BXBX NOVEL Chapter 9: I will become a Revenant.
In high school, as I asked if I could ever be a doctor.
"Impossible, you are too stupid."
A date with a cheerleader. A job at Google or Facebook. Getting a raise. Buying a house. Telling the landlord if I could pay the rent just a single day later. Staying for just a week at my mom's.
Begging my lover to stay with me instead of marrying my best friend. The answer was always the same.
The word used when one no longer wished to try. Men never had wings, thus it should have been impossible to fly. Still, the Wright brothers proved them wrong. They said we could never leave the earth, then Neil Armstrong planted the first flag on the moon.
Impossible. Would I really let it all end just because of this fucking word?
Hell no. I remembered the vow I had made before I died.
'I am through following the rules of others. Do not place your limits on me. I will soar until my wings break and not before.'
Isabella, oblivious to my inner monologue, continued. "It will take too much time to explain, so I'll give you a summary. Hellsgate is like those dungeon towers in anime and manga. Except we are on the top floor and we dive down instead of climbing up. The corpses we see here are the weakest of the weak. The deeper you go, the stronger they get."
Hmm. I had to pay attention for now. Sounded like Isabella had a childish side to her, too. So, we were on the top floor, but why did the reapers even need to go deeper into hell in the first place? What was Hellsgate for?
Fixing her glasses, like a teacher in lecture mode, Isabella continued to explain. Her voice returned to a more vibrant tone as she did so.
"Past a certain point, the zombies can no longer be killed even if you tear them apart. You need a {fate} that cleanses undead. These are known as holy blessings and guns cannot be blessed. Without a blessed weapon, going deeper is impossible."
I abruptly cut her off to ask, "Why do reapers need to dive deeper?"
Isabella looked dumbfounded at my question and took a moment to compose herself. Fixing her hair, she began filling me in once more.
"You really don't know anything, do you? Why did you even become a reaper? Listen, John. I'm not sure what your reason is, or why you even accepted the offer to begin with. But the main benefit to being a reaper is coming back to life," she elaborated.
Why? Weren't we already alive right now? How much more alive were we supposed to be? Somehow grasping my thoughts, Isabella made an annoyed look.
"You are not thinking something stupid like 'aren't we already alive now' are you?" she asked.
Was my face that obvious? I cleared my throat and gestured for her to continue.
"Look honey, becoming a reaper isn't all sunshine and rainbows. You get to live temporarily at a cost. While we do get to return to earth every day, we are also forced to return here every night to fight. As long as Hellsgate remains open, reapers will never truly be free," she explained with melancholy in her voice.
Somehow, I already knew that would be the case. If going back to life was normal, no one would have remained dead to begin with. Roland's words echoed in my mind once more.
'Boy, you know about the Norse Valkyries, right? The ones who bring souls to Valhalla and all that. I am the same. But I will send you to the gates of hell. So, instead of dying pathetically on the ground, you may join our version of Ragnarok and fight demons till the end of the world. Exciting, right?
You interested?'
"Think of it this way. The Reapers only have one goal: closing Hellsgate. The fact that Hellsgate remains open today means every reaper since time memorial has either died or is still out there fighting. If this were a game, it would mean no one has ever cleared this game. Not even once," Isabella theorized.
Fighting till the end of the world… You got to have superpowers and return to earth. But each night you dived into hell and fought till the day you couldn't any longer. This sounded like a deal only the truly desperate would want. For those who had something they left behind, I could understand the appeal. But what about me?
Saying that I was destined to die here because {Rewind} was trash was kinda harsh. I had only just begun, and she was telling me not to even try because it was impossible?
Yeah, fuck that.
"Aren't you the same then? I saw you were using a steel dagger. Do you turn into a bear or something, then?" I asked in curiosity.
Isabella's cheeks turned red as if she was embarrassed. She made several attempts to speak. As she didn't say a word, I guessed I hit the nail on the head. This bitch was in the same boat as me. With an even stupider {fate} than the one I had; I might've added. What did she even wish for to get {Code}?
"Fine, you caught me. I died a month ago, so I researched a lot during that time. But you can only truly know what your {fate} is the moment you kill in Hellsgate. My {fate} is also formless," she said, sounding frustrated.
"Formless?" I repeated.
With gritted teeth and clenched fists, Isabella practically spat out every word.
"{Fates} are basically manifestations of desire, right? I read in an IRIS report that mutated {fates} also do appear. There are two mutations recorded. Sovereign and the Formless. Both are {fates} that do not manifest as weaponry or transformations. Still, the difference is like night and day."
'Sovereign, so the other type is for kings or something? And Isabella and I belong to the Formless. There should be more to this than meets the eye.'
I kept my ears open as the woman continued her lecture.
"Sovereign ranked {fates} are those that manifest as personae. Think how an actor brings a character to life. Their {fates} manifest a character. This persona not only has their own will but is also extremely powerful! Currently the Revenants of all seven battle fronts are all Sovereigns."
Her entire demeanor turned ecstatic as she spoke of the Sovereigns. Her shining eyes meant she worshiped them like heroes or something. I did hear of another new word that grabbed my interest more than the Sovereigns, though.
"Revenants? What are those?" I asked.
Nodding, Isabella explained everything in a single breath.
"Right. The reapers have ranks, each rank is several times more powerful than the last. The order goes Wraith -> Phantom -> Specter -> Revenant. In the history of Hellsgate, only seven Revenants have ever existed, and they are both the commanders and absolute kings of the seven battle fronts. Ah! Each continent is considered a battle front."
So, these Revenants were the kings of this land. Did that mean there were reapers in Antarctica? That was a continent, right? I had to remember that for now. Interesting, but there was still something I wanted to learn more of.
"Then what about the Formless?" I reminded her.
Like a balloon, whatever energy Isabella had disappeared as she deflated from my question.
"Every so often, some reapers are defective and cannot get their {fate} to manifest. They awaken and can gain souls like any reaper, but their abilities are vague and follow no reason or rhyme. Hardly anything is known about the Formless other than that they are considered extremely weak and hardly contribute at all."
Hearing such a bad description of the group both of us belonged to, I tried to learn more.
"Oh, come on, it shouldn't be that bad, right? Maybe they just do not have enough data or something."
Isabella then closed in on me as she spoke in anger. Her agitation was evident in her entire being. Why was she so emotional?
"There is no record of any Formless even becoming a Phantom! That's how weak we are! Just give up! Don't you think I want the opposite to be true?! How are we going to survive in this place?! This is all pointless!
I should never have agreed to join the reapers! It is all hopeless!" she shouted at the top of her voice.
She then began punching my breastplate as she cried pitifully. Her whimpers were so soft, I almost missed them.
"I hoped… I prayed. When I unlocked {Code} I wished it to be a mistake. I ran after a group of zombies to prove that I wasn't defective. That Formless could become powerful too, yet I almost died. How am I supposed to survive then? How can I go back?
Do I have to die a second time just for those bastards to be satisfied?"
Isabella's weeping face tore my heart. Right, no one would intentionally come here to fight without a good fucking reason. She must have had one to be desperate enough to come here. Perhaps consumed by the desire to comfort her, all I could muster was a simple promise.
"I will do it."
"What?" she asked with tears in her eyes.
"I will become a Revenant and close Hellsgate," I vowed.