It was an ordinary apartment with large windows, brown furniture and a low coffee table in the middle. There was a hologram with Arena warriors currently battling on it in the middle of the room. Neil would check every morning for news or to watch the games, but now he was too eager to plant the soul.
The machine in his room was what allowed him to place souls in vessels and reincarnate them into different worlds to awaken powers and train.
Now standing before it, he placed the sphere delicately into the middle.
Checking to see it in place, Neil hopped over in front of the screen scrolling through a catalogue ready to chose a planet with a multitude of different atmosphere and challenges.
"This one.. no.. uhh… this one! It will definitely be hard for you."
Satisfied and baring a wicked smile, Neil taped on the lower realm planet {Catena} and waited patiently.
{Catena} was known for its harsh environments and high morality rate. For a being to reach tier 3 there, they had to consistently fight with their lives on the line and cultivate with lower levels of Vis—the energy that allows regular humans to become super humans. Especially since the plant was infested with Chasm-born and other monstrosities.
[Are you sure of your selection: [Y/N]]
"Yep"
With a final click the sphere will be transported into a body and become a warrior that Neil can collect later.
The sphere suddenly started spinning as the liquid formed a vortex. Electricity revolved around the sphere like it was lightning generator before the the familiar collapse came as the sphere shrunk into a tiny dot and disappeared. When the liquid turned clear again, Neil sat there satisfied as he laid back to relax. Unknowing to Neil, the machine flashed before returning to the catalogue page:
[Transporting to {Higher Realm} planet {Inanis}].
********
Authors note-
Vis is name of the primal energy source that empowered humans and gave them super power like abilities.
********
The sensation of being kept in the dark without thoughts, feelings, or awareness of existence was exactly what he was experiencing. Suspended in nothing. That was his reality until his memories flooded back into his head like a dam had blown open.
'Where am I? What is happening to me?' He thought, panicking.
'The last thing I remember was the sword that flew towards my face before my world went dark'.
'All that work and training to reach tier 3. I did it faster than anyone has done before, and all that was waiting for me was a one way ticket to a death game!'
He wanted to scowl but was met with the absolute nothing. Suppressing the thought of a deadpan face, he soon slowly regained the feeling of being within a body. Starting from his fingertips and toes, the sensation slowly inched upwards through his arms and legs before reaching his torso leaving his chest heaving up and down.
'It's quite nice to be back in a body again' He thought, but not before feeling a fuzzy sensation. As if the entirety of his body felt like he was wrapped within a soft blanket. But that wasn't what concerned him the most.
'Why do I feel so weak in this body?'
'Have I been reborn?'
Soon enough, he felt a connection with his eyes and slowly opened them to be met with a blinding light. Squinting to adjust, a female face with large pale brown eyes and a tired smile hanging from her lips came into his view.
'Is she smiling? I haven't seen anyone smile in a long time. The women in the arena all bore a psychopathic menacing looks' he thought before shuddering at his latest memory of the one who killed him.
To someone like him, the woman smiling above seemed angelic.
'So beautiful' He couldn't help but think.
As he was busy engraving the image of her in his head, she suddenly uncovered her chest and raise him near to it.
'WAIT WAIT WHAT ARE YOU DOING?'
Before he knew it, a warm liquid was flowing down his throat as his vision became hazy and eventually black when he felt himself drifting off. The liquid had a thick consistency in his mouth, but he couldn't be bothered by that as he hear her say:
"I'll name you Zalan. Zalan Caddel".
'Zalan. I like it'
It was the last thought Zalan had before being sucked away to his subconsciousness.
Zalan dreamt of his previous life. From his family who abused him when he wasn't as talented as his peers, to the civil wars he had to fight because of the political situation with other clans. With his last life on earth, Zalan distinctly remembers his dual-faced mother had sold him off to a slave trader when his potential was measured to be tier 1. The money she got from it was more than enough to compensate for his disappearance. Even for beings in the lower plane, one had to be able to rise to Tier 3 to be able to ascend. And so knowing that he would never reach above tier 2, his family didn't hesitate to discard him to save the resources for the potential tier 5s and 6s that can be cultivated when they reached the middle Realms.
The main reason for this was because the planet was at war with the Chasm-Borns; mankind's enemy that appeared one thousand years ago. For an unknown reason, none of them exist in the middle realms. No one knows where and how they originated, but all that is known is that where ever there is a human planet within the lower or higher realms, there were bound to be Chasm-Borns in the same solar system.
Stringing along in his chain of imagery of his previous life, Zalan was startled to his senses after he heard whispering. His mother was on the side sitting speaking with another women who seemed like a maid.
"Ssshhh, he's sleeping". Zalan's mother said to the other lady before turning back and gazing at him like someone who is staring at the cutest thing they have ever seen.
'Where am I? Who am I? And how did I get here?' Zalan tried to remember what happened when he died.
'Did she stab me? Was it even a she? Why were we fighting?' The memory became fuzzy and eventually blank when his consciousness reached to retrieve that information.
'Strange, I only remember my life on earth' Zalan thought. 'Dying to a Chasm-Born'.
Turning his head, he glance at the familiar woman who he first saw and the other one beside her. Seeing them clearly now, both were young brunettes dressed in casual clothes. The woman on the left was his mother and the one on the right wore an apron suggesting that she was a helper, to Zalan. But both were no doubt beauties that would make any man fall head over heels for.
Laying there, Zalan wanted to speak but only let out a high pitched cry. Upon hearing him, Zalan's mother came rushing over to pick him up, and started speaking in her gibberish that he has yet to understand. She started rocking him slowly.
'I should try to learn this language as fast as I can' Zalan thought before closing his eyes and drifting off again.
******
Three months have passed since then.
'The language of this world isn't that difficult. It sounds a lot like English from my previous planet Earth'.
'But part of it is also because of her non stop chattering and tendency to explain everything she is doing to me."
Zalan thought whilst stealing a glance at his mother.
Zalan learned that his family is part of the group of families that lives on the outskirts of Caelum city. His loving unawakened mother's name was Amanda and tier 3 father's was Alex. It was summer. Or at least he thought so after feeling the searing heat through his blanket. Either than or his blankets are the most insulated thing he has ever felt.
The house they were living in wasn't the largest, nor the smallest. It resembled a seaside villa with its open windows and it's many balconies. There was a large blue button beside the door, to be pressed in only emergencies like beast attacks. When it was pressed, tier 2 reinforced metal blast shields would come down shielding them inside. They only had to worry about beast from tier 1 and 2 because the higher tiered ones were taken care of the sentries deployed by the awakened association or the great clan.
Amanda often would take Zalan outside to the farm. In the afternoon, Amanda took Zalan outside to play with the animals. Zalan took this chance to study the flora and fauna of the place since his mother would do this everyday. Along with the giant red lizard like creatures that spat out fertilizer, he had already grown accustomed to seeing the giant white cylinders sticking out of the ground. Each one 20 meters tall that seemed like storage units, scatter around the field of yellow crops. The path that they walked on circled the perimeter of the house. The front door of the house faced the Mega city Caelum, with its jagged skyscrapers peaks standing tall. At least a few hundred stories high.
To the left were the fields where a multitude of machines could be seen harvesting the yellow grain like crop. To the right, there was a dense forest where trees trunks grew in loops, creating a natural wall like structure.
'That's strange, why don't they grow straight?'
Zalan was left with his question unanswered as Amanda finished her routine walk and sat down with Zalan on the porch of the house. She was humming whilst reading something on her holographic screen while Zalan was sprawled down on her side gazing outwards.
'This is a very peaceful environment, the exact opposite of my doomsday bunker'
'If I gain power, life should be very peaceful here'
Satisfied, Zalan continue to take in the scene until he noticed a grey figure staring right back at them a few hundred meters away. It was something Zalan could never forget. The cause of his pain.