The blue woman raised her hand into the air. Blue flame manifesting around it once more.

“Abandon all hope.” She said with a cruel grin on her face.

……

Fred appeared before a cliff. In front of him was a dark horizon. Only darkness in every direction he looked.

A series of glowing words appeared in front of Fred

|Jump. Die to live.| It said, Fred sucked in a breath.

Without hesitation he waved his arms in the air. And jumped.

Or at least that's what he thought he would do. Instead he took a single step forward and froze. His face was pale. A look of strained grief in his eyes. ~I have to jump. I can’t let my story end!~ Fred grit his teeth and pushed with the very depths of his being. Yet he was still frozen. A horrifying scream of death playing through his mind. ~NO! NO! NO! NO! NO! NO!~ He sensed true death on the horizon.

His face turned blue as he forgot to breathe. ~NO! NO! NO!~ His eyes bulged with pain.

An analog clock appeared above him. *Tick* *Tick* *Tick* It had but a single hand moving with each second to a drawing of a skull at the clock's zenith. ~NO! NO! NO!~ Try as he might. Fred could not move. To do so would be to defy the depths of his being.

*Tick*

The soul stiffened. Fred’s heart froze. This was the end. A story unfinished. A goal unfulfilled. It was all over now. Stony weakness encased Fred’s eyes.

A second life finished too soon. A scattered reality cut short before it could meet its ordained end. All because of one weakness. One failure.

But despite this horrible truth. Fred threw his sand on hopelessness. He mustered one last thought. A thought beyond minds and beyond souls. ~To all those who knew me. Delegate doubt to others. For doubt of the soul feeds into itself. And consumes you whole.~ And so he died.

…….

Rodrigo sat next to Fred’s body. His eyes which had developed beyond his gods will. Staring at his prone form. ~It’s gone. That lattice which was bent or twisted by death is gone.~ Rodrigo stood up with a sad smile on his face. He put his hand to the collar around his neck. It began to sizzle. Golden smoke wafting into the air.

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After a few minutes it had disintegrated. It fell off Rodrigo’s neck. ~It was nice watching that man grow. But I guess there was a limit to his lives.~ Rodrigo jumped. His head pierced the stone roof above him. He shredded through the stone darkness flashing with the occasional spark when his head struck metal. His momentum halted when his head popped out of the ground. Rodrigo pulled his hand from the dirt and dragged himself up. He left a massive kilometre long hole behind him. Rodrigo walked. ~I probably had some part to play in this. I was the one who pushed him down the perilous path of the strong.~ Rodrigo grinned. ~But that's just how it goes. He was weak and now he’s dead~

Rodrigo broke out into a run zooming into the distance.

……….

Nathaniel sat atop his throne. A frown on his face. ~Where’s Amanda.~ He had dispatched many an armada of guards to search for her. But all they found nothing. ~Did she run away?~ Nathaniel took a deep breath.

“I’ve really been haemorrhaging money the last few days.” Nathaniel walked into his study. He went under his desk and grabbed a small bag. Filled with smooth oval shaped stones.

He took a handful of them and threw them into the air. “I wish for Amanda to be brought to me!” He yelled.

A skull appeared on Nathaniel's desk. He froze. ~What?~ The skull stared back at him. Nathaniel went pale. ~What?~ He grit his teeth. ~Just my luck.~ He threw the whole bag of wish stones into the air.

“I wish for Amanda to be resurrected!” He yelled.

*Unable to grant* Responded a robotic voice. The wish stones fell onto his desk. Nathaniel fell to his knees. A silent tear falling down his face. ~Amanda. Amanda.~ A hole was drilled in Nathaniel's heart.

His daughter was dead. For no apparent reason she had vanished and died. ~Amanda was a good person. She did nothing to deserve death.~ The tears flowed.

……

The one who pops up floated suspended in a void. A joyful grin on his bandaged face “It looks like that immortal finally died.” He said with a grin on his face. “I always love to see fools bleed.”

_________________________________________________________________________

Thats the end of the story. My shotests chapter yet

Afterword:

Some of you might have realised by the ascending quality and inconsistent characters. But this story was actually a practice story for me. My goal here was to get a small audience and figure out how to write. See. About a year ago. I had started writing and despite writing at the 2chap a day level that I write now. I didn’t see any improvements. In fact I would say that over the year I got worse at writing. The reason for this is because I didn’t understand a simple concept. All art is self taught. I had been following all the advice I'd seen online. I would only show. Never tell. I would pick interesting characters, crazy ideas. But. I never thought about how I could improve. I likened writing to a muscle that would go through hypertrophy if I wrote enough and followed the right advice. I would become good at writing. But that's not the truth. Because writing is not a physical skill. It’s a mental skill. Meaning that the foundation of skill in it is your ability to adapt your mind to function differently. This can only be done in one way. By reflection. You need to think of what you’ve done wrong in what you’ve written now and think up a way to fix it. I didn’t get that. Until now when I wrote this short little story. I wrote it for one reason and one reason only to get better. And based off how much more my collections grew when I made the begging review. I have. I’ll be releasing a better story today or tomorrow. ‘My only power is reincarnation’ will be the name. Check it out.