Rebirth

Charlie's whole body tensed up. It was at this moment that he realized where he was. He was inside of a womb! Despite this being an arguably unpleasant situation, Charlie was dealing with it wonderfully. "Does this mean I've reincarnated!" thought Charlie excitedly.

Charlie had read a lot of books about people being reincarnated or transmigrating into a world where they were suddenly OP which triggered a thought. "Can I use magic?"

A strong feeling of ambition and excitement overcame Charlie. He could be an actual mage! He quickly went over the checklist of reincarnating in his head and called out to a "system" in his head. With no response he tried to call his "status". Which gave a similar result. Charlie was disappointed but he thought "ok, so I don't have a system but that doesn't mean no magic".

He tried to recall how one should begin their magic journey. Based on his "prior knowledge" from fantasy stories, He knew he had to form a magic core or something like that. The most common method to accomplish this tended to be meditation in which the individual would visualize surrounding mana particles in their mind and draw them into their body. So without further ado, Charlie began to focus his mind like described in his stories. He quickly realized he couldn't control his breathing since foetuses don't breath in the womb so he instead focused on what he recognized was his new mother's heartbeat.

The rhythmic beating of her heart allowed Charlie to focus and he soon found himself engulfed by pins and needles. This feeling felt almost the same as when he was without a body but there were two differences. While he could previously move, he now felt tethered in place and secondly, he could see. Well, he technically couldn't see anything but he could tell that he was looking at his surroundings, they were just very dark.

Charlie decided to search around himself for mana particles since this seemed right so far. When he couldn't see anything in his current view he tried to turn his "head" and whilst he could feel his view had turned it was more like his entire being had rotated to the direction he was now looking in. He recalled that he was currently looking around with his mind and as such didn't have body parts. His way of moving in this form reminded Charlie of a gyroscope; he couldn't move from his location but he could freely orientate himself in any direction.

After figuring out basic movements in this form, Charlie continued to look for mana particles. Having not succeeded, Charlie decided to change tactics. Instead of trying to go to the mana he would make the mana come to him. He tried to imagine himself as a black hole, sucking in all directions, which gave results.

Charlie could make out pin pricks of light seemingly far in the distance. He didn't stop at this and continued to pull them in. Eventually he was looking at what looked like the night sky except it was in all directions.

Feeling satisfied with his progress, Charlie went back to his body which made it seem as though all the stars had suddenly gone out. He wasn't sure how much time had passed but he figured it couldn't have been any more than a few hours. Charlie felt mentally exhausted but he wanted to check his new body out before sleeping.

He started by wiggling his extremities which felt more present than before as he could differentiate each toe and finger. First his toes, "1-2-3-4-5-6-7-8-9-10 Check" and then his fingers "1-2-3-4–5-6-7-8-9-10 Check". He next moved his arms and legs which elicited a groan from his mother and finally his head. Satisfied with his body, Charlie figured he was in the final stages before being born due to the mobility and strength he felt. And with that, he went to sleep.

When Charlie awoke from a dreamless slumber he was met with the same dark warmth as when he fell asleep. It was a strange feeling but not an entirely unpleasant one. He heard mumbling from his mother which he assumed to be garbled words and if he focused his ears he could hear someone else as well but the words couldn't be made out. Realizing that eavesdropping would be a lost cause, Charlie began to meditate to enter his mind.

He was met with a familiar starry abyss that seemed to have become brighter since his last look but Charlie couldn't be sure. He visualized himself as a black hole once more and continued his progress with the mana.

After what felt like a similar amount of work as last time, Charlie stopped and inspected his progress. The pin pricks of light were now dots in what had been a sky. They no longer resembled stars and more so bright white freckles or dots; they were too big to be stars. The dots had also begun to overlap in some places which ruined the appearance of stars. This did, however, mean progress so Charlie couldn't complain.

Charlie continued this process of sleeping and pulling in mana for a total of twenty six times although that might not have amounted to twenty six days. The view in Charlie's mind was now predominantly blocked by bright white mana particles. While before, the particles had appeared two dimensional since they were so far away, Charlie could now see them as roughly spherical with a slight glow.

Charlie was in the progress of pulling the mana in when he noticed a particle had come to be very close to making contact with him. Excitement filled Charlie as he focused solely on bringing this single particle towards himself which hastened its speed.

Charlie's excitement kept escalating until the particle finally made contact and was sucked into himself. It wasn't so much sucked in as it was just no longer there but Charlie could tell the difference since he now experienced an immense surge in energy like an adrenaline high. With renewed energy, Charlie focused his attention on the next closest particle until it was absorbed.

Charlie continued like this until he lost count of how many particles he'd collected. He could tell that he'd been absorbing particles for far longer than before which he attributed to the energy he received. He only stopped when he felt that something had changed. The constant feeling of pins and needles had gone away and was replaced by a cozy feeling. His once dissonant form now felt solid which Charlie thought was because of his mana absorption.

Suddenly, Charlie was shook from his reverie by his physical body. Once he returned from his mind, Charlie tried to understand what had happened and that's when he felt his surroundings contract. His mother was going into labour!

While Charlie had been anxious at the start, after ten minutes he recalled that labour was a long process and that he probably wouldn't be doing much for hours and so he decided to sleep until something happened. Unfortunately, the contractions occurred about every twenty minutes so Charlie was woken up frequently.

Eventually the contractions were happening every five minutes and Charlie recognized that he would be reborn soon. His anxiety came back as he recalled his previous life. He hoped that this time things would work out better and that he could be happy. He felt a longing for parents and friends that he wished he'd had. But Charlie decided he couldn't put his happiness in the hands of people he didn't yet know. He would gladly accept them if he deemed them worthy but if they weren't then he would find happiness by himself.

Some time later, Charlie was reborn which had gone by without complication on his end or his mother's. As soon as he took his first breath, Charlie began to wail. His lungs felt like they were on fire! This pain made it hard for Charlie to pay attention to his surroundings but once the pain had subsided, Charlie opened his eyes. He was met with the face of a young woman who was sponging his infantile body. His attention focused on the soft sponge going over the pale skin on his forearm. Charlie abruptly recalled that he hadn't checked his sex so he looked down and found a familiar sight. Charlie hadn't noticed but he'd suddenly stopped crying at all, looked at his genitals and then smiled in relief which earned a strange look from the young woman.

After being cleaned, Charlie was wrapped in a small blanket and brought to an exhausted woman who was resting on a bed. The woman lifted her arms slightly to accommodate the baby and took him from the young woman. She looked down into Charlie's eyes sweetly.

Charlie looked into the woman's eyes as well. They were dark brown and held a loving gaze. The pale skin of her face was the same as Charlie's but was coated in a thin sheen of sweat which slicked some of her dark hairs to her forehead. Her pink lips curved into a pleasant smile and she began to sing a lullaby.

Charlie watched in awe as his mother sang a mellifluous tune in an unknown language until he fell asleep from exhaustion.