In Search of Her Soul

[The soul previously inhabiting the body of the host's wife has successfully been attracted to the host's Soul Beacon, therefore arriving within the womb of a woman living in west side of Chicago, Illinois, precisely one year after the host's birth.]

Magnus' eyes widened, hearing the name of his hometown. 'The fuck? That close? Also, what did it mean one year after my birth? Did her soul travel back in time or something?'

"System, start explaining," he ordered, not knowing where to even begin coming up with questions.

[In this Universe, souls of dead people are always sent to a place called Limbo. It's a place that is beyond the boundaries of time and space. That is where souls await their time to reincarnate. And since Limbo exists outside the flow of Universal time, the souls can reincarnate anywhere at any point in time, regardless of concepts such as the past, present, and future.

Since the host has used Azrael's Lighthouse, setting the host's own soul as The Beacon and his wife's soul as The Ship, her soul has reincarnated close to the host's origin.]

'Right. The Lighthouse. That's why she told me she would meet me again.'

The Lighthouse was a treasure Magnus had used just before Alana's death. The treasure was blessed by and contained the power of one of the gods and Authors, Azrael. Magnus' best friend and long-time companion, TJ, was one of Azrael's Supporting Characters. He gifted The Lighthouse to Magnus after seeing his wife dying.

The treasure had the power to guide a soul during reincarnation. It was used by setting an object or a soul as The Beacon and designating another soul as The Ship. The way it worked, was that The Beacon would lie dormant until the soul set as The Ship was ready to reincarnate. At that time, The Beacon would light up, like a lighthouse that guides a ship sailing on the sea—in this case The Universe—toward its destination.

"Does that mean she was living close to me the whole time? On Earth, I mean. But that doesn't make any sense. How could she exist on two Realms at the same time?"

[To answer the host's first question, she was not living close to the host. At least not in the Reality upon which the host once existed.]

Magnus' frown deepened. "Elaborate."

[The Universe has an infinite number of layers of Reality. The host's time meeting and being together with his wife, who was not born on Earth but on another Realm, is one Reality. The one where she reincarnated close to the host's origin is a different Reality.

The way Realities are made, is that once a soul reincarnates and is reborn into the living world, they will be constantly creating choices and living through the choices made by other souls. Like a river that branches endlessly, this will result in adding more Realities.]

Scratching his head, Magnus took his time organizing in his mind everything he just heard. 'Choices, huh. Some unfortunate souls, like mine, had our choices forcefully made by the gods, though.'

Sensing that he was almost grasping at an answer to a specific question he failed to arrange, Magnus decided to go for a broader question. "Can you tell me the connection between the existence of an Author and Realities? Does an Author hijack people's ability to make choices and add more Realities, from which the result is the increase of Divinity for the Author?"

[That is partially correct. However, an Author has a job to not only create more Realities, but also make them in a desirable way.]

'Desirable for who?'

Magnus shook his head. "You know what? All that information took some extra brain power for me to digest, but I think I get it. Kinda." Taking a deep breath, Magnus mentally set aside the headache-inducing knowledge about The Universe and focused back on what he wanted to do—reunite with Alana.

"Hey system, is it possible to go back in time, I mean to go to that exact Reality on which Alana has been reincarnated? Also, I'd like it so that I don't have to go through the first sixteen years of my life. Skip that period of time and take me straight to two years before The Prolog, please. I never went to live outside Chicago, anyway."

[Two years is not possible.]

Magnus was taken aback. "What? Why not?"

For some reason, the system was taking its time answering him. After a few seconds of silence, it finally spoke.

[The host is allowed to go back six months before The Prolog.]

'Is the system trying to negotiate with me? Is the thing sentient?'

"One year and a half."

[One year.]

"Fine. Take me back to one year before—"

[However, the host is not allowed to literally go back in time. In order to bring the host to a point in his past, the system will have to make an identical copy of The Universe along with its Realities. After that, the host will be sent to the copied Universe instead of the original, exactly one year before The Prolog.]

Magnus was flabbergasted. "What? Why can't you just send me back in time in the original Universe?"

[That is not possible. The Viewers do not like to undo what has been done, since it is the same as deleting history and along with it, multiple layers of Reality. History is what shapes the present, and that includes the host's entire being. Deleting it all but the host's history means giving the host an unfair advantage in influencing The Universe. The Viewers have deemed that possessing the system alone is already a good enough advantage for the host. More than that, and the host will have too much to the point of cheating, and that could possibly bore The Viewers.]

Magnus blinked a few times, hastily trying to make way for all these new information to enter his frontal lobe and at the same time keeping his brain from imploding. "What the fuck? Who the heck are these Viewers?"

Not giving him enough time to think, the system immediately answered, [The Viewers are the existence above Fate itself, the ones who consume stories. They oversee The Universe and allow it to continue to exist and evolve on its own as long as they are being kept satisfied. As everything in The Universe is composed of stories, the better the stories are, the greater the chance of this Universe to continue existing. And it is an Author's job to design a good enough story to keep The Viewers satisfied.]

Magnus' jaw dropped. It was as if he had been given the news that turned his worldview upside down. 'And here I thought those goddamn Authors were the ones in control. But it turns out that above them there's Fate, and above Fate there are these so-called Viewers. Are The Viewers the true gods?'

Magnus' eyes glanced back at the floating screen in front of him. Now he couldn't get rid of the sense that he was being watched through the system, like there were pairs of invisible eyes staring back at him from behind the screen.

'Was the system created by The Viewers?'