"What is this Mikael? Why do you think we are here? What happened, we were getting some food and then I died, and then I woke up here. Did you die as well?" - David understandably was looking for answers. Mikael did not care for his new life, but hearing his small brother speak gave him joy he would sacrifice this world for a thousand times over, he knew he made the right choice.
"You died that day, I lived on, died of old age, met some so-called gods, they requested me to save this world, they were nice enough to bring you back as well, it’s been some time brother"
David looked at him with a surprised face. He pondered for a few minutes with a dumbfounded look and then spoke.
"So, let me understand this right, I died, you lived and died later, you met gods, plural, they've requested you to save this world and they were nice enough to bring me back as well?"
"Yes"
David was filled with suspicion now.
"That doesn't make sense, why did they bring me back, if I was important, they'd speak with me as well"
"Well technically they didn't want to, so I convinced them they should"
"How?"
"I asked nicely"
"How?"
"I refused to do it, unless they did"
"Mikael… you had a choice between an entire world and me… that’s too selfish, even for you"
"Would you have chosen differently?" Mikael asked with a smile already knowing the answer.
"Yes, I would have, I'm a good person" responded the younger brother with confidence.
"Oh right, I forgot that part, well it worked out in the end, a win for the dark side" Mikael said with a laugh and continued.
"You seem to be dealing with this well David" Saying his brothers’ name almost made Mikael cry in his old age. The pain of losing him was always as fresh as the day he lost dear brother.
"Well I trust you, and I do remember dying, and it's not like I have a choice, also I'm a child now, would be strange if there was not a weird explanation for it, but I'm pretty sure I'm staring at a wall in a hospital"
"That’s what I said" smiled the old man.
"What were the gods like"
"So called" Mikael spoke with disdain.
"What were the “so called” gods like" David was aware of Mikael’s disdain for the Idea of god, somehow, he was not surprised that the afterlife had not changed that.
"Like a child drew them"
"I meant the other thing"
"More childish than I would've thought. Anyway, forget about them, where are we, this room seems luxurious, though not very fengshui, its tasteless"
"What is fengshui, though I agree, whoever designed this needs to wake up to the 20th century" "It's something pretentious people say to describe their pretentious homes, without knowing what it means"
"Do you know what it means?" David chided with suspicion.
"...this room still looks tasteless" The old man pouted uncharacteristically for a second.
"What should we do? What kind of world is this even, how much do you know?"
"Not much, for now act like a 3-year-old, we are far beyond our age, we need to carefully show progress in our worldview, intelligence and knowledge. I imagine the parents of these children won't be happy that an old man and a moron possessed their children"
"Hey fossil, go pick on someone your own age. What are we supposed to save this world from anyway and why you?"
"Some great calamity, we must unite this world or something. I have no clue on how we are going to unite anything, but I imagine we would not have been given the task if it weren’t possible. Forget about that for now, I thought you'd have more questions about the other thing" Mikael asked with sadness in his eyes.
David looked at Mikael knowing full well what he was referring to.
"I don't want to know, mom and dad wouldn't have taken it well, I don't want to know how bad it got"
"They were proud, you died saving a little girl, father bragged until his last day and mother was the same"
"We both know that's not the full story"
"No, it's not, but it's the only good part of it"
"Well I'll ask you sometime about the rest, how did you deal with it?"
"I self-destructed for the next 10 years, joined the military, I was good at it, might be why they chose me for this unification, war is most likely included. Then I found my second wife and my eldest was born"
"Somehow it’s hard to imagine you in the military. Eldest, how many kids did you have? what were the names"
"3 boys, David, Rob, Fitzgerald, my wife chose the last name, 12 grandchildren, David, Mikael, Anna, Emily, Theo, Lawrence......I'm looking forward to your children, now that you have a second chance."
"We'll see, someone is coming".
A beautiful woman came in, David and Mikael would proceed to find out about their circumstances soon after. She had taken them for a walk around the castle. They were in the kingdom of Fiery, a mountainous region with a variety of terrain, plentiful enough to prosper, not plentiful enough to conquer. David and Mikael were the princes of said kingdom, they had an older brother, the crown prince Robert, the beautiful woman was the queen and their mother, Lacedonia. Mikael found this amusing. They had yet to meet their father, the king of this land, King George the 3rd. An interesting interaction was with the Archmage of Fiery, Ridos. David was quite excited at the possibility of magic existing in this world. A priest was assigned to the princes to read them about the gods of these lands, Mikael thought this was deplorable, but listened attentively, in his eyes, religion was still a useful tool in his quest to save the world.
There were three gods, the god of Life, the god of death and the god of Freedom. He'd met all three of them, but he still insisted on not believing in them.
They were guarded by a man the rest of the soldiers treated with particular respect. Mikael and David made note of this.
In the evening, when they were left alone, they spoke.
"So, what do you think David? In terms of tools, starting as princes is certainly not bad"
"We're going to need loyal retainers. We need to establish ourselves within the kingdom, loyalty is hard to come by and we will depend on it, though as princes we will have some influence I suppose"
"How do you suppose we do that, we're children."
"It's easier because we're children. We do it through teachers. A connection between a teacher and a good student can be as deep as between a parent and a child, the sense of personal investment and legacy is a strong foundation for loyalty."
Mikael sighed to himself, he missed his social butterfly of a brother, even in his 80 years, he never learned how to make connections with people as deep as his brother. To this day he was fascinated about the day his younger brother asked for directions from someone on the street, and then proceeded to be friends with him for years. Mikael was not particularly surprised with David's instincts when it came to social interactions, but he could always admire it.
"I suppose as a bonus we can collect information, curiosity would not be strange either. by the way, can we even read? we seem to speak their language, but the symbols are strange"
"I guess we know our first goal, let us bother the queen tomorrow, she seems negligent, by the time we were three, mom was already shoving books down our throat every single day. we should make up for her slack"
"What should we learn first?" Asked Mikael.
"Terrain information is not something a child would be interested in, something that would likely involve reading"
"Let's learn about magic, it’s the biggest unknown so far and a child would certainly be interested in that"
"If the teacher is not to our liking, we can always complain, it would not be surprising from children"
"What about the fighting part, I have confidence in our fighting, father had us swinging them since we could walk, but I wouldn't know where to start when it's with a sword"
"Maybe our security would be a good choice? we can ask him directly"
"For now, let's settle for magic, physically we are small children, training now would just bring injury, even after, I hope our guard is knowledgeable enough to know that intense training is overkill until our teens"
"We should be mindful of our bodies as well, I suppose avoiding sweets and a balanced diet is a good idea"
"Certainly, and we should move around a lot, if we avoid activity because we are adults, we won't develop properly"
"I wonder if they have health potions, since you know, magic" Asked David.
"Ahh I didn't think of that, if we can cut down on recovery time, we could achieve miraculous results, perhaps we can even train in our younger years" The discussions between the brothers were endless, they spoke of many things that were obvious, but Mikael had missed his little brother and David feeling this, obliged. The next day the brothers started with the queen.
"Mother, what is magic?"
"Mother what is written on this paper?"
"Oh, my children, well magic is the art of miracles. It says the name our great kingdom"
"Mother I want to learn to read"
"Me too"
"Mother I want to learn magic"
"Me too Mother, me too"
So the studies began.
