Chapter 514: A fate worse than death

Chapter 514: A fate worse than death

“Ah... I also want to apologize...” Sofia told Death while keeping her eyes tightly shut.

“Apologize? What for?” Death answered calmly, sounding more curious than anything else.

“Well... I did turn down your blessing for Sun’s when I had to choose, and there was also the [Avatar of Death] skill, and I put Leverle in a bad position with the paper doll...”

“Is that it?” Death asked, his voice peaceful as ever, “I appreciate the sentiment but you need not apologize. You are free to choose your own path in life; it would be disgraceful of me to take offense to such things. I am happy that Sorrow got to rebuild a family of her own, if anything.”

“I’m glad to hear that... Then, may I ask a few things?” Sofia tried, knowing that no matter what, her time here was limited, as the others were waiting for her outside.

“It would be my pleasure to answer.”

“Thank you very much, then, in continuation of our conversation... Can you tell me a bit more about Sorrow? Despite everything, I feel like I barely got to know her. I have interacted with Sun a lot more at this point...”

Death stifled a weak laugh, “The Sun is hard to avoid, after all, is it not?”

“Not that I mind, Sun has been extremely helpful to me so far,” Sofia started, after a second, thinking back to the sun temple’s quest, she finished, “most of the time.”

“It is not disinterested of her,” Death explained, “Sun is keeping you close because of your relation to the Deep; still, you would be hard pressed to find a more trustworthy ally in this world. She is keeping everyone alive, in more ways than one. But, to answer your question about Sorrow, I am sorry to say, she wants you to learn more by yourself.”

“By myself?”

“Yes,” Death confirmed, “When you open the doors to her old palace, you will learn a lot, and even perhaps earn more of her essence. Be warned, though, it will not be without danger.”

“Business as usual. Thank you for relaying her message, then. I have two more questions if you don’t mind.”

“Only two?” Death repeated, “My Son had a thousand questions for me when we first met.”

“Well... I don’t want to be a bother. Every time I meet someone knowledgeable I end up peppering them with questions for hours on end...”

“Hmm. I see,” Death said after a few seconds of silence, “interesting. The history of this skill is quite something. It was originally designed by a Kleptra to facilitate molting, and was then copied and refined by an unnamed Lich, before the current iteration was finalized by another. Someone we both know quite well.”

“Richard?”

“Precisely,” Death confirmed, “although his version then got worked on by the system itself to adapt it to you. So this would be the fourth generation of this skill. Now give me an instant to review how it works... Hmm, that is simple enough. An elegant design, as expected of the High-Scribes.”

“Simple?” Sofia repeated, “Simply looking at the rune for a few minutes is enough to give me a headache even now...”

“Understandable, the function is simple, the magic is not. Do you know about what is traditionally called un-life?” Death asked.

“I get that it is some kind of opposite to undeath, but I’ve not managed to find much more about it.”

“Undeath is a living soul without a living body,” Death simply explained.

“I see... Unlife is a living body without a living soul...”

“Yes. The skill does two things, firstly, it disconnects your soul and your body, maintaining a discreet link through mana only. This allows your soul to survive unscathed even should your body be reduced to ashes. This technically puts your body into a position of unlife, hence the name of the skill, and the healing restrictions. They are a result of the disconnect. Secondly, it keeps a record of your complete physical body, like a secondary blueprint, and a reserve of mana to explosively rebuild it from scratch if needed as soon as it goes from unlife to death.”

“I get it, thank you for the explanation,” Sofia thanked him, “but... There is one thing I still don’t understand, then. Wouldn’t the record be destroyed when the rune itself is destroyed with my body? How can it still work?”

“You would have the paranoid Lich to thank for that. The reason that the rune is so hard to understand is the same reason it outlasts destruction. Not only is it encrypted with the signature of your own mana, meaning that only your mana can decrypt it and use it to rebuild your body, but it also exists in multiple planes at once, in a state of superposition. One would have to destroy the rune in all the planes to prevent it from activating upon your death.”

“Oh... When Erredis said Richard was hard to kill... I am starting to get it...”

Death laughed freely for the first time in the conversation, “You should expect nothing less from the second biggest supplier of my divine essence.”

“Only second?”

“Indeed. This first is... Very special. But let us not stray too far from the goal of your visit. Should we proceed with the essence transfer?” Death offered.