Awakening

All was still and serene upon the eternal void the souls of the godless rested in, until one particular soul was sucked out of the nothingness and into everything, the universe with all of its warmth and pain – the warmth coming from the sun and the pain from the thorny flowers underneath his back.

David opened his eyes, revealing a hollow gray iris and existential confusion, the confusion of man unwillingly woken up from a long rest, not knowing what he should do nor why he was here.

That was because David was in this exact situation. On top of the confusion, with each heartbeat, and there were many, great pain spread from his body at intervals, making it impossible to think or perceive the world around him.

He performed the instinctive motion to move his hand – but nothing moved, and he still laid down motionless. It was not as if he didn't know how to move his limbs, more so that his entire body did not belong to him and register his conscious efforts to move as an authorized action.

His irises twitched in frustrated agony – about the only movement he could make. The pain was too great, his head was numb, his thoughts scrambled and meaningless, and his body static. David gave in: when you could not move nor think, returning to his dormant state was the best possible solution.

Thus, he closed his eyes, another action he could perform, and tried to rest. Not much halted his passage into hibernation, and right before his thoughts would shut down once again, he managed to form one proper thought, "I don't want to wake up."

…

Too bad the universe didn't listen to the wishes of the godless.

David produced an animal growl – pure, animalistic frustration at his woken state. Fortunately, he could, the great agony mellowing into a nudging headache that shook his body instead.

And his body? He could move it, finally.

These hands were awfully small, his legs awfully short, but they followed his commands now.

Now beyond the issue of his body, he moved on to his mind.

"My name's David…right…Born in Pomoro County of Sencha Kingdom to Iwana and Nimrod…right…" His stream of thoughts came to a grinding halt.

That was the most he could remember – Oh, and magic. Oh, and this was not his body?

Prying anymore into his mind yielded no further results, but only further headaches. Instead, he held out his hand and extended a middle finger into the air – not to curse the universe, but for a specific purpose, sensing magic.

It was supposed to be easy. His memories hinted that he was proficient at it.

Indeed, when he closed his eyes, an imaginary pair of eyes opened. His surroundings would be dark if not for the faint outlines of trees and vegetation around him, and the purpose of his introspection: bright particles dancing around the air.

The conduit of the supernatural and the other fountain of life – mana.

"I can sense mana, good start."

Onto the next step.

His mana vision now moved inwards, into his own body. There were a few anomalies here and there that he would examine later, but for general purposes, his mana flowed properly through his body: his veins, arteries, respiratory channels, and nervous system.

Controlling his mana was another matter.

It was much harder than he remembered, and the headache that dawned him on at intervals always destroyed his control over his mana, leaving him to restart again.

The third time's the charm, they say.

David moved the mana around his extended middle finger to create a vacuum near his fingertip. This was a problem because mana shared many of the properties of gas, one being that it liked to occupy all of the space one provided to it, and that included vacuums.

As such, the mana around the middle part of his middle finger raged, pushing against his control. While this normally would have been a problem, the solution was in plain sight, literally.

As if a switch had been flicked, ambient mana from the air around him flooded his fingertip and occupied a tight space, still under his control.

Then he turned off the switch, and his mana mingled with the newfound mana. While ambient mana normally opposed the body's mana, since he only let it a small amount, his mana overpowered the latter and turned it into his own in no time.

Mission successful.

His control over his mana wasn't as good as his scattered memories displayed, but it was enough.

The lack of control was probably due to the regular headaches. Now, he should examine their source, and hopefully, find out how to eliminate them once and for all.

Unfortunately, his memories showed that he was no medic, and his expertise in medical magic did not exist. Or maybe he forgot about it along with everything else…

Avoiding the gloom that would come with that thought, David mustered up what little perseverance he had and examined his memories for magic useful to his current predicament.

"An observation spell."

A simple observation spell that would examine the state of his body and report any explicit health concerns or issues with his mana circulation.

David began casting the spell: First, he visualized the corresponding sigil to the spell, a simple triangular eye surrounded by the archetypal circle, and allowed his mana to flow outwards, but remain under his grasp.

He then formed a sphere with his hand as though he was praying…through the simple idea of praying repulsed him, almost causing him to halt the spellcasting.

With his mana vision, he began shaping the mana into the sigil, forming a rough outline, then channeling fewer and fewer mana to achieve greater detail.

"Phew…" A crystal bead of sweat landed on his fingers. Not only was it sunny and searing in here, but the act of spellcasting was also harder than he thought…no, than he remembered it should be.

Fortunately, he performed a decent job, and yielded control of the sigil to the universe: who would manifest the spell in reality as laws of physics and magics stipulated.

Data immediately poured into his brain.

His face darkened the more he analyzed. This time, not because of the pain, but the lack of results.

This body was healthy and in perfect condition – too healthy and perfect, if he could say. It was clean, his limbs were trained and fit, his mana circulated perfectly, and it was young and full of energy.

'A perfect vessel.'

David frowned. His first question still endured: Why was he here?

But now, suspicion rose from within and laid further mysteries: Why was this body so perfect, as though it had been made for possession? Who was the owner of this body if not me? Have I simply forgotten my life? What if I'm in danger?

Falling into a contemplative stupor, David naturally de-focused, and his gaze remained on a particular spot out of ease. When he came back, however, he realized that place needed further inspection.

A flowerbed. Yellow, beautiful dandelions.

It was the spot on which he first awakened.

At first glance, it seemed innocent. Perhaps a bit artificial, considering the purely green flora around him, but a beautiful decoration nonetheless.

It did not feel right.

Out of place?

Too obvious?

David closed his eyes and turned on his mana vision. He observed it earlier, but there were a few anomalies in his surroundings.

With caution, he approached the flower bed, and sat down on his knees. From afar, nothing was wrong with the mana around here, but that pretense of normalcy broke down from this close distance.

Small but perceptible amounts of mana moved towards the flowerbed.

There were few explanations, all of which would require David to perform the following. In apprehension, the boy snatched flowers from the flowerbed, peering into the soil for any anomalies.

And there was nothing.

David sighed. The flowers were also entirely normal. Yellow petals, green sepals, and a verdant stem adorned with a horizontal red line.

"Huh?"

David brought the flower up to his nose. Not the petals or the bud, but the stem. His nostrils twitched. Beyond the expected sharp smell of grass and the muddy smell of wet soil, a metal stench stood out.

"Copper…iron…blood?" David sucked in a breath.

There was no debate. The line of red was indeed fresh blood, adorned with a masterfully-painted line?

No animal bled this way.

David scratched his hair and extended his mana vision. Not enough. He wielded his mana and channeled it towards his eyes. Through using mana as a conduit, he could activate a form of active mana vision that, while consuming his mana pool, massively improved the detail and range of his mana vision.

The flower bed grew brighter in certain spots and dimmer in others: until the moving mana gradually began to form a detailed shape.

"Urgh!" David jumped back.

Maybe because of his amnesia, or simply because he grew careless: he approached this kind of an anomaly as if nothing could happen to him.

Because, as it turned out, the entire flower bed composed a detailed mana circle, far more intricate than his simple observation spell, further exaggerated by the method the creator of the spell used to draw the circle: on the stems of the dandelions – a work of art and dexterity more than it was magic.

The magic could manifest anything, and the fact that it was still sucking ambient mana worried David to great lengths.

More worrying, yet, was the ink used for the magic circle.

David's face went pale. No particular memories sprung up on the subject, but an innate terror, an aversion to whatever creature or skilled mage produced that spell. Magic disciplines that used blood were likely to be sinister, evil forms of magic, and David instinctively knew: that magic could be evil.

It could destroy lives, destroy nations, destroy even the foundation of all living beings – the soul?

"Of course!"

Nothing was wrong with his body. His soul was the one damaged!

"That would explain the memory loss…and the loss of magic skill… and everything in between."

While he was happy at the realization, this was more worrying. He knew nothing, nothing at all on the soul. What kind of magic could affect the soul, heal it, hurt it? He had no clue, and that was dangerous.

Ignorance is death.

David shuddered.

Though, maybe not all was lost. He didn't understand the mechanism behind it, but his headache slowly lessened, and the strain on his body accompanied.

What was more straining on his body right now was the searing sun and the fact that this person, maybe him, decided to wear a thick, long-sleeved shirt in this weather. David slid his shirt, undressing the upper part of his body.

His vision traveled downwards, searching for any possible wound the observation spell might have missed.

It was then that his face lost all color.

Adorned on his entire chest, abdominals, and back was a bloody magic circle, as detailed as the one on the flower bed, and as sinister-looking.

"What kind of madman draws a magic circle on his body?" Maybe him, but he didn't voice that out.

With shaking hands, David tried to wipe the bloody thing from his chest.

He tried.

He failed.

Even worse, the damned circle was actively sucking mana, and doing whatever gods, no, whatever no one knew: maybe killing him slowly, preparing to burn him alive, poisoning him, causing the painful headaches…

Fortunately, it probably wasn't doing any of those right now.

Unfortunately, that did not reassure David.

In a burst of paranoia, he observed inwards into his body's mana and looked for any shortcomings in the spell he could use to block the mana from activating the spell.

"What?" The spell was too perfect. There was not a single flaw or mistake David could exploit. Except one.

A convenient square within the middle of the spell. It was an intentional addition to the spell, likely as a safeguard or a way to stop the spell, but pesky details didn't bother him in the slightest. He reached out to the gap with his mana and formed a vacuum as he was now used to.

"Final-

David dropped to the ground.

He gritted his teeth, but soon, he couldn't do that anymore.

His thoughts blurred out.

His body turned restless to combat the pain until he could not move anymore.

Agony, an agony unlike any he had ever experienced.

He had.

A single stream of thoughts remained throughout the agony. David purposefully lost control of his mana, and the spell resumed sucking out mana.

As for him? He fainted again.

…

"Let's not do that again, shall we?" David coughed and coughed.

Behind his façade of fear and coping lightheartedness, a few notions plagued his inner mind, though he would not admit them. Whatever was responsible for these spells was terrifying. They were someone he should never frequent. With these skills, they could kill him again and again. With a supposed knowledge of the soul, who knew what more they could do? David didn't want to know.

They could be out to get him, and that was as good a reason as any for him to move. If there was any chance, he could escape now, he would. If there was any chance a single second would spare him the prospects of meeting this beast, he would take it.

"Now? This forest is quite silent, isn't it?"