Reminiscence

Back in my previous life, we were in the year 2438. The world had been a fantastic technological paradise where androids walked around like people without fear of being assaulted due to a hate crime. The world had gone through some crazy events that one could not help but call supernatural.

For example, long before birth, around some time in 2147, humanity had been forced into a tournament by the so-called "Gods". It was reported that the entire populations of many worlds were cursed and if their fighters didn't win, their population would be wiped out. Thankfully, a man named Leon Walker had put an end to the game and revolted against the gods, becoming a hero known across worlds.

Or another time, in 2298, when the first human group traveled to another star system for the conquest of a distant planet. They were met with great resistance from the local population, and a majority of their group was wiped out, but the remaining three survivors ended up becoming the first colonizers of Evo.

An event more recent to me was in 2384, when the only son of the legendary Marcus Umbra, a man who had brought forth the very technological age that I adored so much, had single-handedly created a new age where androids and humans lived together, side by side as equals. He fought for the lives of those that weren't even seen as human, and in the end, became a legend.

I used to spend many days learning more and more about our planet's long, and interesting history. I had always aspired to leave behind an incredible legend, just like those legends. However, reality had other plans. While I did not mind one bit, it was rather disappointing to learn I would never be able to make a mark on my own world. 

I sat up in my bed, it is now one week until Stella's assassination attempt is to take place. I had filled my mana gloves quite a bit and Everett had been making excellent progress with Liara. The two lovebirds had managed to rekindle their old spark and officially started dating as of yesterday. 

"Lucky them." I sighed as I got out of my bed. It was late at night and I had planned to meet Cassandra in the library, as we had been doing ever since the first time.

I wish I had experienced romance in my past life. Although I had decent looks (at least by my standards) I was bad at talking to girls and was a loner. Of course, I was knowledgeable on the subject of speaking to girls, but it was much harder to do it in reality than in theory. 

I used a restoration spell to wash away the drowsiness on my face and began walking toward the library. When I had finally rounded the corner to the library, I noticed two castle maids patrolling the perimeter. The maid on the left had long orange hair that went down to her waist and large breasts. The maid beside her had comparatively smaller breasts with shoulder-length blonde hair. I quickly teleported back around the corner, startled by their presence. In my hasty retreat, I let the sound of my footsteps be heard, which had alerted the maids.

"Did you hear that, Nyssa? The flat chested maid spoke up.

"It was probably just the wind, Ellie." The busty maid replied in a condemning tone. "Remember the time you said you thought you saw something, so we left our posts to investigate and it turned out to be a stray cat?"

"Ahh! You promised you wouldn't bring that up!"

"Don't worry, El. There's no one around that can even hear us."

I wouldn't be so certain about that, Ms. Maid. After listening to their banter for a bit, which I found amusing, I deduced that they were incompetent. Well, I shouldn't underestimate them, they are palace maids after all. A position just under the royal guard in terms of strength. 

I activated 'time barrier' to set up a freezing radius using my time-altering abilities. Time froze to a stop and my mana began draining slowly. I had plenty of magic power to spare so I used 'accelerate x', a special version of time alter, allowing me to increase the speed of my movement tenfold. I sped past the two frozen maids and swiftly made it to the entrance to the library. I opened the door and the moment I stepped in, the effects of the time freeze had been turned off by me. However, by the time I had turned it off, I had already shut the door to the library.

Cassandra had been at the desk near the front of the library when I came in. She looked up at me and immediately shut the book she was reading. She then threw the book halfway across the room. Jeez, what could she possibly have been reading? I had a brief thought of rushing to see what the book was, but as if reading my mind, she glared at me with immense killing intent. I wiped the thought from my mind as I did not want to invoke the wrath of my older sister. Something told me that no matter how satisfied I would be with the answer, it would not be able to bring me back.

I walked over to Cassandra's table and sat down right next to her. She scooted her chair next to mine and we began going over different magic theories. She had been incredibly invested in learning about different spells ever since Everett's classes, or had it been sooner? As we scanned through many different books on spells, she and I had not only learned more about spells but each other as well.

Cassandra wasn't just the strict and quick-tempered girl that kept to herself the novel portrayed her as. She was the type of person to quickly put aside differences and prejudices if it meant the good of herself and others. She worked hard on magic theory not because she had no talent, but because she did. She wasn't as conceited as she came off and was able to accept when an opponent or rival was stronger than her. All this considered, this girl beside me, she felt like a real person. I wonder what she learned about me.

"Raine, you said your teleportation only works for places that you have either seen before or can perfectly visualize, right?"

"Yes." I nodded, interested in where this was going.

"Well then, does that mean you can teleport yourself to distant worlds if you manage to picture them properly?"

An excellent question. I felt the need to praise her for her amazing thinking skills. However, I kept it to myself. 

"Impossible." I replied shortly.

"What? Why?" Cassandra let out a confused outcry.

"It's simple, mana cost." I raised my finger as I spoke and she paid close attention. "My teleportation costs around one thousand magic power per kilometer."

Cassandra widened her eyes in shock. To a young child like her, she couldn't even think of using that much power. Of course, this changes in the future, but it still limits the number of places I could go. Someone like Everett, who is considered to be at the top of mana capacity couldn't even make it to the earth's moon. If Aaron had spatial manipulation, he would undoubtedly have been unstoppable. Thankfully, his only universe magic is 'ability copy', which will in the future, develop into 'ability steal '. Although that skill might be overpowered, it will take him a long time to evolve it since he doesn't often use the ability.

"As of right now, I would only have enough mana to move about five kilometers. In the future, that might be different, but not even Everett could go far with his magic capacity."

"I see." Cassandra looked downward embarrassed as if she had said something wrong.

"It was a great question, Cassandra! For instance, if there were someone with a limitless supply of mana, they would certainly be able to travel that far!"

I did my best to assure Cassandra that her theory was certainly possible. She looked up, red in the face, and nodded. I forgot how sensitive children of her age were. I recalled the moment when I was crying on Stella's shoulder, then again, my body seemed to have become far more sensitive as well. I shook my head and continued going over theorems with her.

"Cassandra, what if you were to compress an extreme amount of mana into a single small area?" I asked, "Logically, the mana would explode causing massive amounts of damage to the person, and the surrounding area." She looked at me with a sour expression, I feel I might've said something to make her like that.

"Mhm."

We continued reading and she turned to ask with a dark expression, "Would you be able to teleport into another human if you saw what their insides looked like?"

What the hell kind of question is that? Well, I would be lying if I said I hadn't already thought about it, but hearing those words come out of the mouth of a six-year-old is just a little disturbing.

"Well, no, unfortunately. The body is in constant motion, which makes it hard to predict and calculate where to teleport. I could teleport to their position if I saw them in front of me, but the strain of entering another person would destroy both of us."

"Oh, I see." She nodded, somewhat satisfied with my answer.

Once more, we went back to reading through different books about magic. I came across a page on merging magic. Merging magic has been around for a long time, and many people have experience in merging different spells that may be useful. I thought in my head about the different ways I could merge spells. I have already compressed atoms in the air and used earth magic to create uranium, but what if I were to create a person using different elements? Oh my, looks like I have a new passion project to work on.

"Raine," I turned to see Cassandra looking at me, she was wearing a small frown on her face and I could see a faint gloss in her eyes, "do you hate me?"

"Wha-?" 

I had thought Cassandra and I were getting along fine the past few weeks. I've been talking to her a lot and I had even set up specific times when we could meet up and discuss magic. 

"Whenever you're with me, you never smile. Any time I suggest something for your improvement, you immediately brush it off…" Her face was turning redder by the moment and I could see tears beginning to well up, "And you always call me Cassandra when I told you to call me Cassie!"

She listed off a number of behavioral issues I had which gave off the impression of disinterest. It seems that she truly believed that I disliked her, which was in no way true. For starters, Raine's emotional expressions had always been minimal in the novels. I had the same issue in my previous life, which often drove people away. I can see why she would think I had a distaste for her, but I had no way to deal with that. The other issues I could explain.

"Cassandra-"

"See! Just now you called me Cassandra again!"

I put my hand up to calm her down and she stopped speaking, "You can ignore the facial expressions, that's just how I am. As for your suggestions, while they are all excellent ideas, they were already explored by me. So there was really no reason for me to try them again."

Cassandra had calmed herself down and she wiped most of the tears from her face, "But, why do you still call me Cassandra?"

"Ah, that…" I looked away and I felt my cheeks heat up, "It's a bit embarrassing."

In my past life, I had never been close enough to anyone to call them by a nickname, so this is honestly a first for me. I've always called people by their first names, and this especially extended to the opposite gender. Although I had the ultimate knowledge of the human psyche, I had negative knowledge of speaking.

 I explained to her that I just felt a bit of embarrassment calling her that. This development seemed to have cheered her up greatly. She no longer had any trace of tears on her face and her grimace had been flipped to a wide smile. 

She put one hand on her chest and proudly exclaimed, "You have no need to be embarrassed around me! I would never make fun of my family."

"Oh…" 

I see. This is what I am supposed to protect. This bright light, shrouded in a translucent case. Although she may hide her emotions as much as possible, she still lets moments like this slip. It appears that I had been worried for nothing.

"I see, thank you… Cassie" I said.

She looked as if she had been caught off guard as her face went bright red. She immediately shook her head and left a large grin remaining.

"It looks like you could smile."

I touched my mouth and felt that the corners were slightly curved for a moment. So this is family… It's nice.