Chapter Text
Victor was always sure he would have an early death. He constantly felt a sense of dread and swirling questions for what came after that inevitably. He very often told himself that a healthy fear of death was a good thing; those who do not fear death often meet its embrace the fastest. He often escaped this creeping sense of dread via playing games- often with his dear friends.
One of the games he liked playing was Arcane Odyssey.
It was honestly a perfect storm for him to like the game; plenty of collectibles, things to do, themes of the deep sea, eldritch horrors, and hell even Greek mythos to add on top of that! Plus, he loved customizing his little characters in their individual saves, and he loved the story. His favorite part of what he knows so far has to be the angsty as shit boss in skyhall despite how fucking annoying it is to keep the boss from de-spawning in his second phase.
Recently, his mind had been… awfully quiet. It was unusual, because usually one of the others in the headspace trapped in this flesh prison would be yapping too- probably Shadow Milk or StarrySpawn- but this tended to happen when Victor was really feeling depressed. He was having an admittedly really shitty past few weeks.
At this current moment, he was just… trying to play some games. When suddenly, he started to feel lightheaded and really…
Really…
Sleepy. He walked to his bed and flopped in it, yawning as he felt the dizziness overtake him. He smelled something weird- almost like burnt fish, and then…
… it all went to black.
He always hated feeling so alone.
—
A warm sensation surrounded Vi█████. Like a warm hug, enveloping his whole body. It felt so comfortable that he didn't really wish to feel anything else, it felt like he wasn't alone anymore. He opened his eyes, to see some form of… sphere in front of him. It was raining. He reached out after walking a bit on the endless plane, and noticed that the sphere was on a roblox spawn point. It…
It reminded him of Starryspawn. So, he held the sphere close to his heart, as he felt everything start to fizzle out again before be heard a voice.
"My apologies for being late, I had business to attend to. Im sorry to say, but you died- to what, I don't know, but at least it was in your sleep."
"Oh. That explains all that."
"All of what? Actually, you know what nevermind that question. My job is to give you a small extra power or two for your next life, due to you not living your previous one to your fullest, and to disclose to you where you're going."
"Well, what are my limits, and where are we going?"
"First, your limits are that you cannot wish for more wishes and that you cannot wish for insane power that does not fit the 'setting' of the world you are going to. Second, you are going to Arcane Odyssey, but some of your memories are probably gonna be jumbled up on your way there."
"Oh. Damn. Well, I guess… I wish to be able to contact my friends somehow."
"Other than that, it's already packaged in. And before you say it, you will be reincarnated as male this time around, so no gender dysphoria for you."
"Uh… then, the ability to see the truth in anybody, basically the ultimate sensing technique, and maybe the ability to de-escalate any conflict?"
"… done and done. Good luck, I will give you an extra gift when you are ready."
"Alright, where am I bei-"
The sound of rain surrounded him as it all went to black.
—
The tatter clothes clinged uncomfortably to his skin as rain poured down on him. Thunder and lightning made themselves known, although greatly muffled by an unknown force. He… really couldn't remember a damn thing from the past day of his life. Everything felt all jumbled up… did he… die? He knew he heard a voice that wasn't another one of his alters, but the headspace has been quiet after a major depressive episode he had because he 'needed the space'.
Gods, every single bone in his body ached. Like, he was used to body aches, but this was something else. The granular texture of the sandy beach was not helping. He wants back into his cozy bed…
Wait, sandy beach?
He shifted around until he got up, his body felt unfamiliar yet strangely comfortable. He felt like he recognized this terrain from somewhere… like a game he played. Wait. Isn't this… Dawn Island? From Arcane Odyssey? He looked down at his hands and a wave of confusion and maybe just a bit of gender euphoria washed over him. His hands were no longer dainty and soft with barely enough grip strength to open a water bottle; no, they were rough and thick, and clearly quite a bit stronger than they used to be. Despite that, he honestly… looked pretty malnourished. He felt it too, he was pretty damn hungry.
And then it hit him.
He recognized this scene.
A little voice appeared in his head. Oh wait, no that's just shadow milk.
"What in the ever-living FUCK happened while me and Starryspawn were getting ice cream out in the headspace?" Shadow Milk yelled in their thoughts.
"I have no fucking clue man, we should look around, don't blurt anything out to-"
"Why are we in these RAGS?! Last I see in our memories we were… we… uh."
"… and that's why I said don't blurt out anything. Some of our memories fucking evaporated, and I have no idea where we are."
"Well, if we figure it out, then… uh. I forgot what I was going to think."
"How does that work?"
"Whatever whatever- let's see where the hell we are!"
Vi█████ got up, dusting himself off as he walked around the island, sand uncomfortably getting in-between his toes. God he hated being barefoot. He looked around to confirm his suspicions, climbing around the island based off of a strange sense of muscle memory. He saw many notes on the floor, wishes of luck and fortune… so this was dawn island…
Through the rain, he noticed someone standing above a little makeshift grave- he could barely recall a name, it was on the tip of his tongue. The person turned around and spoke; "You're awake... I thought you'd be out for a few more days."
"What… happened?"
"You don't remember? They… they killed Tucker while we were trying to escape, and I could barely carry his body out with us to the boats… This isn't a time for jokes... especially not here, in front of his grave."
"I'm going to be completely honest here, I don't remember a damn thing."
"… Wait, you're serious? You don't remember anything at all?"
"Nope, nothing at all unfortunately."
"Well, your name is Vincent Grimoire, and the two of us just escaped from some place that was performing magic experiments on us for months... we saw some truly horrific things, but I guess you don't remember any of it. How convenient for you…"
"Shit man, I guess I got so traumatized my brain blocked it out…"
"Anyway, we're free now. You still remember how to use magic, right? I hope so- since we're magic-users, we'll make it far in this world, we just need to meet the right people. You can take one of the rowboats and go wherever you want. I'm going to stay here for a bit... I need to think some things over."
"… Will we meet again, then? I don't just want to leave you here all alone…"
"We Probably will… I'm not planning on leaving the Bronze Sea for a while. When I'm ready, I'll probably head to Redwake- and you should too, it'll be nice for you to see civilization for once after so long. Maybe it'll help bring back some of your memories."
"Okay… I guess I'll see you again soon then… please be safe, you never know when things could go wrong… especially if what you said is true…"
"I'll… I'll see you later, promise." The figure- no, Morden returned to mourning the loss of Tucker.
… Vincent. That name felt comfortable, he could get used to it. And Grimoire as a last name? Sounds admittedly kind of rad and mysterious. Well, he might as well go with the flow here, because he has NO idea how or why this is happening. Maybe this is just a super elaborate dream? He… honestly kind of hoped so in a way. He ran around, opening some chests and reading some notes. Strangely, the notes all seem to be player notes… they had the usernames and everything- it didn't seem like Morden could see them at all either, so he didn't really know what that's all about.
He went to the dock, and felt something… admittedly kind of strange. As if something deep down in his soul wished to come out… he focused, reached out his hand-
And now there was a Rowboat he could use. Huh. He got on it, and was suddenly thrown into some sort of third person point-of-view, which was kind of jarring at first. He got a good look at himself, his hair was jet-black with ends that shimmered all the colors of the rainbow, and his eyes were pure white with no pupils whatsoever. Damn, he looked like an edgey deviant art oc. Honestly kind of rad.
He rowed towards Redwake, using the weird out-of-body third-person-POV stuff to get to Redwake with little issue. He saw someone cowering underneath a incline in the docks, just like in the game… Estrid, he recalled. It felt weird and a little jarring to return to a 'first person' point-of-view after rowing on the Rowboat for a while, though.
"What are you doing here? Now isn't exactly the best time to visit Redwake…" she whispered.
"I was told to come here… why, what's happening?" He whispered back, despite knowing already the reason why.
"Well you should either hide or go back where you came from, pirates just landed here and us villagers are defenseless because our warriors are out hunting…"
"Well, how can I help? I may not be that powerful, but I doubt a bunch of lousy pirates can really do much to me."
"A-are you sure? You don't really look like a fighter to me… you're definitely more able than the rest of us though…"
"I won't do anything risky, don't worry."
"Good luck…"
Vincent really didn't know what he was doing, but honestly he's just going with the flow. Maybe if he does this he'll wake right back up in his comfy, cozy bed back at home and can tell all his friends about the crazy dream he had where he got isekaied over discord. Yeah, that sounds nice. He really could go for a comforting cup of hot cocoa and petting his kitties. He felt around in his… 'inventory' bar, and then felt magic begin to circulate and flow through him. He looked at his hands and noticed how the magic flow didn't look like any of the normal magics you would see in the game. Huh.
He heard the distinct alert sound as he was spotted by a pirate, thinking on his feet he dodged and spammed the standard magic attack for whatever magic he had, coming out as pitch black shards of crystalline glass that seemed to let off electricity when they break. He managed to defeat five of the pirates before he knew it, each having been turned into statues made out of the strange magic glass that seem to reflect what each one was like on the inside. The rest were reasonably scared off as the statues disintegrated and the townspeople began to filter back into their normal areas of work. In fact, compared to the game of Arcane Odyssey, it was a lot livelier around and felt a lot more lived in.
He walked over to The Red Fin, and saw Estrid had made it back safely. She waved; "Hey, you found me! Sorry for not telling you before I left, but I snuck back here while you were beating up those pirates… It seems like the rest of the town came out of hiding, too!"
"Well, what should I do now? I am a bit lost on that…"
"I'm not sure... did you have anything in mind before you came here?"
"Not really, just getting some food and regaining my memories I guess…"
"Oh, you have memory loss? That sounds awful... my sister Geirlaug hit her head when she was younger and had it too, she forgot who I was for a while. Luckily, her memory returned to normal after a few months, so there's definitely some hope for you!"
"I guess you're right…"
"Tell ya what, since the chief isn't back yet to give you a proper reward, you can have some food and a drink for free, and use an empty room upstairs. Does that sound good to you?"
"That sounds great, thanks a lot…"
"There should be some spare clothes up there as well, and once you go to bed I'll be down here if you need something. Now, you can look over that little menu for a drink and I'll get the chef to whip up something really yummy today, alright?"
"Thank you again."
He looked over the menu, seeing that most of the drinks were alcoholic but managing to find some non-alcoholic ones as well. He ordered a non-alcoholic one, nearly devouring the meal that he was given along with it before going up to the room and washing up before promptly flopping on the bed, in fresh new clothes to boot. He honestly kind of wanted this crazy dream to be done and over with at this point, but the comfort of this bed almost rivaled the warmth and familiarity of his own. He just needed a plushie to hug… but the spare pillow would do, he guessed.
He heard a distant, quiet tune that slowly soothed him. It was like a lullaby, bringing him a strange form of comfort he felt like he hadn't felt for a long time. Slowly, he drifted off into sleep, letting it consume him once more… and finally being able to rest after what felt like too long.
He really couldn't wait to tell his friends about the crazy dream he had. This was a dream… right?
Right?