Glimpse of Eternity [A Reincarnation Isekai Fantasy]

After Ken seemingly lost consciousness because of Zell doing something to him, he felt as if he was in a dream.

In the dream, he was drifting across an infinitely vast dark blue sky, filled with countless twinkling stars. He just drifted and drifted, following the current of whatever he was on, without any idea where it would lead him.

And then he woke up, feeling extremely uncomfortable. He felt as if his skin was many times more sensitive which made the air multiple times colder than he felt it should be. There was even a lot of... something on his skin. Was it mucus? Or some sort of slime, perhaps? Ken couldn't tell, but he didn't like it.

'This is so uncomfortable.' Ken thought. 'No wonder babies are always wailing like madmen.'

Ken somehow understood that he was a newborn baby at the moment. Zell had told him that he would be reincarnating into a baby's body, and Ken had read plenty of novels, most of them isekai types, so he naturally concluded that the intense discomfort that he felt, which made him want to peel his skin off, was from being a newly born baby.

'I thought I would be reincarnated into a baby that was already born, not into a baby that was literally getting pushed out of the womb.' Ken mused, with a hint of complaint. 'I don't really want to experience that again...'

To top it all off, his eyes felt extremely... clunky? In any case, he couldn't seem to open them. He could tell that there were a bunch of people around him, making a fuss, however, he couldn't really hear anything distinct. It sounded as if his ears were muffled by something, so he couldn't make out any words the people around him could've been saying.

'Oh! That's right.' Ken suddenly remembered something from one of the novels he read. Apparently, babies were supposed to cry when they were brought into the world, since they have literally never experienced anything more uncomfortable than being born. Ken felt like that made a lot of sense, especially right now. The novel also spoke of how it was worrying if a baby didn't cry, since it might have abnormalities, or it might be dead or sick. 'Guess I have to cry...'

Ken then tried to get his newly acquired vocal cords to do some wailing. Once he did, he heard what seemed to be joyous exclamations all around him, which meant that he had done the right thing. He continued crying for a while more, since it would be strange if just stopped right now.

'Oh... what's this feeling...?' Ken suddenly felt himself being lifted up. There was something soft pressing on the entirety of his body. The soft thing seemed quite elastic and held a comforting warmth. Ken unconsciously stopped crying because of this, and he decided to just enjoy the sensation. 'Hey... this is good. I could get used to this.'

In addition to the pleasant sensation, the smell coming off of the soft thing was also very pleasing. With both his skin and nose in bliss, Ken's mind couldn't help but sink into relaxation.

Eventually, he felt what seemed to be a finger prodding his small hand. Ken felt that it had the same pleasant scent and feeling as the soft thing pressing on him, so he just grabbed it a bit. But then he realized something.

'The soft thing on my face has a similar smell and feeling to the finger I'm holding... and I'm being lifted up, so... This soft thing is a person's breast! Why is it so big? It can actually smother me like this? In any case, if the feeling somehow feels familiar, then the one holding me should be my mother...' Ken was a bit surprised by the massiveness of his supposed mother's mammaries, but he snapped out of it quickly. He decided to tighten his grab around the finger, since he felt that that would somehow make her happy, which was quickly confirmed to be true, since he felt a very melodic voice shriek merrily close to him. He then felt as if he was being lifted up and down for some reason. 'But that can't be, right? If my mother is the one holding me, then she should have just finished giving birth, so that can't be right...'

Ken just decided to stop thinking about it, since he wouldn't be able to find the answer anyway. He just chose to focus on what he could find out.

'Let's find out a little more about my new body, shall we?' Ken thought to himself. He proceeded to use [Supreme Insight] on himself, with the goal of finding out as much as possible. 'Since my eyes are closed, I'm looking at my own eyelids, right? Which means I'm technically looking at myself. It should work! Please work!'

A semi-transparent blue screen showed up in his vision.

 

 

'Mm. Seems about right, except for the age...' Ken had been infused with some knowledge about his extra skills the moment he got them from Zell. His species was correct and all of his special abilities were there, as well. As for his name, it was most likely empty since his parents hadn't given him one yet. 'Why is the age like that...? Did I really spend such a long time in the Corridor?'

Ken suddenly felt the up and down motion stop, and his mother seemed to be conversing with some people. Ken tried to listen in, but he really couldn't discern much. He could somehow tell his mother's voice apart from the others, especially since she was holding him at the moment, but he couldn't even accurately tell how many people his mother was talking to.

'Well, I'll just leave them to it then. Maybe mother is talking to my father right now, deciding what to name me.' Ken mused. He decided that now was the perfect time to examine some aspects of his status. He looked at his race first.

 

 

'Oh, this looks promising.' Ken happily thought. The TLDR of his race was that he looked like a human, but better. He could do anything that an ordinary human could do, plus a little bit of what the Warbeasts could. 'The [Beast Form] skill is really obvious, but what does this [Beast Gate] do? Do I summon monsters or something?'

 

 

'Well, that's not very informative...' Ken remarked. His [Supreme Insight] must've been acting up again. In any case, he somewhat understood that he would gain increased abilities in exchange for going on some kind of frenzy like all the other beast-type transformation abilities in other novels.

Ken then rapidly went through his affinities, since he already knew what they basically did.

 

 

 

 

 

'Yep. Just about what I expected.' Ken inwardly nodded his head. 'Chaos and Darkness don't bestow any kinesis-type abilities since they're apparently higher forms of elements. So the stuff I can do with just the affinity alone is incredibly powerful.'

[Electrokinesis] and [Cryokinesis] were self-explanatory, so Ken decided to take a look at his [Chaos Origin] extra skill.

 

 

'Okay... this skill is so dangerous that [Supreme Insight] is taking the effort to warn me.' Ken remarked on the dangers of [Chaos Origin]. Zell had left a warning in his consciousness, that he shouldn't use this until he got a lot stronger. And it seems it was well-warranted since the usually taciturn way of divulging information had expressly told him to watch out for this extra skill. 'Alright, let's seal this thing away for now.'

Ken then turned his attention to his last extra skill. He had been curious about this one the most. Even though Zell had given him information about the other skills, she hadn't done so with [Taunt], for some reason.

 

 

'...' Ken was a bit speechless at the skill. 'Did she give me this skill because I somehow did something to piss her off? Is this some kind of sign that she wants me to kill myself?'

The skill had various things Ken wanted to complain about. Wasn't it too much to only be able to use it on stronger people? Also, it would be one thing, if [Taunt] just turned the target into a mindless, raging lunatic that was thirsting for his blood, but something about the description told him that wouldn't be the case. Also, once he became a [Transcendent] or whatever, wouldn't the skill become completely useless?

If the skill only had one of the problems above, Ken could somehow think of ways to use it, but it had so many constraints that he just found finding a use for it troubling.

'Why would I want someone stronger than me plotting my death?' Ken retorted in his head. He decided to just throw the skill at the back of his mind for future use. He really hoped Zell didn't give this skill to him as an implication for something...

There was a dull flash of light, and the screen for [Taunt] was replaced by something else, accompanied by what seemed to be cheering from a few people around him.

 

 

'Oh, I got a new name...' Ken, or rather Reivan, remarked inwardly. He pensively thought, 'I suppose... that my life on earth really is over now. Even my name is gone...'

Reivan thought back to his past life. He thought of all the people who helped him, who took care of him and tried to ease his pain. Reivan didn't know how much time had passed while he was stuck in the Corridor, but the fact that his age somehow couldn't be measured anymore, the time he spent there definitely wasn't short. All of the people he knew were probably in urns or caskets six feet underground right now.

'Kyouka...' Reivan thought of his little sister. While Zell was informing him about how Kyouka lived her life, he had just been exasperated at her actions, however, Zell saying that she died caused him a stinging pain in his heart that hadn't gone away, even now. Of course, he was happy that Kyouka had lived a good life. And Reivan thought that it was only natural for a person to die after living for so long. But it still pained him greatly.

Surprisingly, when Zell had said that Kyouka's soul had most likely dissipated, he hadn't been affected too much. It wasn't because of a lack of affection for Kyouka, but rather because he didn't believe everything that came out of Zell's mouth.

'She didn't even know her own race's name or the name of her realm.' Reivan thought. 'Even a lot of the things we talked about were just theories and hypotheses. Zell obviously isn't the most reliable source of information.'

Of course, Reivan didn't think less of Zell because of it, but he didn't think it wise to trust in her knowledge unconditionally.

Who knows? Perhaps one day, Reivan might discover a way to revive Kyouka. Or even turn back time, so that he could see her again. The possibilities were endless.

'If only...' Reivan's heartbeat quickened as he thought, 'If only I had power. I could do anything.'

On a pleasant afternoon, in the Kingdom of Aizen's Royal Castle, while everyone was celebrating the birth of the second prince, Reivan indulged in his fantasies.

That day, an ambition so great, that it would one day swallow the entirety of the world, was born.