3 The Fall.

He emerges victorious against his three enemies but his heart sank again when he heard the gallops of the dark horse.

The rider then let's out a grin that sent chills down Liam's backbone for a second before he responds back with a wild grin.

Surprisingly, rather than waiting for the incoming enemy, Liam runs off after him.

As Liam gets to the opponent's scythe's reach, his opponent did not hesitate and let his scythe do it's thing.

Liam, already planned out his defence and counter, dodges the blade but hangs on it with the sickle held by his left hand and manages to throw himself high up, above the opponent.

As Liam let's gravity to take over his fall, he sets his sickles' trajectory to hit straight at the opponent's skull.

Although his spirit was running wild to end the face off as soon as possible, he noticed a bitter truth, that is; the opponent paid no mind to Liam and is relaxed, as if he is just waiting for Liam to do his thing.

"He's a monster!!"

Liam screams to himself with eyes wide open and the next thing, the opponent makes a quick turn of his head to face directly at Liam.

This gave Liam the shock but what can he do? He then positions his sickles to hit the enemy's eyes which did nothing but bounce off, leaving no scratch nor harm, as if his eyes were thick metals.

The opponent rode off but made a quick turn to charge once again at Liam.

This time, Liam stations himself and waits upon the attack.

This time around, strangely enough, the opponent did not attack, which Liam still paid no mind to and hopped as high as he can and went for the enemy's neck.

And for the third time, same reaction. He bounces off from the enemy only for the enemy to taunt him,

"Child, what are you doing?"

This time around, he puts a stop to his horse's gallops and got off.

He slowly walks up to Liam, who is now in a stance, while spinning his scythe around with his grin still on him.

Liam launches forward against the rider and with the aid of his chain, extends the sickle over to the rider, who easily blocks it off using his scythe.

Without wasting a second, Liam draws back his sickle while extending the other one, managing to manipulate the chain to wrap around the scythe's pole, which he manages to achieve.

With full force, Liam pulls back but embarrassingly, the rider stood at a point and watched Liam's efforts being wasted, horribly.

Not even a single budge was noticed from the rider but rather, he singlehandedly drew Liam towards himself.

The force was powerful enough to send Liam onto flight towards the rider just like an object without enough mass.

Although embarrassing, Liam did not have his mind set on such details but rather, has already made a plan to take advantage of his shame.

Few meters left to reach onto the rider, Liam tightly holds onto his right sickle and manages to make a spin and have his blade against the rider's face.

Just about to stick his blade into the rider's face, all the rider did was to spin his scythe a little in order to knock off the sickle and with his left hand, wraps it around Liam's neck while he is still in mid air and sends him down to the ground.

Although the distance from Liam's initial position is short, the impact was great to the point Liam had to cough out some blood twice.

"Not even in a million years, although, that is an understatement but no matter how long you live on this dimension called earth, you are never ever leaving a scratch on me."

The rider mocks Liam before squatting in order to have a closer look at Liam's face.

"Hmm, a vessel in which imprisons the angel of death, so at last, a way to die have been provided before me, is this fate?"

The rider contemplates before standing back up while Liam is busy with struggling how to breathe.

He places the scythe's blade near Liam's neck and said the words to him, "I guess this is where the story of the young warrior who could have made history ends."

Liam's whole body shook in place as he stares right at the blade.

Liam was really terrified while having his whole life flash through his eyes.

Just at that moment, he could see his betrothed's smile while having the Chief's advice ringing on his mind.

With full conviction, Liam manages to move his right hand and holds onto the scythe.

Although with fear in his eyes, he screams as loud as he can and at that moment, some engravings began appearing on both of his arms with a reddish glow.

The engravings appearing was really painful that the rider could notice Liam's screams increasing in pitch and volume.

"No you don't, boy."

The rider with those words, pulls out his scythe from Liam's hand and with his shin, kicks Liam on his temple, rendering him unconscious.

"Now boy, go meet with your ego." The rider said as he gets back on his horse and rides off to meet up with his troop.

............…

It was a dark scene but only a single area seems to be illuminated.

The viewer crawls further to get to the light and before his sight was a chained up figure.

A withering skull for a head, cladded in ash ragged hooded robe, withering black wings and a sheathed scythe positioned upright before it.

While still observing the chained figure, whose ankles and wrists are chained up with the chains originating from nowhere, the figure's eye sockets lit up.

This freaked the viewer out, that the change in the view's perspective shows that the viewer pulls himself back while being cautious.

"Welcome Sebastian or should I call you Liam?" the figure spoke but there is no visible mouth nor lips moving upwards and down.

"W-who are Y-you?" Liam asks as his voice was obviously shaking.

"To you, I appear like a grim reaper but I am the angel of death." The figure replied.

"T-then, w-why are y-you l-like th-that if y-you're an angel?" Liam asked out of concern.

"Who told you that angels are meant to appear humanoid? Although this isn't my true form, I am indeed the angel of death."

"Am I dead? For why do I see you?"

"No, you are just unconscious for the moment. You are in your consciousness."

"The opponent I just faced, do you have an idea of who he might be?"

"A parade-r."

"A parade-r? What term is that?"

"One who exclusively participates in the entertainment of the higher beings."

"Uhmm, what are you just uttering right now?"

"That is not important as you would not be able to comprehend the information on him but at least one thing is certain, he is impossible to beat."

"Indeed, that is correct. Tried every trick in the book but I still can't find a way to harm him, rather, it feels like I am hitting a rock, a solid one at that."

"Him being a parade-r with the inclusion of hard work aided him to be invincible to normal beings. The only way to have him defeated is through the hands of a parade-r like him.

In conclusion, you need me to get stronger while I need you to survive… technically."

"One last question, please. Why did he spare my life?"

"He is in search of his death. Death that harvests the soul of fallen soldiers in war would likely be nothing but a depressing one, as one knows that in war, the innocent does while evil rise to increase the number on the ends of such lives.

The innocent kills the innocent, evil kills evil, minds get manipulated, one fights to protect and one fights to dominate, even to some extent that the other fights because he is incapable to make a choice and go through the stage of reasoning.

With all that, the human heart is enough to give out but of course, he can't die of any other natural cause but to be killed or die when his times up.

He found out that you are a parade-r just like him and then plants a seed of revenge in you in order to push yourself just to have his head."

"If it's by killing my comrades, that is normal. Of course I will mourn but not seek revenge for a natural cause."

"Wake up from your slumber Liam, he has plant the seed by now."

"Huh?" just as Liam questions the figure's words, his eyes open wide and it is morning already.

Liam slowly gets up despite the pains and aches all over his body.

He picks up his chained sickle and before him is a vast land filled up with bones.

It was indeed confusing as he expects to see the fleshes of his fallen brothers but instead, there was nothing but bones.

Of course, he was able to detect which is which with the clothing his brothers wore for the battle.

Yes, he has already concluded that his comrades are dead since he can't comprehend the strength of the monster he just face off recently.

As emotional as once can get, he made sure to take his time and bury his comrades' bones to their graves, knelt as he made sure that every grace had a drop of his own tears.

This went on till he was done but then, it was noon.