The Third God Chapter 1: Funeral and Childbirth

"It was not worth it."

Before, in Hell.

Ellisa Thorn fell, arms and legs limp, a sword lodged in his chest, his teeth gritted in frustration. He had been useless, as everyone had been, dying for nothing in a stubbornness fueled by obstinacy, for someone unworthy of sacrifice. As he fell, the bizarre landscape of Hell surged into view. The terrible air, thick with a red darkness, enveloped him in a strange and disconcerting descent.

I wasn't truly in Hell — I was in the home of the albino, the realm of the Storm, the Anticreation where everything was Lepheus. I didn't know that. She knew she would be dead soon, feeling the cold spread from her lover's sword buried in her chest, freezing her blood and breasts. And I knew it wasn't worth it.

This Hell was unexpected. The sounds, smells, and sensations were incomprehensible to Ellisa, or to anyone else for that matter. She saw impossible angles, non-existent directions, and illogical shapes, her mind struggling to make sense of it all in sheer horror. It resembled a rocky desert, an arid, sharp redness. But no, it wasn't arid. It was alive. The sky and the ground rippled lightly, waves of multitudes. Cities of horrendous size loomed like hives, teeming with millions, billions of beings — all one, all everything. Mountains that weren't mountains surrounded her, an infinite scarlet, a realm composed of infinite creature-things: lefeu. Everything was lefeu. Ellisa breathed in lefeu, felt it on her tongue.

The fall sent her crashing into a cliff, her thigh bleeding profusely, the pain excruciating. Closer and closer to the ground, she lost track of time, for that too had been destroyed, conquered, substituted. The distance felt infinite, an illusion that didn't exist. Ellisa tried to understand, and her mind broke — she thought lefeu.

Shock.

Back on the ground — broken bones. He gasped for the alien air, feeling the barbed tips moving inside him, gurgling out a bubbling moan. His skin crackled, dissipating in contact with the caustic reality. Why wasn't she dead?

He felt a presence, thousands of them. The creatures observed her, seeing something that was not Lepheus, their expressions a mixture of curiosity and disgust. They reacted in confusion, not the conflict of many, but the indecision of one. Everything was Lepheus, and everyone was everything. They uttered infinite painful sounds, which were lefeu. One of them bent down to examine the woman's disjointed form. Ellisa blinked the mist from her eyes, and the creature's form flickered before being accepted by her vision as a crimson, bipedal insect. Intrigued, the lepheus dropped an acidic drop of saliva. The liquid, which was lefeu, touched Ellisa Thorn's face and left a scar.

Why didn't he die?

"Vallen would have bravado," he muttered.

But Vallen was dead, and she no longer loved him. A numbness filled her soul, as well as her body. She welcomed the numbness that enveloped her skin as she felt herself sinking, as if into foam. A warm, inviting bed that promised oblivion. But it wasn't death.

The floor, which was lefeu, had become spongy. Ellisa absorbed it. The creatures around her turned their backs in unison. The red foam engulfed her more and more, cradling her ruined form and letting liquid redness flow from her mouth, eyes, nostrils, and wounds. The pain subsided.

And then it stopped.

She was expelled in the same place. The ground, now hard, spat her out without ceremony. Ellisa took a long gulp of air — it felt less stinging. She moved one arm, then another, noticing no loose bones. She touched her chest and felt Vallen's sword still there. The metal was lodged in her flesh, but it didn't bleed. She grasped the handle firmly, gave it a tug, and tore the short blade from her body, which still poured cold and snow. She dropped it. Standing up, she noticed her solid legs, confident.

All around, the landscape had changed. The mountains continued, the cliff from which she had fallen remained, and the air was still alive. But the creatures and cities were gone. Ellisa felt watched, invaded, but she didn't understand the eyes. The notion that everything was the same, that creatures were like stones and sounds and tools, slightly slipped from her consciousness.

"It doesn't matter," she muttered to herself.

She looked up (though there was no up or down) to the top of the cliff. She spat into her hands and began to climb.

She fell over and over again. Her body, confused by the absence of time, forgot and remembered hunger, sleep, and thirst. It forgot and remembered growing old, working. The skin of her fingers wore away, and then the flesh, until she touched the tips of her bones to the face of the gorge, climbing up again and again.

The memories were perhaps the worst. Climbing higher, she recalled what had led her there. Vallen, Gregor, Ashlen, Nichaela, Artorius, Andilla, Masato. Rufus. Groupmates. Wanderers like herself, who hunted the albino without knowing what he truly was. They hunted a criminal, then a monster, then a demon. And then? They had penetrated the albino's world trying to save Rufus.

Rufus, who had betrayed the group. Rufus, who had betrayed Vallen. Rufus, who had declared his love. The pursuit was driven by the gods, according to Nichaela. They chased the albino — for money, then for justice, then for honor, and then for revenge. And then? Nothing made sense; nothing mattered. Vallen had died without purpose, without heroism. She had sacrificed her happiness, her youth, her courage, her love — just for the chance not to give up. He had taken it from her, and perhaps she had lost more. Why?

She climbed.

She thought about killing Rufus, if he weren't already dead. Absurdities flooded her mind: miracles capable of restoring everything, chimerical plans to lend meaning to what had happened. And then, nothing else. Hand after hand, gripping the stone with bone, foot after foot, eating away at boot, skin, and flesh, she suffocated in memories. Everything had seemed so good. Everything had felt so right. Reasoning shattered. The past became a paradise, until she lost track of what was past and what was now, and simply continued upward.

She dragged her flayed body to the top of the cliff. And she thought, "It wasn't worth it."

Far from home, still.

She crossed the portal, knowing she had never crossed it before. She stopped mid-step, looking at the ground. There were no dead bodies, no friends. She saw them alive, saw them dead, memories she had and couldn't have. Scattered around her were her possessions, tossed carelessly in despair. There weren't the group, but there was that. In the albino world, would they be so different? A cracked shield. A crumpled chalice. Hell, the longsword, broken. A shattered bow.

Like her.

She collected her things and crossed the portal. On the other side, an infinite serpentine staircase twisted in chaotic directions. Ellisa walked the steps for what felt like an eternity, in a timeless space.

Then, suddenly, time existed again. She was drawing closer to Arton, closer to home. Time returned, and then forms. She recognized the staircase, saw what she could understand. The staircase grew increasingly familiar, and then a feeling emerged — an indecipherable sensation, a sudden cocoon, an impression of affectionate vigilance. She was, once again, in a place touched by the power of the gods. Though she was not devout, she felt, without realizing it, a cold caused by absence. Now, she was close to home.

The pain only intensified. She even thought of turning back — it was too terrible to live with what she had lost. But she forced herself to move forward, fearful on both sides. Arton drew closer, almost within reach, and the memories became more real, each one a thorn. She choked on a sob, shaking, trying to grasp with her soul everything she had lost. She no longer belonged to Arton, nor to the albino's world.

She arrived at the forge.

There, all the losses came to fruition. A cramped room with stone walls, smoke and coughing. Bellows, anvils, instruments, and furnaces. Squalid, laughing, frantic imps the size of children, quaking, shuddering, bursting into sharp giggles. There, Vallen had exchanged his youth, happiness, courage, and love for information.

"This was all mine, Vallen," Ellisa said loudly. "You stole from me." All that had been transformed into objects. With a glance, she searched for them and saw them mounted on hooks on the walls: happiness, youth, courage, love. So close, yet unreachable. The demons swarmed around her. One took the lead, hands behind its back, arms like twigs, stomach swollen, feet scraping the ground like a child. The thin body convulsed as it stifled laughter.

"Want to know where your friends went?" the imp asked.

"Survivors!"

But:

"No. Don't tell me anything," she breathed. "I just want to make a bargain." The demons burst into laughter, their joy pure and unrestrained. They jumped around, pierced their palms with nails, banged their heads on anvils, and pulled out clumps of their own hair.

"And what would be the bargain?" the demon asked, its mouth wobbling with mockery. Ellisa's scarred face remained expressionless, more cold than hard. Tired.

"My memories. All my memories, everything," she swallowed. "Keep them, make an object; it doesn't matter."

"In return?"

"Just take it away from me."

"Done!"

Something shiny, like smoke, emerged from her mouth, eyes, and ears. A blinding light, and the demons set to work with enthusiastic dedication. They blew the bellows and hammered the substance.

Ellisa blinked — no, it was no longer Ellisa. The woman blinked like an empty shell, observing the world for the first time. The world was a forge, with demons. It was a purgatory, nestled between two hells. Lips parted, she absorbed the new reality.

Finally, the clanging of the hammers stopped. In the silence and heat of the forge, a new object emerged: a black armor made of memories.

The woman looked at everything, bewildered.

"Here," said the demon. "It's for you."

The others burst into laughter, immersing their heads in boiling water, scratching their cheeks, and biting their toenails.

"Why?" the empty woman asked.

"It's a gift. Here, it's for you."

She removed her tattered archer clothes. She took the pieces of black armor, understood it, and donned it. She was no longer empty, seen from the outside. She no longer bore the astonished face of someone discovering everything. Her face was that of a black skull.

"And one more gift," said the demon.

The helmet turned to her. The squalid hand extended a ring. She removed the gauntlet, placed it on one finger, and covered it again.

"Come this way," it was the imp again. He led her by the hand to the entrance of the world.

The portal closed behind her, silencing the demons' monumental outburst of laughter. Your biggest prank, your best bargain. The game wasn't about winning, but about making someone lose. And never before had anyone lost so much.

The armor looked around — it was in a cave made of ice. Back in the world, back in Hell. In a vague mirror surface, she saw her own face. "Black skull," she said.

It was a shell, a blank sheet. But she felt tangential memories. The metal of the armor pressed against her body: who was Vallen? Who was Gregor? Who was the albino? The memories slipped away, always just out of reach.

And, on her finger, happiness slipped away — Vallen's happiness. But always outside. The names blurred in the void within her. Roles, identities, lives. The feelings. Man? Woman? Human? Half-elf? Minotaur? Swordsman? Burglar? Leader? Archer? She saw herself again in the mirror:

"Black skull," she said. "Black Skull."