From somewhere beyond the stitched seams of dimensions, Hel, the Goddess of Death, stood quietly in the center of an old graveyard, her small frame draped in regal black as moonlight pooled around her bare feet like liquid silver. The headstones leaned inward toward her as if in reverence, and the air itself trembled under the weight of her presence. “Another fate has reached its final breath,” Hel whispered, eyes soft as she gazed into nothing—and everything. “The thread has already been cut… even before the hand ever fell.” The earth beneath her stirred as a rift split the night open, a veil of blue-black light tearing through the air with a sound like distant wind chimes carried through water.

From the portal emerged the Banshee first, floating rather than walking, her veil-like hair drifting around her pale face as sorrow leaked from her glowing silver eyes. Behind her stepped Kaelra Mortavia, Hel’s apprentice, moving with her usual silent grace as her shadowed cloak swayed like funeral smoke. Between them lay the young hiker, his body cradled in the Banshee’s arms like a sleeping child. The Banshee lowered herself before Hel and bowed deeply. “My goddess… his song ended in fear,” she murmured, voice trembling like wind through broken glass. “He ran until his heart gave out… and still he called for his mother.” Kaelra knelt as well, resting one hand over her chest. “The soul did not resist,” she added gently. “He let go when I touched the veil of his breath. His spirit followed quietly.” Hel stepped forward, knelt beside the young man, and brushed a glowing fingertip across his forehead. The tension vanished from his face. “Poor child… you were tired,” she whispered with compassion, then looked up at the two before her with a faint, warm smile. “You’ve done well. Rest, both of you… the night grows heavy.”

The hiker’s eyes slowly opened to a sky of unfamiliar stars as Hel’s gaze met his. “Do not be afraid,” she said softly, her voice warm like a hearth in winter. “You have already crossed the hardest part.” He struggled to speak, his voice fragile. “Am I… dead?” Hel nodded slowly, brushing away the fear from his face like dust. “Yes. But you are not gone.” The Banshee’s mourning cry softened into a lullaby as she leaned closer, tears dripping into glowing motes before touching the ground. Kaelra stepped beside him and spoke low and kind, “You may walk onward into the afterlife… or you may remain and rise with us. Not as you were, but as something new. Loved still. Remembered always.” Hel extended her hand, glowing faintly with promise and mourning intertwined. “Choose, little one—rest in the light beyond, or walk beside death, unharmed by it ever again.” The graveyard held its breath, and even the wind waited, as the boy looked between the Goddess, the grieving herald, and the quiet reaper who would never age—standing on the edge of eternity, finally no longer alone.