Assassin Crow Evolution

It wasn’t easy to stand up while experiencing a stroke, but Vorin did it. With Jimmy’s help, of course. Twenty-one thousand mana points worth of help.

Vorin’s body shook, but within the chaos of it all, Jimmy was the first to notice that the shaking was rapidly reducing after every second. He became hopeful again, because as unusual this situation may seem, Vorin was actually recovering!

Fifteen seconds into the ordeal, Vorin got rid of the shakes, and took a step forward. His balance was sound. He didn’t fall over again.

"What- happened?" Vorin asked, but there was a big pause between the two words he just spoke. "Why are- you- looking at me- like that? Did- I grow an extra- tail?"

"I wish," He answered, "You almost died, man."

"Died? No." Vorin shook his head left and right every five minutes, "I felt weird, but..."

"You don’t remember screaming that you’re a crow?" Julia interrupted him. "It sounds like something you should remember."

"No..." Vorin said, "That’s weird. But- are you telling me that- I was supposed to die?"

"Yes!" Julia exclaimed, "But Jimmy healed you. It has to be him who brought you back to life, because yes, you’d be dead right now if he didn’t help."

Vorin was naturally confused, but he chose to believe what his friends, and his brother said. For that matter, he turned to his brother, and thanked him.

"You’re welcome." He nodded, "But do you realize that you’re making big pauses between your sentences... erg, words?"

"I am?" Vorin asked. "How big?"

"Pretty big, or long," He said, "We’ve been having this ’short’ conversation for an hour now."

"What’s an hour?" Vorin innocently asked.

"An hour is like counting up to 3,600." He answered, "That’s how long it took you to speak to us, four or five times."

Vorin was shocked. Counting to thirty-six hundred sure sounded like it would take a long time. Up until this point, he didn’t even know that such a number existed.

Other than that, there was something else that didn’t make any sense to him. He vaguely remembered having more than five conversations during this hour.

Tens of conversations, really, but other than the crows he saw in front of him, he didn’t know who he had the conversations with. For that matter, he wracked his brain, trying to remember who he spoke to, but he couldn’t piece the puzzle together.

However, within all the conversations he tried to recall, however random, there was one word that stood out, one word that was repeated across all the conversations that he did not have with the friends and family in front of him.

The Void.

Once more, he looked at his brother, who seemed to be waiting between long pauses, and this time, he had an important question to ask. A complicated one, really, that wasn’t mainly based on his recent, great confusion.

"Have you ever- heard of the Void?" Vorin asked.

"The Void? Yeah, what about it?" He followed along.

𝚏𝕣𝕖𝚎𝚠𝚎𝚋𝚗𝐨𝐯𝕖𝕝.𝕔𝐨𝕞

"Can- you tell me more?" Vorin asked, "About the Void."

Jimmy didn’t know if he could do that. The Void had a great ability to make outsiders, such as himself, forget about it. He had been in the Void, and then he had managed to resurrect Gundor with information that he had learned in the Void, but again, he didn’t remember nearly anything from that trippy experience.

For that matter, he had to ask the system about it, and thankfully, she briefed him.

He could come up with a simple answer, "The Void is where rejected souls get stuck in. I have a feeling that you don’t know what a soul is, but basically, when we die, our minds, our personalities either go to paradise, hell, or get stuck in between, in the Void."

"Hell and paradise-" Vorin repeated, though he unwillingly took his time, "You mention hell often... what is it?"

Jimmy did not want to introduce the concept of the afterlife to mere crows. In this world, hell and heaven are very real, and he knows that he has seen them. He had very brief, very blurry memories of spotting them from afar, memories that the Void hadn’t managed to drain out of him yet, of course, so he knew that there was a God up there who may or may not be counting his sins. He knew better than most crows, basically.

With that said, if he introduced that concept to his friends, and his brother, then religion may tag along eventually. In hindsight, it seemed like too much trouble.

For that matter, he simply answered, "It’s a bad place."

The pauses behind Vorin’s sentences became shorter. Well, the current conversation they had, only took half an hour, instead of a full hour. Jimmy noticed it, he saw the pattern, and ended up with a theory.

"Are you talking to souls in the Void?" He asked.

"I think so," Vorin answered, "But I don’t- remember most of what they say."

"That’s the Void for you," He nodded, "It tries to kick out anything that doesn’t belong there. But I don’t understand what you’re doing there, you’re not dead, and you’re definitely not meditating... so?"

"You pulled him away from death," Zoey chimed in, "He was supposed to be in the Void, until you changed that."

It made sense, so Jimmy agreed. The fact that Vorin was slowly getting better, confirmed the notion.

The theory may not be right, it was very vague, but it was the best one they got. The team finally managed to calm down. Vorin was okay.

This was when Jimmy started asking other questions, even if not more important than the topic about the Void.

"You survived, thank god, but did you get anything out of it?" He asked, "Can you shoot a fireball or some shit?"

"Right?" Vorin nodded, "I think so?"

For the sake of experimenting, Vorin tried to summon a fireball. Unlike Jimmy, he didn’t have a system to guide him, or give him specifics. He had to feel the changes in his arsenal, if there were any.

"Fire!" Vorin shouted.

Unintentionally, he was aiming at the walnut tree in front of him. He hadn’t even bothered to look ahead, as he tried to dedicate all of his focus towards fire itself.

It took him fifteen minutes, but he did eventually summon fire, though, in an unconventional way.

Vorin didn’t shoot a fireball, but rather, he became it. He became fire!

Almost naturally, he paired the fire with his Gravity Rupture Leap, as if he was trying to channel the fire through it.

In a snap, he beamed towards the tree, moving forward at great speeds, as a two-foot wide fireball, and so, he managed to punch a hole in the tree, and land somewhere on the other side of it!

The tree was set ablaze.

"What the fuck!" The feathers on the back of Jimmy’s head, cocked up.