Tsk!
'What a drag.' Zareth thought to himself with a frown on his face as he sat in the darkness, waiting to be born once again.
Although the experience of being born wasn't something he had already gotten used to, the length and events of his past life as the Sovereign had prepared him for the worst.
Zereth attempted to cross his stubby little arms to express his discontent, however, failed in his valiant endeavor.
"Damn it!"
Out of nowhere, Zereth began to experience warm and slimy sensations touch and feel all around his body before he was suddenly pulled out into the real world, head first.
He could barely keep his puny eyes open as the bright outside light immediately assaulted on contact.
However, a small grin could now be seen on his chubby face.
'Well hell... I might as well enjoy this as much as I can.'
"By Gaia's mercy! It's a beautiful baby boy!"
The slightly muffled voice of a middle-aged woman resounded in Zereth's ears in a trice.
As he was just a newborn, his senses had yet to fully develop. His hearing was slightly less than perfect, while his vision and sense of smell were quite lacking at the moment.
A plump middle-aged woman dressed in an old maids-dress held Zereth in her hands, seeming to be overjoyed. Her gleaming eyes looked as though they were going to pop from the excitement.
"He's... adorable!" She yelled, expressing her cheer.
It seemed that he could understand the language that she was speaking, even though he had never heard it before in his life. He credited this anomaly to his system.
'A- adorable? Let me go this instance woman! I am not your plaything!' Zereth thought he furiously yelled at the woman, however, all that came out of his mouth were miniature babbles.
"Gu Ga Gu"
On hearing this, the middle-aged woman laughed whole-heartedly.
"Oh ho ho, you're a feisty one aren't you boy?" She doddled with his nose for a brief moment before looking at the beautiful woman to her right who was laying on an inclined birthing bed, fully draped in a thin white cloth.
"Here you are, Freya." She said, handing Zereth over to his mother.
As soon as he fell into his mother's warm embrace, Zereth saw her crystal-blue eyes moisten.
"My baby... you're finally here." She said in a soft-spoken voice, looking down at Zereth as large tear droplets trickled along her fair complexioned face and dropped down onto his forehead.
"Your name will be..." As Freya spoke, Zereth's attention swayed to the other parts of the room that he had yet to survey.
Although his vision was poor, he established that he was inside some sort of small, roughly built cabin.
Inside of which were present his mother, the nurse who stood beside her, and also a man who looked to be standing in the corner, next to the door.
Zereth was able to see that the man was looking down at the ground, however, couldn't discern anything else from the quick glance.
"... Zareth Vanaheim."
These words immediately caught Zereth's attention.
He previously did not give a hoot about what his mother was going to say, but now, his focus had reflected back to her in an instant.
'Vanaheim... Zareth?' He thought to himself for a second before turning to the camera and breaking the fourth wall.
'What a coincidence!' Zereth, now Zareth, sarcastically said with a shocked baby expression.
"Gu gu ga"
Hearing this, the stout nurse laughed once again.
"Oh ho ho, he tries to speak!"
"Indeed he does." Zareth's mother also joined in the laughter.
"Mmm... darn it! I cannot contain myself any longer. Freya, hand him to me!" The man standing in the corner of the room raised his head, revealing a large grin as he quickly walked over to the bed.
As Zareth was placed into the hands of the man whom he now assumed to be his father, he immediately noticed the difference in the style he was carried.
The nurse and his mother had been very gentle with him, however, this man had already picked him up above his own head, and had begun to joyfully swing him around as if he was some kind of doll.
"Haha! You, my son, will be the ruler of the world won't you?" Zareth's father joked as he twirled around with Zareth in his hands.
Zareth immediately began feeling nauseous. He felt as though the entire world was collapsing around him.
By the end of this torture, Zareth was completely spent. His father now held him, face to face, and locked eye contact with him.
'You- you bastard... you will pay for---' Suddenly, Zareth felt an eruption of vomit quickly climb up his throat.
Before he knew it, Zareth had barfed all over his father's smiling dome, now leaving him with a disgusted frown instead.
After throwing up, Zareth's nausea felt like it had dissipated, as he now looked his vomit-drenched father in the face before laughing his ass off.
'Hahaha! That is what you get for messing with me, you pathetic mortal!'
"Ga ga ga"
Zareth's father was frozen in shock, and he was quickly transferred back over to his mother by the nurse.
"He... I think he did that on purpose." Zareth's father said as the nurse wiped the vomit off of his face.
"Looks like he's going to be quite the troublemaker."
Now that he was satisfied, Zareth began to feel tired. 'I suppose, that is all I can do in this pitiful body for now...' He thought to himself as he slowly faded away into a deep slumber.
…
A couple of months had already passed since Zareth's reincarnation.
During these months, Zareth was unable to do anything too useful. However, he made sure that he listened in depth to what people around him spoke about to try and gain as much knowledge about his new world as possible.
He lived in a small town called Bolnuir with his mother Freya, and his father Drufus. Bolnuir was located near the outskirts of the Jotunheim Kingdom, and other than the fact that this town was quite poverty-stricken, Zareth learned that Bolnuir was the most prominent smaller town within the poor barrens of the kingdom.
This was due to the town having an adventurers building which was a small branch of an adventurers association that was prominent deeper within the kingdom's cities.
His family's status within the town was not too bad either, as they were one of the only adventurers within the impoverished town.
Each and every day, Zareth's mother would sit outside their small cottage with him on his lap as she knitted. Here, Zareth would see his father rigorously train with a broad sword almost every day.
When he would sometimes get injured or overly exhausted, Freya would tend to his wounds using a vibrant green light that radiated from her hands.
Just from a single look, Zareth knew that it was magic.
Magic existed in this world.
However, the magic his mother performed was different from that of the Immortal Realm. In fact, Zareth was even quite confused by it at the beginning.
In the Immortal Realm, one couldn't just exude magic from their hands freely. They needed to channel it into a technique and use a trigger word to activate it.
But here, it seemed that magic could be used without any technique or alternative method, and didn't need a spell or mantra to cast it.
On this bright and azure-sky day which was free of any clouds, Zareth was once again sat on his mother's lap as she knitted over his head and quietly hummed a beautiful tune.
Of course, he had a frown on his face.
'Each and every day... I have to endure this.' He thought to himself, almost in defeat.
He stared at this father train below the dauntless sun. Beads of sweat flew off his forehead with each and every swing of his heavy sword, however, Zareth hated seeing such horrible swordsmanship.
With each thrust and each slash, Zareth cringed a little inside.
'How badly can one perform an act? Even a toddler in the Immortal Realm could defeat this man.' He thought to himself.
"You know." His mother suddenly spoke, still looking down at what she was knitting.
Drufus immediately stopped swinging his sword and stabbed it into the ground before leaning on it.
"What honey?" An exhausted look showed on his panting face.
"You train each and every day, but it is only for minor requests of goblin invasions in small villages here and there. Why don't you ever take a single day off?" She said with a small grin on her face as she continued to knit.
Right before answering, Zareth's father paused and questioned himself for just a second; before shaking off his confused look and answering
"Look, you never know when you might be needed for an important quest!"
Freya chuckled lightly as she heard this.
"Besides, It's easy for you to talk, you don't even have to hone your skill each day for you to maintain your magic. Some of us weren't born as mother Gaia's favorite." He said, slightly unimpressed as he pulled his sword back out of the ground and began swinging it once again.
After a couple of swings, he drove the sword back into the ground once again before leaning on it.
"Wait!" His expression was far more bright.
"We haven't tested Zareth's affinity, have we? What if he was also chosen by mother Gaia!" He spoke eagerly.
Freya paused knitting. "You know what... your right Drufus!"
Just like that, Zareth found himself in a baby-carrying basket, being taken into the town's main market center.