Awakening

[You have died and are currently being reborn in the world of HunterxHunter. Please choose one starting wish.]

I stared at the translucent screen that flashed before me, dumbfounded. One second, I had been sleeping peacefully aboard a plane to Italy. The next, I was here, floating in an oddly warm and wet void. I could barely even focus on anything due to the strangeness of the whole situation. What worried me was that everything felt too real to be a dream, and I could never remember my dreams anyway.

As I continued reading and re-reading the message, trying to decide what to do, I suddenly felt my entire body and the space around me tremble briefly before everything stilled just as quickly as it had begun. Pensively, I waited, only to feel the rumbling again. The vibrations were intense but surprisingly gentle. After reading way too many novels and fanfiction in my life, I had a sneaking suspicion that I knew what was going on.

Counting the rumbling, I confirmed my suspicions about where I was. The rumbling was the heartbeat of my mother, whom I am still inside, yet to be born. However, the heartbeat was not that of a normal person or even an elite athlete. My mother's heart rate was only around 15 beats per minute, which erased any suspicion of my reincarnation into an anime world since that heart rate would be impossible to maintain in real life.

I shook my head, mentally at least, and refocused on the situation before me. So far, I have been stunned and unable to come to terms with my new reality fully. If this was even real. Now, with an effort of will, I forced myself to recall everything I knew about HunterxHunter, which wasn't difficult for me. I had read the entire current manga and enjoyed watching analysis videos on the power system of Nen and details about the world.

Even if this situation weren't real, the best course of action would have been to treat it like it was. That way, If I really did find myself reborn, then I wouldn't have any regrets about not taking this seriously. That thought calmed me down slightly as I began to formulate my wish. Under normal circumstances, if it were any other world, this process might have been difficult, but not in the HxH world.

If you want to live and thrive in this world, you need to have Nen. The better your talent, the further ahead of the curve you are compared to everybody else. My wish needed to be centered around boosting my innate talent as much as possible before being born. So, I tried to speak my wish, but that didn't work, of course. Instead, I thought it. I wish for infinite talent with Nen.

[Error. This is an unachievable wish. If you wish for talent, please wish for equivalent talent to any character in the series instead. Sorry for the inconvenience]

I blinked at the message in surprise. I had hoped for more, but I couldn't complain that my wish hadn't worked. After all, I was getting something extremely important for free. No strings attached. However, just because my talent wish got nerfed didn't mean it would be useless. Even with the restraint of only having matching talent to any character in the series, that was still an insanely good deal.

When I read the message, two names immediately popped into my mind: Ging Freecss and Fourth Prince Tserriednich Hui Guo Rou. The problem with choosing one over the other gave me pause for a long while. While Ging may seem like the obvious choice, we are only ever told that he has insane talent with Nen. Meanwhile, Tserriednich demonstrates probably the best natural Nen talent ever seen in the series on screen.

I had to choose either based on hype and statements made by characters or on something I had seen directly and knew was incredible. In the end, I eventually chose Tserriednich since, even if he was the lesser talent of the two, I would still have insane talent either way. I figured that they would both be at a level where the differences between the two's talents wouldn't make much of a difference either way.

[Granting the user talent equivalent to Tserriednich Hui Guo Rou. Good luck on your journey! You are on your own from now on. Goodbye.]

With that final message, the system screen winked out, and I was plunged back into total darkness. Eventually, the excitement of choosing my wish and the adrenaline of knowing that I had been reincarnated into one of my favorite fictional worlds faded, and weariness overcame me. Soon, I slipped into total unconsciousness, awaiting my birth.

~ POV 3rd ~

In a room lit only by harsh fluorescent lights, two figures stood observing a small group huddled around a woman with dark hair pulled back into a bun. She wore a visor on her face that covered both of her eyes. She glanced around alertly despite the worried activity of the servants willing around her swollen stomach. It was clear that she was going into labor, but one wouldn't have guessed that from her demeanor.

Most women would report childbirth and labor as the most painful thing that they would ever experience, but Kikyo Zoldyck was not among the majority. While she could feel the whole process vividly, undoubtedly more than most due to her expert control over her own body as an assassin, it barely caused her heart rate to increase. She just prepared herself to make the delivery as quick and efficient as possible. Especially since she was expecting twins this time around.

She turned and looked toward the two figures beyond the servants. Her husband, Silva, towered over all the servants and the aged form of his father, Zeno. Despite her assurances, both had chosen to stand in and observe the procedure in case anything unforeseen happened. Before she could think of anything else, she felt it.

"Ma'am, it's time for you to push. The twins are on their way." one of the servants said respectfully.

Soon, only after around half an hour, two baby boys were wrapped in blankets and held against Kikyo's chest. The servants backed away as Zeno and Silva finally approached the table, looking down at the two babies. The two men remained silent as they looked down at one of the babies in particular.

There had long been a theme in the family of a child's hair either being black or white. However, the baby boy before them had a line straight down the center of his head, separating an even amount of white and black hair. The peculiarity made Silva's mind immediately jump to curses or genetic diseases, but he immediately dismissed both as unlikely.

"Have you ever heard of something like this before?" Silva asked after a long moment.

He reached down and picked up the child in one large hand, bringing him closer to the two men. Zeno leaned over and looked at the child cradled in Silva's massive hand more carefully. Even in a fantastical world like HxH, it was still strange to have multicolored hair, especially something as bold as an even split of two colors.

"No, I have not. I am sure it is nothing to worry about. Regardless, have you two come up with names for the boys?" Zeno said, shifting the topic away from the boy's strange hair.

"Of course!" Kikyo replied quickly, "This one will be Milluki," she said, gesturing to the child she still held, who resembled a large ball of mochi more than a baby, the immense fat he would gain during his life already starting to accumulate as a baby.

"This one will be Yopi," Silva finished, looking down at his children with a spark of paternal affection deep within his emotionless eyes.

Meanwhile, a shadow silently strode into the room. It made no sound as it moved, and there was not even a sent driving in the air to give away the shadow's presence as I snuck up behind the group. However, before it could strike, a voice rang out.

"Illumi, dear, why don't you say hello to your brothers?" Kikyo called out, Silva and Zeno not even bothering to turn to greet Illumi, whom they had long since sensed.

With not even a sigh of disappointment or any visible reaction at being spotted, a seven-year-old Illumi silently trotted over and inspected his two new siblings. After a quick glance, he moved on from the chubby child to the one with white and black hair, Yopi. As Illumi poked the child's cheeks, eliciting a soft laugh from the sleeping Yopi, the emotions behind Illumi's dark eyes remained inscrutable. 

~ ~ ~ Chapter End ~ ~ ~

Image of Yopi