you can change it whenever but that can cause problems if you give a different name to too many people. They'll get the wrong idea about you, one way or another. It's just a way to introduce yourself, like how you call me Sophia instead of 'Guardian Guide Epsilon 5,063,723, Human Aspect Pattern 29'" There was an awkward silence for about a minute too long.
"Sophia, is that your real… name?"
"In this form, yes, that is my designation"
"Well, I guess any name I come up with couldn't be worse than that" Agrun sat and looked around at the field he was in. He stared ahead at the world tree in the distance. It was beautiful against the starry purple nebula in the sky, completely free of light pollution despite the seemingly supernatural rainbow glow the tree gave off. He never thought the world tree was a real thing, he had heard about it in Norse legends and as a reference in many stories, but never imagined he would be standing anywhere near it, or at least a representation of it. It served to hammer home the idea that he was no longer in the world he had left, and had no idea where he was going. What kind of name could he use to represent himself in a new world? The whole of his personal identity was forcibly wiped clean from his mind, as if he didn't exist despite all the knowledge he still had from his life on Earth. He was a blank slate, truly being given a new start no matter how strange or unconventional it might be. No matter what sort of person he was in his last life, he felt like he could be whoever he wanted to be now.
What was the phrase used to describe the idea of a blank slate? After a few minutes of thinking he remembered: Tabula Rasa. Could he use that to make a name? A bunch of variations floated through his mind, tasting each gently under his breath while Sophia patiently hovered in front of him, flapping her wings and drawing in the dirt with a stick. 'Rasa, Asar, Tabula, Balatu, Utalabu. Nope, none of those sound any good. Why am I mixing up the letters? Why not the sounds?' After some more trying, he found one he liked, it sounded like a solid name to him. 'Raze. Yep, that's the one! I'll be Raze'
"Alright, Sophia you can call me Raze when I'm on Erisith"
"Raze Agrun, then?"
"What? Is that how it works?"
"Not really, but it would make it easier for me to refer to you this way when greeting you or reporting on you to my superiors. Is that okay?" He nodded
"Sure, why not? So how do I learn to read minds?" Sophia floated down back onto the ground and sat in the grass, then patted the ground in front of her to indicate he should do the same. He sat down cross legged and relaxed, eager to learn something cool.
"Alright, so telepathy at the most basic level is a sort of give and take. You can share a lot of ideas very quickly in a fraction of the time it would take to do the same with verbal speech, but only what the other participant is able or willing to receive or share. This improves with more power and more levels in the telepathy skill," Levels? What did she mean? This wasn't a video game, this is real life. Well, sort of. Surely the weird displays from Limbo were just a weird quirk of Entris' mind games, and not some universal thing! "Wait a second, levels?"
"Yep! Access your status!" The confused look he gave Sophia caused her to giggle and kick her feet in the air.
"You mean you haven't even assessed your status? What would you do without me? You'd be the worst champion ever! Here, unfocus your eyes and think about yourself or what part of yourself you want to know about.. I'm not sure how it will work for you though, it's different for everyone" Agrun did as he was instructed and a display screen almost melted into view in front of his eyes, or perhaps inside of them, he wasn't sure which, and the sign of his mark appeared inside of it before giving way to a list of text about himself. The box itself was the same white outlined box from before Sophia appeared to him, no more purple box with skeletons and weird flowers. Was that design just the influence of Entris' Limbo space on his mind? Was it supposed to be like this?
"Hey, you're looking at something, did it appear to you visually?" Sophia spoke up and tilted her head, curious about his experience.
"Yeah, you mean you can't see it?" She shook her head
"Nope, it's only for you to see. You can share what you're seeing to me through telepathy, but I can't see the actual representation itself. For some it might just be a voice in their head reading out their status or listing their skills, for others the knowledge just becomes known to them like a memory would be. It's down to the individual. Nearly everyone in a magic rich environment has this ability, it's a type of Analysis skill called Introspection"
Raze, as he was going to have to start calling himself, took a deep breath and looked at the display before him. It was styled like a character sheet the same as you would find in any RPG, with some notable exceptions.
Name: Raze Agrun
Race: ????
Level: ????
Stats
Strength: ????
Dexterity: ????
Perception: ????
Constitution: ????
Intelligence: ????
Wisdom: ????
Charisma: ????
Stamina: ??/?? Regeneration: ????
Mana: ??/?? Regeneration: ????
SKILLS
Astral Body Control: Novice (Rank 1)
Analysis: Novice (Rank 1)
Introspection: Novice (Rank 1)
Sixth Sense: Novice (Rank 2)
MARKS AND BOONS
Champion's Mark: Variable Bonuses
"Uh Sophia, where are my stats? They're all question marks, also where is my health? This looks like an RPG character sheet, but I have no hit points"
"What? I don't understand?" She cocked her head to the side, unsure what he meant with his question
"How am I gonna know how much damage I can take if I don't know how much HP I have. It's kind of a big deal in most role playing games. It's how you can quantify how close to death you are?" He started gesturing wildly trying to explain, she shook her head, still stuck.
"Why would you have a number to tell you how close to death you are? How alive you are? That sounds stupid and impossible to determine"
Raze opened his mouth to argue, then closed it. She had a point. To someone who hadn't played an RPG, the idea of a number to determine how dead you are sounded ridiculous. How do you determine the difference between 50 HP and 5 HP? If you reach low HP do you just drop and slowly die, or do you pass out? It was something he hadn't thought of before.
"Okay you're right, that is actually something you'd only see in a game. But what about Constitution then, what does that do?"
"It's like your resistance to disease, poison, other ailments, and it does kind of determine how hearty you are, but it doesn't necessarily mean you can take a knife to the heart and not die. Actually… as an undead, you might be able to do that, but whether you can heal that back or not is a different matter" Sophia giggled at the idea, though it wasn't mean spirited. "Anyway, do you notice the levels of any abilities you have right now? The skills? Those are grouped according to Proficiency and then Rank. They go from Novice rank 1, to Master rank 10 as you get better at them and they give different bonuses as you get better. You get better just by practicing usually, or learning from someone else. Here, look into my eyes and try to relax, empty your thoughts" Raze looked into the eyes of the only being that had selflessly helped him since he had died, he saw nothing but calm and suddenly he felt at ease. He felt a wave of tranquility wash over him as he began to take in the alien stars around himself and his angel guide, as he again felt the beauty of the cosmic sea wash over him. A ringing noise began in his ears, then a system box popped up in front of him.
Guardian Guide Sophia is trying to establish a telepathic link to you, do you accept? Yes No
He selected the Yes option and then he was overcome by a sudden sensation of having his head punched, a strange problem to have since he had no body. Then just as quickly as it came, it went away and he could hear Sophia in his mind. "Hi! Are you getting this? Just think of what you want to say and then focus on sending it to me. It's as simple as talking, just quicker! You don't even have to look into my eyes after the link is started if you don't want to, but it might be easier." Raze focused on her eyes for a moment and willed forward the words
"I hear you, loud and clear! This is actually crazy as hell!"
"Oh trust me, things are way more intense in any one of the hellish realms. You want me to show you? Actually wait, on second thought that would probably be a horrible idea"
"Yeah I can do without any of those images, I've already seen some messed up shit with Entris on the way to that big magic circle"
"The Weave of Fate? Yeah that's a really scary flow of probabilities, not something most mortal souls can make much sense of easily. Don't worry about it" This whole conversation they were having had taken only 6 seconds, where verbally it could take longer depending on how fast they were talking. Telepathy truly is superior to talking out loud, that much he could tell straight away. He could see how this ability could save lives if implemented in battle situations, or just to warn people in general if it could be used to broadcast an idea to anyone in range. Was that even possible?
A sudden ping sound filled Raze's head and he saw an exclamation point in the corner of his eye. He took a look at it, sending an image of the exclamation mark to Sophia before it opened up, then a window appeared over his character sheet..
Congratulations! You have learned the sub skill Telepathy: Novice (Rank 1)
Talk to others without words, communicate feelings directly to those who you care about, or send images of what you're seeing to the people who need to see them. You can do this and more with the Telepathy skill, advance this skill to make your bonds gain extra range and enhance connection clarity.
Congratulations! Learning a sub skill of the Sixth Sense tree has contributed to your advancement in this skill, you have advanced to Novice (Rank 3), gaining +1 to Perception and Wisdom, and you have gained the ability to intuitively sense danger within 15 feet of yourself, even if it is magically hidden.
'Holy shit' Raze thought to himself, 'that's a lot of stuff just for gaining one rank. Why was I rank 2 to begin with though?' He figured he should report this to Sophia and sent a mental screenshot of what he was looking at. Her face lit up and she flapped her wings quickly.
"That's great! What are your perception and wisdom scores now?"
"No idea, they're all question marks"
"Oh? Maybe it's because you've been tampered with? You might be incomplete until you have a physical body to apply these stats to. I don't have this problem since I'm supposed to live on the astral plane. I'll check in with you on that again when I see you, but now I have to take you to Yggdrasil to be put into your new body"
As she communicated this, the ground below them shrank away and the world tree came closer, like some form of freaky dream physics. At this point Raze was a little unnerved, but not overly surprised, physics in a non-physical plane of existence made no goddamn sense. Up close, the world tree looked more like a huge bundle of white fiber optic wire in the rough shape of a tree hundreds of feet tall, but that might just be what he was seeing rather than what it actually looks like. Sophia jumped onto Raze's back and held on tight. "Come on, let's go! Piggyback ride!" Whether this was just part of her new personality that she created just for his sake or something she actually enjoyed, he may never know, but he couldn't say no to carrying an angel up the limbs of a giant dream tree.
So they walked ahead, onto the nearest limb of the tree and upwards. When they reached the center, Raze slowly felt a pressure in his throat, like he was choking on razor wire as reality once again fell apart around him. The world tree quickly melted away into the fibers it was made of, then into atoms, then the atoms spread out and became stars.
'What's going on? This is such a weird feeling, I can't breathe! When did the tree start to collapse around us like this?'
"Shhh, don't worry Raze Agrun, you're going to be okay, I'm here. I'll be watching over you, even while I try to get to the bottom of your mystery" Her voice started to shift in pitch from the voice of a little girl up to the motherly voice one would associate with a true guardian angel. He could feel Sophia rubbing the back of his head even as he felt like he was floating at sea, a sea made up of infinite worlds and infinite possibilities. For as long as he could stay conscious, he could explore each and every one of those countless stars and the worlds around them and never fail to be amazed by their beauty. He was floating on the sea of stars, lost but no longer afraid, even as he approached and felt the gravity of planet Erisith weigh on the corpse his soul was searching for, to bind to. He fell like a shooting star crashing through clouds, through trees, through the roof of an old manor house and into the basement. He left no trace of his descent, and would not have known he ever left the sea of stars save for the tightness in his new chest and the darkness he was now trapped in.