Hello, all~ I figured with the incredibly high number of fictions on this website, one more wouldn't really be out of place. I've had this particular tale in my head for several years, but since real life intruded before, I haven't really had the chance to put pen to paper and get to writing. (Sorry about the extraordinarily long introduction; I tried to use the chance to get all the essentials down)
Feedback, especially as to if I should continue or not, is greatly appreciated; I've written several stories in this world, but before, I only shared them to a closed group of friends. (Especially since I haven't written anything in quite a while, and am out of practice...)
Anyway, here's Soul Singularity. Enjoy!
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Being born, no matter how many times it's happened to you, is not pleasant at all. Of course, like everybody else, I don't really recall the first few years of my life- for me, the annoying part is the lost time. And the side effects.
I always spend exactly four years after birth as an ordinary child; my personality reverts to that of a child and I'm free to be as happy, innocent, and downright stupid as anyone else. Since those four years are always my most vulnerable (and are always full of wasted time), I look back upon what little I recall with distaste. It's a little like owning a house that had been used by your annoying relatives for a while; you're pretty happy about it at first, but soon find all the little mistakes that other people made and spend quite a while cleaning it up before it's properly habitable.
So when I properly became “me” again, I was surprised to find that the undeveloped, child-version of me had gotten me into quite an annoying situation: Curled up on a cold stone floor, body screaming from a half-dozen broken bones, and coughing up blood.
Oh. Well. This is most certainly new. Even though I hadn't properly processed my memories of the past year or so, I mentally sighed, already knowing that this particular life was going to be a complete pain.
My name is Elysia, and I have died seven times. No, I'm not stuck in some living hell where I resurrect only to be killed each time, my soul just doesn't seem to operate under the rules that everyone else has to obey. Each time I'm offed- always by unnatural causes, not once have I died of old age- I end up in the same boring, gray room as always, with a cute, black-haired young man grinning at me. Apparently, there was SUPPOSED to be a door through which I was supposed to pass through, but I haven't seen anything of the sort yet.
The young man in question wasn't Death himself, as it were; he used to be, but apparently, he'd lost that position a few thousand years ago. Something about gross negligence of his duties and refusing to properly take the lives of those who didn't deserve it. So, he was demoted (he simply calls it “reassigned”, but I'm not buying it) to the position of the Gatekeeper (Gate for short), the one who sends souls to the afterlife they belong in based on their deeds in life. For me, his job is a little different: he just throws me to a world that has a suitable vessel. ...After we chat for a while, of course; I'm the only soul he's ever met more than once and, although he won't admit it, I'm pretty sure he's quite lonely.
Each time I'm reborn, I keep my memories and skills, as well as my knowledge of magic- which doesn't become outdated despite all the reality-hopping. Regardless of geography, the races inhabiting it, level of technology, environment, or anything else unique to each world, magic always follows the same rules. The mana storage of an individual always grows as they get older, regardless of if they even used magic or not. This is quite unfair, in my opinion, but since it means that I can recover from occupying a new body, I suppose I shouldn't complain.
Magic comes in eight different categories: water, fire, earth, air, light, lightning, dark, and creation. Everyone could, in theory, use magic, but since each person was born with a different amount of power, some were more suited to it than others. Most people are able to use only one type of magic, although there are (incredibly rare) exceptions.
Me? I'm a water mage. In my first lifetime, I was one of the strongest that had ever existed in that world, and never really considered that I might end up being thrown into a new world every time I died. If I'd actually been smart and used it intelligently instead of wielding it like a giant sledgehammer, I could probably have wiped out all life in the northern hemisphere. ...Um, if I wanted. It's not like I'm a genocidal maniac hellbent on destroying every planet I go to.
Instead, I died on my 41st birthday, murdered by a lightning mage with slightly less power, but significantly more skill than I possessed. I have to admit, I totally had it coming; the moment I declared my invincibility, I was screwed. Fate has a harsh sense of humor.
My second life, having had the unique condition of my soul explained to me by Gate, I made the foolish mistake of thinking that dying wouldn't really matter- it would be painful, but I thought that was all. I could just be born again in a new body and get to experience things all over again. So, I tried to conquer the world.
I only managed to live to the age of 23, at which point I was killed by, of all things, slipping on a frozen pool of blood and dying from brain trauma. Gods, I don't think Gate is ever going to let me live that one down.
I spent my third life as a water elemental (or spirit, if you prefer): a nixie. That was my longest life to date, spanning 114 years, but, as usual, I didn't die from natural causes, having been killed during what I believe was probably the apocalypse. That world didn't have a lot to say about it, otherwise, at least not from my perspective; I couldn't leave the safety of the sea and I was much weaker, magic-wise, than I used to be. I mostly just spent my time playing around and eating as much delicious seafood as possible.
By my fourth rebirth, I was able to identify the source of my weakness: every time I died, my maximum amount of mana dropped significantly. I was doomed to forever accumulate experience, but not have the power to use much of what I'd learned effectively. Or... maybe not forever. Since the blow to my natural reserves seemed to be the price for coming back to life, it was likely that if I kept dying young like the last few times, I would become the same as any other soul and head to the afterlife appropriate for my deeds in life. (Or would it be lives...? I'm not sure and have no intention of finding out) ...Oh, and I was a male during that life. Let me tell you, that was probably the most annoying experience I've ever had the displeasure of going through; when I died that time, I was extremely angry about the whole thing and tried lecturing the Gatekeeper, but it was hard to stay mad at him when I figured out that pranks like that were probably the only fun he ever had.
Over the course of my fourth and fifth lifetimes, desperate to make the best of a bad situation, I learned everything I could about water magic; by the time I died for the fifth time, I was known as the most skilled water mage in the history of that world, a major contrast to my previous lives.
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Unfortunately, when I came to life for the sixth time, I was born into a world completely devoid of magic. Zero. Zip. Nada. I was certain I still had my full amount of power, complete with my pool expanding as I got older as per normal, but attempting to use any of it ended in complete failure. As you can probably imagine, since I just spent the past two lives gaining mastery over my abilities, I was pissed.
Of course, since this had never happened before, I'd foolishly began thinking that I wouldn't reincarnate into worlds with magic anymore, and was quite angry about it. In hindsight, this was incredibly stupid. I died at the young age of 16 from an accident involving a broken gas tank and squandered my chance to gain skills that would serve me extraordinarily well in my later lives. I regret my decisions in that life even more than my first one.
My 7th life, the one I just died in, annoys me to no end. Sure enough, I was born back into a world of magic... and then promptly killed (and probably eaten, but thankfully, I was dead by then) by an incredibly desperate and hungry wolf. I was barely three years old.
As you can probably imagine, the two consecutive deaths at a young age dealt a brutal blow to my magical reserves, making me the weakest I've ever been. I wasn't quite sure how much magic I'd be able to use, but I knew I'd have to use my powers with the skills I “recently” acquired once I was reborn again. In an attempt to try to boost them and recover some, I requested that Gate allow me to be reborn as an elf this time around, given their absurdly long lifespans. He always meddled slightly so that I'd be named Elysia, but it was the first time I'd requested a specific race.
Which brings us to the present...
Taking stock of the situation and checking over my recent memories, I was filled with disgust. My wrists were restrained by manacles, leaving only about two feet of chain between them, and my legs were likewise restricted. I was wearing plain, brown clothing that, courtesy of the beating child-me received, was badly torn and barely kept any heat. If it weren't for the fact that I was a mage specializing in ice, I'd be freezing to death right about now. (I'm not exactly immune to the cold, but I have an absurdly strong resistance to it)
Oh, and to top it all off, I was wearing a collar with a 5-foot chain leading to a wall behind me. Fannnntastic.
I utterly loathed collars; this wasn't the first time people had tried to enslave me, and, oddly enough, collars seemed to be a common tool every time an attempt was made. After my second escape from it, it didn't take a whole lot of work to figure out why: if a prisoner was frantic enough to escape, they could cut off an arm or leg. The end result of attempting to decapitate oneself to get off a collar was obvious: death. As a result, they were a reliable method of loading on enchantments meant to keep one subdued without much risk of them being removed. In my case, I would be able to freeze, say, a bracelet off, but if I tried that with a collar, I would end up breaking my neck.
Five of my past seven lives had slavery in one form or another, and I'd been a slave three times previous to this. Of course, I always escaped in a mere day or two, but this time didn't look like it would be quite so easy to get out of.
A high level of skill was all well and good when it came to disabling or killing people with magic, but when it came to healing myself, it was close to useless. Water magic wasn't really suited for it the way light, earth, or creation was; all it could do is replace lost blood and slightly accelerate the rate at which all the little critters in my body got to repairing things.
Eyes and throat dry from crying for several minutes, I got to work, gritting my teeth and shoving each of my bones into the area it was supposed to belong in. It was, obviously, painful work, and I blacked out twice- the second time due to my own ignorance. I'd figured that the layout of bones in the body of a human was pretty much the same as that of an elf.
This way of thinking was mistaken, and I ended up shoving one of my own bones into a spot occupied by something that, judging by the explosion of pain, was probably important.
By the time I woke up for the second time, I'd found that my work and pain had all been for naught: another mage, one utilizing the domain of light if I wasn't mistaken, was working on healing me. I instantly recognized the beautiful, fragile, blonde-haired elf as my mother; of course, the collar around her neck and her appearance of extreme concern snuffed out the happiness I initially felt after meeting her for the first time as myself. Oh, and not to mention that I was still lying on the stone floor in a puddle of my own blood.
What made things even worse was my father lurking behind her; in every one of my previous lives, I had been quite fond of both my parents and, although I often slipped up and did things that a child of my age should never have had the knowledge to perform, I was certain they loved me as well.
This was the first life I'd been in where I feared my own father. Not surprising, considering he was the one that just beat me half to death over merely embarrassing him in front of a business partner. ...Not to mention that he kept both me and my mother as slaves.
I was still grappling with the fear left from my memories in this form when he began to speak, staring down at me coldly.
“I hope you've learned your lesson, Elysia. Your mother begged that she be allowed to heal you, and I'm going to be nice enough to permit it- this time. Regardless, since you've caused me quite a bit of inconvenience, this is going to be your home for a little while. Do try to behave yourself from now on."
Without another word, he gripped my mother's arm, pulling her away just as she finished healing me, and headed out the door. It was probably just as well that the room lacked any windows, as the glare I aimed toward his retreating back would probably have earned me another beating. I wouldn't permit it this time, which may end up getting me killed; I don't really have a high tolerance for pain, so I'd try to defend myself. With my dwindling reserves of power, however, I wasn't even sure I would be able to conjure up and fire a dozen ice-needles, let alone the number I'd need to break both me and my mother out of here.
I am going to murder you if it's the last thing I do in this life, you son of a b****. I silently vowed. Noticing two guards lurking outside the door, a bucket of cold water was thrown over my fury. Fear wasn't so easily dispelled. Just... not quite yet.
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There are a lot of details I really wanted to fit in, but this has already dragged on long enough, as far as prologues go. Upon request (and usually as part of the story as well), I'll provide more information on anything that falls within Elysia's knowledge. If people like it enough to think it's worth continuing, anyway.