Lina can hear her heart beating hard as his words hit her hard. She shakily raises her dagger and backs away saying,
“Priests of death are forbidden, why worship such a faith?”
Ashen simply sits down and calmly relaxes saying,
“To me forsaking death would forsake life itself, so what now? You gonna try to stab me before I take your soul?”
Lina recalls the blessing of death allows them to take energy and souls from others, it’s forbidden because all the priests of death kill and take other’s souls to make themselves stronger,
meanwhile her blessing can only heal or buff. She sheathes her dagger not because she trusts this man far from it, but because a puny dagger would do little in the face of a true Priest of Death.
Lina is in a small stone room with only one exit that is guarded by a juvenile Skeletal Dragon,
she is trapped with a Priest of Death, and the walls are too hard with mana to even crack this far down. Lina steels her nerves with a deep breath and sits by him saying,
“Well you haven’t killed me yet… speaking of which why haven’t you?”
Ashen pulls out a worn deck of cards from his bag and starts shuffling saying,
“I am not impatient. There is no way out and you will die eventually.”
But Lina still feels something is off, not the room that’s as deadly as ever, but this killer. Ashen speaks again,
“Are you sure you have no final words for your loved ones before your inevitable demise?”
Lina considers attacking him while he’s off guard, after all he doesn’t know she’s an Attuned but decides against it. Even if she killed him she couldn’t beat a Skeletal Dragon, nothing would even crack its bones. Ashen asks again,
“Hello? Lina? Are you listening?”
Lina sighs and slaps herself, she shouldn’t be considering the future when the present requires her full attention, then she says,
“Yeah yeah I hear you, there’s no one. Though how about some fun first? Let’s play a game of cards, if I win a round then you have to answer any question I ask.”
Ashen smirks as he deals them both some cards, Lina plays him 5 times but loses the first 3 due to him having an unreadable face. But after the 3rd realizes he has terrible luck so wins just based off luck for the last 2. Lina asks,
“How many people have you killed?”
Ashen doesn’t smile and says dramatically,
“I lost count long ago for those who have perished because of me, it could be hundreds. Though if you’re specifically asking about my former comrades, then 37.”
Lina’s face goes pale, that’s a lot, Death priests absorb souls of those they kill to get stronger, if he’s consumed that many souls he must be a lot stronger then he looks.
She shakily is about to ask a question about how he avoided the Honor Faction then pauses.
She had heard an investigation was brought against the Sole Returner after he killed 4 A rank adventurers, but if he consumed such powerful souls a Priest of Justice would instantly be able to tell, so why let him go?
Why does he say they died because of him and not simply that he killed them? She thinks back, even when they first met he was being dramatic about death, she figured it was just his personality, but if it isn’t… Lina sets her cards down and asks her second question,
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“You don’t want to kill anyone do you?”
The room is silent for a long time, Ashen’s cold face doesn’t change an inch before he calmly sets down his cards and asks,
“What makes you say that? I am a Priest of Death and I am the reason you will die.”
Lina shakes her head saying,
“Then you would have acted nice, try to restore your reputation, to draw in more people to claim their souls. But how you acted, it’s almost like you’re trying to keep people away.”
Ashen sets down his cards and looks at Lina, his gaze is eery and scary but Lina doesn’t flinch.
She has seen that gaze before, someone burdened with death at no choice of their own, because she has a similar look she tries to keep buried,
people she has had to betray and kill to stay ahead of the Paladins. Lina asks,
“Are you cursed by your blessing to kill others at no choice of your own?”
He after a long silence exhales,
“No my blessing keeps me alive but it is not the cause of my misfortune. From what I know, my soul is unfortunate to the point where the god of Death gave me his blessing to keep me from dying. I know not why, perhaps he wanted more souls at my misfortune, I know not.”
Lina can basically envision it now, he enters dungeons with a party in hopes of earning a living, but misfortune curses the party to receive a terrible fate while he uses their souls to run away.
But if he absorbed that many souls then he should be able to get them out of there right? She asks but he shakes his head,
“No, I release the souls after I escape, I refuse to absorb them for my own gain.”
Lina is at first relieved that he isn’t the monster she thought he was, she stands then punches the wall in frustration causing her knuckles to bleed.
Cause if all this was just to his bad luck, then she has gone through so much to live just to die to misfortune? No she refuses to let it end here!
“Take part of my soul! Priests of Death can’t use their blessing without a soul right? Then use part of mine!”
Ashen is a little taken aback for a moment then doesn’t even bother standing as he states,
“It would kill you long before the dragon could, besides for all we know a soul can’t be severed and I doubt your blessing will work against the pull of death.”
Lina shakily breathes in and says,
“Good thing I’m not a regular Priest, I’m an Attuned.”
An Attuned is a person who received a piece of their god’s power so have more energy than a regular priest and can also use their blessing without their god’s involvement.
Ashen is a little surprised but you can’t see it much on his face,
“I doubt you’re lying in such a situation, fine it’s worth a shot, I do not wish to get more blood on my hands anyhow.”
Ashen walks over to Lina who is preparing her blessing. He touches her back as Lina feels incredible pain, it’s like his hand is a vacuum of space absorbing her flesh and energy, pulling and hacking away at her soul. Meanwhile she pushes her blessing to the extreme to try to heal herself.
After what feels like eternity for Lina, Ashen removes his hand from her back with a single shadow writing around in his palm. Meanwhile Lina almost passes out from the pain as she heals herself.
As she finishes healing herself, Ashen decides to ask the questions he won from the cards,
“If you’re the Attuned of Life then you must be the Runaway Saint, The girl who fled her family for unknown reasons as the Paladins try to help bring her back. Why though?”
Lina thinks back to the letters telling of her sacrifice waiting for her when she returns. She says nothing as she focuses on healing herself, thankful for the excuse to not speak of her sins. Ashen sighs,
“Never mind, let’s discuss how we could get out of here. The Dragon outside may only be a Skeleton of a Juvenile dragon, but it is still not an easy foe.”
Lina smiles despite the pain. Later…
A small stone corridor lays before the Skeletal Dragon. He is too big to advance through the hallway from the room he now sits so instead stands ready to torch his prey.
When suddenly one of his prey jumps out and starts running towards him. He launches his flames as the girl continues towards them.
Lina is burned as she ducks underneath the rising flames, severely burned but using her blessing to keep herself good enough. The dragon finishes its flames as she closes in,
a skeletal claw swipes at Lina which she barely avoids then jumps over to continue through and past.
The Dragon chases her as she runs towards the dead end of the room with nothing to hide behind.
The dragon goes to bite Lina but Ashen takes his opportunity. He gathers the shard of Lina’s soul in his dagger then focuses energy into it. Purple and black swirl around the dagger steeling it for its task ahead.
Ashen stabs the dagger into the Dragon’s spine while it’s distracted but it only gets itself stuck. The dragon whirls on Ashen sending him crashing into the far wall with broken bones.
The dragon focuses on the bigger threat of Ashen preparing to roast him with flames, when the prey smirks softly, he can’t believe the stupid plan worked.
Lina boosts her strength and speed a little using her blessing, she leaps off the wall behind her then the ceiling above. She goes barreling full speed towards the dragon with all of her weight.
Her mass and energy would do little against such a foe unless it was concentrated? She lands with her boot slamming into the stuck dagger, giving it enough force to continue its path.
The dagger breaks through the spine of the dragon and without the spine to maintain the undead foe, the bones fall to the floor as any other.
Normally such a risk requires absolute trust, but to those who fear something other than death, Desperation will suffice.
