Chapter Eight - The Judge

Nicholas Freeney lived to be 993 years old. With my memories returned, I spent at least that long going over what had happened. At first, I was so focused on the terrible wrongs that I had done that I was totally unwilling to forgive myself. Why? Why didn’t I fall into the depths of hell and suffer tortures greater than anyone could possibly endure for what I had done. The oath I took when I absorbed that dragon core was an oath of power. The gods, the essences, the creator himself heard that oath declaring my fight against fate. The punishment for such as that is the destruction of your soul in the cruelest way imaginable.

I think it was the final parts of my life that allowed me to forgive myself. The smiling, laughing children as I told tall tales in villages around the world. The good I managed to do using my magic, the research I carried out. Finally, the most important part was that I actually managed to beat Melinda! I remember hundreds of battles with her, but I only won that final one! Chuckling to myself, I finally managed to break myself free from the introspection the visions caused within me.

Looking around for the first time in centuries, I was stunned. The elemental sea had sped up already, I was already past the halfway point to the pearl! So much time wasted on feeling bad about past actions that took place so long ago that even god’s have probably forgotten about them! I went to face-palm and then realized, “O shit I have wings now!”

I hadn’t even taken the time to check out my new soul/spirit form! What the hell was I thinking losing myself like that! I quickly checked out my new form, it was actually quite nice, but I missed being a wolf, that’d just felt…. right somehow.

Before I even realized what I was doing, my form started to shift and I was suddenly standing on all four’s on top of the Sea of Fire. “Cool! I can switch between forms now!” Then I realized that I could sprout wings of fire out of my back whenever I wished it! I couldn’t help but squeal and jump up and down in joy… even with my memories of being alive for thousands of years and the pride of an archmage I still was the same little mutant-wolf who chased his tale and yelped in joy in the spirit plane!

The difference was, now I regained control of myself quickly, and settled down to do business. Since I had my memories of being the most powerful archmage in the history of the planet Iounia, I knew how to train systematically now. Plus, the Elemental Sea’s are the best training locations in existence for understanding the law, so there was no way I was going to let that opportunity go!

Time passed swiftly, and another 500 years had passed. During my life as Nicholas Freeney I had specialized in using lightning magic, but that didn’t mean that was unaware of the basic principles of fire magic. Using my knowledge of these principles as my basis, I managed to master many of the laws of fire during this 500 year period. I was extremely excited about my training results because I felt that I had become just as powerful using fire as lightning. Hehe, I couldn’t wait to fry someone with lightning that then exploded into a massive wave of fire. But, in order to do that I first had to figure out how the hell to get off of the Elemental Seas!

Just as I was trying to figure out what to do, the waves began to rise and the sea move swifter. As the tsunami’s began to form, I noticed a massive courthouse hanging in mid-air above the whirlpool formed by the pearl. Trillions upon trillions of shuffling, sleeping souls slowly moved towards the courthouse waiting to be judged. As I watched some of the souls were pushed out of the back of the courthouse and into the elemental seas, while others walked towards a pair of glowing doors that whisked them off to be reincarnated.

Quickly, I transformed into my bird form since I found it easier to fly this way, and flew upwards to the courthouse in the sky. As I got closer and closer, I noticed that the vast majority of souls were just blobs like I had been originally. The few whose souls had form seemed to be in a different line, and as I flew closer I saw that there was a second, much smaller courthouse with a sign hanging on it’s front. I couldn’t read it, but somehow just looking at the sign made a deep, powerful voice ring out in my head.

“Special Case Courtroom, if you are hearing this message then get in line and prepare to be tried by a head judge.”

‘Well shit’ I thought to myself. Despite feeling a bit of dread at being judged by the head judge himself, I was looking forward to this. ‘Worst case, I’ll just have my soul destroyed. Other then that, anything is acceptable as long as I can escape the elemental seas!’

It wasn’t like I had a choice anyway, after hearing the voice a force seemed to lock onto me with an unexplicable power, forcing me to fly to my place in line. Flying in place was too annoying, so I shifted back into my wolf form and waited. Thankfully, the line seemed to move at a fast pace, which surprised me as there were millions of souls in this line.

It wasn’t until I got inside the courthouse that I realized there are many head judges. Another sign in an indecipherable language was hung above the entrance, and the same voice once again rang out in my head. “You will see the main judge, climb to the top floor and await his summons.” Then, I started moving like a puppet again, quickly climbing the stairs. Aparently, this sign picked what judge you see. The vast majority of souls go to a room on the first floor it appears, as I kept climbing I saw fewer and fewer souls until finally I reached the top floor all by myself. Standing outside the single door, I waited impatiently to be summoned.

Inside the door I could hear the faint sound of movement, and the same voice that rang out in my head previously was heard on the other side of the door talking to someone. “You know it’s been nearly twenty-thousand years since I last heard a case. I’m retired dammit, that's why I hired all of you!” His angry voice was filled with such power that the entire court house shook.

‘Fuck, not only is he powerful but he’s pissed and it’s my fault that he’s pissed…. I can just see where this is going.’

Another voice spoke quickly, hastening to explain, “I know that Lord Yama, but this case is very special! We’ve never had a similar case before, and you told us that any case that will set a precedent must be heard by you.”

“Fine!” came the original voice. “Give me the book, and show him in! It’s been so long since an original case came through here it better be interesting! If it’s not you’ll pay!”

The door then opened, and I finally regained freedom of movement as the assistant waved me through it, closing the door behind him. I heard him sprinting away as fast as he could.

“Harumph.”

The irritated sound came from behind the back of the humongous swivel chair as the almighty being swivelled it back and forth slowly while talking to himself.

“Lets see, lets see…. Slayed a dragon, used its core as your heart, destroyed multiple kingdoms, became known as the Demon-Mage Freeney… Hmmm… Offered soul to the Overlord of Lightning at the end of your life and he allowed you to continue existing because you intrigued him, that’s a new one…. Hmmm…. underwent the overlord’s baptism and survived, that’s rare, that bastard always pushes it too far! … regained consciousness after 21 millennia of floating along the Lightning Sea… That’s quite the long recovery period… HAHAHAHA, You blew yourself up and wound up being incarnated in a dead high-class spirit! HAHAHAHAHA…. So, you were the son of the Fire Empress and Lightning Emperor for a couple of months, hmm… that makes things difficult… Underwent the Fire Overlord’s Baptism! Thats another first, you actually survived undergoing two baptisms! No wonder I have to judge you… let’s see, says here that you took another 3 millennia to undergo the baptism and then another 500 years after that to reach my palace, my, my you’ve had a long journey.”

Finally, the humongous chair turned around to face me, and I was surprised to see a small dwarf wearing a monocle and british style suit complete with tophat turn around to face me with a huge grin on his face. I have to admit that when I first met him, I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. He even had books piled up on the seat of the chair so that he could reach his desk properly…. Wait, how was he swivelling the chair back and forth before? His feet can’t even reach the ground!

Of course, he didn’t wait for me to regain my senses, he hopped off his chair and walked around me three times while talking to himself.

“Yes, quite the interesting soul. Originally damned to the deepest depths of hell by his own oath, and yet he crawled his way out of worse torture than anything I’ve ever heard of from hell… His sins were long since cleansed from the Lightning Overlord’s baptism and after surviving the Fire Overlord’s baptism his soul even ascended. Sigh, a dual element god blessed by the two craziest Overlords possessing the spirit-form of both a Phoenix and a Raiju. How in the hell am I supposed to reincarnate you?”

I assumed that was a rhetorical question, because I had no idea what an overlord’s baptism is in the first place! Not to mention... “I’m a god? I ascended?”

He just sighed, waving his hand and saying, “Follow me.”

We walked through the door at the back of his room which turned out to be a magic portal to a massive mansion. “This is my home, make yourself comfortable but you’re not allowed to leave! I’ll be back in a bit, I need to consult with your overlords.” Then, he turned right back around and walked through the door back to his office while muttering something about being retired, and how he was too old for this shit.