by D. Levesque
I reach up to the top of my head, to the back where I know I have a bald spot starting, and I meet hair. Thick hair, not the thin spot of skin that I usually feel through the little hair that’s left. What the fuck did God do? Tentatively, I touch the scraggly goatee I’d been growing on Earth, and instead of that, I feel a beard-a well-trimmed, thick beard-which I am sure is just as black as my new hair.
Quickly I reach into my pants, but my dick is the same size. Thank God. While I was a dork, and short, I had that going for me, as the girls would always tell me after dumping me. I wonder what else God changed? I wish I had a damn mirror! Suddenly, the singing reminds me of what I was doing before I interrupted myself. Slowly moving forward again through the trees, I keep walking as the voice gets louder. Then I see her.
She is sitting on a rock, and she is not human, that much I can tell. Even from this distance, I can see that her ears are the ears of an Elf! I know God said this world had other races, but I thought he meant races of people! Not different species! The Elf is beautiful and unlike any woman I have ever seen. Although she isn’t looking at me, she is facing me, and I can see her eyes. They are an amazing cerulean blue that, even in the dark, seem to shine on their own. She is wearing a leather outfit, but there is no way that this is armor. Unless it’s similar to most RPG games that I have played, where they make women’s armor incredibly skimpy.
She has long blond hair, and as she continues to sing, I realize that although the language she is using is different than the one I know, I am starting to understand it. I am not sure how. Her lips, which are just as beautiful as her, are singing words that I know are not English, and yet I still comprehend them. She is singing a song of water and lakes, and how the water feeds the surrounding forests. I move closer to hear her song better and I end up stepping on a stick, causing it to snap really loud. The singing stops abruptly, and the Elf looks up and sees me.
Her eyes widen in shock and she stands up, and suddenly there is a blue ball in her hand, and it’s lit with an inner light. Fuck, is she using magic? I don’t have time to think after that, because suddenly that magical ball of whatever it is, is hurtling towards me. Oh shit, I am about to die. I bring my hand up to ward off the blow of whatever is coming at me when I hear a voice speaking another language in my head.
Fire. Heat, the giver of life, or the taker of it. Like a flame of the sun, it can burn, or it can nurture. Keyword. Fire.
“Fire?” I say out loud. But although the voice in my head had been speaking in the language of the Elf, I repeat the word in English.
Somehow, as soon as I’m done speaking, a wall of fire appears between me and the flying whatever. It hits the wall of fire and stops and turns into steam. Fuck, it was water she threw at me? Suddenly there are more balls of water flying at me, but each time the water ends up dying on the wall of fire, which somehow I can see through.
“Wait!” I yell. “I am not here to hurt you!”
What the fuck? How am I able to speak in her language? I thought I was speaking in English, but that’s not what came out. Is that the weapon that fucking God dude was talking about? Magic? Did he give me fucking magic? Holy shit! The Elf isn’t listening to me and keeps hurtling magic balls, but I can see that instead of being angry now, she is scared.
“Wait! I just heard your singing and I found it beautiful, so I came to listen to it,” I tell her, desperately hoping she will stop.
But she doesn’t, and she is now throwing them so fast, it’s nuts. Do people not have mana or power pools here to limit the amount they can shoot? I need to figure out a way to stop her from shooting at me. If only I had magical ropes. As soon as I think that, I hear more words in my head.
Earth. Mud, rocks, plants, forests. The giver of food and life. As with all things, it can kill you or feed you. Keyword. Earth.
“Earth,” I say, and again it’s in English, but I feel the power behind that one word. I imagine vines coming out of the ground and wrapping around her wrists and bringing her down to the ground. Gently! I amend that last thought.
Without warning, vines pop out of the ground, causing her eyes to widen in fear even more. Faster than she can move, they wrap around her wrists and bring her flat down to the ground, causing the magical water ball in her hand to sputter. But then, that water ball changes into a knife, and she starts cutting the vine.
Another vine shoots out of the ground and wraps around her wrist, replacing the one that she just cut. I can see the anger appear on her face, and suddenly she has a spinning blade of water in each of her hands, and they are cutting through the vines. However just as quickly, more vines are shooting out of the ground to replace them.
What the holy fuck! Shit, think. Think like a gamer! What Elements can I even play with? God mentioned five of them. So do I have Water as well? Can I use Water and Air to create ice?
Water. Quencher of Thirst. Eroder of rock. Shaper of the world. Keyword. Water.
Wind. Storm master. Path destructor, or the gentle breeze in your hair. Keyword. Wind.
“Water, Wind,” I say again in English, lifting both my hands, palms up.
As I finish, a ball of water appears in one of my hands, and on the palm of my other hand, a ball of air. I slap both of them together, and then I swing my arms to the right, away from my body, and they both disappear in a blur.
I hear a shout of surprise, and glancing back at the Elf girl quickly, I see water surround her wrists, then her hands, and finally her spinning blades. Following quickly behind the water, a wind blows through the area, and her hands are suddenly encased in ice, causing the water blades that had been spinning to freeze, and stopping them in their tracks.
I stare at the firewall in front of me, and I try to think about how to cancel it. Maybe I have to use English again?
“Fire,” I say in English, and think of it going away.
And just like that, the firewall between me and this beautiful and now angry Elf woman, who is glaring daggers of pure hatred at me, disappears. I look at her closer, and see a lot of fear as well.
I walk up to her and bend down, so that I am eye level with her, since the water and vines had pulled her down into a squatting position.
“You will not take me,” she cries, struggling to get out of the ice handcuffs? Ice manacles? Ice jail? No fucking clue what to even call these things. When she talks, I notice that while I understand her, she’s not speaking English.
“You do understand that I wasn’t trying to attack you, correct?” I ask her. Shockingly, I am talking in the same language as her, but I don’t even know how I am doing it! As I speak the words, I just know what to say, even though in my head, I am speaking in English.
“How do you know how to speak Elvish?” she asks me in shock.
“What? I don’t know. The same way I was able to understand you when you were singing,” I tell her, looking at her in confusion.
Is that another gift from God? To know, speak and understand any language? Fucking hell! He said he would give me weapons to survive. Are magic and hmm, the gift of tongues, the weapons?
“Wait, you understood me singing a song in Elder Elvish?” the beautiful Elf says in horror.
“Yes?” I say, unsure why she sounds so upset at that prospect. “I mean, it had to do with water, river, and trees, or the trees being nourished by the river,” I tell her. “I assume since you can use Water magic, that was why you were singing it?”
She doesn’t answer but looks at me and then down at her hands before asking, “How is it you are able to use more than one Element?”
Now it’s my turn to look down at her hands and then up at her face again. She looks confused; probably just as much as I am. “I don’t know. Can’t everyone here use magic?” I ask her.
She struggles in the Ice Manacles-which is the name I’ve decided to go with for now-for a second or two, but I can tell she isn’t putting much effort in it. It looks more like she is testing their strength. After a minute she stops and settles
down on her legs to take the weight off of them.
“Who are you?” she asks me, looking up at me.
“Oh. Hi, I’m Alex,” I tell her with a shrug. “And you are?”
“I am Leeha Nightleaf,” she says slowly. “You do not have a full name, Alex?” she asks me with an inquisitive look on her beautiful Elven face. Now that I am closer, I can see that her eyes are a piercing blue and her lips are red and full.
Oh, wait. If I give her my real name, will I be under her power? Honestly, I never really did like my last name Boston. I decide since I am on a new world, I will give myself a new name, so I go with-. What? Shit. Does it need to be a real name? I mean, let’s see. It seems like I can summon all the elements like a summoner. Oh, hey, I like that: Alex, the Elemental Summoner.
“My name is Alex, the Elemental Summoner,” I tell her with a grin, excited at the idea of using a cool title like that instead of a last name.
But instead of smiling at my joke, she turns white and starts to struggle harder than she was before.
“No, no. It cannot be! Let go of me!” She is sobbing and crying, and I can see blood on her wrists where she is trying to pull away from the Ice Manacles. Shit, what the fuck? How can I make her stop? She is going to hurt herself!
Mind. What is real and what is fake? Memories of love, anger, hate, and others are fleeting, but vivid reminders that we are creatures of emotions. Keyword. Mind.
Shit, mind. Let’s see. “Mind,” I say in English again. Then, looking at her as she struggles, I say in English, “Sleep.”
Suddenly she slumps down, sleeping with her wrists still in the Ice Manacles.
“What the fucking hell,” I say out loud, and I am so frazzled I can’t tell if I say it in English or Elven. I just sit there and stare at the Elf who freaked out when I said I was the Elemental Summoner.
Chapter Five
As I gaze down at the beautiful sleeping Elf, I have got to wonder what in the fuck just happened here. She didn’t freak out ‘til I said the phrase Elemental Summoner. I mean, I only thought of using it because in some of the games I have played online, a Summoner was a character who could call up the Elements, like Fire, or Water, or such. I figured since it appears that I can call up all the Elements instead of just one, I would call myself the Elemental Summoner.
How the fuck was I supposed to know that it would cause her to try to get away from me as if I had said that I was about to kill her? I mean, she was definitely afraid after I told her my name. No, not afraid. She was terrified. She even ignored the pain in her wrists to try to get away. I am sure if she could have, she would have gnawed her own hands off to get away from me.
I am not sure I want to be here when she wakes up, but I can’t leave her like this. Glancing at the ice around her wrists, I say, “Wind, Water,” in English, and think of it melting away. The ice turns into water again and slowly sinks into the forest’s loamy bed.
I look at the Elf and think again that maybe I should not be around when she wakes up. If she is freaking out, I need to leave. But how long will she sleep for? Will she only sleep until I take the spell off her? I decide to see what happens if I take it off while I am still squatting in front of, Leeha, was it?
“Mind,” I utter in English.
I guess the trigger is to speak English, and it seems the commands need to be in English as well. “Sleep for ten seconds,” I say, and wave my hand towards her.
Just before I count to ten, I say, “Mind,” again and I wait. At the count of ten, she jerks awake, but before she can move, I say, “Sleep for one hour,” and she crashes down to the bed of the forest again. I don’t want to do more than one hour, in case there are bears or whatever around here.
Good, so that worked. It seems I can say how long I want someone to sleep for. Nodding, I look around and try to decide which way I should go. I definitely want to be as far from her as possible when she wakes up. If she is that afraid of me, she might also try to kill me. I wish I had a map to help me figure this out.
I wonder if this will work like in a game world, so I say, “Map,” in English. I wait ten seconds and nothing pops up. Chuckling to myself, I think, yeah. This isn’t a game world, Alex. Don’t be an idiot. It’s a magic world, but not a game world.
Shaking my head ruefully, I stand up and say to the sleeping Elf, “Well, Leeha. It was nice meeting a beautiful Elf like you. Hell, you are the first Elf I ever met, so I can’t really compare you to others. Be safe.”
I decide to walk around the lake and head off into the woods as far as I can go. I will need to keep my spells handy, in case I need to defend myself. That firewall spell was good, but looking at the spot where I had thrown it, I see that the ground is charred, and the only reason there hadn’t been a big fire was because the ground was wet.
Let’s see what else I can do weapon wise. I lift my right hand and say, “Fire.” Then with the flame in my hand, I point it at the water and utter in English, “Fire Arrow.” Suddenly the fire in my hand changes shape, and faster than I can see, it fires off straight into the lake with a hissing sound and an explosion of water.
“Shiiiit,” I say out loud, staring at the lake. I look down at my hands and think, yep. That’s a handy weapon.
Shaking my head, I look up at the sky and say, “Thanks, God, for all the tools. Let’s hope I can survive this new world.”
I look down at the beautiful Elf one more time, and then turn around and head towards the other side of the lake and my new adventure.
This new adventure can go fucking blow its left tit. Jesus Christ, are the bugs here supposed to be this big? I killed a mosquito that I am sure was an inch long. At least the camp I set up is dry, and I have a pleasant fire going. No food over the fire though, as my stomach keeps reminding me. I would say it’s been a good six or seven hours since I left that hot Elf. I need food but I have no clue how to get it. I don’t even know what wild plants are ok to eat without killing me.
My outdoor skills are so crappy that I am sure if I found a blueberry bush, I would eat them, only to find out they weren’t blueberries. I mean fuck, blueberries come in a plastic container that crinkles! At least I figured out that my Fire spell was handy to start a fire. I just gathered wood together in a pile and said, “Fire. Finger flame,” and I had a small flame on the tip of my finger.
I sit back on the rock that I built the fire next to, as a sort of shelter from the wind coming from one direction, and I contemplate what the fuck is happening to me. I haven’t really had time to soak in the fact that I had died on Earth, and that I now have a new body that seems to be in amazing shape, as I wasn’t the least bit out of breath after all that walking I had done so far today. Not to mention that fact that I can use magic. Or should it be Magic with a capital M? Whatever. It’s fucking Magic!
And oddly enough, it seems that the trigger is the English language. Why would God do that? I mean, that would make me too powerful, wouldn’t it? But wait. I don’t remember that Elf saying any words to cast her Water blades. Do I need to say my words out loud? I hold up my hand and think. Water. Suddenly there is a globe of water in my hand.
“Jesus Fucking hell!” I blurt out in surprise
I think the same word again to get rid of it-Water-and it disappears as fast as it appeared. Wow. Concentrating, I think—Water Spear, and in my hand is a spear made of water. I see a tree across from the fire from me. Focusing on it, I think of the spear leaving my hand and going into the tree. Faster than I can imagine, the spear leaves my palm and slams into the tree.
Stunned, I just sit there and stare at it in shock. Within ten seconds, the Water Spear disappears, but I can still see the mark where it entered the tree, causing an explosion of wood chips.
“How did you do that?” says a voice from above me.
Without thinking, I throw myself across the fire and create a Water Spear, shooting it off at whoever is behind me. Too late, I see it’s the Elf who I had met earlier in the day. Suddenly in front of her is
a shield that seems to be made of water. My Water Spear slams into it, making her fly backward off the rock she had been sitting on, which happens to be the same one I had been leaning against.
“Fuck!” I shout. Running around the fire and the rock, I see that she is lying on the ground on her back, dazed. I rush up to her.
“I am so sorry. I didn’t think before I shot it off. Are you all right?” I ask her worriedly.
The Elf focuses on me and tries to say something, but instead she coughs, turning over and spitting up blood. Holy crap, did my spear go through her? I quickly reach for her chest, looking for an entry wound to cover so she doesn’t bleed out, but instead, my palm meets smooth and warm skin, with no hole that I can see. Then I notice I have my hand on her breast, just above her nipple, which I now see has somehow popped out during her fall.
I blurt out, “Sorry,” before hurriedly backing away from her. “I thought my spear went into you, and I was trying to cover up the hole so you would not bleed out,” I tell her lamely.
The Elf looks at me oddly but doesn’t answer me. She sits up and spits up more blood again on the ground beside her, before looking back at me.
“You are not disgusted by touching me?” she asks me finally.
“No, why the hell would I be disgusted by touching a beautiful Elf?” I ask her. Oh shit, did I just blurt that out? “And hmm. You might want to cover up,” I tell her, pointing to her chest and trying not to stare.
Her right breast is still sticking out of its leather armor, which honestly looks more like a leather swimsuit with a split down the middle. It’s more like a corset with her stomach exposed, but her sides covered. When I looked at her when she was passed out earlier today, her back had been exposed as well. It’s a pretty odd choice for armor, if you ask me.
“You do not find this repugnant?” she asks me, pointing to her exposed breast and nipple. I can’t help but look at it again since she is pointing at it, and it is kind of sticking out.
