Death.

"Surely... This isn't how I die," Aldric muttered in a shaky whisper, his knuckles bleached white as he clenched the hilt of the sword so tightly that, if he were the slightest bit as strong as he should be, he would have shattered it.

"Aghhh, no!!! Help me!!!"

A man screamed in utter horror, but his screams, as unfortunate as could be, were simply one of many; over ten more awakened scrambled across the temple, running desperately for their lives.

While the others who had been made incapable of running or walking—crawled, dragging their broken legs along behind them in what could only be futile desperation.

As Aldric watched the horror unfold, the inevitability of his own death seemed to only solidify.

'Why?, just why did I accept to come here?'

His eyes landed on the woman who stood in the middle of the temple, her hair brown and her eyes a color he was certain he knew prior but could not make out now. The woman laughed and waved her hand in manic motion as the chaos unfolded around her—she was, in every sense, like a prophet of their demise.

Yet, not the cause herself.

That, who did her bidding... Was far more terrifying. A Knight, three times the size of a man, and armor that gleamed a faint nothingness, yet blinding in its promise for destruction, an armor painted in the breath-ceasing color of despair, and the blood of enemies mortal men dare not fathom.

This being, this existence, whatever it was... Could only be described as a nightmare that preceded all that the word had defined before.

It moved with terrifying grace, even with its immense size. Its armor, seemingly weightless, clanked softly with each deliberate step. Its movements were fluid and silent; there was no urgency in its pursuit.

Each attack was precise and deadly, spilling a crimson mist each time.

The Knight swung its dull and barbed blade down and cleaved open the bodies of another two, one of whom was a man whose armor now felt like nothing more than pointless decoration as he was sliced open like a fish, his entrails falling from his opened torso.

As this man screamed and cried in pain and agony, cradling his bare intestines in his own hands, perhaps that's when Aldric noticed it, the horrific truth that he had failed to see all along.

No one here had been granted the luxury of death.

The screams were plenty, so he failed to make the distinction, only now hearing it—some screamed of horror alone, while others of unending pain as well, almost a sound of pleas to be freed from the misery they felt.

One woman, her pupils shaking in terror, screamed relentlessly, her voice seeming to rise with each glance she gazed at the lower part of her body, from the shoulder down, laying meters away from her.

For some reason, no one was dying.

Aldric stood rooted as he watched the massacre; he might have been the weakest among them, but he wasn't stupid. Way back at the third attack, he already knew the Knight seemed to specifically go after those who ran.

However, standing idly would only stop him from pleading for death like the rest a while longer.

[You have entered the temple of the perpetually lost. The Firsts have ordained you a candidate. To save the greater past, you must forsake your future.]

Al, like he had done since entering the temple, ignored the pulsing notification hovering before him; after all, he found no survival in its words.

He needed a logical plan. Leaving was out of the question since the heavy stone doors had shut behind them, so he needed a safe place within the temple. As he scanned around, his eyes fell on the woman in the middle again.

"That's it."

Al had noticed a while back that even when people ran and scrambled close to the woman, the Knight had not followed them—where she stood was the safe area.

The woman wielded a long sword, its blade etched with runes. The circle around which she stood seemed to flow with the blood of the Knight's victims, filling more with every drop of crimson the Knight spilled.

"It will soon be time," the woman laughed with an excitement that sent chills down Aldric's spine.

He had no idea of her plan or what she was doing, but none of that mattered to him; he simply knew that getting to where she was is the only chance he stood at surviving.

With an addictive dose of adrenaline and grim determination, Aldric launched from where he stood as fast as he could. He had moved for the first time in a while, causing the Knight to take note of him; however, he just kept running relentlessly.

"Yes, it is time," the woman, unaware of the desperate awakened approach, boomed as she watched the circle fill up with blood.

The woman raised the rune-inscribed blade to her chest as she finally looked up, seeing Aldric running towards her at full speed.

"What-" she muttered as he lunged into her with full force, sending her stumbling back from where she stood.

Aldric kneeled on the floor with heavy breaths above the circle the girl once mounted. He glanced at the Knight that approached him, as it suddenly stopped and turned away.

"I... Made it," Aldric managed to mutter amidst the sound of his own pounding heart.

The woman who held the sword looked at Aldric, her face flashing with horror.

"You fool, what have you do-"

The ravaging sound that echoed through the temple cut off the woman's words; a large pillar of pure crimson erupted from underneath the circle Aldric stood atop, engulfing him completely.

[A candidate has stepped up.]

[You have been chosen.]

[You have been made a true candidate.]

[The true candidate does not possess the Blade of the Black Star.]

[You have been deemed a false existence.]

[Gods of the Expanse have noted this event.]

Aldric's vision flooded with red and the flaring notification, and in that moment, he found himself unable to breathe... to think.

Then it stopped—silence, heavy and unforgiving, descended upon the temple.

Aldric knelt on the circle. As his gaze swept around, he saw those who screamed for death finally receiving it, and those who ran meeting the same fate as well.

Only the woman remained alive, looking at Aldric with a face of utter defeat and despair.

"What... have you done?"

Then, with a single decisive swing, she was made into two halves by the Knight, as it looked down at her corpse.

"You possess the blade, but not the marking, this trial is not yours," Aldric heard it speak for the first time—a voice of dread and pure calamity—as it approached him.

"While you..." The Knight tilted its head as it gazed down at Aldric. "What are you..."

It awaited a response, but none came—just the form of a weak and trembling man. Certainly, Aldric was not who it sought, or so it thought.

"The lost men whisper to the gods pleas of redemption, and for that sin, The First spill the blood of the gods on the very altar they worshipped them... Why?"

The Knight asked as it raised its sword, a question more to itself than anyone else. Then, with an eerie finality, it swung its blade.

Then, for a moment, a perfect silence held, only to be disrupted by the sickening thud of Aldric's decapitated head landing on the stone floor.

[You have died.]