ASHLEY'S REBIRTH

Have you ever thought that in the endless universe, there is other life beyond Earth? 

Life is full of strong people with magical abilities that come from nature. Elemental users. Elemer. That's what they're called here.

And that universe chooses a special person as a catalyst in the silently brewing chaos. Battle and struggle are inevitable in this white war.

This is the story of Jai Waetford. A human who was chosen by that certain universe, as the last lightning element user to fulfill the role he couldn't possibly imagine.

It all starts here... 

**

Manhattan, New York. February 21, 2016.

What sucked more than seeing your own partner cheat on you on your own birthday? That was what Jai currently felt. He was enraged to see his girlfriend making out with another man in public.

“Megan, what the hell are you doing?!” Jay asked, his eyes filled with fury.

Instead of explaining or feeling sorry for her actions, the young woman in front of him laughed and circled her arm to the man beside her.

“Jai, I love him. We should break up,” Megan said easily. The man in her arms smiled at her words.

“What did you say?!” Jai yelled.

His voice was surprisingly higher than he intended, but this event was surprising him in its own way. He couldn’t accept what Megan had said just now. They’ve been in a relationship for five years and now she decided they were breaking up? Why would she decide that on a whim? What had gone wrong?

“Are you deaf? She doesn’t want you, now scram,” the man said.

Jai knew the man was Chen, one of the rich kids in the campus. He did hear some rumors about the asshole putting his eyes on Megan since the first year. He didn’t know it was true nor care enough to do anything about it. Megan was his and he thought they were perfectly fine. But after seeing how Megan chose Chen over him, he could not help but repeat the question in his head: What had gone wrong?

Was it because he was just a courier? That couldn’t be it, right?

“Megan, why did you chose him? We were fine together. Why did this all happened?” Jai asked her. His eyes looking at her in an understanding manner, or at least, he tried to be. He was disappointed, but surely, there should be a logical explanation to all of this and he was eager to know.

“You’re downright poor. You couldn’t possibly buy me anything I want, unlike Chen,” Megan gloated.

He was... Speechless.

His mind was instantly empty of any words he could possibly put his finger on what this feeling he had. Wait, didn’t he had already found the word suitable for this incident the first time he marched in front of these two?

Yes.

It sucked.

Ditched by his own girlfriend just because he was poor? Jai had decided in that moment that he didn’t deserve her.

“Then give me back my savings,” Jai said. He had trusted his savings to her to prepare for their marriage. But, it was clear that he was nothing to her eyes. So anything—everything he had given to her truly, she did not deserve any of it.

“You call that empty piece of crap of a wallet—your savings? I spent it on my nails. Even that wasn’t even nearly anything good.”

Jai could see Megan flicked her fingers like she was disgusted.

He suddenly felt like he had aged. He was tired and very disappointed. He worked day and night without rest to fill that empty piece of crap of a wallet with money. Money they could’ve well spent on a small house in the suburbs. Alas, the effort he put into it ended up in vain now that she had used all of it without any tiniest bit of remorse. On. Her. Nail.

“Scram you little shit, you’re pissing me off.” Chen was getting more agitated because Jai didn’t show any sign of leaving.

Jai’s knuckles turned white. He had not realized he had clutched his hands in anger. His patience was running low, but he didn’t want to leave just yet. At least he had to punch something to sooth his knuckles’ anger as well. Chen’s face seemed well served for it.

As Jai sent him a look, Chen also noticed that the former was targeting him. He didn’t feel the need to reciprocate Jai, so he snapped his fingers.

Suddenly, two bulky men came from behind Chen and stood at his sides.

“Take him down.” Chen ordered.

The men smirked to each other and started walking towards Jai.

Looking at them did not make him down mentally. He was still furious. Luckily though, they did not know what was coming for them.

The man in the left directed his right knuckle to punch him. Jai scoffed at the openly show of weakness and dodged to the lower left. Then he followed by a his own punch to the man’s ribcage. Hard. The man wheezed and instantly hunkered over as he touched his now painful side and groaned.

When Jai stood up again, the other man tried to send a punch over the head of the previous man. Again, Jai dodged. But this time, he stopped the man’s hand by the wrist and proceed by breaking it. The scream he earned was priceless.

“H-How?” Chen and Megan stuttered at the same time. They thought Jai was only a weakling. Even Megan never saw him fight with anyone, so she thought he was not good in any of these.

As both of the men were incapacitated, Jai marched towards Chen and Megan. He was originally never wanted to show this side of him in front of Megan or anyone. It was unnecessary, too. But not anymore, especially now.

“You... You dare?!” Chen tried to brave up. Although the crack in his voice was a major giveaway to how big of a wuss he currently was. Megan was at his side by now, no longer hugging him and apparently looked a bit scared and confused.

Jai sent a slow and hard punch to Chen’s left eye. The impact made the latter fell backwards and onto the street.

Megan was even more shocked. She kneeled down to Chen in reflex and tried to look at Chen’s face. Chen groaned and gritted his teeth. The pain was there. Seeing how her new boyfriend was hurt, she turned her face to Jai. Anger was seen clearly on her face.

“What the fuck Jai?!”

“You think I care?” Jai muttered as he pulled a water bottle from his bag.

“JAI?!” Megan yelled as Jai poured all the content on her. The water making her hair wet and it dripped to her dress.

Jai dumped the now empt bottle in front of her and didn’t even glance as he turn around and left that side of the street.

“No... My hair...” Megan sulked as she examined her hair that was now wet and ruined.

**

Jai just let his feet took him. Anywhere was fine. He was not in the mood for anything right now.

As he walked, Jai could not stop thinking of these mixed feelings inside him. On one side, he was glad he could land that punch to the asshole’s face and made the bitch beside him suffer for tonight. They deserved it for trampling on someone’s feelings and effort. Oh he would count his savings too, alright; he could not—for the love of the universe—let the fact that his savings were now non-existent. The sweat, the tears, the snots and cringe he spent on those money.

His hard work.

He was glad that his relationship with the bitch was over. One regret on this part though, was that he should’ve bought detergent instead of water at the market before they caught them at it. That would’ve been a good way to ruin more of her hair and made him more satisfied.

But on the other side, he was feeling guilty of landing a punch. Not because he was sorry of that punk, but because the martial art he learned wasn’t supposed to be used in something like this. His grandfather would be greatly disappointed that he had used this on a whim. Just because he couldn’t control his emotions.

The sound of water brought him back to the present and he realized he was at a bridge. He stepped closer to the side and looked at the river from above. The current was quite fast. It was not raging, but fast nonetheless. It sent a unique sound that somehow attracted Jai into listening to it.

A sigh escaped his lips. He felt very angry and disappointed at what had happened. He didn’t want to think about it anymore. Fortunately, looking and listening at the water calmed him down. It seemed to him that his anger flows out alongside the river, replacing his anger with a more soothing feeling. He closed his eyes and let out another sigh, letting the river sound calm his nerves.

“Meow~”

Jai opened his eyes to the new sound and looked to the side. A small kitten was walking on the railing—approaching him.

“Hey, sweetie...” Jai greeted with a smile. The snowy fur kitten meow-ed again and stopped near him.

“What’s your name?” He asked as he patted its head gently. The kitten seemed to enjoy his touch.

He got a, “Meow~”, as a response and the furry little creature continued on its path on the railing. Unfortunately, the small kitten lost its balance and fell to other side.

Jai’s breath hitched. He immediately jumped and tried to catch the kitten, luckily got it by the nape of its neck. He swallowed for a second before realizing his feet gave away and his body slowly diving below. He tried to grab the railing, but it was slippery and his hand slipped. He reached out the edge of the pavement in panic and his dive came to a stop.

He let go of his breath slowly reached back to pul the kitten to his chest, “That was close.”

Jai looked up, his left hand grabbing the edge tightly. He had to get back up fast, he didn’t want to slip and get wet. He was about to pull himself up when he heard someone call his name.

“Hey, Jai.”

It was a very familiar voice and the owner of it wasn’t someone Jai appreciated of meeting right now, especially in this position. Because they just met a while ago—and he’d just punched the person in the face.

Yes. It was the bastard.

“Chen?!” Jai did not believe the bastard chased him to the bridge.

Chen smirked at the shock in Jai’s voice. “Looks like you need my help.”

And with that, he stomped on Jai’s hand.

Jai could feel the pain on his fingers, but he dared not move because the kitten could also fall with him. It was not that Jai feared of diving into the river water, but the current was fast. He might have liked the sound and yes, it did calm him down. But it wasn’t the same as jumping down into it.

One more stomp made him grunt.

“I’ll gladly help you out. Hahaha!” Chen laughed satisfyingly as he gave Jai’s hand another stomp. This time, he pressed his heel on Jai’s fingers like one would put out a cigarette on the street.

Jai grunt once more. His fingers hurt so bad right now, but he still didn’t let go.

Chen scoffed. He looked down at Jai in disdain, his eyes narrowing in a cynical way.

“No one has ever punched me in the face. No one dared. But you did. And it hurts like hell. So I’m returning it to you now.”

Jai wanted to get back at him. He wanted to so badly. But before he could think of anything, another pain shot at his fingers.

“Eat this!” Chen yelled, giving another stomp. However, this time, he continued by kicking Jai’s fingers off the edge.

Jai eyes went wide. Chen grinned.

When he realized his hold had come off, Jai sucked in a mouthful of air and clutched the kitten to his chest as both of them fell into the water.

A loud splash was heard, and Chen left the bridge. Laughing in his wake.

**

“Meow.”

Jai could hear a kitten meowing in his ear.

“Meow.”

The sound repeated, as if calling him.

Jai scrunched up his face, feeling himself waking up. He fluttered his eyes open slowly and was met by two grey moon staring back at him. Oh, did he hit his head? The moon was split in two.

“Meow.”

The sound repeated again. This time, a lick on the face too. Jai looked to his left and saw the white kitten from the bridge.

“You’re alive,” Jai whispered, a small smile crept his lips. Then he felt something bang his head from inside and he grimaced from the pain. Something did hit his head. But the pain signified his survival.

Then he tried to sit up. It was a bad decision, knowing that his head hurt, but he remembered falling into the river. The current might have brought him somewhere unknown by now.

After he did sit up, gritting his teeth of the sore muscles, he looked around. His brows furrowed when he noticed there was no river anywhere near him. He fell into the river, so where was the river?

He tried focusing more on his surroundings and found that the ground around him was red and there were some brown-black things everywhere that looked like burnt trees.

“Where am I?”

He looked up once again to see if the moon had assembled into the familiar yellow moon he always see, but the moon stayed the same twin grey ones.

He squinted his eyes in confusion and opened his mouth in reflex, “What... The...”

“AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!”

Jai and the kitten instantly jumped. That was a blood curling scream. Jai wasted no time to take the kitten and sprang on his feet, running to the sound.