The first thing I noticed when I ca to was the emptiness. No. That was a lie. The first thing I noticed was the pain. It started from the center of my being and spread out from there to the rest of my body. It was as if sothing deep inside , sothing important, had been ripped out. No. That wasn't the right word. Shattered. That was more fitting. It felt as if sothing vital to my very being had been shattered beyond repair, leaving an empty void in its place.
The second thing I noticed, or third rather, was how heavy my body felt. It was as if soone had filled my veins with lead, leaving slow and sluggish. Even the slightest movent required great effort and left tired. I even found it difficult to open my eyes, let alone lift up my head. As for getting up and exploring… Wherever I was, that was out of the question.
When I managed to open my eyes, after several minutes of effort, I looked around. The lighting in this place was dim, but bright enough for to see by. I found myself looking up at a canopy made from blue silk. It seed familiar, though I couldn't quite rember why. Wherever I was, it wasn't my room back at Vanguard Tower, the ho and headquarters of the Vanguard Guild. I knew this because I didn't have a canopy bed.
Nor was I in the infirmary of Vanguard Tower. I didn't sll the sharp scent of antiseptic, nor did I hear the beeping of the various machines the infirmary staff used to monitor their patients' condition. Instead, I slled so kind of dicinal incense, one enchanted to promote the body's natural healing process based on the mana I sensed. I heard nothing except for the sound of my own breathing.
My mouth felt dry and tasted foul. I didn't know how long I had been unconscious, but it was long enough for to develop a serious case of morning breath. I wriggled around, just enough to get a sense of what I was laying on. It was a bed, that much was obvious, though it felt like a cloud. Like the canopy, my blankets and bedsheets were silk; high quality silk, by the feel of it.
It was clear that whoever brought here had a lot of money. If it wasn't the Vanguard Guild, then perhaps it was one of the other major hunter guilds. However, if that was the case, why didn't they just send back to the Vanguard Guild? To imprison ? That didn't seem right.
The Vanguard Guild was one of the top ten hunter guilds in the entire world. No one would risk starting a conflict with them by kidnapping an S-rank hunter like myself. Besides, this place was too fancy for a prison.
After mustering what little strength I had, I tried to lift my head to take a better look at my surroundings. When that failed, I looked left and right instead. The curtains of this canopy bed, also made from blue silk, were all drawn. They were thick enough that I couldn't see beyond them. Great.
Again, a strange sense of familiarity struck . I knew this place, I had been here before, but I couldn't quite rember when or how. No matter how hard I wracked my brain, I couldn't rember. It was maddening, like an itch that I couldn't quite scratch. I tried to think back to before… Well, to before whatever happened that left in this state.
The mont I tried, my head exploded with pain. So much so that I couldn't think for several seconds. My vision dimd as my grasp on consciousness slipped. I closed my eyes and gritted my teeth as I waited for the pain to pass. Little by little, it faded away until nothing but a dull ache remained. I took deep, even breaths before I opened my eyes again.
Despite the pain, thinking back to before I ended up in this place yielded results. A series of blurry mories surfaced from the depths of my mind. I rembered entering the Gate with my team, the one with a Demon Lord. After that, things get a little jumbled. I rembered fighting through hordes of demons in a hellish landscape, before entering a dark and foreboding castle. After that, nothing is clear until the fight with the Demon Lord himself.
My team and I fought him in his throne room. The Demon Lord was a beefy fucker that stood over a dozen feet tall. He wore black spiky armor, a horned helt, and wielded an over-sized mace.
The fight itself was a chaotic ss. We destroyed most of the throne room. I rembered most of my team going down, though I didn't know if they just fell unconscious or died. I couldn't check, since I was too busy trying not to die. Despite that… We won? I think we won. It was difficult to tell.
Francis Marlowe, my team's resident wizard and the only one still standing besides myself, attacked the Demon Lord with a powerful spell. That gave the opening I needed to deal the killing blow. However, the Demon Lord retaliated, hitting square in the chest with his mace.
The blow launched across the throne room. I felt my ribs shatter and my organs burst. After that… I didn't rember what happened after that. I was still flying through the air when my mories cut out. No matter what happened, I couldn't recall anything beyond that point. After that, I woke up in this place.
An icy hand gripped my heart as one possibility ca to mind. What if… What if the Demon Lord's final attack killed ? As an S-rank hunter, I was far stronger than the average human. In fact, I was pretty sure I could survive a nuke. Granted, I wouldn't be in good condition afterwards, but still. However, a Demon Lord was powerful enough to level entire cities with ease. A blow from one was far more powerful than a nuke.
If that was the case, if I died after taking a blow from a Demon Lord head on, then where was I? Perhaps this was the afterlife. However, it felt too painful for that. Had I transmigrated? It wouldn't be the first ti. If so, whose body was this? It wasn't mine. At least, I didn't think it was. When I previously transmigrated, I reincarnated into a new body on Earth with the mories of my past life intact. This felt different from that.
Like my current body, or perhaps my old body, this body belonged to an adult man and not a baby. I could tell that much at least. So, if I died and transmigrated, a big if, then I sohow ended up in soone else's body. God, I hoped not. Or, if I had, I hoped I ended up with the mories of this previous body's owner. Otherwise, I knew I was in for a rough ti.
Even if I hadn't died and transmigrated, the fight with the Demon Lord had crippled . The emptiness inside of was from the lack of my mana core. I realized that now. That's why I felt so weak. I could still sense and control mana to a limited degree, an ability all Awakened shared, but I could no longer produce any or circulate it throughout my body.
Fuck.
Without a mana core, I couldn't cultivate or use any of my techniques. In my current state, I was little better than a regular human. Perhaps I could find a way to repair my mana core, but I doubted it. A shattered mana core was a crippling injury. I supposed I could form a magic circle and beco a wizard, but I recoiled at the idea.
From the mories of my first life, I knew that I had little talent when it ca to magic. In other words, I was shit at being a wizard. Back then, before I accepted that fact, I tried everything I could to fix it. Hell, that was what led to my first death. I tried to increase my talent by force and died for it.
Maybe that's what happened to the original owner of this body, assuming I transmigrated. What if he was also a wizard without any talent for magic and tried to increase his talent by force? A wry smile spread across my face. If so, that would be one hell of a coincidence. Perhaps that was why I ended up in this body in the first place. We were kindred spirits.
Ugh, thinking about all of this gave a headache. Right now, I had a lot of speculation and little concrete information. I needed to figure out what was going on, where I was, and how I ended up here. That was my first order of business. Afterwards, I would be able to figure out where to go from here.
I was crippled, but that didn't an I planned on giving up. This wasn't the first ti I died and ended up all alone in a strange place. No matter what, I would not only survive, but thrive. I did it before, and I could do it again.
A wave of exhaustion washed over and darkness encroached upon my vision. Okay, nevermind. My first order of business was resting and recovering. Then I would figure out my current situation and decide where to go from there. All the resolve in the world couldn't help if I couldn't even lift a hand.
I stopped fighting to stay awake and let the darkness take .
When I woke up again, I felt much better. I didn't know how long I had been asleep, but it was enough for to recover a little. My body felt lighter. The pain was still there, but to a lesser degree. The gaping emptiness in the center of my being where my mana core used to be was still a problem. However, I would fix that bridge when I ca to it.
Stolen story; please report.
I also noticed that my left hand felt warm. It took a mont to realize that soone else was holding it. This person's hand felt small and soft. I sniffed. The scent of roses and pogranates mingled with the dicinal sll that perated the air.
The strange sense of familiarity I felt before, when I first woke up, returned. I knew this scent, though I couldn't quite rember how. Unease filled and questions buzzed around in my head, like bees in a hive. What was going on? Why did this place feel so familiar?
Rather than continue to speculate, I decided to ask the person holding my hand. Maybe I could get so answers from them. It was better than floundering about in the dark. This would also confirm whether or not I transmigrated. To be honest, I felt a little nervous about that.
I took a mont to steel my resolve, before opening my eyes. It was much brighter this ti around. The curtains of my canopy bed were open. Sunlight stread in from a nearby window. From what I could tell, it was morning.
I looked to my left. When I saw the woman sitting next to my bed and holding my hand, I froze in shock, unable to even breath. No. That was impossible. What was she doing here? How? Just… How?
I knew this woman, though I never expected to see her again. For a mont, I wondered if I died and went to the afterlife. That was the only possible explanation. We were both dead and this was the afterlife. Nothing else made sense. Otherwise, how was that woman here? Had she sohow traveled to Earth? Or… Or had I returned to Lumina, the world I lived in during my first life?
If that was the case, how did it happen? Did the Demon Lord hit so hard that I ended up traveling between realms and ended up in my howorld? Stranger things have happened. I wasn't an expert in traveling between realms, but I knew plenty of beings who were experts. They told all kinds of stories.
However, even if that were true, that didn't explain the current situation. If this woman was who I thought she was, why would she be holding my hand like this? In my current life, unlike my first one, we were nothing but strangers to each other. So why was she here, holding my hand like this? Unless…
A thought occurred to , one I deed impossible. And yet, it was the explanation that made sense.
Before I followed that train of thought, I took a closer look at the woman. Maybe she wasn't the woman I was thinking of. Maybe she just resembled her.
The woman before now was short and petite, a little under five feet I reckoned, with fair skin, long wavy red hair, and brilliant green eyes. She was a beauty, with a heart-shaped face and delicate, doll-like features. Back on Earth, modeling agencies would trip over themselves to represent her. The woman wore a gorgeous green dress, one that looked like it belonged on the set of a dieval fantasy movie or TV show.
No. This woman was exactly who I thought she was. There was no mistaking it. I would recognize her anywhere, even though we hadn't seen each other in over twenty five years.
Claire Sturm, my mother from my first life.
In my mories, my mother had always been a vibrant and vivacious woman, full of elegance and poise. She always made the effort to look her best, no matter the circumstances. I asked her why once, back when I was a child. She told that how a person looked and how a person acted determined what others thought of them. By using that to your advantage, you could determine how others viewed you.
Of course, as a child, I didn't understand what that ant. Not really. It wasn't until later on, after I grew up, that I realized the truth of her words.
However, the woman before was different from the one in my mories. She looked haggard, with a pale complexion and dark circles underneath her eyes, as if she hadn't slept for days. Her hair was in disarray and her gorgeous green dress looked wrinkled and disheveled. She stared off into space, her eyes devoid of life and vitality.
I opened my mouth to call out to her, but hesitated. What should I say to her? What could I say to her? During my first life, I didn't have the best relationship with my mother; with either of my parents now that I thought about it. They never neglected or mistreated . However, I always wondered if they ever actually loved , or if they provided for out of obligation and duty. After all, in my first life, I was my family's biggest embarrassnt.
On Lumina, every single Awakened was a wizard. Every. Single. Fucking. One. There were no hunters or knights or martial artists of any kind. In this realm, magic and those who wielded it reigned supre.
Luminian society was hierarchical and could be divided into three broad groups. At the top were the Houses, dynasties with long lineages and powerful magic. They wielded unrivaled power and influence. Below them were the minor noble families. While they weren't as influential as the Houses, nor was their magic as strong, they were still powerful in their own right. And beneath them was everyone else, those who had weak magic or none at all, the commoners.
Well, there was the Church of the Sun, but they weren't relevant right now.
A person's magical prowess and their bloodline determined their status. While there was so social mobility, there wasn't a lot. A wizard from a minor noble family could found or marry into a House, and a commoner could found or marry into a minor noble family. However, it was unheard of for a commoner to found or marry into a House.
In my first life, I was born into House Sturm, one of the oldest and most prestigious Houses in the Solarian Empire, one of the two major powers that ruled Lumina. While House Sturm wasn't as powerful and influential as it used to be, they-we were still a force to be reckoned with.
Unfortunately for , as soone born without any talent for magic, this proved to be more of a curse than a blessing. My father was the head of House Sturm, its patriarch. As such, people held great expectations of . At least, at first. However, when I failed to et their expectations, they regarded with contempt and disdain. My parents, in particular, were disappointed in . They never said as much, but they didn't need to. Everyone else said it for them.
In my anger and resentnt, I distanced myself from my parents. Around the sa ti, I beca obsessed with becoming a great wizard. I wanted to beco a worthy scion of House Sturm instead of an embarrassnt and disappointnt.
This led to try out a dangerous magical procedure, the one that resulted in my death. Even after I died and reincarnated on Earth, my obsession remained. It wasn't until I t Teacher, the martial arts master who taught everything I knew, that I let go of my obsession.
As I studied my mother, a maelstrom of emotion surged through . Despite my anger and resentnt towards my parents, I still loved them. I yearned for their approval and acceptance. Even now, twenty five years after my death(?), that hadn't changed.
Still, I couldn't lie here and pretend I was asleep forever. That wouldn't accomplish anything. If I had transmigrated back to Lumina, then there was a good chance that I was in my old body. Perhaps I hadn't died at all. Maybe my soul left my body, leaving in a comatose state for the past twenty five years. However, now that I was back, I needed to face the specters of my past and deal with them.
A part of found it amusing that I found talking to my own mother, who I hadn't seen in twenty five years, scarier than facing a Demon Lord.
With so trepidation, I opened my mouth to call out to my mother. At the last minute I made sure to speak in Common Tongue, the most widespread language on Lumina, instead of English. Otherwise, things could've gotten awkward.
"Mother." I whispered.
The mont she heard my voice, my mother turned towards . When she saw that I was awake, she gasped and her grip on my hand tightened. Life returned to her eyes.
"Gabriel?" She asked. "You're awake?"
Ah, yes. Gabriel Sturm. That was my na. I would have to get used to being called that again. Man, this transmigration and reincarnation stuff was confusing.
"Yes." I said with a nod.
My mother's lips trembled and her eyes grew wet with tears. Before I could react, she stood up and pulled into an embrace. Her hair tickled . The sll of roses and pogranate filled my nostrils. Oh right. That's why that scent felt so familiar. It was my mother's favorite kind of perfu.
"My child," my mother said, her voice thick with emotion, "Thank the gods you're awake. I feared that I would never hear your voice again."
Her sudden display of affection caught off guard. This was the first ti I had ever seen my mother act like this, and I didn't know what to do. Then again, it wasn't as if I had the strength to do anything. Still, I didn't hate this. In fact, it was everything I had ever wanted, back in my first life.
Tears pricked my eyes. I closed them and simply basked in the warmth of my mother's embrace. The complicated stuff could wait until later. Right now, I just wanted to enjoy this reunion.
After a while, my mother pulled away and sat down again. She wiped the tears from her eyes, before holding my hand again.
"How do you feel?" She asked. "Is there anything you need?"
I shook my head. Well, that wasn't quite true. There were a lot of things I needed. However, I wanted answers more than anything.
"How long has it been?" I asked.
My mother's expression faltered.
"Since your accident?" She asked.
I nodded.
"Two weeks." She said. "You've been asleep for the past two weeks."
What? That was it? No. That couldn't be possible.
"Two weeks?" I muttered in disbelief.
My mother nodded.
"Yes," she said, "Though it felt like two years."
I stared at my mother, unable to comprehend her words. Rather, I was unable to accept them. I spent twenty five years on Earth. However, it had only been two weeks here on Lumina? That didn't make sense.
What the hell was going on?
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