Nathan

Year 2850 | Month 5 | Day 21

“The first being to see me in a millennia is a special one,” a female voice echoes out within the cave, making me quickly look around in an attempt to locate its source. But it continues without me being able to pinpoint anything about it, “I can tell that even from within this infuriating cage.”

I blink in surprise while turning to face the cage and the black flame bird inside of it.

“Wait, the voice belongs to… the bird?” I can’t help but mutter out loud. And the black flames in the seemingly pitch black cave with nothing but the single cage suddenly burst outwards.

“You will not call me a simple bird again, is that understood?” the bir- err, creature says. “My name is Incendia, and I am the last phoenix.”

Oh.

My jaw drops open after a few seconds of processing what it said.

“Wait a fucking second, did you say phoenix?!” I can’t help but shout. “As in, the extinct fire birds?!”

“Who are you calling extinct?!” the fire bird in question shouts, the black flames seemingly flaring with her – I’m guessing it’s a female considering its voice – anger and burning my legs. But I ignore the flames, even as they begin to lower again, no longer hurting me. “My apologies, child. I lost my… temper…?”

The self-proclaimed phoenix trails off after noticing that my legs are perfectly fine after having regenerated.

“Very special indeed…” she mutters before raising her gaze to meet my eyes. And the red flames that occasionally flicker out of her pitch black eyes almost seem to come out faster as she asks, “Just who are you, child?”

I stare at the self-proclaimed phoenix for several seconds. Then I come to a decision and begin walking away.

I’ve learned my lesson about opening cages for sealed powerful beings. I’m not doing it again.

“Child, at least tell me your name before you start walking in circles,” she repeats.

Since it doesn’t hurt, I go ahead and answer as I’m walking through the pitch black abyss that is what should be a cave, but I’m getting the feeling might not be, “Nathan. Nathan Fox.”

Not sure what she means by ‘before you start walking in circles’ though. And I’m not sure I like the sound of it.

The story has been taken without consent; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.

I continue walking for a few seconds before she continues, “So how did you end up here?”

Once again, since it doesn’t hurt and I have nothing else to do as I walk, I answer, for some reason feeling a little comfortable talking to her. Almost like I see myself in her somehow.

“Well, it all started when I went out to do some mountain climbing to clear my head…”

An unknown amount of time later

“You poor child…” the phoenix says as I continue to walk through the endless abyss of darkness that I’ve been walking through for who knows how long without end. Far longer than it took to enter this abyss in the first place. “…you really are just like me.”

That has me pausing before turning back, only to blink as I realize that I’m still only a dozen or so meters away from the cage.

Huh? Wait, what? Why am… huh?

“Oh, right, I almost forgot to tell you,” the phoenix – who at this point is probably a phoenix since I don’t know of any other talking birds in existence, much less birds that are several meters tall – says, “when one with death and fire affinity enters this place, there is no leaving.”

I stare at the bird for several seconds before muttering, “Now she tells me…”

Actually, now that I think about it… “How come you believed me right away about the whole ‘immortal’ thing?”

She blinks in surprise and answers, “Well, you didn’t die by my death flames. Which means you have death flames of your own. Which means you’re immortal.”

We stare at each other for several seconds in silence.

“What’s with that jump in logic?” I can’t help but ask.

The phoenix answers as if beginning a lecture, “To know this, you must understand how death flames work. They’re a manifestation of the fire and death element, and will burn the life force of the user along with the one they use the flames on. So to be able to wield them without dying, you need to have a type of infinite life force. Which in your case is that your life force infinitely resets no matter how much you burn away.”

Huh. That… actually helps me a lot with my research.

“Thank you for that,” I tell her. But then I add, “Although, how did you know about my life force being reset?”

I didn’t even know that.

Then again, most people can’t see the life force of others. Generally only Class S magicians with a perfect understanding of soul or death magic can. And it’s not like there are any of those left in the world.

That thought gives me pause as I remember the myths about phoenixes. Birds of flame that are the only truly immortal being in existence. Hence why they managed to last far longer than the other mythical creatures of the past, all of whom are now extinct.

Everyone thought the phoenixes were as well, despite the irony of it. Since no one had seen one in all this time.

People just assumed they found some way to die out or that they left our world somehow.

“Because all mythical creatures can see the souls of other beings, regardless of our control over mana,” Incendia answers, her voice calm and with a hint of motherly affection in it. “It was something I could do even before I had an affinity for the death element forced onto me.”

I blink at that as realization sets in.

“You…” I begin, only to shake my head and continue, “…you’re just like me, aren’t you?”

The phoenix nods her head and says, “That I am. Now that you’ve explained your life story, I’ll explain my own.” She pauses for a second. “If you don’t mind, of course.”

I definitely prefer her over that bag of bones.

“Go ahead,” I tell her.

So she begins her own life story.