In a pristine white temple, six priests wearing white garments with a golden sun emblem on their chests stood around an altar. On top of the altar was a young boy who was tied up with chains and was gagged with a white cloth. His clothes were also drenched in what seemed like oil.
The boy was desperately trying to escape his bindings while the priests only looked on in silence until one of them stepped forward and spoke to the others..
"Bring the holy flame."
Another priest went into another room and came back some moments later with a white flame that seemed to be floating over his palm. The priest glanced at Eon who was pathetically struggling to escape and then spoke.
"You should be honored blasphemer, not everyone gets to be graced with the presence of the holy flames of our divine Lord, much less to gaze upon them."
As the priest with the flame walked closer to the boy, the other priests bowed in reverence. It was clear as day what they were about to do.
As the boy saw this, his struggling increased.
'Damn! How did I get into this mess in the first place? I remember now, it all started when I saw my aspect for the first time. Ever since then, everything has been going downhill.'
A COUPLE DAYS AGO.
"What the Spell?"
Eon couldn't help but exclaim as he read the runes describing his aspect. The expression on his face got worse the more he read.
Name: Eon
True name:-
Rank: Aspirant
Soul core: Dormant
Memories:-
Echoes:-
Attributes: Fateless, Null, Lost
Aspect: Worthless Tresspaser
Aspect Description: A worthless Tresspaser is exactly as it sounds. One who enters where he doesn't belong and is of no value whatsoever.
"So the spell knows I'm a transmigrator and from what I can tell, it doesn't seem very happy about it. Is that what caused the malfunction earlier? Because it doesn't know what to do with me?"
Eon tried to come up with a bunch of theories to explain his predicament, but in truth, he was just trying to distract himself from his present reality.
"I'm cooked!" He said with defeat.
From what he could gather, the spell was basically saying.
"You don't belong here so don't expect me to give you anything."
To say Eon was furious was an understatement.
"Aren't you supposed to give me cheat abilities because I'm a transmigrator? What a ripoff!"
Eon let out a deep sigh as he tried to calm down.
"There's no reason for me to be disappointed. I was already prepared to die anyway. I should just see this through to the very end."
Eon looked around and remembered he was still on top of a random roof, so he began looking for a way down. He grabbed the ledge and dropped down to a lower window before hopping off to the ground.
Some people passing by gave him a curious glance before promptly ignoring him.
"No matter what world I'm in I'm still a nobody. Infact, it's probably worse here. At least in the waking world normal people could tell I was out of place if I entered the middle-class areas. But here, I look like an average commoner."
He was now in the middle of the bustling street he had seen earlier, surveying the people and the shops on the side as he walked. He stopped near a shop which was selling some pots, pans and other household metal items.
'I'm still look the same.'
Eon thought to himself as he looked at his reflection on a large pan. He had the same appearance and was still wearing the 'clothes' he had on in the waking world.
From what he knew about the Nightmare trials, the nightmare spell would usually place them in a body similar to their own. But it seemed the spell couldn't be bothered to do even that much.
"Hey! You've been staring at that frying pan for a while now. Are you going to buy anything or what?" Came a voice from inside the shop.
Eon turned towards the voice and gave a nervous smile.
"Sorry I don't have any money on me."
The shop owner didn't waste any time and soon became aggressive.
"Then what use are you to me? Get lost."
Eon who didn't want to wind up in more trouble, left before the shop owner could cause a scene.
'So let me get this straight, The spell didn't place me in another body so I have no identity, it didn't do the whole time rewind thing so I don't know what to expect in the trial, then it gave me trash aspects and attributes so I'm useless in a fight.'
Eon stood in place for a while just staring at the sky and wondering who he had offended in his past life to warrant this kind of treatment.
"No point getting upset then. If I don't have a goal that just means I can do whatever I want."
Eon, who was already resigned to his 'fate' decided not to overthink things anymore and simply did what he knew best; stealing.
He looked around for anything that caught his eye and easily spotted a clothing shop nearby. The clothes looked fairly expensive and some of them even looked like they could be worn by nobility.
"Those seem good enough." he said with a sly grin.
Multiple hours later, when it was starting to get dark, Eon had put on new clothes and was now walking down the street while eating some strange fruits that looked weirdly familiar. It seemed stealing in this place was easier than he thought it would be. If he had tried any of the stuff he did here in the waking world, he definitely would've gotten caught by now.
"This feels much better. It's been a while since I've worn proper clothes."
As he whispered this to himself, he heard the voice of the spell in his ear.
[New Information on the Aspirant Received]
[Evolving Aspect]
Eon nearly choked on what looked like an apple.
'Did I hear that correctly?'
Eon thought with slight hope. Perhaps his aspect wouldn't be so useless after all.
He opened his runes, once again curious to what he might see.
Everything looked mostly the same until he looked at the runes showing his aspect.
Aspect: Shameless Crook
Aspect Description: A Worthless Tresspaser invaded into where he didn't belong and the stole at the first chance he got. What else could you expect from a Shameless Crook?
As soon as Eon read this, veins bulged on his forehead as he exploded with rage.
"You think you're funny Nightmare Spell! Well you're… just a worthless disembodied voice in my head!"
After yelling as loud as he could, he calmed down and realized that everyone on the street was staring at him and giving him strange looks.
'Great! Now everyone thinks I'm insane. There's no point explaining myself so I might as well just leave.'
Eon walked into a nearby alleyway hoping to get some privacy but instead he came across a weird sight. A girl in a fancy dress who didn't look younger than sixteen was holding a blue slime and talking to it.
"Okay I think we lost them. So where do we go now?...Okay but what if… "
When she finally noticed Eon, she stopped what she was doing and turned towards him.
"What the fuck are you looking at?" said the girl threateningly.
If it was a couple days earlier, Eon would have been flabbergasted. It wasn't like he was the one acting strange here.
'It's a good thing I just recently learned not to converse with crazy people I find in suspicious alleyways.'
Eon promptly and without hesitation turned around to leave.
'She reeks of trouble. I don't know what her deal is, but it's not worth getting involved in.'
Eon had barely taken a step when he felt himself bump into something metallic and looked to see what it was.
"Ow! What now? I don't have.. time.. for this."
In front of him was a knight dressed in full armor. He had a sword on his hip and the emblem of a tree on his breast plate.
'Who is this guy? I just blinked and he was just.. there.'
While Eon was exploring the town, he rarely found knights patrolling around. So why was this one here now.
'Not just that, this one seems different somehow. The others he had seen across the town didn't have those weird emblems on their breastplates.
Even though he was internally panicking, He realized that his plan hadn't changed all that much. All he had to do was get out of there as soon as possible. But before he could, he noticed that the Knight's gaze wasn't on him but behind him. He followed his line of sight and found that he was staring at the girl. Also, somehow in the two seconds he had looked away, there were now five more knights surrounding the girl.
'How the Spell did six knights in full sets of armor manage to sneak up on me? Unless..'
Eon thought as he came to a horrifying conclusion.
'...they're awakened.'
One of the knights stepped forward the girl and stretched forth his hand as he spoke.
"Your highness! We've come to escort you back to the castle. The high priests are not happy about your attempted escape."
Eon didn't understand what was going on, but he could tell that the girl didn't want to go with whoever these people were. Eon was stumped, should he prioritize his own escape or should he try to help somehow he wondered.
While Eon was still contemplating, the princess seemed to panic for a moment but she suddenly regained her composure and pointed to Eon.
"It's not my fault, it was him. I was just scrolling through the castle garden when he kidnapped me and brought me here."
She said with tears streaming down her face.
"Is that so?" Said the knight which Eon suspected to be the leader.
'That bitch! She's going to pay for this later, but for now, I need to get away from here.'
Eon thought as he tried to escape, but he never got the chance. Before he could even move, his consciousness faded to darkness.