What does it mean to reincarnate?

The soul is eternal - and much like a person swapping their clothes, can swap bodies as it undergoes an endless cycle of reincarnation until it at last, breaks free of this cycle. 

Tang Ze had heard of such things, but had never experienced anything like this before.

That said, this could not be said to truly be reincarnation, could it?

He knew he had died - that much was certain, but he was not in the body of a crying newborn, but had the same body he had when he had passed away on Earth. 

So, this could not be called reincarnation per se- if he didn’t know better, he would’ve thought that he was back on Earth, but this could not be Earth. These woods were nowhere near his home, and it made no sense for him to be here. Not to mention there was… something else in the air here in these woods, something that marked them as completely alien. 

Part of reincarnation, though, also includes forgetting all of what you were in the last life. 

No trace of who you were previously is supposed to remain in the next life - in a way, it would be as if a slate had been washed clean. 

And yet, not only did his memories of his life back on Earth remain, he had carried something… ‘special’ with him.

Tang Ze couldn’t put a finger on exactly what it was, but there was definitely something different about him. 

Back on Earth, Tang Ze hadn’t lived much of a remarkable life. He hadn’t accomplished anything of note, but there was a hobby of his that he had absolutely loved engaging with.

And that was cosplaying!

Buying or making costumes - and then breathing life into them to, if only for a moment, become the character you were trying to emulate. 

His free time was always wrapped up in such pursuits. Much to the chagrin of the rest of his family, who had oftentimes told him to focus on studying or something else that was more productive.

Looking back, Tang Ze honestly couldn’t say that they had been wrong.

He really should have put more effort into things during his old life. 

Then again, there were quite a number of things that he harbored regrets about not doing during his old life…

He shook his head.

This was no time to dwell on that.

He had been given something of a second chance, hadn’t he? A second chance to perhaps make up for his shortcomings in his previous life. 

As Tang Ze calmed himself down somewhat, he was able to better grasp this part of him that was ‘new.’ A part of him that appeared to be influenced by his hobby in his past life.

No words appeared on a screen before him, but as he looked inward, he knew them to be true as if they had been written in mile-long flaming letters in the sky above him.

Hidden Talent: When you cosplay a character, you can gain their powers. The closer to the character your costume appears, the closer you will get to their abilities so long as you wear the costume. 

Cultivation Talent: The longer you wear said costume, the more you can permanently imbue yourself with the powers of said character, up to a limit also based on how good your costume is.

Tang Ze couldn’t help but laugh.

To think that of all things, his hobby from his previous life could be the gateway to power in this next one? 

Of course, this left him with a few problems.

For one, he was in the middle of the woods, away from civilization. Meaning there were probably wild animals that were around that could be dangerous.

Second, his power was kind of useless if he didn’t have the tools to make a costume, now then wasn’t it? He was in his regular clothes, though thankfully he had transmigrated with his shoes on even though he hadn’t been wearing them when he died, strange as that was. 

Third, he had no supplies with him. No food or water.

All of these things could be solved by finding the nearest place of civilization, which is what he needed to turn his attention to. 

And hope that something like a bear didn’t maul him on the way….

Within an hour, he heard something in the distance. 

Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

It sounded like the beating of hooves - so unless there were some kind of flesh-eating zebras in this world, this was likely coming from horses. 

It was risky to approach the noise, but then again, what other choice did he have? Die of exposure in the woods as he ran around in circles?

The hooves were moving fast, such that the riders had passed Tang Ze a spear’s throw away before he could even call out to them, asking for help or something along those lines.

There were seven of them, and they were riding what looked like regular earth horses and not some sort of fantastical mythical beast. What caught Tang Ze’s eyes however; was that there was an unwelcome passenger with them, so to speak.

He couldn’t tell clearly from this distance, but it looked like this person was a woman, and more alarmingly, she had been tied up.

It didn’t take a genius to put two and two together, and realize that she had been kidnapped, or was some sort of prisoner.

The men were wearing some kind of uniform of blue robes, though the finer details were not visible to Tang Ze from this distance.

Naturally, he wanted to either stop them, or to try to rescue the woman.

It was the obvious thing to do.

The issue was that Tang Ze had no method to do so. He was still for all purposes a normal human, and they not only greatly outnumbered him, but were much faster as well, being mounted atop horses.

So much so that the dust cloud made by the stomping of their hooves was a distant sight by the time that Tang Ze could get these thoughts together.

In other words, there was no hope of him being able to do anything.

Still, they had proved useful in the sense that they had led Tang Ze to what was clearly a demarcated path of sorts.

Roads were made to connect two places together- so there were two directions that Tang Ze could go in.

After considering it, he decided that it was best not to follow the people who had possibly kidnapped a girl, and went in the other direction instead.

It was a few hours later that he managed to run into someone. 

This person was wearing scarlet robes with an emblem stitched to the breast pocket, though Tang Ze couldn’t really see what it was. He was also carrying a rucksack on his back, and was panting heavily as he walked. Wherever he was going, he was in quite a hurry. He looked to be about Tang Ze’s age or only slightly older, and sweat coated his brow. He had clearly been running for quite a distance, and his face was flushed from exertion. 

Still, at the very least, he didn’t appear to be hostile in any way, so Tang Ze figured it couldn’t hurt to ask him for directions.

“Hello stranger, I was wondering if you could help me out-”

“Sorry, I’m in a rush!” the man yelled out between breaths. He didn’t even send a second glance towards Tang Ze’s way as he rushed on past. “I can’t stop, I have somewhere to be!”

Tang Ze considered what was going on for a moment- and as to why this man might be in such a rush. 

Either he was delivering that bag on his back somewhere, or…

“...are you perhaps chasing after those men on horseback, who were carrying a woman with them?” Tang Ze asked.

The man clearly wanted to stop, but had put in so much momentum that as he tried to do so, he tripped and fell to the ground.

“Are you alright?” Tang Ze asked. It didn’t look like much of a fall, but then again, he was carrying something rather heavy on his back.

The man didn’t answer, instead grabbing onto Tang Ze, who had offered his hand to help him up, and said, “Where? Did you see them? Where are they going?”

“Hey, easy there,” Tang Ze said. “They went in that direction,” he said, pointing this person in the direction he had seen the horsemen leave. 

The man didn’t let me say anything further as he got up and began running in that direction.

It was clear that the kidnapped woman was either his lover- a wife or girlfriend; or a family member like a sister or cousin.

“But wait! No matter how fast you run you won’t be able to catch up with them on foot!” Tang Ze yelled out after him. “And even if you do get to them, are you going to fight off seven people on your own?”

Even if the people of this world had magical powers or could cultivate, if his running speed was any indicator of his strength, he was not that much stronger than a normal person.

“I know!” he yelled back, not even turning around. “But I can’t give up - I have to go after them.”

“At least get rid of what you’re carrying,” Tang Ze said, pursuing him, now somewhat invested in this man’s story. “How are you going to run lugging all that weight behind you?”

“I can’t- I have to keep this stuff safe!” he said, though from how red his face was getting, Tang Ze could tell that this man would not be able to keep up this pace for much longer. 

An idea began to form in Tang Ze’s mind - he didn’t know if it would work, but what did he have to lose by trying? “Wait- I think there might be a way that I can help you!”

The man slowed down ever so slightly, giving Tang Ze a suspicious look. “Help me? How? And why?”

“First things first,” Tang Ze said, the gears in his head turning. “Do you happen to have a spare uniform? Or just a bit of red cloth?”

The man gave Tang Ze a confused look. “What good will that do?”

“Look, I know you want to save that girl, but you’re not going to be able to get anywhere like this,” I said. “You’re just going to end up running yourself into the dirt, and accomplish nothing.” 

The words tasted bitter in Tang Ze’s mouth - he was all for acts of heroism and did not want to demoralize this person, but even he had to note when things were impossible. Unless this man had a secret technique he was keeping hidden for whatever reason, he didn’t have the slimmest chance of rescuing that woman.

And if he had something powerful like that he probably wouldn’t have been in this predicament in the first place. 

“I know that!” the man said angrily. “I know that! But I can’t give up!”

“I’m not asking you to, I’m saying there’s a way I might be able to help you,” Tang Ze said. 

The man slowed down and once again, looked at Tang Ze with suspicion. Tang Ze could understand that - it was odd for a random stranger to be offering a lending hand to someone else, but, from Tang Ze’s perspective, this was an easy enough way to endear himself to someone in this new world he’d found himself in.

At least, it should be easy - if his idea worked that is. 

“Yeah, I do have a spare uniform,” the man said. “Again, why do you need it?”

“If you hand it to me, I might be able to do something with it,” Tang Ze said. The man didn’t fully seem to trust Tang Ze as of yet, but seemed to be willing to play along, if for no other reason than he had no other choice in the matter if he wanted to save that woman. 

Tang Ze watched as the man opened up his rucksack, in which there were several packets wrapped up with the emblem of a phoenix on them, but also a spare set of robes. 

“Thanks,” Tang Ze said as he took the set of robes, and then tied the sleeves around his neck.

It was a pathetic attempt at a costume, but then again, he hoped it was somewhat close enough that it would get him something.