Clang.

  The hammer fell, its sharp metallic sound jolting her awake from her slumber.

  Her eyes shot open, but all she could see was a boundless expanse of unbroken white stretching endlessly in every direction. She blinked rapidly, trying to focus, to find something familiar in this strange place, but there was nothing here. No walls, no floor, no horizon. Only the blinding whiteness that separated her from everything else.

  Where was she? What was she doing here? Was she floating, or was she standing? But most importantly—

  Who am I?

  She strained her thoughts, reaching for the smallest thread of memory, a name, a face, anything that could remind her of who she truly was. But no matter how hard she tried, her mind was a blank canvas, wiped clean of any recollection.

  Clang.

  The sound reverberated again, louder this time, and with it came a flood of images flashing through her head. She found herself surrounded by monsters. Ugly little creatures with bloated bellies and twisted limbs. She cut them down one by one, but every time one of those abominations fell, it burst apart in a spray of noxious green fumes that swallowed her whole. Her strength drained away. She succumbed to the poison. She died in excruciating pain.

  What is happening? Why am I reliving this torment?

  Clang.

  The hammer struck the anvil once more, and a new vision overwhelmed her senses. This time, she was running through a twisting labyrinth, her hand gripping tightly around that of a sickly-looking young man, his face etched with pain and fear. Though she didn’t know who he was, his presence sparked a sense of recognition deep within her, as if they shared some unspoken bond.

  Where were we going? What was chasing us in this endless maze?

  Clang. Clang. Clang.

  The hammer’s relentless beating unleashed a torrent of fragmented memories. She saw herself carving a bloody path through a horde of monsters. She saw herself and the young man slipping past a Cyclops. She saw herself chasing after him as he was snatched away by some bird-like creatures. She saw herself battling an army of undead under the scorching sun. And she saw herself entering this dungeon with another party.

  Yes, a dungeon. She and the young man were adventurers, and they were invited to explore the second floor of the dungeon by a bald, dark-skinned man. But as it turned out, it was an ambush.

  Why? Why was the dungeon so eager to see the young man dead? And who was he anyway?

  Clang.

  Another vision. Another ambush. She and the young man were attacked in the dark, by a group of masked assailants. She had made a mistake. She had let her guard down, just for a moment, and that was enough for everything to fall apart. The young man was overwhelmed, pinned, dragged away. They were going to take him. She would never see him again.

  But then, someone intervened—a young woman with skin of bronze. Within seconds, the masked men were shredded to pieces, and the danger was gone as quickly as it had come. The woman offered her hand, helping her up from the bloodstained ground. She listened as they explained what had happened, then she told them about a new dungeon that had recently emerged in a backwater town in the middle of the endless woods of the Central Plains. That was why they had come to Daelin in the first place.

  Daelin? Is it the name of the town?

  Clang.

  She saw herself standing inside a chamber. A bedroom, but not the kind found in a common dwelling. The walls were richly adorned with banners and tapestries, while gilded furniture gleamed under the golden radiance of candlelight. At the center of it all, resting on a great bed draped in royal purple, was the king.

  Her king.

  Next to him knelt the young man—that young man. She had smuggled him here in secret, slipping him past the guards, down the corridors she had walked a thousand times. He wasn’t supposed to be here, but she had brought him anyway. He needed to see the king on his deathbed, so that they could meet each other for the last time.

  But what should have been a final farewell, a brief moment to offer closure to both of them, had become something else entirely. As the king breathed his last, his power left his body. But it didn’t go to his heir. No, it went to the young man instead.

  Chaos erupted. The crown prince, the new king, was furious. He ordered the young man arrested, and demanded that she stand down. But she didn’t. She couldn’t. And she found herself crossing blades with people who had been her comrades just moments ago.

  Clang.

  She was in her own room, and before her stood a boy. Was this... the young man, but much younger? So... this was a scene set even further back in time.

  The boy had come to her with a letter, a letter from her sister. A wave of pure joy surged through her, so overwhelming that tears streamed down her cheeks, blurring her vision. After all, sixteen years had passed without a single word from her sister. For sixteen long years, she had been alone in a foreign land, with no close friends, no family to call her own. Now, this letter was a thread of hope, a connection to a family she believed was lost forever.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to the original site for the genuine story.

  But the happiness didn’t last. As she read further, she had learned the cruel truth: her sister was dead. Her last family member was gone. An emptiness swallowed her whole.

  No. It was not over yet.

  There was still this boy. He was her nephew, her blood, her only remaining link to the sister she had lost. He no longer had a mother, so she would become his mother. She would raise him, protect him, and help him grow into a magnificent young man. Someone strong, someone kind, someone unbreakable.

  Clang.

  The sound rang out again—louder, sharper. And with it came a memory so old she could barely recognize the face that looked back at her.

  It was her, yes, but younger. Much younger. And beside her stood another girl who looked exactly the same, down to the way her hair was tied back in a thick braid.

  Lif. Her twin sister.

  That was how their story began. Two young warriors who had left their homeland behind, journeying together to the Kingdom of Lyndor. They had sold their swords to generals and lords, spilling blood in someone else’s wars, believing that if they just fought hard enough, long enough, they could carve out a future for themselves.

  But fate always had a cruel sense of humor.

  Though they were identical in almost everything, there was one difference between them, just one, but the one that mattered the most: their martial prowess. She was a much better fighter. So she climbed up the ranks, while Lif did not. She became a knight, then a royal knight. Lif remained just another mercenary.

  The guilt weighed heavily on her. Every promotion now felt like a betrayal. But Lif always smiled and told her it was fine. “No matter what happens, we’re sisters,” she said. “Nothing will ever change that. We will always be together.”

  Then, one day, Lif asked her for a favor. She wanted to see the palace. She was curious about what it looked like from the inside. So she asked if, just once, they could switch places. They looked exactly the same, so who could tell?

  And she agreed. Why not? That was the least she could do for her sister.

  After that, every now and then, they traded their identities. Lif donned the royal armor, striding through the palace’s gilded halls as though she had always been meant to be there. No one ever noticed. No one ever suspected.

  Until the day she vanished.

  She desperately searched for her sister, who had left without saying a word. But there was no lead, no trace. As if the earth itself had swallowed Lif whole.

  Then came the summons. The king had called her to a private audience. And it was... strange. He simply sat in silence, studying her. It looked like he wanted to speak, maybe even confess something, but in the end, he said nothing. Nothing at all.

  She left the room confused and uneasy, and a few days later, she got another promotion. But at the same time, there was a quiet purge of all records relating to Lif. No trace of her sister’s name remained in any document. What was going on? She couldn’t make any sense of it. Her only guess was that Lif must have done something, something terribly wrong, during one of her visits to the palace. More than once, she tried to ask the king, but he offered nothing but an apologetic look. The truth remained elusive to her, until sixteen years later.

  CLANG!

  The hammer fell for the last time, and just like that, the visions stopped. She jolted upright, breath lodged tight in her throat. The endless white that had surrounded her was gone, and in its place came the black. Not the suffocating black of the void, though, but the serene darkness of the night. Overhead, the sky stretched out wide, scattered with stars, and at its heart, a pale moon hung heavy and full, casting silver light across everything beneath. A cool breeze brushed against her face, carrying with it the scent of earth and damp wood.

  “Finally wake up?” came a voice.

  She turned her head, still dazed, and saw him. A young man stood at the edge of the pit. Bespectacled, with a neat bowl cut and a face soft with youth. Not even twenty, she guessed. He was short too, and with such a frail frame, he could easily be mistaken for a boy at first glance.

  “You remember your name, right?”

  “B-Brynhildr...” she replied. Why was her voice so hoarse? She swallowed and forced the words out. “I am... Brynhildr.”

  He smiled. “Good.”

  “Where... am I? And... who are... you?”

  The man adjusted his glasses. “This is the cemetery of Daelin.”

  What?

  Only now did she fully realize where she was sitting.

  Wood surrounded her on all sides, rough planks forming a narrow box. Dirt everywhere. She was in her own grave. Her body trembled, from fear, and from the cold weight of the truth.

  “They buried you, you know,” the man continued. “That’s what people usually do with corpses.”

  “But... but...”

  “But I dug you up, and I resurrected you,” the man said, as though it were the most ordinary thing in the world. “As for your second question, I am but a humble servant of the God of Death.”

  What?

  The man chuckled at her confusion. “Why are you so surprised? You should have all of your memories, so you should remember your own death. Right?”

  She slowly nodded. Yes, she had succumbed to poison, and died in the dungeon.

  “Why... did you... bring me back?” she asked.

  None of it made any sense. Nothing about it felt real. But there was no other explanation for this bizarre situation: she had indeed died, and he had returned her to life.

  “Because it would be a shame if your story ended here. So I want to give you a different ending,” the man replied, trying hard to suppress a laugh, as if he thought what he said was very funny. Some kind of joke only he understood.

  Her story? Her ending? What on earth was he talking about? As she stared at him in bewilderment, he continued his monologue.

  “You don’t know how much effort I’ve put in. No, not the ‘bring your soul back to your body’ part. That part was easy. The real issue was that there was no soul to begin with. You died in the dungeon, so your soul has been harvested by the Dungeon Core, converted into essence. There was nothing of you left.”

  “Then... how...”

  “Well, I reconstructed you. You know, the soul and the body are not completely independent of each other. They affect each other. The soul etches its presence into the body, and that imprint remains even after the soul is gone. What did those ancient priests say? ‘The bones of a man still sing the song they sang in life.’ You’re a woman, but I suppose the rules still apply. So, from the trace your soul left on your body, I remade it.”

  “Is it... even possible?”

  “I told you, didn’t I? I serve the God of Death. This is his domain, so of course it’s possible.”

  The God of Death.

  She knew the old myths, the stories of the Age of Gods, when the divine walked among mortals. But that age had come to an end. The gods were gone. They had vanished without a trace, remembered only in legends. The Forgotten Gods, they were called now. Could this God of Death be one of them? Were the gods coming back to this world?

  “Tell me more... about the... God of Death...”

  To that, the man smiled.

  “Praise Nakhran, First of the Revenant.”