Lying awake in bed I find it difficult to stick to any one train of thought. I’m frustrated at dying. Especially how I died. I’m worried about this weird new world, and I’m still nervous at the thought of magic. 

Cool air from the half open small window lets in the night breeze, but it offers very little comfort. I’ve simply got too much to think about to be relaxed.

On one hand magic has to be the most exciting thing to ever happen to me, but it is also kind of terrifying to think about. I wish Mellisa would help me better understand it now, and not tomorrow. How am I supposed to sleep knowing that magic is all around us and sitting inside me waiting for me to see it?

I’m also terrified to let my thoughts linger on the subjects Mellisa told me to put out of my mind. But seriously, how can I not think about it? 

Not only do dead people from Earth just show up here after hilarious and tragic accidents. They do it from different times. Essentially, every year that ticks by in this world, the range of years people dying might get scooped up from back on Earth tick up too. Best guess these folks have? Currently anyone dying from 1950 to 2050 has a chance of ending up here right now.

People around me are not only plucked out of the past, they're also from the future, not an alternate future, they’re from my future, they can remember things that haven't even happened yet. Mellisa made it very clear. I shouldn’t try to talk to anyone about it because it will literally break my brain.

What am I supposed to think though? Is life all just some big joke? If everything is already determined what are we even doing, What's the point? I hated philosophy courses in university. Thinking too long about it makes me feel ill.

I roll over onto my side and grip the pillow I was using tightly in front of me. I squeeze my eyes shut like I'm holding onto something for dear life. Maybe I am holding on for dear life. I want to scream, but I don’t. I want to sleep to escape these thoughts but I can’t. Tonight is going to be a long night.

 

***

 

In the morning my Elfish welcome party finds me in the small upstairs sitting room nearest the bedroom I've been placed in. I imagine Mellisa can tell by my disheveled look that I didn’t get any sleep.

Time to learn about magic, at least that's good.

I mean come on. How could I not still have magic on the mind? Dinner last night featured enchanted hotstones to keep the serving plates warm. One of the folks working in this building even had some sort of telekinetic ability to hold a dozen bowls in the air at once as they helped pass out food. Even the sink nearby my temporary bedroom has small magical rune things for hot and cold water.

Frankly the shocking amount of magic mundanity in this place was enough for the inhumanness of myself and everyone else I've run into be of secondary interest. 

Mellisa beckons for me and we’re off. I’d much rather be doing something than stewing in my own thoughts. All those caffeinated nights working overtime at the office have trained me to just keep going without sleep and ignore everything else besides what's in front of me.

I follow her through a few hallways until we reach a set of stairs that takes us to ground level. Eventually we reach a door that she opens for me. 

The inside of the room is filled with rugs and pillows. The walls are decorated in what I can only describe as a hodgepodge of inoffensive spiritual decorations. There are paintings of groves and beaches, bead necklaces, hanging items that look like dream catchers. Crescents and stars and painted wood motifs. Even a painted kneeling figure with a halo above their head. There are magical sconces here that are dimmed compared to the rest of the building giving everything a soft glow.

Mellisa guides us to a comfortable spot where we can sit near each other.

Once we’re situated she smiles and nods.

“You’ll find this comes naturally, you have nothing to worry about. This is just so we can help people not need to figure it out all on their own. Every child born here learns to feel the magic around us without much help.”

It’s hard to sit still, despite my tiredness I'm tense with excitement. I focus as we take a few calming breaths together. Then Mellisa starts in earnest. 

“Do your best to listen to my words Evelyn, stop me if I get too far ahead.”

I bob my head a few times and wait with baited breath. 

“Imagine the ground beneath us. Imagine currents of magical energy flowing around inside it like rivers. Imagine the wind outside gently pushing around waves of magical energy.”

I picture the energy like dust motes in a stuffy room illuminated by a ray of sunshine. 

“Even inside this room I want you to think of swirling eddies of magic all around us. Everything around us, every item has magic inside of it. Just a little bit. Inside of you is magic. All living beings call magic to them, the magic wants to be with us. For us people, that calling is strongest.” 

I keep my visualizations to the room, watching blueish purple dust motes swirling back and forth around us.

“Think of the inside of your body as hollow, and filled from the top of your head to your toes with smoke. That smoke is magic, and when it's inside of you it is your magic. Picture it, watch it swirl around slowly. See how it doesn’t leave your body, it's inside you and it's staying there.”

The smoke I imagine-for whatever reason-is creamy. 

“Hold your hand out in front of you. Remember there is magic inside of your hand. Focus on the smoke in the shape of your hand, not the skin on the outside. In a moment I’m going to tell you to move your hand. Imagine what happens to the swirls when you do so. Focus on the smoke, feel it move with you.”

I picture the two overlaid. Almost like an x-ray printout.

“Now move your hand.”

I do so and… I feel something I’ve never felt before.

“Holy shit” I whisper.

I take a deep breath and it feels like a new sense has blossomed inside me. This whole lesson just sort of crystallizes in my head. I feel it. I feel the magic inside of me, and the magic surrounding my body.

I wave my hand about more frantically, it’s like I can feel the blood inside my body moving with me when I move.

“You feel it then? Magic sense is innate to everyone, it ought to come natural.”

I nod, dumbstruck by these revelations. 

“The magic inside of you is yours. We call the magic inside of us by another name, afterall magic is a force and a concept, but inside you it’s different, it’s a resource. Many people call this magic, Mana, others call it Henosi, Ki, or by many other names. If you have a name for it that feels right just let me know.”

“Oh um, Mana sounds fine.” A new thought occurs to me. “Hey... speaking of which, what language are we, uh, speaking? Is this English or Spanish?” Now that I'm focusing on it I realized they've sort of blurred together in my head.

“None and all of them. Ask later though, lets focus back to magic,” her slight frown feels like a chastisement. 

“Okay, Mana then. Your Mana is yours to use, nobody else. Just like the rest of you, your mind controls your magic, your Mana. The same way that you visualized your Mana in your hand as smoke, and then moved it, I want you to visualize your Mana in your head as smoke.”

“Okay...”

“Picture the place where all your thoughts come from, it doesn’t have to be a physical spot. Follow that smoke down, deep down. There is a glowing ember at the spot that makes the smoke, it's what turns magic into your Mana. Inside of that glowing ember are ideas just waiting to get out. What ideas are inside the ember?“

“Oh. Oh…” 

I can feel it, a sort of nexus. I feel my magic, my Mana, and I can use my Mana… But I’m not sure how.

“Yes, um. I feel… something? But I don’t understand…” I reply.

“That’s alright. Everyone understands themselves differently. Try this, each idea is a painting. A painting you can reach out and grab. What are the paintings of?”

“Paintings, okay then. There are three paintings.”

These paintings are hard to focus on, they’re like a reflection in a pond. I need more to understand them.

“Hmm… No, not paintings, they're more like museum display cases with things inside? Not just flat images.”

“Yes that's good, what’s inside the cases, what do you see, what you see might be a concept, let it come to you in its own time.” 

It doesn't take me long.

“One is like a gleaming set of armor, strong, unyielding. One is like a clay pitcher. It looks soft and refreshing. The other is sharp, like a shard of metal, it's red and bloody” I reply.

Mellisa nods as I describe these items.

“Tell me about the armor. Is it your armor? is it someone else’s armor?”

I take a moment to think that over.

“Someone else can use it. I think I could do it. It’s just there, waiting to be picked up, to be wrapped around someone.”

Trying to hold onto these ideas is difficult. It's like trying to count sand grains while they slip through my fingers. I really need a different approach to make this all stick.

I appreciate what Mellisa is saying but I quickly consider different visualizations until something clicks. When it does it feels so much easier. Work has kept my life busy recently but I still make time to play the video games of my childhood and university years when I can. So I default my understanding of magic to video game logic.

I snap my fingers excitedly.  

“Got it. Okay this is so much easier. Yes, this makes total sense, I have three… things I know I can do, three uh, magic spells? I suppose.”

“Spells is right, or at least that’s what everyone calls the sort of magic things people can use their Mana to do,” Mellisa sagely agrees while nodding.

I imagine three little video game spell icons, the icons symbolize what they do. I can read them much easier that way. It’s like the sand has stopped falling through my fingers. 

While I’m forming the shapes of these icons I can almost hear the 16 bit music from the endless hours I spent leaning over my older brother's shoulder watching him battle evil on the Play Station as a kid.

“Okay so, the armor spell. I can protect myself or someone else from injury with it. It doesn’t feel perfect thought. I think I can use this spell from a distance. Like, if I could just see someone and point at them I could use the spell and they’d be protected by my armor.”

“Next spell is… healing? Well no, more like revitalization I think, over a period of time. But I definitely feel like it heals. I can use it from a distance also.”

“Finally this last one, it’s nebulous, but I feel like with this spell someone would have their punches hit just a little bit harder. Same details as the other two.”

Mellisa is the picture of calm and collected. Her bubbly attitude isn’t exactly gone, but she seems to me moderating herself so as not to overwhelm me.

“That's great. You’re picking it up quickly. Spells in this world tend to have various qualities. Keep in mind how you frame things. A Spell might seem like it’s to make a weapon stronger, but it could just as easily help a farmer use their pitchfork. It’s all how you choose to use your Spells.”

That’s a thought. I don’t know why I defaulted to imagining my spells for fighting, instead of like, manual labor.

“I’ll keep that in mind” I assure her.

“Back to you Spells. Can you feel how long they last? Can you feel how quickly you could cast them?” She asks.

“Oh um… I don’t think they last all that long, perhaps thirty seconds? It I’m understanding these things correctly, I think it would take a minute before I could cast them again”  I answer. 

“Good good, alright, and it’s just those three?”

Definitely just the three, the concepts are very clear in my mind, nothing hidden that is missing.

“Yes, just the three.” 

“Well then. This might be a good stopping point. Let's get some breakfast in you, and then we can discuss the other types of magic in the world and go over some more basics to help you find your feet here. If you can cast Spells like these, then we have a lot to discuss.”

 

***

 

That evening, after I’ve excused myself from further conversation I retreat to my room. Today was like a madhouse, and I’m ready to be away from company. Mellisa is nice, of course, but after hours and hours of talking about my Spells and the other sorts that exist out in this new world I’m completely done with talking.

Instead, I want some time alone. Sitting comfortably on the edge of my bed I focus inward.

I toy with picturing the spells I have within me. Mellisa assures me people develop more ways to express their mana over time, but for now this seems like these three Spells are all I have access to. I also haven't shaken the idea that these spells are intended for fighting despite suggestions from Mellisa about the sorts of good they could do elsewhere. 

I’m trying to find the best conceptualization of them. Gamification feels pretty good, but it isn’t quite perfect. At least not for me.

Thinking back to my old life I’m tempted to try to fit them into some sort of business framework. I’m imagining a simple sort of database management system, and I slot the gaming icons into them, with verbal descriptions linked to each entity and filed under a category I’m calling ‘Spells’. I also tag them with a cool sounding name with descriptors for better sorting. 

The cool sounding names are an absolute must.

Now that I’ve mixed my game logic with my business logic it feels even more me. Gone is the nebulous smoke visualization and fuzzy concepts of Spells, I’ve got an honest to goodness understanding of my Mana and what it can do at my fingertips, right? It can't get much more complicated than this.

I like this database theme, I feel like I could easily execute each as a command if I wanted to. It would be as simple as reaching out and pressing the ‘Enter Key’ in my mind. For now this feels right and I’m keeping it.

Tonight I think it is going to be much easier to get to sleep. My mind is worn out from conversation all day. Dinner was fine, a rich vegetable soup. I’m at peace. 

I can work with this. A lot is going on, but I can do this. 

Next up, getting ready for bed.

I've been running into the same problem, a problem with my new body. Taking off my shirt while getting ready for the evening I have to maneuver the thing over my horns. They frequently catch and it’s annoying and cumbersome. The same thing happened this morning too. 

Laying down in bed trying to get my pillow just right is worse, I keep having to adjust because of these damn horns.

I haven’t really taken a second to examine myself properly since I landed here. It’s been one thing after another for what feels like a week straight, but in reality is not yet two days. 

With a great deal of frustration I sit up and decide to take stock of my new body. Lucky for me, it’s not really so different from my last one.

First up are these stupid horns. They start right where my hairline meets my forehead. Each is fairly thin at maybe two fingers width, but have a good deal of length. They’re incredibly smooth. As I poke and prod, running my finger nails along them, and try squeezing them, I'm shocked by how bizarre they feel. The sensation is similar to touching my ears, kind of sort of ticklish, but also a bit like what it feels to press down on my fingernail. They are smooth but hard. Part of me is afraid of breaking them, but I imagine they are made of something like bone and won’t break easily.

Each is certainly hard as bone, but also feels a lot more like skin, as in I have sensations on the surface of them. In fact they’re pretty sensitive and feel tingly from all the attention.

Luckily for me I’m not sporting some kind of devil body. No cloven hooves, no tail, nothing like that, just the horns and red skin. Oh and pointed ears of course, but they don't seem so different from my old ears, so I'm sure it's fine. What fantasy race that makes me in the scheme of things I’m unsure of.

My unmentionables are unchanged. Well mostly unchanged. My breasts haven't grown any bigger, thank goodness, but they are a bit different feeling. Maybe it’s just my nipples which seem to be damnably more sensitive. Just the cool night air is enough for them to tighten up. I’ll have to keep an eye on things like that.

I was informed that my body has likely changed in other ways too. Mellisa let me know that most folk feel a bit more youthful and everyone seems just a bit more fit than they were. I look like I’m in my early twenties again, which is a hell of a new body bonus.

Maybe I have better balance, or I’m more flexible, or stronger, but truly I don’t imagine it is by much if at all seeing as I can’t notice it.

For the tiniest moment my mind drags up the horrible idea of taking this new body for a debauchery test drive to see if anything has changed on that front. I quickly bury that thought. I’m in a strange room and I have no idea how thin the walls are. I don’t even know who cleans these sheets. Am I supposed to clean my own sheets? I’ll have to ask Mellisa, maybe they have magic washing machines? Either way, there will be no tomfoolery tonight.