Back on track

The dawn brings some clarity; I wash up, have a breakfast of edible leaves, and take off… going the right direction this time. Still naked as the day I was born… yesterday, in a sense, but I'm also in my late twenties… I encounter the same distraction… and take a break periodically for stress relief… and a milky snack. At least it means I don't have to forage anymore…

…and it does feel really good.

It takes half a day of travel to get back to where I started (Strix flight speed isn't that high, just thirty feet, same as a human walking… but in three dimensions), then another while (an hour?) to get to the road. When it starts to get dark, I make camp up in a tree again, with a view over the road.

I wake up to someone shouting at me from the ground: “Hey, birdie, get down here before we put holes in you.”

I look down from my perch and see a group of a half-dozen people pointing weapons my way, standing next to a big van… that has another such inside at the wheel. They're all human, surprisingly. They're wearing fairly dirty, patchwork armor… and have their weapons pointed at me.

Great. Seven to one is not odds I like. Maybe I should have kept the invisibility. Still… I am what I am, now. Also, thanks to the Destruction sphere, I'm never unarmed. “What's the plan, exactly?”

“Well, you got two options,” the Android shouts up to my position, “One, you come down here and show us a good time by letting us use that big booty of yours. Two, you die.”

No thank you. I'm immortal, so… I start to fly down (to get them in my range, which isn't much) as I start casting, trying to use the trees for cover. I start with Acidic Mist, dropping a damaging aura on them that will last… well, six seconds. But they're bunched up, so some area at range damage is a good thing.

They yell and scream as the thin mist eats away at them slightly, but they all survive it… and open fire. Turns out they're not very good shots… but there's enough of them that I still have to strain to not get hit, and I can absolutely feel the pulled muscles in my wings from having to move like that. I suppose this is what losing stamina points feels like… I let off another spell (a Stone Blast from Spheres of Power) as the mist fades, triggering an explosion of stones where they're all bunched up… and they dodge the worst of it, still taking some hits.

They appear to wise up, and shoot at me while scattering… and this time, they're much better shots… I go down in a hail of very painful gunfire.

I wake up with the rays of the sun. I sit up and get my bearings… freezing when I see a bullet-ridden corpse. I swallow dryly as I stand up and examine the woman. Huge, gravity-defying milk makers, a caboose that's remarkably similar, black wings, very dark skin, bird feet, stupidly fat lips that apparently rest in an “o”... she's a caricature of a black human woman, with wings and bird feet. The bullet holes in her body make it clear she's only partly organic… which may be why I'm not seeing the marks of scavengers. Poor girl, whoever she was.

Saying a prayer for her soul, I summon a shovel and spend the day burying her. I mean… I know deities exist - first hand, even - and am not in any particular rush, so respecting the dead seems to be in order… even if it is just some naked pleasure bot. I make a marker for her with some wood from the nearby trees, and kneel down by the graveside when I'm done.

“Best I can do for you for now,” I whisper, “At least **** seems like a good guy? And you'll get Reincarnated eventually.” I shrug as I stand, “Well ****, she's in your hands now.”

“Actually, no,” I hear ****'s whisper from somewhere behind me… I look around, but don't see him, “‘She’ isn't dead.” He chuckles darkly.

Horror spreading across my face, I summon a shovel and start digging again, “I buried her ALIVE? Oh no…”

“Ah, no, you can stop,” **** chuckles again, “you buried an empty shell. It's your own corpse. Easy mistake to make, seeing as how you've yet to encounter a mirror, and you're not in the body matching your twenty seven years of experience.”

I pause, and the shovel vanishes. “Oh.”

**** continues, “Your ‘Rejuvenation’ ability reforms you. The prior body is completely meaningless to the process.”

“So…” I cringe, “I look like a whore?”

“A very expensive fetish one, but yes.” **** pauses, “Sorry, but I do need to answer your questions honestly. It's most assuredly not your fault you look that way. You had no control over what body my sister gave you, and you are very much incapable of changing those aspects.”

I take a slow breath, “It's okay. So… how are we talking?”

“Funeral rites are covered by my portfolio, so because you respectfully laid your body to rest, I am here, can see the surrounding area, and will be able to do so until such time as that grave stops existing.” **** pauses, “And you're a Champion… a Prophet, really… and mine at that, so I can speak directly to you whenever. If you ask for me, I'll hear you… same for my siblings, if you ask for them. I can only see when something related to my portfolios happens, however.”

“Does simple **** trigger your portfolio?” I consider.

“Temporarily, as do the events leading up to it. Before you ask, yes, I did watch you die. Or rather, ‘die’.” I don't know how, but I can hear those air quotes.

“Can you tell me which way they went?” I smile.

“Sadly, no,” I hear **** sigh, “I have some restrictions I'm under.”

I roll my eyes, “They stayed on the road.”

“Yes,” he chuckles.

“They went that way,” I point away from my target town.

“Ah, no,” he chuckles.

I nod slowly and sit down to rest and reprepare my Spheres talents known and spell slots… then ‘have dinner’....