The cold of the cobblestones seeped through his clothes- clothes that felt slightly coarse and too large. Ethan pushed himself up, his limbs protesting with an unfamiliar ache.
"The hell? Did I get run over by a truck or something?" He murmured while trying to stand, and surprisingly, his world seemed... taller and his center of gravity was off.
He looked down at his hands. They were small, pale, and the fingers were slender but short.
"Why the hell do my arms look short?" he whispered, his voice a higher, younger tone.
What the hell? he screamed.
Stumbling into a grimy, cracked windowpane. The face that stared back was a boy no older than 14, fine-boned, with messy snow-white hair and wide, brown eyes set in a face that looked more cute than handsome.
"I think I just got myself into something crazy," the boy in the mirror mouthed slowly with his eyes wide.
The reality of Leo's warning was a punch to the gut. I'm not exactly sure how perfect your transmigration is going to go....'
It suddenly doesn't feel like an adventure anymore.
"I'm trapped... in the body of a ****** child!!!,....what grand opportunity, this is just a cruel joke.
How am I supposed to hunt and destroy the godly essence?"
"I've got two years to prepare, but I'm a kid? At this point, I don't see a way to keep up with the deadline."
Despair threatened to swallow him whole. But as he leaned against the glass, a grim determination took hold of him as he stepped out of the alley.
The city hit him with a wall of sounds and smells. The air felt different, almost like it was fully saturated with substances he couldn't understand. He felt a thin resistance while waving his hands in the air slowly.
People zipped past him, conversational sounds coming from every direction, trying to go about their lives. He started moving slowly, trying to get out of the crowd while his mind raced.
"Ok? What do I know?
First, the gods in this world can no longer interact with the humans through any means."
"Leo called this the silence, I think."
"The nether place, too, is broken.
I'm not entirely sure what that means."
"Secondly, Leo sealed his essence with me.
He said it's called Godly essence, and from its name, I can conclude that Leo is a God, He didn't want me mentioning his name, so.....
Not the best God in this world, apparently."
"Okay, that's all I know for sure right now....
geez, I'm at a huge disadvantage.
I need information quickly."
A blinding, intense pain shot through his skull as a flood of images and sensations that weren't his shot through his consciousness.
The scent of faded perfume and dust. A crumbling manor with a coat of arms, he couldn't quite grasp, as the images were almost too fast to grasp much.
He whispered a name, ALERION, his name ALERION ETHAN.
a declining noble family, of which he was the last direct descendant.
a last-ditch attempt at salvaging the family "The Awakening" at the god temple.
a journey through the city from his manor.
arrogant words to a mugger.
a sharp crack and then.... nothing.
The pain receded, leaving him gasping on the cobblestones, the memories settling within his mind.
The original Ethan was the last descendant of his noble family, the Alerion family.
after losing both parents in an assassination, he was next in line for the throne, but with his age and his non-ascended status, the family members wouldn't even take him seriously.
as a last attempt, he made this trip to the temple after he became 14 to ascend his affinity because only with real power will he be able to take the family head status and return his family to its former status.
on his way, he was robbed, but as a kid, he ended up saying too much and got hit a little too hard. He died.
, and in that exact moment, Ethan's soul replaced his.
'Woah," he breathed, the pieces clicking into place, so this world has a power system that doesn't rely on the gods. The fact that the gods went silent didn't stop the humans from their power struggles.
A low grin slowly spread across his youthful face, a stark, unnerving contrast to his pained posture.
A world like this was just what suited him.
He pushed himself to his feet, ignoring the lingering headache. He now had a direction and an identity.
First, the "awakening" was his ticket in, determining that he wouldn't be able to do anything about his family till he had enough power.