Scream's Notes: Here's another chapter for you losers because you're all just so special to me (;p nyah). Also, you guys can reread chapter one if you all want to, I went back and rewritten it since there's was mistakes here and there fix (I did create this late last night after all). Anyway, I won't bother you much of my ramblings and let you readers be on your way to the new chapter. Have fun~
Dislcaimer: Magi and The Adventures of Sinbad belongs to Shinobu Ohtaka (with the help of her lovely assistant Yoshifumi Ohtera). My original character(s) belong to me!
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It was huge, colossal, and unbelievable.
Giant towers with reflective mirrors and stones stacked so high that I wondered if they could reach the sun. There was noise and people everywhere, colors and bright strange lights that overwhelmed my vision. Turning and twisting away from the crowds that walked by me in strange fashion and fabrics I had never seen, and there was even children who were—my eyes snapped up towards the sky when some bird-shaped monstrosity made of armor flew over the giant towers, and I ducked, afraid yet mesmerized by the magnificent sight. The metal bird gave a loud and bellowing pitch that grew higher in volume until it faded away, and the people continued on, unbothered and unhindered.
"What is this place...?" I murmured, looking each and every thing I could get my eyes on.
I squeaked when something went by me, faster than any carriage hauled by horses could ever accomplish. The yellow thing (also coated in armor), halted when someone waved a hand, grabbing onto a latch blended into the frame of the carriage, and opening it until it revealed furnished seats.
Looking back up to the towers, colors that caught my attention, and the moving paintings that displayed people and other things, a wave of familiarity and loss came over me. I was amazed and frightened, but deep down, some part of me felt welcomed and happy. There was nothing to feel welcome and happy about in my life, except for not being done away by my Masters and having an extra slop of food on my dirty plate.
It was like there was a name on the tip of my tongue...
"I believe this place is known as Time Square."
'That voice...!'
I slowly turned my head to look over my shoulder.
He looked like a man... if a man had extra eyes, long ears, and blue skin. Looming over me with his massive form was a giant with skin as blue as the sky above me, hair as pale as my own, and a grim expression upon his handsome features. His collar and chest were adorned with large jewelry that were framed by silver, pearls decorating around the sapphire ovals on them. On his upper arms with silver cuffs, fashioned in a similar style as the one decorated on his torso. But my eyes were quickly focused on the next thing that really brought an otherworldly feature on his person, the skeletal snakes that circled around him, slithering like serpent pets that climbed up and over their owner. Even with his unique and strange appearance, the blue giant had an air of majesty, the likes of which I had never felt even in the presence of the wealthy people, that no mortal man could ever hope to carry with them.
"You flatter me," the corner of the giant's lips quirked.
"I..." I trailed off, unsure and afraid.
Slaves did not speak, they only bowed their heads to the people who walked over them. We were things, we had no voice, we were—
"Enough," the giant spoke, cutting off my thoughts. "In this place, all who enter stand on equal grounds. There are no slaves, no masters, just people."
He gestured to the crowds that filtered in an out of vision like an unstoppable river. Elderly, men, women, children, all dressed in strange clothes that looked glamorous or a little, all of them moving as one without breaking the flow.
"What... is this?" my words slowly came out, waiting for a punishment of some sort, but none came.
"New York City," the blue giant replied easily, his many eyes looking across the scene with interest on his solemn appearance.
"I've never seen anything like it." I told him, watching a bottle with a red and white brand appear on the moving pictures with a flash.
Then again, I haven't seen a lot of things.
"Neither have I."
I looked up at him, my brows furrowed in confusion. The blue giant saw this and prepared himself, for what, however, I did not know.
"My name is Belial, the Djinn of Truth and Conviction; the fortress you had seen before entering is my domain, the sixty-eighth Dungeon." the blue giant's voice boomed, like a great echo I once heard from the canyons of which I had crossed on the slave Masters traveling carriages.
"A Dungeon...?" I squinted my eyes, the word familiar to me the more I thought about it.
Where have I heard it from? It was nothing the Masters had spoken of, they were moreso interested in speaking of prices and grueling over the maps of the next best location to do their sales for their goods, but there was no such talks about Dungeons... But somehow, when I gazed at the mystical creature looming over in his magnificent frame, I couldn't help but feel that this was something that I should know already. Again, it was there, just at the tip.
"Sorry, mom, I can't make it back."
A voice that struck a deep cord in my being, a voice that screamed minemineMINE had me whirling around to face them. One part of my brain was bewildered of such instinctive actions I was making, actions I had never done from being whipped and trained by my strict Masters, but another part of me reached out for something that had felt lost and taken. Whatever I was expecting to find when I had turned to face that voice that called out to me more than the Djinn's voice who had spoke as if inside my thoughts, I was not expecting this...
There was nothing noteworthy or interesting about her (besides looking as strange as the rest of the people). Her hair was like Tanna's, golden, but a little darker. Her eyes were brown, dots littered all over her face, and she wore something over face, like two small see-through mirrors held by bright blue frames that hugged the side of her head.
"I'm working the night shift hour, so I won't be home until probably four or five in the morning..." the girl spoke out loud, talking to no one but herself.
'Is she touched in the head...?' I wondered.
"Look a little closer, imp." Belial, the giant, said.
Following his tidbit, I looked back at the girl, eyes watching and ears listening as she continued to talk to the air, no one passing by batting an eyelash... but I noticed she kept one had up close to her ear. Feeling that I was on to something, I looked a little closely until I spotted an object pressed against the side of her head where her ear would be. If I listened carefully, past the noise of the people and every strange high-pitched horn that sounded where the yellow carriages were, I could hear another voice coming from the object in the girl's hand.
"A phone. Devices used to communicate with people at long distances." Belial supplied an answer, crossing his arms as he watched the girl. "Also a source of trouble from the high rate of car crashes due to the drivers' texting."
"For someone who says that they had no idea of a place like this, you sure know a lot." I pointed out to him.
"Well of course I know," the Djinn looked down to me. "You are the one who knows this place better than me. I'm only learning this from you."
What?
"Learned this? From me?" I shook my head at him, wondering if there was a mistake in my understanding or his wording.
"There are no mistakes here," Belial said, waving his arms where the whole scene around us shimmered to reveal that this was an illusion, a mirage, a picture he was reflecting from somewhere with his control. "I see the truth where there are lies. This place holds a deep connection to you, and through this, I can see it and better understand you."
...
What?
The words that filtered out of his mouth grew less and less sense. This place holding a connection? The claims of me knowing such a strange powerful looking city? I couldn't believe this.
"This is... this is insane!" I told the Djinn, knowing it was reckless of me to say such things, but I couldn't hold myself back. "I don't know anything! I'm just a merchandise to be sold, nothing more! I've never seen or been to a place such as this: you must be mistaken!"
Expecting a harsh reprimand, I waited for the inevitable. Something happened, but not in the way that I had assumed it would.
There was a scream and the sound of collision with a sick crunch that followed afterward.
Snapping my head up quickly, Belial was nowhere to be found, and the girl whose appearance caught my eye out of the thousands of people that swarmed through the colossal kingdom, I looked and felt my insides freeze.
Lying on the pavement, all twisted and bent like a limp doll whose limbs were thrown wildly when it had been dropped on the floor, was the golden-haired girl. People were around, screaming into devices similar to the one the girl held, calling out for help. A carriage, near identical to the yellow carriages, albeit the color, was off the hard trail and onto where the people were. A crater-shaped dent on the glass at the front of the metal carriage, shattered glass splintered and dents on the metal carriage's forefront.
There was blood spreading around the girl like a perverse version of a halo—
'o-HG-oD!I-mDY-inG!'
I shot up, a cold chill running up my spine as I stared on. I couldn't move, I couldn't turn away from the scene, I couldn't even turn my head away enough so that I didn't have to watch. But my body was frozen, uncooperative, and I was vulnerable.
"Of course you're vulnerable. You did just die, after all.' Belial's disembodied voice drifted through my head.
No! No, I was right here! I was breathing, and I was watching that girl die as people were helpless to do nothing but stand and watch the girl bleed away. Why was no one carrying her off to the hospital? Why was no one trying to reach out to prevent the blood from oozing out of her?! Why was no one there to stop their goddamn gawking and actually do something for once in their fucking selfish lives?!
'WHY AREN'T THEY CALLING MY MOTHER?!'
...
... what?
And that's when everything around me collapsed, buildings falling, people disintegrating, and the only thing that I knew was me, myself, and I/Her.
My name was Linda Myers, I was twenty-seven-years-old, still living with my mom, and I was attending university.
I wanted to be a teacher.
My tuition was pretty hefty, so I worked at the mall at a clothing store and took the late night shifts of fast-food restaurants to earn extra cash. I didn't want to keep mooching off my mom's money, only taking the free meals she cooked and the bedroom that still remained my own. It was until recently that I started talking to a few fellow students that we began thinking about moving in together as roommates, all of us pitching our money together to live away from our parents (honestly, who wanted to be living with their mom when they turned thirty?).
I was taking another late night shift, the late hours of the night to answer the hungering people that skulked around at the dead of night, smelling like they've been partying or just simply hungry. Anyway, I was talking to my mom on the way to work. She had already went ahead and cooked my favorite meal: crispy boneless chicken with macaroni and mashed potatoes on the side. Just hearing the food of the night made my mouth water, but I couldn't back down from this shift, not if I wanted a little extra in my wallet. She was disappointed not to be seeing me tonight, but she understood and promised to pack up the dinner in the fridge for me to eat when I was awake enough to get some.
Mom was so awesome.
"—I'll see you later, love you!"
Those were the last words I heard from her before the violent sound of tires on tarmac tore their way into my eardrums, and before I knew it, I was flying a few feet until I collided on the sidewalk with people scrambling out of the way. I blinked, confused as hell and bewildered of what just happened, and then the pain came, boring down on me like two walls were squishing my sides until I was in an uncomfortable grip between the two hard walls. I was bleeding, choking, and I couldn't fucking move!
What the hell just happened?
My blurry eyes locked on a familiar phone, cracked and broken beyond repair, yet it was still alive that I could hear my mom's distorted voice.
"Lin—Linda! Hone—"
I wanted to cry out, I wanted to tell her that I was hurting and I wanted her to be with me because I was so scared, and I wanted to cry and wait for my mommy to come and rescue me.
But all that did was make me cough up blood, choking more and more on the heavily copper liquid.
'Oh, God! I'M DYING!'
Finally, without warning, death took hold and spirited me away.
I screamed.
This was not my body, this was not my face, this was not mine! THIS LIFE IS NOT MINE!
"Hush."
I saw it, this time with a perfect High Definition experience that no entertainment company would ever achieve for another hundred years. I saw myself born from a dark-skinned and white-haired woman, watching me with solemnity as I was taken from her without a fight. She was a prostitute, a working escort that lingered around the brothels of Heliohapt country, the father was unknown.
I was given away to the slave traders where I would be taken care of by enslaved women, all of them clothing me, cleaning me, feeding me as I grew from a babe, to a toddler, and now a young girl. I understood better of the things that had passed over my head, as I was too young to make sense of them. Past lessons ingrained in me from my classes of elementary, middle school, high school, and college filled my thoughts with knowledge (knowledge was power). I was thankful for taking Arab and Japanese language classes after I passed my philosophy courses, something I knew would come in handy in the long run
Which lead to my next big issue.
I remembered Heliohapt, I remembered Sasan and Parthevia. I also remembered Kou Empire, Balbadd Republic, and the Sindria Company. I remembered Djinns that went by the name of Ugo, Amon, Paimon, Baal, Focalor... and I remembered Belial.
And most of all... I remembered a story about a little blue-haired boy who had come from another world, and he was known as a powerful magician known as a Magi.
"Simple yet mysterious. Interesting." Belial pondered over the title of the manga.
Oh, Em, Gee.
"Of all the things to say, you resort to your texting language?"
"You've got to be fucking kidding me!" I screamed out loud, my voice reaching higher than it had ever after so many years of submissive silence.
My name had been Linda Myers, I was twenty-seven-years-old, I went to university, and I had died. And then, I was reborn in a world I knew from a fictional manga based off the Arabian Nights tales.
I was so fucked.