The revenant opened his eyes.

He'd been dead, he was certain. He remembered it. Death had been, for him, like a party going on elsewhere in the building. He could hear voices nearby, muffled, and had known that he could join them at any time - but instead he'd found a quiet corner. Again, like a party, one where he'd taken something too strong too early in the night, and gotten overwhelmed by the laughter and fighting and music.

And now, having not actually laid eyes on that eternal celebration, he had returned to the world of the living. Again.

This was, to the best of his reckoning, the third time he'd died. It had also been the worst, because he remembered it clearly. The fucking Curse Grinder had chewed him up, tearing his body apart layer by layer. The revenant wasn't the type to think about revenge, but for a moment he did stop to ponder the fact that he'd already killed the person that made that infernal machine, as well as the one that had pushed him into it. It was efficient, in its own convoluted way. He was, pre-emptively, avenged. Or they had avenged themselves by killing him, maybe. Either way, they were all even.

The room he found himself in was unfamiliar, but it was clean, and comfortable. Maybe a bit... impersonal? A glance out the window told him he was in Sentortzi, though he wasn't sure how he'd gotten there, and a wall clock with wheels for the months and days told him it was third bell in the afternoon on the twenty-seventh of the eighth. That part was a little surprising - he'd died on the third of the third, give or take a day. True, he'd been in bad shape just before his death, and then he'd been utterly obliterated, so it seemed fair that he might take a while to recover - but it was distressing to think it had been almost half a year.

Something caught his eye on the desk - a letter had been left for him, written in English so that there was no danger of anyone else snooping. Well, hardly any. He read it, stared at a wall for a while, and then read it again. Just to be safe, he read it a third time before going back to staring at the wall. Setting aside some of his immediate concerns with the events he was just now learning about, he was bothered that the letter had anticipated his plans and made it very clear he was not to enact them. It stated, in no uncertain terms, that he was not to interfere with Gilbrecht Halenvar's schemes.

This made the revenant cranky. Not that he was eager to return to Brinkmar, but it seemed wrong to leave things as they were. He could deal with the cult-crazed, fate-addled king. Cleanly. Quickly. Justice would be served, Brinkmar would be protected, and the vaults would stay locked.

He read the letter a fourth time, and had to admit the counter-argument had merit. Fine.

Opening the chest in the corner of the room revealed an assortment of scrap he'd collected from Earth and Brinkmar. There were enough pieces from the Assembler Forge to make a full set of armor, and some magic swords from Coelestis Acquisitions' vault. He also had the Coelestis Acquisitions stealth helmet, which... hmm. He read the letter a fifth time, and stared at the clock as it ticked away the seconds.

The revenant made a decision, to follow the intent of the letter but not the specific instructions. He wouldn't stay put - couldn't, now that he'd had the thought. He sorted through the chest more thoroughly, assembling a somewhat ridiculous mismatched suit of armor laid out on the bed. The parts were standardized, thanks to the Clockmaker's personality quirks, so it wouldn't get in the way of itself like you would expect.

The swords were too good to throw away, so he took all four. The extra armor bits and some other random items, he just left in the chest for now. He'd have to get a backpack, or something. Or just leave them. He slid the helmet on, and looked at himself in the mirror. The helmet had served him well when he had to fight its creator, but he had planned on being done with it after that.

He tried to call up the visual overlay, but nothing happened. Right, his Coelestis Acquisitions pin had been on him, and would have been destroyed in the Curse Grinder. Still, even without the pin the helmet would hide his face and disguise his voice. It would be enough. He would lay low, as the letter instructed, but he'd also head back to Brinkmar. He wouldn't tamper with fate, he'd just... insert himself into events quietly, and look for little opportunities to make a difference.

There was a way he was supposed to get to Brinkmar, one that wouldn't violate the instructions in the letter. He'd known, they'd talked about it, but... he'd been a bit foggy when they'd had that meeting, not thinking clearly. He knew where several portals were, and was even pretty sure he knew which one he was supposed to use, but that wasn't all there was to it. Well. Either fate would guide his hand, or it would have to tidy up his messes.

There was a very gentle knock at the door, and the healer walked in - looking like she was a bit scared of him, which was fair. He took the helmet off, but of course that didn't help. She'd seen too much to be relaxed about it. "Ah," the revenant said, "I understand I have you to thank for being alive again. Healer Rutlen, you are a miracle worker. Would you say everything is going to plan, for now?"

She paled. "Ah. There have been... questions. About two weeks ago, Calliope Smith - uh, that is, the - the -"

He cut her off. "I know who you're talking about."

"Ah. Right. Well, she asked me about whether or not I could bring someone back to life. If... If their body had been completely destroyed. This was while I was reviving you. I did as I was instructed, I didn't tell her anything, but I... I did confirm that it could be done, under certain... exotic circumstances. I hope that's okay?"

He laughed. "It's fine. That won't cause any trouble. Listen, I'll need a few things. I have some magic items I could give you in exchange, Old Empire stuff, or even older. I can make you a list, but it's not much. Just a backpack, some belts for my swords, a gambeson. I can do the rest once I've got that. And I'll need... hmm. I need directions to Poicelria's old fortress, if you know where that is."

She looked confused. "Are you... are you going with Professor Yanipliss? When did you have a chance to talk to him? I know he's only a few rooms down, but I thought you'd only just woken up. Also, I think you should discourage him from taking this trip; he's still recovering from being poisoned."

The revenant smiled. Fate was watching, as suspected. "A few rooms down from me in which direction?"

Jeort desperately tried to scoot away from the revenant. "Fuck, fuck, fuck. You're here too? Shit, you're the asshole that carved his way through half my men. Listen, you can't kill me. I surrender. Fuck."

The revenant shook his head as he pulled out one of his swords. "As a duly appointed representative of Brinkmar, I find you guilty of murder, destruction of public infrastructure, and assisting in a plot to unleash mass destruction. The penalty is death. Have some dignity, I'll make it clean."

This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

Jeort tried to be difficult and scrambled away while attempting to simultaneously curse and bribe the revenant, but he was tied up. His head rolled across the floor, and the revenant cleaned he blade and proceeded to open the secret passage. He pulled the cabinet back towards the wall but prevented the latch from clicking into place, so that he could be followed. Things were about to get interesting.

When he reached the bedroom, he only took a moment to glance around - it was just as he remembered it. He grabbed a duffel bag and loaded it with the suit of armor that was on display, gazing mournfully at the empty sword stand. He knew where the sword was, and it wasn't even far away. He knew that he could go to the throne room right now, pull it out, and have his sword again. But... no, he couldn't. Not now.

Slinging the bag of armor over his shoulder, he walked out into the hallway and closed the door behind him. Halenvar troops yelled at him to stop where he was and so he did, but they also charged at him with spears and swords out. It seemed rude. They were trespassing, and he'd done what they said, and they were still going to try and kill him. Fully unacceptable. The revenant shrugged and walked through the rushing soldiers, leaving them to fall in his wake. It was a ridiculous waste of human life.

He proceeded down the halls of the palace, until he saw a familiar symbol over a door. Bingo. He went inside, and breathed a sigh of relief to find that the teleporter to Trallanar was intact. It had been disabled, just like its counterpart on the other end, but the queen hadn't been willing to just destroy it. The revenant had already taken some time and figured out how to disengage the locks on the other platform, shortly after slipping away from Calliope Smith and Harmid Yanipliss, so doing it again wasn't a big deal.

He hooked up a mana battery, one of several dozen he'd crammed into a pouch, and stepped into the alcove. In a flash he was there, at the center of Brinkmar, surrounded by destroyed Deadshells and ruined barriers. Once again, he was tempted to go and kick Gilbrecht Halenvar's ass, but the Empire forces were in the way and he didn't actually know of another route to the vaults. They were, after all, designed to be defensible. No, he'd have to settle for checking the other to-do items off his list. The planar seal, of course, and then searching like hell for the demigod-slaying sword. The Clockmaker had almost certainly been planning on using it to kill Tindelus, but he hadn't. So where had it gone?

Greg had looked for it too, for years, but he'd never found it. Not in Brinkmar, not on Earth. But the revenant wasn't going to give up. He was going to find that sword, even though he didn't want to. He'd been ordered to, and he'd agreed.

"If you go right," the revenant yelled down the stairwell, "which you probably should, you can leave at the second exit and cross the way to the old monastery. There's an exit under there, though it's a bit... hard to find."

He turned and trotted away before giving them a chance to respond. He was trying to stay positive, but seeing those faces looking up at him had been rough. They'd been injured, and scared, and exhausted. The revenant had been sorely tempted to invite them to follow him, to lead them to the secret apartment he'd set up with its protection from the Curse Grinder and its lovely hot shower. But of all the people he could potentially talk to, that group was absolutely the riskiest.

Sneaking out into the city streets, he returned to the teleportation hub. Tindelus, now free - curse Gilbrech Halenvar for a thousand years - was almost certainly going to secure the building soon so that it could spread to the other cities. The revenant had wanted to set traps to prevent this, but in the end there just wasn't any way he could find - it was outside his skillset, and he'd already watched Tindelus waltz right through security even he couldn't pass. He had no leverage.

Pumurom's portal turned out to be already unlocked, probably by the Erathi soldiers that were camping just outside the alcove. They all jumped up as the revenant appeared, but he just swept past them. "Tindelus is loose, and taking everyone over. You need to find an evacuation portal, as quickly as possible. Go."

One tried to stop him, and ended up with two broken arms. The others stayed back. They, too, looked scared and exhausted. What a mess. The revenant hurried out, took some time finding an unguarded alley that could take him to the hubward side of the city past the barricades and patrols, and started searching. He'd found a few leads - flimsy things, references that wouldn't be worth a second thought if he had had anything better to do - and just needed to cross them off his list so he could go back to being frustrated and mildly depressed.

He found the building he was looking for, finally, and it was thankfully intact. It had been some official government building back when the Old Empire was still around, but at some point the second queen introduced the idea of nobility and it became a mansion for one of the new lords. This house, the revenant knew, did not contain the demigod-slaying sword. But it had probably held a key, once upon a time, that could lead to a place where the sword might be.

The mansion had been hastily packed, or maybe looted, or a little of both. Items were strewn around, some crumbling with age while others were made so exquisitely that they weathered the curse and time itself as if neither could touch them. Empty walls surrounded him, the hangings all in heaps of dust on the floor. This meant that a door, once hidden, was now in plain view. It was also ajar. The revenant approached slowly, activating the enchantment on the lower legs of his armor.

Boots slapping down on the stone steps with the same volume as a falling leaf, he hurried down the spiral staircase. In all likelihood, the door had been left open a hundred and fifty years ago. There was no reason to think it was anything recent, and certainly no reason that someone would just happen to still be there at the random moment the revenant arrived. No reason at all, except... "To the death of fate," he muttered to himself, "may we strangle her with her own chains."

Greg had used it as a toast of sorts. It was one thing - possibly the only thing - the revenant had to give him credit for.

The revenant came to a landing, and there before him was a large storage room. One of the pillars had opened up to reveal some sort of hidden compartment, and a man was examining the contents. The revenant hadn't met him in person, but he took a moment to recall the briefing he had received. Ulren, former professor at the university of Sentortzi, had no notable combat ability but could manipulate time in a very potent way. That meant that the revenant's best bet was to kill him so quickly and completely that it would be impossible for the man to turn back the clock.

Climbing silently onto the nearest shelf, the revenant tensed and then leapt, flying through the air while swinging a blade wreathed in black flame. He watched in slow motion as the sword's edge swung closer and closer to Ulren's head... closer... and... stopped. The revenant was left hanging in midair, with Ulren spinning to face him while letting out a ridiculous squeak and almost falling backwards. Clearly, it had been some sort of pre-programmed trigger and not the man's reflexes. That was bad news.

Also bad news, Ulren was holding the key. He couldn't be allowed to use it, but the revenant didn't have a lot of options. With time nearly frozen, and Ulren able to move freely, it seemed likely that he was going to die. Would he come back to life again? He wasn't so sure. It would be harder this time, since it possible his mind and soul would become lost before they could be contained. There was also the question of whether or not anyone could recover his body, in this place.

Screw it, he thought, and detonated the black flame blade.

It was a terrible ability, one that was only useful if you were going to die anyway or really really trusted your armor. The metal of the blade fractured and split open, unleashing a flood of burning shadows. They moved like molasses, but that was only because of the temporal field he was caught in. Ulren stepped back, watching the unfolding fireball as it grew, and then seemed to come to a decision and just... left.

The revenant collapsed to the ground, surrounded by cold flame that made his skin peel and warped parts of his armor. It subsided quickly, though, and he drank a potion as he began pulling away some of the more damaged pieces of his armor. He could go get replacement parts from the Assembly Forge, but... no. There was no reason to not wear the good stuff. He would don the armor of the Savior of Brinkmar that he'd stashed away, find Ulren and pry that key out of his hands, then get the sword and... prepare to use it.

It wasn't a job he wanted. But it was his duty.

He needed to be ready to kill Calliope.

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