The Tower
Zephyr
Solitude and darkness seemed to have a way to affect the way time and space ebbed and flowed.
Magic, or rather, Arcane energy was energy gifted to the world by the 'Arcana Gods', and not all were endowed with their blessings.
Dregs were forsaken— arcaneless creatures seen as lesser beings, believed by some to even be malevolent. The 'Wheel of Fortune' seemed to have its preferences. Arcanist parents, no matter how powerful they were, had a chance of producing a dreg offspring. None seemed to know why such people existed, or, it was more likely I didn't know from his limited information.
Each Arcanist was born tethered to an unseen Arcane spirit known as their "origin spirit". Often, those spirits would lay dormant until one reached a certain age. Most would unlock it by the age of five, yet on rare occasions, some had to wait until up to the age of 10 and were considered lacking in talent.
Yet, there existed those who had to wait until certain criteria were met. These criteria varied, unique like snowflakes— none ever matching another. As such, it was possible for there to be dregs above the age of ten who have simply gone through life not yet reaching that set criteria, yet those people were anomalies.
With this knowledge, I clung to this possibility, experimenting tirelessly, yet each endeavour ended in vain disappointment.
If Zephyr lived several years of his life not unlocking anything, the likelihood of me doing it now was slim to none.
As such, I did what I knew best, and closed my eyes to focus inwards… Perhaps now, with more knowledge, I could better resonate with the world's arcane energy…
'Ahhhhh—'
Yet, amidst my concentration, there was a sound… I noticed it ever since I exited the mines… Bizarre yet seemingly inconsequential. It began as a sombre muffled hush, and gradually became louder… A scream, like a car approaching me far from the distance…
Try as I might to ignore it, it ran incessantly in my ear. An annoyance that ever so slightly, hampered my concentration…
But that was when suddenly, the screaming… the ringing voices in my ears stopped all at once…
Perplexed, I paused and opened my eyes before I heard what I could only describe as the sound of a rolling ball…
'Hmmm?' I looked down and that's when I saw it…
My eyes went so wide they nearly popped out of their sockets… It could not be real… Vigorously, I rubbed my eyes and stared… Yet it still remained in front of me… bright as the sun.
The head of Norman… the boy I had just killed…
It burned an obscure, ethereal translucent blueish white and rolled right before me, a glowing beacon within the ebony that strangely seemed to not illuminate…
Right before my feet, it stopped… There was a brief silence as I looked into its shrill eyes, before it exploded into a blinding white that engulfed all…
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There it was again. That same feeling of unfeeling that felt so distant yet so familiar.
His mind numbed.
He felt nothing, and all he saw was white…
Until suddenly—
The whiteness dimmed, receding at the edges like a tide pulling back from the shore to reveal a realm that far defied the ordinary…
His eyes opened to see unknown colours… most similar to the human hues of deep purples and blues. They mingled with a soft glow surrounding pillars of stones… No… Towers.
He looked around him.
Towers as far as the eye could see, erected from the clouds beneath, stretching endlessly into the sky as though upholding an invisible ceiling.
They were grand, otherworldly structures… their tips and ends were lost to the eye— infinite in both size and number, lost in the sea of ethereal clouds above and below…
It was only then that he noticed where he stood. Not in these clouds, but on a dark cobblestone road overlooking a vast expanse surrounded by black rocks, mud, dirt, and dark green grass. There were strange trees and flowers, some dead, and some alive and flourishing next to each other.
The ground beneath him was solid, yet it felt as if it were made of the same stuff as dreams.
He was on a small island, floating amidst an ethereal expanse of clouds and towers— The only anomaly in this otherwise ordered world.
Unconsciously, he looked behind him only to see the ethereal void once again—one step back would send him plunging into doom.
He had spawned on the precipice, and the only path ahead was forward, laid before him in stone. And thus, unconsciously once more, he took his first step forward and moved.
Joseph's mind was overwhelmed trying to internalize everything all at once— it was oddly nowhere near as calm or as natural as his reincarnation.
Never in his life had his brain ached so heavily, at least from something like this. Yet even still, Joseph found a way to keep his calm.
'Have I been reincarnated again into another world?' He thought to himself, only to look down at his now familiar wooden left arm and disregard it.
'No… I'm still Zephyr… But what is this place… It's so…'
His eyes panned side to side as he moved forward…
Lifting his right, he glided his hands on the path's black, dusty railing, not thinking as it suddenly appeared.
There was an uncanny sense that crept into his ever-unsteadying heart as he looked at the scene around him.
It felt like… Deja-vu? He couldn't quite understand it… Was it memories from the original Zephyr? Was it why he didn't feel any danger here? If so then—
'What a pity… Still too weak…' Suddenly, an odd ethereal voice echoed all around him.
"Huh!?" Joseph's nerves jolted away, and his eyes began looking for answers.
The words hung in the air, laced with a melancholic tone that seemed to resonate from everywhere and nowhere all at once.
His vision once again dimmed and looked down to see his hands sparkling, and slowly turning translucent as both he and that voice began gradually fading away.
'I wish I had time to see you… Master Joseph…'
As the last syllables of the voice trailed off, Joseph felt the world slipping away, his presence fading like the last flicker of a candle in the wind.
'Joseph…' He slowly pondered, and his eyes glimmered as he noticed, "WAIT!! Who are you!? How do you know my na—"
He reached his arm out as he felt himself withering away, but it was too late.
In the blink of an eye, the mystical realm vanished. The endless towers, the bottomless void - all replaced in an instant by the utter darkness of his earlier confines…
Joseph found himself back where he had began, like it had all been nothing but a dream, yet that scenery and voice burned deep in his brain spoke otherwise.
Sweat trickled down his visage as he looked at his outstretched arm grasped at nothing but empty shadows…
It was then that he noticed it— swirling and emanating a sickening purple mist that flowed around the back of his wooden left hand— A tattoo-like mark of a simple stone tower…
'It was all real…' He now had no doubts. 'The Tower… The High Priestess… Twenty-two Greats… Twenty-two tarot cards… It all makes sense now…'
In a panic, he smacked his left hand on the sharp, rocky ground, causing cracks and scratches on the wood.
His mind moved like lightning, calculating his next moves with meticulous precision. He instantly tore a part of his attire, and wrapped it around the wound he could not feel, making sure the mark of 'The Tower' was covered along with it.
He steadied his breath, looking at his wound, his hand heavily shaking and mumbled…
"Temporal Echo… Act 1…"
The words just slipped out of his mouth. He had no idea how or why the information came, but there it was nevertheless.
It was as though he began seeing the world, and his body in a new light… A deep, yet murky purple flicker that soothed within an orb, like faint ripples in the sea… Or rather, a puddle would have been a more accurate description.
His knowledge of this world was still meagre, yet even he understood that this energy was pathetic, like ten grains of sand dropping from a brimming hourglass. If he had to put a number on it, it was 2% full.
He had no doubt in his mind, this was his arcane core— the source where all arcanists drew their energy.
From it, he felt a tingle that spread through his entire body. It was not Ki, this feeling was completely alien from it, to the point that he felt they did not belong in the same realm of existence.
What caused such a sudden change? Had he been an unawakened arcanist the entire time and somehow completed that hidden criteria? If so, then what was it? He could not recall doing anything necessarily special at the time it happened…
The more he learned, the more his ignorance became apparent. There were still so many unanswered questions ravaging Joseph. In this sudden flash of inspiration, he had somehow unlocked how to use magic… or rather, arcane arts, as they called it in this world.
"Temporal Echo Act 1…" He mumbled the words once more, as he slowly began realizing things were manifesting within his festering mind.
However, that was not what pressed him the most.
Those last words he heard… 'Joseph' — that voice did not call him Zephyr, but Joseph…
It was his previous life's name… Somehow, that voice knew it…
Perhaps that place was the domain of some god and held the secret of his reincarnation, and possibly even Nina's fate and whereabouts all lay there.
'How is that possible? What was that place? Who was that voice? I need to find a way back—'
"INNMATE ZEPHYR!!" like a thunderclap shattering a cloudy sky, a voice pierced the fabric of his contemplation. "By Captain Alton's command, I am here to escort you back into your cell!"
With a sharp bite of his tongue, Joseph stilled the chaos within him. He exhaled slowly, allowing the tension to seep out of his body with the breath.
'No… Now is not the time for that…' He took another breath and finally stood up.
It was an enigma, a puzzle for which he currently had no time to reference points or find clues, and to dwell on it seemed as fruitless as trying to grasp the wind.
As the door opened revealing the faintest embers of the lit hall, he suppressed all his turmoil and curiosity under an impeccable poker face.
There was a rhythm to the universe, a right moment for each action, and he would not let his composure falter. Not now. Not when he needed to be most clear-headed…
'As long as I gain power… I'm certain the answers will come find me eventually… No use in worrying about such an anomaly if I'm dead… For now… I must figure out this Temporal Echo ability… Whatever it may be… It might very well be the key to it all…'