Ashen steps through the doorway as it closes shut behind him.

  He sees quite a few dead paladins scattered throughout the room, Evan’s remaining paladins fighting the skeletal dragon boss, and Lina tied up along with 2 paladins near him.

  His arms are shaking a little bit, he’s taking such a big risk to his own life in doing this, but… he looks towards Lina who is injured and has been crying, he’s not letting another of his friends die like his past ones, he refuses to be the Sole Returner again.

  He steadies his hands and draws his dagger as he walks towards the 2 paladins guarding Lina.

  Lina sees him approaching and is filled with hope despite not knowing how Ashen could best 2 High ranking priests when he can’t even use his blessing without souls to use.

  One of the paladins advances towards Ashen while the other stays by Lina to guard her in case the dragon attacks this side of the room.

  Lina watches as the Paladin draws their sword and readies their shield as they draw closer to Ashen.

  Ashen suddenly lunges forward and strikes the Paladin with his dagger, but the Paladin easily blocks it.

  The sword is swung down and Ashen barely blocks it but is knocked back, then for some reason he starts running perpendicular to the Paladin he’s fighting as he heads around towards the dead paladins.

  The Paladin he was fighting rushes to take him down and as Ashen reaches a corpse, with an arm outstretched, the Paladin slashes Ashen’s back.

  Ashen falls but catches himself on his knees revealing it was only a faint cut, then he whirls around and attacks the Paladin once more with his dagger.

  The Paladin blocks with his shield once more but shadows erupt from his dagger as he pushes the Paladin back with extreme force.

  Lina watches in awe at the strange surge of power then as Ashen starts running to another Paladin corpse she realizes what’s happening, Ashen is grabbing the souls of those who died and using them to fight back.

  The Paladin keeps trying to rush to take down Ashen but he holds them off as he flees to collect more souls, eventually he’s gathered all 17 souls of the high priests who perished making him around Master Priest level.

  The Paladin slashes at Ashen but he dodges then steps around their shield and slashing their arms with his dagger.

  The paladin drops their shield and sword as they start healing themselves, Ashen moves onto the paladin guarding Lina.

  The paladin blocks Ashen’s initial attack but Ashen manages to knock him back. Ashen takes his moment of reprieve to rush to Lina who has settled her mind on escaping after seeing Ashen risk himself for her.

  Ashen starts cutting Lina’s ropes with his dagger as Lina says,

  “You came back, why?”

  Ashen momentarily slows before going back to cutting her ropes with his crappy dagger saying,

  “I can’t lose another comrade to the throes of death, my misfortune is mine alone.”

  Lina is then freed from her ropes and grabs a sword from a fallen paladin nearby, but then Ashen’s misfortune strikes again.

  Evan’s party of paladins finishes off the dragon as the bones come crumbling down like any other remains. Ashen is about as strong as Evan currently but Evan also has 12 paladins who while injured and exhausted, are still high priests.

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  Ashen and Lina catch their breaths and gather their energy as the paladins make a circle around them with Evan in the middle of the room and edge of the circle, he speaks first,

  “Oh the boy is death, and your blessing is of death isn’t it? Seeing how you got stronger after taking the souls of my soldiers, but we will not lose to a demon.”

  Ashen and Lina are unsure how best to go about this however are determined to succeed.

  As the paladins slowly close the distance at once, Ashen and Lina rush towards one end to break the circle one soldier at a time.

  A fierce fight emerges as Ashen and Lina fight with all they have and they do a decent job taking down 4 paladins in the chaos, but it all comes to a crashing halt.

  As Lina fights a paladin, trying to use the fact that they won’t kill her to her advantage, she notices multiple paladins converging on Ashen.

  She turns to help him but Evan’s golden thread appears around her and she falls to the floor, she looks up and is about to start crawling when… Ashen is swept off his feet, then stabbed with a sword straight through his chest into the floor.

  Ashen raises his shaky hands one last time before his vision goes black.

  Lina screams and tries desperately to crawl to him and heal him, she sees his body shaking and eyes twitching so he isn’t dead yet, but that wound will be fatal if he isn’t healed soon.

  Lina tries crawling but is pulled by Evan through the golden thread, paladins restrain her as she is brought to face Evan once more.

  She tries resisting but her body won’t move, Ashen is going to die because of her and there is nothing she can do about it.

  Evan finishes tying her up then says to her and his paladins,

  “Finally this goose chase is over and done with, paladins, grab the loot from the treasure vault the we can take the escape spell out of here.”

  Evan’s paladins start heading towards the treasure vault as Lina stares with tears flooding her face, as she stares at the now unmoving form of her only friend.

  Meanwhile Ashen opens his eyes to a black void with nothing around. He tries looking around but can’t, then shadows darker than the void itself start forming in front of him.

  A terrifying skeleton in a black cloak emerges from the shadows. A large rusted scythe appears in its bony grip as it walks closer. The hood of the cloak is pulled back to a Skeletal face.

  Ashen’s body trembles with fear but his mind is calm even in the face of death itself.

  The reaper raises his scythe to Ashen’s neck then before taking his soul he speaks in an eerily cold yet distant voice,

  “About time you died little thief, You hold so many souls inside you right now yet doom yourself and your fellow mortals to doom because you refuse to consume them. You wield my power but refuse it’s nature? Why?”

  Ashen tries to calm his trembling body as he responds,

  “I think you are a force of good not evil, so I do not believe a vile act such as consuming souls is your nature.”

  Long silence followed by Death pressing his scythe harder into Ashen’s neck then saying,

  “Mortals pray to me in terror yet you speak as if I am their salvation, yet if you truly believed that then why delay your death? You have faced hell to survive off the deaths of others.”

  Ashen gathers his courage and looks death straight in the eye sockets and says,

  “Because Death gives value to life, it is because we only die once that gives our lives such value. If I accepted death early on then I would never have gotten a chance to live, even though it was hell.”

  Ashen is quiet for a moment thinking of the pain and suffering he’s endured before he continues,

  ”Cause even if this life is hell, it is a hell I only get to live once. I will never get another chance to be me, whether after death is an endless afterlife, reincarnation, or nothing it doesn’t matter. Cause to me this is me and I will not forsake myself.”

  Death is quiet for a long moment before he pulls back his scythe and sets its hilt down, he then says,

  “Tell me then, what do you think of the phrase, Death should not be feared but avoided at all costs?”

  Ashen’s gaze is steady now cause he knows he can’t do anything but respond earnestly in this situation so fear is useless,

  “Death should not be feared as it gives value to life, but it shall not be seen as a force of salvation only an anchor to help us live.”

  Death creepily smiles as his skeletal face contorts before he says eerily,

  “Little Thief, how about we make a deal?”

  Back in reality, Lina is restrained by Evan as Evan speaks,

  “You will finally be able to fulfill your purpose, you are our Saintess, you will end all suffering and rid this world of death forever.”

  Lina is drained emotionally and mentally, she painfully opens her eyes to Ashen’s corpse before looking up at Evan, she may be committing a sin by living but Ashen didn’t deserve to die like that. She then says,

  “Says the priest of life who killed Ashen, you stupid…”

  Then she notices he isn’t looking down at her, she looks towards the other paladins who are also looking behind her. Then she hears a voice similar to Ashen yet cold and eery,

  “So this is how this mortal came to my doorstep.”

  Evan’s group watches as Ashen’s body stands up from the brink of death with the sword still impaled into his chest, he turns around but his eyes aren’t the same, and his voice makes them fearful as it speaks again,

  “How strange it is to feel flesh again.”