A crystalline skeleton lay on a grey altar in a rectangular room. A single torch burning with green fire hung on the back wall above the skeleton’s head. A set of stairs led upwards into darkness. A layer of dust covered the skeleton and the floor.
An orb of silver light flickered into existence above the skeleton’s chest. A dark mist in the shape of a hand pushed the orb downwards and the skeleton shone with a myriad of colors as the silver light spread throughout its bones. A black rune that looked like a raven’s claw appeared on the center of the skeleton’s forehead. The skeleton stopped glowing and its hand twitched. Its fingers scraped against the altar, leaving lines in the stone, as its hand clenched into a fist.
“It seems like it worked,” a voice coming from above the skeleton said. “Can you hear me?”
The skeleton sat up and looked around. It tilted its head down to its body and gazed at its hand. Its fingers opened and closed as it moved its hand around in front of its face. Its skull turned to its other hand and then its legs.
It opened its mouth and asked, “I am dead? Have I achieved nirvana?” Its voice sounded like gravel being ground together.
A chuckle sounded next to its skull. “You are dead in a sense,” a voice said. The skeleton’s skull whipped around, trying to locate the source of the sound.
“You can’t see me,” the voice said. “My name is Nocturnis, the god of darkness.”
“Where am I?” the skeleton asked.
“You’re in the tomb of Lahur in the world of Erde,” the voice said and sighed. “Sadly, while you were meditating, your soul was harvested by a reaper before your time was up. I couldn’t just watch a soul get eaten before my very eyes; thus, I saved you. Unfortunately, your body was destroyed during the harvest. I had to implant your soul in the next closest thing before it dissolved.”
The skeleton remained silent and stared at its hands. “A skeleton…” it muttered. The skeleton raised its head and peered into the darkness beyond the steps. “Thank you for saving me, Nocturnis; I am in your debt. May I ask a question?”
“You may.”
“What happens if my soul dissolves? What happens to a soul when the body dies?”
“…”
The skeleton sat in silence for a minute.
“If you can’t answer my question, that’s fine,” the skeleton said.
“It’s not that I can’t answer your question,” Nocturnis said. “I’m unsure whether or not I should tell you. You might not like the answer.”
“I want to know.”
“When a body dies, its soul is let loose into the world and travels until it finds a suitable host. Namely, newborn animals or plants. A dissolved soul lives in limbo, unable to be reborn and unable to ascend, but still existing. A soul dissolves if it can’t find a suitable host or if it’s eaten by a reaper,” Nocturnis said. “In your case, the reaper harvested your soul and brought it to the void. I disposed of the reaper, but there were no natural hosts nearby for your soul to inhabit; instead, I took you to this world.”
“Why a skeleton?”
“I can only travel through to this tomb freely; otherwise, I would have chosen a more suitable host for you,” Nocturnis said. “Even gods have limitations.”
The skeleton lowered its head and stared at its hands. “Is it possible for me to die?”
“You want to die so soon after being saved?” Nocturnis asked. “Well, your existence is… special. Normally, an undead can be killed if the body runs out of energy imbued by its creator. However…”
A moment of silence passed. “You’re my creator,” the skeleton said.
“Yes. As long as I exist, your soul will not pass on and it will return to that body, but it receives damage every time you die. If you die enough times, your soul will dissolve.”
“Can you uncreate me?” the skeleton asked as it scratched its head. “Is that the right term?”
“I could do that, but your soul will dissolve. The hosts here are incompatible with your soul.”
“I see. Then am I not already a dissolved soul?” the skeleton asked. “Unable to move on from this body. Unable to achieve nirvana. Is this not limbo?”
“You do have a point. But I am a fair god,” Nocturnis said. “I can help your soul ascend, but not in my current state. I’m far too weak to do that at the moment.”
The skeleton clenched its fist. “What can I do?”
“I need faith energy. If you can convince enough people to worship me and make me the sole god of this world, then I’ll be able to release you.”
The skeleton fell silent.
“How do the people of this world feel about skeletons?” it asked.
“…”
“I wish you the best of luck,” Nocturnis said. “I’ve reached my time limit in this world. I’ll be back in a year.”
The green fire on the torch flickered out of existence and the skeleton was left in complete darkness. It sighed and crossed its legs while placing its hands on its knees. The room was silent. A few seconds passed.
Seconds turned to minutes.
Minutes turned to hours.
Hours turned to days. Dust gathered and the skeleton remained unmoving.
Days turned to weeks. Occasionally, the raven claw rune would expand and try to spread through the skeleton, but it was always suppressed and shrank back to its original size.
Weeks turned to months.
And soon, a year passed by.
The torch ignited with a green flame. The skeleton had gathered a layer of dust an inch thick on its body.
“Uh…” Nocturnis let out a noise.
The skeleton twitched, causing a downpour of dust to cascade off its body.
“I’m still here,” it said, causing more dust to fall from its face.
“Have you been here this whole time…?” Nocturnis asked as his voice trailed off.
The skeleton nodded. “At first, I meditated to clear my mind,” it said. “Then I realized I didn’t need to eat, drink, or sleep. I also realized I couldn’t remember my name or the names and faces of the people I once knew. And, occasionally, thoughts or memories that didn’t belong to me would enter my mind. I’ve learned much through these insights.”
“You haven’t tried exploring? Leaving to convert people?” Nocturnis asked. “Don’t you want to ascend?”
The skeleton shrugged. “As long as there are other people actively working to convert others, why must I bother? If I meditate here long enough, eventually things will work out.”
“…”
The skeleton lowered its head again and straightened its back. Five minutes passed in silence.
“I’m ashamed to admit it,” Nocturnis said breaking the silence, “but you and that cat sitting outside the tomb are my only followers. And sometimes the cat will abandon me for a piece of fish.”
The skeleton looked up and scratched its head. “You call yourself a god?” it asked. “I’ve received memories of legions of undead being led by this body. What happened?”
Nocturnis let out a sigh. “I lost a battle against the goddess of light. She obtained enough faith energy to bless a champion with her power and I lost control from there. The skeleton you’re in belonged to my strongest lich, but his soul had nearly dissipated. You’re most likely receiving fragments of his soul.”
The skeleton remained silent. It straightened its legs and dusted its body off with its hands. It climbed off the altar and walked towards the stairs.
“Wait. Before you go-“
The skeleton walked into the darkness and Nocturnis’ voice trailed off.
“Come back; I have a map to all the treasures in the tomb.” The footsteps sounded further and further away. Nocturnis sighed.
“Please?”
“…”
“I’m screwed.”
The green fire vanished and the room fell silent.
The skeleton continued to walk forward through the darkness. It crashed into a wall and collapsed onto the floor.
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“There needs to be some torches in this place,” it muttered as it picked itself up. It placed its right hand against the wall and started walking again. After an hour of walking through arrow and spike traps, it rounded a corner and saw a faint blue light shining at the end of the corridor. It arrived at a circular room with a black book resting on a pedestal in the center.
It walked up to the book and sighed. It prodded the book with its finger and covered its head with its hands. It looked up and glanced around the room and shrugged. It picked the book up and a stone slab fell from the ceiling and covered the entrance to the room. A green gas rose out of holes in the floor and permeated the room. The skeleton scratched its head and opened the book, ignoring the poison.
“Just as I thought,” the skeleton said as it flipped through the pages, scanning each character. It hummed and whistled as its finger traced the lines in the book. “I can’t read this.”
It tossed the book over its shoulder and swiveled its head around 360 degrees. It walked behind the pedestal and picked up a wooden staff.
“Hmm, it’s a bit too long to be a cane…”
It propped it up against the pedestal and stomped on the staff, breaking it in half. It observed its handiwork and nodded.
“Who am I kidding?” it said to itself and tossed the broken staff on the ground. “I don’t need a cane with this kind of body.” It walked up to the blocked entrance and placed its hand on the stone slab. The rune on its forehead expanded and the skeleton collapsed onto the ground. It struggled to sit up and crossed its legs. The skeleton trembled and, after an hour, the rune started to recede. The skeleton raised its head when the rune shrank back to its original size.
“You should’ve showed me this earlier,” it said and shook its head as it stood up and walked over to the fallen book. It picked it up and started browsing through the pages. It sighed and placed the book next to it as it began meditating.
“It seems like I’ll have to absorb all of your memories before I can fully understand this,” the skeleton murmured. Five minutes of meditation later, it started fidgeting. “I wish I could close my eyes.”
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“I dare you to go inside.” A group of kids peered into the entrance of a cave on top of a hill in a forest. Behind them, the outline of a small town could be seen. The entrance to the cave was covered with vines and the majority of it was blocked by a rotting tree trunk. The kids had stumbled on it when their ball fell inside.
“No way,” a girl said. “It looks scary. What if a skeleton or ghost crawls out?”
“Scaredy-cat,” a boy said as he pulled off a vine. “Everyone knows that the hero killed all the undead twenty years ago.”
He crawled on top of the tree trunk and cupped his hands over his mouth. “Hello!” he shouted into the narrow gap. “Anyone home?” His voice echoed through the cave and faded away after three seconds.
He turned to the group of kids below him. “See,” he said, “no such thing as ghosts. Help me move this log so we can-”
“Meow.”
The boy screamed. “It’s a ghost!”
“That was a cat,” the girl said. “Who’s scared now?”
“I-I knew that,” the boy said while stammering. “I was just testing you guys. Let’s move the log and see if we can get the cat out.”
“I don’t know if you should do that,” another girl said. “My mommy said forest animals are dangerous.”
“We can still see the town from here so we’re not really in the forest,” the boy said. “We’ll be fine. It’s just a cat.” The boys tugged at the tree trunk and it started to creak. A few of their faces turned red as they tugged harder. The trunk snapped and the kids flew backwards with a portion of it in their hands.
“Alright. If we can’t move it, then we can just kick it until it breaks,” one of the boys said.
The rotting wood groaned and trembled, until it collapsed under the boys’ continuous assault. The kids looked at each other and smiled, their faces dusty and their hands coated in grime.
Dong. Dong. Dong.
A church bell rang and all the kids let out a groan.
“And we just cleared it,” one of the boys said and pouted. “The cat’s gone too.”
“Let’s go, you probably scared it away,” a girl said. “We can’t be late for dinner again.” She glared at one of the boys.
“Fine,” he said and sighed. “Let’s go. We’ll come back tomorrow.”
###################################################################
Dust fell from the ceiling and the walls trembled as the stone slab shifted to the side. The skeleton let out a groan as it shoved its body against the stone slab, pushing it aside. Eight years passed since it last entered the room with the book and the rune on its forehead was gone. The stench of rot and blood pervaded the air, but the skeleton couldn’t smell anything because it lacked a nose.
Two green orbs of light floated in its eye sockets and the once dark tunnel was as bright as day to the skeleton. It frowned when it saw a child’s body with seven arrows embedded in its dust covered clothing. It knelt next to the body and placed its palm against the rotting forehead. It was sticky to touch. A green light trickled through its hand into the corpse beneath it. The once dull eyes that had fungi growing out of them flashed with a green light and the corpse let out a groan.
“Hello,” the skeleton said and moved its hand away. The corpse turned its head towards the skeleton and moaned.
“Can you speak?”
The corpse moaned again.
“Guess not. Your soul must’ve dispersed then,” the skeleton said and sighed as it stood up. The zombie struggled to its feet and slouched while following after the skeleton. The skeleton continued through the tomb and encountered a trail of corpses. At first, there were only children. Afterwards, a string of adults followed; everyone had fallen victim to the spike or arrow traps. The skeleton reanimated all the corpses, but none of them were able to speak. The trail led to a dead end, but moonlight pierced through some cracks in the wall. The skeleton pointed at the wall and the horde of zombies lumbered towards it. Their bodies amassed against it and more moonlight streamed in as the wall groaned. Soon, there was a gap wide enough to exit through. The skeleton nodded and walked past the boulder that was blocking the cave entrance. It tilted its head towards the sky and took in a deep breath. It sighed. “Breathing really is unnatural to me now.”
It looked towards the horizon and saw the outline of a town. A cat meowed and the skeleton stumbled as it tripped over the fluffy ball beneath its feet. The whiskers and fur on the cat’s face were grey. Its green eyes were dim and its body made cracking noises as it struggled to its feet. It mewed and licked the skeleton’s foot before falling over on its side. The cat stared into the skeleton’s glowing green eyes and sighed.
“Sorry for making you wait so long, old friend,” the skeleton said as it knelt next to the cat and stroked its head. The cat licked the skeleton’s fingers and closed its eyes. Its breathing slowed and soon its stomach stopped rising.
The skeleton continued to stroke the dead cat’s fur, while the zombies dug a hole in the ground. The skeleton lifted the cat’s body and lowered it into the hole.
“It’s unfortunate that I can’t revive animals,” the skeleton said. “This is the most I can do for you now.”
The zombies filled in the hole and the skeleton stood over the patch of earth with its head lowered. It raised its head and looked into the distance towards the town. The skeleton’s eyes flashed with a red light and it smiled.