Champion From Hell

Chapter 1: Beginning of the End

Surrounded in a thick black smoke, screams echoing around, quick flashes of fire hidden behind the close layers of smoke, disorienting and confusing, in the centre of this confusion stands a young man in faded black and polished silver armour, his sword held aloft, as a blue spectral smoke eminates out of the blade, piercing through the smoke it touches, deep panicked breaths shooting from his lungs, the smoke continuing to erratically swirl through this void, the man swinging wildly through the darkness to slash at anything he could get purchase to, his slashes becoming slow and tired with each swing, the spectral energy fading, the smoke enveloping more and more of his tiring body, there was only a matter of time left before he came to his seemingly inevitable fate. Through the screams echod a shrill piercing voice, the booming tone send shivers down the man's back.

"They never sent you here to defeat me, they never sent you to return back a hero, they sent you here to die, a sacrifice to save themselves, you were nothing more than a sacrificial lamb to my slaughter, they had no belief in you, you are not the first, and you shall not be the last"

Bellowed the almost demonic voice, it's deep tone seeming so familiar, yet like a stranger's, it was never going to be stopped, it had no difficulty in its fighting.

"It would be foolish to keep fighting, give up, face the inevitable."

As this voice became angrier at the man's persistence, the black smoke behind the man formed into a unnatural spike, it raised high, just enough for the man to notice, as he turned the spike shot down, straight through his breastplate, the force buckling the armour, twisting through the finely detailed metal as if it were nothing but air, the pain staggering from the wound, bringing the adventurer down to his knees, gasping for air. His sword dropped beside him, the spectral energy fading back down the blade and toward the hilt, he clutched at the spike, his hands fading into its shadowy figure, with a deep dismissive laugh, the darkness wrenched itself from within the man, pulling blood out with it, letting the crimson flow pour down his armour, staining the polished silver plate he prided himself on.

"You really thought you could defeat me? Your blades are weak compared to me. This is where your story ends, in a mountain, sent in as an offering from the people of the nearby town, how pathetic, that this is the great end to Gabriel Stone's heroic journey."

His vision began to blur and darken, he began to feel weak as he fell from his knees, landing hard on his side, watching the dark swirling void around him begin to dissipate, his last push to twist himself to his back took his final effort from him, he stared upward through the remaining smoke and up to the rocks above him, his breathing becoming difficult and short.
Footsteps began approaching him, as he tilted his head towards the sound, he witnessed the smoke all fading toward the source, appearing as the smoke swirled together, building up a soft blonde man in finely made dark clothing, creating him from the sharp rock ground up.
As he formed he moved to above Garbiel's body, the face being the last to form from the black smoke, began smirking as he watched the light drain from behind Gabriel's eyes, the smoke was continuing to absorb into him, through his bare skin as if nothing were out of place, the man leaned over as his hair bounced down with him, a casual stance as he looked down into Gabriel's filling pool of blood, amusment of his face reflected in the clean red puddle now surrounding his shoes.

"You didn't have to come here you know, you could have ignored their requests, left while you still had the chance, and yet you fought for them, you risked your life for them, and look where it got you, bleeding out onto the cold hard stone at my feet"

One final laugh to himself as he walked back through the mountain and out of sight, leaving Gabriel to die in his own blood, his sword fading by his side, as the cave grew cold and lonely, his vision faded, the darkness was all he was left with, his passing was inevitable, the afterlife was set for him.