Reincarnation: A Litrpg/Gamelit Trilogy (Last Born of Ki'darth Book 1), page 1
REINCARNATION
LAST BORN OF KI’DARTH: A LITRPG/GAMELIT TRILOGY
TIMOTHY MCGOWEN
EDITED BY
JOSHUA MASON
ILLUSTRATED BY
LUCIANO FLEITAS
ALSO BY TIMOTHY MCGOWEN
Haven Chronicles: Eldritch Knight
Dead Man’s Bounty
Copyright © 2022 by Timothy McGowen
All rights reserved.
Reincarnation: A LitRPG/Gamelit Trilogy
Last Born of Ki’darth
ISBN: 978-1-956179-02-6
First Edition: February 2022
Published By: Rising Tower Books
Publisher Website: www.RisingTowerBooks.com
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
For permission request, email to timothy.mcgowen1@gmail.com . This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations, and event portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
Visit my website at Timothy-mcgowen.com for news on my upcoming works.
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This book is a re-written from the ground up version of a previously published novel of the same name, published in July of 2020. There are similarities, but it is a drastically different and worth reading even if you have already read the previous novel.
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To my wonderful kids and loving wife. Thank you for your patience.
CONTENTS
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
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CHAPTER 1
“The letter came!” Mom was beaming, waving the envelope as if it were on fire.
I scowled. “You didn’t open it, did you?”
“No, of course not. Are you going to wait for your father to get off work?”
“No way,” I said, my hand shaking with excitement as I took the letter. I was ready to start the next phase of life. It wasn’t like I’d applied to Harvard or Stanford, but I struggled to keep my glee contained.
I ripped it open and began to read.
“Don’t tell me yet,” my mom said. She was giddy with excitement. “I’ve video called your father. Okay, here he is. Well, tell us you got in!”
“I didn’t get in.”
I sat in my room and stared at the wall.
How did this happen?
My mom walked into the room. I’d left the door open, and wished I’d closed it. “Go spend some time with your friends.” Her voice was quiet. I didn’t know how to tell her that all my friends had left for college already, moving all over the United States.
“I have to work in an hour.”
She put a hand on my shoulder. “Don’t let this get you down, Nick. You’re a smart boy. I’m sure some of the other schools you applied to will be sending their acceptance letters any day.”
“Sure mom, thanks.”
“I love you, Nick, and so does your father. We’re proud of you.”
I gave her a noncommittal nod, and she left. If she only knew I hadn’t applied to any other schools, she might not be so relaxed.
I quit. No more of this damn job, I can’t take another minute of it.
“Uh, excuse me,” a voice quavered. “Is the ice cream machine working?”
I looked up and into the eyes of a cute brunette. Her hair curled into loose ringlets, falling free around her shoulders. She had sparkling blue eyes and a nervous smile, and wore a loose maroon hoodie with the letters ASU on the front. I wasn’t a fan.
“Nick,” came the exacerbated voice that haunted my waking hours. There was no way I was going to take any more of his shit.
I turned to face Chad Wilcock, my manager at this dump of a fast-food restaurant, and gave my best smile. He was a pudgy boy, only a year younger than me, but a boy nonetheless. His hair was parted to the side and as if this job didn’t provide enough grease, Chad added a thick layer to his hair. His white manager's shirt was stained with fry oil.
“Oh, Chad,” I said, trying my best to sound like a sarcastic version of his mother. “Could you come here real quick sweetie? I need to tell you something really important.”
“What the hell, Nick? Just take that girl's order already.” He seemed unnerved by my sudden change of attitude.
The fluorescent lights above the cash register flickered suddenly, breaking my attention. Someone behind the girl let out a loud, exaggerated sigh.
I walked up to Chad and put my hand on his shoulder. His pimpled face and narrow-set eyes recoiled as I touched him.
“I quit,” I whispered into his ear. Why I decided to whisper it, like it was some damned secret, I don’t know, but it was satisfying all the same.
“You know, some of us have places to be,” a heavy-set lady called out. She glared at me from behind the cute girl that had requested the ice cream earlier. My mind threatened to snap from the weight of the mediocrity that was my future.
I looked at the cute brunette, and decided someone as patient and good-looking as her shouldn’t have to wait for my existential crisis to be resolved. I grabbed a cone and filled the last ice cream of my career.
“Here you go,” I said, smiling. “On the house.”
Then, I tossed my apron on the counter and walked out the door. The air outside never smelled as fresh and free as it did at that moment.
I didn’t look, but I liked to imagine Chad’s jaw fell to the floor from my petty show of bravado.
The moment of triumph was fleeting. I sighed, thinking about how even a state school wouldn’t take me. My grades had always been average, and I was mediocre at best in the sports I played.
I was average.
Perhaps above average when it came to pitching, but an injured elbow my junior year ruined any chance of nailing a scholarship. Problem was, being average wasn’t enough anymore.
“Today is the first day of the rest of my life,” I declared to the world as I slipped into my red 1998 Toyota Camry. I imagine my declaration was less impactful than it could have been, as it was followed directly after by the whines and wheezing of my decades-old car.
“Come on,” I groaned, hitting my fists against the wheel. “Start, you piece of crap.”
It started.
At least someone out there is listening.
I took one last look at my previous place of employment. The girl had just exited, and smiled in my direction. I tilted my head in acknowledgment as I left the parking lot. Sure, I smelled like day-old fries and hamburgers, but I felt alive for the first time in years.
I would soon find out the irony surrounding that particular thought, but for the moment, I was on top of the world.
It was one of those rare days in Arizona when it was neither hot as hell, nor cold and wet. I flew down the I-10, windows cracked, pushing my twenty-year-old hand-me-down car to its limits.
Red and blue lights pulsed in my rearview mirror. For a moment, I considered putting my foot to the floor, but I was feeling liberated, not stupid. I turned my blinker on and moved to the slow lane, a dozen fake excuses forming in my mind.
I squashed them, and decided on the truth. I’d just quit my job, and wanted to feel the metaphorical wind in my hair by driving twenty miles over the speed limit in the middle lane while faster cars sped past me for going too slow.
But to my surprise, he flew past me. Somewhere, someone else was going to enjoy the pleasure of visiting with that fine officer.
My day can’t get any better!
Up ahead, a man stood by a blue, broken-down Jeep on the side of the freeway. The hood was up, and smoke drifted toward the heavens. The officer didn’t stop for him, the cars driving past didn’t stop for him, and I didn’t stop for him.
Why should I? I’m no one's fool. I’ve heard the stories about getting robbed or worse when helping people on the side of the road.
It didn’t matter what I told myself. I felt bad having not even considered stopping to help. It was the I-10. There was no easy way to turn around. To assuage my conscience, I took the next exit.
I needed to have a purpose. I needed to help people. Something.
Not even the military wanted me. Shortly after in
I stopped just off the exit ramp, unsure of the exit number I’d taken. I turned right and then made a left and then another right, cruising through a random neighborhood, looking for a way back onto the freeway.
Smoke.
Ahead, a house was engulfed in flames. But something was wrong. No fire trucks, no police cars. Only a small group of people standing in the street, watching. I squealed to a halt opposite them, jumped out, and called to the group.
“Is everyone okay?” The people didn’t appear soot-covered, I guessed they were neighbors.
“Yeah, we’re fine,” a man in his early thirties said. His phone was out, but he was recording, not calling emergency services.
“Has anyone called the fire department yet?” I asked, my gaze jumping from the people to the inferno.
A woman in curlers and a fluffy pink robe nodded to the man next to her. “I had Bill call. They’re on their way.” She scratched a mole on her chin. “Shame about the Johnsons. Not sure they got out.”
She said it so casually I had to suppress the urge to reach out and smack her upside the head.
Then, a screech drifted over the roar of the fire. My body went stiff.
Someone was still inside!
I looked at the rest of the group. They heard it as well, but no one moved to do anything.
It was up to me.
I took a deep breath and scanned the burning building. Two stories. The fire looked to be contained to the upper floor, perhaps I could make a quick check of the bottom floor without getting myself killed.
Now or never.
I took off my shirt and wrapped it around my face, then sprinted toward the door.
It didn’t budge. I wiggled the handle, but it didn’t turn. At least it wasn’t hot—that was a good sign.
I moved to a window, relieved to find it unlocked. I swiftly pulled open the window and pushed the screen inward, then tumbled inside.
“What the hell is he doing?” yelled one of the men from the group. I spared them a last glance. Nobody was moving to help.
The living room was a nightmarish black cloud of searing hot smoke. I hit the ground, remembering the whole ‘stay as close to the floor as you can if you want to breathe’ bit. It didn’t help much, but I managed to make it to a staircase in front of the door. I could see flames licking the walls at the top of the stairs, and a small form halfway up.
I squinted, but couldn’t make out any more detail through the smoke.
Coughing and hacking up bile, I darted up the stairs and grabbed… whatever it was. It was too small to be a child, but I was running on pure adrenaline now and didn’t stop to think too much. I lunged for the window as fast as I could. For half a moment, I considered that I had just grabbed some little girl's stuffed animal, but that theory faded away as whatever it was squirmed in my grasp.
The world spun, and my coughing switched to gasping for air. Whatever I held in my arms bolted through the window. I kept pressing forward, desperate to make it out.
I have no way of knowing how far I made it before I passed out, but the world went dark. Next thing I knew, I was floating above it all.
Oddly enough, I could still hear the people outside talking with a new group that had just arrived in a minivan.
A little girl cried in glee as her confused and lethargic cat padded its way to her. “Daddy, look! Neako made it out!”
I died saving a girl's cat.
After the cat made it back to its owner, I stuck around for a few minutes, floating above the remains of the house. Long enough to see the paramedics pull my body from the fire.
They didn’t try to revive me. By the time they got there, the firefighters had put the flames to rest, but my body was already extra crispy. As it happens, a person covered in fry oil and burger grease isn’t the optimal choice for firefighting heroics.
The girl seemed happy, at least. Who knows? Maybe she’ll turn out to be the next President, and I’ll be remembered as the guy who saved her cat.
The thought had barely formed in my mind before I felt myself getting pulled.
No! I’m not ready!
I resisted, but it didn’t matter. Once again, everything went black, but this time I remained conscious. I felt as if I was traveling a vast distance, but without the streaking lights to show whether or not I had gone to warp, I had no way to be sure.
As fast as the pulling began, it slowed, then stopped.
“Welcome to the afterlife.”
I turned toward the voice, and a room coalesced around me.
It was a room I had only seen in movies, Like the sitting room of a mansion, but everything was an overpoweringly bright white. There were no visible light sources, but the room shone like an Arizona summer.
As my eyes adjusted I noticed the wallpaper, also white, sported a faint floral design. Crown molding framed the walls, and even the carpet was vibrant alabaster.
“Interesting choice for a meeting room,” the voice said, and I remembered I wasn’t alone. My mind was sluggish—dying will do that.
I recognized the man sitting in the middle of the room. Dark hair, blue eyes, chiseled face, a pleasant grin that mirrored those in my earliest memories.
My father.
He wore a white suit, and his always-messy hair was combed to the side.
“Dad?” I gasped. “Did you die too? Oh man. Mom’s going to be so alone.”
“I’m not your dad. I’m merely taking a form I found in your mind. Someone you find extremely intelligent,” Not-my-dad said. “I am Hakorus, God of Knowledge. I was allowed to intervene in your passing, and give you a chance to be something”—he touched a finger to his chin, then pointed at me—“greater.”
My head spun. What is Dad talking about?
My father, no… Hakorus, waved an arm, and another antique chair appeared across from the god. “Please, sit. Let us discuss.”
I sat down.
The chair was soft but brought little comfort. I was supposed to be dead, which according to my limited religious knowledge meant I should be more ‘Casper the confused ghost’, and less a physical being sitting on a chair in a fancy room. I looked around again. Add some padded walls and it would look exactly like those rooms where they lock up insane people.
“You don’t give yourself enough credit, Nick,” Hakorus said, his voice low and gentle. “But you know quite a bit about religions, politics, even matters of the heart.”
“I’m dead, right?” I asked, interrupting the so-called god.
“Yes, you are dead.”
“Okay.” I put my hands behind my neck and leaned back. “Cool. What’s next?”
Hakorus regarded me, laughing. “Just like that?”
I shrugged. “Are you able to put me back, or do I get Isekai’d to a new world?” I frowned. “Or did the light novels have it wrong, and I have to worship Jesus for the next forever? By the way”—I raised my hands to forestall the god from interrupting—“how does that sound like a good time? I mean, you live your life, and the afterlife is just… worshiping some guy all day long?”
“Are you done?” Hakorus asked, still grinning.
“I guess.” I leaned back further on my cushy chair, and the legs creaked.
“It is funny that you mention Isekai. While I am familiar with the knowledge of your realm, I am always surprised at the entertainment your planet has come up with.” He steepled his fingers. “I am going to offer you several choices, and you can pick the path you find most appealing. How does that sound?”
