The hole I fell through wasn't far, but the thought of what I'd just done kept me spiraling down the overthinking alley. I didn't have time to process it—not yet. I just needed to get out. After following the path back, retracing my steps through the ruin, my pulse slowed as I neared the entrance.
When I reached the shaft I had fallen through, I looked up and saw them. Erik, Sissel, Lokir, and Jouane. They were all there, crouched near the edge, peering down anxiously. The rope hung down, swaying slightly, and when Erik spotted me, his entire face lit up.
"Rune!" he called out. "You're alive!"
"I am. Sorry about that, brother. And just when you were about to get my portion of dinner."
"Ha! If you're able to kid around like that, then I guess my worries were for nothing. Get up here, you son of a horker!"
Erik and Lokir braced themselves and started pulling. The climb was easy enough while using the wall for leverage, though my hands did ache from gripping the rope. Several hands grabbed my arms as I reached the top and hauled me over the last stretch. As soon as I hit solid ground, I felt a rush of warmth against me—Sissel. She threw her arms around my waist, burying her face into my tunic, clutching me like I might disappear again.
"I—I'm so sorry," she mumbled, her voice muffled against my chest. "I got frightened when I heard you fall, and I—I didn't mean to send the spell your way. I swear! I wasn't trying to—"
"Sissel." I gently pried her off me, lowering myself slightly so I could meet her eyes. They were glassy with guilt. "It's okay. I get it. It's my bad too, we shouldn't have gone spying on you either."
She bit her lip, nodding, but I could still feel her trembling.
I hesitated, then asked, "Why are you learning destruction magic?"
The question made her flinch, and she cast her gaze downward, scuffing her boot against the ground. For a moment, she looked like she might answer, but then she just shook her head.
"I... I don't want to talk about it."
I frowned, but before I could press further, a quiet sigh from Jouane interrupted us.
"Some things take time, Rune," he said, folding his arms over his worn robes. "It's best to wait until she's ready to open up. For now, I hope you understand."
I did. I didn't like it, but I understood. Some things weren't meant to be forced. Especially when I knew the most likely cause from my reinstalled memories.
Erik and Lokir, however, weren't as patient.
"What? You're just gonna leave it at that?" Lokir scoffed, crossing his arms. "Come on, Rune, she nearly crushed you with an icicle!"
Erik, though less aggressive, frowned. "I mean… I get it's personal, but shouldn't we at least—"
"We'll leave it for now," I cut in, shooting them a look. "If Sissel wants to talk, she will. But I definitely would like to talk about it with her at some point. Whenever that might be."
Sissel hesitated, then nodded slightly, not meeting my eyes.
Whatever motive it was that compelled her to learn magic, I'm sure I knew now what the source was, at least. I know from my past memories that it's not just her sister who bullies her, but her father also beats her at home. It's just not public. I'll need to think of something to do about that.
…
The cold wind of Skyrim bit at my skin as I wandered away from the group, my boots crunching against the frost-kissed grass. The ruins behind me faded into the distance, and soon, I stood in the open fields, surrounded by nothing but rolling hills and rocky formations. The skies above were gray, thick with clouds that threatened snowfall.
I let out a slow breath, watching it curl into the air before vanishing.
What the hell just happened back there?
No, scratch that—what the hell was happening to me?
It wasn't just the fact that I'd survived a Draugr crypt or that I had somehow eaten a Devil Fruit in the land of Nirn. It was the fact that I knew things I wasn't supposed to know. I wasn't just Rune, some orphan from Rorikstead. I was someone else. Someone who had lived a life before this one, a life that had nothing to do with Skyrim, Tamriel, or even this world.
I had regained my past-life memories.
At least, some quantity of them. I remember most of the details regarding the lore of the games and anime I watched, as well as my general lifestyle in modern society. But I don't remember my original name, nor face. I don't remember any of my friends or family's faces either. I just know they exist on Earth. As for how I got here, whether I died or not, that part is also rather hazy.
Regardless of how much I remember from before, it was still a terrifying realization, one that set my nerves on edge. It meant I knew history that hadn't yet been written, knowledge of the world and its future that no one else possessed. The year was 4E194. That meant I had seven years. Seven years before Alduin's return would plunge Skyrim into chaos, before the Dragon Crisis would begin and the Civil War would reach its peak. There were also other issues besides those, like Miraak's cult and especially Harkon's court. All of these events were terrifying to even think about living through.
Harkon's issue was especially worrisome, because no matter how you try to spin it, those events taking place alongside the dragon crisis wouldn't make sense on the real life timeline. The Dragonborn canonically wouldn't have time to do both at the same time, so there is a chance it might happen even sooner…
I need to prepare for everything. There's no guarantee real life won't show me something unique too. I need to be ready for anything because none of those were events I wanted to live through unprepared.
The future aside. God, my head is a whirlpool of nonsense. There was of course also the more recent event of an hour ago.
I held up my hand, staring at my fingers. They looked the same, but I knew they weren't. The moment I had eaten that fruit, something in me had changed. I had felt it, a shift in my very essence.
The Soul-Soul Fruit.
Big Mom's fruit. The one that let her steal souls and breathe life into the inanimate.
I clenched my fist, my pulse quickening. It made zero sense for a Devil Fruit to exist in Skyrim. Hell, it made even less sense than me being here if I'm being completely honest. The two worlds shouldn't have anything to do with each other. And yet, here I was, standing in the open tundra of Whiterun Hold, having just absorbed the souls of a horde of undead with nothing but a wave of my hand.
The how and why of it all twisted in my mind like a puzzle I couldn't solve.
Was this the work of a Daedric Prince? If so, which one? And more importantly—why?
I had no answers, and I doubt I'd find any of them soon. If this was the work of some Daedric influence, I'd just have to wait and see how things played out.
For now, there was something far more pressing.
I needed to test this fruit's power.
I turned my gaze to the ground, searching for something—anything—I could use. After a moment, I spotted an old, withered log lying near a line of trees. It was brittle and half-rotten, but it would do for an experiment.
Alright… let's see how this works.
I raised my hand and focused.
I didn't know what I was doing, not really, but something inside me did. I concentrated on the Draugr souls I'd taken, reaching for them with my mind. It was an eerie sensation—like dipping my hands into a swirling pool of something alive yet separate from me. I could feel the souls writhing in my grasp, their essence like a flickering flame waiting to be used.
A deep, primal instinct whispered to me to give them shape.
I extended my fingers toward the log.
The moment I did, a wisp of pale, ghostly light slithered from my palm, twisting through the air like a serpent before sinking into the wood. The log twitched. Cracks spread across its surface as it shifted, groaning like an old door being forced open. The surrounding air grew heavy, thick with an unnatural presence.
Then, with a final shudder, the log moved.
It didn't just roll or shift—it rose. Jagged roots twisted like broken limbs, bending at awkward angles as if forming crude legs. The thing lurched, staggering as if trying to understand its own existence.
I took a step back, heart hammering in my chest.
I just animated a piece of wood.
This wasn't even comparable to necromancy. This was something else entirely. I wasn't simply raising the dead—I was giving stolen souls new vessels to inhabit. Creating life itself.
The makeshift creature twitched again, its movements jerky and unnatural. It turned toward me, though it had no eyes, no face—just a gnarled chunk of wood pulsing with spectral energy. For a brief moment, I felt something—an odd connection, like a tether binding me to the creature.
I clenched my fist.
The light within the log flickered—and then vanished. The thing collapsed instantly, the soul within it snuffed out like a candle in the wind.
I took a shaky breath.
"Okay," I muttered to myself. "That was… terrifying."
And exhilarating.
I had just done something no necromancer in Skyrim could do.
I glanced at my hand again, flexing my fingers.
The Soul-Soul Fruit was a powerful ability in the world of One Piece, but when I thought about it, souls mattered so much more in Nirn. That meant this fruit had even more potential here than it ever did in the world of One Piece. So much more potential than I'd first realized myself even.
This was still only the beginning. I had a lot of experimenting to do.
…
I spent the entire day testing the limits of my new powers, pushing them as far as I could without drawing too much attention.
The results?
Absolutely insane.
The Soul-Soul Fruit allowed me to do so much more than take souls, I could shape them, force them into new vessels of my choosing, and just as easily snuff them out. I had animated fallen branches, stones, even a pile of discarded bones I had stumbled across. Each creation lasted as long as I willed it, bound to me by an invisible thread. I could also choose how human I wanted them to look, like whether they should form a face or not. I even made a really goofy looking rock, similar to Big Mom's homies, but that was too much of a living joke so I'll try to give them a more proper shape than those childish creations. It's gonna fit me more.
Anyway. After experimenting so far, I realized that the Draugr souls I had taken were weak, fragmented remnants of whatever they had once been. That much was clear. But what if I used something stronger? Something more… personal?
That thought had lingered in my mind as the day passed. If I truly wanted a powerful Homie—one of the soul-infused beings the fruit was known for—then I needed to sacrifice a piece of my soul. In doing so, I should be able to create one of the special homies that Big Mom had, like Napoleon, Zeus and Prometheus. Even Hera.
But I didn't have anything on a grand scale like those big guys. It wasn't stormy out, nor did I have a huge fire to just bring to life here. Much less a good enough weapon to waste a piece of my soul on.
No, at the very least, it had to be something important.
Something of mine.
I had paced back and forth for hours, turning the thought over and over in my head. The sun had begun its descent, casting long shadows across the ground.
And that's when it hit me.
My own shadow.
What was more personal than the very thing that followed me wherever I went? The part of me that stretched and shrank with the light, always clinging to me, yet intangible—something that existed only in the presence of something greater?
It was perfect.
I exhaled slowly, steeling myself, then reached deep within.
A strange sensation washed over me as I pulled. It was like gripping something inside my chest and tearing it free. A flicker of pale blue light shimmered in my palm—my very soul, raw and unshaped.
I pressed it against the dark shape beneath me.
The moment my soul touched my shadow, something changed. Darkness twisted, shuddering violently, as if it had suddenly woken up. The black shape beneath me warped, bending in unnatural ways, slithering across the ground like liquid night.
Then, with an eerie, almost graceful motion, it rose.
A feminine figure emerged, stepping free from the ground as if she had always been there, simply waiting to be called forth. Her form was dark and fluid, shifting like an ever-moving silhouette. Where her eyes should have been, there was only an abyss, twin pools of darkness that seemed to drink in the fading light around her.
She tilted her head, studying me. Then a slow, mischievous smile spread across her lips.
"Well now," she purred, her voice smooth as silk, yet carrying an unnatural weight. "That was quite the birth, wasn't it?"
I swallowed, forcing myself to remain composed. "I suppose it was."
She took a step forward, and though her feet barely touched the ground, I could feel an unnatural presence emanating from her. It was like standing next to a living mass of blackness, a piece of the void given shape.
"You gave me a piece of your soul," she mused, stretching out her arms as if testing the limits of her own existence. "That means I am you, in a way. And yet… I am not." She chuckled softly, a sound that sent a shiver down my spine. "Interesting."
I exhaled. "Then I suppose I should name you."
She arched her brow. "Oh? And what do you have in mind, my dear master?"
I hesitated, then smirked. "Hel."
Her smile widened, sharp as a knife's edge. "After the Goddess of the Underworld? How fitting."
"You don't mind?" I asked.
She let out a low, amused hum. "Mind? Oh, Rune, my dear, I adore it."
I wasn't sure whether to be relieved or concerned by that response.
She circled me then, her body shifting with the dying light, blending seamlessly into the growing darkness. "So tell me, what exactly do you intend to do with me?"
I crossed my arms, observing her. "That depends on you. You're a part of me, but you're also… yourself." I narrowed my eyes. "What do you want, Hel?"
She stopped in front of me, tilting her head as if considering the question. For a long moment, she was silent. Then her gaze met mine.
"I want to see what we can become."
I blinked. "...What do you mean by that?"
She chuckled again, stepping closer, close enough that I could feel the strange, weightless presence of her body against mine. "Oh, Rune. You and I are bound together, are we not?" She reached out, tapping a single finger against my chest. "I am your shadow, your soul given form. Your darkness, your potential."
She leaned in slightly, her voice dropping to a whisper. "So let's see what we can do in this world."
I exhaled slowly, a smirk tugging at my lips. She was me, and I was her. Hel knew exactly what my desires were, for they were her own as well.
"You know what?" I said. "Let's."
...