It was barely after a few seconds that Mark found out that something was not right.

Having your arm caught by a strange old man with a creepy smile is usually a good indicator, especially when you are in a situation that is quite supernatural on its own. And the always alive “Can I have a moment of your time young man?” just send a shiver down his spine.

He didn't feel in danger, but this still could not end well, not for him at least.

And then he saw the mans face up close, and this was what truly shocked him.

This man was visibly in pain, no not just in pain, he suffered. A lot if shaking facial muscles and visible drops of sweets were any indicator.

How, he could suffer so much HERE? Scratch that how he could suffer at all HERE? From the moment of his death Mark felt instinctual confidence about security of this place. It was impossible to be in danger here. It was also impossible to be hurt here, so how this old man could be in such a state?

“Now, young man I have seen that you didn't look so intensively even on this beautiful young lady from before, if you won't stop I might get embarrassed.”

“You are hurt, whatever you are doing, it is probably dangerous for you, I have no idea how-”

“THIS ” Old man interrupted him “is, mister Mark my private matter, don't worry about it. What is important for you is that I need you to do something for me and have no intention to allow you to end your reincarnation before you help me.”

Mark instantly caught difference before 'will help me' and 'agreed to help me'. He briefly wondered if other people have nearly as much troubles with them being reborn as he. Most likely not, they probably just sleep through entire rest of the way after the Flames.

Lucky bastards.

Well, it was not like he was really as angry as he made himself sound (even if it was inside his own head) as he always liked learn about new things, but as a born physicist he liked to start from the basics and learn all the way up to the most complicated formulas.

And right now it was like someone just telling him that somewhere there he could find an entire library of a completely new science subject, only to show him nothing more than few most complicated equations, without any basics for him to hold to.

“So you want me to help you before I reincarnate?”

“Yes”

“... What would I have to do?” There was no reason to disagree. It was not like anything could harm him when he was already dead right?

Well, look on this strange man's face seemed to prove differently, but he was sure it was something that concerned him specifically. Or rather he was simply unable to acknowledge any other possibility.

“Wonderful, you can call me Koeth by the way.” Stranger smiled and for a little moment young man thought that he didn't looked anywhere that old, actually.

“Mar-”

“Forgive me for unnecessary courtesy, I want to retrieve something from Ideal” Mark frowned for unknown man breaking into his sentence. “Ideal is a specifical place on the border of existence, and non-existence, well this place is like that too, but Ideal is a little more into existence side... Anyway, it can be interacted only in very specifical circumstances. The exact principles of it are... complicated, and even I don't understand them completely. Anyway long time ago I lost there something very precious to me, it looks like that ”

A man... no, Koeth opened his palm, and three-dimensional illusion instantly appeared above it, The thing presented looked like a small tube made from teen-odd rings, it was barely ten centimetres long, and maybe two centimeters wide. Rings where hexagon-shaped, and Mark supposed, that they were movable parts. Every side of every hexagon had a single glowing letter... rune? Painted on it, but Mark was somehow unable to recognize how this looked exactly.

“You just need to remember this object. More or less at least, keep it in your memory, and it won't be hard to find. After it I will release my grip on things. You reincarnate with a ring with you... in a way. After that I won't care how you use it, or if you want to learn from it, just consider this as a payment for helping me retrieve it. As long as you remember that one day I would want ring again. ”

“You know that children aren't naturally born with metal parts? It coul-”

“Like I said 'in a way' ” Koeth interrupted him once again “don't underestimate me, it will be fine.”

“I am not sure if I can just belive you..” Mark said doubtfully. Still it didn't looked like he had other choice, so he would have to comply anyway. But before former student opened mouth to say it Koeth growled threateningly.

“And you think that you can 'just believe' this girl?” Older man face contorted into the grimace somewhere between anger and great pain. Mark noticed more and more drops of sweet appearing on his forehand. “I don't know what she told you, but I would put no faith in any of promises or offering of help from such a person. ” Mark remained silent while his conversation partner took few deep breaths. “I have seen broken and defeated people boy” he continued, already a little calmer. “And this girl looked even worse than them, she looked like someone, that had given up. Just keep that in mind. And it is not like you really can NOT help me anyway. Unless you are willing to stay here until my patience will end, and I assure you I want this ring A LOT.”

“Well, I had to just agree anyway” Mark ignored the doubtful look in his new acquaintance eyes. His though ran with full speed.

This 'Koeth' could just lie, but he somehow doubted that... Or maybe he, Mark was just too gullible? But then again Levi did not really promised him anything, what was best proof that this guy, at the very least didn't know much about the entire situation, nor about even as much as subject of their conversation. But then, could he just ignore this? After all, there are far better methods to make someone negative towards another person, that to claim her as someone who had 'given up'.

Only if Mark knew that, then this guy before him probably knew as well...

“Then I will send you off. We probably won't meet for quite a long time. Fortunately”

Young man was forced to stop his thoughts when Koeth snapped his fingers and he was instantly sucked into the colorless whirlpool of light-bending power.

It was quite a particular experience, at least as far as art sense could go, the whirlpool itself seeming like it blurred a shape of the space itself...

This was though something that Mark noticed with only a border of his mind, as most parts of it was occupied by quite different thoughts.

“Snap of a fingers? Seriously? I am officially classifying this guy as one with arrogance issues”

***

After careful consideration Mark though that perhaps he agreed to easily.

Well not really, considering that, (Thank god!) he indeed still feel completely safe, and under careful protection that he already come to understanding, was granted to all soul between their incarnations.

Still he severely underestimated how different this 'Ideal' will be. Because what he had seen certainly was far from direct definition of its name...

There was no sun here. No, instead in the sky, you could find three gigantic radiating with light bells.

Yes bells.

Why even bells? It was completely nonsensical. And fact that nearly half of the bell-free sky was covered by multiple wings growing from the immeasurable big tree, visible somewhere far in the horizon Did Not Help.

Though it did actually make the third gigantic figure – a kind of strange shaped tower that looked like something that was half-melted and reformed few times to much, look almost normal in comparison.

And Mark did not even want to think about snake-shaped void space that seemed to draw your very sight whenever you looked at it.

As much as previous student could assume, this reincarnation – space that he was previously while strange still was a place destined for... well living, for the lack of better words.

'Ideal” was not. There were clearly plants here, but no animals. At least not a normal one's, and he could swear that every time when he turned around things looked slightly different than when he looked at them previously.

What was only the next reason, why he should get to work fast.

But then again, there was the problem with that as well. Since he could clearly feel not one but two instances in his mind. And only one he could make appear or disappear with accordance to having an image of the ring, showed him by Koeth, in mind.

Oh obviously that it would not be simple. He was seriously starting to see a rule here, as nothing with him and reincarnation seemed to be straightforward. At least he hoped that it would not carry over on entirety of his next life.

Should he then go only for the ring or for this other thing too? Well answer was quite obvious, he always was a person striving to better himself and possibility to obtain something interesting in completely safe, though strange environment was actually without any disadvantages.

Not even telling, that things, that he encountered up to this point made him sure that if he was to be reincarnated into the 'sword and magic' world, he would need any kind of help to be able to keep even the reminder of control over his life.

Well, he was relatively sure, that manipulating the time flow and dimensions, were not something that normal – or even nearly any person in this different world could do, but if he already was involved with people like that, then it was only more reasons to not give up any opportunity, and later work hard to better his abilities.

During his journey to first, image-independent instance he briefly wondered if this was what Levi thought when she spoke about him 'doing things anyway'. For example Mark could simply not imagine himself not throwing himself into all fantastical things that 'sword and magic' world could probably offer. Especially 'magic' part.

The journey itself was actually very short. In the first place it did not even seem that definition of 'space' in this place was the same as what he was used to. Here it seemed more about... intend than effort. As long as he focused on this strange link in his head, he not only knew a direction but was also able to move like miles with every step, landscape changing around him in flashes.

As for the environment, he somehow lost a drive to look around after seeing pseudo – living rock with many, TO many eyes. Rocks were not supposed to have eyes. They were not supposed to look at you like they were hungry as well.

Once first half of his journey ended he was slightly disappointed, thing that was linked to him showed to be a completely normal-looking one-handed sword.

Of course it was obvious for Mark that there was no way that it actually was any kind of normal weapon. After all it was probably not a place where you could find anything normal even if you tried. Yes, the blade surely was hiding its own secrets.

Once he stepped in and took a sword's handle, blade flashed with a blinding light and vanished.

Surprised, Mark take a step back, but nothing suspicious followed, both sword and his connection to it disappearing almost without a trace.

Almost, since he clearly could feel something... additional in his right hand. So he looked and indeed on the inside side of his palm there was a visible scar. Surprisingly it was not sword-shaped, but rather looked like a contour of a sword injury, two very thin lines started and ended together with a slight distance first growing and then lessening before two ends. Even at the widest point distance, was barely two millimeters big.

As much as fascinating it was, Mark decided that it was not the time and that he would have to left researching this scar for later.

It was very hard to measure time, when you are in a dimension with clearly different laws of physics than you are accustomed to. And not being actually even alive no doubt was no helpful as well. However as far as Mark was concerned it have taken around quarter of an hour and two meetings with clearly-not-alive-and-yet-still-somehow-moving island, and a big group of something that he first took for a butterflies and what actually was golden points of light that somehow was still visible, despite not having any real size, to reach his next and hopefully – last destination.

The crater that he found here was big on the good mile, and deep on at least a hundred feet, Though sincerely speaking he already somewhat accustomed himself to many things in this dimension being made far bigger that they should. The crater itself was clearly very old with plants that long already reclaimed what was most likely barren land many years ago. What made Mark uneasy was fact that object of his search was clearly in its very centre, since this was usually point where you could find things that were, well... a cause of a craters...

He was pretty sure that it was very meaningful, but again, he didn't have any clue what exactly was going on.

Once, he got into inside and closer to Koeth's ring – he decided that he would keep calling this thing like that, at least until he would find it's real name - he noticed that around ring itself there were a lot of sparkling points like someone spilled a broken glass here. Soon however, it showed to be letters, or rather words, make from crystal-like material.

He didn't even consider it strange that they were in english, it was probably nonsensical to expect logic in a place that not even completely existed, at least if what Koeth said to him was true. That was probably one of this cases when anyone could see things written in they native language.

The words themselves when understandable, didn't compose into any sensible sentence. As they were scattered around ring in apparently random intervals, Mark walked around for a while to read all of them.

And he felt slight shiver running through his back.

spike, poison, wealth, cattle, giant, wisdom, mount, man, water, journey, posession, torch, joy, gift, need, ice, luck, protection, sun, sacrifice, plant, day, lantern, precipitation

Mark, was not one, who liked to indulge himself into the world of paranormal and mystical things, at least not in his previous life where all this things, didn't really worked. But even then he knew of some basic things, like Odin runes, that where as much mystical, as they were a part of a history. And as much as there were some difference, this words here, were clearly wery similar to supposed meanings of these runes.

“Wait, wait” Mark shook his head to calm himself. “ Things on the ring showed to me by this old Koeth guy, were clearly, runes as well, and if these words are their meanings, then it is clearly somehow connected to runes in my old world... But maybe I am reading into it to much... let's suppose, that things have a tendency to... leak out from one universe to another, I am sure that I once read about such a possibility, so if these runes are so important that this old man was willing to intervene into the cycle of rebirth...” What he still refused to believe was any kind of easy thing “Then it would not be to strange for some version of them to exist in different universe... or maybe even many different universes.”

Calmed Mark walked up to the ring. Finally being able to look at it closely, he could tell, that actual number of lesser rings was twelve, with runes glowing on entire ring with a faint white light, They indeed looked similar to one's in his world, at leat as much as someone who had seen them barely few times in his life could tell. Only that with one rune on each side of a hexagon it meant seventy-two runes overall. “But there were twenty-four words around, and I am sure that this alphabet consisted from twenty-four 'letters' on Earth as well, so or some runes repeat, or there is still something that I don't know.”

This last thought actually made Mark smile. Something that he didn't know... and how much did he know actually?

Shaking his head Mark touched ring that flashed and flowed into his left hand. He didn't have time to look into changes in his palm as with this flash everything blurred and vanished leaving him alone into black nothingness.

In his last thought, before he lost consciousness Mark hoped that there were no more surprises waiting for him, at least not before he will even be actually born.