The human Champion held his gleaming blade aloft. It was the only source of light in the dark of the forest. Everything here seemed lifeless. There was no sound of wild things, the trees were barren and dry, and even the wind was still. The heroes had walked through the shadows into the Deepest Darkness, where dwelt the ultimate enemy of all. Oblivion, the goddess of shadow and death.

  For this, this all-but doomed ultimate mission, the culmination of his long career, the Champion had gathered allies as he could from all the peoples. From the treefolk was an Archer, the most accurate marksman he had ever known. From the beastfolk there was a canine witch, whose mystical connection to the wilds was all the more potent in the paws of someone with her own fangs to enhance. From the trolls there was a Warrior, who lacked the champion’s own divine power but was stronger by far than he was.

  They were among the most accomplished heroes of the kingdoms, but still this journey was thought to be a suicide mission. But they had to make the attempt. Who else could?

  And so the Archer guided them through the forest. It was his home turf, after all. Though he disagreed. “There’s nothing living here. I can’t feel these trees. How can they all be dead?”

  “They were probably never alive,” said the Witch, sniffing near the roots, “This isn’t the living world. It’s not a forest, not truly. More like a dream of one.”

  “Can you navigate it, or not?” asked the Champion, “If you can’t you need to tell us, so that we can come up with another plan.”

  “I-I think I can,” said the Archer, “though with no feeling and no light…”

  “Maybe,” said the Warrior, “the Witch can track her?”

  “For all the death here, there’s little rot. Which makes sense. We may think of decay as part of death, but it’s caused by living things, insects and bacteria. If nothing lives here, nothing decays. At least, not as much.” The Witch sniffed the air. “Something does smell of death, though.”

  “That’s her,” said the Champion, “it must be.”

  “I smell her all around, though,” said the Witch, moving from tree to tree, her nose touching the roots, “This is her domain, after all.”

  The party of heroes was quiet, for a time.

  “I think,” said the Archer, “if the two of us work together, if we each correct the other when they go astray, we can make it.”

  “We can find her,” agreed the Witch, “together.”

  “I trust you both,” said the Warrior, shouldering her heavy club, “and the Champion and I can protect you so that you can focus.”

  The Champion only nodded, and held his gleaming sword high so that its light shone as far as it could.

  They continued on, a little less certain of their path. In this place, where all was dark at all times and there were no landmarks, it was impossible to track time. And soon enough it wasn’t only the Archer who realized the strange, listless, dreamlike feeling of this between place. The group of heroes lost track, entirely, of how long they’d been searching. It may have been minutes. It may have been years. It felt like they’d just left their homes, found the deep place that connected to the Deepest Darkness, and yet it also felt as though they’d always been searching.

  But eventually, they reached something different. A clearing. Rocky ridges ahead of them, and a cold moon above shining enough light to see the barren earth.

  “The moon?” said the Witch, her tone apprehensive, “But these trees have no foliage. If the moon was shining, we should have seen it all along.”

  “Even though the moon gives light,” said the Champion tersely, “it is an old symbol of Oblivion. If we’ve found the moon here, we’ve found her lair.” He brandished his shield and held his sword at the ready, no longer needing to hold it aloft for light.

  The other heroes followed his lead. The Archer put an arrow to string and fell back into the shade of the trees. The Witch uttered a syllable of power that few could articulate, her teeth growing longer and sharper. The Warrior took her heavy club in both hands, adjusting her stance so she could move quickly, falling back just a touch to keep the Witch between her and the Champion, at least until they’d spotted their foe.

  “What business do you have here, mortals?” the darkness asked them.

  “We come to challenge you, Oblivion.” The Champion was brave, the bravest of humankind, and perhaps even the bravest of the four heroes. Still, his voice faltered, and the darkness laughed softly.

  “Are you sure? You can leave this place unharmed if you choose. I will shine the moonlight on your path, to show you the way. The moonlight will lead you to the living mortal world. It is said I am unforgiving, but that’s not so.”

  “It is also said,” growled the Witch, baring her fangs, “that you are a liar.”

  “You are mislead by lies,” agreed the darkness, “but are you so sure of their source? Let me show—”

  “We challenge you,” the Champion reiterated, his teeth grinding and his face set, “Oblivion!”

  “So be it.” The darkness swelled around them, and all light was lost to the heroes. But then the darkness coalesced and took shape the shape of a woman. She mostly resembled a human, but was as tall as a troll and as graceful as a treefolk. She didn’t resemble the beastfolk, not physically, but there was something of them in her eyes, in her stance.

  Her gown was a dark purple, her cloak black. Her eyes, too, were such a deep violet they were nearly black, as were her lips and her nails. The darkness took the shape of a weapon, a scythe whose blade was the crescent moon. “Mortals who challenge a god survive at the god’s pleasure,” she warned them. She waved a hand towards the forest, very close to where the Archer hid. There was a path there, an open path lit by moonlight. They didn’t see the trees part. It was as though they’d never been there, as though the path had been there all along. “Return safely, knowing it was by my generos—”

  An arrow struck her in the shoulder. She looked at it in mild surprise. She touched it, and it melted away into darkness.

  And then she attacked, swooping towards the Champion as though she could fly—and perhaps she could. Her scythe clashed against his shield with vicious fury, driving him back with each blow. And then, on her fifth swing, she slice right through the shield and deep into his arm.

  He cried out as the halves of his shield fell to the ground, toppling over onto the dry earth, his sword also falling as he held his injured arm.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  Oblivion smiled and raised her scythe over him, when the Warrior’s massive club slammed into her, throwing her off the rocky ground where she stood. She landed some distance away, though lightly on her feet. “Impressive,” she admitted.

  Two more arrows struck her, and then the Witch landed on her, all four legs wrapped around her and gnashing teeth tearing into her shoulder.

  “Off,” said Oblivion, tossing her away lightly, “Are you a Witch, or not? There are people who claim they can’t tell your kind from common beasts, you know, and you attack me like one? I could rescind your gift of speech, if you’d rather be one.”

  The Witch growled, winced, stood again. She touched a paw to the ground and cast her magic into it. The dry ground cracked as something living grew from it, a thin vine that grew longer and stronger, snaking around Oblivion’s ankle.

  “Ah, now that’s more dignified, isn’t it? Though it can only last here while your magic sustains it.” Oblivion tore through the vines easily. “You might try manipulating the earth instead,” she suggested, “you’ll find that’s easier here.”

  Another arrow struck her.

  “You know, that’s terribly annoying.” She let go of her scythe, which sliced through the air under its own power, directly towards the Archer. He ducked and avoided the fatal blow, but it cut through his bowstring. The arms snapped straight with sudden force, smacking him hard over the ear.

  The Archer grunted at the pain as his vision blurred for a moment. Cursing, he removed and threw away the two halves of the broken string, fumbling for another to string his bow again. He touched his injured ear, which was perhaps a mistake. His hand came away red, and the wet blood made the work more difficult.

  The Warrior caught up to Oblivion and swung her club again, but the scythe returning to the goddess’s hand struck the weapon and threw it off-balance. The Warrior tried to shake it away, but Oblivion grasped her weapon’s handle and drew it back to her, slicing through the end of the club.

  The Warrior looked down at it, her mouth open in surprise. It had been her father’s weapon, and his father’s, and his mother’s first, and it was startling to see it damaged after all that time. But she shrugged and changed her stance, jabbing with the end of it instead of swinging it; it was sharp now.

  As the Warrior struck from one side, the Champion darted around Oblivion. His shield arm hung dead at his side, but his sword arm was back in play. Oblivion laughed as she lightly, easily, parried the Warrior’s jabs with her own weapon again and again.

  But then the Champion’s gleaming blade cut a line across her back and she gasped, her laughter abruptly interrupted. The cut was red with blood and bleeding, the first blood the heroes had seen on her. The blood was thick and dark, as though she bled shadow. But then what was the red?

  “Mortal blood!” she gasped, stumbling a bit, her feet dragging across the uneven terrain, “Mortal, you strike me with your blood?”

  The heroes froze. “Who else is bleeding?” the Champion called.

  “I am,” said the Archer, “and my bow is ready again.

  “Bloody your arrows!” shouted the Witch.

  The Archer did not bother to respond to this. He was already touching the head of his next arrow to his wet ear.

  The stone around Oblivion’s feet cracked and warped as the Witch worked her spell, bending the terrain to block the goddess’s movement, maybe even restrain her if her reflexes were sufficiently dulled.

  The Warrior dropped her club and grabbed Oblivion in a hug. Between the stone restraints and the troll’s mighty grip, the goddess squirmed but could not move. The Champion’s sword, red with the blood from his damaged arm, struck again and again. So did the Archer’s bloody arrows.

  “No!” cried the goddess of darkness and death, “NO! Mortal hands cannot—”

  What mortal hands could not do they never learned. The form of the goddess melted away into shadow, leaving only her cloak in the Warrior’s arms and her weapon which fell to the ground.

  The darkness seemed less dire, as though the moon shone brighter. All was quiet for a moment, and then a light wind stirred, and the branches of the dead trees all around them creaked and groaned.

  “We won,” said the Champion dully.

  “Not only that, we didn’t lose one person,” said the Warrior, “though my great-grandmother’s club is a sad loss.”

  “My shield, too,” said the Champion, “That was an artifact of the Radiant Church.”

  “And my bowstring,” said the Archer coming forward, “though that’s no great loss at all. And we’ve some new divine treasures as recompense.” He looked at the Champion’s injured arm. “This isn’t so bad,” he said, “I could stitch it up.”

  “Don’t bother,” said the Witch, whose lack of hands hindered her own ability to tend wounds, “In this dead place it’s hard for me to refill my magical power, but I’ve enough left to heal the three of us.” She looked up at the Warrior and sniffed. “I don’t smell troll blood. Are you injured at all?”

  “Just my club, which you can’t heal.”

  “Guard us, then,” said the Witch, “for a moment. Though I don’t expect any more trouble.”

  And soon enough the mortal heroes were on their way again, following the moonlit path.

  “I wasn’t looking forward to finding our way back out,” said the Archer, “I’m glad the path she showed us still persists.”

  “She probably would have had to make an effort to hide it again,” reasoned the Warrior, “and she did not expect to lose.”

  “She’s really gone then?” said the Witch, “All will be at peace from now on?”

  “Stories say she’s been slain before. As an immortal goddess, it may be impossible to kill her forever. She may return. But there will be peace for a time.” The Champion breathed deeply, flexing his restored arm. “We must be satisfied with that. ...though I’ve never heard of the weakness to mortal blood. We may have discovered something new, and truly finished her for good.”

  The heroes left, and all was quiet in the Deepest Darkness, as it always had been.

  * * *

  In the darkest cave of the Deepest Darkness there was a man, or at least a being in the form of a man. He was fair, with silvery hair and golden eyes. His lips were also golden, and his face sparkled and shone with such brilliance that it illuminated the cave as day. He wore a white robe with a golden sash, golden bracelet and earrings, and golden sandals.

  He touched a cloak that had been left haphazardly across a rock, a rock that was really a seat more comfortable than any in the mortal world. “Oh sister dear,” he sighed, “though we ever clashed I still feel a note of sadness to see you gone from this world, and by mortal hand no less.”

  “Oh, shut up Radiance,” said the darkness, taking on again the form of a woman.

  “As though mortal hands could fell a god,” snorted Radiance.

  “Do you need something, brother dearest?” Oblivion took back her spare cloak, pulling it roughly from his grip.

  “You know, if mortals showed up at my doorstep to challenge me I would simply end all of their lives.”

  “Then they’re lucky, I suppose,” said Oblivion, “that they showed up at mine.”

  “I would have at least taken his hand.”

  “That would hardly be fair. You’re the one who keeps sending them after me.”

  “Oh, but he wouldn’t even have minded,” said Radiance, drawing up a chair that had not been there, “They weren’t expecting to live at all, you know. You do have such a fearsome reputation! It would have been quite the battle scar to show his grandchildren. And it hardly would have slowed him down, the mortals do have such useful prostheses these days.”

  “I don’t know what that is.”

  “Artificial limbs. Making new ones by magic is apparently quite difficult for them, so fake ones serve. But they do it fairly well!”

  “How lovely. I’m sure he prefers not to need it. Besides, he would have bled out.”

  Radiance clapped his hand on his knees and smiled so brightly that Oblivion had to shield her eyes, “But then you would have had all the blood you needed! ‘Mortal blood, my one weakness!’” He leaned forward conspiratorially. “Tell me the truth, you were planning that since the moment you cut him. Such restraint you showed there, slicing just deep enough!”

  “Since before then,” Oblivion sighed, “You do know that eventually one of these mortal heroes is going to realize that you’re lying to them?”

  Radiance laughed, a bright cheerful sound that sickened his sister. “And now, thanks to you, when they do they think their blood will poison me!” He stood, “Not that I particularly needed the help, but thank you for that.”

  “Just get out, Radiance,” Oblivion said firmly, “I banish you from the Deepest Darkness for an eon.”

  “As though you can keep me out that long.”

  “For one eon, the longest I can, though I am sure you’ll break through before then.”

  “I am the stronger, after all,” the light said as it faded away, leaving only darkness.

  Oblivion waited a moment in complete silence and darkness until she was sure he was gone, then sat at the place at the wall that became her desk. She drew out a book, an ancient book of mortal magic. It fell open to a particular page, because it was a page she referenced more often than any other. The recipe to slay a god.

  Oblivion thought of her battle with the mortal heroes. She knew she’d heard a few questions there, and they didn’t trust her end. They hadn’t listened to her, but they’d followed her moonlit path all the same. And who knew where their path would end?

  Her finger touched on the first ingredient: Blood of a mortal.