The sky was red, and several fireballs were coming towards the castle, I was looking out of the window, and my attention was on the person who was casting the spells, she was a very beautiful lithe woman, and her face matched her blonde hair tied up. The movements she made were enchanting, she moved her wand the way a conductor moved his drumstick. Her level of strength was close to divine, making her one of the ten strongest people on the entire continent.
Next to the enlightened one was the hero Zev, a human who had been brought from another world to kill me. I'm not sure when humans discovered that they could summon people from other worlds, nor do I know how they discovered that these people were stronger than the people of this world, which made it a danger since humans always want to destroy everything.
"We're ready," Cal said as he adjusted his glasses. I'd told him to change them several times, but he insisted on keeping his glasses on, this movement of lifting the frame of his glasses was already a trait of his personality.
He was calm, calmer than I thought he would be, it hurt my heart, I didn't want him to be here, the plan was to leave me alone.
"I still think we should run away," Vespera was afraid, not of dying, she was afraid of seeing me die, I remember once when I fell to the ground and scraped my knee, she screamed in fright and her concern seemed like that of an overprotective mother who doesn't let her children play.
She's always been with me and maybe that's why she worries so much, I'm the only person she can call family.
"If anyone wants to run away, this is a perfect time. But I must stay in this castle, at least I'll be able to kill the hero and his group."
I had already foreseen that I might lose, I had been planning to destroy the Castle ever since I got the title of Demon Lord. I had hoped to win back the territory that the humans had stolen from my kind, but unfortunately, I was weak and unable to win it back, so the best thing to do was to kill everyone I could, at least I could be remembered as the Lord who killed the hero, both sides lose, it's better than just my side losing.
As I watched the illuminated one, the hero looked at me, his eyes were the eyes of a person without fear, power can change a person, from what I heard, he was a fearful man who fell to the ground and despaired the first time he had to kill a wolf. But now he is strong and knows that hardly anyone could hurt him.
A few minutes passed, and I was sitting on my throne, Cal was on my left, Vespera was on my right and Sorene was behind me, she was my bodyguard, but I ended up protecting her. It was a bit ironic, but I was used to the situation.
The hero entered the courtroom, he looked at me and said something, but I couldn't hear, the Castle began to explode and part of the ceiling crushed the hero before he could finish speaking, a few seconds the ceiling fell on top of me, the pain was unbearable, I stopped breathing and heard a voice. It was a woman who was saying something, 'Gael...' was the name I heard, but I couldn't understand it.
My people believed that when a demon dies, a goddess comes to receive the soul and take it to paradise, humans have a different deity, their deity takes us to purgatory and there we suffer until our soul is cleansed and we are reincarnated as a pure being, in other words, until we are purified and born as humans.
Our races had different ways of seeing the world.
But the voice seemed concerned about me, so I assumed my people were right. It would be interesting to see my companions in the afterlife.
I didn't die from the impact, strangely I was feeling fine, my body didn't hurt, which was strange, since even the best-enlightened people couldn't heal anyone that quickly. Especially someone who had been crushed by a concrete ceiling.
When I got out of bed I could barely stand, my head started to hurt and I began to have memories of someone else, it was as if all of someone else's memories were being written down and lived in seconds.
What do you mean? Who is Gael?
- - - ❖ - - -
A blonde woman was heating water in a large saucepan. Inside the saucepan were some towels. She was stirring the towels with a large wooden spoon and in her hands were napkins which she used to prevent her hands from being burned.
"I think you're worrying too much, he's 11, he's almost an adult, and he's not going to die from a simple fever."
The woman didn't seem to care what her husband said, it was as if he always talked like that and at some point, she stopped caring.
A noise was heard, and she dropped the napkins on the floor and went into the bedroom, she knew where the noise had come from. She ran in and saw her son lying on the floor, he looked stricken. His right hand was holding his head.
"Did you hit your head?" She asked desperately.
"No, I'm fine, I just got disoriented, don't worry about my health, it happens all the time."
"Are you really all right?"
"Why would I lie about my current state of health?"
"You're talking strange."
- - - ❖ - - -
I've really started to speak differently, in fact, I was speaking as I always did, but it's still confusing, I'm not sure if I'm Cedri and I've been reincarnated in this body or if I'm Gael and I've inherited these memories.
I think I was reincarnated, because first I remembered the explosion and then these memories appeared, or I just entered a dead person's body.
There are many possibilities and I don't have any answers.
"I apologize, but as I'm getting older, it would be interesting if I changed my way of expressing myself, the old one was very childish."
It wasn't the best answer, but I hate the way I used to talk, the memories make me feel ashamed of the way I was.
"All right, but are you really feeling well?"
"Yes, I'm feeling so good that it's bothering me a bit," I laughed. But she didn't laugh, my deprecating humor doesn't work here, which is a bit of a shame, as I only have it.
I got up from the floor and she looked at me, then left the room, she was finding my behavior strange again, but I refused to act like a child, even if it aroused the suspicions of these humans. I laughed a little, because now I'm human too, which makes me someone to hate.
I'm still a bit confused, it's as if I've woken up from a very realistic dream to the point where I doubt that I'm the Demon Lord Cedri. But at the same time, I feel uncomfortable being a human, so I don't know what I really am.
The memories are overlapping and confused.
I was standing and the woman was watching me, she came back and stood in the doorway.
I walked past her and said I'd be right back, before I went she put her hand on my forehead and let me go.
A worried mother, but my old mother was much more, she wouldn't let me leave the house alone, even though I was stronger than the bodyguards she put in place to protect me. Am I strong in this world?
According to my memories, here they use a different system, they call it magic and the energy is called mana. A bit strange, I'm used to using spiritual energy in a system called enlightenment.
I went downstairs and when I came out of the door my father stared at me.
"I told you he was fine," he said to my mother, who must have been worried about me.
If I remember correctly, I was ill, or something similar. I don't remember what happened just before I woke up.
But I have some obligations, I'm the fifth son of a bankrupt nobleman, my father is a Baronet who inherited the title and the land and today doesn't know how to manage it, so we're poor. Poor enough that I have to help collect food, and we don't have any servants.
Rather ironic.
I looked around for a basket, but they had all been taken away, so I would have to carry it by hand, which would make my job more difficult.
I went to a place I liked, it was a bit noisy, but the sound of the waterfall calmed me down, and along the way, I collected some plants that were edible and could be used in soups.
After a few minutes I left the plants on the ground and remembered what it was like to use light, I concentrated and managed to create a ball of water, I was better with the fire element, but I didn't want to burn the forest.
I modeled the ball until I hit a tree, I wanted to break it in half, but all I managed to do was wet the trunk. I wasn't very good with the water element, but I didn't expect to be so weak.
Maybe it was because I hadn't trained for so many years, or just because I didn't have that much spiritual energy. I don't know, but I didn't know how to use magic, so I kept trying over and over again until I got tired and decided to go home.
On the way I observed the plants and some animals, one caught my eye, it was transparent and it was jumping around, I avoided touching it.