It was another average Friday night for a young 17 year old teen, grinding out games I found on the web. This night I was playing a popular turn based, fantasy game called "Cygnus Academy: Eye of The Serpent". Its a generic fantasy academy game, it had no problems except... It was difficult, a bit too difficult.
It wasn't the Black Souls or Born From Blood type of difficult where it felt difficult but fun and that you had a chance and it was dependent on you. No this was the type where a random enemy could one shot you in the middle of the streets with a fireball. I went through 5 keyboards and one monitor in one week. My wallet felt empty by the time I reached the final boss.
It was a difficult fight with it spamming as many insta-kill moves it had, at one point it even said fuck you skip your turn and get dealt with double damage the next. That battle costed me a grand total of $329...
Finally I beat it after a whole hour of attempts. The boss muttered something about this not being the end but I didn't really pay attention as I was busy parading all over my room and cursing the game out. After I got exhausted from that I dropped the controller and drooped into my chair.
I rested my arm over my eyes as they felt dry over the long period of me not blinking, staring into the computer monitor. I yawn stretching my arms out before my eyes fluttered close as the last thing I saw at the bottom of the screen of my monitor were two ominous words.
'Challenger Found'
"Mhmmm hmmm," I groan as my eyes slowly open staring into an unfamiliar ceiling, "When'd I move to the bed"
A strange voice came out as I spoke.
"Huh, who the hell does this voice belong to?"
The voice sounded a bit deeper than my previous voice.
'Damn, I guess puberty finished a bit late' I stretch my arms out trying to wake up my body, catching a glimpse of my bed sheets and blanket.
"The hell, did I get kidnapped in my sleep?" My eyes scanned my new room as I tried to process what was going on, "Did my parents finally get tired of me staying in my room all day and sold me off?"
Countless thoughts wandered my mind as I tried to figure out what was going on before I stood up and looked into the mirror.
Before me stood a face with well defined features, black hair and bangs covering a part of my face. Iris colored eyes stared back at me as I processed this. I tried to think who this belonged to but it all ended up blank. I stared down and lifted my shirt.
'Damn, this is a nice body.'
While it wasn't celebrity nice in terms of looks, it was still far better than my previous one that never really did phyiscal activities and just stayed inside all day playing games when they weren't in school.
This new body was semi lean, meaning you could see the muscles but it was really protruding too much, it wasn't skinny nor bulky.
I ran to a nearby window to look outside.
"It really looks like I transmigrated into a fantasy world" I chuckle
I've seen these stories before, shut-in reincarnates becomes strong, gets a harem, defeats demon lord, blah blah blah. Normally its a drag to read these types of novels as they're all cliche and they never change the formula, however.
Experiencing it is whole different matter. Who hasn't imagined being in a world of magic and swords. To cast spells and fight monsters, to make a party and meet mystical creatures. Some people might wanna go home but not me, the possibility of learning magic was too much.
Being able to create things out of thin air, to be able to manipulate nature, wouldn't it feel like you're god to the normal human being from Earth? I sure as hell wasn't gonna waste this opportunity.
'Who the hell am I?'
I realized a big problem, I didn't know who I was. I tried to rack my brain for new memories related to this body and its life but it ended up empty.
"I'm doomed'
I concluded
'What if someone who knew this body previously, talked to me? How do I respond? Can I feign amnesia or say I've lost my memories after an accident involving head trauma? Doubt it.'
This world was an unknown one, a world with infinite possibilities in what it could be as I had no clue where I was. The only thing I knew or hoped for was that there was magic and socery and if that was true they could possibly extract my memories using magic.
No matter what happens I'd be in trouble. Then I realized something, just play dumb and nod your head to everything. Just always agree and go with the flow when they talk to you.
'But I atleast need to know who I am or my general identity.'
I searched my room searching for any means of identification or something that I could use to conclude facts about this body. In the end I found two things, an ID and a notepad.
I inspected the ID closer. It had a small photo of me and read,
'Name: Azriel Blackshade
Date Of Birth: 09/27/2013'.
'So my name is Azriel, sounds better than my previous name. Hmmmm, what was my previous name?'
I froze, I couldn't remember my previous name, to add to that I can't remember anything besides the night and the weeks where I played the crappy game. I tried remembering my parent's face but all that came up were faceless haired people, nothing I could remember them by.
They looked like generic mob npcs in games used as filler, not even having their face drawn accept a small line called their mouth.
'Ah... so thats neat'
I sat there dejectedly realizing that everything from my past was erased from my mind, my parents who could have possibly been warms and nice, friends who could have been close, relationships I should've known.
A silent tear glided across my cheek before dripping onto the floor below.
Plop
That noise woke me up.
'What the point in fretting about it? All that matters is this new reality and how I can survive in it. What would the point of this new life if I just cry about the past the whole time? I must survive and live a new fulfilling life here.'
I flipped open the notepad trying to find anything I could use here to gather information. I flip to the very first page to realize something.
'This is a... diary?'
The first page went as follows,
"Entree 1
05/17/2015
5:51 A.M.
The headmaster has gifted us these notepads to keep track of our activities and missions shortly after assigning us our first task. Me, 005, and 041 are tasked with killing a certain noble who has recently caught on about our organization."
'Seems like I was apart of a secretive organization or something.'
"We acted as orphaned kids that needed help and he took us in as the headmaster planned. That night we snuck up on him while he was asleep and slit his throat. Afterwards we burned him estate along with any incriminating evidence.
The headmaster praised us talking how gifted we were. I felt happy."
That was the end of the first entree in the notepad and from what I could gather was that,
'First, I was in an organization since a young age that was secretive and killed anyone who tried prying into it. Second, theres more like me and theres and mysterious person called headmaster who seems to be our master of some sorts. Lastly, they take missions that includes assasination.'
I tried reading more of the notepad but I got interupted by a sudden noise from the corner of the room.
Ding
I walked over there to find a small watch. I flipped it over to find a serpent emblem with its eye protruding.
'Interesting design.'
Then I looked at the top of the watch, it seemed very similar to the smartwatches from my previous world with a screen and a scroll on the side plus a few buttons. I try opening it to find a single app.
"Eye Of The Leviathan Mission Board"
At the top of the screen I see a new message,
"Oi, 001 not responding immediately eh? Looks like we have to drag you back to the 'chambers' you useless brat."
Thats when I realized what world I was in.
"Fuck, I'm royally screwed."