Isaac Sygrim - that is my name. Isaac meaning one who laughs or rejoices and Sygrim literally meaning one who sees grim. In combination my whole name should mean something like - the one who laughs despite the grimness of this world. That was probably my mother's intention, but the name never suited me.
My mother - Elena Sygrim was from a conservative family - a real church girl in fact. As for my father - I don't know his name, well, I never knew him. haven't met the bastard once. All I know is that they both were from the same small town and that my father managed to charm my mother somehow and they became lovers. I was the fruit of their 'love', at least that is what my mother always said.
When my mother's parents - my grandparents found out about her pregnancy, they demanded that she have a secret abortion. This might sound strange knowing that we are speaking about super conservative, super Christians, but it happens a lot more often than you would expect. You can't have your slut of a daughter tarnish your family name, what would the neighbors think after all?
When my mother refused, she was graciously given two options - do what you are told or leave. My mom was just seventeen, but they actually gave her that offer. Well I guess she really loved my father or me because she chose to leave, to my knowledge that was the last time she spoke to my grandparents.
After leaving home my mother went to her boyfriend's house for shelter and help. When she knocked on the door she was met with the other pair of my grandparents. Instead of helping her or at the very least offering shelter until she got a footing in the world they chastised her for daring to come to their house in broad daylight and 'lying' about their precious son.
When mom saw that it was futile to try and reason with them she turned to my father. He would be different right? Well yea, he was different, in the sense of being a total coward and a pushover with commitment issues. Maybe he was scared of his parents, maybe he didn't want the hassle or maybe it was getting boring now that she was pregnant. Either way he rejected her, laughing at the thought of knowing her and my mom was left truly alone in the world. She was shunned by the whole town, even the church showed no mercy.
It is strange that while recounting this story she never showed any resentment towards the people in it.
Having no one to hire her, no roof over her head and little money she decided to move to a bigger city in hopes of a better life for herself and me. That city was LA.
She worked as a waitress, often pulling double or even triple shifts in order to just survive and lived in a crappy, one bedroom apartment. And then I came into the world. Knowing the life that awaited me, she named me in hopes that I would be okay, that no matter the circumstances I would be happy.
For a while life was quite good, of course we had hardships and I was always jealous of others that had more, but I was - comparatively happy. Until my mother broke.
I was four or maybe five when the stress finally caught up to her - gotta admit she lasted pretty long. At first she stopped praying to god - I can't blame her, he seemed to have abandoned her. Then she started drinking - a lot. When that didn't help she started injecting herself. She tried hiding it from me, but when I was six I found out. Because I was the one to find her pale and lifeless body when I returned home from playing outside. She had overdosed.
At first I did not know why she was 'sleeping' for so long, why the flies were constantly buzzing around her, why there were maggots coming out of her mouth, nose and eyes, where was that awful smell coming from. I had spent almost a week with her, trying to wake her up, asking for food and wondering why my mom, who was always busy working, was home all the time. Then the neighbors started complaining about the smell.
I was found alone, malnourished, exhausted, dirty, in a room with a corpse. The authorities took me to a home for lost children "It's OK" they said "You will be fine" they told me "These kids are just like you." But they weren't like me.
Because of my experience I developed a detached, unfriendly, borderline unlikable personality. I had no friends, always spent my time alone, my personality was opposite of Isaac and I did not look like one. My ashen hair hadn't been cut in a while and probably hadn't seen a hair brush in an eternity, dark, dead eyes showing no sign of life with bags underneath contrasting sharply with ghost white skin, lean frame with neither fat nor muscle, hunched posture and, of course, a face incapable of smiling.
That is how I spent ten years, ten painful and lonely years until one day on our annual school's trip to some boring museum the bus got enveloped in bright, shining light, was lifted from the ground and then dropped. When the driver and the teachers got off they were taken back, I imagine, because what they saw was that we were in a huge, lavishly decorated garden full of plants that we had never seen before. To one side of the bus there stood a huge elegant castle, to the other - a line of people dressed in medieval amour carrying swords, shields and spears.
When the students, driven by their curiosity, against the wishes and warnings of the teachers piled out of the bus and were looking around, the line of people wearing amour split in the middle, faced the split and took a knee. The sudden movement of those soldiers, who were standing motionless for all this time, startled everyone.
From the spit came a new group of people, they looked nothing like the soldiers. The man in front looked to be around fifty. He was wearing a black vest on top of a white pants and shirt combo covered in a white - on the inside and red - on the outside mantel. He was sporting a ridiculous amount of golden rings and necklaces with wearious gems implanted in them. shaven face with shoulder length golden, greasy hair on which sat a pompous crown. He looked very smug, as if his farts smelled like roses.
To the man's right was a woman clad in an elegant purple dress, she had brown hair. She was a real looker. Looked to be in her forties and also wore something similar to a crown, although it was smaller and looked simpler.
To the man's right I spotted two people around my own age, a man and a woman. The man was wearing a white, military style suit, had short golden hair, while the woman was in a blue dress adorned with golden lining, her hair was also gold.
She was really someone you couldn't avert your eyes from. She was beautiful, there is no denying that, but that wasn't the main reason. It was her eyes, they were very light and vibrant blue. Her eyes seemed like, how should I put it, it seemed like they could see straight through you, as if there was nothing in the world that could escape her gaze. Although she looked younger than me, out of all the people in the garden she looked the most dangerous.
"Travelers from another world, welcome to the world of Eden!" the man in the middle shouted "My name is Jogeswar Ishwan Cheliyan the fourth and I am the rightful and noble ruler of the Cheliyan kingdom, the most powerful and righteous kingdom in this world and the kingdom protected and blessed by the goddess herself. Our people are always happy and they thank the goddess for my wisdom and courage and blah blah blah"
He spoke for like a solid hour about his greatness, generosity, wisdom, compassion and kindness. About how much the people of the kingdom love him, about how much the goddess has blessed him and how much the people are blessed to have a king like him and so on and so forth. Then he quickly introduced the people standing next to him as his family and finally he went to the point.
"Brave travelers, you were summoned to this world to help me save the world from the scourge of the demons" Oh cool, they have demons in here as well? "You see, we have been at war with their kind for hundreds of years already. They pillage the fields and towns, block trade routes. Because of them I had to increase the taxes several times already and to expand my armies, but thankfully my people are understanding, they know about the sacrifices that I have to make in order to win this war." If it's not clear already, this guy rubs me the wrong way. "So, brave travelers, I order you to fight on my behalf and destroy them!"
The murmur of the students was intense, some were worried, some wanted to know what kind of a joke this was, some seemed to genuinely want to help. The murmur was quickly stopped by one of the teachers "Absolutely not! These students, these children will not participate in a war, please send us back."
"Unfortunately we have no such power" the king said grimly "But threat not, for I am sure that the ever compassionate goddess will send you back to your world. As soon as you defeat all of the demons, of course."
"So, you are saying we have no choice in the matter? We will have to fight?" The teacher seemed worried.
"Yes, but what could be more joyous and fulfilling than protecting a nation of good and noble people from the vile scum?" In my opinion it's laughable that the 'most powerful and righteous' kingdom in this world needs to be saved by two classes of tenth graders, a few teachers and a flipping bus driver, but what do I know, It's my first time in another world. "And besides," He continued "as travelers you have been gifted with great powers, so it shouldn't be that difficult for you." Powers? sounds cool. Is it like magic or something?
The king proceeded by making a small fireball on the palm of his hand, shouting something about the blessings of the goddess and launched it in to the air. Yup, they have magic here. Nice. Everyone else looked excited too and the king looked very proud.
After the demonstration we were ushered into the castle, the whole time we were walking, the king was giving us a mandatory history lesson on the ones that built the castle - his ancestors, not the actual builders, of course, until we entered a spacious, well illuminated room made of marble. In the center of the room stood a raised platform on which there stood something similar to a marble podium over which hovered a grey orb.
"Brave travelers, this is the compatibility examination room. As the name implies here we shall test your aptitude for magic, the amount of mana you have, what is your innate trait, what abilities it gave you and whether you are someone who excels at casting - a proud and noble caster or just someone that enhances his physical abilities - a warrior." It seems the king doesn't like warriors.
One by one the students, teachers and the very confused and flustered bus driver were ushered to the orb. We were instructed to put a hand on it and when we did, it started to glow. It seems that the color the orb glowed represented the elements that we had an affinity for and the amount of light determined our mana capacity. Pretty straight forward so far, but I have no idea how the people running the test found out about our traits and our fighting aptitude though.
As for what are traits - they are something like your personality amplifiers, as in it amplifies the strongest parts of your personality and weakens everything else. In addition, people with particular traits are more adept at particular elements and have a higher chance of attaining certain skills.
For example a person with the trait 'Friend of the forest' is kind, gentle, loves animals and nature in general. His affinities should lie in water, earth, wind or light magic and the skills he might obtain include controlling plants, communicating with animals, various healing skills, general knowledge of plants and animals and so on and so forth.
A person with the trait 'warrior' is usually someone who possesses a strong will, tenacity and doesn't give up easily. Their skills may include something like body reinforcement or martial arts. Also important is the fact that there are two ways to obtain skills. The first one is by acquiring them naturally from your trait and the second one is by simply learning them. In other words you can simply get lucky or work for it. How do I know this? Some kid asked that during our examination and the king gladly answered.
Everyone that had taken the test was also ranked from 'F' to 'S' depending on the amount of mana they possessed and it seemed that some traits were far more desirable than others. My trait is 'Cold blooded'. It is nothing special, as you know it always keeps me calm, rational and collected no matter the situation. My mana level was also quite low - evaluated at 'D' and it seems that my affinities lie solely in shadow magic. So yea, I am no one special. There were some guys with triple or even quadruple elemental affinities, there were guys with 'B' or even a few with 'A' ranks and of course there was Arthur Bellmont - the only 'S' rank with the trait 'Hero'.
I didn't really know him all that well, he was from a different class than me, but I had seen him a few times. Kind, just, smart, charismatic, tall and good looking. He had blue eyes and brown hair, always the center of attention. I usually tried to avoid his type of people. No wonder he became the 'Hero'.
As for the trait 'Hero' - the overjoyed king explained that it is considered the strongest and one of the rarest traits one can get. You are guaranteed the ability to control all of the elements and the skills of 'Limit break' - the ability to temporarily, but drastically enhance all of your physical abilities as long as you have enough mana, 'Boosted growth' - allowing you to learn needed skills twice as fast (no man required) and finally 'Follower of the righteous path' - giving you a physical and magical boost as long as you believe that what you are doing is right (no mana required).
And again those are just the skills Arthur was guaranteed. In addition to them he was granted 'master of Sword' - giving him the sword skills of a veteran swordsman, 'Eyes that see the truth' - allowing him to discern if one is lying, 'Body strengthening' and 'Body fortification' - making his body tougher. It should be clear to everyone that the guy was pretty overpowered from the start. It is frightening to think what he would become in a few years of training.
After the examination we were placed into something akin to a training academy which the king named heroes boot camp in honor of mr. Bellmont. At first we were given theoretical and practical classes in mana manipulation, combat, world knowledge, and so on and so forth. Then the instructors helped us choose the most fighting jobs for us, we were instructed how to acquire skills for them and how to utilize them. I chose the 'assassin' job class since I didn't have the mana capacity for anything else and I had an affinity for shadow magic which allowed me to somewhat conceal myself.
Finally we were told to assemble teams of six people and the team fighting lessons began. My team consisted of a tall ,red haired boy with sharp eyes - the swordsman and leader of the group with the affinity for fire and earth, a light blue haired mage girl with an emotionless face who had the affinity for Ice magic. A tank with a rough face, muscular body and short brown hair welding a giant shield and sword had an affinity for earth and wind, a very outgoing priestess with dark black hair and the dual affinity for light and black magic, the alchemy boy whose affinities lie in fire and water and finally me.
I was the outsider in the group. From my understanding all the others were friends in our previous world and I was simply invited to fill in the last space. I can't complain though, It's not like I had friends to form a group with anyway so this worked out fine. at least until two weeks into our practical training in the great dungeon when we encountered that thing.
It was a day like any other in the dungeon. We fought monsters, tried to acquire new skills. It was hard, but strangely fulfilling seeing your skills slowly improve. We were told that the dungeon has 100 floors and we were only on the 15th when we found a teleportation circle and our fearless leader decided that we should take it. "C'mon guys, it's been a breeze this far and this is just the challenge we need to improve!" The confident bastard smiled. I was about to object, but everyone else thought that it was a good idea so we took it. What a mistake that was.
We were taken to the 50th floor, on to a bridge-like structure far above the ground. That is right, not the 30th nor even the 40th floor but straight to the middle of the dungeon. For the record - the dungeon was explored only up to the 48th floor. no one in our team expected that nor did we expect to meet that thing there - the 'Devil snake'.
The devil snake is an 'S' class monster known for it's dark black scales, golden eyes, incredible speed and power and of course it's telepathy and insatiable appetite for human suffering.
When we saw it, we all instinctively knew that this was the end for us. A very slow and painful end. The girls started crying, the boys trembled and the snake gleefully observed. After a while of despair, the monster gave us a shining ray of hope - pretty nice of it. It spoke to us, straight into our minds with this "I give you a choice - you can desperately fight me and die or you can survive and get out of here." Everyone looked surprised and slightly relieved at hearing this. "Four of you, that is… If four of you wish to survive, you have to kill the remaining two. Oh, and I will let you decide which ones live and which ones die." The blood drained from all of our faces and the snake looked so very amused.
The first to snap out of it was the alchemist "We must fight, how could we sacrifice anyone of us? We should…" He was wordlessly pushed forward along with me by his very best of friends who wished to sacrifice us in order to survive. "If you want, go and fight that thing on your own" said the priestess, everyone else just looked down trying to avoid eye contact.
The alchemist was shook, "But why, after all we have been through together why, why me?"
tears rolling down his cheeks he asked, his voice wavering.
"You should go now" said the swordsman, still not making eye contact.
The alchemist was heartbroken, he fell to his knees and wept while the 'Devil snake laughed in our heads. Finally, he wiped away his tears, took me by the hand and forced me to jump from the ledge with him.
At firs I thought that he just wanted to escape the pain of the torture by ending us as fast as possible or he was too hear stricken by the betrayal, but then he ordered me to enhance my body with mana, straighten it and inhale as deeply as possible. I was confused, but then it all clicked. This wasn't a suicide, this was a desperate attempt to live. Under the bridge HE HEARD WATER.