TABLE OF CONTENTS
Chapter 3
“Die? What?” Kade felt as if someone had punched him in the gut.
The Keeper’s voice was as empty as her expression. “The only way to save them if we reverse time is for you to die in this universe.”
Kade considered the proposition, his mind racing, thoughts consumed by a whirlwind of emotions. He had wished he could trade places with them. Now, he appeared to be on the verge of having that wish granted.
Maybe, I’ll get to see Mom and Dad again after all.
He frowned, struck by a sudden realization that gave him pause. “You said I must agree to complete a task and then I must die. But wouldn’t I have to live to complete the task? And you specified in this universe.”
“Intelligent and attentive.” A ghost of a smile touched Netatia’s lips. “Like the Heavens, this universe is one of many. You must die if we reverse time in this universe because you were the reason for the battle. The Wraithlord had come for you. Another will eventually follow the threads of fate he left behind.”
Kade grappled with the revelation. “Why me?”
“Your soul. It is of rare strength. Either he intended to consume it himself or take you to his master.” The Immortal tilted her head to one side, sharp brows drawn together as if struck by a sudden thought.
Kade didn’t like the thought of being someone’s food. At the same time, he couldn’t help a shake of his head at the irony of having such a frail body but a strong soul.
Pondering the idea, he regarded the Immortal. “That still doesn’t answer how I’ll complete the task if I’m dead.”
“You will live in another realm, in another universe, where the task must be fulfilled.”
“Another realm. Another universe,” Kade said softly. He frowned, thinking. Is she talking about being isekaied? Yeah, this really is some anime-style madness.
“Yes,” Keeper Netatia replied, as if answering his unspoken question. “You reside in the Mortal Plane, one of the Three Planes of Existence, and within existence are countless dimensions containing realms full of universes with infinite possibilities.”
Kade’s brows shot up. “A multiverse.”
Keeper Netatia nodded. “Not one. Many multiverses. What we call the Planes of If, where untold threads and cycles of your fate play out. Every decision, every move you make, every word, shapes that fate, constantly spinning out into a web across the Planes of Existence, forging your destiny.”
At those implications, Kade whispered in awe, tinged with hope, “Then there has to be a thread where we all live in this universe,”
The Keeper’s mouth downturned. “You live now, but you all die later.”
Kade drew his brows together. “You sound certain. And you can reverse time. Can you see the future?”
“There is no single future. There are threads of fate. We keep records, allowing us to see the possible destinies of lesser beings, but we do not know what you will actually do, the Way you will walk, until the moment you have walked it.”
“What exactly did you see for me?”
“The end of your thread in this universe. Whatever you are, whatever you could be in this universe, ends.”
After all the fighting he had done for his life, the declaration was hard for Kade to accept. Impossible, even.
“Here, let us show you what your current thread holds.” One of the Immortal’s delicate braids stretched out to him, and even before he could flinch, it coiled around his wrist.
In an instant, the world changed. Kade saw himself still impaled on the support structure.
Emergency workers directed several fire trucks into the area. Time shifted to the firemen, sawing through the metal, and gingerly lowering him to the ground.
Paramedics worked on him even as they rushed him to a helicopter, and he was airlifted to a nearby hospital. No one else survived.
Kade sobbed as he watched, guilt and grief threatening to overwhelm him. If he hadn’t insisted on this trip, on riding Oblivion, they would still be alive. I’m so sorry. Memories of his family flitted through his mind.
The doctors said that along with the wound in his midsection, he had suffered spinal and nerve damage. He had a series of successful operations despite complications due to his brain tumor.
But he would never feel his legs or walk again. Paraplegic. That’s what he became.
One doctor said the disability was the least of Kade’s troubles. The tumor or the underlying cancer would surely kill him.
Pain wracked his chest as he attended the funeral for the rest of his family.
Why them? Why not me? I was the one who asked them to take me on the trip. I’m the reason they’re dead. I’m the one who was sick, who didn’t have long to live.
Years passed, filled with therapy sessions. Oftentimes, he’d wake sweaty and crying from nightmares of the incident. He sued the theme park and won seventy million dollars.
With the money he was able to pursue avenues to remove the tumor and fight the cancer. Avenues unavailable to him when his family ran out of money, when insurance companies and doctors had refused the pleas of his parents.
As was his wont, he never gave up.
He made a promise to Aunt Harriet, Uncle Rob, Ray, Ishmael, and Nicole. They didn’t die in vain. He would live on. For them and for himself. Eventually, he won the fight against the cancer at the age of twenty-two, though he did remain paraplegic.
Committed to working hard, enjoying life, and proving all the naysayers wrong, he started his own game company, Golden Arm Tech, focusing on AI and VR development. They created the most advanced AI, named Picasso, and the biggest, most successful VR game, Ascension Online.
He became a billionaire. Time passed, and he continued to thrive, living the best life he could, using his wealth to improve the lives of the less fortunate.
He married, had children, and named them after his parents, his brother, and his favorite cousin. Terry, Marie, Ray, and Nicole. He provided them with everything he lacked as a child.
Experiencing this as the Kade in the vision, he smiled and reached a hand out to his children. I wish I was there with them now. He drew his hand back as the scene changed. Images spun on.
He died at the age of forty-four, along with his family, along with the majority of the Earth, in an attack by a silver-clad Wraithlord. The Wraithlord feasted on their deaths, on their souls.
“Now, if we reverse time, erasing the incident, making it so you all live.” Keeper Netatia gestured.
There was another shift. The world reversed, erasing all that had happened before Kade saw the beings in the sky.
Life continued, this timeline closely following much of his current one.
Many days were filled with pain, debilitating migraines, hospital visits, treatments, and a plethora of medications. Some days he wanted to give up, to die, to commit suicide, if it would get rid of the suffering.
Conversely, there were days he refused to surrender. Days he swore not to let his illness win, tried to convince himself things would get better, that if he held on, he would be cured.
His life was a constant war of endurance.
He’d made the track team after years of trying, almost beating Lizzie, who had sworn Kade would never make the cut. Lizzie and her friends, Marcus and Winslow, the Terrible Three, laughed when Kade showed up for the 5000-meter tryouts.
Let them laugh now; you’ll laugh later. That’s what he’d told himself.
Reliving their shocked expressions when he earned a place on the team made him grin all over again. He almost pumped his fist, mirroring his other self.
Kade continued his love of rollercoasters, fantasy books, and video games. He’d gone to see Kendrick Lamar, his favorite rapper.
The boy grimaced as his girlfriend, Danielle, had gone to the prom with Jamie Barston. That had hurt. He’d cried. Until he remembered what Mom had said a long time before the prom. ‘Don’t cry over someone who wouldn’t cry over you.’
So, he’d taken Stephanie and had a helluva time. Kade smiled.
His results for the SAT exams, which he’d taken weeks before his sixteenth birthday, had come in. He aced them.
Not only that, but he’d won a coding competition. Ivy League schools had made numerous offers. Several game companies promised him internships.
He excelled at both endeavors.
At his twentieth birthday party, a Wraithlord appeared and killed all in attendance.
“And more still.” Netatia glowed faintly.
More flashes. Kade ran from Oblivion’s tracks and never saw the sword. A boy, laughing through nausea, feeling alive despite pain. A man, twenty-two, triumphant, standing on stages he’d never reached. A father, forty, holding children who might never exist.
And everywhere, the shadow of the Wraithlord. Circling. Hunting. Thousands of threads manifested, most ending with a Wraithlord killing Kade and his family.
In some manifestations, the Wraithlord kidnapped him, placed him within some device. Moments later, those manifestations became a black void.
Within others, change came over the Earth and its people. An unknown entity assimilated them, made them a part of a System, allowing them to gain levels, classes, skills, and abilities like some video game. In each iteration of those timelines, Kade died before he reached level twenty, often at the hands of a Wraithlord.
When the threads ended, Kade found himself back in the present, standing before the Keeper, who watched him with expressionless eyes. The world resumed as if nothing had occurred. Yet, nothing was the same. He had seen the lattice, glimpsed infinity, and felt the weight of every choice.
A hole existed inside himself at the death of everything he loved. Tears rolled down his cheeks.
Struggling to compose himself, Kade took a deep shuddering breath. “Even… even if that’s true, there has to be more threads. Different ones.”
Keeper Netatia nodded. “Those were your most likely threads. There are deviations, but they end with your death in this universe.”
“I don’t believe that. You said there are infinite threads. In all of infinity there must be at least one where we survive and things turn out for the best.”
The Immortal shook her head. “You mistake what you saw for your actual future. You saw potential. You will walk one Way. One alone. And even then, threads will collide, echo, and resonate across dimensions. What you do will ripple, Kade Constantine. What you fail to do will ripple further.
“In this case, the choices to ensure survival here will result in something worse happening in this universe and others beyond it. Infinite deviations leading to an identical outcome.”
Kade’s heart raced. Every choice was life or death. He felt both insignificance and importance compressed into the same instant.
“But my children, my family, the people who die in these attacks… is there a way to stop it, to stop whoever is hunting me?” He couldn’t help the guilt crawling through him.
A hint of pity eased into Keeper Netatia’s eyes this time. Her lips curved down, even if only slightly. “Any chance at saving your family and friends begins with your death today. Afterward, we will bind your consciousness to your spiritual vessel, and transfer both it and your soul to a body in a universe in a different Realm, a Realm where your soul will fit in, where it will be shrouded from those hunting for it.”
Hope trickled into him. “So, you’ll save me?”
“After a fashion.”
“My family will be safe after that?”
Keeper Netatia shook her head. “For a time. A Wraithlord will return in twenty years, searching for you.”
Kade screwed up his face. “Then what’s the point of doing anything if a Wraithlord still comes back?”
“The other Realm will provide an opportunity for you to stop them.”
“Why don’t you? You obviously have the power to do it.”
The Keeper waved him off. “Such a confrontation has consequences you cannot begin to fathom. We cannot risk it.”
Kade gave in. “How’ll I be able to stop this… Wraithlord?”
“In your new life, you will have access to great power, power enough to defeat the Wraithlord and to complete the aforementioned task for us.”
At the reminder of the task, he became suspicious of Keeper Netatia’s intentions. He glanced down at what remained of his family, at the mangled bodies and ghosts. Feeling sick, he averted his gaze. Their lives meant more than his. “What task?”
The Immortal’s expression became hard, her eyes like chips of ice. “You will help us discover who sent the Wraithlord, help us in our pursuit of vengeance for the death of our son.”
“Your son?”
The Keeper pointed to the giant corpse. Her expression grew tender. “That is Quelsera, our son. He knew he was not strong enough to defeat this Wraithlord, but he tried anyway.
“Unfortunately, our chronoinversion will not resurrect him. The Wraithlord devoured his core and a part of his soul before we could intervene.
“All that is left of the Quel we knew is contained within his Geist, which will be gone in a few moons. His only hope for any semblance of his former existence is for us to bind his Geist to a being from this world.”
Though Kade didn’t understand much of what the Keeper had said, he recognized the pain of loss in the Immortal’s voice and expression. A question nagged at Kade. With all the power at the Keeper’s disposal, the Immortal had picked him.
“Why me?”
“The strength of your soul and your innate connection to qi, one of the two energies that power this world. Both tell us you can become a powerful mystic in my universe. They are the reasons you live when you should be dead, the reasons you can function at all.
“Finding such a soul as yours in its infancy is extremely rare in young Seedworlds. It would be a terrible thing to waste.
“Just as importantly, is that as a fledgling mystic in our Realm, you will be overlooked. The Immortal at the heart of this attack, the one responsible for Quel’s demise, will not suspect you nor see you as a threat. You will help us find and kill them.”
“Kill an Immortal?” Kade arched a skeptical brow. “I hate to be the one to break it to you, but if Immortals can die then you aren’t…” He added air-quotes. “Immortal.”
The corner of Keeper Netatia’s mouth twitched; her citrine eyes twinkled. “Flesh can die. Soul is eternal.”
“Unless someone eats it.” Kade immediately regretted the words.
Keeper Netatia’s face was a blank slate even as her eyes shifted to her son’s corpse.
Kade hung his head. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking. It’s a bad habit of mine.”
The Immortal lifted her gaze to Kade, eyes glowing, assessing, judging. Silence stretched like a night sky devoid of stars.
Anxious, he flicked his thumb repeatedly along the underside of his middle finger. Fearing the Keeper’s next words wouldn’t be favorable, he spoke first, “Let’s say I accept your offer… how would I even begin to find this Immortal?”
“You are getting ahead of yourself. Before you can search, you must become strong enough. Gaining such strength is your first true task. Do you accept? Or do you wish to continue with what remains of your current life?”
Kade opened his mouth to answer when it really hit him that he’d be replacing someone else. The idea weighed on his conscience. “What happens to the other person I’m replacing?”
“Their soul returns to the Nether to be spun out again, beginning a new cycle.”
A sense of relief eased over Kade. At least that unfortunate person would live again.
“Soooo, how does this work? Being isekaied. Me inhabiting this other body.” He paused at a sudden thought, eyes narrowing. “I’m not coming back as a slime, am I? I don’t want to be a slime. Or a goblin.”
The Immortal arched a brow. “You will be neither. You will be in a human body.”
“Phew.” Although when he considered it, the slime in that light novel had become pretty powerful. And being human again sounded a little boring.
For a moment he considered asking to become something different. Maybe an orc. Or a dragon. Dragons were always powerful. But one look at Keeper Netatia’s emotionless face chased away the thought. “Alright, so how’s it work?”
The Keeper’s eyes bored into his as she spoke, “When your souls touch, there will be spiritual backlash where you experience their memories. In that frozen space, you will live their life. You will see through their eyes. You will feel as they did. Their experience, their story, will be yours. This lasts a few moments but will feel like countless chapters.
“Afterward, in physical terms, you will be reborn as them. But the life you live will be your own. The heart of who you are—your spiritual vessel and soul, your Anima—remains.
“Usually, when the Nether takes an Anima, it destroys the attached consciousness and memories, but we will make certain yours are intact. They are what has shaped you, what drives you.
“That version of you is the one we need. But for your own safety, you must never reveal your origin should you accept our offer. Now, choose.” Keeper Netatia stared at him with that unnerving blank expression.
Killing an Immortal. Kade shook his head, the thought seeming as absurd and improbable as it sounded. As did the idea that he would be isekaied as if he were in some anime, LitRPG, or cultivation story.
Wanting something of his presence to cling to, he asked, “Can I at least keep my first name?”
The Keeper barked a laugh. “That is simple enough to arrange.”
“Wait.” Kade frowned, a thought having crossed his mind. “Keeping my name won’t expose me, will it?”
“It will not. They do not know you.”
Despite the knowledge of the things he’d lose, Kade’s choice was an easy one. He’d always hated suffering, hated feeling worthless, hated being weak, looking frail, the memory lapses, the many absences from school, being made fun of when chemotherapy caused him to go bald, being told what he couldn’t do, couldn’t be. He hated his disease.
If being isekaied meant he could be rid of his cancer, his tumor, truly become strong, then he was all in. “I choose to save my family.”
“Good.” Keeper Netatia smiled. “Hold out your hand.”
Kade complied. A silver ring appeared on his middle finger. The band was a dragon eating its own tail. An ouroboros.
“This is a soul ring. It contains Quelsera’s Geist. When the time comes you will know what to do with it.
“The ring also binds your Anima and soul. It is connected to its twin in Avros, your new world in the Quintessence Realm, ensuring you are spun out there. Are you ready?”
Kade took one final look around, bypassing the frozen people, and settling on the ghosts of his family. You’ll soon be back. Don’t cry too much for me.
A solemn thought came to him. “Will death hurt?”
“Does it matter?” Keeper Netatia arched a manicured brow.
He shrugged. “Not really. I just always wondered.”
The Immortal shook her head. “Death will not hurt.”
“Good.” Kade paused, the conversation bringing a question he often contemplated. “Earlier, you made it sound as if you knew Death. What’s it look like?”
The Keeper gestured. “Death is like the air. It just is.”
After always imagining Death as the Grim Reaper, Kade had a hard time wrapping his head around what the Keeper said. He expected more but wasn’t going to dwell on it. He’d stick with the Grim Reaper’s hooded robes and sickle.
“Alright.” He spared one last glance at his dead family and exhaled slowly. “I’m ready.”
Keeper Netatia lifted her arms out to her sides, fingers spread wide. Wisps of gold and white rose from her fingers like threads of sunlight given form.
Her fine intricate braids flared out like an immaculate headdress. A wave of power shot out of her in every direction.
The world reversed.
In moments, Kade was impaled once more amid the raging storm. He felt the merest twinge of pain before he was hurtling through the air, then he was back in the roller coaster car, which soon rejoined the rest of Oblivion’s train. The world spun. Seconds later, the roller coaster train was back at the start of the ride.
“Here we go,” someone yelled.
“Woooooo!” cried another.
Oblivion shot forward and down. Kade’s stomach lurched. People screamed.
Cackling, Kade threw his hands up. He savored every moment of his last ride, every bit of weightlessness, every lurch of his stomach, every flutter, every incline, twist, and turn. It was the best ride he ever had.
Oblivion was pulling in at the end of the ride when he had the slight sense of something bursting in his head.
Death felt and looked like nothing at all.
