Chapter 2 Hearth

Lysander was not done with life, he didn't want to go to the After. He had a life here! He wasn't bad off either! Now here he was learning that this wasn't even real, if Death didn't kill him then he would die anyway and just become nothingness. Just cease to exist. That's what made up his mind Lysander was a person who was better than all. He would never disappear into nothingness to be forgotten. Even if so help him that meant traveling to the After.

He stood up and faced Death right to her face. "I will go just promise me I won't die." He expected her to swoon maybe a little but she just dusted herself off and answered "I can try". Before he could catch up to her she was getting ready to fly off and he rushed over to her before she could leave without him.

"Come on Whinny, let's go" Death reached out her hand and smiled as he took it, and she and he launched into the sky.

He loved flying more than anything. It allowed him to breathe.

As Death-

"Can you stop calling me that? I have a name you know! It's Calypso. I don't actually try to bring death. It's just what you call- uh side affect." How did she know? I am sure I hadn't said it out loud.

"I can read your mind that why Whinny. So I would appreciate it if you could also stop complaining so loud!"

Calypso (are you happy now?) at this point was about to drop him from her quaking anger he thought it was best to just clam up. After flying for about an hour it started getting humid and his skin thickened with sticky sweat. When Lysander looked down he almost brought Calypso down by grabbing onto her hair and latching onto it but she didn't seem to notice, they were floating over lava. But then she started to descend. No, no, no she was going to kill him he never should have-

"Oh please, we need to get rid of this obstacle first before we can go on unless you want to get knocked out of the sky, look see I'm landing on the strip don't worry Whinny." She slowly descending onto a jagged giant black rock. As she landed she let go of his hand allowing him to roll and cut his forehead on one of those jagged rocks.

The journey barely began and Lysander was already bleeding enough that on a normal day he would have gone to the healer but considering all that had happened to him today he just tried to wipe the blood from getting into his eyes. As for the pain, Lysander couldn't feel it, ever since he was a child he found out that he couldn't feel physical pain. Some people thought it to be a gift but in reality, it almost cost him his hand. He didn't have some traumatizing interactions because of it but it was still an inconvenience at the least. As he stood up ready to join the fight he knew that he would most likely win, he looked up finding a not so easy opponent.

Calypso didn't like him. Whinny stuck true to his name and continued whining nonstop. Her powers were meant only for herself and her purposes not taking care of some- gah! Not only was carrying him around, the extra weight, but she also had to deal with all this noise! She wasn't in the headspace to think about these things with all his thoughts bombarding hers! After finally addressing the fact her name was NOT Death, she realized they were heading into Mortis Valley, a sulfuric land covered in volcanic ash puddles and fissure cracks that probably lead to the Hell's Core. Most importantly in the middle guarding the pathway was the Lycrith. A more ugly beast than actually powerful. Ugly enough to intimidate mortals who try to make the way on their own and powerful enough to be a monster of Death. It was covered in jagged spikes that mimicked the ground and gleamed in the glow of lava. It had large eyes that cried tears of lava that turned blood red as soon as they left his sockets and dripped down forming a puddle at his disfigured feet. In total, Calypso measured him to be about 12ft tall, not bad she thought. On the other hand, Whinny was seemingly shaking in his boots. Over this? He had a mixture of blood and sweat dripping down his face yet he seemed more bothered by the monster. Why? His injury seemed much more serious, it was a long jagged cut across his temple that ran pretty deep and he was losing a lot of blood. Without thinking, she ripped a part of her white underskirt and tried to approach his head but he flicked back so she grabbed his shoulder and held him while she began wiping up the blood around the cut on his face. After she began healing him, she had never used this power before so she hoped nothing went wrong. For healing, she assumed she should use her hands and concentrate so she waved her hands above cut and thought about envisioning him completely fine maybe with a slight scar. She warily blinked open her eyes to a dumbfounded Whinny and a small scar on his head where the cut once was she wanted to touch the scar to make sure it wasn't illusion magic but before she could he grabbed her hand mid-air.

Lysander was about to die. After crashing on the ground and cutting himself he now had to face a giant monster who was made of giant spikes and blood tears most of all he wanted to sleep. But on the other hand, Calypso just stood there looking at the monstrous beast as if it was a desk lamp! She then turned toward him and with a grim expression began approaching him, and ripped her dress! What was she doing?! She then came closer and he quickly flinched back fearing the touch of this unknown person, but she held his shoulder so firmly he couldn't understand what she was trying to do but then she with surprising gentleness wiped of the blood that smudged his face. Then she closed her eyes and began moving her hands over his head. He felt his head close around the cut just like when he went to the healers. He almost jumped back into a lava pit as she reached her hand towards his head out of instinct he grabbed it and almost instantly regretted it. Calypso kicked him in the shins but he didn't even feel anything but her gaze was enough to make him fake it.

He began howling to sulfurs air, limping around dramatically trying to imitate a broken bone. But what she did next scared him the most. She started laughing. Hysterically at that. Her laugh sounded like a little child who had just been scared by a jack-in-a-box and discovered the joys of fright. He began laughing in the midst of the sulfur air and the burring lava while the overbearing monster loomed far away Lysander suddenly felt the warmth of another person for the first time in a long while.