Markets and Multiverses (A Serial Transmigration LitRPG)
Chapter 341: The Dayless Isles

After we jumped into the pool of reincarnation, as usual, we were punted into the ocean of souls. I felt as if a giant hand had grabbed me, and quickly found myself being dragged in a very specific direction. I looked around, and saw my friends trailing behind me, connected to me by a giant thread of light. I relaxed.

I had been a bit worried about this pool of reincarnation, but at least so far, it looked like things were turning out fine. Nothing seemed out of place.

Time passed. after about an hour, we arrived at our destination. I felt something reach out to me, and my soul latched onto it like a sailor clutching a piece of driftwood after a shipwreck.

I was quickly dragged into stillness, softness, and darkness as my mana-brain started to collapse.

Then, I felt a pushing sensation. I realized I was being born, and tried to open my eyes as wide as possible to get a look at my parents. My eyes were still rather undeveloped, so I didn’t manage to take in very many details - however, I could faintly hear my mother grunting and laughing, while a man I assumed was my father stroked my head and laughed in delight. My mother’s hair seemed awfully bright, and something seemed rather unusual about it - but before I could get a better look, I felt myself fall back into sleep.

Time passed. I occasionally woke up for brief periods of time, but my brain was too undeveloped to support me. Thus, as usual, I felt thick, fuzzy headaches and swollen eyelids over and over again, pushing against my thoughts and making it hard to concentrate. My body fell into autopilot as I tried and struggled to make sense of my surroundings.

Despite that, I still managed to make out a few things. First of all, I spent a lot of time in a room that was fairly brightly lit. I could tell that there were glass jars in each corner of the room, emitting both light and heat. Normally, I would have found it annoying to sleep in such bright light - but oddly enough, my eyelids seemed much better at shutting out light than usual. Even though I knew I was in the middle of a bright room, when I closed my eyes for sleep, I had no problem with the brightness.

Second, I sometimes got glimpses of a city, with either my mother or father holding me. Both of them held me like I was made of glass, but they sounded cheerful as they spoke with the other residents of the city. My eyes were still nowhere near as developed as I ‘expected’ them to be, but I could definitely tell that the people of this city had some rather unusual features. Some people seemed to have rather… fuzzy ears on top of their heads, and others had pointed ears, making me think of elves and beastkin.

Finally, I was aware of one final thing. A warmth that was attached to my side, and also made happy giggling sounds from time to time. It didn’t take me long to realize what this meant.

I had a sibling. I was pretty sure they were my twin - although they might have been a year older or younger than me. I wasn’t entirely sure, since my periods of consciousness were so scattered, but my twin stuck to me like glue.

I felt a bit happy at the thought of having a twin. I had never had one before, but having a twin sister or brother sounded fun.

Through several months of hazy, fluttering consciousness, I noticed a few other things about my living environment. I always felt warm and well fed. I often heard the sound of a man and a woman laughing when I woke up. I was usually held in someone’s arms when I woke up, and I could usually feel my twin nearby.

My family situation this time seemed to be good.

The other thing I noticed was light.

This world’s light, as well as the way my eyes worked, seemed very different from before. Even though I could barely think straight, I rarely felt hungry or tired. I felt pretty good.

I felt a bit relieved when I realized that.

I had tried so hard to get close to my mother last life. I wasn’t sure if it was because she just had a different outlook on life than me, or if she just couldn’t beat her addiction, but… I had never felt like my overtures towards my mother were returned. I always felt like no matter how much love I tried to give my mother last life, it was never returned. That felt bad.

My parents this time seemed to love both my twin and I a lot, which felt far more relaxing. I didn’t think I needed to worry about drug addiction, or the cold, or finding ways to feed myself because my mother was high again.

Then, I felt guilty for thinking that way. I did think my mother had tried to kick her addiction last life - she just hadn’t been able to do it. Was it wrong for me to feel relieved that I didn’t need to grapple with that kind of problem this time?

Finally, after a few years of drifting in and out of consciousness, my brain stabilized enough that I could properly return to being awake for an extended period of time. When I woke up, I was greeted by a series of System notifications.

I took a look at the System notification, and resisted the urge to sigh. Of course the world was in need of maintenance. And the user manual was mentioned to, which got my hopes up only to bring them crashing back down. I seriously doubted the corporation that owned this world was in any condition to do maintenance here. It was an open question whether there were any surviving employees of the corporation in the first place.

We would be on our own this time.

Still, that wasn’t terrible. We had been on our own every other world we reincarnated in, too. We would just have to make our way without any guidance, just like always.

I shrugged, and then opened my Status Screen. It was time to see how capable this body was. 

After looking at the physical attributes this body had, I grinned. I had no complaints about my rolls, except for Willpower. On one hand, my two most important essences had both rolled above average. My Intelligence was also nothing to scoff at - I was probably the first of the four of us to be awake, unless someone else had been luckier with their rolls. Since I could expect to get several more stats after rebuilding my runes, I felt I had gotten pretty lucky this time.

My physical stats were fine as well. My strength was a bit below average, but I didn’t really care about any of my physical stats besides Fortitude. I didn’t rely on my physical stats for combat anymore. Teleporting attacks away from me was far more reliable than dodging, and extinguish hit far harder than any fist against most enemies. I could definitely work with this.

Basically, I had nothing to complain about this reincarnation. My family seemed at least reasonably well off, my body had no major deficiencies, and my runes could resolve my low willpower and perception.

After that, I started to look at the room I found myself in. True to my earlier observations, I was in the middle of a brightly lit, warm room. All of the light and heat seemed to come from four glass containers, which hung at each corner of the room. I was sitting in the middle of a soft crib, with padded wooden bars to keep me or my twin from rolling out and hurting ourselves. The top of the crib was carved with a variety of birds, and while the workmanship wasn’t exquisite, it still looked better than average. There were a bunch of toys scattered around the room, although most of them looked like they hadn’t been played with much. There were also a few decorations that were plastered on the walls and ceiling, although I had to admit, I had no idea what they were decorations of. The only one that made sense to me was the picture of a giant tree.

I giggled. Either way, decorations in our room was a good sign. It seemed like our parents really weren’t worried about food and water, at least. They could meet basic needs without difficulty.

I scanned the crib, and my eyes quickly alighted on the other inhabitant of the crib. There, I saw a girl who also looked to be three or four years old. She had bright pink hair, was a bit shorter than me, and she looked awfully familiar. I stared at her in surprise, and then blinked.

<Anise? Is that you?> I asked.

The toddler in the other crib stirred, and it almost looked like she was trying to lift her head and look around. I heard a sleepy voice come across the communication bracelet. <Miria? Head… slee… spell…>

The baby I had been observing flopped over and rolled back into her resting position, but that action only cemented my suspicion.

For the first time ever, two members of our group had reincarnated as siblings. 

I was now Anise’s twin.