I had no idea how long I had been in this room, but it was at least a few weeks. The man that had taken me from Korron, whose name I never learned and just called Servant, had left me here "to get used to being heavier than I had been on Korran." Indeed this room, wherever it was, made me feel much heavier than I had in years. I guessed that the gravity was like what Earth was as far as I could remember.

Life in this solitary room had been anything but boring for I had not been alone aside from the last day or two. Another man would come, one wearing a mask and clothes that hid any features, and had been "training" me until I fell to the floor exhausted. I don't know why I had been training so hard and by now I felt that I never wanted to do any training ever again, but as a result, I had never been stronger.

"I see the training has paid off, Salis." Said the Servant, finally returning after all these weeks.

I groaned, still lying on the floor after having just finished another training session.

Servant laughed. "Do not worry you will not see your masked friend ever again."

Servant walked around the spot I was laying and looked me over closely.

"Terrans are such interesting things. Even after all the many years of making them, I still find myself curious about them."

Something he said took me by surprise and I sat up.

The man laughed again. "I thought that would get your attention, and as thanks for your past and future cooperation I think you deserve some explanations."

"Like what you said about making Terrans?" I was very curious.

"Yes, but not only will I talk about that, I will be more than happy to answer some other questions you may have. Not all but whatever I feel is safe for you to know."

"All right," I said. "Can you explain the making Terrans bit first and how it affects me? And why did you make me a baby?"

The man thought. "I cannot explain everything because I only know part of the Terran phenomena." The man looked at me for a moment and then continued. "I do not know what happens to Terrans before they come to Calorin, and I imagine it is different for everyone, but I can tell you what happens after.

"You see, the Deity I serve saw that the souls of you Terrans had somehow found their way from Terra and would wander, unseen by all but the Deity and us Servants. Being the kind Deity that my master is, he commanded me and a few others to give these spirits life because they seemed to be unable to enter the reincarnation cycle.

"We did as we were told, but unfortunately the process to make you Terrans new bodies is not perfect. For one, it uses the soul itself as a template. Because souls are effectively pure white light, your bodies keep the white color."

So Terrans were white because they took on the color of the soul? But if that were true why were my eyes blue and not white too?

"I know you said we turned out white for the most part, but what about my eyes? They are blue. I heard that all Terrans have blue or grey eyes."

"To be honest." The man said. "I do not know why. It just happens. What affects the age a Terran becomes is mysterious as well, though for you I would say it was the fact that you were screaming like a newborn baby that determined your age if I had to guess."

"What about all the physical deformities Terrans have?"

"As I said earlier the process is not perfect. It also takes lots of concentration and most spirits tend to not like to stay still long enough and it often disrupts the process." The man looked at me for a moment. "Fortunately for you, you did not move around much so we could make you a proper body. Your only problem was that you would not stop screaming, and that is why I made you unable to physically express emotion to quiet you down. Unfortunately, I forgot to return your ability to express emotions before I sent you to Calorin. Which is now fixed."

At that moment I realized two things. The first was that the thing about my emotions made sense. In my time on Calorin I did not remember smiling even once, let alone laugh even though I did often feel happy or find things funny. The second thing I realized was that if I was a spirit, it meant that I must have died.

"Was I screaming because of the way I died?" I asked.

"Ah, so you finally realized the probable truth. While I would not know for certain if Terrans die before they come to Calorin, I know that all of them have experienced something traumatic before they come. All of them."

"I can't remember anything bad happening to me before I woke up on Calorin," I said, not sure if it was true.

"That is because we block those memories. For the most part your mind is very strong so only your strongest and most recent memories were blocked and not all of them like the most weak-minded."

Well, that explained that question.

"Why do you need to block our memories?"

"Because you would be mentally broken, though I expect you would fare much better if I were to restore it now."

"Are you going to?"

"Now is not the time." The man paused. "Do you have any other questions regarding Terrans or yourself?"

"Why is my magic broken?"

"Oh that? Once again that is thanks to your mental strength. Do you remember lots of blue fire when you woke up?"

I nodded.

"I am not completely sure but from the few other times I have seen this problem it happens when Terrans are exposed to magic for the first time and, I think, they reject it which results in all of their magical energy being released at once. I am not sure why this causes the problem it does, but it happens. The blue fire is your expelled magical energy by the way."

"Can you fix it like you did my emotions?"

"No. If I knew what to fix, I might, but the process we use to make new bodies is automatic and only my master knows the exact workings of it. If it was a matter of the mind, it would be a simple matter."

"Can you ask your master?"

"My Master is… predisposed for as long as I can see."

Who was this Servant's master, anyway? Of all the Deity I had heard of, none had servants that did anything like this. Of course, there are probably a lot of things that the Deity do that the people of Calorin would never hear of. But this was making bodies we were talking about. Which Deity had that kind of power?

Of them, all only Kel had anything to do with spirits and the dead. He even had places where bodies were created out of black stuff.

If it wasn't Kel… could it be Lolorai? Could Lolorai be the Deity of Life?

"Is your master Lolorai?" I asked, interested in being one of the few who knew anything about Lolorai if I was right.

Unfortunately, the man showed no reaction. "Who my master is is something I cannot tell you. If others were to find out they would contact my Master and tell my Master of my plans, which I cannot have."

"Why can't your master know your plans? Are you doing something they don't want you to do?"

"Enough questions about my master."

I sighed.

"One or two more questions and then we need to leave." Servant said.

"Oh yeah," I remembered something he had said to me before I came to this place. "Before you brought me here, you said you fixed a problem you forgot to fix, and that you gave me a gift."

"Your gift will be a surprise. One that many would kill for."

"It better not be becoming one of your Berserkers."

"I would never dream of it. You are above such disgusting creatures."

I was glad to hear that. The thought of losing control of my mind like that only to be controlled by another disgusted me.

"If it is not that, then what is it?" I asked.

"That, Salis, is something for you to find out." The man shifted on his feet. "One last question."

"Why did you bring me here, to this room?"

"To bring you back to strength, of course. I even found this place that Melche abandoned that makes things weigh about how much they would on Terra. I always wanted to see how strong a Terran would get when subjected to their normal weight."

"Wait… why would Melche know what things weighed on Terra?"

"All I know was that she found the way the spirits of you Terrans were coming to Calorin and found out how to cross over. There was also a large increase of Terran spirits crossing over for the two thousand years she was exploring Terra. As for why she stopped only she could say.

"Her stopping was a good thing. The large influx of Terrans meant we had to rush, and we made more mistakes with their new bodies. Now we only get one or two Terrans every three years or so."

Hearing this made me think. If Melche had found a way to Earth, that meant there might be a way back. This meant I needed to contact Melche. The only question was if I wanted to go back. There was nothing there for me, but nothing here either.

"Enough questions Salis. It is time for me to take you back to Calorin so you can get on with your life."

I nodded.

Servant touched my arm, and we left the room.

No sooner had we left the room I had to shield my eyes. The light was bright, and I had just exited a rather dim room so my eyes had not been ready for the sudden change.

I also noticed it was much hotter. I don't know if it was the fact that Korron had been fairly cold, and this place was a normal temperature or if I had come to someplace hot. Either way I knew that I would be uncomfortable until I got used to it.

"I hope you do not mind me not dropping you off in a place of luxury but I could not have anybody see us." The man said.

I finally opened my eyes. It was still a little too bright for my comfort but I could see the area around me now.

I was in a canyon. It was fairly deep and maybe a kilometer across. Running down the center was a small river which had reeds, small bushes, and trees along both sides. The cliffs on each side were steep and looked difficult to climb.

The land on either side of the river was fairly steep and was littered with boulders. Unlike the river, there were few plants.

"If you follow the river you will reach the larger Non' River in three or four days. From there follow the Non' until you reach Eto Lake where you can take a boat to Eto." The man said.

I was in Toa Mirr! Why would he bring me here? And why so far away from any place?

"Why Toa Mirr? I'm pretty sure they were the ones that tried to kidnap me in Flaern." I said.

"I am sorry, I thought you did not care where you went. Besides, in a few weeks it will be safer here than in Flaern." He said.

"Why? Flaern isn't full of bandits, murderers, and rapists like Toa Mirr."

"Since you have been on Korron and that room you could not hear any goings-on so it makes sense you have not heard about the Toa Mirr invasion of Koa Flaer."

Toa Mirr had invaded Koa Flaer? That would mean they would have had to have gone through the mountain range separating the two countries. And if they had invaded one of their old territories that meant they probably wanted the other too.

"Still, you could have sent me to a different country."

"Deko!" The man shouted. "Come fulfill your role!”

Immediately a large black cat, a puma or something similar, came out from behind a large rock resting near the river and ran towards us. It was carrying a basket in its mouth and had a bedroll strapped to its back.

"Bad Kitty," I said as it neared us.

It paused but continued towards us.

"Bad Kitty?" The man said curiously. "Are you a bad kitty, Deko?" The man said to the large cat. When it didn't reply the man said, "Never were a talker were you."

The cat looked at the man and me and didn't make a sound, but just placed the basket on the ground.

"Deko here will be your companion for a while. Mostly, she will leave you alone but if you get into a situation you cannot handle she might help."

"Might?" I said.

The man ignored me. "I have prepared a bedroll for you and a basket. The basket has some food, money, shoes, and a few changes of clothing. There should even be some soap in there. That black sand staining you spoils your Terran look, so it was a personal request of mine."

I picked up the basket and looked inside. Everything was there. Even the soap.

"Good luck!" The man said and disappeared.

I turned and looked at the cat. "No peeking," I said and took the soap to the river.