Chapter 2. Strange New World

The second thought that came to Amon was that this was actually hell. His soul had been put inside a helpless baby body and these people around him would start to administer different kinds of torture upon him as punishments for his sins.

He did not feel scared though. He had gone through numerous kinds of torture during the course of his life, both administered to him or by him. He instead sort of looked forward to what kind of creative method these torturers would do to him.

Yet, the tortures never came. He was instead taken care of with utmost attention. In a way, this was a kind of torture for him. A mighty general who had caused fear and terror upon the entire Earth, now laid here as a helpless baby, being nursed and fed. He even needed the help of these people to clean his piss and shit. The devil was indeed creative in devising his torturing method.

Days passed. He slowly accepted the fact that this was not hell. He could feel his body growing. The people around him were also shown to have other activities other than tending to him. It felt real enough.

However, he was sure that this place was not Earth, or even if it was the same universe from where he was from. The first reason was because of their language. It was not any language he knew of. He could speak many languages of Earth. Although he could not say that he knew all the languages of the Earth, he had heard a great deal of them and could identify them even if he did not understand them. The language that was spoken by these people though, was completely foreign.

The second reason was because of the devices they used. Lamps, books, and writing instruments, were unlike anything he had seen before. The lamps were not powered by electricity. The books, when opened, would have runes floating around them. Some could even produce moving images.

A third reason was because of his caretaker, that's what he called the person who took care of him. Amon did not see any individuals he could identify as his parents. There were no couples that showed him affection when he was born. Only a group of men and women who showed curiosity and interest in his being.

This group of people took turns to take care of him, but at the end of the day, there was always this aged man that watched over him. This aged man looked more like his grandfather than his father. He did not see anyone there that he could identify as his mother or father. It didn't matter though. Even if there were, he would not consider them his parents. That aged man that watched over him, was the one he came to call his caretaker.

The reason that his caretaker contributed to the idea that this was not the Earth where he was from, was because every night after making sure that Amon was asleep, the aged man would sit cross-legged upon his bed and started to meditate. Amon was of course not asleep, he just pretended to. He would then observe his caretaker's meditation and saw numerous fancy lights gathered and swirling around him. It was almost like magic.

This completely piqued Amon's interest. He realized then that this world did not revolve around the same rules as his old one.

The people who took care of him started to teach him how to speak. They taught him the strange local language. Even before these people started to teach him, he had already started to learn from them through their daily conversations. He could not yet say that he had mastered them, but he started to understand bits and pieces.

When the people taught him though, he pretended to not understand most of them. He did not yet know about the nature of this world, it was better to pretend a normal baby as he continued to observe the situation.

When these people were not looking, Amon also tried to learn to stand and walked. It was a difficult task, due to his weak little baby legs. Around four months after he came into this world, he managed to walk successfully. Of course, when any others were present, he continued to lie helplessly in his crib.

Once he could move around the room, he started to look at the magical books that he could get to. When he opened the books, the letters within them started to dance around as they formed some sort of formation. He did not understand any of the letters, as none of the people taking care of him had taught him how to read this world's writings. Nevertheless, it did not stop him from trying to learn or made sense of it.

Little by little, he started to be able to connect some of the runes to the words that he had learned. When his caretaker started to teach him about the writings, his understanding skyrocketed. Yet, he did not show any of it. He continued to pretend as if he was like any other normal baby.

At eight months of age, he could roughly read a book already. Although many meanings still escaped his grasp, he could understand most of the writings.

From the books and the conversations he heard from the people that took care of him. He learned some basic structures of this world. This world was called Aetheria, it was not based on the logic and science that dominated his old world. This one revolved around some sort of mystical energy the locals termed Aether. The name of this world was given due to this mystical energy.

This aether existed everywhere, and it could be harnessed to create many things or to be used to do great things. One of the books he read depicts that aether could be used to control the elements, such as fire and lightning. People who knew how to utilize the aether could perform what his old-world depicted as magic.

Learning about this miraculous thing, Amon could not help but felt excited. A new plaything for him, he thought with anticipation.

He also learned that what his caretaker did every night with that light show, was called cultivating. It was an act to absorb the aether around and used it to nourish the energy core that existed within one's body. The book depicted that this energy core would start forming once someone came to five years of age, and would grow stronger if the right cultivation method was used. This energy core could evolve to a higher stage when it reached the limit of its current stage.

It's all very fascinating, but to wait till he reached five years of age was rather boring. Yet there was nothing he could do. He could only continue to learn through the books as he waited for his energy core to form.

When he was one year of age, he did not bother to hide anymore when he read. He would just take a book and sat in a corner and read it silently as the others were doing their businesses. Most just thought of him as a silent child who liked to read and left him to his own device.

The house, or rather, the mansion he grew up in, consisted of several interconnected buildings. It was considered large for his old-world standard. But the occupants were not that many, he counted only fourteen, nine men and five women.

From their casual conversations which Amon eavesdropped on from time to time, he deduced that they used to be part of a large clan. They were somehow involved with a cult that held forbidden knowledge and ended up being punished by the city lord. They had been in decline ever since.

Their main income came from chores that they performed for other clans and the medicines that the eldest women in this mansion concocted.

At two years of age, Amon had been actively roaming around the mansion. Most of the occupants only saw him as an overcurious child and left him be. He spent lots of time watching the elderly woman concoct medicine. He also realized that some of the medicine that she made was in reality, poison. In fact, through his observations, he could see that she sold more poisons in comparison to medicine.

He paid attention to where the old woman stored her ingredients and recipes. She also kept a notebook that she left inside her workroom. When she was not around, Amon took the notebook and studied them. He was not a master alchemist, but he knew a bit about them. He had dealt with toxins in his past life.

The contents of the notebook were very much confusing at first, as all the terms and ingredients noted inside were completely alien to him. But he studied them patiently, comparing them with the ingredients and recipes inside the workroom. Eventually, he gained an understanding of them.

He did not attempt any experimentation though. Such an action would easily be discovered. He just kept all the knowledge to himself for the time being.

In his third year of age, he felt something unusual with his body.