“What kind of demon grants immortality?” Bleak asked, deciding it might be better to name the thing, to take away a measure of its power.

“A demon? Me? Have you looked in a mirror lately?” Interloper asked, ending the question with soft rolling chuckles. It seemed to speak an entire language of laughter, each ripe with secret meaning. “I’m not a demon…but a god.”

“Same fucking thing,” Bleak said. “Equally useless.”

In a reversal of the darkness and mystery Interloper had favored so far, a halo of light shone around its dark form. Its chalky outlines filled with soft white. Bleak thought he’d finally have a glimpse of the thing’s true form, but the light became blinding. Then it vanished, and only the indistinct outline remained.

He’d had more than enough of Interloper, who should have lain dead at Bleak’s feet well before he’d launched into his inane performance. If he could become immortal, then surely the opposite was also true. Somewhere in the vast sphere of the world must be a way to kill Interloper. And he would find it.

Every journey started with a first step. Bleak took his with purpose, easily maneuvering through the hall of mirrors. Though he expected another snap at any moment, he would endure. In a battle of wills, he doubted a demon or god could equal his stubborn resolve.

“Equally useless!” Interloper used its angry laugh to further punctuate its otherwise jovial exclamation. “Right you are…Ser Glintstream.” It spoke the title with pure malice.

Its anger reminded Bleak of the cursing swordswoman he’d cut down. He allowed himself a moment to imagine doing far worse to Interloper. They would have to create new words, quite a number of hither to undreamt of actions and descriptors for the things Bleak would do.

Bleak was broken from his reverie by a flash of movement to the side. Instincts honed with the precision and care of any fine instrument turned him to the right.

The mirror had become a window into the past. Half a second was all he needed to know what lay before him–three generations of his family killed clinically and methodically. A remorseless, emotionless act.

“Boo hoo, my family died,” Bleak said. “Probably happens to some poor sod every day.”

The image had been meant to wound his soul, but it didn’t shock him or bring back painful memories. How could it? The sight greeted him every time he closed his eyes.

Every.

Time.

If all he encountered was bloody and dead, eventually the memories would become a blur. Indistinguishable. He hadn’t been at fault when his family died. Didn’t know who was. Therefore, everyone could shoulder the blame. Everyone could share in a suffering akin to his own.

He shattered the mirror with a swipe of his sword, and when the scene remained, he turned away, continuing his slow progress through the maze.

“Right,” Interloper said. “No redemption arc for you, I guess.”

*Snap*

Bleak sighed even as the sound still echoed in his ear. He’d been waiting for Interloper to snap and instantly dropped into a fighting stance. To his surprise, the demon had taken them back to the grail chamber, which was no longer a black void. Restored to its original state, blood dripped down the walls and pooled on the floor once more. The armored knight was still frozen, waiting for Bleak to kill him properly.

“I’ve been torturing you for roughly thirty minutes,” Interloper said. “You’re thinking that you can handle anything I throw your way, but you’re wrong. How are you going to feel after a day of being tossed around different worlds? A week? Maybe a century?”

Once again, Bleak waited until the demon was well into its monologue before striking. With a quick pull of liqua, he traced a rune on the air which became a solid wall of fire rolling toward Interloper. But when Bleak moved to follow, he found that his feet were held to the ground.

“There’s a horrible little world I know of.” Interloper continued speaking even as the fire passed over him…without effect. “What it’s lacking in lifeforms, it more than makes up for with an endless supply of fire. You’d burn and regenerate, unable to die.”

Bleak continued to struggle, easily moving his feet around inside his boots. He surmised only the footwear were adhered to the ground, which was a lazy move on Interloper’s part. Since Bleak couldn’t think of a convincing way to remove the boots while pretending otherwise, he simply bent over and attacked his laces in lieu of Interloper.

The demon wasn’t having it. But instead of a sharp snap, the cavern rang with a clear new sound.

*Clap*

Bleak had enough time to look up before his entire body stiffened, frozen as efficiently as the armored man. Not a single muscle moved, including (he was pretty sure) his heart. It seemed to strain in his chest, fighting the demon’s power. That might also have been Bleak’s lungs, suddenly unable to pull air.

At first, he thought the predicament to be informative. Being able to live without heart and lungs opened up some interesting possibilities. However, though Bleak was immortal, he quickly learned that blood and oxygen still played an important role in keeping him conscious.

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

He started to pass out but recovered, hovering on the fringes of warm darkness for a few seconds before Interloper apparently realized his mistake. With the slightest wag of a finger, it restarted Bleak’s heart and loosed his lungs. He sucked in a deep ragged breath.

If the demon could make mistakes, if it hadn’t simply wanted to teach him a lesson, then Bleak had another morsel of useful information to feed the slowly growing plan that would see Interloper dead some day.

Interloper’s hands were still pressed together from when they’d clapped. It pulled them apart in slow, dramatic fashion. They lingered a foot apart while Bleak held Interloper’s gaze. The demon’s smile had slipped by a fraction.

*Clap*

The cavern floor seemed to drop several feet as Bleak’s head popped cleanly off. It didn’t simply roll or fall. His head literally made a soft pop and flew several feet up into the air as if it were a flowerbud flicked clear of its stem by a cocked thumb. Interloper laughed, thick snorts of pure joy as Bleak’s head reached its apex, hung there a moment, then fell.

Now the cavern rolled and swayed as his head turned in the air. Bleak gritted this teeth, able to move once more, and held back the scream welling in his chest as if he were engaged in a game of tug-o-war over a heavy coinpurse instead of clawing to hold in a natural reaction to his circumstances.

His head splashed into the pool of blood, and whether luck or design, it landed at an angle with his face mostly free of blood. The sticky liquid quickly filled his left ear and forced him to close the eye on that same side, but he didn’t think it would go into his closed mouth should he choose to open it. He had a clear view of Interloper and his own headless body, leading him to believe the demon had controlled his head’s fall to some extent.

“Oh, Bleak,” Interloper said, pity leaking out between his bared teeth like noxious fumes. “It’s impossible for you to harm me; whereas, I’ll never run out of ways to harm you. Would you like to live for a century with your body turned inside out?”

Headless though he might have been, Bleak remained undeterred. With liqua flowing through his veins, he discovered it was still possible to control his body. Awkwardly. He stumbled around, feet ungainly and almost tripped over his own head before turning his body in Interloper’s direction, sword sweeping the air in jagged streaks.

“Or I could force you to relive all your worst moments, especially the day your family died,” Interloper spoke while lazily dodging Bleak’s body, which moved like a drunk toddler. “By the way, I know who did it. But I’ll never tell you. Too cathartic. You’re much more interesting the way you are now.”

An alabaster dagger appeared in Interloper’s hand, and he casually deflected Bleak’s sword strokes with efficient flicks of its serrated edge. It seemed to chill the air around it; a coruscating aura emanated from the blade in slow waves.

“After that I’ll flay you over the course of several decades, and when I’m finished, I’ll send your skin to a thousand worlds to be worn into battle day-after-day, and you’ll be able to feel every wound suffered even as your skinless body writhes in agony from the slightest breeze. Then I’ll introduce you to the giant worms of Cofel Five who will be more than happy to take you on an all-expenses paid trip through their digestive tracts for a few millenia.”

“Definitely a demon,” Bleak said, not sure if Interloper could hear him over the distance and the sound of their weapons striking.

Regardless of what the creature had said, he would not think of it as a god. No, it was surely a demon through and through.

Though far from standing a chance against Interloper in his current condition, Bleak was quickly gaining better control over his body. Once or twice he managed a feint that almost slipped past Interloper’s guard. Bleak was actually quite proud of himself, flaring liqua into his blade as it met Interloper’s and hoping to slice the dagger in two.

With a dizzying twirl of the dagger, the demon disarmed Bleak, suddenly holding Shear.

“Stop trying to kill me,” Interloper said with a note of boredom. “What do you say?”

Bleak turned his body to better see the scabbard at his hip. Guiding his finger along a rune carved there, he called Shear back. To his relief, it came, appearing in the scabbard as it always had. He took a few steps back, centering himself in the field of vision afforded by his head’s awkward position as he made to redraw the sword.

Which was why he had an excellent view as Interloper laced its fingers together and stretched them, cracking the knuckles. It rested one hand atop the other, both perfectly flat and slid them together in a flurry of quick chops.

Bleak’s body split into a myriad of pieces, cut surgically in an instant. The pain was so immediate and so intense that his mind could hardly register it. Several dozen chunks of meat and bone fell, splashing a great deal of blood onto his face a second after he closed his right eye. When he opened it, his vision was blurry, so he blinked hurriedly until it cleared.

*Clap*

Bleak’s body reassembled itself. Slowly. Noisily.

Painfully.

Nerve endings came to life in explosions and avalanches.

*Clap*

Pain as his body fell apart once more.

*Clap*

Pain as it flew back together.

*Clap*

*Clap*

*Clap*

Each sound was the same–no louder or softer.

Each explosion of pain the same–no greater or lesser.

Bleak was earning quite the education in pain. But there’s a funny thing about pain, which he was also learning. Or…not quite learning. It was more like a wooden shapes that children played with, trying to fit them into the corresponding holes in a block. If the lesson was a star shape, Interloper was forcing it into his mind through a circle hole. With enough brute force and a significant scraping, the lesson made its way through Bleak’s thick skull.

Here’s the lesson: pain serves a useful purpose. It keeps us alive. But Bleak couldn’t die. Pain no longer served any valuable purpose, so knowing that he could still manipulate liqua, he seared away all his pain receptors. They would eventually grow back, he was certain, so he kept the liqua flowing at a steady rate.

Bleak also discovered something he’d been too busy to notice earlier. When he’d been fighting, even though it hadn’t been a long battle, he’d never felt the slightest twinge of exhaustion. His energy had not waned. Not once.

He regenerated. Didn’t get tired. Could use liqua without suffering any side effects from drawing too much for too long.

*Clap*

It took Bleak several seconds to realize his body was whole once more–completely whole, head and all. He couldn’t help shivering as he patted his limbs, wiggling all his digits to be sure everything had been put back where it belonged. Without an ounce of shame, he even reached between his legs and gave his crotch a quick squeeze.

Interloper raised a milky eyebrow, its beaming smile as wide as ever.

“Satisfied?” Interloper asked. “There are rules to your immortality if you’ll allow me to explain.”

Bleak crossed his arms, a clear enough sign that he wouldn’t attack again. For now.

“This is Leo’gustus,” Interloper said, appearing beside the armored man. Crooking its elbow, the demon placed on the man’s head and leaned against him. “He’s an immortal like you. Drank from the cup and can’t be killed. Unless, you remove his head.”

“Easy enough,” Bleak said.

“I don’t mind keeping him frozen until the last second,” Interloper said, pushing off the man to stand tall once more. “For half a century he’s been ambushing new immortals before I’ve given them the ol’ tutorial. I didn’t mind at first, but it’s become extremely droll. The whole point is to have some fun. Otherwise what’s the point of it all?”

“Put you out of your misery?” Bleak asked, removing a few inches of Shear from its scabbard.

“If the day ever comes when I seek death, I’ll allow you the honor,” Interloper said and sounded sincere. “Oh, the same rule applies to you, if you hadn’t already guessed. If you’re beheaded, you die.”

“Just now…” Bleak said and clapped his hands, pealing back his upper lip and sticking his tongue out to the side in a truly horrific imitation of what Interloper hadn’t looked like while slicing his body to pieces.

Interloper shrugged in response.

“Great,” Bleak said, “So I’m not really immortal.”

“Close enough,” Interloper said. “Just behead any other immortals that come after you.”

“How many until only I remain?” Bleak asked, not exactly intrigued by this new turn of events, but not exactly not intrigued.

“That’s the best part,” Interloper said, a laugh bubbling up behind each of its words. “There’s no end.” Like a ship taking on water, the demon sank into peels of laughter.

“So I can only truly be immortal by killing all who challenge me? Forever?” Bleak asked.

“Yes,” Interloper hissed out between hiccuping chortles.

“Sounds like fun.”