Alice approached the last unopened chest. She kneeled down and put both arms on the chest. She gently started lifting the lid, when suddenly everything around her lost all color and the world around her turned grey.

“Alice Raven…”

Alice turned her head surprised. She stood up and stared at the figure. She was now looking at a woman with gold hair dressed in white robes. The woman had a light skin tone, and her beauty couldn’t be compared to anything Alice had seen before. The woman did not look hostile, nor did she give any harmful vibes. Alice relaxed.

Alice took a few steps and looked around to find her friends only to find everyone was frozen in time. Alice saw the scene and thought about when she would ask Tim to pause his game to come help with the cleaning. Except, of course, the games that ‘did not have a pause button.’ Alice still didn’t believe there was such a game, but she didn’t know enough to argue with Tim about that.

“What did you do to my friends?” asked Alice.

“Nothing. Do not worry about them. They will be fine,” said the woman in an almost soothing voice.

“What do you want?”

“I came to meet you of course.”

“Oh, you’re another god then,” said Alice in an annoyed tone.

“Yes, I am. Does that bother you?”

“Well, you gods sort of force the meeting. It would’ve been nice to get asked first.”

“Apologies. We are not used to asking for… permission.”

“Well, that’s just disrespectful isn’t?”

The god raised her eyebrows and raised her right hand. “You forget your place mortal.”

Alice fell to her knees. Her hands started to wrinkle. Her hair turned gray. She looked as if she had aged 50 years in a blink. As Alice kept getting weaker, she started to have difficulty breathing. Her lungs no longer with the strength to even suck in the air needed to breathe. Suddenly, as she was about to suffocate, she was back to normal. She gasped. “What did you do?”

“You might be Death’s chosen, but you still need to show the respect I deserve.”

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

“Oh, yeah? Who decided that you deserve any respect whatsoever?”

The woman chuckled “You were at the brink of death a few seconds ago, and you still have the audacity to talk back to me? I can see why Death found you… interesting.”

“Lady, enough small talk. What do you want?”

“Like I said, I just wanted to meet you. See what all the fuss was about.”

“Well nice to meet you, Time I’m guessing,” said Alice guessing “I asked the other guy who he was and got all chippy about it.”

“You guessed right.”

“Look, I appreciate all the attention, but this is getting old really fast. Let the other know that the next one will have to make an appointment. You can talk to my personal assistant about it. His name is Grimmy.”

“Assistant? Grimmy?” said Time confused.

“Yeah, Grimmy. Just ask Joe, he will let you know who he is. Anyways are you going to threaten me like Dream did or are you done? I really want to see what I got for clearing this dungeon.”

“Oh, dear Alice, on the contrary. I’m here to give you a little piece of advice.”

“Advice, you just tried to kill me. Why would I listen to you?”

“I was never going to kill you. I would never do anything to harm my relationship with the almighty God of Death, one of my fellow greater gods. You see, Death actually sent me here. He insisted that I meet you.”

“Did he also insist on you turning my 90 years old and almost kill me?”

“No, that was all me,” Time smiled.

“Ah well, I must give Joe my thanks for sending you here then.”

“Alice Raven!” said Time in a serious and elevated tone.

Alice got shaken a bit with the change of tone.

“This is not a game. You are part of bigger things now and you need to take this seriously. I don’t have much time here on Sfiraz left so I will give you the advice that I came here to give. Dream and other gods are not happy about you participating in the tournament and will do whatever they can to stop you from entering it. You need to be ready. I know Death already gave you a charm to fend off Dream’s attacks, but there is nothing preventing Dream from sending mortals to harm you. You need to reach D-grade as soon as possible. Only then will Death be able to protect you.”

“I still don’t get why it had to be you who delivered this message.”

“Death asked me for a favor, and I needed to meet you before I agree to do such favor. Reach D-grade and Death and me will make sure you and your team are ready for the tournament.”

Alice nodded.

“Like I said, I can see why Death took an interest in you, and I have started to take a liking to you as well. I will take my leave now, please be careful, Alice Raven.”

Alice remained silent and nodded again.

The god of Time started to fade out of existence, but as she was fading away, she said: “Oh, and thank you for befriending Joe. It’s been a long time since I last saw him smile.”

“Hey how did you get over there?” said Rami, “Did you learn teleport or something and you didn’t tell us?”

Alice turned to Rami and saw that everything was back to normal. The bandits still on the floor slowly dying from the poison. Rami and Bonetta looking over their new-found loot, and Grimmy floating next to the chest she was kneeling at before Time appeared.

“God of Time?” shrugged Alice.

“Another one?!” shouted Rami.

“Hey, it’s not like I’m inviting them over. Honestly, it’s kind of disrespectful not to ask before appearing you know. Had to told this to tell the others to make an appointment next time.”

“You did what?” said Grimmy in panic, “Alice, you don’t simply tell a god something like that. They could think it’s disrespectful.”

“Yeah, lesson learned,” Alice murmured.

“What?” asked Grimmy.

“Nothing. Let’s open that chest, shall we?”

You have received a Long Skirt of Putrescence.

Long Skirt of Putrescence. This skirt was made of the skin decayed ghouls. The skirt gives off an aura that has a small probability of inflicting Necrotic Wound to hostile enemies around you. Allies and non-hostile enemies will not be afflicted. The aura is 3 ft in radius.

Alice quickly put them on. The skirt was a deep green color, and looked as if Alice had a pair of short leggings that reached a little over her knees. Around the leggings and only covering the back, there was a sort of cape, giving it a skirt look if you looked from the back.

“Now this looks good!” exclaimed Alice.

“Yes, it does,” said Rami grinning.

Bonetta slapped Rami over the head. “You look good, girl.”

“Hey! Why did you hit me?”

“You know why,” replied Bonetta, “She is married.”

“Not in this world,” Rami murmured to himself.

“What?” asked Bonetta.

“Nothing, nothing,” said Rami as he slowly walked away.