2 A new body

Savine woke up to the smell of shit and piss wafting through her nostrils. From how it felt almost familiar to her, she assumed it was a normal thing for the body she now possessed.

'What kind of dog world…'

Her thoughts were interrupted by a searing pain that ravaged her heart. A blistering fire was set inside her and was rapidly eating away at her body!

'Fucking!'

"Nngh!"

"Ney! Are you okay?! Ney!"

A foreign, yet familiar voice was calling out to her, but Savine was too busy containing the fire inside her.

Jibril's words replayed in her head. This world was young, only two million years old, but its residents had already learned to use mana to a certain level.

With what was happening inside her now, Savine could immediately tell why.

'If they don't learn how to use it quickly, they're going to be killed by it!'

"Nahar! Nahar! Call the Magus! Tell him we'll accept the contract!"

"But…"

"Ney's dying! Your daughter's dying in front of you! Go!"

As Savine's presumable parents were arguing about Savine's presumable future, the memories of the body Savine was now inhibiting finally trickled into her mind.

Her name was Ney; she was now twelve years old; her parents were named Nahar and Liley; she had a 14-year-old brother named Lihar. She lived frugally in the capital city of the Strati state belonging to the Great Magicracy – a collection of states where the Great Magi ruled supreme. It was a country that put the mages above all, with the ones blessed with the ability to gather mana granted the highest privileges.

However, this great Magicracy, it had long become an Aristocracy. The first few Magi who founded the Magicracy had expended all their efforts to keep the powers in their own bloodlines. Now, for a mage of 'outside blood' to learn how to use magic, they needed to sign a slave contract with the higher-ups, directly cutting all their chances of rising up to the top of the Great Magicracy.

The biggest cause of this situation was that the mana that appeared inside of mages wasn't something that they themselves produced. It was something that accumulated inside them by breathing the mana-rich air of the world.

Normally, such mana-rich worlds were a treasure trove. Its mages could achieve levels impossible in other worlds, and the growth of the civilizations inside it would be unfathomable.

However, there was a slight problem.

Since the mana that accumulated inside mages was not their own, it was impossible for people to control it naturally by themselves. They needed a tool to make the mana more accustomed to their bodies.

And the Great Magicracy, such tools were monopolized by the founding bloods of the country. If someone of outside blood became a mage, their only choice was to become a slave or to die.

"Wait!" Savine managed. "I can contain it! Don't sell me yet!"

With the memories she received, Savine could easily determine her current situation.

She was luckily born a mage, but she was of outside blood. Knowing that her future would be crippled if she signed a contract with a Magus, she and her family tried their best to avoid such a fate. But there was no escaping the ever-growing mana inside her body.

"But…"

"Trust me!"

But that was when Ney was still Ney.

Though the world's residents couldn't handle such mana without the use of tools, who was Savine? She was God's Chosen, sent here to save the world. It would be a joke if she died on the first day because she couldn't control the mana inside of her, of all things. 

She was already halfway there. Focusing inwardly, she exerted her control over the unruly power, diligently shrinking it until it was no longer so raging. The threat to her life was no longer there.

Her fever subsided and the faint 'something' that leaked out of her was no more.

Even Ney's parents seemed to notice it.

"Ney? Is everything okay now?"

However, Savine was not done yet. She needed to fully take over her mana, so things like this wouldn't happen anymore. She carefully sent her consciousness deeper into herself, probing the fire residing inside her. The residents here needed certain tools for this job. But Savine wasn't a resident here.

Unexpectedly, though, when she tried to take over the mana, she was met with intense backlash. A sharp stabbing pain stung her mind.

'Shit…! It's too big!'

Subconsciously, she tried to reach for the Divinity inside her to quickly solve the problem, but she quickly realized there was none stored inside her. There was a momentary panic. How could she have no Divinity?! A second later, she realized who the culprit was.

'Fucking Jibril!'

At this point, Savine could only wrap her hand around her head and curl up on the floor.

"Ney?!"

Ney's parents started shaking her all over, intensifying the pain.

'Fuck off, you dogs! Stop shaking me!'

Savine wanted to scream out, but the part of her mind that was still operating coolly knew that acting out of character now would spell doom for her.

In this very moment, Savine wasn't the all-powerful God's Chosen, but a 12-year-old named Ney, who was on the verge of death. The only people who could help her was her family, but who knows what could happen when they started to suspect her?

Ney was a quiet, enduring child. She barely spoke up, and she never spoke out. Even with the mana concentrated inside her, she only silently battled it despite the constant sense of burning. It was hard to believe she was a teen.

Savine shouting to not get herself sold was already the limit. If she shouted profanities never once uttered by the original, it would be difficult to not arouse suspicion.

Thankfully, the pain from the backlash subsided. And enduring the pain, Savine managed to keep the mana from flaring up again, so there was no threat to her life.

But with the mental fatigue from wrestling with mana and the constantly weak new body of hers, Savine could tell she was losing consciousness fast.

With the voices of her new parents turning more and more blurry, her mind quickly went blank.