Leon found himself staring at nothing as time stood still around him. He felt a sense of strangeness.
He placed his hands on his head and began to rub his temples.
“Damn, I don’t understand anything about you really, and what do you want from me?”
Leon received no response, but he heard a faint hum that started turning into mad laughter.
[Ha ha ha ha ha, oh my dear, you still don’t remember anything]
“What do you mean, for heaven’s sake?” Leon shouted loudly, even though he knew he could think about what he was saying instead of shouting.
But discovering that the system was only using him and that he was just a pawn made him feel tremendous pressure as if everything was against him.
[My dear, my dear, I saved you from something that would have been your end. Now, tell me, what if I told you something even more shocking?]
Leon’s heart was pounding heavily in his chest, and he stuttered as he spoke. “What… what is this supposed to mean?”
Leon heard the eerie laughter echoing in his mind. [First, come here, dear]
Suddenly, the world around Leon changed completely, and he found himself in a black void, empty except for the black stone throne in front of him. Leon started moving his head frantically and shouted,
“What have you done? Where am I, you cursed woman?”
Then, a white, black, and red mist appeared above the throne, and gradually it took shape, transforming into a woman sitting on the throne.
The woman who sat on the throne had pale skin covered with tribal tattoos, wore revealing clothes, and her eyes seemed unnatural, at least to Leon. She sat on the throne and looked at him.
Leon said, pointing at her, “You’re the Dark Witch.”
The woman mocked him, “Goodness, how clever you are! You figured it out right away.”
Leon didn’t have time for jokes. “Damn it, just tell me what you want. I don’t have time for games.”
The woman placed her hand over her mouth to stifle her laughter. “Oh, why all this anger? In reality, we have all the time in the world. The spell I placed on the world extends beyond just a planet or a few dimensions.”
Leon’s eyes were wide open as he looked at the woman in front of him, and he stammered as he spoke.
All he could think about was one thing; if what the woman said was true, it meant she could erase him with ease.
The sorceress began to move her finger in a circular motion towards Leon. “I know what you’re thinking, dear, and as I told you, I will not harm you.”
“So what do you want from me?” Leon asked, sweating from fear after discovering the woman’s immense power. She also knew he was not from this world, leaving him with only a feeling of fear.
The woman tilted her head and placed it on her right hand. “I won’t lie to you. I saw you as an anomaly when you came to this world.”
“I was bored, and when I saw you, I enjoyed it up until now, and that was before I discovered the manipulation of your little system, or as you call it, Elsa.”
Leon wanted to interrupt, but she stopped him by raising her hand. “No need to say anything, boy, but I want to ask you something. What do you remember from your previous life?”
Leon looked at her in confusion and still felt some fear. “I really don’t understand what you mean. If you’re talking about my personal life, I don’t remember anything. As for this world, I know everything.”
The woman nodded towards Leon. “Yes, as I suspected. What if I told you that this is not your second life, but your third?”
Leon’s mouth and eyes widened in shock, and he couldn’t find words to express his astonishment. “You’re joking.”
The woman smiled slightly, “Yes, as I suspected, you wouldn’t believe it. But to explain further, your second and first lives have been erased, and some things in your memories were altered to fit the situation.”
Leon placed his hands on his forehead and gritted his teeth. “I don’t understand anything anymore. Everything is confusing.”
“Ha ha ha ha ha ha, yes, sometimes these things are extremely confusing. Well, at least for me. As for you, the matter is incomprehensible.”
Leon sighed and tried to calm down, even though he felt short of breath. “I don’t understand why all this.”
The woman laughed but decided to answer Leon. “It’s simple, dear. While your first world was ordinary, your second world was based on one of the best two novels I’ve read.”
“You died in your second world, but you showed in that world the ability to evolve. Therefore, the system chose you to take over your body, of course, after equipping you with everything you need to become stronger, as it will lose the ability to access all those powerful elements it provides to its host after taking over your body.”
Leon sat on the black ground in front of the throne where the Dark Sorceress sat, with every piece of news he heard being worse than the last. “I… I don’t know what to do. Everything doesn’t seem logical. I have no memories, and now I don’t know if my life is real or fake.”
Leon just looked at the ground with vacant eyes. The woman smiled, “That’s why I’m here. Initially, I wanted to enjoy your adventure in this world, but after some thought, I decided to enjoy watching you from another world and see what makes you interesting enough for the system to choose you for the takeover of your body.”
“But it wasn’t fun watching that alone. And who would be a better reading and watching partner than the main character?”
Leon looked at her in shock, overwhelmed by the number of shocks he had experienced in one day.
The woman snapped her fingers, and suddenly Leon found himself sitting on a chair with a table in front of him.
The space changed, and a giant transparent mirror floated in the void. In front of him, a small book with black and gold colors appeared, with no title.
Leon looked towards the woman, who smiled at him. “You will read your second life recorded in this book, and the mirror will show you everything. Don’t worry, I’ve cast a spell that divides your consciousness between reading and watching.”
Leon shifted his gaze from the sorceress to the mirror and then to the book.
His hands began to tremble as he took the book and opened the first page.
—
As you can see, things have become more complicated for Leon than necessary. This volume, titled The Past, will talk about Leon’s second life, which is what the story is based on.
