Chapter 48: Chapter 48: The god of death has come for our bones. But they’re ours and he can’t have them. Who~

Hineni sighs, keeping his eyes closed as his body moves from side to side.

 

He already knows that he’s dreaming again, that his mind is some place where it ought not to be.

 

The man stops, or at least tries to. But he finds it hard to do. It’s as if his body was simply following a well-practiced series of motions, which he had been following for so long, that stopping and standing still seems a stranger thing to do, than to just keep dancing.

 

“What is this?” he asks, not opening his eyes. It sounds odd, but he’s sure that, now that he has realized that this is a dream, that he will wake up, if he opens them.

 

Does it make sense? No, not really. But in his dream-logic, it does.

 

Despite him still just standing there, his feet planted firmly onto the stones of the smooth floor, he can feel the other person still moving, holding onto him. “This has to stop,” says Hineni, pulling his hands free from her grasp. “Leave us alone,” he says, feeling something press its head against his chest. The other person smells like frogs and he’s sure that its her again, the big frog.

 

Hineni takes a step back, trying to push whatever is holding onto him off of himself. “I dont know what happened anywhere else,” growls Hineni. “But you and your kind need to stay out of our lives,” he warns. “I’m not putting up with y-”

 

- Something presses itself against his mouth. A finger, shushes him. The hand stays there for a moment, sliding down from his face together with three other fingers.

 

Having had enough already, Hineni opens his eyes.

 

“I’ll hurt you, if I have to,” he warns.

 

“Four,” she says, a smile spread across her pale, greenish face dotted with two swamp-emerald eyes. “Next time will be our fourth dance.” The woman tilts her head, her long black hair dangling very loosely, catching a stray ray of moonlight. “- Hi~ ne~ ni~ hi~,” she croaks, beaming.

 

---

 

Hineni sits upright in bed, but this time not in a quick jostle. Instead, he simply rises up and then quietly exhales, as he looks around the room.

 

Everything is as it ought to be.

 

The man rubs his face and bends down, planting a kiss on the side of Obscura’s head, before he gets up. She lets out a series of excited clicks and hisses, but doesn’t seem to have woken up, instead, balling herself into the blankets some more.

 

The word ‘cute,’ flows through his head, repeating the echoes of what Sockel had muttered this prior afternoon.

 

Hineni rubs his face, getting up and slipping on some clothes, before walking out of the room. He needs some fresh air.

 

It’s not unheard of for gods to speak to people and to visit them in their dreams. Hell, Obscura had literally given him his weaponsmithing sub-class in a dream, back when they had first met.

 

But why is the big-frog calling on him in his sleep? What does she want from him? Is this just some game to torment them, having no way to physically reach him at the moment?

 

The man walks out into the hallway, looking at the many rooms of his home. All of them are full. That makes him happy. The beds are full and used, the guild, while not close to being fully functional, is starting off well. He has a family of sorts, he’s engaged. By all objective standards, he has to be happy.

 

And he is.

 

- In general.

 

But right now, for some reason, he isn’t. Hineni stands there in the long corridor, looking at the streaks of moonlight, which shine in through the upstairs windows, as he wonders what this familiar feeling is and where it’s from? How did it find him, all of a sudden?

 

The man shakes his head. The ‘big-frog’ dreams are messing with him.

 

He looks at the door to their bedroom for a moment, before heading downstairs into the restaurant area, as he wanders around his own home, haunting it, like a lost spirit at night.

 

Already knowing what to do, Hineni grabs his boots and his coat, puts on his yellow scarf and his wizard’s hat and he grabs his axe, slinging it over his shoulder.

 

For old time’s sake, he’s going to take a walk in the forest and get some wood. Plust there’s something else that he needs to see, something else that he needs to do.

 

He thinks he understands it now, why he feels a little glum, so late at night. It’s because that person, that man who he used to be, the one who he had gotten quite some distance over, it’s because he’s finally caught up to him.

 

Hineni grabs the front door of the house, opening it.

 

Standing on the other side of his front door is a familiar, ghostly woman, dressed in a white robe. The night air blows the strands of her hair to the side as she stands there, her hand outstretched for him to take, as if she had never left since those many days ago.

 

He lets out a tired, annoyed sigh. “I’m not holding your hand,” says Hineni to the priestess of the god of death who has made her fourth appearance in his life. In a way, he had expected her to be here, waiting on him. He has an appointment, apparently. After Avarice, he supposes that it’s best to at least hear out what the important gods have to say. The other ones, not so much. Like that weirdo from the lake-god. “Also. I want to take the axe,” he says, lifting his shoulder. “Need some wood,” he lies.

 

She nods.

 

Hineni steps outside, closing the door behind himself and jiggling it to be sure. By the time that he looks back towards her, she’s gone already. But that’s fine. He knows which way to go.

 

The man follows the street down into the opposite direction of his usual path.

 

As for what the god of death wants from him, this is as much of a mystery as what the frog-god wants from him. He sure is popular these days and it’s kind of exhausting, honestly.

 

Hineni stops, staring at the ground for a second, staring at his shadow, projected there from a light coming out of an upstairs window next to him. No. That’s not a good thing to think and it’s not true either. He’s exhausted, sure. But not because of the people all around himself. It’s because he’s been thrust into a new environment. So much has changed in his home, in his life, in himself and he’s barely been able to keep up. It’s been a marathon.

 

Hineni lifts his gaze, looking at the pale woman in white, standing down at the very end of the street, waiting for him.

 

He has to be careful. Just because that man from his past has caught up with him, doesn’t mean that he’s going to let him call the shots again.

 

“The god of death, huh?” he mutters to himself, vanishing into the night.

 

- How bad could it be?

 

---

 

The hairs on Hineni’s neck stand on end, as somber singing fills the grand, stone halls. The deep throes of a single man’s voice echoes around the massive featureless corridors of the expansive temple. The unseen person leads a chant, while a somber chorus behind him continues after him, acting as his low-toned back-up. The ceiling of the temple is up so high, that Hineni is sure he could fit his house just into this single corridor two or three times, stacked on top of itself. Gods sure do love their big, ornate structures. Honestly, he hopes Obscura doesn’t get any ideas. He really likes their house as it is. It’s… cozy.

 

Arching his neck backwards and trying to focus on the ornate cupulas above himself almost makes him dizzy.

 

In comparison with the building itself, he feels absolutely minuscule. But perhaps that is the point of the crushingly oppressive atmosphere? He walks on after the robed woman, leading him through a maze of gigantic, ornately carved, stone columns, which are made out of a dark, gray basalt rock, until they reach the end. Here, a heavy, massive door sits, embedded into the walls. Each great hinge is as large as he himself is, each door is ornately hewn with such an intricacy, that it itself must have been the work of a full lifetime.

 

Hineni lets out a breath that he has been holding in for too long, as he stares at it, glad to finally be here, but nervous about what lies beyond.

 

- A god. A real god. Not some obscure, vaguely deistic entity. But rather, a real, flesh and bone god, who was there when the world was made and perhaps even before that too.

 

Every last hair that he has continues to stand on end. It isn’t that there is an electricity in the air, rather, there is an overpowering, crushing sensation of a presence. It is an empty presence. Like the breath of a ghost down one’s nape at midnight, it floats through the door and reaches him, touches him and Hineni almost finds himself thinking about stepping back to get away from it.

 

His eyes wander around the dark-gray features of the cathedral one last time. Despite the bright moonlight outside, it feels as if not a single ray of it makes it inside towards them. The tight, thin, ornately decorative windows seem to act as barriers themselves, rather than points of entry for such things. This is a cold place, an empty place -

 

The large doors creak as they begin to open wide, slowly, inevitably, as a maw of a great beast, ready to consume him.

 

- A deathly place.

 

Hineni stands up straight, adjusting his scarf and his hat, as he looks out past the rim of the thing, towards the priestess at his side. The woman beckons for him to walk inside, but does not seem to be willing to do so herself. Not so much out of fear, but rather, it simply isn’t her place yet.

 

Hineni looks back ahead of himself and into the room, the chamber. But he doesn’t see a room, he just sees fog. A vague, nebulously pale and cold fog hangs in the space, hiding anything that might be visible from sight. It feels…

 

You are reading story Weaponsmith : [A crafting litRPG] at novel35.com

He shudders and steps inside.

 

- It feels cold. It is not cold like the chill of the winter, raging on outside. Rather, it's the ambient, inner cold, that one with an overpowering sense of loneliness might feel inside, manifested now into a tangible presence.

 

Slowly, the doors close behind himself and Hineni finds himself alone.

 

He exhales again, watching the vapors leave his mouth and drift through his scarf, floating away to intermingle with the rest of the fog. He watches it depart and then fade away, like the soul of a dying man, floating to mix in with the waters of the river of the dead.

 

“…Hineni…” whispers a quiet, sharp, feminine voice to his side. Hineni shoots a quick glance that way. But there is nobody there. His heart beats in his chest, loudly, strongly as his hand lifts itself up to reach for the fog. A smell permeates the air, a smell of water-lillies.

 

That voice. He recognizes that voice. Even if it was just a whisper, just a word, just a single second. He knows it.

 

A silhouette forms itself together out of the fog. It takes the shape of a human woman, made up entirely out of a dense mist. At least her flesh is and Hineni stares through her, towards the many thousands of yearning faces, that begin to form in the twisting shadows behind her.

 

A rattling sound comes from the darkness and in horror, Hineni lifts his boot, as a bone flies free from where he was standing. The floor is covered in bones. Dozens, hundreds of bones roll from all around the room, collecting together inside of the fog-person, into a misshapen entity with too many arms, too many legs, but the mist still surrounds the wrong-skeleton, losing its attempts to take the form of a woman, a woman who holds her arms out towards him, beckoning him to come closer, beckoning him to step towards her.

 

“Hineni…” whispers the thing, reaching for his outstretched hand. A soft wind blows and tousles his hair, his scarf moving. An old feather flies out and he, instinctively, catches it. His eyes open wide and he lowers his hand and his head.

 

He exhales his third calming breath for the night, letting out the odd feeling that he had let start welling inside of himself.

 

“Hineni…” she whispers again.

 

“You’re dead,” says Hineni, lifting the brim of his hat and looking into her eyes. “- I killed you,” he says, clenching his fist so tightly shut, that he can hear the strain of his leather gloves.

 

One.

 

The shadow begins to retreat back into the fog. He finds it hard to do, but he doesn’t lower his gaze.

 

“I’m doing well,” he says, nodding to the fog. “I’m engaged now, you know?” explains Hineni, rubbing his head awkwardly, showing the spirit the feather in his hand.

 

Two.

 

The bones fall apart, the faces vanishes and then, so does Hineni, stepping forward further into the chamber. He has a meeting to go to, after all. “Go back to sleep. I’ll catch up with you when I’m done, okay?” he says. “Sorry…” he apologizes one final time, watching as the last of the foggy entity clutches its hands together in a doting manner, shaking its head, before dissipating back into nothingness, drawing away, together with the ten-thousand faces of the dead. The overpowering smell of water-lilies fades.

 

Three.

 

The last bone strikes against the ground at the same time that something dewy falls from his face. Hineni turns back forward and keeps walking. Must just be the condensation of the fog on his skin.

 

“...Child,” calls a new whispering voice from ahead of himself. A man’s. “Child of mine,” it calls. Hineni rolls his eyes. Why is everyone whispering? Is it a dramatics thing?

 

He narrows his gaze, his eyes fixated on the floor and he stops in his tracks, finally looking up towards what he sees. He has reached the end of his path. The two halves of the room are separated here by a thick, unnaturally straight wall of fog. It’s like a translucent curtain, like a veil. All of the fog in the room seems to be coming together to this place to make this odd barrier between worlds. It is like a dusty window, separating the room into two halves.

 

Ahead of himself, he sees only the silhouette of a gaunt, dead man, sitting on the equally as indiscernible silhouette of an ornate platform, elevated above the floor. His skeletal body is slumped over sideways, as if he were the decaying carcass of a lost king, fallen over his forgotten throne. His bony, cloth-laden limbs do not move, his wispy colorless hair doesn’t sway, his fingers don’t twitch and yet, Hineni hears his voice coming from the hollow sockets of the skull, which he sees only the vague outlines of.

 

Clenching his fists together, he lifts his eyes towards the most fearful entity that he has ever witnessed.

 

“What do you want? I’m not yours yet,” says Hineni. “I’m sick of you people bothering me at my home.”

 

The whispering voice laughs a quiet, hacking laugh, as it begins to cough a sickly cough. But all the while, there is not a single bit of movement from the body.

 

“Ash…” replies the god. “Ash,” he says again. “Ash. You are mine in half and I claim you.”

 

A claim? Is that what this is about? Hineni steps forward. However, despite taking a step closer towards the throne, towards the man, he finds himself standing at the exact same spot as just a second ago, as if he hadn’t moved an inch. “I deny your claim,” states Hineni. The fog begins to swirl. “I am the owl-god’s. You’re too late.”

 

“- And yet, here you are,” whispers the voice. “Child.”

 

“I’m already spoken for,” repeats Hineni, lifting his arm to display his feather to the entity. “I’m engaged.”

 

The entity continues to laugh, hacking its lungs out as it does so. “You waste your life for a pittance,” it says. “You would be much better served to give it to me.”

 

“What does something like you want with my life?” asks Hineni. “You see the irony here, right?” he asks.

 

The fog begins to creep towards and around his feet, as if it were the rising water of a coming tide. “You have gotten bolder, since we last met,” says the thing on the forgotten throne. “Do you not fear me anymore, child?”

 

Hineni lets out a deep breath. “Weren’t you listening?” he asks. “I said I was getting married,” replies Hineni clearly. “I’m not afraid of something like you anymore.”

 

Now. This isn’t true, of course. But he thinks that it was a good line. He wishes that Rhine was here to have heard it. He thinks the boy would have been impressed by that one.

 

Damn.

 

Hineni makes a mental note to say it again when Rhine is around, should the opportunity ever arise.

 

Laughter breaks out in the fog, as the voice from the throne hacks out another joviality.

 

“- Teetering,” it whispers into his ear, as if it were standing right next to him. “For ten years, you were teetering,” it hisses, floating around him from side to side. But Hineni doesn’t look towards its source, as he knows that the thing is just trying to unnerve him. He instead stares up at the body, his eyes locked on to its eyes, which somehow seem to be staring his way, despite never having moved an inch, despite being nothing, but empty sockets of a fog-engulfed skull. “When you were a boy, I almost had you,” it says. The voice wanders. “When you grew from there, I almost had you,” it whispers. The voice wanders. “You were teetering on the edge of the void for so long and then…” it whispers and he feels something touch his back. But he doesn’t look. “- You became a man and I almost had you. A few more weeks…” it whispers. “A few more months and you would have broken. I would have finally had you.”

 

“- I’m here now,” says Hineni, gesturing to the space around themselves. “What do you want?”

 

The fog pulls away from him, drifting up and away, back towards the throne and towards the corpse.

 

“Weaponsmith Hineni,” says the spirit of death. “- Chosen of the owl-god,” it adds on with an almost mocking hiss to its voice. “We come unto an age of death,” it whispers, almost gleefully now, as if the tension in its voice, the venom in its spirit, had all vanished at this most fantastic news.

 

“What?” asks Hineni. “People die all the time,” he says, shrugging. “What does this have to do with me?”

 

“It has everything to do with you… ash… ash…” it whispers. “Ash… Weaponsmith Hineni, chosen of the owl-god.” Hineni narrows his eyes. Gods do like to be obscure and obtuse, don’t they? “War,” it says. “War.”

 

“Huh? War?”

 

“For us, weaponsmith Hineni, it is the greatest season of the decade,” states the god. However, despite the morbid joy in its voice, the body still hasn’t moved a single inch. “The southern region is breaking free from the continent. This will not be allowed,” it speaks. “Generations will die. Ash will paint the land. Ash will paint the skies,” it says, its voice becoming higher and higher in pitch. “And there will be so many… so very many bones,” says the god of death, ending with a cackling, hacking laugh, like a man who had worked in the mines for all of his days.

 

“War?” asks Hineni again. “With the south? I haven’t heard anything about that. I mean, sort of, but nothing serious.” The fog begins to condense, obscuring the silhouette on the throne once more by the second, as it seems to be leaving. “Wait,” calls Hineni, looking at the vanishing figure. “What was this about? What do you want?”

 

“I want you to make weapons, weaponsmith Hineni, chosen of the owl-god,” whispers his mother’s and his father's voices into his ears. “Our season of harvest has come, child of mine.”

 

And with that, the voice vanishes, leaving Hineni standing in a fog that feels slightly less present than it did before.

 

Looking around at the empty room that he finds himself in, the man turns around and leaves.

 

Hineni stares for a moment, sighing. “- Next time, send a letter, okay?” he tells the room. Why are gods always so dramatic?

 

He shakes his head and hoists his axe back over his shoulder. Forget the wood. It’s time to go home. He wants to lay in bed with his not-wife for a few more hours.

You can find story with these keywords: Weaponsmith : [A crafting litRPG], Read Weaponsmith : [A crafting litRPG], Weaponsmith : [A crafting litRPG] novel, Weaponsmith : [A crafting litRPG] book, Weaponsmith : [A crafting litRPG] story, Weaponsmith : [A crafting litRPG] full, Weaponsmith : [A crafting litRPG] Latest Chapter