Chapter 1

Clink.

Clink.

Clink.

An onerous ringing sound roused Dorian. As he began waking up, he felt an odd pressure pushing down on him, constricting him. He tried, and failed, to open his eyes as he came fully awake, his mind awash with confusion.

Clink.

Clink.

Clink.

A wash of memories swept over him as he tried to understand where he was and what was happening.

He was a fresh graduate from college, an aerospace engineer celebrating graduation with a night out. Dorian strained his mind, and vaguely remembered crossing a local street, and hearing a loud screeching noise.

The very last thing Dorian could recall was a wave of pain crashing into his side, and then a sudden, fading darkness that overwhelmed all.

“Did I die? Am I dead?” He mumbled, or tried to. When he tried to speak, however, all that came out was a gargling echo.

Clink.

Clink.

Clink.

The ringing sound continued for several more minutes as Dorian struggled to see or speak.

After a few minutes of effort, Dorian figured out that while he still couldn’t see or speak, he was able to move, albeit very slowly. By focusing his will on moving his body forward, he felt himself sluggishly start to drift forward.

Through this, Dorian determined that he no longer had a human body. Or, if he did, it was one that was horribly maimed beyond all recognition.

Clink.

Clink.

Clink.

Dorian had always been a calm, analytical person. He had worked his way through getting his aerospace engineering degree in 3 years instead of 4, and had already been accepted as a Graduate student. When he ran into a problem, he would always break it down to understand exactly what he was facing, and how to solve it.

After a few initial moments of panic, Dorian calmed down and focused, trying to understand more of the situation he was in.

“I don’t have arms, or legs that I can feel. I also can’t see anything, and am unable to make any noise. Well, I might just be unable to hear properly due to that ringing sound, but I don’t feel like I can speak.” Dorian shifted his mind from trying to move forward to focusing on trying to sense his surroundings. After a few moments, he was rewarded for his efforts.

A vague understanding of the world around him entered his mind. Despite not being able to see, he could somehow sense the surroundings well enough to draw a dim mental picture.

He was in some type of cage. Dozens of thick black bars covered the sides of this cage, and a strange, glowing white symbol stood out on a metal plate covering the top. He was unable to see beyond the confines of this cage.

As he took note of this, he also attempted to examine his body. It was not much of a body at all, he noted, smiling wryly in his head. He appeared to be some type of black blob, featureless for the most part. He had an innate sense that he was around a meter wide and long, and that the cage he was in was about five meters wide and long, circular in shape.

Dorian exerted himself as he tried to move forward, using the picture in his mind of the cage to navigate. After a few minutes of effort, he reached the side of the cage he was in. He slowly extended himself forward as he came into contact with the bars of the cage.

He felt nothing. His sense of touch seemed to no longer be present as well.

He noted, however, that instead of having his black blobbish self pass through the holes in the cage, an invisible barrier pushed back, keeping him from escaping.

Dorian worked at trying to slip through for a few minutes before giving up, sliding back into the middle of his circular cage. He calmed himself down for a few moments, trying to come up with a plan.

“I’m stuck here it seems.” He muttered in his head as he turned his focus up to the roof of his cage.

A glowing, white symbol lit up the top of his cage. It was shaped like two letter “Y”‘s stacked on top of each other, one upside down. Dorian sensed that the light it gave off was very bright, lighting up the rest of his cage. He tried again to expand his senses beyond his cage, but found that he could only focus on things within a few meters of him.

Clink.

Clink.

Clink.

The ringing sound rang out again, continuously. Dorian finally turned his focus to that, trying to discover where it was coming from.

He focused on the sound, trying to zero in on it. It was an abrupt and sharp ringing noise, but on that occurred with a normal frequency. The noise seemed to echo every time it appeared, making it difficult to track.

“Is it coming from the symbol?” The only thing in his cage he could trace the sound to seemed to be the glowing white symbol above him. There was nothing else unique about his cage.

“I need to get out of this cage. I can’t think of any good reason to be left trapped in a cage, and getting out is of paramount importance, even in this body. I guess I’ll need to risk this.” Talking things over in his head had always been a method he used to calm himself, and work things through.

He paused for a moment and then began focusing. He pictured himself stretching upward, trying to reach the glowing symbol. His movement earlier had required him to focus on moving, rather than actually physically move. For some reason, moving like this felt and came naturally to him while he was in this body.

Slowly, he began to stretch upward, the black blob that was him thinning as it reached to the roof of the cage. As he moved upward, a slight strain began to simmer within him. He felt a strange push of pressure, increasing as he moved closer to the symbol.

As he got closer, the ringing sound increased in volume, starting to echo loudly and painfully in his head.

Clink.

CliNK.

CLINK.

Dorian mentally grunted in pain as he ignored the increasingly loud ringing noise and tapped on the symbol, feeling a sort of compulsion. The louder the ringing got, the more he knew he needed to touch the symbol above.

As soon as he touched the symbol, a blinding white flash of light overwhelmed him. A quick instant of pain moved through his body, setting him tingling. If he had eyes, he would have been set to blinking as he tried to recover. A loud grinding noise rang out as the clinking noise abruptly stopped.

THUMP.

The covering on top of his cage slid off to the side. As it did so, a voice suddenly echoed in Dorian’s mind, with such power and might, it overwhelmed him, almost knocking him unconscious.

AH, FIRSTBORN OF MY PERFECT FLOCK. YOU HAVE FINALLY FORMED, AND BROKEN FREE.

YOU HAVE BEEN CREATED FROM THE ETHER, BY YOUR LORD AND MASTER, THE GODKING YUKELI.

YOU WILL FOLLOW MY COMMANDS, YOUR SOUL HAS BEEN SEALED. YOU WILL KNOW WHAT YOU NEED TO DO WHEN THE TIME COMES.

GROW.

EVOLVE.

SOW THE SEEDS OF CHAOS IN THE 30,000 WORLDS.

YOU, FIRSTBORN, WILL HOLD MY HIGHEST HOPES.

WHILE I MAY NO LONGER BE ALIVE IN THE DIVINE REALM, MY PLANS WILL CONTINUE UNABATED.

CHAOS WILL RISE. ORDER WILL FALL. THE CYCLE CONTINUES, UNABATED.

Dorian’s mind went into shock as the powerful message flooded into him, slamming into his consciousness. Intense, searing pain washed over his soul, almost causing him to black out. Agony like he had never felt before ran wild within him, as if a thousand burning daggers were piercing through his flesh, cutting him to pieces.

As pain filled darkness washed over Dorian, knocking him unconscious, an intense pulling sensation slammed into him, making his last thought before he was overwhelmed a mix of shock, awe, and confusion.

…

…

…

Dorian groggily came awake again, faint echoes of pain pulling at him as he took in his surroundings, spreading out his senses.

He was still a black blob. He wasn’t, however, still in the cage. Instead, he found that he was sitting in a small crater in the ground. Random patches of dirt and rock littered the floor near him, the smell of freshly moved dirt scenting the air.

“Ah! Smell! I can smell!” Dorian mentally smiled as he came to this realization. In his cage, he hadn’t had many senses that he could detect, save the ability to gain a general understanding of his surroundings.

Dorian focused on moving out from this crater in the ground, and found that as he moved, he slowly gained a feeling for the ground beneath him.

“So I can feel things now too.” He muttered in his head. He could vaguely make out sunlight falling on his blob-like body.

“Where am I now? What was that ridiculously loud voice saying? I am the ‘Firstborn’ and need to evolve? To sow seeds of chaos? What kind of nonsense is this? None of this makes any sense.” He mentally grumbled. Dorian had already grown inured to the strangeness of his present situation. He half expected an angel or God to appear, ordering him off on some mystical quest. He mentally shook his head and began making his way to the side of the crater.

As he reached the edge of the crater, climbing up the side of the wall, he spread his awareness out as far as he could, trying to sense his surroundings.

Gradually, an image of the area he was in came into focus. He also found that anything within 25 meters of him was something he could detect.

He was in a small clearing. Several small and large rocks surrounded him, with a small stream about 20 meters off in front of him. He could clearly make out several very large trees next to the river, surrounded by a few bushes. Grass grew all around. Small insects and animals crawled about, all within his field of view. He sensed several fish swimming within the river.

Anything past 25 meters, however, was completely blank to Dorian. He couldn’t even see the tops of the trees 20 meters away, constrained to only sense the lower portions of them.

Behind him were only more rocks, slowly slanting upward, like on a hill or mountain.

As Dorian was considered what to do, a flash of blue light spread through him, and a cool voice spoke quietly in his head.

“Targets for Absorption have been detected. Following Spell Matrix Protocol, the Host has three chances to call upon aid for Absorption. Please outline a target and send a command to the Matrix when aid is required.”

Dorian mentally blinked. He waited a moment to see if the voice was going to say anything else. When it remained silent, he tentatively issued a mental question.

“How do I send a command to the Matrix?”

He received no response.

Dorian waited a few more moments. He then turned to focus within himself, figuring that if the voice was telling him to do something, it should be something possible.

He scanned his own blobbish body like he did the surroundings, focusing on himself. As he did so, he instantly became aware of a small bead of yellow light, deep within himself. He looked closer at the bead, seeing hundreds of thousands of tiny symbols, with white lines connecting them in different fashions. Small darts of energy moved along these lines haphazardly.

He immediately latched onto that, focusing on it. As he did so, a flood of knowledge rushed into his mind.

This was a Soul Spell Matrix. It was an unbelievably complicated construct of energy and magic, created by combining a countless number of symbols and energy lines. It was this matrix that held together his current body, and his soul. It was perfectly fused within him, such that it would be impossible to remove.

A voice began to speak within his head.

“Hello. I am the Genie of your Soul Spell Matrix, Ausra. You may direct any questions to me.” The voice had a faint, feminine edge, and was soothing to hear.

Dorian did a double take, surprised. He mentally shook his head, however, surprised that he had even gotten surprised. With all the strange things that were happening, another voice inside his head was hardly that startling.

“Ausra, what is a Soul Spell Matrix?” He had been given a general definition of the Matrix when he looked at it, but he wanted to know more.

“All beings, no matter how big or small, across the 30,000 Worlds have within them a Soul Spell Matrix. It is through this Matrix that they grow stronger and are able to learn new abilities or powers. Your Soul Spell Matrix is unique in that it possess the complex ability to allow you to Evolve, as well as possessing a Matrix Genie so early in your development.” The Genie’s voice remained cool and relaxing.

“Hmm…” Dorian’s thoughts turned inward. The pulsating bead that was his Soul Spell Matrix seemed incomprehensible to him at the moment, but he was filled with an intense curiosity. How did this work? This was all so strange.

“You said mine is unique in that it allows me to ‘Evolve’? What specifically do you mean by that?” He queried.

“By absorbing other being’s Soul Spell Matrixes, you can absorb some of their abilities or their bloodlines and Evolve, transforming into a new or different being. You will not always Evolve when you absorb a creature’s Soul Spell Matrix, but your strength and capabilities will grow. This ability was personally designed by the Godking Yukeli to craft the perfect being. Regular Soul Spell Matrixes can grow and expand, allowing a being to grow stronger or more powerful, but they can never let a creature change their fundamental race.”

“A Goblin Soul Spell Matrix will always be a Goblin Soul Spell Matrix. It was only through millions of years of research and experimentation that His Worship was able to create your Soul Spell Matrix.”

“Okay.” Dorian responded, thinking quickly as he mulled things over.

“Then what am I suppose to do? Why did he pull MY soul from the ether? Why am I here?” That was the thing bothering him. Why was he chosen? It made no sense. He had been a regular human.

“That…” The Matrix Genie paused, “I am unsure. There appears to have been some type of… The Reborn should not possess any intelligence or memories at first, yet you appear to. The Soul Seal should have been applied to your Soul to remove such things. Yet it appears to have failed. The Firstborn appears to have been… His Worship does not make mistakes. The Firstborn’s reason for intelligence is merely beyond my understanding.”

“I see.” Dorian understood, somewhat. Whatever Soul Seal was supposed to wipe his memories and enslave him appeared to have failed. Perhaps it was because he was the first, or perhaps some random mistake of fate.

Regardless, he was free now, and he had no intentions of being someone else’s slave.

Before he could thinking about this further, however, Dorian’s thoughts were rudely interrupted.

A large salamander appeared at the edge of Dorian’s vision bursting into the river in front of him, attacking a fish. The lizard was large, several feet long and covered in shimmering green scales. It had a long, teeth filled mouth that latched onto one of the small fish swimming in the river.

As soon as it grabbed a meal, the salamander leapt out of the water, sliding to a halt in the grassy area. It started to devour its meal before it paused, looking at Dorian curiously.

“Target for Absorption has been detected.”