What A World
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A moderate sized room dimly lit by the flickering light source affixed to the ceiling. The stone walls of the space were evidently aged yet somewhat comforting. Heavy tapestries adorned the walls, depicting scenes of heroic battles and noble deeds, their vibrant colors muted by age and dust.
In one corner, a sturdy oak table stood, weathered and scarred from years of use. Upon it lay parchments and quills, remnants of scholarly pursuits and bureaucratic duties. Nearby, a set of worn wooden chairs offered modest seating for those engaged in discussions or negotiations.
In the center was a well-worn rug and to the right of it stood tall bookshelves that lined the walls, their shelves laden with dusty volumes and leather-bound manuscripts, each of them inviting visitors to linger and lose themselves in the pages of forgotten lore.
After four years in this world, this was now my usual scenery, save for the fact that Oliver wasn’t currently scribbling away at the stacks of paper lined up on his desk. The man seemed to be out quite often but given the peculiar uniform – like clothing he usually wore, it must’ve had something to do with his occupation.
This was section of the small house they’d regarded as the ‘living room’. Julia was sitting on one of the wooden chairs knitting away at something, so she was hardly keeping track of my every move at the moment, seemingly lost in the melodic hum that subtly resonated from her.
My second greatest achievement after coming to this world had undoubtedly been developing my motor skills, after four long years I now possessed the ability to walk once more. It was a far cry from what I’d been used to but still far better than being forced to follow this woman around all the time.
Slowly rising to my wobbly feet, I made my way over to the large bookshelf on the right side of the room, passing by a vertically oriented mirror that stood sentinel like a silent guardian. Its reflective surface captured my passing figure and immediately began projecting the appearance I was still wholly unfamiliar with.
I began to take note of this body's still developing features for just a brief instant. It wasn't something I'd done often but rather an action spurred on by a sense of pure curiosity. It was something akin to a reward since I could now finally use my own two feet to see myself in the reflective pane of glass affixed to the wall.
“Heh-Heh....Haah......”
After giving myself a once over, that exasperated sigh mixed in with a faint chuckle managed to somehow escape me. That reflex reaction was spurred on purely by the sight of the figure being reflected back at me. This body wasn’t completely hopeless, but if I was going to make this work then it did need some major improvements. For starters -
This vessel looked incredible fragile; a notion that actually wasn’t very far from the truth. The hair on my head was both short and spiky, the strands of it were dyed in a jet – black sheen so dark it rivaled the night sky itself. The texture seemed similar to that of Julia’s hair, except it held a much, much darker hue. My face on the other hand appeared quite round and perfectly fit the confines of my features, perhaps because my body was still developing, the manlier aspects of it hadn't become as pronounced on my face as of yet.
Looking closer, I could see trace aspects of both Oliver and Julia's features subtly peering out, but even more surprising than that was the deep crimson color being reflected by my Irises. At a glance you’d never be able to tell that we were blood related given the stark differences in appearance, but trace amounts of both their features were in fact there. I’d figured as much from the brief glimpses of myself I’d managed to get over the years, but it was now undeniable, the crimson hue of my Irises had seemed to only deepen with time.
The reason behind that was becoming more apparent to me by the day, after I’d begun interacting with mana all those years ago, my soul had started using those mana particles as a link to strengthen its influence over this body, it was a good thing my soul didn’t have the same overpowering essence it did when I was still acting as the reaper, or else this body would have died the moment I got too close to it.
The sole reason this body had even been so abhorrently hard to control in the first place was because my weakened soul had been locked in a constant struggle with the soul of a newborn child, but after harnessing the power of mana and strengthening my connection, my soul was finally able to assert its dominance over this body and assimilate that hindrance.
It wasn’t particularly my style to go around robbing people of their bodies, but this was an emergency so it couldn’t be helped. If I was going to make any progress in this world, I needed a vessel and information, and it just so happens that Oliver was something of a ‘bookworm’, or at least that’s what Julia often called him anyway.
Running my slender finger along the hard spines of the musty books on the bottom section of the shelves, my now dusty finger stopped on a particular book, its contents encased in a worn led cover of velvet design, the faded symbols practically screaming hints of its arcane origin.
“Hm? Liam are you playing with your father’s books again? You know those are too hard for you to understand.” Julia somehow detected my intentions without even facing my direction.
“Mother I’m just going to look at the pictures inside....Can I?”
After hearing the childlike innocence my voice, I heard the sound of a relieved sigh escaping her. Turning to face me, she wore a conflicted expression but had still decided to give in nonetheless. If nothing else, this woman truly had remarkable skill, even when looking away from the garments in her hands she had still managed to somehow continue knitting away at it without a single hint of hesitation.
“.....Just try not to mess anything up. Are you taking it outside again?”
“Yeah, but I’ll be careful.” Conjuring a ‘smile’, I nodded in agreement before prying the book from its position.
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“Fufu...I suppose you do take after your father. You can take it outside but just make sure to put it back when you’re finished.”
Even though she seemed conflicted over the idea just moments ago, a thin smile was now curling up from the corners of her lips.
Addressing these people by their designated parental titles wasn’t something I was particularly looking forward to, but for now it would have to do. I wasn’t really sure how to mimic human children because their souls hardly ever needed guidance, but this was also something I needed to refine. Acting erratically would just draw unnecessary attention to myself and ultimately make it harder for me to reach my goals.
Walking over to the large wooden door that acted as the entrance, the lumber floor beneath me creaked under the weight of my lightly placed steps. Standing on tiptoe I restlessly struggled to unlock the fragile frame barring me from the outside world but doing that was much easier said than done in this body.
Stifled chuckles reached my ears, Julia was watching my futile struggle with pure delight. I wasn’t sure as to why, but she seemed to find a great deal of pleasure in watching me carry out the most mundane of tasks.
After a while my fingers had just barely managed to get the job done, the barrier that had inconvenienced me to such an absurd degree finally creaked open with a trembling sound.
Stepping onto the ‘patio’ as they called it, my body was once again enveloped in nature's embrace. This body did have a few upsides that made this entire experience slightly more tolerable, the first of those was the fact that I now had access to all five of my senses.
The stagnant winds drifting by carried a scent of damp earth, mingling with the distant aroma of wood smoke and wildflowers. Each breath of air brought with it a symphony of nature's fragrances, dancing on the breeze and whispering tales of the world beyond. Experiencing this glorious sensation just didn’t seem like something I was going to ever completely get used to, not after spending all those centuries with nothing to compare it to.
These new senses of mine were only growing sharper by the day, in the past I usually just relied on detecting the presence of souls to navigate my surroundings, but to my surprise, this fragile body was somehow able to deliver the full experience.
Taking a few steps forward, I slowly lowered myself into a sitting posture, one that gave me a full view of the human settlement nestled in front of me.
It was known as ‘Zale.’
Even without much thought, I could tell that this town was on a smaller scale compared to the cities further inland, but despite that there was surprisingly a lot of traffic here. The houses were, for the most part, just the same as the one I now occupied.
They were small wooden constructs boasting triangular roofs that neither seemed to be clumped together nor extravagantly spaced. Their sizes did vary but the ones that did were few and far between, coated in a ceremonious mix of contrasting colors they surprisingly came together to form a cohesive blend.
Stretching out in front of me was a brick paved road that led to the ‘town square’ and now trodding along it were pedestrians maneuvering pedaling carts, riding on horseback and even walking on foot. That much was normal for me, but the otherwise drab scenery soon began to deviate from what I had grown to know as the ‘norm’.
Mixed into the chaotic mob of pedestrians was....a wolf.
Or at the very least a creature that resembled one. The beast, coated in a sheen of white fur that seemed to disregard every speck of dust being carried by the steady stream of wind towered over the other passerby's at least three times their size. It held a stern expression, those split pupil yellow eyes conveyed nothing but a sense of apathy, locked onto a single target as it walked along somewhat reluctantly, after all if it refused the metal chain currently fastened around its neck was now lodged in the hands of a man I could only presume to be the owner.
He seemed to be far younger and far more fragile than Oliver, a blue-haired youth that rode atop the large creature, his curly hair was slicken back with to the extent where it was almost glistening, and his lanky build swayed with a sort of unfathomable confidence stemming from the very core of his being. He sported a smile as his way of responding to the gestures of admiration and envy he was now getting.
Judging by the way he was now dressed in plates of silver armor that only seemed to cover the core aspects of his body like his chest and forearms, he must have had at least some experience on a battlefield.
There was a small white carriage strolling alongside the conspicuous pair of man and monster as they walked, and beside the coachman of the vehicle, was a woman dressed in a frilly white dress that covered everything from her bosom to her ankles. There was a large white broad hat sheltering her slender frame from the sun, so her face wasn’t completely visible, but she seemed to be around the haughty young man’s age, and she too was grinning in sync with the flamboyant man in an almost rhythmic display of arrogance.
The carriage was undoubtedly carrying others like them, given the formation of the other four men that encircled them on all sides, their eyes scanning the surroundings with a mixture of vigilance and suspicion.
“So those are raiders huh....” Somehow my own thoughts had unconsciously wandered out of my mouth.
The scene unfolding in front of me had temporarily managed to garner my focus, my eyes locked onto the conspicuous gathering like a lurking prowler, maybe it was because I wasn’t used to having actual eyes, but I could feel my Irises gently gliding across the scene, absorbing every detail with an intensity that bordered on obsession. While I was used to observing others from a distance, it somehow felt uncanny given my current situation. It was a good thing this house wasn’t that close to the main road, so nobody was really paying any attention to me.
Because of the beast’s size, the young man simply led in the front so that the beast could hastily clear out all the other travelers slowing their passage. Many of them didn’t take too kindly to this of course, but after gazing up at the large silhouette looming over them, they hastily cleared the way for the man now reigning over them like a king.
Narrowing my eyes, a veil of black and white encased my vision and I saw the flickering lights being emitted from their bodies disappear towards the city. Although that was the most obvious case of it, the group just now weren’t the only ones walking around with mystical creatures of that nature. Plenty of the people that now passed me by had similar creatures in their entourage, though they were far less daunting.
They were known as ‘monsters.’ Beings that came about as a result of mana mixing with nature and distorting the natural order of the world.....or at least that was my hypothesis anyway.
Monsters and mana, nothing of the sort existed in the lower realm of my former world, but here they were tangible and palpable, weaving themselves into the fabric of reality with an unsettling ease. In this new realm, the boundaries of possibility seemed to blur, and the laws of nature bent to the will of arcane forces beyond comprehension. It was a world where the unimaginable walked among mortals.
The moment I realized that I finally came to terms with the true scale of this daunting task and along with it, the long, long road ahead.