"Ah…"
A kneeling woman inside of a circle of harrowing ground sighed. Her dark-blue hair flowed beautifully in the wind, twinkling as the moonlight reflected off of it. She smiled, though this smile was not a happy one, it was one of pure despair.
"I couldn't stitch up a good ending for everyone it seems." She mumbled, her hands trembled, aching to tear out the throats of the people that surrounded her.
"Betrayal. Classic, let me guess, you'll be turning me into some sort of wicked villain if you manage to kill me, right?" She asked, her voice was smooth and sweet, but had a venomous and sharp edge to it. Her eyes turned into slits as she glared at the people in front of her, her eerie smile never leaving her face.
"This isn't anything personal, Miss Lilianna. I hope you understand." A man clad in black armor said, staring down at the despairing witch but not daring to take a single step inside the harrowed ground that surrounded her. Just a single touch was enough to kill dragons after all, and he was merely a general that climbed the ranks not with skill, but money.
"Mmh, yes. I understand." Flickering embers surrounded her, and before anyone could register what was happening, Lilianna had already said her final words.
"But if it means dragging everyone down to hell with me to make sure the Isles' magic is preserved. Then so be it."
That night, the stars shone bright as ever, and the pale moon's light would have enveloped the land. But it was all blocked out by the smoke and soot that the burning Isles' produced. Rivers dried up, whole forest's eradicated, mountains turned to ashes, large areas of land turned barren.
In the middle of the cursed ground, Lilianna sat burning. Though her flesh was peeling off as if it were tape, and her eyes were bursting at the seams, she was calmly weaving together a spell. Ripping out a piece of her soul, she imbued it with the spell and gave it a heartfelt goodbye before being put into a deep slumber.
Witches of her caliber never died, they only slept until their power was back.
"Take my place, if those who want to harm the world's magic come back in any way, shape, or form, come into this world and stop them. Be my stand in, this is my will, and it will be your responsibility to carry it. When I come back from my slumber, we shall be reunited once more."
"Why's it taking so long? Damn it, I'm gonna be late for my night shift. Fucking traffic jams man." Gabrielle Agustin, a short and tan college-girl groaned. Her dark combed hair rested neatly on her shoulders as she waited for a jeepney to hopefully get to her job without getting a pay cut for being late one whole week in a row.
"Puta…¹" she swore, a deep exhale followed before she resigned herself to her fate of having to cut corners again because of Angeles City's horrible road infrastructure. Even if she had her own car, she'd definitely still be late. Her dark heels clicked on the pavement impatiently as she waited for any sign of the long line of vehicles moving. Marquee Mall at night was an absolutely horrible place to commute at, especially at this time of year when people are rushing to buy holiday gifts.
"Ano na!? Galaw galaw naman!² I'm just gonna walk my way there. It'll be faster and I'll have an extra ten pesos for tusok-tusok.³" She huffed, her heels clacked angrily at the cracked pavement, walking in the general direction of her call-center job. She was amazing at customer service and had a ton of experience handling kids, so she had lots of patience to spare for adults that wanted to act like children.
But with a blink, she found that instead of the paved-but-super-cracked-sidewalk that she had been walking on earlier, the ground that she was walking on was now viridian grass. And instead of the mall that was supposed to be around her, it was an expansive meadow of flowers of all colors, mostly lavender though. For some reason there just was a very, very, massive amount of lavender flowers around her.
"Great, I'm hallucinating. And what's with the lavender? I get it, I'm gay, stop shoving it in my face, you dinglefuck of a mind." Exasperation was clear in her voice as she trudged onward the sea of grass and lavender.
"I just hope that I'm actually moving and not just passed out on the sidewalk. Not sleeping for three days straight apparently has consequences."
And so she walked. For what seemed like miles, she didn't snap back to reality like she expected, so she started to get very worried. Why was she not waking up? Damn the Bystander effect!
"If the next time I wake up is on some old, rusty, surgical metal plate to get my organs harvested, I'm cursing every single person who ignored me with my last breath. Lola⁴ was a really good babaylan⁵, the spirits will hear my plea and cast upon them a great curse… Or something." Out of boredom, the girl decided to just start talking to herself. She knew something was very wrong, everything in this realm felt too real, like she was actually in here and it wasn't just a dream.
But she just acted cool about it, panicking wouldn't do anything but make the situation worse anyway.
"Welcome, Gabrielle." A chorus of voices, smooth and pleasing to the ears, resounded throughout the meadow.
"Who's there? Oh no, I know exactly where this is going." Being a closed-in weeb that had little to no friends, Gabrielle had read and watched a ton of Japanese Light Novels, Anime, and Manga. She knew full well what the implications of being transported to a meadow and hearing a mysterious heavenly voice was.
"Having read through your file, we expected a lot more excitement coming from you." A woman, a man, and a little girl, said from behind her. The man and little girl assimilated into the woman, her red hair shone in the sunlight as she smiled at Gabrielle, who just stood dumbstruck at the beauty of the woman, completely ignoring how she seemingly just assimilated two other beings.
"O-Oh, I'm absolutely very excited. Yeah… I mean, like, uh, yeah definitely!" Gabrielle stuttered and stumbled over her words. "But I have to refuse Ma'am, I'm just your average Kapampangan⁶, I don't think I can survive in another world. My mother is also going to be waiting for me in the morning." Gabrielle calmly explained, as much as she knew how cool being the hero of another world would be. She wasn't an anime protagonist protected by plot-armor as far as she knew. She really didn't want to die a brutal death, She didn't like pain.
"You don't have a choice in this, sadly. This goes far beyond your request, you have to go. Do not worry about your family, inside your physical body right now is a stand-in for you. We will make sure that your family lives comfortable lives as part of our compensation specifically tailored for you." The woman's smile didn't falter one bit as she talked.
"Why me? I don't even know how to fight! Okay well that's a lie, my teachers forced me to learn Arnis…⁷ I'm not any good at it though!" Gabrielle whined, she didn't know where all the audacity came from, arguing with a deity like this.
"It is strictly confidential. We cannot tell you anything. Do not worry about getting hurt. As part of our special compensation program we will be giving you gifts, three unique abilities and infinite potential to grow into heights normally untouchable by any mortal."
"God, you sound like me when dealing with customers who want to cancel memberships. Is this some sort of punishment for all the times I muted myself to cuss at rude customers?"
"You're awfully casual with a deity, most humans would kneel out of respect. But that's a whole other subject. Let us get started. We do not have much time, winter is coming. You have to be born before then." The woman said as she walked closer to Gabrielle with glowing hands.
"Born? Wait, I start out as a child? This doesn't seem like a very good deal." Gabrielle said as she staggered backwards, trying to dodge the woman's hands.
"Trust us, you will enjoy it more than you think you will. Didn't you always wish for a fruitful childhood? This is your chance of getting one."
"I don't think I'll have a very fruitful childhood in a world where child mortality is higher than the amount of drug addicts in my neighborhood." Gabrielle kept dodging the gentle hands, thinking she was doing very good. The woman, however, got tired of Gabrielle's movements and forcefully grabbed her by the shoulders.
"Do not worry, you'll find yourself fitting in where we will be sending you."
"What does that mean? Cryptic riddles are the worst, man, just tell me directly."
"I can't, it is a request made by certain deities. I cannot simply ignore their pleas." The woman closed her eyes, and two heads sprouted from the sides of her neck. It was a horrifying sight, the average human would probably start screaming from how grotesque it looked. Gabrielle however, didn't seem to be all that bothered.
"Are those warts? No, those are heads. How did you just grow two additional heads? Well you're a God of course but wow…"
"Please be quiet. You will now receive your gifts. First, the skills." The woman ordered as she let hot cosmic light course through Gabrielle's body. The girl's movements ceased, her body stiffened up almost immediately and a pained expression was pretty much glued onto her face.
[Congratulations, you have been bestowed upon three Unique Skills.]
[Harmless Sweetie gained.]
[Magical Companions gained.]
[Toymaker gained.]
[Set to reincarnate to the SSS-Class danger world—Magamundo.]
'SSS-Class!?' Gabrielle thought. She might be paralyzed physically but her mind was still going at lightspeed trying to comprehend everything.
"Do not mind the rating." The woman calmly said, trying to prevent Gabrielle from panicking. "We do not have much time left. You cannot stay here for long. I'll make it tell you about your skills before sending you down. Do your best. I'm done with giving you your potential." The woman then closed her eyes, and disappeared in a flurry of lavender.
[Harmless Sweetie:You will always be perceived as a harmless, innocent, and kind person. No matter what you do or say, this cannot be changed.]
[Magical Companions:The ability to create creatures from your magic. These creatures are affected by Magamundo's status and grading system and have the potential to grow.]
[Toymaker:Anything crafted by you that can be perceived as a toy can come to life. Their properties depend on the maker's intent on what their purpose may be while in the process of crafting it.]
"HEY! I didn't agree to any of th-" Gabrielle was about to protest when she phased through the floor and lost consciousness.
In the depths of the Great Forest of Illusions, one of the many divorakk villages' chieftains were currently giving birth. The wind makes the leaves of the evergreen trees around the chieftains house dance, the rivers rush in approval, and the first winds of the cold north blow in happiness.
The threads of fate were starting to wind, the Abyss was starting to open up once more. The winds prance around the house, the waters grow restless, and the permafrost expands throughout the lands.
Through the night, the mother was giving birth. It was an unusually hard pregnancy, so the mother was hurrying to see the fruits of her labor. She wanted to gaze at the eyes of her newborn soon, and dress him in the finest clothes they had, she wanted to spoil him as she did her first children, a pair of twins that were currently anxiously waiting for the birth of their sibling. The father was passed out, not because he was some sort of deadbeat, but he got too excited when the mother went into labor that he passed out.
The moment the moon reached its highest peak, the child was fully brought into the world. Not a single cry, not a single moment of movement. The mother almost broke down crying, thinking her baby boy had died.
'That was incredibly rude.' The baby boy, once Gabrielle, thought. This was her… Or… well…. his first thoughts. 'Oh, wait, I'm supposed to be crying.'
And so the baby boy wailed after a few dozen seconds of no response. The mother and the children were brought to tears, thanking their patron deity, Goddess of the Moon, Bu'Wan. The midwives cleaned up the child and the mother took the boy into his arms, her dark hair covering up her eyes that resembled a pink diamond both in color and how it refracted the light that hit it.
"Dearest Clailip, may you be blessed by the moon. Inherit my surname, Diancia. Like the moon that shines bright through the night, quietly and without trouble, may you live a life of happiness and contentment." The mother, named Kara Diancia, whispered in the seemingly-sleeping babe's ears, blessing him. She was the current Matriarch of House Diancia, and in turn, was very close to Bu'Wan, so close that she is considered the highest priestess of Bu'Wan in the Great Forest of Illusions.
A single kiss on the forehead sealed the blessing. Outside, the moon shone even brighter, and the wild magic of the night sky and stars saturated the ground, and made their way to the Diancias' home—A massive tree hollowed out with magic to preserve its life.
The night continued, the wisps of magic around the massive tree working on shaping the little boy's magic.
I like the descriptive intro.
But with a blink, she found that instead of the paved-but-super-cracked-sidewalk that she had been walking on earlier, the ground that she was walking on was now viridian grass.
Why the large space in this sentence (reading on phone.)
Oh! That must be the firmatting. I used Justified so it would look like that ehe, don't worry too much about it!
@Hexenblume *formatting
I wonder if this harmless sweetie will also be an alchemist
Imagine a whole army of alchemical toy golems that look like gundams