Kashan was lying face up in an infinite puddle of water that seemed to stretch on for miles, its surface mirroring a pearlescent sky that constantly shifted hues. He was dead, and he’d accepted this…or at least he did his best to. He breathed in and felt no soreness from the arrow that pierced his lung. He twisted and turned, remembering the spears that held him when his legs could not. Death was oddly comfortable. When he glanced to his side, he saw his trusty greatsword, rusty and worn. Out of comfort, or perhaps pity, he reaches out with his metal-plated gauntlet, grabbing it by the dulled edge right next to the guard. For a moment, Kashan moved to stand, but froze half kneeling when he watched the rust fall away in autumn leaves. As he ran his hand along its ethereally polished fuller, he noticed the nicks and chips in the edge shrink, forming the blade he’d received and rained with daily as a lad.
“Like it?”
In a practiced swift strike, Kashan swung his blade in a wide arc in the direction of the voice, only to see it bounce off a single finger’s force.
“There are no enemies here, Commander Telkarov. Be calm, so that I may show you your fate.”
The woman before him was human, save for a few discrepancies. Her pupils had the shape for a 4 pointed star that twisted its arms as she focused her vision. Her skin was a canvas, pale and luminous save the hues that shifted across it like the auroras painting the sky. Her hair… was brown. Kashan clung to that normalcy to ground himself as he reached onto his back, searching for a sheathe that didn’t follow him to this place. The mention of his fate had him believing he’d wronged something cosmic, beyond his understanding.
“My fate? I’m… Honored?” He said, now simply gripping the blade by its blunt ricasso and keeping its edge and tip away from the ground..
The cosmic woman chuckled at Kashan’s apprehension, gripping a door invisible to anyone but herself. “Please, step inside and have a seat,” was what left her lips as she opened that door, creating a gateway into a simple study, perfect for a middling noble. She stood for a few moments while Kashan gawked at how this door that led to nowhere somehow led to somewhere. When she’d had enough of waiting, the woman began pushing Kashan toward the entrance, despite her standing just by it just now. She moved faster than Kashan could comprehend, prompting him to simply surrender to her gentle nudging.
“Okay, so, you were killed in battle,”
“Yes, I understand,”
The woman smiled, relieved that she didn’t have to try and console someone. That was a task better suited to her siblings. “Good. You did not however, ‘pass on’ as it were,”
“I… did not rest peacefully?”
“Yes, that is half correct. We… I did not allow you to pass,” The woman said as the door shut behind the two when they fully entered the room. It was a study filled with books, scrolls, and a small fireplace off in the corner, cradling a flame that shared the vibrancy of the sky outside. The woman motioned to a seat before the fire before sitting in a seat of her own.
“Am I to be punished for my deeds? I have taken as many lives as I have saved. If that is-”
The woman begins to laugh again, though hides her smile behind interlaced hands.
“No, no, that’s not it at all! I actually admire your virtues and the commitment to your liege and comrades.”
Kashan placed his sword on the floor, away from reach as a gesture of peace as he takes a seat in the provided arm chair. He was easily flattered by his admirers when he was alive and often cleared his throat to try and do the same for his mind. “Then what is my purpose in being here?”
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“To offer a choice, Commander Telkarov. You see, there are not many who’d go to such lengths as you. For your tenacity and loyalty to your cause, I believe you should be rewarded.” The woman forms an orb in her hands, allowing both her and Kashan to see where Kashan was buried. “For your deeds, I offer you new life. I cannot guarantee your fate afterward, but I can bring you back with your memories, a little at a time until you are fully acclimated.”
“A new life… Wait, ‘acclimated’? Why would I need to be acclimated?” Kashan leaned toward the orb, watching his resting place. It is adorned with flowers of all kinds with varying meanings. There are even ribbons tied to a statue of him..
“We have your soul and a temporary vessel here holding your memories so that we may converse right now. Have you ever studied intensely before? Drilling the details into your head so that you wouldn’t forget?” The woman closes her hands, shattering the orb along with its vision. Kashan leaned back into his seat, begrudgingly remembering the nights after training when faux battle plans were written, re-written, critiqued, then written again to think up the best way to defeat their opponents in wargames that decided one’s regiment. “You have accumulated decades of memories, pleasant and cruel. If I were to implant those memories into that vessel with your soul, you’d most likely break under the sheer amount and lose yourself entirely.”
Kashan nods, understanding that memory manipulation was illegal for a reason. “So you plan to return my memories to me, but how will I-”
“Worry not, it’s simple. I will allow a few years of memory at a time, that should allow you to acclimate to your vessel over a few months through your dreams. I will be starting with the memories that make you who you are, your skills, and your most important moments, along with the conversation we had here. Once you feel you have settled into the memories of your past, pray at any graveyard,”
Kashan grimaced with confusion and jerked his head back for a moment, then leane toward the woman with great interest. “You can hear prayers? If you hear prayers at graveyards that makes you-”
Kashan is silenced with a finger on his lips. He didn’t even see her move, yet there she was. She was faster than anything he could fathom, she left no blur, no sound, and no mild breeze as she stopped. “I will rescind parts of this conversation of course,” she whispered, the abyssal void of her pupils consuming the stars in her irises. She then walked normally to sit back in her chair, running her fingers through her mildly tangled hair. “Any other questions?” Kashan opted to remain silent, shaking his head as his fingers gripped the arms of his chair. “Good. I must warn you however. An age has passed since you fell in battle. You may not recognize the Stallaertzo you once knew. All the people you’ve known are gone, including your lord. This is a brand new beginning for you and you alone. Do you accept?”
Kashan was offered two orbs. One was of the door he’d just passed through, bathed in the abyss. The other was of him, standing tall once again in a field. In a heartbeat, he chose the new beginning, of him standing tall. “Stallaertzo is my homeland, and I will serve regardless of its form.”
“Loyal beyond the end, ey?”
As Kashan accepted the deity’s favor, the world around him twisted and stretched, crumbled and rebuilt itself. His memories warped and burned, leaving his skills, his loyalty, and that conversation. But something foreign creeped its way into his mind. The spellforms, incantations, enchantments… They were all apprentice level magicks, but his mind was attuned to master them.
“A little something for the path ahead. Forge on Comman-... Just Kashan Telkarov now. Live well.”
After what felt like an eternity in a moment, Kashan woke to see… Stone. Stone to his left, stone to his right, and stone directly in front of his nose. He’d see nothing if it weren’t for the glow that was surrounding him. It took a moment for him to remember that he was reconstructed… With his own body… That was still in his sarcophagus. “You’re not serious. You CAN NOT be serious.” After brooding for a moment, he rubbed the palm of his gauntlets together, then placed them on the stone before him and… Pushed. Very hard. Hard enough that the stone flew away from him, tilting toward his feet before falling onto the ground and shattering. He didn’t remember being that strong before, only to notice the glow around him dissipate. Then he noticed the child to the side of his sarcophagus, frozen in fear holding a wreath of flowers in her arms. “Oh. Um… Hello?”
The child began running and screaming.