Chapter Text
The air was heavy with the smell of blood and dust. As you trudged along the field, dragging your scythe from behind you, you block out the sounds of battle. The sounds of agony and pain as soldiers from both sides fight for their kingdoms. You stop at nothing until you reach your goal, your eyes obsessively locked onto a particular individual fighting one of the human knights. The monster falters in its movement as you make your presence known, standing ominously behind the oblivious knight.
A look of fear strikes the face of the monster as it starts to back up, dropping the battle it had with the knight. The knight stares at the monster in confusion, not breaking their stance until they follow the monster's line of sight. The knight's look hardens as they finally notice your presence, and you don't bother acknowledging them as they abruptly turn to escape.
At once, a hand shoots out from under your cloak, the grip on your scythe tightening as you take hold of the monster's soul, willing it outside of its form. The monster stares in silent horror as its soul is forced out, in its shock, it fails to notice you slowly approaching. It only snaps out of its frozen state once you arrived in front of it, a gentle hand reaching out to take the monster's soul.
Your eyes glance up at the monster whose mouth is moving, dry and scarred lips begging you for mercy, but no words reach your ears. You stare at it with an unreadable expression, and it stops begging once it realizes its cries have been falling on deaf ears. You let go of the soul and wave your hand in the area in front of you, willing a twitching rectangular aura to appear. It glowed green dimly as it hovered in front of you, the aura fading in and out of existence as if straining to remain its presence.
Without another look at the monster, your hand slams on the button, and you keep your eyes trained to the floor as the monster's soul begin moving toward you. From underneath your mask, your jaw clenches tight as the screams of pain overwhelm your ears. The soul continues moving despite the cries of the monster, and you watch as it begins to absorb into your chest before completely disappearing within you. The monster's form begins to crumble once you finally capture its soul. You can see it shaking in the corner of your eye, the monster falling to its knees.
You only look up once the noise had finally stopped, only a pile of dust left laying where the monster used to be.
You close your eyes and bring a hand to your chest, lightly humming as you sense the new soul's presence along side your own and a number of other souls you've collected that day. You stand there for a moment, listening to its thrumming until you're knocked out of your daze, your body being forcibly thrown across the field.
You groan as you finally skid to a stop, your entire body aching. You begin to move but flinch as you feel a sharp pain on your side. You look down to see a deep cut on your waist, warm blood oozing out of the fresh wound. You press on the wound as you move yourself up, your eyes locking onto your attacker standing a few feet away from you.
A skeleton monster stood holding its ground in front of you, an eye blazing a brilliant blue in one of its sockets. "s o u l c o l l e c t o r ." It called out, its mouth not moving, remaining in a permanent grin.
"do you know how long i have been waiting to finally meet you?" The skeleton's mouth twitches, its expression hardening as it waves a hand engulfed in a blue flame around. Its words sound light, but no ounce of amusement comes from its tone.
Your expression remains the same at its words, not bothering to give it a sound of response. You continue clutching at your side, your form hunched as you stand in front of the monster. "you make it very hard for a guy to get a talk with you." It raises its hand as it chuckles, the sound deep and reverberating despite the vast open field the two of you stand upon.
"now, i've got a couple of questions for you." the world plunges into darkness as you suddenly feel your soul get ripped out of your chest, a blue glow similar to the skeleton's magic enveloping its form.
"mind answering them?"
You feel the air get knocked out if you as your body abruptly hits the ground, your soul having been slammed down. You're only given a second to recover as you hear a ping. You roll out of the way just as a spiked bone emerges from the ground, nearly skewering you on the spot.
You bite back a gasp of pain as you push yourself to your feet once again, your eyes widening as a light twinkles in the corner of your eyes. You jump back from your spot, narrowly missing a beam of light that burned the ground you were on. Your eyes shoot up to your attacker, and you see multiple large draconic skeleton heads floating above him all in various forms of charge.
You continue dodging as endless beams of light rain down on your form. You recognize the smell of burning cloth as you narrowly avoid getting burned by a beam. Suddenly, you could feel yourself being thrown again, and you struggle to push yourself from the ground as a heavy weight seems to hold you back.
You look up as a pair of feet enter your vision, the skeleton having finally moved from its spot to you. It holds a dark expression as it looks down on you on the ground, its glowing hand keeping your soul from moving. "why are you collecting monster souls?" You struggle to move again, your feet kicking and your arms pushing.
You falter in your movements as you feel your legs hit something. You subtly turn your head to your side, your eyes briefly scanning the discarded scythe laying near you, having been thrown away after the skeleton's initial attack.
"is it not enough that you humans endlessly slaughter my people everyday?" You turn your gaze back to the skeleton, a glare settling on your face.
"what are you planning to do with those souls, h u m a n ?" you shift your leg, your foot hooking over the handle of the scythe. You hold your stare with the monster in an attempt to keep its attention away from your movements.
"answer me!" conjuring enough strength to briefly break lose of the monster's hold, you pull the scythe close enough with your foot, hooking it under it to kick it up toward your hand.
You catch it with ease, knocking the skeleton back with the tip, his hold on your soul breaking as it falls back. Color returns to your surroundings and the sounds of battle fall on your ears. You push yourself up to your feet, holding the scythe against the skeleton on the ground. A crystal ball floats at the head of the scythe, glowing green dimly as you conjure your magic.
The skeleton glares at you from its spot, its eye briefly flaring a brilliant blue once again. The skeleton lifts its hand but falters as the magic begins to diminish, the fire enveloping its hand sputtering out of existence.
The monster's gaze snaps to you and your scythe, its expression darkening as it realizes what was happening. You stare down at it with a blank expression as you begin to raise your scythe. You bring it down on the monster, only to realize that it had already disappeared from its spot.