Ch 149 – Isaac Deathwill, Emperor of Death

In a universe where mana runs rampant throughout countless worlds, there will of course be many worlds with similar development.

They awaken mana, magic becomes the main point of development for society, and now they can't live without mana. Then there are also worlds that were originally devoid of mana and went to other routes, but once mana awakens, then it would eventually become a mana-dependent civilization due to how convenient it is.

Now, one such world exists where mana has awakened at an early stage, and that world is called Tellus.

It was a world much larger than that of Earth, with multiple contents holding billions of lives. There are humans, elves, dwarves, monsters, beasts, magical plants, mystical landscapes, and was a typical world of swords and magic.

But that isn't what we are here for. Nay, we are here for a certain individual. And that individual is Isaac Deathwill!

In a continent down in the south, one can see a large landmass devoid of any sort of life. Instead of greenery, it was a bleak gray with no hints of plants and life around it. Just from the view outside the world, one can intuitively know that the continent down in the south was an ominous one.

It was called the continent of the dead, where undead beings roam free and spread the essence of death all around. Skeletons, zombies, ghouls, banshees, vampires, dullalahans, death knights, spirits, it was a thriving civilization of undead creatures ranging from mindless to intelligent undead.

And the source of such drastic extreme? He was Isaac Deathwill, the Emperor of Death and one of the most powerful mages of Tellus!

His tale is hundreds of years old, he was a legend whose fame rang throughout the entire world. He was deified as a god, a being who has transcended life and death, a being who has ascended beyond mortal life! A powerful undead lich who threw away his humanity for eternal life to pursue the secrets of the arcane path!

To live for an eternity to grow everlasting, he was known as the greatest researcher of magic to ever exist in Tellus. Nobody dares say they know magic more than him, for he has devoted centuries to studying the arts of magic. The five elements, runic inscriptions, magic circles, divination, alchemy, necromancy, summoning, and taming, most developments that any path of magic has seen these past few centuries are directly correlated to the research of Isaac Deathwill.

Even as an undead lich, he was respected and revered throughout the entire world. His act of throwing away his humanity was romanticized due to his own strength and contributions. Him killing countless beings and bringing them to the undead world was instead praised and sung songs of awe by people all around the world.

His power was simply unrivaled, and with that as a foundation in a world where might means right, nobody was able to overthrow him. He was truly a being who has attained the apex of the mortal world, the being closest to a God in Tellus.

And that being whose legends remain famous after hundreds of years currently resides in his palace of death constructed from jade white bones. His palace of white bones pierces through the dark clouds of the sky as if it was a pillar of white in a bleak gray world. Dark clouds loomed around the peak of the palace as the essence of death was far thicker than anywhere on Tellus, just being near it would corrupt any human if they spent a long time enough near that palace.

Inside that palace of grandeur, Isaac Deathwill can currently be seen sitting on a throne made of white bones just like his whole palace, but one can see that the bones used to make his throne came from legendary monsters. Ancient Dragons, Primordial Beasts, and other bones stemming from beings of extreme power.

His appearance was quite normal for such fame. He was simply a body of white bones, with a skeletal structure belonging to that of a human considering he was a human before he turned into a lich. He wore a simple black robe embezzled with gems imbued with magic. A staff of bones stood erect beside him with a bright red gem adorned on the tip of the staff of bones. And just like the color of the gem on his staff, his soulfire eyes glowed brightly with an ominous scarlet.

Even though he wore simple clothes and held a simple appearance, his mere presence alone would suffocate any being who dared approach him. Meeting his eyes were akin to looking at the abyss, it was as if their soul were getting sucked away from their bodies. The thick aura of death emanating from his body took a physical form of dark miasma.

"It's already been long since I started down this journey of understanding magic," Isaac muttered, his voice deep, eerily deep. His mere voice would cause others' souls to shake in fear.

His flickering scarlet soulfire eyes mellowed down as he rest his back on his throne of bones. The dark aura of death surrounding him receded until it finally went away.

'It's already been a thousand years… It really flew by like a flash.' Isaac's eyes flickered as he reminisced about his past.

His life was full of twist and turns, his tales of his rise to power was already well known throughout the entire world, but only he knew what his life was truly like.

A thousand years ago, the name Isaac Deathwill was merely the name held by a young boy who lived in a village in a poor kingdom. He lived a life of simplicity, with no riches but the warmth of family. But, as if it was destiny, he was taken as a disciple by a wandering mage and he took his first steps on the path of magic.

His talent was high, abnormally high for a village boy who came from a family with no history of magic. In only a few years, he rose through the ranks and became a respected mage around the area. His family was able to live a well-off life now that he has become a respected mage, and he devoted his life to studying magic just like his master.

But, when his master died of old age, it was like a wake-up call for Isaac. Death, he started to fear it the older he grows. With magic, it does slow down his aging, but he wasn't an elf or belonging to a long-living race. One by one, his family members died as they lived a life of luxury with bad health.

The more he witnessed others die due to natural causes, the more he realized his own mortality and how he might never experience the apex of magic no matter how hard he tries in his lifetime, for he will simply die in a few decades.

The thought of changing race did occur in his mind, and he did commit heinous acts to try and turn himself into an elf, a race that was the closest to humans in terms of physiology. But he later realized its futility, for elves would also die, for their long lifespans would eventually end.

What he wanted was true immortality, true everlasting life, one where he can't die no matter how much fate tries to kill him. And slowly, he realized what he needs to achieve such a feat, strength and to throw away his humanity.

Vampires? No, they could still die.

Zombies? No, they could still die.

Golems? No, they could still die.

Almost every alternative he could think off can be killed, and that's when a flash of inspiration flashed through his mind.

To store his soul in an object and achieve eternal life! He became the first lich to ever exist in Tellus!

Eternal life means the problem of time now presents no problem for Isaac. He can finally experiment and study to his heart's content! No emotions, a perfectly logical mind without the limits of his mortal coil, he has transcended life and death!

With time, he grew. And as he grew, the faster his strength exploded. He became stronger the older he got until he achieved a level just below the Gods!

And now, as a thousand years passed since his birth, he has achieved a level of strength only a few beings could ever hope to achieve with his intellect and hard work. He didn't rely on luck, he didn't rely on fate, he relied on the power of knowledge and the results of his research. His immortality was turned into a certainty under his wits, and his strength was a product born from his intellect.

He wasn't a dumb baboon that relies on destiny, he was an intellectual who relied on brains, and unknowingly, science. He was both a mage and a scientist! Science and magic were combined to attain immortality!

'Hmm?'

His scarlet soulfire eyes flickered in curiosity as he felt something amiss out of nowhere. This intuition, it was a product he trained and developed with the help of magic, it allowed him to sense something wrong was going to happen which alerted his mind.

As he stood up and a field of mana surrounded him, he tried to sense what was amiss but saw nothing, confusing him further. But, out of nowhere, he suddenly grunted as a sudden pressure pressed down on his body out of nowhere.

It was suffocating, it was akin to an entire world pressing down on him. It was a level of pressure not even he could resist!

'What is this?!' He questioned in his mind as his scarlet soulfire eyes glowed brightly. He tried to move his mana, but to no avail. Not only that, he could even feel a presence tampering with his phylactery and soul!

Alarmed by that, he tried to resist further but he wasn't able to do anything. Slowly, his flickering soulfire eyes started to wane, and from the middle, his scarlet eyes turned purple. It was akin to a visual representation of the weird presence corrupting him.

The more it spread, the more he felt his will slowly being altered by that strange force. Even with his strength, he was just a helpless ant against this force.

Until finally, his pair of scarlet soulfire eyes turned bright purple. The pressure slowly lifted from his body as an unbearable silence ensued. The whole room was eerily dark, with the only source of light being the flickering purple eyes of Isaac Deathwill.

But inside his mind was a lot different. Memories, no, a set of knowledge not belonging to him invaded his very soul and was ingrained in his being. Worlds not his own, lives experienced by others very much similar to him, and he slowly felt his own soul getting influenced by that stream of info.

And one simple thing rang in his mind, a ridiculous idea that made him feel chaotic emotions, "To plot against a Goddess? Hahahahaha!"

He laughed madly as he sat down on his throne and his soulfire eyes flickered wildly. To scheme against a Goddess, it was mad and insane, yet… He crazedly looked at the air in front of him and waved his arm, his mana moved and warped the fabrics of space in front of him, allowing a tear to form and he plunges his arm deep inside.

He pulled it out swiftly, and he held a weird white orb that glowed brightly in front of him. It was his phylactery, the container of his very soul and one of his sources of immortality and eternal life.

"Kukuku, to think I'd experience something as ridiculous as this! Very well, I accept your proposal, Freidrich Braun!"

As the name of Freidrich Braun rang with a strange power, Isaac watches as his soul turned purple for a split second, that scene causing a mad cackle to erupt from his mouth as he rammed his arm to his soul and severed a small part out of his soul, causing a pain that would cause anyone to be knocked unconscious greet him.

But his eyes simply flickered with madness and a complex spell matrix covered the severed part of his soul.

'To scheme against a Goddess who exists throughout the multiverse, hahaha!'

As the severed part of his soul slowly flew away in front of him, Isaac continued to laugh loudly inside his throne room, for he has become a part of a scheme that would affect countless universes.

With that, a white soul slowly flew through the void of space as it traversed an unknown length for an unknown amount of time. It flew past multiple planets and solar systems, until it finally arrived near a blue planet called Earth.

As if being noticed by somebody, a golden radiance suddenly erupts near the severed soul of Isaac Deathwill, and just like that, the soul flew to the surface of Earth, for another part of Braun's plans shall now start!

AN: This chapter has 2188 words.

(September 16, 2022 – 296th day of writing)