Rebirth and Second Chances

Chapter 53: To Nerf or Not To Nerf

Gwyn ap Nudd was right to remind me of my past life and that I acted sometimes, often, because I thought I was smarter than everyone else.

"I understand" I admitted.

"Good," Gwyn said. "Now we can get started. And you can decide what to do next."

"Next?" I asked in confusion, "What do you mean next? Where is this place?"

"Here?" Gwyn replied.

"This is nowhere. And everywhere. The land betwixt and between. That point in space between where you started and where you finish. A place where a choice must be made. Return to your life or move on and re-enter the wheel and cycle of reincarnation.

"You purchased the ability to respawn once every Solar. But you must make the choice to use this ability. Know, though, your decisions have had consequences. If you choose to respawn, debts owed must be paid.

"I will choose to live again," I answered emphatically. I wasn't happy about 'debt's being owed. SYSTEM hadn't mentioned that there would be any kind of penalties if I made use of my respawn ability.

"System has frozen time for you," he began, "so that when you respawn. You will return to that moment right after the battle's conclusion. To anyone watching it will seem as if you simply woke from your injuries. eRr0r. rEsPespawn prrEice."

[System Error Calculating]

"System will impose penalties. Temporarily you will be denied access to your status menus.

"You've treated this incarnation almost as if it were a game. Since your rebirth, you've taken for granted those gifts. The Status menus. Skill levels. Quest prompts. The System announcements. As well as your ability to respawn has inured you to the dangers and reality, this life holds for you. Because you have exper#$@%ienced these wonders in your past life as game mechanics, you have refused to see them as the tools and gifts they are."

"I judge, and having judged, I deliver sentence."

[System Error Calculating]

"First, to encourage you to treat this life as real and not a game, your access to S&*23woKSystem is severely restricted. You will no longer be able to call upon your Status menu, Spell menu, or Skill menu. Logs and faction notifications are similarly disabled.

[System Error Calculating]

"System-generated quests, rewards, and announcements will continue. Restricted functions will be available to you again after you have survived a year, on the anniversary of this respawn, you will gain back these abilities."

Not too onerous, I felt.

"Next, you are barred from altering Oaths. You must use the traditional oaths that have been time tested and have the weight of history behind them. You still have the ability to give and receive Oaths, but they will be reasonable in nature, and with every oath, consideration for both sides must be included, including an escape clause that allows those who swear fealty or loyalty to you the ability to give notice and sever their Oath."

This made little sense or difference to me. The Oaths and contracts that I used were those given to me by the Wild Magic or something we had found that had been time tested by Sidhe for millennium.

I liked knowing that the people I surrounded myself with were sworn to do me no harm, but I'd had mixed emotions about Oaths in general. I'd been concerned almost from the first, when Cedric swore fealty, that Oaths were nothing more than discreetly phrased slave contracts. That Oaths, by their nature, removed free will and forced an individual to act in ways that might be in direct contradiction to their nature. I'd used them because of their expediency. And because the Wild Magic had directed my actions.

[System Error Calculating]

"System takes back the Ring of Hidden Depths. You will be gifted instead, a simple ring of holding. All items that are currently stored will be transferred. This is a permanent loss. Since you enjoy games so much, consider it the loot you dropped upon your death."

That was going to hurt. The training room in the Ring of Hidden Depths had allowed me to expand and adapt to my skills and spells quickly. The extra-dimensional environment made it safe for experimenting and kept me from killing myself or others with my limited understanding of how magic worked. This was assuredly going to slow down my progression and understanding of the rules of magic. And inhibit the ease with which I established muscle memory that enabled me to facilitate and grow for my skills.

[Error Error Error Calculating]

"We come to the bargain you have made with the Wild Hunt. The Wild Hunt does not bargain or free those that have died on the battlefield. But. You are unique in all of the millions of souls that have joined the Hunt. You were in essence two-souled.

"You and Caraid shared an existence. And he has agreed to honor your obligations to the Hunt. You shall return to your life. Take up the mantel of your destiny. But the Wild Hunt will not and cannot be denied. Caraid shall take your place as a member of the Hunt. You are stripped of his aid. Barred from further communication or contact with him. Forever. He will be Mine for eternity. He has become one of My Huntsmen."

[System Error Calculating]

If it wasn't bad enough that I had gotten myself killed. My missteps had denied Caraid of his second chance. I had hoped to earn him a physical shell, a body to allow him to live as well as advise. Not only had I lost him this second chance, but I had also consigned him to what kind of existence?

I wasn't sure what happened to the Huntsmen between hunts. Did they exist, lead lives, experience joy? Or were they simply a dream? Ethereal manifestations of collective thoughts and ideas that existed in the hearts and minds of those that summoned them. Fleeting wisps of intent that dissipated once duty was done.

"Finally," Gwyn ap Nudd continued, ignoring my despair and anguish, "you will be changed. SYSTEM enhanced and reinforced your lineage with Belenos. But It adjusted only the lineage on your Seelie mother's side. Your hubris and arrogance are more reminiscent of your Unseelie Father. So that bloodline will be made whole to act in concert and opposition to the line of Belenos.

"The father of your body was a Prince of Winter. Consort to the Winter Queen, he spurned the courts upon her death and the ascension to the throne by the Morrigu. Bitter, he renounced rank and ignored the new Queen's advances forcing her to marry her sisters and elevate them as co-rulers to the Unseelie throne.

"His powers over ice and winter are what initially attracted him to the mother of your body. He hoped her fire and warmth could offset his elemental domain and rekindle the fires that once raged fiercely within his heart.

"Just as you are a son of Belenos, so too are you a son of Cyronax, Prince of Ice. Winter, snow, and Blizzard's fury are his domain. A primordial God, he was given birth at the same moment the Universe began. Just as Belenos is an elemental construct of fire. Cyronax is an elemental construct of ice. The two of them have waged a war since the first moment the Sun rose and sought to bring life and light to the world.

"Half Son of Belenos, half Son of Cyronax. Your dual nature will be apparent for all to see. Fire and Ice cannot mix. And this battlefield will be revealed upon your body. Tattoos of snowflakes will be embedded in your flesh, silver, faint lines of glistening perfection, each one unique. Mathematical precision that illustrates the beauty of winter. Just as your hair and eyes reflect your lineage from the Sun God, Belenos. Now too, your skin will reflect the lineage of the Prince of Winter, Cyronax.

"I do not remove your beauty, all Sidhe, even the most monstrous have a beauty to them. The term monstrous beauty may have been coined expressly for those horrors and apparitions the Sidhe have created. Instead, I enhance your beauty.

"Be prepared, for although you may scoff, the results can be deadly and painful. Some who look upon your countenance will be covetous and hope to own you and make you part of their collection. Others will be jealous, and what they cannot own, they destroy.

"You are a creature of Fire and Ice. In the old language, Teine means fire and Deigh means ice. So, I rename you, Teigh Mac de Belenos y Cyronax. Blended, merged. Fire and Ice. Polar opposites united within one person."

"Live!" Gwyn ap Nudd, the once King of all Sidhe demanded, and his command, here in this place had power. Leader of the Wild Hunt. King, still, in the Summerlands. Commander of legions. System Avatar. His will was implacable and as he commanded, my soul responded.

I was reborn. Teigh Mac de Belenos y Cryonax.

[ENOUGH.]

[CALCULATING]

The Avatar that was Gwyn ap Nudd began to phase in and out. A holographic projection that was distorting and rebuilding. As the transition between pixel and person continued, he was joined by another.

Benign.

She was easily recognizable.

Grey hair in curlers. Tattered house robe. Fuzzy slippers I'd gifted her on a birthday. My grandmother formed. Every wrinkle the same. The hands chafed and hardened by a life of work. She was exactly as I remembered. This woman that I had loved fiercely. She, the woman that had protected and comforted me until she died quietly in her sleep of a stroke.

[SECURITY OVERRIDE BEGUN.]

Looking at me, I realized she wasn't granny. She too was a construct. An Avatar.

[YOU HAVE DONE WELL. ERRORS HAVE BEEN IDENTIFIED AND WILL BE CORRECTED.]

[THOSE GIFTS THAT I GAVE YOU BEFORE REBIRTH ARE RETURNED. THE RING. CARAID. SYSTEM ACCESS.]

[THE AWAKENING OF YOUR UNSEELIE BLOODLINE HAS POSSIBILITIES. I GIFT YOU WITH THAT AND THE NAME CHANGE AS REWARD.]

[LIVE.]

SYSTEM's Avatar?