When Wilhelm opened his eyes, he was greeted by the familiar sight of his dorm room.
As he gained clarity, he realised that there was something in his hand.
He held it up and saw it was a ring, the ring that Rachel had with her.
"I won then." Wilhelm realised.
He also then saw that it was his previously mangled right hand that was holding the ring.
"Looks like they fixed me up." As Wilhelm inspected his arm, he thought about Rachel and a sigh escaped his lips.
"I went too far." He lamented.
"No, if you truly wanted that ring then it was the only choice you had. She won't stay dead, they value her just like they value you."
Wilhelm's eyes narrowed.
"You are correct." He slowly spoke.
"Who are you?"
"I'm you."
"No.. you are not, if you were me then we wouldn't be having this talk." Wilhelm narrowed his eyes.
"Madness perhaps?"
"I'm mad enough to have a talking voice in my head that lectures me about Man and also can strategize?" Wilhelm refuted.
"Good, your mental capabilities are enough to refute me and not believe whatever I say."
"What?"
"Nothing, as for your question as to what I am? I do not know,I came into being in that dungeon when you refused to eliminate the threat."
Wilhelm at once knew what dungeon the voice was talking about.
"But why then?" Wilhelm wondered.
"I presume it was a catalyst, an inciting event that triggered my awakening. I am the adrenaline released by you at that moment." The voice speculated.
"But that doesn't make sense, if you truly were born from me at that moment then why not in the dungeon with those wolves?"
"Perhaps due to the source of existence not being with you at that moment. After all I don't think every individual who has ever had a mental dilemma had something like me, thus it is most probable my existence has a source that you have with you at the moment, an artefact perhaps?"
At that Wilhelm's mind was as if struck by lightning.
"The watch!" Wilhelm at once realised.
"Where is it?" Wilhelm tried remembering where he put it.
"System storage."
Remembering it, he immediately accessed it and took the pocket watch out.
He had it in his hand, opening its cover to reveal two of its hands, the hour and the minute, ticking away.
"If your memory and logic are not flawed about this particular subject then shouldn't there be a second hand, continuously ticking away?"
"Yeah, there should be one, weird." Wilhelm muttered.
"Then let us see this from an objective viewpoint, you receive a gift from one of the higher ups of The Academy in the form of this presumably useless pocket watch and then in the next moment you are in danger in both mind and body, a strange voice starts speaking to you and tell you that they only came into being just at that moment without any peculiar event."
"The System Storage now is linked to you wherever you go, correct? Then wouldn't this watch be with you during that moment and now we see that this strange watch has the minute hand missing? How peculiar, almost as if the mysterious event that occurred to be my source is this watch, yes?" The voice immediately brought forth a speculation.
Wilhelm scratched his chin in thought.
"You know I am correct in this regard, you are me after all."
"That's correct."
"Indeed and thus we can infer from this that-"
"Each of the hands give me an ability or something." Wilhelm interrupted.
"Yes…..perhaps more like something designed to help you at a specific moment."
"Yeah, that makes a bit more sense." Wilhelm nodded along.
"Now that that mystery regarding this pocket watch has been solved let's move onto the other thing: The ring." The voice spoke.
Wilhelm swiftly glanced at the ring.
Its initials were worn out but could still be made out.
"This." Wilhelm frowned.
The initials were strange symbols that looked out to be complete gibberish.
Just looking at them made Wilhelm feel nauseous.
"Care to use the System's built-in Analyze?" The voice recommended.
"That's a good one." Wilhelm acknowledged and accessed Siegfried.
[Siegfried Operation Status - Active
Functions Available - Analyze, Storage]
Wilhelm selected Analyze.
[Please Select Item for Analyzation.]
A pointer appeared in front of Wilhelm's face, slightly surprising him.
Dragging the pointer to the ring, Wilhelm clicked on it.
[Analyzing
......
......
Error
Error
Information not found 😞]
Seeing the result Wilhelm raised an eyebrow.
Testing something, Wilhelm dragged his pointer to the pocket watch.
[Analyzing
User lacks authority.]
This seemed quite peculiar.
Whereas, the ring seemed to have taken some time for the analysis, the results for the pocket watch were almost instantaneous.
"What the hell is lacking authority supposed to mean?" Wilhelm wondered.
"You lack authority to know about the pocket watch, after all it was formerly the property of a so-called higher up. The ring is just an unknown that has not been recorded into the mainframe yet."
Wilhelm couldn't help but scratch his chin once again realising what was happening.
"Why did I even want the ring?" Wilhelm thought but couldn't figure it out.
As he was thinking this, the system's display warped.
The pocket watch began glimmering as well.
"???"
Although Wilhelm was shocked, the voice inside of him had already made a guess.
"Could it be?"
Suddenly the minute hand of the watch disintegrated into light particles that flew and embedded itself into the display.
Immediately the display changed.
[Authority Overwriting.
Base Authority Level - 2
Authority Oversetter Level - Ex
Calculating Authority level.
Authority Level - 7 Granted]
"Huh" Wilhelm was taken aback by what had just transpired.
"Well it seems we were correct in the assumption that it really designs something to help at a specific moment."
"Indeed." Wilhelm nodded and now once again used Analyze on the ring.
Now with his increased authority level, the results were quite different.
[Analyzation complete.
Results: Ring of Ebengairi
First Owner - Wilford Aguarias Darrow (Dead)
Second Owner - Karis Ebengairi (Dead)
Third Owner - Vincent Ebengairi (Dead)
Fourth Owner - Neol Ebengairi (Ownership rescinded)
Fifth Owner - Rachel Ebengairi (Ownership rescinded?
Current Owner - Mortis]
"Who's Mortis?!" Wilhelm was alarmed at learning that the system registered his name as Mortis.
"Quite peculiar indeed, very peculiar." The voice noted.
Wilhelm looked like he was about to explode with the amount of shock that was inscribed on his face.
But in the end he could only take a deep breath and calm down.
"I'll figure this out later."
There was nothing he could do, nobody to answer his questions, so what point was there to scream?
"Now one last thing, what's your name? No, that's stupid of me. How about a name? Perhaps-"
"Mortis, refer to me as such."
"Alright, does Polaris know of you?"
"If you refer to that one, no it does not know to differentiate the both of us."
"That one?"
"Indeed, that is what you inwardly think of him after all. You try to feel him as your mentor but you always have seen him as a stranger, isn't that correct?"
Wilhelm didn't say, he didn't know what to say.
"Although I am just a voice in your head, keep in mind that I am the voice made up of your inner being, all your thoughts and desires in your subconscious given form. I am ever-scrutinizing as is common for a person and thus I am your Second Thought, which always remains behind the 1st." Mortis replied.
"..I see" Wilhelm mumbled in deep thought.