“Hey don’t you think its about time you woke up?” A strangely familiar voice pulled me from the quiet nothingness. I felt compelled to trust the voice, I somehow knew that it was looking out for my best interests. “Good, you’re finally awake. Well, its kind of weird talking to a cloudy silhouette so let’s address your form first and foremost.”
The image of a young man appeared, a boy who could have been in his mid to late teens or early twenties in terms of age. He had fine features with hints of softness to them and flawless lightly tanned skin that gave him the look of someone who spent time in the sun, but not often. The only hair I saw was on the top of his head and a pair of neatly groomed eyebrows, the hair was soft and snow white, and the artfully tousled hair on top of his head seemed to invite one to stroke it. The piercingly deep purple eyes seemed to hold a mix of playfulness and power that drew me into their depths and held me under an almost hypnotic sway. All that coupled with a moderately tall and lean form of defined, lithe muscle made for quite an awe-inspiring package.
This was me, I understood as soon as I saw the body that this is what I looked like.
Suddenly I was standing in a luxurious study whose walls were lined with shelves filled with books. Sitting at a massive desk in an armchair that could almost be called a throne was a mirror image of myself that was slightly older, had black hair with some stubble on his chin, and warm brown eyes. This double smiled at me and then spoke in that voice that woke me.
“There. That’s much better. Now we can get down to the important stuff. First off, I’m you, or at least I’m a representation of what you once were. Think of me as a sort of past-self that is doubling as a quasi-guide to help you sort out your thoughts and memories. Our past life isn’t all that important, just know that we didn’t leave anything important behind and our old world was very different from our current one.” I nodded as my double’s words rang true within me, half remembered memories of loneliness and pain flitting through my mind. “Anyway we got a second chance and obtained a new life by making a deal with some sort of cosmic power that might have been a god. That isn’t all that important, what matters is that we traded a good bit of our being for power. That means that you can be strong in this world, and you wont have to be weighed down by our past.”
Tilting my head, I asked what I thought was the obvious question, “What about you?”
My double waved his hand dismissively and chuckled at my question. “Don’t worry about me, I’m just an echo after all. You are the one who matters now. Oh, that reminds me, the name we decided on before for us was ‘Hex Umbra’. You’re free to use that as your name or come up with a new one yourself.”
I felt a smile form as I softly whispered the name to myself. I liked it, it seemed to snap something into place inside of me.
“So the important points. Your world is what we would have considered a typical fantasy world with the added flavor of magical cultivation and a few RPG elements thrown in for good measure. This should make growing stronger fairly intuitive and instinctual for you given our old hobbies, that said you’ll still need to put in work to grow. You have a few cheats right off the bat thanks to our deal, but none of them make you invincible. Basically, you have a magical home that can grow and change depending on how you upgrade it, the same goes for your sword and clothes. Your body is also abnormal and can mutate to take on certain advantageous traits, but it can only do this three times so don’t waste it. Oh, and you should pick up on magic and languages pretty quickly if you try to. That’s about it.”
I stared blankly at my double in wonder. I sounded strong and as more and more memories filtered in from my past life I was beginning to realize that I had nearly limitless potential.
“That’s pretty much everything I wanted to say, I’ll manage our intake of memories and experiences from our past life so don’t worry about that. Also don’t get cocky, from what we heard about this world there are plenty of hidden and open experts and powerhouses that could erase us totally, body and soul. Tread with care until you make it to at least the middle of the metal stages.”
I nodded not entirely sure what a silver stage actually was, but certain I would eventually discover what it meant.
“Ok, well, I guess this is goodbye. Good luck, and try to make the most of our second life…”
*
Opening my eyes, I found myself sitting on a gray marble throne that was veined with black and white. The throne itself was hard and uncomfortable, so I quickly stood up. Leaning against the arm of the throne was a sheathed Japanese style sword. It was either a katana or tachi, but I honestly couldn’t tell which based on length and curve alone.
Looking down at myself I saw that I was wearing what looked like dark grey combat pants with thick black leather patches on the knees for extra protection. The shirt I was wearing was a black long sleeved turtle neck type thing that had extra leather padding on the chest, shoulders, upper back, and outer sleeves. Finishing out the ensemble was a long coat that was the same dark gray as the pants with black decretive scrollwork designs, the coat had a high popped collar, sleeves that ended in what looked like in-built fingerless gloves coming out of the thick cuff, and a bottom that split into five tails to not restrict movement below the waist. I also seemed to be wearing two belts that were somehow crossed at my waist.
My entire outfit reminded me somewhat of what the main character of a game or anime would wear, and I think I liked the look.
A sudden pain lanced through my head as the image of a phantom thief in all black with a white stylized domino mask appeared in my mind. My own outfit seemed to be heavily influenced by this ‘Joker’s’ own signature costume. I shook my head as I recovered from the sudden flash of pain. Somehow, I knew that I was better off simply thinking of my past life’s memories in general sweeping thoughts and leaving specifics alone.
Looking around I found that I was standing in a room that could generously be called a shabby looking throne room, more realistically I was in a big and empty marble room. The walls were a grey marble like the throne but much lighter in shade and the floors were black marble speckled with white, the ceiling was really interesting as it was a highly reflective silver, but that was all there was.
I saw that the door, or opening really as there were no actual doors, simply lead outside to what looked like a grassy plain. There were no other doorways, so this place was only this single room. A big empty throne room of marble.
Looking up I saw my reflection staring back at me. I had no idea what to do now. I had been reborn into a new world, and supposedly I had a vast and nearly unimaginable potential, but I didn’t actually have any goals. I knew I was unhappy and felt trapped in my past life from the vague memories swimming through my mind, but that didn’t actually tell me what I should do with myself now that I had a new life and was free to do anything I could think of.
Closing my eyes I felt a urge to shout out ‘menu’ or ‘status’ and such things until a game like read out of my character information appeared before me. Opening my eyes I saw that a slightly transparent grey menu with white text was superimposed over my vision before I could even say anything.
“Ok, I guess it’s time to see my stats…” I mumbled to myself as I slowly read over the information presented in the menu.
[Name: Hex Umbra | Race: Human (Eldritch)]
[Level: 0/1 | Soul Stage: Mundane]
[Classes: N/A]
[Magical Attunements: Null: 1% / Chaos: 50%]
It wasn’t a lot of information, and I could already see that it would be up to me to track any skills or spells I came up with. It wouldn’t be a problem; the menu could track my growth and I would just have to keep a grimoire or skill tome for my actual abilities.
With that potential problem taken care of I went back to the throne I woke up on. I carefully inspected the throne, but after a few minutes I was forced to conclude that it was simply what it appeared to be: an unadorned uncushioned marble throne. With a sigh I sat back down on the seat.
I felt lost. I could explore outside, of course I could, but this was supposed to be a fantasy world and fantasy worlds had monsters. I was pretty sure I had magic of some sort given what I read in my menu, but I had no idea how to use it, and I didn’t like my chances against a monster with just a sword I didn’t know how to use. I would have to venture into the outside world eventually, but for right now I just didn’t feel it was a good idea.
“I wish I knew how to get a class. At least with a class I could have some security, maybe even get a skill or two.” I sighed as I sat on my throne in my empty marble room. I didn’t know how or why, but I was sure that I didn’t need to eat for nutrition anymore and on top of that I was confident my body would no longer produce waste unless I forced it to. Biologically speaking there was no imperative to leave this seat, I could live my entire life here without any biological issue. It would be boring beyond belief and I wouldn’t wish that fate on anyone, but it was entirely possible for me to do so.
I needed a goal, something to drive me forward and motivate me to actually do things. What would be a good goal? Judging on the endless stories I could vaguely recall from my past life striving to be the strongest or the best would be a goal that could sustain me for a long time, but it was a shallow motivation. Power was attractive to me, and I did want to be strong, but ultimately, I didn’t really care if I was the strongest there was in this world.
Love could also be a good motivator, I could look for an ideal lover, maybe even assemble a harem of lovers for myself. I don’t think I’d ever been in love before in my past life, and I sort of wanted to experience that feeling first hand. Still, I didn’t really feel like that was a good goal to set as the foundation of my being, after all what would I do with myself once I found and obtained my ideal love?
I could try and build a kingdom for myself, or since this is supposedly a cultivation world maybe I could establish my own sect and school of cultivation. That could be fun, and it would be a long-term project that would never really end. It would also necessitate my obtaining tons of things like power, fame, influence, and land. It would be a major undertaking that would lead me to yet more undertakings, and adventure that constantly spawned more little adventures for me. I could easily see this being my ultimate goal, but as fun as it sounded, I didn’t want to make it my end all and be all reason for existing.
Maybe I didn’t need an ultimate goal? Maybe I could just pick out a goal to work towards and keep at it until I got bored, then find a new goal. That seemed sort of frivolous, but maybe that’s the sort of person I am?
“My name is Hex Umbra, and I have no idea what to do with myself…” I chuckled as I realized how true those words were. I was given a name and some cheats alongside a brand-new life, I even had some vague recollections of my prior life as an added bonus, but I had no idea what to do with any of it. My past self, the guide who woke me said that we had to give up some of our being to get all we did out of the deal that rebirthed me, at the time I hadn’t thought about it too deeply. Now though, now I wonder if I may have given up something I shouldn’t have, something intangible but deeply important.
“I guess I need to sort this out before doing anything else, after all I have plenty of time…”
