"On the 31st day of the 12th month in the celestial calendar, Cyrus Cador has finally met his end." The hooded figure sat down, next to the fallen statues rubble, allowing himself to rest finally. "Pretty enticing headline huh?" the man spoke softly, coughing up blood in between words. The tall figure opposite the man simply looked down at the hooded man, before finally speaking, "All of this could have been avoided Cyrus, but you chose the wrong path" At this the hooded man laughed harder than he should have given the situation he was in. "You still don't understand Zephyr. I thought you would by now, but it seems like you're still at her beck and call huh?" The standing man gave a final look at the dying man and then walked away.

My time was finally over, 46 years of trying to right every wrong I've ever committed, but it was to no avail seeing as I was seconds away from dying of blood loss, and I had accomplished nothing. Betrayed and left to die, I felt weird for not being angry or sad. I felt free, like even though my vision was blurring and I could no longer feel my body, I could run around and frolic for months without being tired. Then I felt it, my time was up. My eyes closed and the world started to get colder and colder until I was floating in a vast darkness with nothing but my thoughts to keep me company. This isn't nearly as bad as I thought it would be, I thought to myself. If heaven and hell were real, this darkness would be emitting heat equal to that of the sun. Even though I felt at peace with my death, 

I couldn't shake the feeling that there was so much more for me to do, it was as if I couldn't leave the world of the living, just not yet at least. My thoughts were cut short as the darkness changed from having almost no weight and allowing me to flow freely to pulling me in with more force than my body could handle. It was as if I was being pulled limb by limb into an endless chasm of darkness. I was trying my best to scream and break free, trying to escape the pull, but I had no body. There was no mouth to scream from, and no limbs to help me move, and yet I could still feel the pain like I was alive.

After what felt like hours of excruciating pain, the force that was pulling me finally stopped. The feeling of helplessness and anxiety did not. The pain had gone away, but I was lost in the dark, with no knowledge of what was going on. I could no longer relax in this emptiness because I never knew when the darkness would pull me in again, or what else it was capable of. My anxiety was however short-lived, as before the darkness could reach me again, I was hit by a light so blinding, in that moment I hoped for the darkness to return. But, how was I seeing this light? I had no eyes that could be blinded, and if it was some kind of reaper that had come to take my soul, this wasn't the best way to get my attention. And then, I felt it. I could feel the warmth of the world, the weight of my body, and then finally the light subsided. I could see. I could see! Wait, I can see, how is this possible, I'm dead, I was one hundred percent killed, and I felt the embrace of death, or at least I'm assuming, it was my first time dying. This also could not be the work of necromancy, because I wouldn't be able to think. It had been too late for a Saint to resurrect me. As I ran through all the possible situations as to how I'd returned to the world of the living, I could feel someone shaking me violently. 

How stupid and senile I'd become, instead of first figuring out my situation I started thinking of pointless things. As I finally decided to look around and attempted to move, my vision fully cleared and I saw multiple people surrounding me. Several of them wearing what seemed to be servant uniforms, and then a woman and a man who had just rushed into the room wearing what seemed to be the clothes of royalty covered by a gold and black robe respectively. The woman grabbed onto me in a tight hug and started to sob uncontrollably. I noticed that almost everyone in the room was crying. Where on earth could I be right now? The man stood silently, with distant eyes. He was trying to hold back tears but was unsuccessful. He finally caved and grabbed onto me alongside the woman before yelling "My son is alive!".

The rest of the room, including the woman who'd been holding onto me rejoiced. As they all talked around me and attempted to conversate with me, I remained mute and pretended that I could not hear anything, which didn't work as it just raised the air of worry in the room. In reality, I was just too awe-struck to speak. It had become clear to me that this was no form of necromancy or resurrection. I am no longer Cyrus Carod. I had no idea who I was, but seeing as my soul and my thoughts, were in a body that is not mine, I had been reincarnated. But how is that possible? Reincarnation is a form of magic that exceeds the level of Divine Arbiters, a class of hybrid mages that haven't been seen in thousands of years. No matter how hard I tried I could never reach that level of power.

Alright never mind all that, for now, I need to act my part as this new body's host and find out more information on this mysterious place. It'll do me no good to keep thinking about my return, not yet at least. Okay Cyrus you were a peasant for most of your life, you should at least be able to act to some degree, which is a little stupid to say but hey when you're trying to beg for food, the scared little boy act works great. I finally opened my mouth and prayed that I knew how to speak. 

"M-m-mother…?" I uttered, assuming obviously if the man had called me his son then that woman must be my mother. However, I immediately started beating myself up in my mind. What kind of first words is that you imbecile, are you trying to make the situation worse? Sounding like a scared little kid was going to make the crying even worse, and then I'd be stuck here with these people for even longer. I needed the room to myself to figure things out. In full truth I tried to say "Mother what's going on?" but that idiotic stutter was all I could mutter. I was now praying that the crying wouldn't get worse because even though I could feel the urge to cry, which I'm assuming was coming from this body's original host, still feels weird to say that, but I just wasn't very good at handling any emotion. I tried to play my role as best as possible, hugging the woman tightly and hiccuping into her shoulder, trying to hide the fact that I was unable to cry. I was trying my best to speed up this process of crying and hugging but nothing I did seemed to work.

Then the first man who had entered the room, who I knew to be this body's father, or maybe I'm in some weird place where the word son is used differently, but I was hoping it was the former, came in to hug me as well. I would much rather be back to being sucked in by that chasm of nothingness than continue with whatever was happening here. Finally, as I felt my ability to speak be at the point where it wouldn't just incite more crying, I said that my head hurt immensely and that I'd like to sleep a little bit more. Once they'd exited the room, after the woman had clung onto me at least 10 more times, I took a second to catch my breath. 

Alright, first and foremost I need to check on this body's condition because I will genuinely be unable to do anything with a weak body, just looking at myself in the mirror I saw that maybe I'd end up in the unable to do anything situation. I sat cross-legged with my arms resting on my thighs. I first tried to circulate my mana, while also praying that I had mana to circulate. But to my surprise I did, and not only did I have mana, I was able to draw it in faster than I could in my previous life. I got carried away with this newfound ability, considering being able to circulate mana like this would make someone a generational talent, but I soon discovered that this ability was not a blessing. But rather a curse. As I continued to pull in mana, I suddenly felt an immense shock being sent across my body, causing my body to go limp and my heart to start beating so fast I felt that it was going to explode. And it was just my luck that my head decided that it wanted to join in on the party as my head also started to feel as though it was gonna crack open. Hundreds of images flashed through my head, showing a boy running around with his parents, talking with other children, and just simply being a kid. 

If not for the complete feeling of death, which I was now an expert in, taking over my body I probably would have realized a little earlier that this was this body's memories. So I was now trying to stay alive, not scream like a little girl, and also try to lock into my memory as much as I could, out of the images I was seeing. And people like to tell me I can't multitask. When I had finally stopped the circulation of mana in my body, which is unbelievably dangerous for a mage, considering once your mana core had been established, mana then became your literal life force, but with just the sheer amount of mana that I'd accumulated in that short amount of time, I would be able to go without keeping my mana circulating for a decent amount of time. I slowly stood up, using the bed as support, then sat down on the edge of the bed trying to piece together everything that had happened to me. 

In an unknown amount of time, hard to keep track after death, I have been betrayed and killed, reincarnated into the body of a person that I do not know, surrounded by people that I do not know, as well as this body that I've reincarnated into having an ungodly ability to absorb mana quicker then probably anyone else, but once it absorbs a certain amount, the body is unable to control it all and it will simply shutdown. What a great day I'm having. I wanted to continue to investigate, find out where I am, who I am, what the hell is wrong with this body, and probably what I should've started worrying about if I'm still even on the same planet.

However I simply could not remain awake any longer, this body was already not in good condition when I'd first woken up in it, and after that whole situation, it was feeling much much worse. I laid back on the bed, covering my eyes with my face and I just started to laugh. I don't know why, there was nothing funny about what was happening to me but I couldn't stop. And like that, I just ended up laughing myself to sleep.