As Moriah continued to speak, i roughly grabbed on to the table for support as i forced myself up to my feet, heaving and panting.
I got a look at Moriah's face. Contrary to what i probably expected to see from a patron in charge of said world, Moriah's expression wasn't sullen or stricken with grief.
If anything it was completely empty. Not the blank and expressionless, or even aloof— something more vacant and devoid. There was a blank, empty look in her golden eyes as well, overrun by a glassy shadow.
It was eerie.
Moriah met my gaze and her eyes and expression reverted back to normal like it was a dream i had hallucinated. Her godly grace and aloofness returned as she continued, peering deep into my soul.
"I want you to kill them." She said again, i stood.
I stared back into her eyes, it was hard to but I forced myself to. The fingers of my left arm still trembled, the memory of the vision still vivid as i suppressed my thoughts.
Without realising, i grasped a handful of the table cloth and squeezed.
"What's in it for me?" My voice came out flatter than i expected, it was hoarse.
Moriah nodded, satisfied.
"A second chance. Complete the task, and I will return you. Your body still breathes, suspended between life and death. I can wake it — if you fulfill your end of the deal."
'A second chance...' my eyes widened subtly.
So i really would be brought back to life, i thought.
But i didn't let Moriah's honey words lure me carelessly. The memory of the vision from just now haunted me, the feeling and sensations of a world unraveling all around me did, too, as well.
It made it painfully hard to think and remain compose. For a moment a hot swelling rage boiled inside of me. I felt anger partly towards Moriah for showing me something like that, almost as if she internally wanted to break my psyche and cause me to be careless.
And partly towards me because i already knew my answer even despite that.
Distraught, i swept my fingers through my hair and grinded my teeth.
"And if i said no?" I almost growled, frowning.
Although i anticipated Moriah's answer.
This was a 'deal' after all; if one party backed off or failed to compensate, so does the other party.
Moriah replied matter of factly, a faint playful smile twisting along her lips as she did:
"Then the current takes you. Your soul will be washed clean, your memories scattered. The man called Aiden Walters will cease to exist. And you die for real." She declared openly.
Since i had expected that much, i didn't react too openly and continued to glare at Moriah with a mixed expression. I couldn't help but brush against the feeling that she seemed to find some level of amusement or intrigue in my current state.
It irked me so, for some reason.
The silence after Moriah's words was long— heavy and suffocating as time continued to flow in the strange space. Within that time, i felt my mind growing cold as my thoughts sought meaning in it.
For a while, i stood— thinking.
Eventually, i pulled my chair back in place to take a seat slowly, deliberately— feeling Moriah's gaze intently follow all of my movements from across the table.
I propped my shoulders against the table and leaned over it, lowering my head and hiding my face. Finally i sighed tiredly and looked up at Moriah with a frown, steadying my breath and thoughts.
"Let's say i believe you," i softly began. "You're a goddess. Fate, luck, whatever. Why me? I wasn't some hero or priest. I was just… there."
I had heard and listened to all that Moriah said up until now, but there was one thing i still didn't know.
Why me?
She was a God, i was a mortal. I wasn't sure about Gods, but there were over seven billion other mortals like me on Earth. So why out of all of it, was i chosen?
Moriah gazes at me calmly, her lips twisting faintly with that familiar edge of amusement. Then she began speaking in parables.
"Exactly. You were there. Wrong place, wrong time — a coin toss in a storm. That's what fascinates me about you, Aiden Walters. You weren't chosen. You were… rolled..."
She gazes off into the distance pleasantly for a few seconds and looked back.
"And yet, you're still here. That means the coin landed on its edge."
What the hell is that supposed to mean? I retorted inwardly, unamused.
"If you're saying that's fate, it's a terrible sales pitch. You're basically saying I died for nothing." i was beginning to grow tired and frustrated, and Moriah's choice of words weren't exactly comforting or something i could turn too.
Still, i listened closely, very intensely as if not to miss anything. I wasn't sure; maybe not now, but her words could eventually make sense somehow.
Moriah, smiling softly, responded: "No. I'm saying you died with potential still unwritten. And I hate loose ends."
"I see." I vaguely responded.
Right there. Moriah's last sentence subtly sets the direction of her motive, even though i still didn't know what it was. But from that line, I knew what it wasn't; not compassion, and definitely not Mercy.
It wasn't that she happened to see me die and decided to give me another chance with this deal. It's more closer to intrigue and some kind of twisted divine obsession.
Perhaps maybe because she was the Goddess of Fate, but Moriah seemed to believe me dying under the exact circumstances as i did — wrong place, wrong time— were the threads of fate weaving some kind of potential she wanted to completely see.
If that was truly it, in one word, this bitch was crazy.
And i must be crazier from the way i felt.
Another stretch of silence ensued as i masked my thoughts. Then at that moment, another vast tremor, more powerful than the last, swept through the space again.
RUMBLE-----!!
The entire hall shook like an earthquake was unraveling. The scale of the tremor this time was significant enough to completely trip over the cups and pots off the table. As their fine, ceramic glass crashed into the floor, they shattered into shards and pieces.
Once again, i reached for the table and gripped on to it for support. I held on tightly and intended to wait until this second wave went by, but unfortunately that didn't happen soon enough.
My frown deepened as i noticed Moriah remained completely unshaken and calm despite the whole space shivering like it had a seizure. The rumbling this time was so loud and powerful, it was like i could hear the bellow of a slumbering beast stirring below us.
'Wait.' i thought for a beat.
"There's no monster sleeping under us, is there?" I asked, recognising how absurd i sounded, but Moriah was the one talking about Transmigration and Otherworlds and what not. Who knew what other crazy, unrealistic hobbies the lunatic goddess had?
Fortunately, Moriah shook her head, dismissing my worry. But the trembling still didn't stop.
Unfortunately, her next words weren't exactly comforting either.
"It's collapsing." The Goddess of Fate lamented with a sigh, causing me to quip.
"What?"
CRACK------!!
Suddenly, a literal crack cracked open in the empty space right next to me. A sprawling crack appeared in thin air like the broken surface of a mirror, causing the space around it to contort like a distorted reflection.
Did i mention it was right next to my face?
"Hey, What's happening?! Make it stop, please!" I cried out as the trembling of the space increased, and the crack got visibly wider like a maw tearing open to devour me.
Other similar fissures appeared at multiple places in the hall, literal cracks tearing open through space and appearing in mid air. And they each kept expanding in real time as the vibrations only got worse. At some point, i couldn't even remain sitted anymore.
Just like Moriah said, the space really was collapsing. Like glass.
"It appears our time is up, Aiden Walters," Moriah's voice reached my ears as i suddenly found myself levitating by some strange ability. I quickly realised it was the doing of the Goddess of Fate who aloofly stood in mid air above me.
Her gaze bore into me.
"What is your answer?"
Before the familiar tea table and chairs could also collapse from the tremors, i watched them dissolve into sparks of fluorescent light and cease to exist. All of the tea, pots, cups and pastries vanished into thin air, and a particularly massive crack tore open in the exact space the chair and table just was a second ago.
CRACK———!!!!
It burst open with shards of space like glass, shooting outwards like sharpnel, if that was even supposed to be possible. The world all around us began to groan and wail like it was suddenly under immense pressure from something pressing against it.
Moriah's gaze on me only grew more and more intense as the situation seemed to worsen. She declared urgently:
"Aiden Wal—!!"
"Dammit, i know! No time, i got it!" I retorted in a panic; " i need some more time to decide. Hello, life changing decision, remember?"
I have to say, Moriah did not at all look amused my response. She gritted her teeth in annoyance, her godly features finally twisting beyond her aloof visage. It was kind of worthwhile— if only i also wasn't on the verge of vanishing.
"Decide faster! What's even there to think about, anyway?" Moriah retorted in an almost roaring voice.
And deep down, i knew she was right. There wasn't much to think about any longer— no, there was. But to me it didn't matter because i already knew what i wanted.
I already had my answer.
My mind involuntarily reflected over Moriah's bargain.
It was a ridiculous offer. Insane.
But my pulse… was racing. My heart was racing. The same way it did in the past when I used to place a bet I knew I shouldn't.
On the surface, i didn't want to go to another world, not one rife with doom and destruction at the end of it. And more importantly, I didn't want to have to kill anyone!
But I also wanted my old life back. No matter how much i complained about how quiet and still it was, it was where my family was. It was where i had my freinds, the bar, the late weekend hangouts— everything! I...i couldn't just leave it all behind?
Yet deep down inside of me, i was exhausted. The mundane cycle that had become my 'normal' life back on Earth had left me more weary and yearning than i realised to even admit.
I glanced at Moriah with clenched teeth as the world continued to rupture around us.
She wasn't offering mercy. She was offering a risk. And damn it… I could feel myself leaning toward it.
If nothing else at all, there was one thing Moriah, the Goddess of Fate and Luck sold me;
The promise of Thrill.
"Fine!!" I shouted reluctantly through the void — at this point, most of the gold Hall was gone, replaced by an endless and sprawling dark purple void of nothingness.
Between Moriah and i, was yet the largest of the cracks spreading the widest open. I glared at the divine visage of the Goddess through it from across.
"Deal!"
Moriah's lips curled into a cold smile i failed to see at that moment.
Then a resplendent radiance of gold erupted from her figure like the birth of a new star in the empty void of space.
"!!"
"Wonderful choice, Aiden!" Moriah's voice boomed through the space, sounding more godly and Divine than ever before. It seemingly resounding from all directions, while a massive and ethereal gold circle, reminiscent of a mandala with runes and symbols, unraveled behind her figure from the radiance of light.
Moriah's already golden eyes, took on an even brighter Otherworldly radiance as her starlight hair streamed like constellations. Golden mystic circles weaved and unraveled along the full length of her arms, and a single gold thread stretched from it, through the void, and reached out to me.
As Moriah's visage continued to ascend into something more Supreme and Otherworldly, her omnipresent voice echoed through space and directly inside my head.
"We've already spent too long deciding, there's no more time to fully bring you up to speed. So I'll insert the little knowledge you need to survive in the Otherworld using my Will, and give you my [Blessing]."
As Moriah explained, the gold thread connected into me and a bright radiance suffused from underneath my skin. I didn't understand what she said, nor did i have any idea what was happening.
"I'm connecting your soul and spirit with the other world. You shall be Transmigrated into a new body as the last child of a fallen family. The odds are already stacked against you, and you need to get stronger quickly."
A head-sized golden circle unraveled just above my right chest, and i felt something permeate through it. Then a second circle, this one red, and more aggressive, appeared over the left side.
Moriah's instructions continued to trickle into my soul.
"Chances are direct communication between you and i will be impossible for the unforeseeable future, so your Intuition will be your greatest weapon there. Follow it."
And then a third larger circle — purple and mean— appeared over my stomach with more complicated runes. But just as it did, it flickered and vanished.
And then, Moriah's last words reached my ears. I had to say, the crazy Goddess of Fate and Luck who i couldn't read sounded awfully too delight to make me think i may have made a mistake.
"And finally," she declared one last time. My body embraced by the gold thread, visibly began to dissolve before my eyes. Slowly my vision faded.
"You no longer will be 'Aiden Walters'."
I was vanishing. And amidst that chaos, Moriah's last words were the last thing i heard