"Kill him... no, kill them both!" Cried the priest at the top of his lungs.
In only a moment, the man in the purple suit had been grasped by a group of civilians from the ground. With heavy blows, they pounded the man into the ground, stomping his face until it bled.
Leo, on the other hand, jumped to his feet and sprinted as fast as he could.
He had been given a chance, and there was no way he would ruin it. Or rather, he had created the chance for himself.
There would be time to focus on everything that happened, including his power, and the strange world he had found himself in, but for now, he had to run.
As he dashed through the cobbled streets, he heard the sounds of metal footsteps chasing after him. One of the knights was approaching, with his sword in hand.
For a moment, Leo expected it would be easy to escape. After all, he wore only rags, whilst the man wore a full suit of heavy armour.
However, one glance behind him told him that wasn't the case. Shrouding the man's feet was a strange red essence that seemed to hasten his movements.
The bulky knight was gaining on him, enhanced by the strange magic.
Fuck, fuck, fuck!
Civilians in the distance had noticed the chase. Men and women in chariots pointed at him, and some threw things in an attempt to trip him up.
It was only when Leo took a turn into a dark alley that he thought he had a chance to get away.
He thanked whatever gods existed when he found that the city had a sewage system. A manhole was covered by a metal disk, which he quickly lifted, and he began to descend down the ladder.
After covering he manhole up again, he was met with absolute darkness. The sounds of the streets above had been blocked out and were replaced by a steady drip below.
Leo tried his best to catch his breath as he descended the ladder. He took his time, making sure not to slip.
Fate surely wouldn't smile on such clumsiness.
Once at the bottom, Leo found himself in the smelly tunnels of the city's sewage system. He found a platform that had not been covered in grime and took a seat.
Finally, he was able to process his situation.
Leo, after somehow dying on earth, had found himself reincarnated into the body of an eighteen-year-old black haired peasant named Aldiun Black.
Aldiun belonged to the world of Veshpa, where magics existed, and the gods were fervently believed in.
The peasant seemed to lack knowledge of the greater world; however, he was aware that the city he was currently in, Mist City, was located in the country of Fentura.
Mist City were a believer in the god, Cread. A man who was said to have ascended above the mortal plain, after sacrificing himself and being struck by lightning on a cross to save the country, Fentura, from a thunderstorm apocalypse.
For whatever reason, Aldiun had refused to believe in such a god. A known crime in the city. This ultimately led to his imprisonment and, eventually, his hanging.
Leo, now Aldiun, felt at his neck where a ring of blood had formed. It was sure to scar.
However, a scar was a much greater outcome than what Aldiun could have faced, which was a gruesome death.
Which brought him to his next topic. The power that had saved his life.
It had called itself the Meddler Path, and seemed to act as some sort of game-like system, granting him powers to alter the world itself, though on a small scale.
Aldiun carried no memories of such a power. After all, it deviated from the natural magic in the world, which was centred around utilising the different types of mana. This meant that Leo's reincarnation, for whatever reason, had activated the power.
He wasn't about to complain. After all, it had saved his life.
Curious, he closed his eyes once again, trying to remember the feeling he had felt when using the ability before.
Only a moment later, he opened his eyes and found himself standing in the sewer water, looking at his sitting physical body.
The water was still, as was his physical body. As he neared closer to it and placed a hand on his shoulder, he was met with a block of text.
[Your level is too low to interact with yourself in any possible way.]
Interesting.
He noted that increasing his level allowed him to interact with the world in greater ways. He tested this again by focusing on the sewer water.
He felt as though his mind wished to interact with it. To force it to flow in a different direction, or perhaps purify it, by filtering out the waste.
However, as he tried to focus on such a thing, another block of text appeared.
[Your level is too low to interact with water in any possible way.]
He stood there and thought for a moment, and as he thought, his system introduced a new section to him.
His current skills.
[Emotional String View: Basic Colours]
[Allows the user to perceive emotional strings extending from beings while in Stillworld.]
Though the description was vague, he swiftly came to an understanding that this was the main ability that he had in what seemed to be called the "Stillworld".
There were also limitations that he understood without the system telling him, such as the fact that he could only sense the most prominent emotion present in the being.
He also had a feeling that certain beings might be too powerful for him to alter the emotions of.
[Present thought: Emotional Tie]
[Allows the user to briefly read the surface thought tied to a visible emotional string while in Stillworld.]
This was his second skill. The one that had allowed him to read the current thoughts of the purple-haired man, as he pitied the hanging Aldiun.
Before he could do anything else, Aldiun felt the timer in his stomach running low. At any moment, he would be drawn from his astral vision, so he closed his eyes and allowed himself to return to the body of Aldiun.
He found myself too drained and fatigued to think any further, so he allowed himself to drift into sleep.
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