A Scholar sat at his computer desk, he put up a camera and began to record a video log.
“M-my name is Dr. Alric Baggle. I was born in the city of Meltova, Capital of Honnenburg. When I was eighteen, I was sent to the most renowned school for alchemy known as Cromstone. I was a model student, but I hungered for more than the knowledge held within its walls. *gulp* Throughout my life, It has become my sole desire to conquer death, to create life... T-to play God if you want to say it that way.”
He held up a luminescent stone, it had sigils engraved throughout it and seemed to pulsate with every moment.
“I-I believe I have found what is needed for me to be able to walk amongst those in the divine realms.” He grasped the stone with his fingers and squeezed hard “With this, I will become a god. I will travel the cosmos learning the knowledge that each world has to offer, and then… And then I will only be one.”
Standing from the desk, Dr.Baggle ended his transmission. He moved towards the graf generator and placed the stone within it. The generator, like everything else in the lab, was quite dirty, the Doctor hadn’t stepped out in a while either, with his ribs showing his continual self-starvation and the bags under his eyes being huge, there was a cooking pot somewhere in the distance but that too hadn’t been washed in what looked like a week.
The Doctor looked towards the stasis tank, which held a stark naked boy. The boy looked to be about eighteen years of age. Sidecut hair that was as dark as night, he held his eyes tightly shut within the stasis gel, the doctor touched the glass of the tank and put his face as close as he could to the boy.
The boy’s well-built body had wires and tubes connected to it, the doctor had put them there for the direct downloading of information and the transference of power between him and the stone.
The Doctor began to download his world database, he began with linguistics, science and finally combat having deemed all else unnecessary riff-raff with little substance. He stared directly at the screen with his tired eyes, each file having to do at least two rounds to be turned into the bio-downloadable information he needed. After a few hours, the installations were complete and he prepared for the transference.
For the first time in a long, long while the doctor smiled… in fact, it was more like a deep grin filled with a burning desire.
“It is time that we become one…” He touched the tank’s glass one last time and then stood a few steps away from it, on a specially made receiver platform.
“System, Initiate transference, begin extraction and exportation of consciousness.”
AFFIRMATIVE, INITIATING PROTOCOL: “AMBROSE”.
As the system began to work, A hideous red glow came from the tesla coils which began to arc electric waves through the stone and into the stasis tank.
It started spinning and rumbling with a deep sound of displeasure like the machine itself disapproved of what was occurring, the tubes began to glow as the energy made to pass the doctor’s consciousness into the body let itself out. The doctor himself put a ring around his head, the ingenious invention which would transport his mind outside of his tired body.
Everything was going well… until it wasn’t, one of the cables that connected the generators and the tube separated, the copper not being able to conduct the ungodly amount of electricity that was passing through it. Arcs of pure power came from the generators. ruining the coils.
“WHAT, NO. NOT NOW, NOT RIGHT NOW.” He yelled as he tried to step off and turn the entire power source down but the receiver platform had other plans.
One of the many arcs came striking into the doctor's chest, seemingly pulling the very essence of his soul from it, redirecting it to the core.
The sigils on the stone began to activate, cracks of bright light began to seep through as the doctor's soul entered the core. Finally, the stone gave out and disintegrated, fusing into one final surge of electricity.
The flood of electricity reverberated through the tank, feeding its way up the pure silver tubes towards the boy's body. Lines of power could be seen etching into the boy’s body and face until it began to form a core at the center of his chest.
The core was riddled with sigils, much like the stone that was once held within the generator. They began to dance across his body as they moved from the core.
The core at the center of the boy's chest began to pulsate, faster and faster. Waves of power battered the laboratory. Disintegrating everything they touched until finally the core became so bright it seemed as if it couldn’t withstand it’s own power any longer.
At that moment the boy's eyes opened, beautiful golden irises which had the exact same sigils as the stone and core, they seemed to sparkle within the arcs of electricity.
Finally, with a pop. The boy was no longer there in the tank, nothing survived within the lab, even the remains of the doctor who took a chance at godhood were no longer there. In their place was a pile of ash roughly in the shape of a human body.
The boy stood there floating within what seemed to be space, he could see the endless stars and worlds unknown, a plethora of lights, he knew what they were called, but not why, he knew nothing yet he understood it all, on his unmoving face something changed, he found no reason to be, for he knew not who he was, an unexpected tear rolled across his cheek and then he waited, alone with his thoughts, he could’ve been there for mere minutes, maybe hours, even eons didn’t sound that farfetched, he’d thought of nothing, seeing only meteorites go around and nothing to truly look forward to, but one thing had changed, within all this time, he’d gotten an idea, a single thought which would shape him in ways unknown, a deep, deep hunger for knowledge, to know more, to understand more, to become more.
Out of the blue, he heard a strange voice within his head, it sounded… artificial?
SCANNING COMPLETE: COMPATIBLE WORLD LOCATED, MIGRATION IN T-3, 2, 1...
Unlawfully taken from Royal Road, this story should be reported if seen on Amazon.
Once more he disappeared, reappearing on his feet on the outskirts of a moderately large city. The shift was so unexpected it physically hurt, he had to blink a few times before he understood what he was seeing, it was… grass, and trees, as he turned around though he could see an enormous tower piercing the clouds, it was so gigantic he almost missed the whole city that stretched under it. Looking closer, there were ramparts surrounding this city at the top of which he could see what looked to be cannons.
[Ramparts? Cannons? How do I know all this? Why can’t I remember anything?!]
INITIATING INTEGRATION WITH THIS WORLD’S DYNAMICS…
...
...INTEGRATION COMPLETE
WELCOME TO ARGENTIA, Ambrose.
“This, what is this voice? Ambrose?... is that my name?”
He stood there, stark naked, in deep thought. He thought of where he’d been until now, the space, the darkness… the beautiful, beautiful stars, how long he had been in that space. Why couldn't he remember anything before those stars?
“My name... is Ambrose.” He said aloud as he stretched his hand out in front of him the motion feeling unnatural, he began stretching his body, jumping up and down, twisting left and right, and falling over more than a few times, not being used to his own body was quite annoying. After several moments of testing his ability to move, he concluded a few things;
First, he was very physically fit and able to stretch his body very easily.
Second, he would need a bit to be used to his body since not being able to walk until now had impacted his ability to use his body severely.
[I wonder what else awaits me here] He continued, his face was completely unmoving, his thought process trying to reach any meaning in anything that had happened until now, after a while of thinking he concluded, with a fist in his palm.
[I need more information… and possibly a large amount of soup]
Yes, information would come in handy in every way and soup was one of the most low-calorie high-protein and filling food that was easy to find, it all made perfect sense! Or at least in Ambrose’ mind it did.
He started striding towards the city and noticed a row of people in front of the main gate. He kept walking towards the main road leading into the city, people would stare at him in shock as he walked around in nothing but his birthday suit, well, technically, it was his birthday, or was it?
As he approached the row he was stopped by two men with spears.
“HALT, YOU ARE UNDER ARREST FOR PUBLIC INDECENCY.” The man on the right yelled, they were both covered in chainmail with a cloak over them and had open-face helmets on, clearly some type of guard.
Ambrose didn’t miss a beat before answering “I was brought here like this, I had no other choice but to approach the city or I would have either frozen to death or been hunted down by wild animals.” He understood that them believing him would be quite hard if he didn’t have a response for everything they threw at him, and they would definitely be suspicious of him for a while, but he still didn’t know why.
The guards paused and looked him over, their expressions strict. They glanced at one another before one of them nodded.
“You will still need to come with us to the guard station, we cannot have someone naked and without an I.D. Also we need more information on how you were ‘brought’ here.”
The left guard unclasped his cloak and draped it over Ambrose’ shoulders. They dragged him to the front of the line and Ambrose got a close look at the ground and the ramparts, the dirt road in front of the city became cobble around halfway through the gates and the walls that separated the city from the rest of the world were quite thick, made fully out of rows of large stones cut into rectangles. Right behind the wall, there was a two-story building towards which he was being led. It seemed that this was the guardhouse.
It wasn’t that impressive, to be honest, it was made out of smaller stones and it connected to the wall in a way that made it easy to either hop onto the wall quickly or run to the front gates, the whole building had very few windows and a simple bell in front of it seemed to be the only way of alerting the guards.
They pulled him in and made him sit in a chair in one of the rooms, it was a very bland room, there were a few chairs and a few candles on the stone walls.
The Guards whispered to each other for a bit and one of them left the room, the guard that had given him the cloak sat in front of him and started asking a few questions.
“Now kid, don’t worry about anything, I’m just going to ask you a few questions and if you answer truthfully we won’t have a problem, let’s start with something easy, what’s your name”
The Guard was an older man, maybe close to his sixties, but he seemed way too fit physically for that, he had grey hair and a scar next to his lips which cut a bit from his beard, overall he seemed quite experienced, or at least like he knew what he was doing.
Ambrose took a deep breath before answering.“Ambrose.”
“Good, Ambrose, now could you tell me why were you naked in the middle of the goddamn road?”
“I was brought here like this.” He repeated himself, there wasn’t much to tell him if he kept asking the same questions, and he still didn’t understand why him not having any clothes bothered the man so much.
The guard rubbed his nose bridge and then kept asking. “What do you mean you were ‘brought’ here, who brought you?”
“I don’t know”
That made him raise his eyebrows “you don’t know? What do you mean you don’t know?”
Ambrose tried explaining again “I have no memory of being brought here, all I know is that I woke up here and my only choice was either the city or the woods and I didn’t want to take my chances.”
At this moment the other guard stepped in with a pair of clothes and a small white stone on top of them, the guard that was questioning Ambrose up until now took the stone and threw it to Ambrose, he barely caught it and kept looking at it, it was just a rigid piece of rock.
The guard looked at him sternly again. “Now, son, what’s your name?”
Ambrose simply stared at him for a minute, was he playing dumb or was he actually dumb? He answered to avoid any further problems. “Ambrose.”
The guard kept staring at the rock as he questioned him again “Alright then, Ambrose, what were you doing in the middle of the road naked?”
Now Ambrose was completely confused, what was happening? Why was he repeating questions? he kept playing with the rock in his hands and answered “I don’t know”
Both guards stared at the rock for an uncomfortable amount of time before whispering to one another, they talked for another minute and the guard with the set of clothes dropped them on his arms and took the rock from him, the other Guard stared into Ambrose’ eyes and said.
“Now look here, son, I believe you but this is a very strange occasion, I will need you to wear those clothes and then follow me to Wolfsong University, maybe we’ll find a solution for ya then.”
Ambrose slowly stood up and started clothing himself “I’m sorry but what was your name?” he asked the guard.
The guard looked at him for a second and then answered. “The name’s Roderick, the other guy’s Cook, nice to meet you son.”
Roderick took out a piece of parchment and began to scribble on it, he started walking out of the door and motioned for Ambrose to follow. He handed him the parchment with a bit of writing on it.
“Here, this is your temporary registration, do not lose it. I will take you to the Wolfsong; they take care of all the outsider registrations.”
Taking the piece of parchment from Roderick, Ambrose thanked him and followed him out.
Leaving the guardhouse. he took his first steps into this new world, he took a deep breath of fresh air and asked Roderick one last thing.
"Do you have some soup laying around or...?"