Infinite Realm: Monsters & Legends

Chapter 472: Nayra

Afterlife

There was no sleep in the Afterlife, nor did Nayra even feel the need for it in herself. Something about this place made it unneeded. Though, people still rested. They retired to their homes and meditated, contemplated their day in privacy. Nayra sat in a small garden next to a desert tent built in the style that was familiar to her. Seeing it there was strange, usually such tents were obviously found in the desert, and this one was surrounded by life, but she had learned that some questions didn't really have a logical answer. The Afterlife, for all of the familiarity to the Real Realm that it possessed, was ultimately a strange place.

A lot of it seemed no different than the life in the Real Realm, it didn't have a feel for what she had always imagined death to be like. Until one looked a bit deeper.

The Warrior Afterlife was for all those who fulfilled the requirements of having led lives of battle, in all of its forms. Most of the people she had encountered were those devoted to martial battles, and so their days in this place were spent pursuing the core of that aspect. There were fields here that where armies fought every day. Warriors meeting and cutting each other up, relishing in the battle, until they all died and woke up on the next day to do it all again.

Most, she had learned, found profound enjoyment in it, and didn't really think more beyond it. They had earned their reward in the Afterlife, and they now existed only to relish in the glory of combat.

Then, there were the few who continued to improve, to advance and master their power in the hope of... well, she didn't know what exactly. They didn't speak of it to her, but she could tell that there was something that they were searching for.

Her brother, Nathan, was one of those who pursued mastery of himself and his power. The true path of the warrior, as he said it.

One thing has become apparent to Nayra during their stay in this place, though, and that was that the Afterlife was not Death.

She had struggled with understanding her Aspect for a while now, and coming here she had hoped to get some answers. Instead, all she got were more questions.

She took a deep breath and stood up, then walked out of the garden. Her brother's home was on a small cliff side, with a winding road leading down into the valley. As she made her way down that road, she could see the grand city in the distance, shining with gold. It was a place where warriors gathered and fought or talked. Mostly fought.

Some stayed there, while others had homes around the valley. Nayra wasn't sure how they got those homes, like her brother's one, and every time she asked he would just shrug and say that the Afterlife provides, whatever that meant. There were obviously rules in this place that she didn't understand. Perhaps it wasn't for her to understand at all.

The valley below was vast, and on one side she could see a battle taking place, as it always did. On the other was a forest covered in mist. She reached the bottom and headed for the forest. She entered the mist, and kept going despite not being able to see. She didn't pretend to understand how the Afterlife worked, but somehow, she knew that she would end up where she wanted to be.

A while later, the mist thinned until she walked out into a small clearing covered in bare earth, where her brother was standing surrounded by scorched ground. He held both hands in front of his chest, palms turned upward. A brilliant red flame wove between his fingers like a snake, curling around his forearms and then back again. From one hand to the other.

Nayra could feel the heat of his fire from across the clearing, and she could tell that it was powerful. Yet, she could also tell that it lacked something. It was both stronger and weaker than she expected.

Her brother hadn't reached the peak of his tier in life, and there was no way to advance in the Afterlife. Not in the same way at least. The only thing that one could do in this place was master the power that they had in life, and understand their Aspect.

Her brother's fire felt like that, like what she felt when she stood next to the Warden, Zacharia. Like someone who understood their Aspect.

He titled his head and the fire vanished, then he turned around and gave her a smile.

"Little sister," he said, his eyes sparking with the last embers of his fire. "You've done with your meditation?"

Nayra sighed. "Yes."

"I see that it hasn't borne fruit," Nathan added.

"No, it has not," Nayra nodded. She had been in the Afterlife for two weeks, almost half the time she had in total, and she hadn't made any progress on understanding her Aspect. There was nothing here that called to her Aspect, no sign of Death. It felt more like a strange life, one filled with careless survival. People here had no real wants or needs, they did what they loved and just existed. There was no struggle, no danger. Sometimes she wondered if perhaps the ones living in the Real Realm were fools. Why live and struggle if you could just come to an Afterlife and enjoy doing what you wanted to do the most?

"Well, perhaps you are not looking in the right place then," Nathan said.

Nayra rolled her eyes. She had quickly learned that Nathan was very different than Erik. Her other brother always felt like he held himself at a distance. He talked with her, but always from a place above. He held himself like who he was, a person more powerful than most that were around him.

Nathan was a stark contrast, he smiled easily, he was open and warm. He asked questions about things he didn't know anything about, and wasn't ashamed about being ignorant. In truth, Nayra was more powerful than he was, she had reached a higher tier of power than he had in life. And the mastery he had achieved in the Afterlife wasn't enough to narrow that gap enough.

Yet, she still felt... small when she was next to him. She listened, because she could see that he had things to teach her.

"There is no Death here," Nayra said slowly. "My Essence is that of transition, in between the Life and the Afterlife. It is that which causes a Life to die, a Soul to detach from the Real Realm. It has elements of all the Essences that can cause the connection between the Soul and the body to be severed, or that can take Life away. Destruction, Decay, Blood, Violence, Disease, all those and more are Death, and there is none of it here."

Nathan raised an eyebrow. "Are you sure about that?"

Nayra rolled her shoulder. "You spend all your days here, in this clearing, practicing with your fire. There is nothing here connected to Death."

"I see that meditation didn't agree with you," Nathan said.

Nayra cut the air with her hand. "Of course it didn't, I spent two weeks contemplating nothing!"

She was allowing her anger to come to the surface, and immediately grimaced when she realized it. It wasn't Nathan's fault. He had advised her in the way the thought best. Meditation was something that he enjoyed, that he had seen working first hand. It wasn't helping her at all.

Nathan nodded. "I will not pretend to know what you are going through, I have never reached as high. I don't even know the things that you speak about, Glimpse, Grasp, these things have no meaning to me in this place. I only know what I know."

Nayra sighed. "I'm sorry, it's not your fault." He might not know the words, or the things that the people in the Real Realm had learned about in the centuries since he had died, but Nayra was pretty sure that he had reached at least Grasp of Aspect, if not more. Or at least the equivalent that existed in the Afterlife. His fire felt as pure and powerful as any she had ever encountered.

"Perhaps you need a break then," Nathan put a hand on her shoulder and smiled down on her. "Why don't you join the battlefield. Work out some of your frustration?"

"I don't know," Nayra said.

Nathan smiled. "Go, join a battle, it will be good for you. And it will definitely be good for the others. They grow bored of fight people that they know. Maybe one of them will be able to help you where I have failed."

"Don't you have new warriors coming all the time?"

Nathan shook his head. "Look around, this valley is not large enough to house all the dead warriors in the world. Just like the Real Realm, this place is infinite. There are other valleys, with other warriors. A new one arrives here from time to time, but it is rare, this is a place for a specific kind of warriors."

Nayra blinked. "What kind?"

Nathan didn't answer, instead he just ushered her back into the mist. "Go, fight for a bit. I'll come with you even, fighting has a way of clearing one's mind. Especially in this place."

Nayra sighed and let him guide her back into the mist.