《Frostsmith》


 The Abyss

    I had always thought that hell couldn¡¯t be that bad.


    Well, yeah, hell is obviously bad. Eternal torment and all that. But think about it.


    Being in a fiery abyss would actually be rather cozy, wouldn¡¯t it? A warm heat always surrounding you, nice and dark¡­ An introvert¡¯s dream.


    That was probably why, when a angel descended and beat the shit out of me, I figured things could only go up from there.


    And I mean beat the shit. It dropped out of the sky and just started punching. The pain was excruciating.


    I had never been that religious. I mean, I¡¯d been atheist for life. But when an angel appears, it makes you believe in the Abrahamic religions. So it wouldn¡¯t be a stretch to assume hell existed.


    That¡¯s what I told myself as I bled out on the concrete.


    After a long time, I drift awake. My memories are a blur and I¡¯m sleepy. I can¡¯t help but feel my consciousness slip away.


    Waking up. It feels like I¡¯m floating in a pool. I can¡¯t see anything, everything is dark.


    My body feels¡­ wrong. Compressed?


    Everything is warm. Comforting. Peaceful.


    Here, I don¡¯t have to worry about anything. Grades. Annoying interpersonal relationships. I can just sit back and think.


    I drift away again, this time a little more willingly.


    I keep slipping in and out of sleep. My body feels odd. Like it¡¯s¡­ expanding?


    The fog over my mind lessens more and more each and every day. It makes it easier to think.


    It feels so easy. I don¡¯t have to worry about people, or eating, or things normal humans have to. Briefly, I wonder if I¡¯ve some kind of god or something, but that would be ridiculous. A blind god?


    There are no distractions. No school. No people. No funny memes. I can just think.


    It feels like stretching after a long nap. It¡¯s comfortable in a way I¡¯ve never considered.


    I¡¯ve always considered myself smart. One of my earliest memories is from kindergarten.


    I was sitting in the corner, alone. I was lonely, but I was purposely distancing myself from my classmates.


    I had been certain that I didn¡¯t need them. They were¡­ lesser to me. They drooled and babbled. Inferior creatures. They weren¡¯t my peers. I couldn¡¯t connect to them. It was like they had never bothered to really think in their lives.


    A lot of my childhood comprised of staring at a wall. Thinking. But never quite as fully as I did now. It was fulfilling. Emotions don¡¯t hold me back as they once had.


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    My mental capabilities are far more unhindered now, my body not quite as uncomfortable.


    I think about the angel quite often. Sometimes I wonder if it was just my own delusion, but I¡¯m certain it must have occurred. If I couldn¡¯t trust my own memory, what could I?


    Female. Blonde. Pale skin. A face that would likely be considered beautiful, though I was no proper judge. Dove-like wings.


    It fits the classic description of an angel. I¡¯m honestly a little disappointed. I would have preferred if angels were biblically accurate. Biblically accurate angels are the stuff of nightmares, and that¡¯s what makes them so great. No stupid beauty involved.


    But their face. It was twisted in rage and disgust. Every time I played the memory back, it was unmistakable, the hatred it had had for me.


    At some point, I wonder how my memory got so good. I don¡¯t have photographic memory or anything, but it was easy to remember.


    The question feels clumsy in my brain, and it slides right out. It feels insignificant; why think of something so pointless when I could be thinking of more important things?


    At some point, I realized my body was coming into contact with a weird wall of some kind. Which was strange, because I hadn¡¯t felt anything in what felt like years.


    Scary. The first word that occurs to me. I¡¯m afraid of the unknown? The thought is ridiculous, almost painful. The thought of fearing anything feels beneath me.


    I hadn¡¯t felt anything for a while, and it took me quite a long time to realize what the sensation was.


    I can only hope that this won¡¯t mean anything bad.


    One day, as I ruminate on the nature of the prison and utopia that held me within, I feel a shake.


    That isn¡¯t strange. Over time, I had become acutely aware that the true nature of the world was¡­ still unknown, but moving in some way. But his shake was different.


    It was pushing me. Where? No! What the fuck?! I was just getting cozy!


    I curl up, trying to keep my position. To my horror, I saw a glimmer of light open up. An exit from this abyss.


    Hell no!


    The light is excruciatingly painful. After not seeing anything for forever, this shard of light was too much for me.


    As I¡¯m pushed out, my senses are assaulted by a variety of sights, sounds and smells.


    My sight is a blur of colors. In my ear, it feels like someone is speaking some harsh, jilting language.


    But the worst part is the cold. It¡¯s fucking cold. After spending an eternity in a wall blanket of coziness, I¡¯m hit with some fucking 30 degrees weather. It¡¯s too much for my Californian soul.


    I scream, realizing I¡¯ve entered hell.


    I stare into the piece of glass irritably. I poke at my cheek, tugging it a little. I glare at my reflection.


    I¡¯m pale, freckled, with a mop of pale blond hair and light blue eyes. I hate this.


    This is too much for me. Born with Indian ancestry with dark skin and sunny weather, obviously I wouldn¡¯t be happy with this.


    I¡¯m white. There¡¯s nothing wrong with that, but it¡¯s jarring seeing something I don¡¯t expect in the mirror.


    My eyes flick to the outside of the tent. Snow slowly drifts down from the sky. This is one of the warmer days.


    Great. A frozen wasteland. I love having everyday be fucking 15 degrees Fahrenheit. I¡¯m likely going to die if this continues.


    I¡¯m bundled up in plenty of furs and pelts. It would be bad if a child were to get sick from the cold. The village has already lost a lot of children that way.


    Today, I¡¯m about a year old by my metric. Probably a little off, but that¡¯s fine. They still seem to have the concept of birthdays in this world, but if they celebrated mine, I wouldn¡¯t know.


    I¡¯ve been reincarnated in another world. Haha. Laugh it up. Yay. Isekai. I thought protagonists usually got hit by a truck and died painlessly. Instead, I get brutally murdered by a psycho angel.


    I¡¯m a little horrified that my little slice of paradise had actually been my (new) mother¡¯s womb, but oh well. It only took me a couple weeks to stop screaming constantly. At least people just thought I was crying.


    Speaking of my new mother, here she is now! Hello mother!


    She speaks something in a cooing tone. Like a dog. I want to express my outrage, but we don¡¯t speak the same language. Pity.


    The best I can guess is that she said something along the lines of: ¡°Please tell me you didn¡¯t shit yourself again.¡±


    Well, she probably phrased it in a nicer way, but I¡¯m a little angry. At myself. And my tiny bladder. Fuck my tiny body!


    I shake my head, causing her to frown.


    I have mixed feelings about my new parents. They seem nice enough, but there are problems with this. For one thing, I already have parents. For another, I have the mind of a high school freshman. I can¡¯t exactly be their child for them.


    But I was sure things would turn out fine. After all, I had a genius plan. It was called: ¡°Abandon parents as fast as physically possible.¡±

 Intricacies of Language

    ¡°Abandon parents and cause them misery¡± was a plan thought of one the course of several days.


    Being a child was inconvenient for a variety of reasons. People thought less of you, spoke in a baby voice and were generally a hindrance.


    Most of the problems applied to people. My parents seemed rather doting, which had quickly become annoying.


    ¡°Open wide,¡± my mother commanded in Low. I opened my mouth as wide as possible. Unfortunately, as a baby my mouth was quite small, so my mother struggled to put all of the bland meat stew in.


    The wooden spoon tilted, sending stew across my fur onesie. Fuck.


    ¡°Aww, did the baby spill their (stew?)¡± she cooed in Low.  I wasn¡¯t quite sure what that last word had been, but I was sure it was some kind of stew. In this world, there seemed to be a different name for every kind of stew.


    Annoyance prickled on my skin. What kind of mother blames their child for what they spilled?!


    Well¡­ one that knows her child wouldn¡¯t understand¡­This novel''s true home is a different platform. Support the author by finding it there.


    I was already two years old, but I hadn¡¯t talked at all. Multiple times I had seen my parents express concern about how long I was taking, but this was all due to a miscalculation on my part.


    The language of this world was complex, to put it lightly. There were two main forms of the language. Well technically three.


    Form one was known as Low. Low was what you used in everyday life, from the market to your house. Pretty simple stuff.


    The other form was called High. High was the more polite version, used essentially never except when you wanted to butter someone up.


    Low sounded rather grating and harsh, though my mother managed to make it sound soft. High was softer, though it kept the key guttural sound of the language.


    As for the third form¡­


    Two people burst into the spacious tepee we lived in. Between them they held a stretcher.


    In the stretcher was my father bleeding out from his missing arm.


    One of the men holding the stretcher cried, ¡°Fuck! (mother¡¯s name?), help us! (father¡¯s name?) is dying!¡± Interestingly, the man used Curse form.


    Curse form existed as a ubiquitous swear word for every word in the dictionary. I could see the usage of saying ¡®fuck¡¯ in Curse, but why would you need to say ¡®table?¡¯ Plus, you could say ¡®fuck¡¯ in the other forms as well, so it was pretty pointless.


    My one pet peeve with the language was the fact that there was no correlation between the languages. ¡®Table¡¯ in High didn¡¯t sound like ¡®table¡¯ in Low. There were no roots, just pure nonsense.


    Though, as I sat there thinking about the intricacies of language, you might think me callous. After all, my father is dying right now.


    Well¡­ is he?


    I suppose it¡¯s time to talk about my family.

 Community Roles

    In the strange world that I now lived in, there were a number of roles in our community. Hunter. Gatherer. Smith. Caretaker. And¡­ yeah, no, that was about it.


    Something that took me an embarrassingly long time to  realize was that there were no names. None.


    Instead, people were referred to by their role instead of real names. Like Smith or Hunter. (Wait¡­ aren¡¯t those real names?)


    My mother was Weaver and my father was, obviously, Hunter. There were a lot of Hunters, but somehow no one ever got confused.


    Thus comes the question: are roles given based on name, or are names given by role?


    I wasn¡¯t sure yet, but what I did know was that those titles weren¡¯t given lightly.


    For example, my mother. One fine morning when I was mentally lamenting my fate, my mother had finished crocheting a blanket. It had been an even weave that put all of my attempts from my past life to shame.


    Humming to herself, my mother had clicked her tongue at the blanket that had somehow not met her standards. She continued to fucking summon a fireball and douse the blanket in the odd looking fire.


    To my absolute astonishment, the blanket was removed unharmed, and, if anything, strengthened.


    From there she pulled out a knife, signaling that the blanket¡¯s suffering was not yet over. She drew the knife downwards across the fabric, drawing a sound like the scratching of metal against metal, sending sparks flying. Find this and other great novels on the author''s preferred platform. Support original creators!


    So yeah. I think they¡¯re good at their jobs. I didn¡¯t really need to worry. Besides, and though it made me uncomfortable to say, they weren¡¯t really my family. They were basically strangers to me. It felt¡­ strange to care for them.


    I watched as my mother held the severed limb of my father to the bloody stump, sewing the parted flesh together. As I watched, a dark red flame burst into existence around the wound.


    As it subsided, it revealed clean, healthy flesh without the slightest glimpse of a scar. I didn¡¯t really know anything about medicine or such, but I was sure that was a miracle. Even with the medical knowledge of Earth, I wasn¡¯t sure if that was even possible.


    My mother looked over to me, where I was sitting on the floor, blankly staring at the wound that disappeared faster than your father.


    Anyway.


    My mother looked at me, smiling affectionately. ¡°Oh, look. The baby looks so sad!¡±


    What?! I was certain that my expression was as devoid of emotion as ever. She was seeing things!


    She ran a hand through my hair as I squirmed under her grasp. She looked¡­ oddly sad.


    ¡°He has to be¡­ he can¡¯t be .¡±


    At that last word, I frowned. I couldn¡¯t¡­ hear it? I was sure I had heard it, but I couldn¡¯t recall what it was that had been said.


    As I tried to remember what she¡¯d said, a throbbing headache erupted from my thoughts. The pain was way too much for it to just be a normal headache though. It was like I¡¯d pulled a muscle¡­ in my brain.


    To reassure her, and also because I was freaked out, I placed a small hand on hers. ¡°It¡¯s okay,¡± I murmured.


    She stared at me. Hmm? Was there something on my face?


    Her eyes rolled back into her head and she fell backwards. Hmm. Hmmm. Hmmmmmmmm.


    Oh. Right. That was the first time I¡¯ve spoken in this life.


    Though, now I was alone in our tepee with the only two adults in my life unconscious.


    Hmm. I was too little to cook for myself. And it was lunchtime.


    I hoped one of them would wake up sometime soon and feed me.

 Getting Smithy wait no get away from that bird you psycho

    ¡°Okay, class! Today I¡¯ll be reading another story.¡±


    I squirmed with excitement. Story time was always my favorite.


    ¡°The story is known as: The Tale of the Green Eyed Witch.


    ¡°Once upon a time, there was a Hunter. He was stronger than ten men and had the wisdom of twenty. One fine night after drinking a few too many mugs of ale, a mysterious being appeared before him.


    ¡°She looked like an old crone, wearing pitch black pelts with striking green eyes.¡±


    I leaned in, eager to hear what was next. I had never heard anyone mention witches before.


    ¡°¡®Young Hunter,¡¯¡± the teacher crooned in an overdramatized voice. ¡°¡®I have come to warn you of a plague of beasts bearing down upon your lands.¡¯


    ¡°¡®Foul witch!¡¯¡± bellowed the teacher in a deep voice. ¡°¡®Why should I trust thy word?¡¯


    ¡°¡®Know this, Hunter. I have come to offer you a deal. I shall rid you of all the beasts upon thy lands, and leave without a price.¡¯


    ¡°The Hunter couldn¡¯t believe his ears. He accepted immediately. Before his eyes, a pile of corpses appeared. Mighty beasts, even ones of great strength the Hunter had never been able to slay lay dead at his feet. Yet he began to mourn, for in the pile was the bodies of his fellow clansmen.


    ¡°¡®There is no greater beast than that of man,¡¯ the witch cried as she disappeared into the gloom. And though the Hunter survived, it was a lonely existence. The End.¡±


    My fellow classmates and I clapped with the end of the story.


    ¡°Now, can anyone tell me what the theme of the story is?¡± Nervous faces all around me, the kind that didn¡¯t know the answer and were praying they didn¡¯t get called on. Sighing, I raised my hand.


    ¡°Yes?¡±


    Feeling rather bored, I answered. ¡°The dangers of making risky and life-changing decisions while inebriated.¡±


    The teacher blinked rapidly, with a blank smile that faltered slightly. Her face said it all: I don¡¯t know what you just said, but it wasn¡¯t the prepared answer I had, so I¡¯ll just say that¡¯s another way to look at it.


    ¡°Oh, that wasn¡¯t exactly what I was looking for, but that is another awesome and wonderful perspective.¡± What did I say? I have too much experience with teachers.


    After the lesson, I tromped out of the giant circular tent that served as our school. It was made of a bunch of stitched together hides from massive beasts, too big to belong to any earth animal. It creeped me to no end thinking that one day, I might become a Hunter and have to kill those things on a daily basis.


    I didn¡¯t feel like going home immediately. In this world, there was nothing to do inside except eat and sleep. I considered playing, but¡­


    At my current level of intelligence, games of strategy were a breeze. Even adults fell to the might of an American freshman who had played too much Civilization 6 and Balatro.


    Meanwhile, physical games were something this body was incapable of. Not only was my four year old body rather weak, but I was beginning to suspect that even for children my age, I was on the smaller side. Just like my last life¡­


    Grr! No! Cast off those memories faster than Juliet¡¯s vestal livery! Thinking about the past did me no good.


    Oh well. Might as well visit the forge. That was always nice.The narrative has been taken without permission. Report any sightings.


    The forge was a nice place. It was mostly quiet, if you didn¡¯t mind the occasional ring of a hammer against steel. Though everyone else always complained about the noise. I was glad, because it meant that you could be nearly alone.


    What do you think of when you hear ¡°blacksmith¡±? A big, burly man with a giant hammer? As far as I could tell, in this world your physical strength didn¡¯t matter. At least, I assumed so due to the way Hunters could swing around greatswords three times their size.


    The blacksmith of our village was a petite woman, with black hair and red eyes that kept others away. It was probably why she lived on the outskirts of the village.


    ¡°Hello, child,¡± she said, her voice melodious. Despite her stick-thin arms, she swung a heavy hammer without hesitation. Her aim was clear, too, as each stroke of the hammer further defined the shape of what was to be a bracer.


    At my sigh, she smiled slightly. ¡°I suppose that once again, your peers didn¡¯t realize your ¡®brilliance¡¯?¡± Her tone was slightly sarcastic, with a hint of truth. We were both outcasts, I supposed.


    ¡°Tell me about it,¡± I say in High. I rebuke myself mentally after. She isn¡¯t even that much older than me in true years, but I¡¯ve gotten used to this life. I automatically default to treating elders with respect.


    Annoying, especially since in my last life I died and was unable to finally enjoy the benefits of sucking up to teachers.


    We sit mostly in silence, as usual. What topics would we have to talk about? Besides, Smith was preoccupied with her work and I liked to watch.


    It was fascinating how so many things could affect the end result. Minute variations in force, angle, composition of the metal and its temperature. To master such an art would be difficult, but I would have to learn.


    After all, I was practically set up to be her successor. I was the only one who wanted to learn the art, and it was vitally important. Besides, as I had come to learn, I had a quality that none else in this world did.


    As if hearing me, Smith asks softly, ¡°You still can¡¯t hear it? The screams?¡±


    ¡°If I could, I wouldn¡¯t be here.¡±


    Supposedly, fire talked. As in, whispered advice and their feelings. At first, I regarded the idea with skepticism, thinking it was religious nonsense. But as time went on, I realized it wasn¡¯t figurative or a drug-induced hallucination. Fire actually talked. And I couldn¡¯t hear it. My best guess? Probably because I didn¡¯t belong in this world. Hearing fire was probably some innate quality of the souls of this world.


    That wasn¡¯t where it ended. On top of that, the act of smithing was seen as heresy because it supposedly hurt the fire. This could be inferred from the very loud screaming that could be heard from the flame when you used it to heat metal. Since I couldn¡¯t hear it, I would be great at smithing. That didn¡¯t stop people from treating me with pity as if I was lesser in some way.


    A crow landed on my shoulder, snapping me out of my thoughts. Smith froze, dropping her hammer. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up. She didn¡¯t even flinch as the fire yelled in her ears, but something had scared her enough to stop?


    ¡°A crow,¡± she said solemnly. ¡°A bad omen.¡±


    ¡°What? It can¡¯t be that bad.¡± A crow seemed like a silly thing to worry about.


    ¡°It smelled death on you,¡± she said, a note of worry creeping into her voice. ¡°It means that you or someone near you will die soon.¡±


    I raised a hand, stroking the crow¡¯s feathers. It was soft. The black of its feathers stood out against the endless plains of snow. ¡°It¡¯ll be fine. I¡¯ll raise it as a pet.¡±


    She fidgeted nervously as I walked away, petting the crow.


    The spot didn¡¯t look particularly remarkable, merely a jagged rock sticking out of the snow. A further inspection, however, would reveal a symbol on its side. It was the dollar symbol. Something that was hard to forget, but that none of the natives of this world recognized.


    ¡°Omen, schmomen.¡± I muttered. I raised my hand and the crow nuzzled its head against my palm, eager to be petted once more.


    I closed my fist around the neck of the crow and it writhed in my grasp, sluggishly as if not expecting this.


    It moved to peck at my hand with its beak, but I couldn¡¯t let it leave a mark. That would be telling to the natives that something was wrong.


    With my other hand, I ripped off its beak. Blood erupted from the new hole in its face, though I was careful to keep it pointed away from me.


    Soon, the bird stopped moving. I lay it against the snow, picking up the stone. Beneath the stone lay a small hole I had dug out over a long period of time. In it lay the bones of many small animals, like mice, rats and birds. I had examined the anatomies of a couple of animals that resided in both earth and this world, and they remained quite similar, though with a few minute differences.


    What a pain. The crow must have smelled the blood on me, though I thought I had cleaned it off pretty well. This works to my favor though, I haven¡¯t examined crow anatomy yet, though I could guess.


    The stone was one I had picked for its particularly sharp edge, and it came in handy as I cut open the stomach of the bird. Finally, I could do more dissections.


    This world is so much better than earth, a part of me cried. We can do all the ¡°experiments¡± we want, and no one will notice. I had been so naive on earth, thinking my parents would accept my¡­ hobbies. No matter, I could do them in private.