I can feel something. Something bad.

It's a sticky feeling, almost like feeling nauseated but without knowing why, leaving you to speculate if you ate something bad...

It's progressively getting worst, each moment the urge to vomit grows.

But what would I vomit in this black void in which I can not see.

Wait, can I not see? I haven't actually tried opening my eyes.

Huh, while it's still the same black abyss as before, I can definitely tell trying to see if my eyes worked, worked.

This is confirmed by the sight of something other than the endless black. The same black-grey smoke that came from the necromancer.

It circles around me, and seems to be pushing me. This too is confirmed by me looking at myself, finding I appear to be a ball of light although I do not radiate any out into the darkness, and looking around I spot what seems to be a crack in the void. The crack itself is black, much like all else around me, but I can just feel the opening. Why do I know it's an opening..?

Ah, it's getting closer. Like I thought, it's pushing me towards it. 

And the closer I get the more I wanna just hurl. I don't know what'll happen if I go through that crack but I trust this nauseating feeling in the pit of stomach that it will not be pleasant.

I try to exert force, but this light body of mine doesn't respond, as though I'm detached from it like a rider from his horse.

Wait, could this be my soul?!

WAIT, SOULS ARE REAL?!

God damn.

Wait, shit probably shouldn't say that, if souls are real I don't wanna piss off whoever it is that's in charge of them after death.

And if reincarnation is real, woah nelly, do I not want to be the guy who irritated the supreme being who's in charge of, ironically, what you'll be being.

Alright, with that out of the way, and the acknowledgement I should take religion more seriously, back to the problem at hand. 

How do I move my soul?

Trying to move it like my body isn't producing any results, and with every passing moment I'm move ever so closer to that crack.

I'm guessing that crack was made by the very magic trying to expel me.

Stolen content warning: this tale belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences elsewhere.

It's standard education for a soldier to be taught about the basics of how necromancers go about their business, and raising a zombie is one of them, at least as to the how, and not anything on the actual doing.

Firstly, the intended target to be raised must be a corpse. Considering my current situation, that's not entirely true. It appears that the target has to be soulless, and it so seems the magic will force that to happen if need be.

Secondly, I don't remember.

I slept a lot in class, despite the undead being sorta interesting, the allure of sleep in lieu of the soul crushing reality of anything you remotely love turned educational caught me in its unrelenting jaws. I even sometimes snuck in a pillow.

Maybe I'm going about this the wrong way, perhaps the spiritual works differently from the physical?

Maybe I'm stupid and this situation is stupid and I should just let what's happening happen, because from that redundant statement and the fact I even had issue coming up with it has left me a strong desire to kill myself, if only by letting death happen.

But despite that, the fear of death won over and gripped my heart, er, my soul.

Now to check on trying to manipulate this soul body of mine, perhaps it's like magic? 

I'm no mage, but from what I know about them it's all mental, mind over matter.

Clearly by me possessing the awareness of my soul, on a literal level, it is something if not matter.

I mentally command myself to stop.

HOLY DAMNATION OF A FUCK!

Catching my non-existent breath, I did not notice that my ever approaching doom has stopped, while the death magic that had previously surrounded me shivered.

As soon as I felt my soul conform to my will, I felt the most excruciating pain of my life. Forget that axe in my shoulder, this was like having your brain used for a play ball, kicked around until it pops, only to then get stepped on over and over again by oblivious passerbys.

In short, I found out that one can literally fry their brain.

Luckily the pain was only for a mere breathe of time despite the extensive amount of knowledge it taught me in the ways of pain unimaginable. 

As in, I can not imagine that pain being used on your worst enemies. Perhaps the scummiest of people, perhaps, but a simple hatred fueled relation isn't appropriate.

It is now that I notice that my original goal has been achieved, as that had been my destination no longer approached like a due date for an assignment you hadn't even finished.

Furthermore, the death magic that got so cozy in this space with me that it sought to show me out personally, stopped whatever shivering it had been doing. It then, to my surprise, surrounded me but no longer pushed me further towards an unknown end. It seemed more like it was cloaking my soul, covering and smothering at the same time. I did not feel any discomfort from this, the nausea from earlier no longer increasing.

Actually, it felt like it was lessening, and along with this I could feel from the crack that it was closing. Around that area I could also see the death energy acting like a sewing needle, closing up the hole.

Wait, why would it do that? It's no longer trying to oust me?

Unless ousting me wasn't it's original goal, and my attraction to that hole in the darkness was not its doing.

My mind whirling as it tried to make sense of what's going on now.

Maybe the crack wasn't made by the death magic?

I can't be sure on that. I'm not exactly an expert on wherever it is I am with my soul body in tow.

Perhaps that was where my soul was to exit my body to ascend to wherever souls go to after they die?

Plausible.

But without any knowledge of what'd happen after going through the crack, and with complete aversion to such a thing, I was stumped.

Before long, the death energy finished sewing together the crack, and I was immediately met with relief from my nausea. That explains that, at least.

Before long, though, I found myself once again losing focus, and descending into another void I was much more familiar with.