Ante

Akira gasped as air filled his lungs and he opened his eyes. His chest was burning, and his skin was tingling, as if it was stimulated. Everything crashed into him all at once, the air was cold, there was a smell that was both crispy and sweet, and he could hear birds chirping somewhere far away.

‘Gah!’ Akira sat upright as he felt the sharp pain fading.

He was sitting on the ground, and was surrounded by a wide field of snow, some withered trees scattered across the planes. His eyes widened as he realised what had happened. He had died, he was killed by his former friend seeking revenge. But somehow, before truly entering the vast darkness after death, he met a supposed “god” and was sent here.

Akira quickly looked around him, before he grabbed a handful of snow, feeling its texture as it slowly crumbled in his hand. It wasn’t a dream… I really was sent to another world! Wait!- He looked at himself, he still had his suit on, only it was now wrinkled. His rare golden-black watch was still around his right wrist, but he had lost all his other possessions.

‘Fuck.’ He slowly said, before a smile appeared and he jumped up in excitement. This was something he always wanted as a kid, to be brought to a different world, one with magical powers and mythical creatures. And isn’t that what the barbecue bird said? I was getting extraordinary powers!

But his eagerness didn’t last long, he soon realised he had no idea how to use these “powers”, and he also had no idea where he was, he could be in the middle of nowhere, weeks from civilization. But that wasn’t the worst part.

His bottom was wet, same with the rest of his backside, the snow he was laying on had melted and now drenched and dirtied his perfect suit.

“Right, what to do nowwww?’

As he looked up, he saw a dark blue sky, the sun covered by gray clouds. ‘It’s right around noon.’

‘I think, I guess I don’t know how this world works yet.’ There might just be some god controlling the sun, or no, time could move differently here. Damn this is exciting!

Akira decided to just move in some random direction for now, perhaps he would find a settlement or meet people nice enough to help him.

As he trudged through the snow, he swiftly noted how cold he felt, his suit already didn’t do much against the chill, considering it was summer at his time of death, but on top of that, his back had been soaked, making him feel like he was freezing.

Akira shivered as he rubbed his arms, each step he took produced a crunching sound. If only I could get a little warmth from the bird, surely he could miss a l- ‘Clunk!’

He had stepped on something that sounded very little like snow, and as he tapped his shoe against the ground again, he felt something hard. ‘Huh.’ He crouched, sweeping away a thin layer of snow.

A stone slab was revealed, carved with strange symbols and weird patterns. ‘Sure looks old.’ I still haven’t seen any other sign of advanced life anywhere, would it hurt to spend some time investigating this old piece? While deciding whether he should investigate the area around him, he tried pressing the slab with his body.

Suddenly the slab gave away and the ground around collapsed with it. Snow, dirt and stone caved inward as Akira fell with a yell. He tumbled, rolled and bumped into a bunch of things before falling on his back and groaning in pain.

‘Seems about right.’ Akira groaned, ‘First day in another world and I already screwed things up.’

When he finally sat up, he opened his eyes to darkness, except for the piece of rock being lit up through the hole he had just made. Everything else was dark, and the air smelled damp and old, for some reason reminding him of parchment.

When he looked up, a way out of the hole could be seen, but he doubted he could actually climb his way up those sharp rocks.

Akira squinted his eyes, trying to look beyond the darkness in front of him, only to be met with failure. Alright, think, think, think, think! I need to somehow get out of this hole by either climbing rocks that will surely cut my hands, or by venturing into darkness in which I can’t see shit. Hmmm.

Both are a gamble, which is why I’m having a hard time choosing which one I like more…

Just as he was about to go for the rocks, which he had chosen because of his distaste of the dark, a familiar flame burst into being in front of him.

Even though the flame was familiar, Akira still flinched, scared of being burned. But he quickly realized that he felt nothing from the flame, there wasn’t even any warmth emanating from it.

‘Greetings, great master of rebirth and flames.’ Akira said gleefully as he bowed, hoping to appease the deity in front of him.

‘You should not try to leave this place, but enter the darkness.’ A majestic voice from the flame said calmingly, not even acknowledging Akira’s sucking up to him.

‘You want me to go to a place where I can’t see anything?’

‘It’s not about me wanting it, and you don’t need to follow my orders.’ the flame expressed. ‘I can see that the path behind you only leads to your inevitable death, even if you manage to make it out.’

‘Righto,’ Akira said in a dead-pan voice, ‘And how should I go about entering the deep dark scary space behind you? What do I call you actually? And why don’t I feel any warmth from your body, God knows I need some right now.’

The voice sighed, causing Akira to worry he might have overstepped his boundaries and offended the flame-phoenix-faceless creature. ‘I am called Auren, and I am now what is called your “patron”, the reason you can’t feel anything from me is because I am not actually here, you can only see me because I am your patron, I exist in your mind only. Simply put, I am an illusion for purely you.’

Akira stroked his chin, ‘My patron? So you are my supporter? Is that what you meant by giving me powers?’

‘That is correct.’

Akira's eyes lit up at Auren's confirmation, ‘So why don’t I have powers? Apart from being extremely cold, I don’t feel any different than I did before I died.’

‘When a contract is made between a god and a mortal, there are always clauses, negative effects. These are usually beneficial to the contractor, the god, and are necessary for a mortal to be able to hold the powers of their contractor, otherwise they will slowly perish. I am unable to give you a clear negative effect for your power, so you can't handle the power yet. A conduit is needed, something that will absorb the overbearing presence of my power so that you can wield it.’

So there are more contracts like mine throughout this world?

‘So what will my powers be?’ Akira asked with a smile plastered on his face, his interest piqued. ‘Will I be unable to die, or get the ability to manipulate fire?’

‘Even I won’t know until you’ve claimed them.’ Auren responded. ‘I can, however, give you two powers for now, I believe your body should be able to handle these.’ After he said this, fire ropes erupted from the big flame, entering Akira as he felt his body warming up.

When the ropes receded, Auren spoke, ‘You now have a resistance to the cold, with your body constantly warming itself when needed. You will also have better vision in the dark.’ And just like he said, Akira could now see his surroundings a lot better, there seemed to be a doorway hidden in the darkness behind the flame.

‘I don’t think you will survive the next three hours without it.’ Auren added gravely.

This alarmed Akira, ‘W-what do you mean I won’t survive the next three hours without it.’ His voice had a slight tremble. After his last experience, his fear of death had increased.

‘Your constitution is even worse than I thought, your body will only manage for three hours before crumbling, you will need to find a conduit in those three hours or you’re as good as dead.’ Its voice was without care, sending a shiver down Akira’s spine, I think I’m just a pawn in this fucker’s game, if I die, he’ll just get someone else to make his “contract” with.

As these thoughts surfaced in his mind, Akira also realised a big problem, ‘How am I supposed to find a conduit for divine power in three hours, are these things just lying around?’ He exclaimed a bit louder than he meant.

‘No, they are very rare even, but you seem to be in luck, this is a special ruin belonging to the former Emperor of the land. It wouldn’t surprise me if there are relics holding special powers hidden here.’

‘Even for a god like me it is tiring to have a form in the mortal realm for this long, I will be leaving now.’ Auren concluded with a slight drop of strength in "his" voice. ‘Oh, and one last tip, there will be a bunch of protections in place to keep people like you out, so you should be careful. Alright goodbye!’

And just like that he disappeared, leaving Akira standing alone in a cave, looking at the doorway in front of him with determination.