The ruins of a forgotten town lay on the second floor of the Great Tower. Dried soil and an unforgiving sandstorm ravaged the buildings. The town's citizens were long dead, and their corpses withered away. It seemed as if no life could thrive there any longer.
But against all odds, something moved.
A corpse of a forgotten war, shrouded in a dark mist, began to move. It was something that had never happened before inside the great tower, a corpse stood on its own. Not manipulated by something as crude as necromancy or corpse animation, it simply stood. Empowered by the will of its soul's last breath.
The lone figure walked across the shattered roads. Dragging a broken spear behind it like a club, it walked past the forgotten town and towards the aura of the living. Its goal was quite simple...
"Shatter the gods, I must, such cruel beings do not deserve to exist."
Each living soul had a spot of divinity inside of it, which is what allowed them to climb the tower. They gathered more divinity the higher they climbed, until they reached godhood.
The knight walked through the sandstorm and into a stony savannah. The hot temperature was slowly cooling the more he walked towards the mainland.
Ahead of him, he could feel something. A small ball of warmth and light was playing around in the dirt.
As he got closer, he could see what that ball was, a small wolf that was digging a burrow. It must have been pushed out of its old territory by something bigger.
The corpse lifted his spear high above his head. It had been a long time since it had done so, its bones creaking and bending unnaturally. The wolf looked at the knight just a moment too late. Blood splattered everywhere, the young wolf stood no chance.
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The corpse stood still, watching the wolf for any surprises. After a couple of minutes, it was satisfied, it reached for the thrown spear and pulled it out of the dirt. The small ball of warmth and light came with it, and it floated near the spearhead.
It was a soul.
Even such a pitiful beast had some divinity inside of it.
The knight raised the soul to his face and bit into it. It screamed and whimpered, but it would do no good. It was already dead, and it would dissipate after not having a body to return to after a while.
A small bit of rust fell off his armor, and he felt something inside of him. He felt more alert.
"Fuel... I need more fuel."
The wind picked up behind him, bringing with it the sounds of crickets and beetles into the afternoon sky.
Life moved on just like that, that was why he must slay the gods. To be impartial to beings inside their domain, not mourning the death of their believers, they must have forsaken their empathy long ago. Even the domain of life was at fault. A being so old and forgotten had grown empty.
Just beyond the treeline, through the underbrush and over the grassland, was a gigantic wooden wall. The knight remembered it's name, Langdale, a town that just sprouted up when the holy war had started. It seems it has grown into quite a decent city.
He walked towards the city calmly, it wouldn't matter when he got there, the gods were not going anywhere. He was not strong enough to slay a god yet.
He walked for hours until he found a change in scenery.
The forest ahead of him was louder than the savannah. Birds chirped and wolves howled; it was a proper forest.
Everything would retreat before the knight could get close, even a group of wolves ran scared after they saw him. They must have felt the press of death, most beings would run from such a presence.
He would have to learn how to control it. If he were to walk among humans once more, then he must blend in. It wouldn't be good if he was shot down at the gate.
The knight had yet to look inside his soul, was it even there? It did not matter. He would find another to replace it in due time. He focused on his mind, inside was a grey sphere with cracks spreading all around it.
His soul had been shattered. It was a shame, but he would prevail. No matter the soul or the body, his will had reanimated this corpse. He would use it to succeed in his goals.
He would need to gather enough souls and divinity to heal his broken soul. Then he could hide his presence from the humans. They should still despise undead, the thought of them made the knight shudder.
The only way to heal his broken soul was to get more souls. Which meant it was time to hunt.