‘Well, that sucked,’ I thought to myself ‘Wait a moment. Why can I think? Shouldn’t I be dead?’ I tried to open my eyes, but I couldn't. This feeling was one I have felt before. It was dark, probably because I couldn’t open my eyes, but it was also warm. I tried to move my limbs, but I met resistance. This was a familiar experience, it has been a couple of centuries sense I last felt this feeling, but it brought back memories, memories I surrendered to the dark.

  Once upon a time there was a man who was walking home from the bar. He heard a woman scream and in his drunken stupor he went to check it out. He looked down an alley to find a women bent over a big green garbage bin. Skirt flipped up and panties around her ankles. Behind her was a man with a gun pointing at the back of her head and his pants down with a small erection. The drunk man knew what he was witnessing and decided to be the hero.

  “Jusst becausse youuuu, have a ssmall penis. and can’t get no bitchessesese doesssnt mean you sshould rape oone. Thiss iss why we habe hookers.” The man drunkenly yelled. That was not the right thing to do because the next thing that happened was a bullet entering the mans gut.

  This caused him to panic and run, right into the street where a lifted Ram 3500 with a cattle guard was speeding down the road. Now if the driver didn’t swerve the drunk man would have only had to worry about a gun shot wound to the gut. However, the driver of said truck was possibly drunk too because he swerved right into the drunk man. The cattle guard met the drunk man’s head then, the rest of his body. He was already bleeding out but, that truck just made everything worse.

  Fortunately for the lady he saved she managed to grab the rapists gun and called the cops. Fortunately for the man as well the cosmos deemed him worthy or something and he was isakaid. Yes, this man was me, can I remember his name? No, I cannot. A couple of centuries of boxing, that horrible night away caused me to forget some figures. Did I have any siblings? I can’t really recall. Parents? Don’t even remember their names. All I know is that I worked in a mining town, learned some martial arts from a friend, got drunk, a lot and that’s about it. I think the friend that taught me martial arts became my girlfriend or boyfriend; I can’t recall their face. I just knew they were a good friend of mine.

  That brings me to here and now. After that incident I experienced this same thing here soon I should start feeling the contractions.

  After a few moments I started to feel the squeezing from the contractions. I tried to help my new mother along by shimming myself closer to the opening.

  While I waited to be born, I thought about what happened moments before. I The Dark God was blown up by the idiot of a Hero doing a self-sacrifice. That moron doesn’t know what he did. He just sentenced that world to suffering. That bitch of a goddess is what I would call a certified psycho sorry, correction an expansionist, power hungry, manipulative, tyrant psycho. I didn’t explain this to the Hero, and I only learned about this later but, she would discreetly kill people that didn’t follow her.

  Okay, killing isn’t the right word she would take them to join her halls and throw them in her meat grinder of a war. Doing this worked perfectly for her because people saw that they didn’t have to follow her to be granted access to her divine realm. This caused more people to follow her.

  All she cared about was getting more followers. Gods gain more power in a handful of ways however all Gods get power from prayer. She wanted more people to pray to her, so she developed ways to get more people to follow her. The smart ones knew what she was doing and avoided those things she did. Some of her campaigns worked but most didn’t, so she wanted to expand her influence. So, she invaded another world. After Kyrun’s Gods politely then firmly asked her to stop she escalated it. They didn’t escalate; she did. Contracted souls aren’t anything unusual for gods. Most have contracted souls; thing was she abused the fuck out of them.

  I didn’t know any of this while I was her paladin or hero whatever you want to call it. She knew what she was doing, or at least I think she did. Anyway, I found out some of this truth from the previous Dark God. Once he was slain, I returned to Browen I was upset because at the time I thought the Dark God killed my wife. Then I met the Goddess of light. You see at first, she only appeared in my dreams, and she didn’t have any defining traits so, when I met her and saw my dead wife’s face I started to think. While she asked if I wanted a boon I sat and contemplated what the Dark God said. To throw the goddess off track I asked her to show me what happened after I died on Earth. She showed me and then I left. At first things were fine. A few months went by food production went up sickness disappeared; things were good. Then she tasked me to take out a group that did not worship her. She said they followed the Dark God. Surprise, surprise they didn’t, they were atheists. After the first group I thought it was a fluke then the next group came, and I knew it wasn’t.

  After that I used a refined version of dispelling light, it allowed me to use magic but not others. I traveled back to the Dark Gods castle and explored it. Inside were libraries full of memoirs and diaries. They were helpful but a part of me was still skeptical. Then I saw a message. “Put the Void Crown on to see the truth. Do not worry the crown is easily removable.” I wore the crown and viewed the Dark Gods life. I didn’t remove the crown instead I started to scheme. All that to say is that the Goddess of light is like a toxic ex… Crazy.

  Knowing how crazy she is it isn’t unlikely that she instructed the Hero to self destruct. Unfortunately for her I had a feeling she would do something like this. My “minions” were constructs with faux souls I created. In each one of them I gave them instructions to go into hiding if I were to pass. Some had the ability to shape-shift and mimic a true soul. I had those ones go around and pretend to follow the Goddess. This would help keep them alive and continue the next part of my plan. They would wait around until they run into someone that would fit the roll of Dark God. This minion would train them up and then guide them to my realm and show them how to enter. There they will put on the crown and know the truth. Hopefully, this will buy the people of Browen and Kyrun some time.

  There isn’t much I can do about it now, but hopefully I set them up for success. For now, I just need to be reborn and see where to go from there.

  *-*-*

  After a few hours it finally happened. I’d like to say I came out gracefully, but whoever the mid-wife is didn’t grab me, I ended up sliding onto the bed slowly. I started to cry to try to get their attention to grab me, but whoever was supposed to grab me didn’t until I was fully out. Like seriously help the woman give birth by supporting the baby.

  Anyway, just like last time when I was born and presumably the first time, everything was unfocused, upside-down, and blurry. Depth perception don’t know her. After finally being picked up by who I presume my new father is I realized I was wrong. Things were not upside-down, just unfocused. My now presumed father was just a blurry grey and black vaguely humanoid form.

  I stopped crying after he picked me up and tried to get a grasp on my surroundings. Unlike the first time I was reborn I was a little calmer and tried to get a grasp on things. The first time around I was a mess, I tried to escape my dad’s arms because I thought he was a giant monster. An upside-down blurry monster, conducting some weird ritual. This time I tried to get my eyes to focus and kept my ears wide open to hear my surroundings.

  I heard a few things, my new mothers labored breathing, and possibly sobs of joy, my father’s heartbeat, and a new language. Which was just great, another language I had to learn. I already knew seven languages what’s one more. To be honest four of those languages I learned from the previous Dark Gods memories. Either way this is good news, it means I am not on Browen or Kyrun. A new life away from that trouble, maybe this life could be nice.

  This narrative has been purloined without the author's approval. Report any appearances on Amazon.

  Eh, who am I kidding, things are never easy.

  Alright back to observing. I am in a slightly dark room with white-ish walls. I am now in my mother’s arms. Any smells? Nope can’t tell I still smell like birth, no new baby smell yet. Limb control? As expected for a baby, it is difficult and exhausting. I tried to take a good look at my new mother but all I got was blurry humanoid shape made of tan and blond colors. You know with my father’s skin tone you would have guessed he was the one that gave birth. From what I could tell at the time he had grayish skin while my mom has tan colored skin. My father has short black hair and my mother long blonde hair. Alright now I can tell the two blurs apart time to nap. Being a baby is exhausting.

  *-*-*

  The dream I had was a pleasant one. Having good dreams was a rare occasion for me, especially after I became the Dark God. The memories of both his life and constant fighting I had to do as the Hero lead to many sleepless nights. This time this dream was of my family on Browen when I was still a child. We lived in a small farming village north of a major town. In the dream I was running through barley fields with my older brother, we were playing tag and I was it. I won because he tripped on a particularly thick stalk. After we went and had some lunch, I miss the simple things like that. I wish I could have more memories like that. Maybe I could.

  I entertained the thought for a bit, but I quickly doused it. Living as the Dark God I learned nothing is ever so good and simple. Something is always brewing and whether it affects me or not it doesn’t matter, it’s better to be prepared than to be caught with my pants down. So, I have made the executive decision to start training.

  This training will start with physical mobility. As a baby my muscles are shit, I need to train them. Next thing I can do while resting is meditation. Back on Browen magic was simple. You had internal mana and external mana. When starting off you would start with external manipulation. Being able to influence the mana outside of your body is key to influencing your internal mana. At least it is for most. Some people were born with a high internal mana level which made it easier for them, most weren’t though. I liked to think of it as sorcery and wizardry. Sorcerers had innate mana potential and wizards manipulated external mana. That’s how I thought of it at first though. No good mana practitioner worth their salt was stuck with one or the other. I’ll get back to that in a minute though.

  Sorcerers would manipulate the energy within to create spells. Whether it be physical augmentation to something like strength or creating a ball of fire in your hand. All of the spells they did originated from the body, and all they needed to do was make the mana flow in patterns within themselves with intent on the outcome.

  Wizards used the mana around them to create spells. They had a harder time with physical augmentations but spells like fire ball were much easier. Just like sorcery they had to give the mana intent for it to manifest something. Here is where they really start to differ.

  A sorcerer could just throw more mana into a spell to make a bigger boom, while wizards had to use runes. They would create runes out of mana and put more mana into them to make bigger spells. At some point a wizard or sorcerer will start to manipulate the opposite. Wizards will start to gather mana and shove it into the body; sorcerer’s will start manipulating external mana. Once they reach a point where they are proficient in both, they will start using words of power. It was a separate language that combined both internal flow and external runes. Giving them bigger spells.

  There were also what I liked to call warlocks or clerics; they used power from a separate entity or item. The Dark God was closer to a warlock then anything else. The Void Crown stored and gathered a lot of energy, I mean a lot of energy. I would use it to cast my spells.

  There was also one other thing I started to notice before the goddess made me her Hero. It was similar to cultivation from xianxia. I found my soul. I don’t know if it was because I had more of an awareness from being reborn, but I found it. I started to take the mana inside my body and shoved it into my soul. I kept repeating this till something happened, and something did happen. My body purged the toxins within. Then I noticed that in certain areas the mana flowed much easier. Like the pathways that xianxia novels and manga talked about. I found that if I cast a sorcery spell in those pathways the spells would be stronger. Then the goddess found me.

  I kept doing the same thing taking external mana, her mana, and my internal mana and kept shoving it in. That’s when I experienced the tribulation lightning. Yup I defied the heavens, even took the goddess’ power, and made it my own. That tribulation refined my body, made it stronger, I needed less sleep and all sorts of good stuff. The goddess approved of my actions, so I continued until I hit a bottleneck. I couldn’t get past it which sucked. Then the events with the Dark God happened and I became the Dark God.

  The mana sitting inside my soul was inaccessible. I tried to expel it but something about it felt wrong and dangerous. I took the warning and stopped. Then I did some God things and started to create my minions with the faux souls. I had an epiphany what if I created my own faux soul. It was actually much easier than I thought it would be.

  I created the soul with Dark essence in mind, and it slotted into place like it was meant to be. I went through the same pain as I did before, the expulsion of impurities and the tribulation, again I was stuck at the bottleneck. I never found a way around it, maybe this time I will.

  So, all of that rambling to say that I will do both physical and magical training. First, I need to figure out my surroundings. I took a look around and with my eyesight being the way it was I didn’t see much. I figured I was in a crib because whatever I was laying on was soft and there were walls pretty close to me.

  Having got a small idea of my surroundings, I started. I started with just moving my limbs. Right now, I don’t have much strength, it was just enough to move my limbs but, not much else. So, I tried to do some stretching that was possible while laying down. While I was doing those movements I tried to get a feel for mana. Unlike my first time where it took me years, this time I found it immediately. I guess mana isn’t exactly a muscle and more of a skill, a skill I was well trained in.

  While I couldn’t really see the flow of mana I could still see it. The mana in this area was dense it subsumed everything and moved in patterns. These were recognizable patterns, lighting, heating, and sound proofing spells. Although they were designed in a slightly different way, but I could tell what they were meant to be. A part of me wanted to grab the mana and manipulate it but, a day-old baby manipulating mana would be weird. So, instead I turned to my internal mana to see if I could help with my strength training. What I saw made me pause.

  My internal mana was dense, that in itself didn’t quite cause me to pause but my soul was. I shouldn’t say soul but souls. There were two fully formed souls in me. Not just a real soul and a faux soul but two real souls. This caused me to panic a bit. I didn’t want to take over another person’s body so, I took a closer look at them. They were both me. It is hard to explain but both gave off the feeling of me. ‘Did my faux soul get converted?’ I asked myself. Souls are very complex and not even a true god like the goddess can create a real one. While they were both me, they were imperceptibly different. What the difference was I couldn’t tell you.

  I tried circulating my internal mana through them and they both took to the mana like a dry sponge. That information didn’t tell me much, so I tried channeling different essences. This is where I saw a difference. I started with the six main elements water, earth, air, fire, light and dark. Earth and air felt like shoving something through molasses. Fire slipped into one soul with little resistance and water did the same with the other soul. But trying to switch which soul I was channeling them into felt like running into a brick wall. Next, I tried light and dark. Light rushed into the core I put fire in with absolutely no resistance. Dark did the same thing with the soul I put water in. This told me a lot. One soul was light essence aligned and the other dark essence aligned.

  With this information I continued my training. I circulated mana through my body in a way that speed up my bodies recovery and prolonged my energy. There was a downside to this spell it ate up internal energy a lot. How do you recover internal energy you may ask? Well, there are two ways but one would be weird if I was caught so, I cried. Fun fact babies can be very loud and when a new mother hears her baby cry, she comes running.

  Over my crying I heard a door open then shut. Shortly after I was picked up and was given a tit to suckle on.

  ‘Food has been acquired,’ I temporarily stopped my training and sucked my mother dry. While I was looking at the blur of tan skin, I tried to get a look at my new mom’s face hoping to get some details. I was unsuccessful but I did hear her coo at me and memorized what she was saying. There was one combination of sounds she made continuously. With some intuition I guessed she was saying my name. The name confused me a bit, because unless it was common in the culture of this world, it was not typically considered a male name. To make sure what I heard was right I did an in-depth search of my mana flow.

  ‘It’s gone!,’ my mana was noticeable not flowing the same way in a certain area on my body. So, my name’s gender is not different in this culture. Sophia is still a girl’s name. This is different.