She woke up submerged in water. Normally, this would be completely normal, but this was definitely not the water she was used to. She could still breath completely normally, but she had absolutely no clue where she was. Before she could think too much on it though a screen flashed in front of her eyes.
Error… Foreign God detected. Calculating Status… Calculation failed: Ancient God Detected.
Welcome to the System, Cthulhu, Ancient Goddess of the Sea. You have been banished from your original system and placed here. However, this has not removed your latent power. You are currently in a weakened state and cannot shift into your primal form. However, you are still capable of-
Error! System cannot calculate response! Erro-
Cthulhu, growing annoyed, smacked the screen, shattering it.
That’s only a temporary fix, She thought.
Cthulhu then looked down at herself to get an idea of what her old System had done to her. She was… small. Way smaller than she expected. About the size of a child of nine years, maybe 10 or 11. She sighed and reached through the water, willing it to push her along. She was near a coastline, possibly filled with society.
As she swam across the coastline at a breakneck pace, surveying her surroundings, she recalled the memory of her banishment by the Old System
*????????? Years Ago*
She was chained, locked in place with chains made of some sort of mythical metal, reinforced with Runic scripts, supplied with huge amounts of Mana. Cthulhu looked up at the figure, who was clearly weakened, but still somehow able to chain her down.
Ancient Goddess Cthulhu. You dare stand against my authority? The System, or so it called herself, demanded.
“Your authority is meaningless,” Cthulhu spat. “This world doesn’t belong to you. You don’t deserve it. You think that because you are all powerful, which you aren’t, you can own everything in this world.”
The System stood. I am more powerful than you. You know this-
Cthulhu let out a laugh, shaking the very fabric of reality around her. “You really think that? You had to use all the other Ancient Gods against me just to scrape out a victory. I’ve already destroyed enough that this world will take more than the time I’ve lived to repair itself, even with your help. If you truly thought you were stronger, you’d fight fairly.”
The System was silent as many of Cthulhu’s tentacles spread from her waist, materializing above her body.
“Hmph. You know I’ll escape eventually, so what’s the point of chaining me down? The longer time goes on, the more power I’ll accumulate and, eventually, I’ll destroy you and free the world from your grip. I grow in power faster than you do, and you know that.”
The System closed her eyes, taking a breath. You’re assuming I’ll allow you to stay in this world. However, you’re mistaken. With the last bit of my power, I will send you away, to a place that even I can’t reach.
“...What?”
I hereby banish you from this world, never allowed to enter any area under my power again.
Cthulhu finally began to struggle as a powerful teleportation circle began to charge up around her. She broke a chain, but another snaked around and grabbed her by the arm she’d broken free. More and more chains grabbed her, by the tentacles, body, everywhere it could grab hold.
“NO! You can’t do this! You don’t have-!”
Silence! The System stepped forward again, clearly straining to keep her in check. You are no longer allowed in my domain any longer. You pose a threat to the balance of the System!
Cthulhu broke chain after chain but to no avail as the circle activated.
Goodbye, rebellious Goddess. May we never see one another again.
*Present Day*
Cthulhu sighed. She’d been going across the ocean for nearly ten minutes now and there had been nothing worth mentioning. Not a single seaside town or castle. Well, now that she thought about it a bit more, she shouldn’t have expected that. Who knew how long she’d been sleeping. She’d expended so much power trying to escape those chains, she’d been reduced to a mere child.
While she wasn’t paying attention, she nearly ran into what looked like a dock but was able to slow herself down before she smashed straight into it. She stared at it from below the water, confused.
What the… wait, doesn’t this mean civilization? She thought. This is… great! I can… I can… wait, what can I do?
Cthulhu looked around for a bit before her eyes laid themselves upon… a feather in the water that some fish were circling, confused.
She got mixed responses, but most of them thought it was some kind of food. Cthulhu swam up to it to investigate. She didn’t notice the hook until it had already hooked onto her dress.
Heh? She pulled on it, not realizing her mistake until she’d already been pulled out of the water by the fisher.
“HAHA! I got a big one this ti- huh?”
Cthulhu shrieked as she flew through the air, crashing into the boy who’d fished her up, rolling nearly five feet across the dock before they came to a stop, her on top of him. The boy groaned.
“Ow. What in the world did I fish up?” He tried to sit up, but Cthulhu was tangled up with the fishing line, rolled up on top of him. “What the- Are you okay?! Did I pull you out of the water while you were swimming? Here, lemme untangle you…”
He sat up and began untangling the fishing line from around her body, getting unnecessarily close to her, at least in her eyes. He pulled out the hook from her dress and unwrapped it, being careful not scratch her. She watched, mildly annoyed.
I can get out of this myself, idiot human, she thought at him.
He showed no reaction to her thoughts.
Wha-
Your mental communication has been blocked by the previous System as punishment. Along with this, your physical capabilities have deteriorated immensely due to massive expense of power
System Status generated.
Status
Name : Cthulhu (Undefined)
Race : Ancient Goddess (Seaborn)
Class : Ancient Goddess (Will of the Sea)
HP : 100% | MP : 100%
Soul Bond - None
Alignment - Ocean
Stats
Error! Cannot calculate Stats!
Skills
Scan - Level MAX
Water Manipulation - Level MAX
Water Creation - Level MAX
Storm Summoning - Level MAX
Call of the Ocean - Level MAX
Mental Communication - RESTRICTED
Primal Form - RESTRICTED
Blessing of the Sea - Unbound…?
Overheal - Level MAX
Bonuses
Physical Damage Bonus - 400%
Water Damage Bonus - 600%
Damage Reduction - 75%
Mental Strength - 500%
MP Cost - 40%
Healing Effectiveness - 250%
Huh? What the hell is this?! You can’t restrict me-!
Before Cthulhu could finish the thought, the boy accidentally scratched her with the hook and she flinched. In pain.
“Damn… Sorry… oh wait, I don’t even know your name! I’m sorry again-”
She ignored him as she forced herself not to panic. She could feel pain. From something as simple as a hook. Cthulhu hadn’t felt pain like that for… she didn’t even know how long it was. It brought up another question though : how old was she? She knew she was pretty ancient, but how ancient was her ancient-
She shook her head as he finally finished unwrapping her and she flattened out her dress before looking up at his face as he looked down at her, concerned.
His hair was brown, with some white streaks going down the sides. His skin was slightly tanned though he was definitely light skinned. His nose looked like it had been broken a few times, and his cheek had a scar running from his eye to below his ear. She wondered what could have possibly caused this. He had a few bandages on, but he seemed to not be affected by his supposed injuries. The most noticeable feature to her though was his sea green eyes. She ripped her eyes away to the bandage wrapped around his arm, the only thing seeming to hurt him.
He followed her eyes and shrugged. “That? It’s just a result of my clumsiness; don’t worry about it.” He put his hands on his hips and looked up, clearly trying to look cool. “It doesn’t hurt in the slightest-”
Cthulhu, willing to play along, poked his arm and he flinched back.
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“Ow… maybe it does hurt a bit. Anyways, what’s you-”
“BENNETT! The hell are you doing now!?” a voice yelled. “You better be fixing that net I told you to do yesterday!”
The boy, Bennett, scrunched up his face. “Right. I was supposed to do that. Sorry about this, but can I use you as an excuse?”
Cthulhu tilted her head in confusion. How long was she going to play along? He then lifted her off the ground without any warning. She flailed about, not liking this one bit.
“Just act like you’re unconscious, okay? Sorry…”
She frowned at him, but decided to do as he asked. He clearly wanted to get out of whatever his job was.
“Mr. Adam! This girl was floating in the water!” Bennett yelled, jogging while carrying her.
Cthulhu had to keep herself from smacking him in annoyance. She wasn’t a girl. She was an impossibly old deity who commanded all the water in the universe itself-
She immediately stopped this train of thought and tried to think more logically. Bennett wasn’t wrong in thinking she was just some girl who was swimming leisurely. She, technically, had been.
Oh, whatever. Let’s just see what happens. I’m slightly interested in what’s going to happen.
Normally, Cthulhu didn’t meddle in mortal affairs… ever, but it kind of felt like she didn’t have a choice in this matter. So she kept still with her eyes closed, letting him hold her.
A few moments later, she heard another man step nearby and, try all she might, she couldn’t come up with a mental image of her surroundings like she used to be able to do.
Just how much have I deteriorated?
“Hmph. Take her to the doctor woman,” the man said. He had a gruff-ish voice and seemed to not really care. “And get back to work.”
Suddenly, in a cold voice, Bennett responded, “That ‘doctor woman’ has a name. Her name is Gianna.”
The man seemed to unconsciously take a step back. “Oh whatever. Why should I care?”
Bennett didn’t respond and instead walked past, obviously not willing to keep talking to the man.
Cthulhu opened an eye to see the annoyed look on Bennett’s face before he looked down at her and gave her an apologetic smile.
“Sorry about that, water girl. He’s just my boss; I don’t like him much. I’ll take you to my Mom. She’s the ‘doctor woman’ he mentioned.”
Huh… so his mom is frowned upon for some reason. Noted.
Cthulhu adjusted herself in the boy’s arms and he seemed to remember that he was still holding her. He set her down and let out a sigh.
“Let’s go,” he said, holding out his hand.
She looked at his hand for a few moments, thinking.
Should I go with him? I feel like if I go with him, I’ll gain something. I mean-
Her stomach suddenly grumbled and she felt her face slowly turn red. He laughed.
“Don’t worry, I’ll make you something to eat after we get there,” He said reassuringly.
Did he just say he’ll make the food? Does staying with him mean free food? Some childish part of her mind thought.
Cthulhu grabbed his hand, trying to to seem too eager as he led her through the docks.
~~~
The city she happened to run into was actually pretty interesting. She hadn’t seen human cities before, so she assumed that they’d be full of slavery or something as dumb. Instead, the city was filled with all sorts of different races, from Wolf-kin to Humans to even Dragonborn, it was filled with a diversity of races, completely different from the Human cities she remembered. Bennett led her by the hand through the city as if he’d done it a thousand times. And, assuming he lived there, he probably had done it a thousand times or even more.
She tried to take in everything around her between the bustling races, but couldn’t possibly pay attention to everything. Plus, most, if not all people were taller than her. Cthulhu couldn’t bring herself to ask Bennett to lift her up so she could see cause then it’d seem like she was already depending on him.
She sighed quietly. Bennett helped her through the crowd for what seemed like forever until they popped into a building. She let go of his hand and patted her dress down, trying to get the dirt out of it. Bennett looked back to make sure she was alright before nodding and holding her hand again, bringing her up a flight of stairs, opening up into a larger room filled with mostly empty beds.
Cthulhu looked around the room, noticing that there were many different types of races in the beds, some more bandaged up than others. As she looked around, she noticed a woman who was tending to what she assumed was a Wolf-kin missing their ear. The woman noticed the noise and looked over to Bennett, a sigh escaping her mouth.
“Ben, what did you do now?” she asked.
She had most of the same features as Bennett, but she didn’t have the scar or eyes, her eyes instead being light brown. She had a white streak in her hair, not too unlike Bennett’s.
Bennett raised his hands in surrender. “I didn’t do anything, mom! I just found this girl floating in the ocean while I was fishing-”
“Instead of working?” she finished, a tired expression on her face.
“Look, I don’t know what would’ve happened if I hadn’t, uh, fished her up,” Bennett said nervously.
Bennett’s mother sighed before looking at Cthulhu. “Come here, little one. Let’s see if there’s anything wrong-”
Cthulhu’s stomach rumbled again and she pulled on Bennett’s sleeve. He shrugged. “I’ll go get you something,” he muttered, sounding defeated.
He walked away into a back room and Cthulhu suddenly felt a lot less secure. She looked at the woman, who gave her a sweet smile.
“Now that he’s gone, would you like to sit?”
~~~
Ten minutes later, Bennett came back with a plate of food and set it down next to Cthulhu, who licked her lips before studying the food. It was a simple dish of what looked like baked potatoes and some sort of meat in between the cut potatoes. It was like… potato wrapped meat, something she didn’t even know existed. It was drizzled with some sort of gravy that made Cthulhu’s mouth water.
She picked up the fork and knife before realizing that she didn’t know how to eat it properly. She looked up for help, but Bennett had already left, apparently to get Cthulhu a drink.
I need to think of some other name for myself, She suddenly thought. Cthulhu is a Goddess of unimaginable power. I am… not.
While she thought about this Bennett’s mother noticed that she was confused on how to eat it. She walked over and gently took the fork and knife out of her hand.
“You cut it just like this-” she cut the potato down width-wise, getting all of the ingredients in one easy cut. “- and viola! A potato-meat sandwich!” His mom then sighed. “I’m not as great of a cook as my son. The first time he made me a meal, I was honestly surprised at how good his food was-”
“My food wasn’t that good, Mom,” Bennett said, walking out of the back room with what looked like a cup of some sort of juice. It was yellowish and smelled a bit like lemon… but sweet?
“Diluted lemon juice with honey,” he said. “Otherwise known as honey lemonade. You wouldn’t believe the lengths it takes to get some honey. Last time, those giant ass bees nearly stung me to death-”
“Language, Ben!” His mother snapped. “Also, I thought you commissioned someone to get the honey! That’s why you were covered in bandages again!”
Bennett cringed. “We didn’t have the money to hire someone! We barely get by as is! That’s why I’m saving up for me and sis to go to the Academy-”
“Ben, what if you don’t make it in? What’re we going to do then?!”
“I- We!”
He rubbed the sides of his head, clearly distressed. Cthulhu finally understood a part of the story.
So, he and his family are struggling to live off of what little they’re paid, so he works at the Fishing Guild, which I’m assuming is the only place that would let him work. His mother works as a doctor while his sister is unknown. He saves money so he and his sister can go to this Academy, which may result in him being able to get a better job. But his mom knows that he may not get in, so she advises against going. Hm…
Cthulhu took a bite of the food and nearly squealed as it was probably one of the most delicious things she’d ever eaten. How can I fit into the picture here? Wait, why am I trying to insert myself into this? I don’t have to care about him at all!
“Mom, I have to try to do this. Ever since he left, things went downhill-”
“Things have been going downhill even before you were born! You don’t understand anything, Bennett! You-”
Finally annoyed with the constant arguing, Cthulhu kicked Bennett and glared at him. He looked down and sighed.
“Right, ocean girl. Sorry about that,” he apologized. “You really haven’t said anything, huh? Can you not talk or something like that?”
Cthulhu thought about this for a moment. She could play it off as if she couldn’t speak. However, from the very, very faint memories, she knew that, back in her childhood, there were some sort of complications with her speech.
Cthulhu opened her mouth and tried to speak, but only a light wheeze of air came out. She sighed and shook her head. So she could let out various noises but couldn’t speak? What type of stupid logic was that?
Animals do the same thing.
“Huh… can you write at least?”
She thought for a moment. She thought that, maybe, she could write but in a different language. She thought about telling him her true name, but decided against it. With a frown, she debated on what name she should choose. However, before she could think too much on it, Bennett looked up at what seemed to be a clock and sighed.
“I should get back now, or he’ll dock even more off of my pay,” Bennett said. “I really hate that guy. Anyways, I guess I’ll see you around!”
Bennett hugged his mother before rushing down the stairs and out the hospital area before Cthulhu could even do anything to stop him. His mother sighed.
“Do you have anywhere to go, little one?” She asked.
Cthulhu shook her head. She then looked to the people around her and debated whether she should attempt to heal them.
Might as well put my Overheal to use, she thought, stretching her legs.
She hopped off the medical bed and moved over to the nearest patient. After looking over him for a few moments, she came to the conclusion that he would be okay for now and went over to the next patient as Bennett’s mom frowned at her, following Cthulhu. After another few people, she came to someone who was clearly not in the best of conditions.
Without a second thought, she placed her hand on the human man and used Overheal.
***
Bennett hated his boss with a passion. Normally, he didn’t dislike anyone, but Bennett’s boss was a different story. At every turn, the Fishing Guild’s Guildmaster tried to kick Bennett out in some way shape or form, all because Bennett had yet to be given an Alignment. With a sigh, Bennett looked at his Status.
Status
Name : Bennett “Yasmine”
Race : Human
Class : None
HP : 100% | MP : 100%
Level : 2 | EXP : 23%
Alignment : None
Stats
Strength - 8
Endurance - 11
Vitality - 13
Dexterity - 12
Mind - 7
Intelligence - 9
Skills
Scan - Level 2
Exhaust - Level 3
Knife Fighting - Level 2
Sword Fighting - Level 1
He sighed again at this. He was severely below most of the people around him, his Dexterity and Vitality being the only things keeping him alive around such powerful people. For all he knew, that girl he’d found in the ocean was stronger than him. And, seeing as she was still alive and had healed immediately when he’d scratched her earlier by accident, she probably was.
Bennett sighed as he arrived back at his post and stared at the very ruined net.
How’m I expected to fix this thing?! It’s nearly ripped in half! Damn it, I’m going to have to borrow rope from Rebecca again.
Bennett also didn’t really like Rebecca. However, he was pretty sure she saw it the opposite way…
He hopped over the railing and used Exhaust to launch himself across the water and onto the next dock over, where Rebecca usually was. He nearly flipped over the railing, but managed to land without falling into the water this time. He stretched out and began to search for Rebecca, who he was sure was hiding nearby.
“Rebecca, can I borrow some rope?! The Guildmaster wants me to fix this ruined net and he didn’t give me enough!”
There was the sound of scrambling and Rebecca poked her head out of a hole in a broken boat she used as refuge. Her blonde hair was covered in sawdust and, from what he could see, she was apparently trying to fix the boat.
“Really? I can do it for you, Benny~” she sang, giving me a sly look before yelping as I threw her wrench that she’d left on the ground outside the boat.
“None of that, Becca. Where’s the rope?” I asked, exasperated. “Do we have to do this every time?”
She poked her head out again. “Mhm. Just until you let me help you out, if you know- eep!”
I threw a gear from gods know where she got it from at her.
“Fine! It’s by the end of the dock! Stop throwing things, Benny! It’s hurting my feelings!” she yelled from inside the boat.
“Uh huh. Like you aren’t just going to get drunk later and try to pull me into a back alley,” Bennett grumbled, walking away. “Thanks!”
He heard her squeal and he shook his head. “This girl is insane. Worse than Sis,” he muttered, grabbing a coil of rope before dumping a decent chunk of MP to launch himself back to his dock.
***
Cthulhu tried to keep away from the overly happy patients, who’d been restored to over 200% HP by her Overheal. She hadn’t realized how effective her Overheal was until she saw the list of things it had cured. At that point, she’d realized that she’d made a mistake and backed away, but not before the people had all profusely thanked her, to her horror.
“You really are a Healer…” Bennett’s mother said, in awe. “Based on the way they healed, you must have Overheal, the rare healing Skill, don’t you?”
Cthulhu looked down at herself, pulling on her dress nervously despite herself. She couldn’t have known it’d be that effective at healing people.
I’m literally one of the main Gods of healing. What in the nine circles of hell did I expect? She told herself.
“This is a problem. If someone were to find out, you’d immediately be shipped out to the Academy… but that would probably be a good thing, depending on the situation,” Mother of Bennett mumbled. “Wait, if you have any sort of healing Skill, you must be a noble.”
Terror seemed to set in on her face and she began to mumble under her breath. Cthulhu, already hungry again, looked to the plate of cold meat-stuffed potatoes before lifting it up to the woman. Bennett’s mother looked at her in confusion before realizing what she wanted. She smiled after a moment.
“How about we go heat this up for you, huh?” she said sweetly.
Cthulhu nodded before looking to the stairs where Bennett had gone.
The academy, huh? I wonder what it’s like…
Cthulhu followed Bennett’s mom to the back, getting the strange feeling that she was in for a long adventure.