The sword had definitely killed her, but Alice didn't die just yet.

Or rather, something much stranger happened.

“How... am I still alive?”

Inside the world dyed in emerald, near the village that reeked of rotten flesh, stood Alice yet again next to Albert.

“What are you talking about, Alice? Hey, stay calm. Cover your nose and drink some water.” He handed her the bottle while eyeing her in concern.

It wasn't the concern of someone who had just witnessed her die. It was as if Albert didn't see it happen at all.

But it did.

Alice rejected the bottle, grasping her staff so tightly that her knuckles turned white.

“It definitely happened! That man...” Alice screamed her lungs out with teary eyes. “That man had killed everyone!”

She ran off again to confront the death god that ruined her home.

“Alice, Wait!” Again, with the same words, Albert chased after her.

With anger fueling her legs, her heart raced as a mixture of negative emotions consumed her. She was in control, and at the same time, she was not.

Like a monster came out of her.

“You!”

“So you didn't run, pathetic little thing.”

The death god waved his sword to draw arcs of blood on the ground.

His gray hair shimmered like silver, and so did the eyes filled with madness. The pile of corpses behind him stood tall as if it meant to reach all the way up to heaven. In truth, this pillar would reward the creator with a spot at the farthest point from the ground. In the deepest part of hell.

And Alice will be the one to send him there.

“Die! Fire Lance!”

She conjured a spear of flames and fired it as fast as she could.

“Fire Lance! Fire Lance! Fire Lance!”

Without a break, Alice continued to shape her magic power into a spear and ingite it into fiery flames. She shot as many as her capacity allowed her, not caring for anything except revenge.

A magician should never succumb to their emotions. They are taught to control their minds and remain composed in every situation, as an agitated magician is a dead one. Inner turmoil would disrupt the necessary visualization, which would lead directly to the failure of the magic spell.

On the other hand, Alice had full clarity, casting spells with a power she didn't have before. She was using her emotions to focus, making her magic power violent but stable. It was instilled with her killing intent, causing the spell to turn deadly for the man who was her target. All that without anyone to teach her that.

Clearly, she was very talented as a magician. Alice was mostly self-taught and was satisfied with her abilities, but were she to train under a competent instructor, she would have made a fearsome mage.

It is really unfortunate.

“Laughable.”

Potential is useless at a given moment when it hasn't yet been fulfilled.

The shower of flame spears dispersed before it could even touch the man. It was an unbelievable sight that defied common sense, greatly shocking Alice.

“How?” she asked.

“A pathetic existence such as yourself doesn't deserve to know. You should wallow in despair and lose your mind.”

Treading closer, the man raised his sword, ready to strike. Alice wanted to move, but the same peculiar power stopped her from moving. She felt her body being torn from the inside, trying to resist this invisible force.

“Get away from her, you jerk!” Albert's voice echoed from behind, and hope started to fill Alice's heart.

Hope was something the Malevolent One loved to crush.

“He will never reach you when he is this slow.” The man snapped his fingers, causing Albert to move inexplicably slowly. “See? No one can save you.”

The pain wasn't enough to haze her mind, but instead sharpened it awake, which amplified the suffering as all Alice could see was blood, guttered organs, and dead people she used to know. Her nostrils burned, calling forth the urge to vomit her lunch. Or blood.

It soon passed, replaced by terror as her stomach churned from fear under the shadow of the bloody sword. The same sword that killed her once before.

Why? Why is this happening? She asked herself that as the blade descended. She couldn't weep, only let tears silently run down her cheeks.

The blade suddenly stopped. The death god read her thoughts contained in her eyes.

“For the near eternity, you are my plaything.”

Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

He stabbed Alice's heart yet again.

“I will break you until it is no longer interesting,” he said. Then, with an authoritarian tone, he orders her, “Despair.”

So she did, just as she fell into oblivion once more.

Alice lost count of the number of times she died.

The death god always killed her and apparently found it very interesting, even after doing so many times. She had secretly hoped he would, and she would be at peace without needing to die again.

But that wish never came to fruition.

She was beheaded, stabbed, sliced, guttered, and suffered many more forms of gruesome death. It weighed on her mind and started to take a mental toll.

Before she knew it, Alice had become completely unable to cast any magic. Her mind was in such disarray that she couldn't even control the flow of magic power inside her body.

The more she went through this cycle of life and death, the more she came to understand the situation and perceive everything there was to see.

This was not good, as it meant she got to take a closer look at the pillar of corpses.

Alice finally noticed that none of the corpses piled there were in an intact state. Every single body was butchered into several parts and horribly wounded with vicious stabs and cuts. It must have acted as a sort of blood fountain, as there was dry blood with a translucent color, gaining an emerald luster.

Flies fed on the corpses, making such a buzzing sound that Alice didn't even notice at first but now drove her crazy.

Maybe she already was.

“I can't beat him,” she wailed. “Please just let me die!”

Looping again by Albert after she was killed for the umpteeth time, Alice lost all will to resist and just collapsed on her knees and cried.

“Alice, stay calm and cover your nose.” Albert handed her the water bottle. Again.

He was about to say something else, but Alice was already sick of hearing the same useless words over and over and over again without end.

“Stop saying that!” she snapped. “I'm fine with the smell, and I can't stay calm! Not when I repeatedly die at the hands of a monster!”

This visibly caused Albert to twitch. He could see in her eyes the pain she was under.

Although he felt confused, he didn't dare try to doubt her. Not while it was clear Alice was experiencing so much pain. Even if it was somewhat sudden, it could all be explained by the obvious tragedy that occurred in this village.

“Talk to me, Alice. What happened?” he asked in a gentle tone.

Alice couldn't say anything right away. Everything was too raw, and she simply sat in silence for a few minutes, just wanting to disappear.

But she didn't, so she spoke of every loop and death that she experienced together with the man who called himself the Malevolent One. The cycle of misery she had plunged into.

After she finishes talking, Albert nods his head in understanding.

“It is very unbelievable, but a westerner like you shouldn't know about the Malevolent One. And if it is him, then he could probably do all that.”

“Who is he?” Alice pinches herself hard to push back the creeping anxiety.

Albert shudders. “I originally thought it was nonsense. It's only a myth in the East—a story you tell children to keep them obedient. The Malevolent One is a being that drove all the dragons, the legendary beasts, to extinction. It was said he was a demon in human skin, could destroy everything, and was eternally youthful. He ruled the continent, even the ferocious north and isolated east, with such a tight grasp solely because of his absolute strength. He is said to be the embodiment of all evil.

“The gods—in the east, they believe in multiple gods and not just one—were furious at the tyrant who covered the world in darkness and sent their powers to avatars so they could vanquish the Malevolent One. They gave so much power to mere mortals that the connection to the heavenly realm was severed.

“Anyways, the Warrior of Light, who was granted the strongest powers of the chief god, defeated the Malevolent One and ushered the world into a long era of peace. But they said he would come back for revenge, and the shadow of his rule would eclipse the world once more.”

Hearing such a tale, Alice found it fitting for the cruelty she had experienced so far. Only the embodiment of evil could do something like that for no reason.

“So he was such a monster? Makes sense.” She could only mock herself for falling into the grasp of this devil.

“Alice,” Albert calls her name, then gently embraces her with his arms. “You have been through so much, and I couldn't stop it. I'm so sorry.”

She was dazed. After feeling only the cold touch of a blade, the warmth of a living human body soothed her and gave her comfort. It instantly became her only solace in this world of emerald and despair. He became her solace.

Thinking about it, Albert was always trying to save her and always wearing this desperate expression when he failed. He always cared.

“Why do you care so much about me? We are practically strangers.” She ended up raising her doubts as she burried her face in his chest.

“I have never met anyone like you, Alice,” he says. “You are strong and smart, and I came to like you. It's that simple.”

“That simple?”

“Yes.”

Soon, the Malevolent One will come to bring her death again, but those words gave Alice the courage to stand up once more.

“Did you try to run?” Albert asks eventually.

“I... have,” she admits. “But he would simply kill me before I ran too far.”

Escaping wasn't an option.

“Then we fight.”

But fighting was even worse. The enemy was too powerful for two simple mercenaries to handle. Alice knew it, and she was sure Albert knew it as well.

“We can't run, so we can only fight. I'm not retaining memories of the loops, so tell me, and I will fight for eternity if needed.”

“I can't have you die for me.”

“So I won't,” Albert asserts with a smile. “I'm strong. The Malevolent One might have some mystical powers, but no one can beat me in the sword. I just need to make him fight me fairly.”

How could he be so confident? Alice couldn't help but wonder.

She began to feel hope again, reassured by his confident smile.

“So you chose to have an uninvolved person join you in death.”

The death god sauntered on the path with a glee. His presence alone was ominous and dreadful, ready to kill Alice again.

Albert put himself between them, acting as a human shield.

“I'm not uninvolved,” he says.

“Okay then. You can die as well.”

From behind, Albert's back seemed so big, enough to shield her from anything. Alice felt she could rely on this man with his large back.

“Here I come!”

If it's him, then maybe, just maybe, he could end this. At least, that's what she felt...

Stab.

A sword pierced her abdomen.

It wasn't the death god that had killed her.

It was Albert.

Seeing the wide, crazy smile on his face, the realization of this betrayal came down like a hammer on the head.

Alice felt her heart shatter as she lost her strength.

“You were stupid until the end. I knew you wouldn't realize, not with how stupid you are, but this emerald world was always my creation.”

The emerald color dyeing the world was absorbed by Albert, forming a coat of emerald aura.

By his side, the death god is reduced to a mere servant as he kneels in front of his master.

“Albert and Felix were just as foolish as you. You don't need to know them, but you'll soon meet them. Or disintegrate. Who cares, really?”

He stabbed her in the abdomen. He wanted to give Alice a slow and painful death, knowing her only solace was the source of her misery.

Alice felt her emotions dying along with her body. It felt like the death she yearned for, only it was not. It was a state of numbness born from physical and mental exhaustion.

Raising a mouth full of sharp teeth made of shadows, the Malevolent One was ready to devour her.

Her body dissipated into ashen-colored particles. It was the Elemental Power the Malevolent One had sought.

“No.”

Before her consciousness could vanish completely, a surge of emotion rekindled her will, sending a wave of ashen aura.

Alice was dead.

And became an undead as the Master of Death, enveloped in the ashen aura of decay.