I died.
Whether it was by illness, accident, overwork, or old age, I couldn’t remember. I couldn’t even remember if I had been a man or a woman.
“I’d like to invite you to my world,” a voice called out.
“Who are you? Why have you called for me?” I asked, memories still fuzzy as I looked towards the beautiful woman before me.
“I am Liriel, goddess of another world. All I ask of you is to live a new, long life. Just doing that will benefit my world.”
What a weird offer, I thought. But if it would give a dead person like me another chance at life, I had no reason to refuse.
“Okay. So am I getting reincarnated right now?”
“Not yet. Reincarnators must first choose special skills in order for them to live as long as possible.”
I picked up the tablet that appeared in the air before me, and looked over the available skills—abilities with names like “Swordsmanship” and “Possessor of a Sacred Sword.”
It seemed that reincarnators could freely choose as many skills as they wanted, so long as they had the skill points for them. So, using all of my allotted skill points, I took the unique skill Creation Magic, which would let me create anything at the cost of an appropriate amount of mana.
“Very well then,” the goddess said. “Please enjoy our world.”
“I’ll just focus on surviving for now.”
After I chose my skill, the goddess Liriel saw me off, leaving me in the middle of a wasteland.
I took a couple minutes to find my bearings.
“This is a young girl’s body,” I determined. “Does that mean I was female in my past life?” My memories were vague, but I had a hunch I was right.
I was wearing a normal linen shirt and pants, and had a pouch attached to my belt. The pouch turned out to be a magic bag, with everything I would need for now inside.
Looking around, all I could see was wasteland. To the north were pale, deserted plains with no plant life at all, and in the south there were only a few sparse patches of weeds. It didn’t seem like there were any hostile beings around, at least.
“Okay, I should probably start by checking out my profile. Status.”
It seemed that this was a world with levels and status effects, and, having been freshly reincarnated, I had 50 MP. From the basic knowledge the goddess Liriel had given me when I was reborn, I knew it was the average amount for a normal person—and that was way too little for a mage. If I’d known I’d start out like this, I would’ve picked a skill like Mana Increase or some other magical ability, I thought regretfully.
I decided I might as well test what I could make with my current mana pool and my Creation Magic skill.
“So, what can Creation Magic do? Creation: fireball staff!”
I cast my spell, and a staff with a round red tip appeared in my hands. Something innate told me that it must have taken 40 MP—or eighty percent of my mana—to make, and that it was a disposable item that shot out basic RPG fire magic.
“And done! Now, let’s look for some monsters that even I can beat so I can start leveling up.”
Taking my 40-MP fireball staff, I started walking through the wasteland with the sparse weeds. And just as I’d hoped, I eventually found a slime bouncing along the ground.
“Fireball!” Though it was a bit embarrassing, I had to raise my staff and say the incantation aloud for the spell to cast. The ball of fire swiftly hit the slime, evaporating it and leaving nothing but a scorch mark on the ground.
“This weapon will do.”
It wasn’t long before I found a couple more slimes and shot them with my magic too. But after casting three total fireballs, the staff stopped working.
“So I guess the spell Fireball costs about 10 MP?” The staff itself probably worked out to be 10 MP to create, and then it took 30 MP to charge it with three Fireball spells, for a total of 40 MP. It also seemed to be disposable, becoming just a normal staff (or some firewood) once its power was depleted. Creation Magic seemed to be a horrible mana guzzler since it was creating things out of nothing, but I was grateful I was able to at least make myself something to attack with for now.
And so, by creating fireball staffs and defeating slimes, I gradually leveled up. I could feel the sensation of my mana pool increasing, and when I checked on my status, I found it really had increased. But unfortunately, leveling up didn’t heal me completely.
“At this point, I should have about half of my mana left after creating a fireball staff, maybe?”
My status screen showed that my mana pool had grown to 100 MP, and since disposable fireball staffs cost 40 MP to make, I’d end up having 60 MP left after creating one. My increase in mana also seemed to raise my natural mana regen rate, meaning I could make more things now with my Creation Magic.
For the time being, I continued walking southward through the sparsely weeded wasteland, using my staffs to defeat monsters—but no matter where I searched, there were no signs of civilization.
I spent three days walking and defeating monsters, and having found stronger creatures than slimes to beat, my level had risen to 5. And not to digress, but partway through all that, I realized it was more efficient to simply clobber slimes with empty fireball staffs than to actually shoot fireballs at them.