Jake’s POV

I was at home in my apartment, lying in bed. In my hands was all the magic I was able to muster while still on Earth, a single navy-blue orb about the size of a golf ball. Over a year of training and practice, and this was all I was able to create outside of Suma’s world. If I switch to the new method of using my own internal mana instead of mana I collect from the environment, then the orb turns purple and gets smaller; coincidentally, about the size of a grape. If I try to summon any of my weapons, or my armor, nothing happens, but I do get a feeling that I am getting close sometimes.

I let the orb dissipate and pulled out my phone from my pocket to call my mum. “Hello?” She answered.

“Hey Mum, just calling to let you know I am home now.” I said.

“My, you stayed rather late today, didn’t you.”

“Yeah, sorry for not telling you, but we met with a specialist to figure out what has been going on with me.”

“A specialist? Did they find out anything?”

“Yeah Mum, they did. Apparently that flaming guy was the cause.” I said.

“Do they know what he did?”

“Yeah, he shoved a bunch of his memories into my head, and a piece of his soul too.”

“You know Jake, I have heard you say some pretty strange things in these last few months, but I think that may have been right up there with when you told me you worked for a bird.” My mum said in a unique mix of dry sarcasm and motherly concern. “Do they know how to fix it?”

“Not yet, but they said the portion of his soul he put into me might simply go away on its own.”

“Oh… okay. Does that mean he will die?” She asked.

“I asked the same thing, but apparently no.”

“Then what will happen to him?”

“They don’t know. They haven’t ever seen something like this before. Apparently it used to be a fairly well known thing, but it stopped being used a long time ago.” I explained.

“Our conversations have gotten a lot stranger than they used to be, haven’t they?” Mum pointed out. I laughed a little and agreed. I explained a bit more about what happened, and the results of Suma’s delve. Since she hadn’t had as severe of a reaction to the memories, they figured that what she experienced was most likely a kind of overflow from me.

After spending a little while talking we hung up. It was about eight o’clock at night now, and I was starving. I made a sandwich and sat on my couch to watch some TV. I expected to have a quiet night at home, but maybe that was hoping for too much, because a few minutes after I finished my sandwich, there was knocking at my door. I got up to see who it was.

“Hello?” I said through the closed door.

“Are you Mr. Jake Vandal?” The voice outside said. It was a man’s voice. I looked through the peep hole and saw two people in officer’s uniforms. “We are with HMRC, Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs. We need to have a word with you sir.”

A while later, I was sitting at a cold metal table in an interrogation room. In front of me, were two officers; one was from HMRC, and the other was a police officer from my city. Apparently, they wanted to talk with me about some abnormalities in my personal banking account. I can’t say I blamed them. If I was a banker and over a hundred thousand pounds suddenly appeared in a person’s account out of the blue, I’d notice and call HMRC too.

“So where did you get the money?” The HMRC officer, his name was Detective Harewood, asked.

“If this is about my taxes, I was pretty sure I filed them correctly. If there was any mistake, I’m happy to pay the difference.” I said nervously. I have fought wyverns, experienced mages, and corrupt nobles, but this was still making me sweat.

“It’s drugs, right? Nobody just happens to find a hundred thousand pounds in the dirt outside. Just tell us who you were selling to, and you might get off easy.” The local officer said. I think she said her name was Detective Lin.

“No! I’m not selling drugs!” I denied.

“Then how do you explain the money? Did a little birdy just leave it on your front door?” Detective Harewood asked.

“Uhhh…” I admit, for a second I panicked. He was closer than he realized after all. My brain kinda went blank for a second as I just sat there with a dumb look on my face and my mouth open. “I… I just… I sold stuff. But not drugs! Just like, legal stuff.”

“Really? Because according to your credit card reports, you spent over three hundred quid on bulk purchases of paper in the last year.” Detective Lin said.

“Yeah. I sold paper and stuff. I bought it in bulk and sold it.” I said.

“You bought paper, and managed to sucker someone into giving you money for it? You must have been charging a thousand pounds per sheet.” Detective Harewood said.

“Here’s what we think. You bought the paper and made cash, literally.”

If you stumble upon this narrative on Amazon, it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

“You think I was counterfeiting?” I asked, shocked. My stomach was in knots already, and this wasn’t helping. “I… think I want to talk to a lawyer.”

“And do you realize how guilty that makes you look?” Detective Lin said in a cold calm way. “If you aren’t doing anything illegal, why do you need a lawyer?” I suddenly remembered the advice my dad used to say when I first started driving: if you get arrested, no matter what happens, always ask for the “Duty Solicitor”.

“I want to talk to the duty solicitor.” I said. I wish I could say I sounded confident, but my voice cracked halfway through.

“Hm, fine.” Detective Harewood said and have a “follow me” head nod to Detective Lin.

They called the station’s duty solicitor, and he came to talk with me. It took half an hour for him to arrive though. All the while, I was stuck in that interrogation room that was at least three degrees too cold for humans to live in, or maybe that was just the chills running down my spine? The duty solicitor was an overweight middle-aged man with dark brown skin, a bald head, and a charcoal gray suit; his name was Robert. As soon as he arrived, he started talking. He went over all my rights, asked if I needed to call anyone, and asked if I had a personal lawyer I needed or wanted to call. I called my Mum and let her know what was happening and to call our lawyer, then I had a long conversation with the duty solicitor.

“Everything we say to each other is just between us. Nothing gets reported to the police.” He said.

“I didn’t do anything.” I said.

“Okay, that’s good. Can you explain to me what happened, then?” Robert asked.

“I can’t…”

“I’m not going to lie to you, that is not a great response.”

“I really didn’t commit any crimes. At least, I don’t think I did.”

“So why can’t you explain?”

“Because… I’d get put into a mental institution. Also, no one would believe me.” I said sighing.

“Do you think you should be put into a mental institution?” Robert asked.

“…No.” I said after thinking about it for a second. He didn’t look convinced but moved on anyway.

“If it isn’t illegal, why do the police think you committed a crime?” He asked. Robert interlocked his fingers and placed his elbows forwards on the table. His hands and arms were now making a triangle in front of his body.

“Because it looks illegal to an outside observer.”

“I’m going to give you some professional legal advice: don’t say that, whether it be in court or to any of these officers.”

“Yeah.”

“So, let me hear some context to what is going on. I know you can’t explain in detail, but what about generally?”

“Generally?” I thought for a moment. “Yeah, I think I can do that. Basically, my friend Suma and I started selling things to rich people and charging a lot of money for it.”

“Well, that is certainly not illegal. Why paper?” Robert asked.

“Because they wanted it. I really don’t have any reason better than that.”

“Okay…?”

“I should also note; I stopped doing this a few months ago. I had to move so I lost everyone who wanted to buy from me.”

“And what crime are they accusing you of exactly? None of this sounds like enough reason to suspect you of breaking the law.” He asked.

“They think I’m counterfeiting money.”

“Because you bought and sold paper?”

“I should probably say that I made over one-hundred-thousand pounds doing this.” I admitted.

“Okay… things are starting to make sense now.” Robert leant back, taking his elbows off the table and dropping his hands to his sides. “Do you have any proof that you made the money legally?”

“I doubt it. There was no paper trail, no receipts, and I was paid entirely in gold coins.” As soon as I said that last part, I quickly added on with, “but I can’t explain why.” Robert looked at me for a second, probably questioning his life choices and wondering how he got to this point. I felt his pain.

“I don’t… gold coins?” He asked.

“Yes, I still have some at my apartment actually.”

“Alright. Do you happen to have a therapist?” He asked.

(Ah great, he thinks I’m crazy.) I thought, but answered him anyway. “I do.”

“Great, I’d like to get her number from you if I could. As well as an emergency contact if you have one.” I think he had his fill of me and wanted someone he thought was sane. I decided to go along with it, hoping maybe Dr. Maxwell could convince them I was sane at least. I gave him her number and my mum’s number as well. After that, he left the room to make the calls.

About ten minutes later, Robert came back in. “She says you’re mentally stable, but that you occasionally have hallucinations.” I had told her about everything at my last appointment. She knew everything already after all. “Your mother is also on her way with your family’s lawyer. My legal advice to you mister Vandal is to do whatever your lawyer tells you to do, and to not answer any questions he doesn’t talk to you about first. You may have an insanity defense, but your therapist claims you’re of sound mind. Personally, I’d switch therapists. That one doesn’t seem to be very good.”

“I can see why you’d think that.” I said flatly, with my head in my hands. After that, Robert left.

It only took an hour for my mum and Robert, our family lawyer, to arrive. We also called Dr. Maxwell and put her on speaker. I had explained the situation to her before Robert arrived, so she knew to play along. After talking, we came up with a moderate plan of action. Basically, tell the truth, let Robert do the talking, and only speak when spoken to. After we came up with that… plan… the officers came back, and they resumed the interrogation.

“Can you explain how you acquired the money in question?” Detective Lin asked.

“Legally through buying and selling merchandise to customers.” I said. Robert had prepared me for a few of the questions they might ask, and said I should follow a basic script even if they didn’t ask those questions exactly.

“According to our records, you have been unemployed for almost a year and a half now.” Detective Harewood pointed out.

“That is correct.” I said and looked over at Robert, who nodded slightly at me, letting me know I was still on script.

“So how do you explain the money?” Harewood asked.

“You will find that my client’s reported all of his profits from those transactions on his tax reports.” Robert interrupted.

“We weren’t suggesting that Mr. Vandal was hiding his taxes, but rather, the means of which the money itself was gained is being called into question.” Detective Lin said.

“I assure you, all of the money my client has was acquired legally.”

“Absolutely.” I stated.

“Right, and Mr. Vandal, can you tell us again how you were able to sell paper for over one-hundred-thousand pounds?” Detective Harewood asked.

“One-hundred-thousand?!” Robert asked, shocked.

“Oh, I’m so sorry. I forgot to mention that. Yeah.” I apologized.

“Well, um… the price of the merchandise is meaningless. The point is, that it was all acquired legally.” Robert said stumbling over his first few words.

“Can you prove that?” Detective Lin asked.

“Can you prove that it wasn’t?” Robert asked. Detectives Lin and Harewood glanced at each other for a moment, then back to us. “You have to admit, it’s ridiculous.”

“My client does not have to admit anything. You have been accusing him of illegal actions without enough evidence and he does not need to take such an affront. He came to this interview willingly and without any warrants, thus he is free to leave. Let’s go Jake.” Robert started to stand up, but he was an older fellow, so it wasn’t a quick endeavor.

With that, we left. Mum was waiting for us outside in the carpark. “Jake! Are you okay?”

“I’m fine Mum.” I said and hugged her.

“Thank you, Robert.” Mum said and hugged him too.

“It’s no problem, but Jake… they are not just going to let this go.”