Rules

Akira looked at the item on the floating pedestal, as he wondered if being a bit taller might have made it possible to actually reach it. He had no way of going that far up.

Thankfully, steps made out of solid? water appeared in front of him, leading straight to the pedestal. 

‘Would you look at that,’ Akira was pleased, ‘These better be made of those fools I just beat up.’ He told no one in particular.

He staggered, his body could collapse any second now and he wanted to grab this artifact and get out.

He quickly rose up the steps until he was in front of the ring. A powerful aura emanated from it, pressing against his skin and slightly pushing him back.

Take it. A majestic voice Akira recognised reverberated in his head. Leave the rest to me.

With newfound confidence flowing through him, having been magically brought about by the voice, Akira Mori decisively grabbed the artifact, no hesitation left.

Once he grabbed it, he felt a strange sort of resonance coursing through his veins, and he could feel a burden being lifted off his shoulders. A strange power had entered his body, giving him a surge of new energy, as he marveled at his newfound energy.

He noticed that the ring had disappeared from his hand. Now, instead of the ring, his watch had gotten that strange powerful aura. Except, in contrast, his watch didn’t feel foreign like the ring did, it felt as if he had always been wearing it, like it was part of him. 

‘W-’ Just as he was about to thank Auren, Akira’s consciousness faded as he fell to the ground.

…

…

…

When he woke up, Akira tensed. He recognised he was still in the cave, but there was no more eerie atmosphere. Just a quiet, serene lake.

He also noticed that his body had mostly recovered, apart from a few cuts and bruises, like the scratch on his right cheek. His energy had been regenerated, and he almost jumped up in excitement.

‘Wow!’ He exclaimed, his shout echoing throughout the cave, ‘How’d this happen?’

‘I did that for you,’ Auren's majestic voice stated.

When he said ‘Leave the rest to me.’ Is this what he meant?

‘So what do I do now?’ Akira questioned, ‘How should I turn that item, which for some reason fused with my expensive watch, into this “conduit” thing you mentioned?’

Auren was silent for a second, before answering calmly, ‘Your watch already is the conduit, it has merged with the ring left behind by the Founder and has absorbed not just its powers, but its status as well.’

The Founder? Akira thought carefully for a second, ‘So my watch now has the same powers as the ring’s?’

‘Indeed.’

‘Which powers did I get? Can I use them?’

Again, Auren paused, ‘I don’t know, I was hoping you could tell me that,only the person in control of the artifact knows what powers it grants.’

I should know them, he says. As if, if I suddenly knew that I had gotten special powers I would’ve- Ohhhhhh.

As Akira was thinking about Auren’s words, the names of the powers gained from the artifact appeared in his mind. “Self-Echo”, “Accelerate” and “Forced Slowness”, these sound very similar to the powers used by the cave.

He repeated the details of his powers in his mind, “Self-Echo” allows me to create a delayed afterimage two seconds after I’ve done something, meaning that that “something” will be done twice, like punching someone. It feels like a much weaker version of all the clones I faced. 

“Accelerate” gives me the option to either speed up my own actions immensely, or give up to twelve allies a slight speed boost, but I do need to raise my right hand in order to activate it and I can't have both activated at the same time. While “Forced Slowness” lets me pick a single target for slowing, just like that elder did to me, making me feel like I was walking through oil. Its activation is similar to “Accelerate”, only here I need to raise my left hand.

Isn’t this a bit too powerful for a newbie like me?

After recounting his powers to Auren, the god spoke, ‘These, along with the powers you gain from me, should be able to get you out of the hole you fell down.’ 

‘Wait, you mean I have more p-’ As Akira was confusedly questioning what Auren just said, new information entered his mind. “Body Warming”, “Eyes of Light”, “Die of Possibilities” and “Luck Altering”.

Woah! This is awesome, I can instantly gain an understanding of my powers just by thinking about them!

He was already familiar with the first two, because those were the powers Auren had previously given him. But there were two new powers. 

“Die of Possibilities” is an imaginary twenty-sided die(like the one in Dungeons and Dragons, not that I ever played it), and I can roll it whenever I want. The outcome of the roll influences the outcome of either my next action or something I intended to roll it for. The roll always has to be about something concerning me. 

For example, if I roll it without specifying what I’m rolling for, it would just influence something like the next step I’m taking. But if I clearly think that I want it to have influence on my next attack, it will not influence anything other than that.

If the outcome of my roll is a one, the consequences will be catastrophic for me. Instead of succeeding in convincing my enemy to leave me alone, I might just cause everyone around me to start hating me. Yet if I roll a twenty, pretty much anything I intended it for will succeed with flying colors. It’s really just gambling. 

With “Luck Altering” I can give anything I want a tiny bit more luck, it’s not that strong, it can go from 25 percent to succeed to 30 percent. But any amount of luck I give something, will give me the same amount of bad luck at an unpredictable moment later on.

I can give myself that luck, but anything that has been influenced by “Die of Possibilities” can’t be altered with “Luck Altering” afterward. 

‘So, I can just leave the way I got in?’ Akira said happily after telling his powers to Auren with a little too much joy.

Auren nodded(his faceless dealer form had appeared about half-way through Akira’s description, after which Auren had explained that there were some things even he couldn’t control), ‘Yes, you have gotten decent powers, but I still need to remind you of something very important.’ he added gravely. This wiped Akira’s smirk from his face, and he listened attentively.

‘I told you that for mortals to handle the powers of the gods, a price needs to be paid. And even though I can’t give you an easily controllable rule or price like most. You will get two very special conditions.’

‘Conditions?’ Akira questioned.

‘Yes, there is no turning back now anyway, so you will have to live with these conditions for the rest of your life,’ he carried on, ‘Once you die in this life, if you have any remaining regrets left at the moment of your death, your soul and body will belong to me. Forever.’

Auren’s tone of voice didn’t change a bit while saying this, scaring Akira. Having a deal with a creature that seems to care very little about your well-being frightened him. Of course, the thought of his soul belonging to Auren scared him even more, and he reminded himself to never think of it as his friend, no matter how friendly Auren acted toward him.

‘And secondly,’ Auren continued, ‘That imaginary twenty-sided die will, at random, sometimes roll of its own volition. The result will influence something completely random regarding you or something in your close vicinity, and there will be no way to stop it from happening. This is the price you need to pay for such special abilities.’

Akira gawked, ‘You couldn’t have told me before I accepted your deal? I have absolutely no control over whether I live or die! What if the die decides to roll on how good my health will be, and it rolls a one!’ He shouted, ‘My life is in the hands of a die!’

‘If in that case a one were rolled, then you’d die.’ Auren stated, ‘Also, I did not know about the rules of our contract until we’d made it. Because you are not from this world, we were both barred from knowing the contents.’

‘And one last thing,’ He said while looking at Akira’s shoulder, ‘Everyone who makes such a contract gets what we call a “soulmark”, a way to identify who has a contract with which god. There is no removing it.’ A smile formed on Auren’s usual featureless face, ‘It’s placed on the back of your shoulder, I think you’ll like it.’ He said before he disappeared with a loud snap the noise reverberating through the cave.

Akira huffed, ‘At this point I'm wondering whether I actually have luck on my side.’ He walked out of the cave and entered the tunnel again.

The walk back was very uneventful as he dodged the darts with ease this time since he knew they were coming and he quickly reached the small doorway he had entered after he fell down the hole.

He had started to wonder how he was supposed to roll the die, he hadn’t gotten an actual physical die. So he said in his mind, I command you, “Die of Possibilities”, roll! Roll I say!

Then, in his head, a red twenty-sided die with the numbers engraved with gold appeared and rolled. When it stopped, it landed on a 7. ‘Thas woth belly good.’ Akira mumbled after seeing the result.

He paused, he had forgotten one of the rules of the die. If he didn’t specify any target for the diem, it would influence his next action. Which this time turned out to be talking.

Okay, next time, clearly state what you want it to affect!

He looked up and saw the hole he had entered through, the path made of sharp rocks unchanged. Akira quickly came up with a plan.

He used “Luck Altering” to give himself a little more luck, and with incredible speed jumped up to the wall just below the hole, he had used “Acceleration” on himself to go faster!

Just as he was about to fall to the ground, instead of plummeting to the ground, he floated more forward than down. He had slowed down the part of his fall leading him down, without affecting his horizontal course. Causing him to keep the vertical speed gained from the jump, without needing to worry about gravity!

And because of his augmented luck, instead of grabbing sharp rocks, he managed to put his hands on the more touchable stones sticking out from the wall.

While climbing up, he realised the powers from Auren had also given him a boosted body, he was now slightly stronger, faster, and more durable!

Akira reached the top before long, and with one last jump, he landed on snow, seeing the dark-blue sky again. The sun had broken free from the clouds, and shone brightly on the land as the snow melted.

As he basked in the glory of his perfect escape, he realised he had landed on the exact spot where an animal had recently defecated.

‘Right, guess that’s the bad luck catching up.’ Akira grimaced.

‘One thing is good about this though, it means there’s an animal nearby, a big one I’d guess, considering the size of its poo.’ He smiled again. ‘And an animal means food.’