I was born crippled… So uncool—trust me, I know.
However, after nearly two dozen years of sulking, I finally found solace… In alcohol!
Fifty or so odd years later, I died—very unceremoniously, I might add. Apparently, there were labels on the liquor bottles that recommended you drink under a certain amount once past a particular age. Honestly, they should've highlighted that better.
Anyway…. My life as a pathetic cripple came to a sudden end! Thank God for that!
Or so I thought…
Another funny thing: Pretty sure God liked to play games, because why else would I be born as a cripple not once but twice!?
The first time, I was at least conceived in the modern world of Earth with a loving family. On my second round of the cripple life, however, I found myself lying in a cold, wet puddle inside a cave of sorts. And although I wasn't too keen on the era, based on the "ooh oohs" and "ah ahs" coming from nearby, I assumed it was around the start of the dawn of human civilization.
I died within a couple of days. Yeah, it sucked, but oh well.
Oh, there was one good thing that came out of the whole ordeal. I learned that dying from lack of nutrients while freezing to death was not a very pleasant experience. Not pleasant at all…
Anyhoo… God—that silly goose—decided I deserved a Round 3!
This time, I was reborn in what was most definitely a prehistoric world. Funny thing about living among dinosaurs? There were no humans. This also meant that I myself wasn't a human.
Tell me, have you ever seen a baby T-Rex with the inability to use its limbs? Yeah, neither have I!
Of course, after being reborn as one of those featherless chickens, I immediately figured out why that was. All it took was me flying out of a dino's coochie, only to be instantly gobbled up by my cross-eyed mother for the whole "No Recorded Dinosaur Cripples" to paint itself a picture in my pea-sized brain.
Yeah, that death was not a nice one, but it was at least better than my second death.
Also, note for Dino Mummy: I'm pretty sure the reason I was born inept was due to the inbreeding you were doing with Dino Daddy!
Then again, those goofy crossed eyes didn't come from nowhere…
Perhaps Dino Mommy's parents were inbreeders as well!?
Must be a family tradition!
Ahem, ahem, where was I again?
Ah yes, the matter of God's unwillingness to give me a break. He really wasn't the best at catching the hints I was throwing out while wailing like a banshee.
Wait… God was capable of understanding goo goo gah gah, right?
Well, that wasn't important.
And neither was my fourth life, as it turned out.
I was born into a lovely, lovely family. Standing over me were those very family members, all dressed in noble attire. I speculated it to have been roughly the Middle Ages, but interestingly enough, there was magic in this world. My parents were able to bend magic to their will—and quite proficiently at that.
I, on the other hand, was… What was the word again?
Oh yeah, a f*cking cripple!
As I quickly figured out on my fourth playthrough, my crippled state was not only limited to my physical extremities; it also extended to my aptitude in magic!
And when those oh-so-lovely parents of mine discovered my ineptitude, they covered it up and swept everything under the rug.
By that, I mean they covered my head with a pillow, suffocated me to death, then swept my corpse under their rug.
A nice rug, by the way. Really brought out the color in my eyes as I met my Maker.
Speaking of my Maker… Why was it that after so many crippled rebirths, he had yet to show his face to me? Was he afraid I'd fight back or something?
Though, considering how he declared my destiny to always be that of a cripple, I find the notion of me fighting back to be quite mean…
Cripples have feelings as well, ya know…?
So, anyways, my fourth life came to a grand close!
However, even though the curtains may have been closed shut, there would always be a new day. And as the light seeped through the curtains of my new home, the curtains to my joke of a life opened up once more!
This time, I was born as the youngest son of a Duke who ruled a good chunk of a mystical world with dragons and talking donkeys. It had everything! Even those hot elves I'd heard about in my first life!
Unfortunately for my pitiful virgin soul, I was thrown into the gutters as soon as my father learned of my incompetence! Dear Duke Father took one look at me, then said, "Nope, that kid is not mine!"
As was the natural course of things, I thought I'd die in those barren gutters. But seeing as I truly abhorred slow, dragged-out deaths, I was happy to hear the hissings of a massive snake the size of a bus.
I had no clue what that thing was, but it was extremely scary and angry.
However, none of that changed the fact that this snake was my savior—my way to receive a quick and (mostly) painless death!
Yet, just as the snake opened its jaws and lunged at me, an old man with a wooden cane ruined things and slew the giant snake. That stinky old codger…
I mean, a part of me was grateful that he saved me. But I'm almost entirely positive I didn't cry out for help or anything; I wanted to die. Hell, I wanted to die four deaths ago!
This old man's saving grace was more bothersome than anything. And you can sure as heck bet that I put on the meanest wrinkled baby mug while glaring at him.
That stupid old man, however, seemed to take this act of mine as a sign of intelligence. This subsequently compelled his senile a*s to pick me up and carry me away to his secret chambers of wizardry or whatever.
The Dumbledore-like old bastard couldn't read the room at all, even going so far as to dub me his damn disciple.
After which, he dropped off a stack of books, instructed me to read them, then f*cked right the hell off to Narnia!
Just thinking about that old bastard has really put me in a bad mood…
Like, honestly, why in the hell did he believe I was some God's Chosen??
With all his decrepit heart, he believed that leaving a newly born infant to his own devices with a pile of magical books would bring about some divine epiphany and allow the infant to ascend…
No, you dumbfuckadore, I f*cking died!
Gah! The gall of some idiots!
Whatever, let's just get this recap over and done with already. I have some more attribute farming to do, after all.
To sum up the rest of my lives, my sixth life had me as a crippled dog. I was beaten to death by some snot-nosed kids within the same hour.
My 7th Life, I was back to being a human, but I was also unlucky enough to be the sole heir to a Trillionaire's fortune in the 24th Century. I lived on the Moon and stuff; it was cool. However, it wasn't like I was given the opportunity to sightsee for long.
See, as unusual as it was, an alien race had enslaved the entire human civilization. My parents were breeders for the aliens, and when the Alien Masters learned of a crippled human's birth, I was immediately sent to the platter of some ten-tentacled Gorp Glop Boss.
I was slurped up and devoured, left to rest within a pit of stomach acid.
8th Life was a little weird, for I was reborn in the 28th Century as the son of a common Gorp Glop alien whore. Weirder yet, this life was actually one of my most long-lived ones.
Thirty-seven years.
I wasn't even considered an adult in Gorp Glop culture, but it was still a pretty damn long time for me. Wasn't very pleasant or even enjoyable, but it was tolerable.
On my 37th birthday, though, I was thrown into the Gorplex Worm Hole as a sacrifice to some sort of Worm God that lived on Neptune.
I died, obviously.
9th Life was comparatively more boring. A peasant. Died because my mother was accused of witchcraft, and I, as the spawn of the devil, wasn't allowed to live.
As the simple-minded plebs saw it, a physically inept 8-year-old child was a serious threat to their pig-like lifestyles!
Some could say I was a feared figure, haha.
With the start of my 10th Life, I seriously doubted that this life could be any weirder than my previous ones.
However… I was quickly proven wrong.
I was reborn as an… as an… earthworm.
Yeah, a motherf*cking worm!
I hadn't thought things could get much worse than being a glorping purple alien, but these days, I was rarely accurate with my expectations! This was one of those days!
Let alone a day, I wasn't even able to survive past the first hour…
A crippled earthworm—what did that even look like??
An earthworm didn't have limbs to begin with, so what exactly qualified a worm as a crippled worm???
The simple answer: Incapable of wiggling, efficiently breathing, and moving.
That run was naturally a flop!
But with the beginning of my 11th Life, hope spurred inside me.
It wasn't hope created because of wishful thinking. Rather, it was just me praying for a win.
I really, really, really… needed a win.
Unfortunately…
A fly.
A sh*t-eating, annoyingly buzzing, short-lived insect. That was what I became.
But that wasn't even the worst of it, for I was actually quite lucky among flies!
I lived a grand total of three months!
Which was a record-breaking lifespan for a sh*t fly…
The more my mind wanders back to that brief period of time, I wince in disgust, finding myself hating… myself.
If I could, I'd wipe those memories from my mind.
Regrettably, though, such good fortune was not meant for one such as I—the crippled soul who, even after experiencing 1,313 rebirths, couldn't escape his destiny.
Nevertheless, there was one more rebirth that left a big impact on me.
My 12th Life.
Twelve—being an auspicious number—made me foolishly believe that I'd finally be set free.
However, in the very first second of my new life, I came to understand that I really was a naive fool.
A toilet.
I was reborn as a living, breathing, gawdamn toilet!!
And do you wanna know what toilets were used for??
Yep, you guessed it! To sh*t and piss in!!
But wait, wait, wait, that wasn't even mentioning the ridiculous lifespans of living toilets!
10,000+ Years!!!
For 10,000 long, excruciating years, I lived a torturous life that wholly consisted of being shat in, urinated in, and forced to gulp it all down without complaint!
And all of this was happening outside an alien gas station—one in buttf*ck nowhere!
There was nothing cool to look at, no hotties to whisp some of the pain away.
There was nothing.
Just a bleak rock floating in space with a large neon sign hanging above a futuristic dump show!
I know I resolved myself to sit down and seriously ruminate over some of my previous lives. But at this point, I feel that I might just lose the last of my coco-pebbles if I keep forcing myself to recall all those godforsaken memories!!
*Deep inhale*
*Calm exhale*
"Nope, I can't do this sh*t anymore," I said, my face twitching out of control. "I focused my mind on something long enough to get my just reward, so where is it??"
Just then:
*Ding~!*
[An Attribute Orb has dropped because of the exertion of an aspect related to the Mind!]
[+2 Mind Attribute Orb]
There it was—his Attribute Orb!
The small, perfectly spherical whitish-blue Orb—it was such a beauty.
And one most warmly welcomed by one Mr. Knox Falazar.
"A +2 Attribute Orb!?" I said, joy curving my lips upward. "Who woulda thought reminiscing about my sh*tty past would not only give me a whole number Attribute Orb but a +2! I just knew my 1,314th Life was the one!"
"First, it was the Attribute Farmer System," I continued, beaming. "And then I come to learn that the number 1314 is especially auspicious in these lands, for it roughly translates to 'Forever.'"
I smirked, focusing my mind on the whitish-blue Attribute Orb that only I could see.
I beckoned it toward myself, watching as it collided with my immobilized body and assimilated with it.
[Mind Attribute +2]
[You have become significantly more intelligent!]
[Your Mind-related Powers have moderately improved!]
[Your control of your Mind-related Powers has moderately improved!]
Though, if there were one downside to this auspicious 1,314th Life as a cripple, then it had to be…
[Keep going like this, Dear Host, and you might just barely be able to bridge the gap between 'r*tarded' and 'slightly less r*tarded']
[I imagine this information pleases you! Wait… was I speaking too fast just now? If I was, then I sincerely apologize! I'll make sure to speak slower next time—pinky swears on it!]
It had to be that my System… was a Complete A*s!