Prologue- Beats the moon upon my window
-Personal Diary.
1st Day, unknown time and date.
It was never as they describe in the stories. Isekai, waking up in another world, magic ticket, whatever you call it but going down the rabbit hole and waking up in the body of a character from a story that you read is never, ever like they describe it.
That was my reaction as I woke up in the body of Ross Boiler, even the name screams TO BE IGNORED.
And immediately my first reaction was to go back to sleep and try to wake up, not to scream or be confused, for when you find yourself in a different world, a different body, you always assume it's a dream.
And this was a dream that refused to let me wake up.
So I decided to go outside and see just how deep the rabbit hole goes. I just hope that what's awaiting for me is Wonderland and not something worse.
I can dream about it can't I?
Prologue- Beats the moon upon my window
The wind blew through the hair of Ross Boiler, or rather of the body of Ross Boiler and the one who now occupied his body as the young boy had snuck out of his house and now wondered the woods outside.
To the one that was now Ross he wandered through the dark ground and woods in order to fully grasp his new state. Having remembered that in a previous life he had read many stories with a similar subject Ross was confident that this was just a dream, born of flight of fancy.
So he went without fear into the deep, dark woods. Woods that where unnaturally easy to traverse than the real ones that he spend his childhood in, a first clue that this was not like the real world.
And the same could have been said by when he encountered a gathering of banshees in the woods. Fearsome corpse like apparitions of women who were mistreated and they all looked at him and started to circle and spread their dark arts around him.
Banshees could not truly kill their victim, no, they had to have their victim give into their hypnotic songs and arts. And Ross just walked through them, their songs had no effect as he treated them as one would treat the Boogeyman.
An apparition that only exist in one's imagination. The stunned banshee's followed this unnatural boy as he had seemingly defied magic itself as he went deeper and deeper into the woods.
Past gatherings of undead that starred at him in surprise as he looked at decay on two legs with a passing curiosity. Ross walked deeper and deeper without fear or concern.
Why should he be concern about something that only exists in his head?
Then he stumbled onto something.
He had tripped and hit his knee and the pain made his blood run cold. For he had never sensed pain in a dream before and he realized that he was now alone in a dark unnatural wood, filled with terrors of a dark nature, and bereft of the ignorance that acted as a shield against the dark creatures.
"Stay calm....stay calm." Ross said to himself, for despite being in the body of a boy he remembered how the key point in all the stories that keeping a cool head was always the best solution.
Ross reached into his pocked in order to see what meager supplies he had with him in order to make his current situation more bearable.
All he could find was some candy.
He took one to calm his nerves and after about half an hour he was now more calm.
Deciding that the logical thing to do was to just go back and pretend that he was the same before this revelation and he turned and followed his own path back through the woods. Back through the lairs of banshee's and undead, only this time they seemed to be different in appearance than before.
The songs of the banshees and the presence of the undead affected him in a different way as now he knew that things where far different than the first time he viewed this world, that how he perceived them to be.
As soon as he got back to his house and room he laid locked his window and room door and quickly lit up every light in the room, now terrified of the dark. Of what creatures it may hide.
And as the light flooded the room, revealing all so too did it reveal what his candy was.
It was anti-psychotic medication.
Once more he was uncertain and confused.
Was this world real and not a dream? Or was it real and all that he just experienced nothing more than delusions? Was his memory of a previous life nothing but the products of a sick mind?
Or was this just part of this new world?
What if the body that he currently inhabited's sickness was what enabled him to leap from his previous world.
Ross did not know.
All he did know....he knew nothing! He could not remember his previous world, his previous life, not even his own previous name. He was aware of them, but at the same time they were like echoes of past memories, shapes and shadows in the darkness.
And he realized something else.
"This.....this is a flashback." Ross said to himself as he blinked and found himself in the daytime, with an older body as he realized that what he just lived through was a memory.
A memory triggered by the sight of him finding himself in front of a fearsome demon in the woods again.
This was a moment that was common in all the old stories. The ordinary boy either died or froze and he was captured and use to give the protagonist a new story. And any san man would freeze and become useless in such a scenario.
"Good thing I'm crazy." Ross said as he remembered past echoes of a past life and noticed that the demon was four legged.
An animal.
Immediately the echoes reminded him of wolves and bears and so Ross did not run or attack, he simply kept facing the demon like beast and lowly backed away.
With each step the snarling demon calmed down and when enough distance was between the two of them then the demonic beast turned and left.
Ross relaxed and thought the worst to be over, only to be tackled hard by something unknown.
"ROSS! Are you okay?" The voice of a petite girl said to him, the voice that belonged to the one that leaped at him for a hug.
Memories flooded him this time, not just mere echoes, but of this girl. Hexen a childhood friend, one that was painfully obvious by her clothes, he eyes, her hair, by the way that she had suddenly appeared next to him and there was not visible trail of footsteps for her, while Ross had a noticeable trail that this was the magical protagonist of this story.
A witch?
An elf?
A demon?
An angel?
A fairy?
Ross did not know, all he knew was that someone had come to his aide and was hugging him and after facing a beats in the woods, Ross needed a hug.
"I'm fine, just stumbled onto a big wolf." Ross said.
"A wolf? You sure it was a wolf?" Ross heard Hexen said and he felt a chill down his spine as a strange sensation was felt behind him, probably magic.
A spell then. To do what? Erase his memory? Hopefully. Do worse? Hopefully not.
"Yeah, a big wolf. They're more common than you think H." Ross lied through his teeth and that seemed to work as the spell disappeared and Hexen broke the hug and gave him a cheerful smile that could make a soldier weep.
"I'm so happy that you're okay. But don't wander around here alone. Don't get into trouble Ross....Don't." Hexen said with what could either be anger born of concern or...or of something else.
Either way Ross decided there and then to do 3 things.
1. Get strong.
2. Be prepared.
3....Never.....ever....make an enemy out of Hexen.
"Wouldn't dream of it." Ross said as Hexen then cheerfully embraced his left hand in hers and escorted him out of the woods.
"Wouldn't dream of it." Ross repeated quietly as he reached for his pocket and gripped the pill bottle there.
Just another day Wonderland. He thought.