original

Djinn : Shatterers of Old

Chapter 1: The clear blue sky

Pain, piercing pain, exploding pain. It felt like every particle of his head was stabbed, trampled and fried. Fortunately, he was only able to feel it happening from an outsider's perspective.

'Man, that's gotta hurt... But who is he ? Wait, no, actually who am I ?'

Then, it started, he suddenly, without a warning, felt an urge to bit his own tongue and rip it off his own mouth, to gouge out his eyes and tear his face in half using his own hands. The feeling was impossible to resist, lest for the fact that he didn't have the capacity to move.

His personality, memories and emotions were in pieces and nothing seemed to make sense. He instinctively attempted to classify them, arrange them in a narrative, to make a story. Unable to answer the simplest question such as what was his name and what he looked like or even which language he originally spoke in, he desperately searched for an anchor. A fixed point to act as a witness to his identity as a human being.

Nothing seemed to work, everything he saw led him to believe that he was not a person after all. Perhaps he was simply the equivalent of multiple thoughts, feelings and sensations put into a blender for too long.

While his dying consciousness was collapsing on itself helplessly, in the deepest part of his memories, he discovered something. A sort of nucleus that seemed to contain something whole in this fragmented landscape. Feeling a strange thrill, he made a single step towards it and saw a face. This was a very good-looking face, with a bit of a malicious smile visible in its dark red eyes. It looked like a 10 years old boy of Egyptian origin and felt like something entirely different. More importantly the face felt ridiculously familiar, more so than all the persons who seemed to share some kind of parental bond with him.

Even more confused, he saw his consciousness arrange on its own, memories clearly separated themselves and combined in comprehensible ways. All he could think about at the time was : That's not my face.

He hurriedly took another step towards the nucleus but it seemed to completely vaporize into thin air. Finally, he heard a juvenile voice articulate : "Nartolem".

'That's not my name either.'

This last thought resonated in his mind before he fell asleep.

***

Blue. Sky blue. Warmth. Joy. He felt ecstasy spread in his entire being. He took in all the sensation around him like a drowning victim after reaching the shore. The sun, the texture of grass on his fingers and its' refreshing smell when he breathed. The comforting heartbeat and the awareness of his body...

'Wait, that's not right. '

He extirpated himself of those pleasant feelings and seriously started using his brain. First, he could not remember his face or name but had a rather still a good idea what happened : he had died and been reborn. And this world wasn't the one he came from. He could tell because of a new addition to his memories, it was probably what made him in this state earlier.

Understandably, having a completely new identity grafted to your memories after your own death wasn't a very easy process. It seemed to have worked out however, fortunately.

Different from his own facial features, he could clearly remember those of the person he "absorbed". He was named Tom, a 10-year-old farmer with a common face and bright brown hair. He was a follower of the Church of Mother Earth in this world, which was called Blue... The name sounded more profound in the original language.

'Actually this poor guy was pretty much sold by his parents to this farm... He became a bit of a weird kid and doesn't know enough about anything, how annoying. Well, can't expect much from a 10-year-old body anyway.'

'As for me, I'm a 19 years old student, no 20 now. Right, I remember everything except my damn name. And why exactly did I replace Tom, did he die ? I don't remember that happening...'

Laying on his back, he brought his hand before his eyes. It was a small but masculine hand with light-copper skin, different from the pale Tom's. He raised a brow. I think I have a guess. The hand made contact with his face and its' features were clearly drawn in his mind.

It was clearly the face he was so familiar with, the one belonging to Nartolem, whoever he was. Other than this, he felt absolutely fine. He moved to his black, messy hair and then the back of his head, it felt sticky. At this moment, a metallic smell assaulted his nostrils, overcoming the scent of grass. Blood.

The nameless boy jolted awake and raised his body to observe his surroundings. In the clear blue sky, the sun was still rising above the grass and surrounding forest and mountains. It was a truly beautiful sight, resembling a certain European region. However, the stunned dark-red eyes were watching something else entirely. It was a white-furred animal who also appeared stunned upon seeing him move. He instantly spotted the bloody feet, splattered with brain matter and observed, wide-eyed, as the beast periodically expired a cloud of orange flames. His brain came to a full stop as a single thought came to his mind :

'This is a goddamned beast who can breathe fire. And it is right in front of me ! '

Unable to find a more intelligent thing to do, he quickly got on his two numb legs and ran away in a random direction under the dumb look of the alpaca which seemed to be completely flabbergasted. Yes, alpaca.