Until death?

by Andur

  1 - Kicked by a Goddess!

  So here I lie, coughing up blood and with a broken body. I don't think that I will make it much longer as my vision is already blurry.

  Strange ….. somehow I thought dying like this would hurt more, but it feels more like slowly drifting away. And this happening to ME! A God!

  Nonono, don't think of me as a maniac. I am really one of those supposed all powerful omnipotent beings.

  Though like you see...... even gods can be wounded or killed by other gods, half-gods or other extremely powerful mythical beings.

  And that's what happened to me! I had a big argument with another god in this realm. The two of us are like fire and water.

  I stood for magic and change. His divinity is rooted in order and everlasting continuity. So I am like pure Chaos or the Devil himself to him.

  So by his orders, his followers continued to kill or enslave my worshippers, negating my divinity and other stuff that's pretty offensive to a god like myself.

  At first we interfered with the world just though our divine rules, given out to the people who believe in us.

  Then he started to give out powers to his champions. I retaliated by doing the same and taking some actions by myself.

  Just smiting some of his followers, who desecrated one of my temples. Those guys had the best faces ever when I came upon them.

  Ever had an angry god coming for you?

  Well .... to make a long story short. My sworn enemy did the same and so on. It was a slowly developing process over several hundreds of years.

  It all resulted in a big ugly holy war around the whole world. Our followers got really into it and did some things even we were horrified by.

  People can be real monsters!

  In the end we both took matters into our own hands personally.

  The bastard had it coming, I tell ya! We had a good fight with each other. To the mortals of this realm it must have felt like Armageddon, Ragnarok or the Apocalypse.

  We rearranged some mountain ranges, flattened others or threw up some new continents. A part of this one is now open ocean.

  Hahaha *cough* shit I hate the taste of blood.

  I never liked the bastard. The best thing that would happen with both of us in the same room is screaming and insults from the first moment on.

  Oh, its so dark. I think I will sleep for a while.

  …. “up!”....

  -PAIN-

  “Wake up! Or I will kick u again ASSHAT!”

  I open my eyes, “Oh Seria!”, *cough*

  “You here? If that does mean that the other gods have decided to take action then you guys are way toooo late. We are done already.” *cough**cough*

  “Kyaaa! Look what you have done to my dress! Stop spitting around blood while talking!”

  *cough*, “I am sorry, but I think that's not within my control, I will wipe it off from you.”, I raise a bloody hand and get kicked again! It HURTS!

  “Ugh, and there I wanted to use my last bit of magic to cast a cleaning spell on you.....”

  Seria seems to be pissed. I guess its justified. After all she is some sort of goddess of life and death in this realm.

  We sure just gave her a great headache by creating something on the scale of a mass extinction event.

  “Keep your magic to yourself! You have to live long enough for me to tell you guys the divine judgement of the gods for what you pulled down here Ascathon!

  Where have you left Myrm by the way, I have to judge him too!”

  Yeah.... Seria sure is pissed. And when I tell her about Myrm she will be raging......

  “I think over at that mountain range are so*cough* ...some of his guts. And somewhere above the Serkment Sea he lost his left arm.

  And when I last saw him I got him point blank with my best offensive Magic. Blew him to bits..... can search for his parts in that direction.”,

  I point somewhere to my left.

  Well Seria sure has an ugly job before her, if she has to reassemble Myrm. Not that its possible to do so, I made sure of that.

  “I am not talking about his body! The parts can rot where they lie for all I care.

  I am talking about his Soul! What did you do with it?! I can't sense it any more.”

  -Seria

  “Sliced it to pieces and tossed it outside our realm. Will take an eternity to heal unless someone finds the pieces and puts them back together. Hrhrhr” *cough*

  Fucking blood! Why can I cough so much blood, I am sure there can't be much more.

  Well so you guys understand too. Here some facts:

  You can't really kill anyone! Souls are immortal. The most you can do is damaging them, so it takes longer for them to reincarnate into the next life.

  The River of Souls is the great Void between Worlds or Dimensions. Call it what you want.

  Its filled with the Souls of people who aren't currently alive. They just float there, dormant and sleeping.

  Some maybe forever, while they forget more and more of the time, in which, they were alive.

  And maybe if they are lucky, they drift near one of those countless worlds and get sucked in, being reborn into a new life.

  The faster you are reborn, the more you can remember of your previous life.

  So either you are reborn fast, or you have a very strong soul, so you can endure the eternity of drifting without forgetting anything.

  I am the second kind, just you know! Wasn't always a god. Everyone has to climb the ladder of power, but that's a story for another time.

  “Great! So you really tried to dispose him for good. It will take some time to bring him to judgement.” -Seria

  “What? Didn't you hear? I minced him and tossed his pieces into -”

  “Oh shut up! Didn't YOU hear? The Council of Gods has judged your case and will give you guys divine punishment.

  If necessary all the gods in the whole multiverse will act to piece Myrm together,

  if only to tell him that he gets his soul cut to pieces and tossed into the River of Souls.

  Thats how Divine Judgements work. HEY! Don't slumber off!”

  Urgh, I got kicked again. Damn I begin to hate that goddess. Almost managed to drift of. Why does it take this fucking body so long to die.

  I don't even have the power for an answer. Why did the fucking Council even give a shit to what we were doing.

  They shouldn't care what happens to a single world in the multiverse normally.....

  “Whatever. I'll just get it over with you first. Ascathon, God of the Realm of Nashok, Divine Being of Magic, Divine ….ah and so on and so forth, you know the rest.

  The Council has found you guilty for bringing great unnecessary suffering over the lesser beings you were put in charge of.

  So you get stripped of all of your divinity and will be reborn into a place where you can learn from your mistakes and reflect on what you have done.

  So I cast you out into River of Souls to a proper place of punishment.

  Puh! What a uselessly long speech, don't you think so too? Hey? Are you ...........”

  Oh, by all the gods let me die already before this barbaric woman kicks me again!

  I will not reflect in the least, even if they send me through a million of the worst reincarnations they can come up with!

  2 - I see the light!

  I see! I see the light at the end of the tunnel!

  Hmpf! Hrm. Yeah that's what some people tell you, when they are close to death.

  But its not really anything dramatic or religious inspiring if you think about it. It's a memory to make it short.

  A deja vu! Of what, you ask?

  Well think about it! Its really not that hard.

  What's the one thing, that happens to you in almost every incarnation? And should b
e always the same?

  So you are almost sure to have some sort of collective phantom memory of it?

  Well yeah. Being born of course! You get pushed out of the warm and dark place inside your mothers womb into the light!

  And that's it! Really messy and dangerous stuff. There are some beings in the multiverse which I like way better in that regard.

  Like laying eggs, or being built, or just growing!

  Ents are surely superior beings in that regard, they are those smart talking trees in case you don't know.

  Unfortunately almost all forms of life, which are able to hold a soul, are mammals!

  Don't ask why, when I was a god I wasn't all knowing just almost all mighty hehe.

  Back topic, it seems I am just being born again. Oh how I hate this.

  Its nothing pleasant in case you don't remember your own birth. Uhh!

  “Press harder your Majesty!” -unknown person. “Its almost out.”

  Oh I can understand them, that's convenient! One thing less to worry about.

  “Its a son! My King and Queen! Like we all prayed for!” -unkown person.

  Ugh, that was exhausting! But worth it! Seems like Seria messed the whole punishment thing up!

  YES! It seems like I am the son of a King. Obviously not a bad starting point in life.

  If I would punish someone in their next life, I would obviously do a better job!

  First of all giving him a world with a new language, he doesn't understand.

  Second making him born into slavery or something like that.

  Swapping his gender just for the fun of it! There is a lot of shit out there in the Multiverse.

  “hi hihi hi hi” - my baby voice. Damn that mad laugh didn't come across like I wanted!

  “What a healthy child! Laughing first thing he does in the world! Strange almost all others cry at first.....”

  -unknown person.

  “Wahaha! Come here my son! You can't believe how happy I am!” -other bearded person.

  The bearded guy scoops me out of the unknown persons hands. I will call her Maid for now, going by her dress.

  Bearded guy seems to be the king – or dad, I will judge later if he is worth ….. uuuugghh

  The king just held me into the air and turned three circles with me!

  I get that you are happy, but you can't do that to a newborn mad king.

  Be happy that I didn't have anything in my stomach!

  I would have barfed all over you!

  “Give me my child! You can't do that with a baby!” - Queen.

  “Oh, sorry, sorry. Here you go.” -King.

  That didn't sound sincere in the least! Oh, at least my mother sounds like a sane person.

  Ugh, I still feel like I just got out of a roller-coaster.

  Ow, mother presses me to her face. Haah, I am not a pet you know.

  Well for know I guess its better than being in the clutches of the mad King.

  Seria seems to have messed up big time with my punishment.

  This reincarnation isn't all that bad? Of course, the mad king could go with more sanity.

  But until now it seems really good!?

  Oh, mother holds me in front of her and all three of them look at me with sparkling eyes.

  Am I out of gold guys? What's with those stares?

  “MY HERO!” - “OUR SALVATION!” - “THE KEY TO PEACE!” - all three of them.

  WHAT! Nonono, I get a bad feeling about this! This cannot be one of those annoying realities with a prophesied hero?

  HEY, Seria? What's up with this?

  Mother pets me again. Aw! Damn this baby body can't speak. Only baby gurgles come out, when I try to speak.

  GIVE ME A GODDAMN EXPLANATION!

  “Oh, he is so cute!”, Mother has some strange fire in her eyes.

  “I will be sure to teach him properly, so he doesn't come up like his father!

  There is a lot of education to do.”

  I don't like that look of yours Mother? What are you planning? Don't tell me you are one of THOSE parents?

  “I am not all that bad, dear? By the way....”, Mad King.

  Oh now they start talking about matters of state? What busy people they are.

  Seems like I can't get an explanation out of them for now.

  Sigh, well. It will take a while to make some sense out of this, so let me tell a bit more about my divine self.

  On the other hand I am not so divine any more. Damn! So cut the divine.

  I already told you about the River of Souls and the whole reincarnation thing right?

  Well I have come a loooong way in that regard.

  In the first incarnation, that I can remember I was a monk on your world. That's right! I come from earth!

  But don't think that gets you any bonus points with me. There isn't much to say about that time.

  I lived a live of seclusion and training my mind in a Tibetan monastery. Lived in peace, died in peace at the proud age of 102!

  Oh how often did I wish I hadn't done that by now. I could still be one of those blessed Souls, who can start every time with a whole new lookout on the world.

  It is true that not knowing some things lets you live a happier life.

  By training your mind through meditation and study, you obviously strengthen your Soul.

  And like I told you, strong Souls can take the time inside of the River of Souls better than weak ones.

  So when I reincarnated the next time, my memories came slowly back to me.

  Inspired by my memories I lived my second life in a similar manner. Becoming scholar, learning magic studying mystic arts and science.

  There wasn't any religion in my second world, so I went for the job that was most similar to my previous life.

  Like you can tell, my second life was in a world with a strange mix of science and magic.

  Like my first life, it was a peaceful place too.

  Well that went on and on, sometimes good and sometimes bad. I found out that every time I end one of those lives you get weakened.

  The time inside the river of Souls eats at your essence. And your essence are your memories.

  So if you live a long live and have lots of knowledge and memories its easier to carry some of it into the next one.

  So if you are doing a good job you get stronger and better at remembering, through every cycle.

  And the stronger your soul gets, the higher you climb the ladder.

  Obviously there is also some kind of Karma, you carry on to your next life.

  The better you did in your previous one, the better your starting point gets in the next.

  From being born as a peasant, to some type normal citizen, to being a noble or celebrity.

  But it doesn't end there. If you get strong enough you can be reborn as some kind mythical being like Dragons, Angels, Demons and so on.

  It doesn't have anything to do with being good and nice! Just you know.

  Being an asshole or mass murderer is perfectly fine.

  The only thing that gets you is if you are unlucky and get on the bad side of a being, that is able to fiddle with your soul. Weakening it or worse, somehow killing you off while you are still young. Dying young gives your soul a real headache for the next life.

  I went through a BIG number of those cycles. Sometimes you meet others who remember their past lifes.

  But its not all that common. Meeting one is like winning the Jackpot in the national lottery twice in a row.

  I doubt that there are more than ten people like that on a whole world at a time.

  Most of them gods, so that makes it less likely that they would concern themselves with you.

  If you aren't a god yourself.

  When you get to a certain level of power you have to join the ranks of gods.

  The Council of Gods is something like a collection of the real bad asses throughout the whole multiverse.

  If a normal small god like me can easily smash his own world to pieces, they
smash a universe instead.

  So you get that there is no way you can tell them no, if they want something from you?

  And they are control freaks! They swoop up everyone who gets powerful enough and restrain them in their big society.

  Giving them a world to play god for, and having them look out for other potential Gods.

  If you do a good job and have a lot of followers you can even make your way up into the council.

  But I never managed that. Having that fight over power with Myrm surely made a big fat red spot on my file.