“You are right! Why am I dead yet? Is this providence?” The man pondered.
“Providence?”
“What is your name, warrior?”
“I am Dyne Valiant. Son of Ritcher Valiant.” Dyne copied the man's way of talking.
“I am Strafe of the Four Elements. A Disciple to the Weaver, the Sovereign Goddess of Alos Vasilous. It seems the Sovereign of this Universe has willed this meeting!"
“I’m sorry?”
“You do not understand how strict the instructions of the Sovereign is! He will not tolerate any interference with this world. Our kings and gods, and the strongest warriors that have emerged in our world, have long known this place's existence. But even the slightest attempt would be met with severe punishment. And yet, now, I used a charm to save my life. Why would the Sovereign want this?”
“I don’t know.”
“Because He willed us to meet. The world that I am from is falling into the darkness, just as this world is. But he allowed me to meet you to repay the sins of those in my world!”
“You may have had too much to drink.” Dyne frowned.
“I am serious, Dyne Valiant! If you do not believe me, then allow me this... I will use my magic to look into your memories. Such an act is even prohibited in my world. So I’m sure it would be worse at this! Allow me this gamble. If I do succeed in casting the spell and am not smitten by the God that dwells here, then it is His will for me to send you to my world!”
Dyne frowned.
“What the heck. I’m dying anyway.” Dyne shrugged his shoulders.
Strafe bit his tongue to force himself to focus and move. His hands drew a strange seal, and his arms created a bright golden light.
He placed his hands over Dyne’s forehead.
It was then that Dyne saw all his memories. As if it was being pulled up. Even the things that he had long forgotten emerged in his memories.
Suddenly, it ended.
Strafe’s expression grew even paler. Greenish veins appeared all over his body. Yet despite his weak state, he laughed as he hurriedly caused the bottle of wine to fly to his hand as he drowned it in his mouth.
“This God is Just! This God is Just!” He laughed.
“Ok. You’re alive. So I’m guessing that you are right?”
“I am! And it’s amazing! This world! This world is amazing! The imaginations, the stories! Even those games you played were outstanding!”
“I know, right?!”
“This is just perfect! You are the perfect candidate! You can enter my world! The fact that I’m alive proves that the God here will allow it!" The man laughed as he drank another mouthful.
“What do you mean, perfect candidate?”
“First of all, I finally understand your regret. Now that I've seen your memories, I can understand why you want to play more! You never even got to play a PlayStation 2? Or an Xbox?”
“I really wanted to! But the moment I got into the army, they knew that I was my dad's son. They made me take some special course, and I became one of the top soldiers and was sent again and again to go to war!”
“At least you were able to replay those old games.”
“I could play those games through phone and an emulator! But with how secretive my missions were, I couldn’t even bring advanced cellphones that could emulate at least a PlayStation 2! And my dad told my superiors of my tendency to be addicted. My country couldn’t afford to get me addicted and strictly monitored and made sure that I couldn’t play!” Dyne cursed as he recalled his past.
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“And so you went to anime to fill that void. But it wasn’t enough.” Strafe laughed.
“Of course, it wasn’t enough! My superiors even offered drugs to keep me calm. But I always yearned to play. Can’t a guy just play his games in peace?”
Strafe laughed.
“You're such a fool. Through your memories, I can gauge how strong and skilled you are as a soldier. You clearly are an aboriginal among mortals. No wonder your country made you go through strict training! You even completed an impossible mission so they can send you home for two years and still get paid! You planned to use those years to play, right?”
“Just let me play enough games to get to PlayStation 3! That was all I was asking for! But those damned politicians killed my dad! And one of them is close to an Army General in this region!”
“It is quite a sad yet perfect tale. But listen, Warrior. I have a way for you to play those games in your head in the highest definition possible. It will surpass any known consoles of this world and even the virtual realities that they are developing. You will get to go to my world and play a beloved game of yours. The drawback is that the game you will play will be one of those old PS1 games.”
“I’m listening. Now that I’m dying, I am feeling a bit nostalgic.” Dyne smirked.
“Of the number of games that you have played in your memories, it’s a good thing that you studied it in great detail. With the Imaginarium Bond, we can recreate the real world. In my world, we only used that power to create and harness energy from the souls of everyone living in that realm.”
“Like what you did when you sacrificed an entire world to be here.”
“Do you really think that?” Strafe shook his head in lamentation.
“The people of that world... well for the great majority of them. I would say nearly ninety percent willingly gave their life when I used that energy. They were happy to sacrifice themselves for me. And this isn’t due to some manipulation magic. They just want to.”
“What? You can’t be serious.”
“They didn’t have a choice. If I die, they will also die. The Imaginarium Bond is linked to the wielder. If the wielder dies, all the world dies with it. It originally belonged to my master, but right before she died, she transferred the ownership of all her artifacts to me. When I was about to die, it was they who willingly gave me their souls. Around ninety percent of the population in that mini-world of mine gave their life and transferred it to me. As such, I didn't need to take the energy in their souls forcibly.”
Dyne was stunned.
“My master loved that world. She remembered every single one of them and even made me remember their names when she gave it to me. It was only natural for those living in the Imaginarium Bond to sacrifice themselves for me. I am Master's disciple and her only son.”
“I’m sorry I made that careless comment.”
“It is but a tragic past. But there is hope. Although vengeance is in my heart, my real regret is leaving my world into their wicked hands.”
“So, you want me to use the Imaginarium Bond and create a world of my own?”
“Not exactly. You will do will be something totally different.”
“Different? Why?”
“Firstly, it is because you are human. I give you the Imaginarium Bond and send you to my world. You will be as you are. And in the world of Cultivation, you will have to start as a mortal before embarking into the path of the Immortals.”
“Sounds Chinese.”
“The Chinese were the ones who coined this term because right before your God forbid entry, many of our kind had visited that region in the distant past.”
“That makes sense. So, I will be human... What will that imply?”
“For one, you cannot harness the power and use the Imaginarium Bond energy as we can. Your cultivation level would be too low.”
“Then how can I use it?”
“You still can use it. Not just in the way we do. When I gazed into your memories, I realized something. You see, for people like me, we live in a world where everything is possible. We didn’t live in limitations. We grew up knowing that if we cultivate hard enough, we can eventually do anything we want. But because of that, we lacked one thing that anybody in this world has.”
“Wi-Fi?”
“Erm...No. It is the ability that you have in using your imagination.”
“So basically Wi-Fi.”
“The point is... We were not capable of imagining great worlds and write great stories and tales that you call literature. We only aspired to be great because it was possible. But in this world, where reality is so limited, you have dreamed of amazing things. Games, animated shows, stories, and so on. Even the best literature of our world pales compared to yours in terms of imagination and creativity!”
“So the power of believing trumps everything? Including hate and injustice?”
“Stop fooling around.” Strafe frowned.
“I’m just saying, what can our imagination do?”
“While you can’t harness the energy and use it as we can, you can do something else! You can live in a world that I will create using your memories! Do you understand? Because you have very detailed accounts of the nostalgic games you have long kept to heart, I can craft it and bestow it to you so you can enter that world and live in it as if you were a character of that game world! You earn and acquire the powers, the skills, even the items that exist in those games!”
Dyne’s sarcastic expression vanished. And it was as if his dead heart started to thump once more. There was finally a ray of hope in the dark storm that has covered his horizon all this year.
“So, you're saying... I can play those games?!”