Heading Back to Heafdes

A familiar place once again. That same old pitch black river with Ctothis standing in her boat over me. Still naked, still can't feel any sort of emotion. I just hope I'm still able to speak.

"Ahh… I was honestly extremely worried there Azariah."

"Hm? Why?" I ask. Good, it looks like I can still speak.

"Because of just how close you came to death there. You're the first person I've spoken to in thousands of years from my perspective, remember? I don't want you dying."

"Well, I certainly don't want to die either. I'm sure all the people who know me would be very upset, but I'm not sure where you're really coming from. You rule over life after death, wouldn't dying just let me speak with you even more?"

Ctothis takes up a thinking position.

"Well… I guess that would technically be true, but I'd rather not let you die because of that for two reasons. The first is your friends back in the realm of living. I actually have a pretty decent idea of how everyone who knows you would react to your death and having to watch that would make me feel quite awful. The second is because of Seshat. I don't really know how she'd react if I made an exception for you."

"Seshat? She's… she was the court mage during the Earth God's reign, right? She's here?"

"Yes… um, how would I explain this to you? Well, you're aware that in order to use magic you have to have a connection to something, right?"

"Obviously. That's the most basic rule isn't it?"

"Yes, well, said something would have to actually exist in order for a connection to exist, right? Moving on, when you make a connection with someone, it isn't that person you're making a connection with, rather it's their soul, and the power that person cultivated within it. It stands to reason then, that if I were to wipe their soul and send them back into a newborn baby, that that power would be gone and the connection thus useless, right?"

"So… the fact that I'm able to make a connection with Kari means that he hasn't reincarnated? So his soul is here?"

"First, yes. Second, not technically. You see, when the Archenemy Michael struck down all the Archons, as well as Seshat and the Earth Prince he used his own magic to put a seal on their souls so that they couldn't even reincarnate. You see, even being near any of their souls brings me great pain, and trying to send them off to any afterlife or reincarnation causes me to slowly unravel until I don't exist anymore."

"That… that's horrible."

Ctothis is lonely enough, that's too much. She has actual people who can wander around here, and yet she can't even be near them?

"Well, their souls mostly just wander around from here to afterlife to afterlife. Except for Seshat that is. She mostly just bosses me around from a distance to make sure I don't do anything too drastic in my position. I'm not sure how she'd react to keeping you around me or reincarnating you with all your memories intact."

"Huh? You can reincarnate me with all my memories intact?"

"Well of course I can, it would be simple, really. I could even reincarnate you as any kind of living creature I want, and wherever I want. A carnivorous plant in the Ulfur Forests, a princess of the Lyong Empire, a powerful monster race in monster country, etc. But you must consider the people you'd be leaving behind if you died. I also don't know just how angry Seshat would be at me…"

"Hey, that's… that's a lot of potential."

"Azariah, there are many people that care about you in this life. I must ask you to reconsider whatever you're thinking of."

"I'm not planning on killing myself. I just want to pick what I want to be whenever I die. That's a normal thing most people would want, right?"

"Well… you are not feeling any emotions right now, so I guess that could be a normal response… Alright, I'll organize that for when you die, even if Seshat doesn't like it. I have one condition though. You have to promise me one thing, then I'll do it."

"What is it?" Just promising one thing to Ctothis to not only keep all my memories after I die, but also reincarnate as anything I want? That's literally just immortality but better.

"Promise me you'll value your life. Keep fighting to survive just as hard as before we had this conversation."

"Alright, I promise. I'll struggle tooth and nail to survive for as long as possible, just like before."

"OK… now Azariah, as a spirit, I could make a contract with you with those terms that would break the moment you broke that promise. But I'm not going to do that, because I trust you."

"Thank you Ctothis. Now, I know how this sounds, but I'm just really curious. What kind of feeling should I expect for when I reincarnate?"

"Hm… well that does sound like something you'd be curious about. It depends on what I reincarnate you as. Your soul will enter the fetus of whatever it is that I reincarnate you into whenever the soul usually enters the fetus. For humans, that's 2 months into pregnancy. So if you want to stay human, you should expect around 7 months within the womb. Childbirth also won't be very nice either."

Oh… so this won't be like some standard isekai reincarnation where I just wake up right after I'm born. 7 months not being able to do anything but kick at my mother's belly also seems boring. I'm also sure that when I get my emotions back I'm going to be utterly disgusted by the idea of birth from the baby's perspective.

"Alright, alright I've told you enough. Remember how you said you were going to tell me about coding and robots? I say it's about time for that now, so go on. Please."

Oh, right. I honestly kind of forgot I told Ctothis that. Well, I guess it's time to scrounge up all the little information I know about those two subjects. Maybe while I'm talking about it I'll come up with an idea for a few spells.

><><><><

I slowly wake up… the first thing that I notice is that I'm sleeping on top of Kiaran. He's laying on his back, as I lay on top of him, my boobs pushing into his chest. The only thing that could possibly make me happier in this situation is if we didn't have any clothes on. Ooh, or if just I didn't have any clothes on? Haha… I'll have to bring that up with him later.

"Good morning, Azariah." He says as he puts his hand behind my head in a sort of hug.

"I love you." I say, without really meaning to. The words definitely come full with meaning though. I mean it, I really do. I actually fell in love with Kiaran. All it took was a kiss, too. It's a bit embarrassing to be so easy, but I enjoy the feeling of being in love so much I can't bring myself to hate it.

"Ah…" Kiaran blushes, and makes a face that just screams that he doesn't at all know how to respond to that.

"Sorry! Sorry!" I say. "I didn't mean to say that, it just came out. I'm so sorry…" I get up out of bed and stand up, leaving Kiaran laying there on the ground.

"Azariah?"

"Y- yes… Kiaran?"

"I'm sorry if this comes off as rude, but… why? You love me, right? Why do you feel that way?"

I'm a bit frozen in place at Kiaran's question. I know the answer, but I'm not sure how to say it. Well… Kiaran did say he would put up with me last night… He seemed to really mean it too. I'll trust Kiaran.

"Um… it's just that last night, you filled me with such bliss, my brain was kind of overloaded… and when you kissed me while you were still inside me it was like I was in heaven… I just fell in love on the spot."

"Oh… I see." He looks a bit upset about my answer. Did I say something wrong?

"I'm sorry. That answer upset you, didn't it?" I say.

As I say that Kiaran seems to panic. "Ah, no! That isn't it at all! It's nothing, please don't worry about it, it isn't your fault"

Kiaran gets up out of bed too, and smiles at me. "Come on, we should be heading back to the capital soon. We wouldn't want everyone else to forget us, right?"

><><><><

We're at our cart, ready to leave. Everyone's here with us, except for Inell whose absence keeps catching my attention. We showed up to find Cesre and Freware here, who were waiting for Aubrey. Now Aubrey's here, and…

"Aubrey… just what are in all those boxes?" Kiaran asks.

Aubrey dumps three boxes onto the ground. One box is big enough to fit a cat or small dog in, one looks about the size of the boxes clothes come in during christmas, and the third couldn't be much larger than the box a wedding ring would come in.

I'm about to get closer to see what's in the boxes when Freware suddenly recoils in disgust, catching everyone's attention except for Aubrey's.

"Aubrey, you didn't… in there isn't actually… Olen's…" Freware starts mumbling.

"Olen's head, what was left of his clothes and a sample of his fur." Aubrey says, as if it's totally normal.

I recoil in disgust at this, Cesre does too. Kiaran is the only one who seems unphased by Aubrey's disgusting behavior.

"Aubrey… I know that Olen wasn't exactly a good person, but… don't you think that disrespecting the dead is a bit, well… disrespectful?"

"Kiaran, I heard you talked with him before the fight broke out. Did it seem like he had anyone who would have cared about his body?" Aubrey asks.

"Well, no, not really, but I can't say for sure…"

"Given what little I've heard about him, that doesn't seem to be the case. All of this is just insurance that Azariah actually gets her bounty. Oh, and here's this."

Aubrey pulls out two slips of paper, each of which only seem like a bit bigger than a dollar bill.

"This one is a check for the scales Inell had us grab on the way here. I had done a bit of negotiating with the adventurers guild and I think I managed to catch a pretty nice price for them."

That one surprises all of us. Honestly, with everything that had happened I completely forgot about those. Those were also meant to be worth a lot of money.

"H- hey, you can't just do that without our permission. Did you have any idea how much those were worhorhor…. Uh…" Freware seemed worried and walked towards Aubrey. As soon as she saw the check though she had… whatever reaction that was. I have no idea what expression she has on her face.

"A h- h- h- hundred and ten golden coins?!" Freware yells out in a mix of shock and excitement.

Everyone else is noticeably stunned, including me. That was no small sum of money. Between the five of us, that made 22 golden coins for each of us. That was equal to about… 33 days of working for me, if I took no days off. That also added up to well over 3 weeks staying at the inn and other expenses. And that was for each of us!

"Baha! H- what?! How?! The market price for those was, what- 2 or 3 gold coins?!"

"Yes, and I got 5 for each of them."

"How did you even do that?! Seriously! You'd probably do better as a merchant than an adventurer!"

Aubrey just looks down. "I'll… consider that. Oh, and Azariah. This is for you."

While we're still recoiling from all the shock at that announcement, Aubrey hands me the other piece of paper. I'm confused at first, but it looks like another check. I kneel down to read it, and when I do another pang of excitement runs through me.

"The check for Olen's bounty. We'll have to check it in when we get back to the adventurer's guild, but I managed to get it up to 18 gold coins."

That's… so much money! I don't even deserve all of that! Freware, Cesre and Kiaran all deserve that money much more than I do, but… this would mean I would get 40 gold coins out of this. 40 gold coins!

I'm 17, what would I even do with all that money?! That's like, a month and a half worth of my salary without any off days! Converting that to US dollars is a bit difficult, but that almost definitely comes up to 10k or more. It certainly isn't an amount I could live the rest of my life on, but for someone my age that's life changing!

"Oh, and don't worry about Olen's head. There's a magic circle in there that will keep it cool so it won't decompose. What's more, as long as I turn the boxes back into the adventurer's guild, we won't have to pay any money for them."

I really don't think that should be your first concern, but… eh, at least I don't have to smell the corpse. Still, this makes me incredibly uncomfortable.

><><><><

The trip back home starts off much more uneventfully than the trip here. Since my communication orb isn't working, I try my best not to get involved with any conversations. As long as I pay attention, I can understand what Cesre and Freware are saying though, so I'm not completely screwed.

The sun starts to set as Freware goes to catch food. Since Kiaran's scythe was in several pieces for some reason not involving me, he couldn't exactly hunt. Aubrey had struck up a conversation with Cesre (probably about all that money) so I was alone for a bit with Kiaran.

"So, I know I didn't mention this, but… how are you doing without that little orb?"

"Oh, well I can understand conversations well enough, I'm just not very confident in my ability to keep one up." I speak in English, and not the native language.

"I see. It really isn't turning on, then?"

"No, no matter how many times I try."

"Have you figured out what caused it? It was something to do with Olen, right?"

"Yeah, I think it was. Um… this is really hard to ask, but when I was decapitating him, did you notice him cast any spell?"

"Spell? No, not after whatever that laser of yours was."

"Right, I thought so… actually, if that is the case, that gives me an idea."

"And that is?"

"Um… you remember how I mentioned being able to seperate my astral body from my physical one?"

"Oh right! Yeah, I didn't have time to register just how cool that was given the situation!" Kiaran's eyes are beaming.

"Well this idea involves that. It's just that my astral form is… naked, so… look away for a bit, OK?"

"But I've seen you naked before? Besides, you love me anyway."

"Ahh… you love me so show me your body, woman…" I accidentally say out loud.

"Sorry! That was a bit- you enjoyed that didn't you?"

"Anyway! I don't think you can see it anyway, but please look away just in case… or, don't… if you'd like…" I say, barely a whisper by the end of it.

Before Kiaran can respond, I sit down on the ground, and do all the necessary steps to get my astral body outside. It isn't long before I'm having the somewhat familiar experience of having that weird, colorful astral body sticking out of my physical one.

I instinctively put my arms over my boobs and crotch. Kiaran keeps looking down at my physical body though, looking confused. Alright, after last night I know full well that isn't how he'd respond to a naked Azariah in front of him. I slowly remove my arm from my boobs and wave it in front of his face. Not the slightest bit of response.

Yeah, Ctothis did tell me this, but this is my confirmation. No one can see me like this. I slowly move my boobs right in front of his face. Aha… I'm completely naked and no one knows… ah, this is amazing…

As I'm having the time of my life thinking about exhibitionism I notice that there's something in Kiaran's shadow. Not something physically there, but a small part of his shadow where I sense depth. I can also see the grass in his shadow, but in the area I sense depth is a pitch black. It also appears to be smoking a black mist I didn't see when I was there physically.

Eh, it doesn't appear to be hurting him, but I definitely have to say something about that. I should work as fast as I can then. I quickly float back over to my body, and reach into my throat. My hands go right through my body and I feel all the flesh that makes up my throat. It's quite strange.

Sure enough, I feel something hard in there near my vocal cords that shouldn't be there. It feels like a rough ball that's been broken into pieces. I grab ahold of it, and slowly pull it out. Sure enough, out of my physical throat comes the frozen shattered remains of my communication orb.

I drop it onto the ground and return to my physical body. I slowly come back to my awareness, and stand back up. I pick what's left of my communication orb up, and it definitely looks frozen. I don't think it's really a physical object while it's inside of me, so it must have been Olen's last spell that did this.

"Wow, it just popped out… that's so weird." Kiaran says.

I look down at Kiaran's shadow, and sure enough, I can't see anything there. "Um… Kiaran? I think there's something in your shadow."

"Huh? What do you mean?"

"Um… your shadow. When I was in my astral form there was this pitch black spot that was smoking. Are you OK? Seeing that is very worrying…"

"Oh, yeah. That's really cool you can see that." Uh, what? "Here, come on out Shirley."

As soon as Kiaran says that, a small part of his area runs pitch black and starts to ripple around like what. Shirley pops right out of that darkness and it returns to normal.

"Huh?" I can't help but say, shocked. I'm sure the expression on my face isn't one I make very often.

"Yeah, well… When Inell had us go looking for you, we met up with some dragons while we were doing it. One of the really young ones got a bit interested in Shirley and taught her how to do that. Apparently it's another racial ability of the Gnostis Rana. Even when we were in that cave, she was in my shadow the entire time."

Huh… I mean, that's very interesting, but… "Kiaran, does this mean that last night… she was?"

"Oh, no, I dropped her off with Freware before I went to see you. She went looking for me this morning before you woke up, so she went back into my shadow then."

I'm honestly not sure what to think. Like, at all. The only thing I can really say to all that is "huh." I guess that's something that Shirely can just… do now. Is this what it was like for everyone else when I told them about my new spells?

Well, Shirley is an animal, but this is a fantasy world so I can't rule out the possibility that it's impossible for her to deliver any sort of information to Kiaran that he should not be able to know. I'll have to keep reminding myself to constantly be checking if she's there, hiding in some shadow.

><><><><

I find myself in a small room within the royal castle. It's an empty room in the understories of the castle that serves no real purpose, whatever purpose it might have originally had been long forgotten over the years. Of course it's only the size of a large bedroom, so it couldn't have been anything particularly special when this castle was first built all those centuries ago.

I find myself in this aggravatingly dull and boring room, being yelled at by a rather annoying pest that has insisted on yelling at me every chance she gets no matter the time of day or situation. In a lecture with my students, during my meditation, right after I wake up, during an audience with the king, when I'm reading, she just doesn't stop.

"She had a huge scar across her cheek! Like this! It was completely healed too! What horrible monster could have given her that injury?! There's no way to even know! I mean, her cheek could easily have been ripped apart with an injury like that!"

The annoying fly of course, being this kingdom's greatest healer, Cherilyn. She's been like this ever since went on that errand to deal with those couple of monsters. Ugh… this is so annoying… leave me alone for 5 minutes for the love of the Archons…

"How did that even happen?! Your students were meant to be watching over all the summons!"

"Cherilyn, no matter how many times you ask me that question, my answer will never change. My students lost track of her after she was stuck underground because of an earthquake. It's not as if they could just show themselves either."

"Again! There's no reason she should have even stepped down there in the first place! And even before that! Nearly falling to her death?! Kiaran fighting against a follower of Vincent Boreas?! Your students also reported Aubrey coming pretty close occasionally in the beginning of his adventuring job! Your students are meant to keep them safe!"

I start to hold my own face in annoyance. "And they are safe. The only situations that weren't completely under control were when Azariah first flew, and when she got stuck in that cave."

"There shouldn't be any situations that aren't under control in the first place! And you call Aubrey's and Kiaran's near death situations "under control?!" Kiaran had to have his soul stored outside of his body! Do you have any idea how serious that is?!"

And there was something to store his body in, and an excellent healer trained by Pitiful Girl nearby. I'm sick and tired of this conversation, I'm leaving. I go to walk out of the door, but Cherilyn just keeps yelling at me. She follows me out into the hallway, and I reach the end of my patience.

"Iryis! Iryis, are you listening to me?!"

I fling my hand back at her, and fire several dozen blades of energy at her that each cost me more mana than the average mage would generate in a month. Cherilyn's blood flies everywhere and her body's chopped up into nearly a hundred pieces. All the stone behind her shattered as well, which is a bit of a shame, but the castle should repair itself.

One of the anonymous chunks of Cherilyn starts to grow rapidly, and in just a second Cherilyn's completely healed herself, clothes and all. That just seems to have made her angrier though. Ughhhhh…

"Iryis! Just who is going to clean these chunks of me up?! Do you want to traumatize the custodians?!"

It's just one thing after the other with her… I won't mention how Lucidna asked me about that entity reaching out to Azariah. Even if Ctothis is one of the nicer Great Death Spirits, there's no way I'll ever hear the end of it if she figures out she's trying to get a connection with Azariah…

Maybe telling Lucidna about Azariah being an otherworlder will be a fair compromise to Cherilyn? Maybe if I tell her Lucidna's taking care of her, she'll stop bothering me… eh, no, I want to see how long it will take Lucidna to figure that out. Watching one of my smarter and more serious students missing something so blindingly obvious is extremely funny, and I don't want to ruin that.