Archaeologists in a Magic Cultivation World

Chapter 2 New Body? Feels like my body as a teenager!

The team that headed to the town was luckier than those at the dig site. When reaching the top, Pete made the mistake that one of the other college students made. He touched the metal harness attached to the corpse uncovered.

With out gloves on at that.

A silence permeated the area with a wave of light snatching them all up and spiriting them away to a different place.

The distance for the people who left was just enough to keep them from getting spirited way as well. At first. The area the fell into had its roof missing and constant years of tremors and weather damage left it exposed to the elements when the wind blew the sand away.

Several hit podiums and weird protrusions coming down. A young man had an unfortunate encounter with a rod. His jaw hit before cracking and then sending him off into the light.

One by one they all hit something that sent them away. All but William and Claire. Mosconi had shattered his legs landing on his feet. Falling over onto the weird floating ball of light, his body healed then vanished on the spot.

William woke up first. Crawling to the only bit of light he could see thinking it was possibly a Medical team come to help. The broken bones were forgotten and the stinging pain across most of his body was ignored as he just wanted to live.

"Ughh!" Claire awoke next. "Ahhh!" Her scream was intense as she sat up on extinct. The excruciating pain was enough to cause her to faint. Heading hitting right against a metal box.

*Chish!* The box lid opened up as metallic-looking beetles entered her body. Her flesh was repaired but she did not awaken. A crown of a beetle now on her head with antennae wiggling. Small pulses extending in the area.

Each pulse brought clarity to William who was grateful his mouth was mangled and he couldn't speak. He would have surely screamed after seeing what looked to be Claire covered in some type of living metal.

After the pulses stopped, Claire vanished into light. Going off to a place unknown. All that was left was the original light William mistook for medical services. It was a lever that was attached to a lift as far as he could tell.

'Must get to the light!' William dragged himself along. He rembered falling so he was defintely in a hole. Which meant he needed to go upward to be found. His chin pushed against the floor to help even more. The stinging pain kept him conscious. The moment his finger touched the lever, his skin ignited. "Ahhhhh!"

Flesh, bones, organs, and everything that was "him" and "who" he was burned away. A suction force pulled away at him into the ball of light. Sucking the immaterial of his essence away to parts unknown like the others.

William was the last to cross over the Dimension, but would not be the last overall. The caved-in area was already getting checked by the locals and an extremely upset Billionaire looking for his daughter.

As William travelled he heard voices discussing various matters. Nothing he could understand so he tried to focus. Just to hold onto a semblance of himself. What felt like hours but was only a few seconds he rembered everything that happened but could not feel any discomfort.

"I know for a fact I was injured." William voiced out. But he could tell his mouth did not move. His voice came from every direction but also from nowhere it seemed. "Where the hell am I?"

He could feel he should be scared as well as angry but the feeling was numb. As if hidden behind a barrier of water. Which infuriated him but still did not cause a feeling to surface. He started to freak out but it never built up.

"Owww!" William said on reflex but the pain was not really there as he hit a ball of light. Which was better than anything else in the vast darkness. "What the heck is this thing?"

*Shine!* The ball lit up with the light itself entering him. Immediately returning his various sensations to him. The Concept of Three entered his mind.

"The Body to house everything...."

"The Mind to develop everything...."

"The Soul to experience everything...."

"SHIT!" William shouted loudly from the pain then blacked out. The sensory overload alone should have been the final act of killing him.

Waking up hours later feeling somewhat normal besides seeing countless Gas Giants in every direction. Which would be impossible since that would kill him all over again.

"I have to be going crazy in a dream or I was saved and given some really powerful pain meds. I wonder I might have just passed out from the heat and everything after was a fever dream?"

It came out as a question and he did not expect an answer.

Knowledge System: This is not a dream William. Reboot to fix errors.

The voice came from nowhere and everywhere and sounded the same as his own. But he could hear it and that is what mattered. The voice sounded like the configuration speech back for the laptop he set up. Helped to remember something when it sounded like one's own voice a friend told him.

Which made him give that a try since he couldn't see his bag anywhere.

"Knowledge System," which was the name he gave to his laptop when buying it. He actually did that for all his computers since it was funny to him. "..activate GPS location."

Knowledge System: No signal detected. Reboot to fix errors.

"Knowledge System," William didn't like the sound of that but still that helps a little. "..open map."

Knowledge System: No map detected. Reboot to fix errors.

"I have several maps downloaded.. that doesn't make sense." William really did not want to reboot. Especially since he could not tell where his laptop currently was and didn't want to lose any data or worse, it might not come back on. "If this doesn't work, I am going to go bananas. Knowledge System, reboot."

*Pulse!* A light shined around William as he disappeared once more. At least this time it was not painful. In fact he, he assumed it was even more so his mind played tricks on him. Or some type of gas at this point. That pain should still be felt.

On the Continent of Pangea, in the Akademy of Habilis, the students have gathered about in one of the courtyards. Spending free time doing nothing before the teachers came with the new assignments. As the Upperclassmen, they had more time on their hands the first month. Of every school year at that.

A dazed young man stared at the sun with his mouth open. Drool coming down one side of the mouth. His classmates gave him odd looks. Well, the ones who didn't know what happened the last few weeks did.

*Shine!* A ball of light shot down into the dazed young man. The Concepts of Three link with the individual in moments.

Eleven of the students thought internally not letting on it was their fault he was now dumber than a headless person. As the top students in each field of a major study, they were usually together since freshman year. Despite different backgrounds before entering the Akademy.

"Upperclassmen William looks really bad lately. Did he have trouble with his Mana Pool?" A student asked in a murmur. Gossip was always the best way to find out anything. "I mean, for one of the top twelve, he looks bad off."

"Aaah." William wiped his mouth from the drool.

The life of the previous individual owner disappeared into his own. The young man's mind was so damaged it couldn't put up a fight against the force brought from his presence. Especially since it was forced to experience what he felt recently. The visual of the Gas Giants then the excruciating Pain felt ended the last possibility of recovery.

'Well... how the hell do I get home now?' The confusion was a bit much but he found himself oddly calm. Able to think clearly of what was currently unfolding.

Picking apart the damage information was a pain but he knew enough to get by. At least he hoped so. For now, anyway, he was glad the belly was full and he was not dehydrated. The tingling sensation in his chest, back, and head kept him occupied not to wander off to get information.

A weird type of feeling in each location caused further reluctance.

"Alright, gather around for assignments." The Coordinator came over speaking with authority. "A new batch of students have come in and we need some volunteers to speak with them and guide them for a bit."

The Upperclassmen all groaned not wanting to do the grunt work. All but William who raised his hand to volunteer. He could use the students to help facilitate information gathering. odds are at least one or two were smart and could answer questions that the other students ask.

"Well don't all of.." The Coordinator was about to convince them of the perks of doing it but stopped seeing the raised hand. The shocked look was quickly removed from the Coordinators' faces when seeing who did so. ".. thank you for you assistance young one. Here is a little payment for doing so."

A bag was floated over to him. Sending one's consciousness inside revealed a few Welcome Books, Beginner Uniform of the Akademy, and a few Elixers for Beginners to help start their journey of self-discovery.

"The students are gathered at the front entrance, you are excused from the next "proceeding" to take care of this."

"Of course, Coordinator," William said respectfully. He walked at a brisk pace to meet the students. The moment he was out of range of the others, he popped open the bag taking in an Elixer. 'Gotta hurry to down this!'

*Uncorked!* The elixir's fragrance was pretty good. At least he thought so. The entire thing was downed without a bit of it wasted. The bottle was shaken for good measure and droplets taken in.

Refined Mana passed through his body quickly. Healing the damage to the bones as well as the damaged organs. Bringing it back to a decent healthy state to make a better appearance which an Upperclassmen should have. But the most important was the mind restored from the damage noticeably.

Knowledge System: Restored to Gathering Realm, Operation Features are still disabled. No Signal was found. Info on storage capacity function available.  A total of one Terrabyte of information is available. Processor damaged.

'Good.' William pulled out of the Beginner books and read as he moved, coming to a slow pace. Every bit his eyes scanned over was stored away. A mental image formed in his mind bit by bit. Pages torn, wrinkles, and stains for most of it. 'Ok, a terabyte will not last if I am not careful. Must remember to clean up what I store later. At least the scanner used for artifacts came with. But where the hell is it?! And where are my guns!?'

Knowledge System: Search Function disabled.

Not only did he have to understand different information quickly, he needed to find ways to access his computer more. The good news, his thoughts triggered Computer functions at least. A headache was the least of his worries as he read.