"Mmm?" I mumbled out as I pulled myself out of bed, "Oh! There's a test today, I should study for a little bit before heading to school." I'm always lazy in the mornings so the last thing I do before I leave is brush my teeth and get ready for the day. I slowly make my way to the desk in my room and pull my biology book out, 'This subject is always so hard to remember!' I inwardly curse. My door slowly opens to reveal my father, "I'm going to work. Clean my room and take out the trash before you leave." He politely asked with his neutral face, "Yes sir." I quickly respond. He leaves my room and I hear him stumble over a few beer cans and mutter "Fucking worthless."
After hearing that phrase my mind goes blank and I pass out. I wake up to myself holding a trash bag over the dumpster for our apartment complex, 'hmm? That was weird, whatever.' I know that I 'sleep work' sometimes, so I'm used to waking up doing various tasks like studying, chores, and turning in tests; but that last one rarely ever happens. 'OK, so now all I need to do is get ready for the day.' So I make my way to the bathroom sink and brush my teeth, splash some cold water on my face, and tame my bed head.
As I stood there looking at myself in the mirror a grin formed on my face, 'Alright I'm ready for school.' I walked to the door, opened it and as I reached out to the light switch I felt a small zap. 'Hmm, that was weird.' I pondered, I stuck my head back through the doorway and watched myself attempt to turn the light off a second time. Out of the electrical outlet at least a meter away, possibly the world's smallest lightning bolt flew out and struck my hand. BOOM! The sound barrier was broken as the noise thundered throughout the apartment, but my vision had already blacked out and I was unconscious.
I had this weird sensation, during what I can only assume was my coma, it felt like I was being pulled through water. As this feeling intensified a warm white light slowly began building in the darkness of my vision. 'This is a little freaky.' I inwardly commented, I know some people have weird dreams during a coma. The white light seemed to be coming from my left, so I looked in that direction, it almost looks like a star but not quite, it's almost like a rectangular star. 'Ok, I'm officially weirded out.' I thought quite loudly, almost like I spoke but without my mouth or vocal cords.
"I understand, anyone would be uncomfortable outside of their body, it's only natural." A slightly disembodied male voice answered my 'unspoken' statement. "Who are you; and what do you mean outside of my body?" I asked the white light, that seemed able to speak for some reason. "You may call me K. You have died in an unnatural way and I am… hmm, how do I say this… I guess you would call me an angel or assistant?" The white light outwardly wondered. "What? In an unnatural way? What does that mean?" I asked the 'angel'. "Well it's not really important, let's move on to what is important. So since you died before you were supposed to, you get a few boons, or gifts for your next life."
"My next life? Boons?", "Yes, since your death was unnatural, we will give you a few wishes, so please hurry time is running out." The angel almost pleaded. My gut has never lied to me and right now it's telling me not to trust anything this 'angel' says, but if I could live another life like in the books it wouldn't hurt to have a little faith. "I wish to keep my memories. I wish for knowledge about where my new life will begin. And, and…OH! I wish for a system!" I nearly begged for that last wish. "The first and second wishes can be granted, but from what I can tell from your surface thoughts, the third wish may not be exactly what you expect." the angel stated, "I would be happy if it's just an A-I assistant with system screens, instead of a leveling system." I said, a little dejected. "Then it shouldn't be a problem, I will relay your wishes to the God handling your rebirth."
After the angel said his peace, I felt the sensation of being pulled through water again and the angel's light started to dim. 'Hmm, it's a little weird he didn't handle this, why pawn off work to his boss?' I also had a slightly painful cramp in my gut, that means my gut agrees with me. I turn away from the angels receding light to see another white light in the distant abyss, and a much larger light too. As I reach this being that completely encompasses my vision in blinding white light, I ask with slight annoyance in my tone "So what do I call you?"
The 'God' flinched upon hearing my voice, "You may call me mistress." The disembodied female voice responded rather quickly. "So how does this work?" I asked the 'God', "Well, I will place your soul inside a suitable vessel and you will be reborn with no memories just like your past life." There was a slight lapse in the conversation before the mistress asked me a question, "Are you displeased? I can see and feel anger emanating from your soul… both pieces of it." I responded with a little more bark than I meant to, for some reason my gut feeling was to act outraged, "Will someone explain WHAT THE FUCK is happening to me? One minute I'm being told I get to keep my memories, the next I'm not; One minute I was promised boons and the next I'm not." I stopped my tangent before it got out of hand and waited for the mistress's response, I didn't have to wait long.
The mistress flinched at my tone again before shaking and bending her light aura in fury. "That bastard set me up, I'm going to wring all the gold from his neck the next time I see his slimy ass." She quietly cursed. There was another pause before the mistress looked like she was going to respond, but my gut was telling me to press my advantage, so I interrupted her before she could speak. "If you don't start giving me answers I swear by holy hell I will hunt you down and suck all the gold from your veins." I stated firmly, "The other god you spoke to was the one who brought your soul to me, I needed a hero for my devoted, but it wasn't supposed to be you."
"I was promised three wishes, but I demand a fourth!" I decreed, the mistress flinched again and my gut started to feel a pleasant warmth about the situation. " v-very well, ask and you shall receive." The mistress scampered out, "I wish to keep all of my memories intact; I wish for knowledge about my new life; I wish for an A-I system assistant." I stated calmly. "All three of these wishes can be granted, but I should inform you that there will be side effects that you might find unpleasant." The mistress said with a slight undercurrent of fear, "Explain." I ordered the 'God'.
"Well, if you wish to keep all of your memories intact, your new body will need to be developed enough to handle them; and I can only think of one way to grant your third wish and it will be painful." The mistress answered, "how long do I need to wait to use my new body; and what kind of pain and how long will it last?" I asked. "You wouldn't even notice the wait, your soul would slip into an unconscious state until the vessel is ready; and the pain would be brief, but it will be the worst pain you have ever felt."
"Ok that's not too bad, but before that I have a few questions about the new life. Will I be reborn on earth or a different world?", "You soul has left your previous world's cycle of life forever, so from now on your soul will be reused on Pernthas; the name of the new world your soul now resides.", "Cool, tell me about this new world. How many continents are there? Does magic exist; if yes how does it work? Are there more than just humans? How about dragons, do they exist? Oh and what about…
The questions just kept coming, but eventually the mistress cut me off. "I don't have the time to answer all these questions; I will answer the first ten. There are five major continents. Yes magic does exist; and magic is too complex to explain in one sitting so I'll just give you the most important details; firstly magic is like air but ethereal, it blankets the world just like air but it can enter anything that channels it. Magic alone is just an energy source for the soul, you channel it through your body to reach your soul, but once you alter the base state of magic it gains an affinity. Magic will keep its affinity for about two months' time on Pernthas; magic with an affinity could be harder to work with depending on what you do with it; if you wish to change the affinity it will be more difficult; if you wish to use the affinity it will be easier." The mistress took a small break to form her next answer.
After about an hour of explaining, the mistress asked a question, "What is your final wish?" After she asked her question the soul before her froze, and grew so large that it started to tower over her form and blind her vision. Then it started to writhe in sheer fury, just the pressure this mortal soul exerted on the magic with only its will was completely terrifying. In a detached voice completely devoid of all emotion from before, no anger or even sadness, it demanded; "You will tell me the name of the God that killed 'me'."
"It is forbidden to tell mortals the name of…AAAAAhh!!" With only one thought the soul completely mutilated the mistress's right arm, every bone broken at least twice. 'This shouldn't hurt so much; why does this hurt? Is he using magic to torture me? Wait! How can he use magic? He doesn't have a body and therefore nothing is stopping his will; any normal mortal soul would have dried up by now, but this soul is too powerful.' She raised her other arm and lowered her frame to the floor like a meek servant girl begging and began to speak.
"He is known as Klaus, God of Chaos, mas…" she stopped herself before truly degrading her image. After hearing his name the soul returned to its normal size and spoke again in his normal happy tone, "Weird, anyway can I get my system assistant now?", "aa-as y-you wish." She managed to stammer out, and then created a wish with a simple intelligence and a desire to serve the soul in front of it. She slowly approached the terrifying soul in front of her and plunged her good arm with the wisp deep inside of it, she attached the wisp to its core and removed her arm carefully.
"Huh, that felt like a flu shot. Whatever. Is there anything else I need to know mistress?" The boy calmly asked with genuine curiosity, but the Lady of Chains couldn't shake the feeling of being watched by a predator. "Your soul has a sort of template since you're from a different world with next to no magic so your body will develop with an extremely low tolerance for magic. I would advise you not to even consider practicing magic until you're a young adult or fully developed. Also I wouldn't recommend making use of the wisp inside of you for at least a years' time, simply because it's not smart enough yet. It will take time analyzing your memories to create the perfect 'system assistant' you desire."
"Ok, I'm ready to start my new life." I tried to smile. "One more thing, when you enter your new vessel your soul will need time to adjust to the body. So it might take a few weeks before you're able to properly move around. Don't panic and just remain calm; you're not trapped inside of your new body, just relax and try to enjoy lazing around for the short foreseeable future.", "I understand, thank you for this second chance mistress I hope we meet again." The mistress surprised herself with how fast she answered, "As do I."
As the 'God' said those last three words my vision grew black and heavy as I fell asleep. The mistress quietly wondered aloud to herself, "Why did I say that?" She proceeded to attempt to scrub her mind free of this humiliating encounter, but she found out rather quickly that the young soul, slowly descending towards the Graywood estate, was the only thing in existence she could think about.