Motherfuckers....
I will avenge you..., Fio ...
I will avenge you ...
I will ....
When Tom opened his eyes, he found himself to be in what appeared to be a place where everything was pitch black. Interestingly, in spite of everything being pitch black, he could see his own bare body with clarity.
“Where am I?” He wondered aloud. When he stood up, this was when a large golden judgement scale appeared in front of him. It was the size of an elephant.
Then -
“Welcome to the judgement.” A voice sounded.
“The judgement?”
The voice explained, “You’ve been killed. Therefore, your soul is now being judged before being reborn.”
Tom sagged his shoulders, now remembering what happened. He had failed. He couldn’t even reach where he meant to go. He was shot down midway and was hacked to death.
“Who or what are you?” He demanded.
“I am the God of life,” A feminine voice responded.
“I am the God of death,” A male voice responded.
“The two supreme Gods...,” Tom said with a shocked voice.
In this world, there were six prime Gods. There were four basic elemental Gods in fire, water, wind, and earth. And then there were two supreme Gods that stood above the others. They were the God of life and death.
And there were three planes: Material plane, elemental plane, and finally celestial plane.
[https://twoclusters.com/novel_img/LM/Lore_planes.png]
Mortal beings, AKA organic beings, belonged to the material plane and were not able to travel to the elemental plane on their own. If invited, they would stay in an elemental plane for a short period.
Beings from the elemental plane were able to traverse down to the material plane but could not enter the celestial plane. Likewise, beings from the celestial plane were able to traverse down both elemental and material planes. Spirits and elementals were often attracted to the material plane, creating numerous what humans called “haunted” or “magical” forests.
Magic which humans used were predominantly borrowed from spirits and elementals from elemental plane. However, high tier magic spells might require communicating directly with their respective elemental Gods.
Feeling drained, Tom felt weak in his knees and had to sit down.
“I am really dead, aren’t I.”
There was no response from the Gods. And Tom stared at the judgement scale in front of him.
“What am I being judged for?”
“Your sins will be counted on one scale. Your virtues will be counted on another,” The female voice responded to which Tom shrugged and said -
“I am but a humble hunter from a small village. I don’t ever recall performing any virtuous deeds.”
“Perhaps you may have not. But we are not bound to human standards,” The male voice responded.
Tom spoke no more and waited for a while for something to happen. At one point, the female voice spoke.
“In your life, you have killed 6,233 rabbits and 219 boars.”
“A lot of sins?” Tom whispered to himself.
This novel's true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.
The female voice continued, “Your reason for killing those creatures was for your own survival and to provide for your family. In other words, you were acting a part of the food chain. Therefore, those deeds are not sins.”
Then the male voice spoke, “In fact, not once had you killed any of those animals for leisure.”
“That is a point for virtue,” The female voice added.
As soon as she had spoken, the judgement scale leaned a bit to its right. There was nothing on the scales themselves however.
“In your entire life, you have done no ill deeds. You did not steal. You did not fight another without a valid reason. That is a point for virtue,” The female voice declared.
“And,” The male voice added. “You took in a woman who was blessed with misfortune. That is -”
Tom interjected at once. “Wait, are you talking about Fio, Fionara? My wife?”
“Yes,” The female voice replied.
So, she wasn’t really making it up..., He thought. She was indeed blessed with...?
“Wait, blessed with misfortune? Blessed?” He wondered aloud. He stood up at once and argued fiercely, “How is that ‘blessed’?! The woman suffered for her whole, short, life!” He emphasized on the word, short. Ironically, he was forgetting the fact that he, too, had a short life.
“That was her punishment from her previous life,” The female voice responded and the male voice added, “If she was cursed with misfortune, she would have led a far more horrible life.”
Their explanation made him wonder meanwhile.
“Was the war and the death of our children due to her misfortune?” He inquired carefully and timidly as if being afraid to know the truth.
“No.” A simple reply came. That made him feel better at least.
Nevertheless, the scale leaned further to the right.
In the end, it turned out that Tom had no critical sin, and the scale was leaning to right. However, his virtue points weren't enough for any blessing. His life was rather short after all.
“It is about even,” The female voice spoke. “You will be reborn without any disadvantages or advantages.”
“Please, Gods, wait.”
There was a period of silence, and Tom continued.
“I would like to be reborn to exact revenge.”
“It is your life. We do not care,” The male voice responded. “However, when you are reborn, your memories will be erased, making your wish for revenge impossible.”
“Is it possible to keep my memories?”
“Yes, but not without a heavy penalty. The penalty is forgoing your own soul.”
Tom didn’t understand.
The God of Death elaborated, “When the wheel of life recycles a human’s soul, its previous memory must be reset. It is one of its primary rules. If you wish to retain your memories, it will only mean that the wheel of life will reject your soul, meaning you will no longer be qualified to be reborn. We can do your rebirth manually but we shall do it only once.”
The God of life added. “Souls that are rejected by the wheel of life will soon fade away. What this means is that, when you die the next time, your soul will be rejected and will fade away.”
As terrible as it sounded, for Tom, it didn’t sound real to him. He didn’t have any idea or concept to differentiate between death of a soul and just death. To him, it was all the same.
What he did not know and was not told was a fact that a soul could be reborn as something else entirely. If a soul of a human had enough virtue points, there would be a chance to be reborn as something greater.
And there was more. Spirits and elementals were allowed to retain small bits of memories from their past lives which gave them being able to reborn an entirely new meaning and purpose. This was one of primary reasons that spirits and elementals were attracted to material plane; they used to live there most likely. A sense of longing was attracting them.
Of course, Tom wasn’t aware of any of that. For him, the way Fionara ended herself felt too pitiful. The woman did her best during her short lifespan. The only thing she got in the end was bottomless sorrow. He sincerely felt the woman deserved better. She deserved her own happiness, he felt strongly. She even had it within her grasp. She had two lovely children and a faithful husband.
In addition to his agitation regarding his wife, his children’s death felt just unfair. They had done nothing wrong. Yes, it was war. People die in war. He understood that much. Alas, his entire family was killed for reasons unknown to him. Why did the army decide to wipe the village out? It was a small and remote settlement. He had absolutely no idea why, and that was bothering him.
Nevertheless, the chances were that, even if he was told the truth behind the massacre, he wouldn’t have accepted it either way. He and his family were killed in a way he couldn’t accept. That was all there was to it.
He had his right to avenge. Whether he exercised his right, it was down to him.
“Whoever it was, he had no fucking right to take Fio’s happiness away from her,” He lamented while gritting his teeth. “It makes me so mad just thinking about how she ended herself. And don’t even talk about my children. They were just four and three years old.”
His wife plunged her dagger into her heart without any hesitation and died instantly. The amount of despair that drove her to do such an action must have been immeasurable.
Meanwhile, the judgement scale began to vanish progressively, and the God of life asked Tom.
“Do you wish to be reborn with your memories intact even after we’ve warned you of the consequences?”
There was nothing much for him to think about. With strong resolve, he replied, “Yes, I do.”
The God of death spoke, “So be it. It is your life after all. You shall be reborn with your current memories. And you shall not be reborn again.”
The God of life added, “When you are reborn, you will keep your memories. Additionally, because of your last act, elementals of wind have taken a liking to you. Your affinity with wind has slightly increased.”
At this point, his affinity to wind had increased by one point, from 2 to 3.
Tom’s body began to fade away and soon turned into a ball of light which flew away.