Death was not the end.
I knew because I was still aware. My last memory had been heat, the blinding crack of metal against flesh, and then—nothing. No pain now, no heartbeat, no lungs dragging for air. Only stillness, a velvet-black quiet that stretched in all directions.
And then, something spoke.
"You died unremarkably," said a voice, neither male nor female, neither near nor far. It vibrated through the void like a note struck on glass. "And yet, I'm… bored. So, here we are."
I blinked—or thought I did. For the first time, there was form: a figure, shapeless at first, then slowly folding into the vague outline of a man. Its face was a blur, like oil sliding across water, but the grin was sharp and precise.
A R.O.B. A Random Omnipotent Being. I'd read this trope before, tucked away in forums and fanfiction. But now, standing before the embodiment of one, I felt the surreal weight of it.
"You get three wishes," the entity said, like it was handing out candy. "Be imaginative. I despise dullness."
My mind reeled. Panic fought with a spark of excitement. Wishes—actual wishes. Three, not one. Enough to twist fate into something… extraordinary. And before doubt could smother me, the answer rose clear.
"I want to reincarnate in the world of Elden Ring. With my memories intact."
The grin widened, impossibly. "A brutal choice. Most die screaming there, eaten by madness, or gods, or each other. Interesting."
"Second," I said, finding strength in the rhythm of my own voice, "I want unlimited potential for growth. No ceiling on my level. No stat too far out of reach."
The R.O.B. hummed, eyes like shattered constellations. "Ambition without end. I like it."
"And third—" I swallowed. "Quick regeneration. Health and focus. Near immortality. Not invincible, but… unrelenting."
A low laugh echoed through the void, curling around me like smoke. "A soul that cannot stop climbing. A will that will not die. Very well. I grant it."
The figure reached out. A hand—or the idea of one—pressed against my chest. My heart, long still, lurched awake with a thundering beat.
—
He woke on cold stone.
The air was damp, flavored with mildew and old blood. Darkness pressed close, broken only by shafts of ghostly light spilling from cracks above. He sat up, wincing as sensation returned—every limb tingling, as though stitched back together.
His hands were his. Human. Calloused, but ordinary. His body lean, muscle enough to move but nothing beyond what training could bring. No sudden monstrous strength, no divine glow. He was a man.
And yet… not.
His veins thrummed with energy, an inexhaustible current. He drew in a breath and felt it: the silent fountain of stamina beneath his ribs, the well of health sealed against loss, the pool of clarity where thoughts sharpened into focus.
The HUD of memory, once just pixels, now breathed inside him. Improved by the power of a god. Fortunately not borrowed, but given permanently.
The chapel lay open and ruined. The great doors loomed tall, their wood swollen with age and moss. Against the southern wall slumped a lifeless figure: the body of a maiden, her robes stained, her head bowed as though in prayer.
Blood pooled dark beneath her, long dried.
Etched at the base of her corpse, words barely legible lay beneath the dirt and lichen:
"Though the path be broken and uncertain, claim your place as Elden Lord."
He read the words twice, the silence pressing in around him. Broken. Uncertain. Yet forward, always.
The chapel door groaned as he pushed it open, wood swollen with centuries of damp. Beyond lay pale moonlight spilling across flagstone, a courtyard stripped of warmth. Vines crawled like veins along the walls, and ruined arches framed the stars.
He stepped out.
The air outside was sharper, tinged with salt. In the distance he could hear it—the slow, endless crash of waves against rock. He knew this place. The Chapel of Anticipation. But now, not as pixels on a monitor, but stone and wind and water. Every detail was sharper, crueler.
The familiar platforms stretched before him, narrow and precarious, hanging over a void that smelled of brine. His breath fogged faintly in the chill as he crossed, feet scraping against worn stone.
It was the same, and it wasn't. The game had given him a camera's distance, a birds-eye vantage. But here? Here the walls loomed, the sky bled silver, and every step carried weight. He could hear the faint whisper of his heartbeat, steady, unyielding.
At the end of the bridge, the grand arena yawned open: a circular platform of pale stone, blackened and cracked with age. And there, waiting in the moonlight, was his executioner.
The Grafted Scion.
It did not idle like a hand-animated digital creature. No. It breathed. Its many arms twitched and flexed, fingers like hooked talons scraping against its blades. Each stolen limb rippled with muscle, stitched grotesquely into its bloated frame. Its head turned slowly toward him, and in the hollow pits of its eyes, he felt a predator's attention fix like a nail.
The sound it made was not a roar, not yet. It was a rasp—like metal dragged across bone. A shiver crawled down his spine.
In the game, the Scion had been a trial you were meant to lose. A punishment that was disguised as a lesson. But here? Its presence pressed down on him like a storm front. Real. Its weight, its stench of rot and iron, its impossible mass of bodies moving with hideous grace.
His instincts screamed to run.
But the shimmering current in his veins whispered otherwise. Health, focus—they churned within him like molten ore, quick to repair, eager to be spent. His hands clenched. He felt… infinite. Fragile still, but infinite. He realised it was only an illusion soon enough.
The Scion shifted. The arena quaked as its many legs carried it forward, blade-arms raised in a grotesque parody of nobility. It let out a howl now, deep and jagged, echoing across the cliffs.
"Alright," he whispered, voice small against the sea wind.
The Scion moved first.
A blur of steel and flesh, its many arms slashed downward in a storm of blades. He barely had time to throw himself sideways. Steel screamed against stone where he'd stood, shards of the ground spraying outward like shrapnel.
Fast. Too fast for something that size.
He scrambled to his feet, chest heaving. His heart was already hammering. The monster loomed, and stepped forward again with grotesque elegance.
The second strike came low, sweeping. He tried to jump back—too slow. The edge tore across his thigh.
Agony. White-hot and immediate. He screamed as blood sprayed, his leg giving out beneath him.
But as he fell, he felt it: the wound knitting. Muscle crawling back together, bone reweaving itself, veins finding purchase. In seconds the bleeding slowed, the pain lingering like a phantom even as strength returned.
His breath was ragged. He pushed himself upright, leg whole again. He gasped for breath.
The Scion laughed. A jagged, broken noise, half roar, half grinding steel.
It lunged.
This time, its blades punched through his chest. He felt ribs snap like twigs. Felt steel pierce lung, pierce heart. Hot blood filled his throat. He choked, gurgled, saw stars.
Then—healed. His chest sucked inward, pulling steel free, skin knitting over splintered bone. He collapsed forward, coughing, gasping, spitting blood onto the pale stone.
The pain didn't fade. He still felt the cracking, the tearing, every inch of himself raw and screaming. His body fixed itself, yes—but it was like his nerves still remembered.
The Scion didn't wait. Another arm swept down. He rolled, clumsy, his still-healing ribs shrieking with protest. Steel bit into his shoulder instead, nearly taking the arm clean off.
He howled, voice hoarse. Then staggered back, clutching the limb as it reattached, tendons pulling taut beneath his skin like puppet strings.
The monster pressed, relentless. A storm of blades came crashing, a tidal wave of steel. He dodged what he could, bled when he couldn't, and every time he fell he stood again, trembling, broken, reformed.
Minutes passed. An eternity. He lost count of how many times he died in all but name.
But with each time he was brought back from the edge by his speedy healing, something shifted.
At first, his swings—wild, desperate punches and kicks—barely registered. But pain had a way of teaching. Slowly, he began to time his movements. Duck under the wide arcs. Step in close when it overextended. Slam his fist into soft flesh beneath the mass of limbs.
He felt stamina burning, draining, refilling in a heartbeat. Every dodge, every strike, every ragged breath—the fountain inside him poured endlessly.
And with each exchange, he noticed: the Scion bled. Thin lines at first, trickles of ichor from beneath its stitched skin. His blows did almost nothing compared to this… thing's, but they added up.
The beast shrieked, more furious now, its weight behind every swing. But his body refused to stay down. Ribs shattered, lungs burst, skull cracked—he kept coming. Again. Again. Again.
His knuckles split open from punching steel, then healed before the next blow landed. His face was a mask of blood, but behind it his eyes burned.
For the first time, the Grafted Scion hesitated.
It wasn't winning.
He staggered upright once more, chest heaving, every nerve alight with torment. His fists shook, his legs unsteady.
The Scion lunged again, a hurricane of arms and steel. He ducked low, rolled under the sweeping blade, felt it slice his back open to the spine—then felt it close again before he even hit the ground.
The pain was blinding. He tasted copper, his vision swimming. But his body kept moving.
Instinct now. Rage. Desperation.
He surged forward, into the monster's reach. A risk no sane fighter would take. But he wasn't sane anymore. He couldn't be—not with the pain, not with the endless second chances.
His fist slammed into its torso—once, twice, again. Fingers clawed at muscle, tearing at the stitches that bound its stolen limbs. The flesh was soft beneath the layers of steel. It screamed, and for the first time its steps faltered.
Hope sparked.
Another blade came down, split his skull in two. For a breathless second there was nothing but darkness—then light, nerves stitching together, bone knitting back, his consciousness clawing its way up through the abyss.
He gasped back into being, laughter bubbling through blood.
The Scion reeled, confused by its failure to kill what should not live.
He pressed in, reckless. Every strike was agony. His bones shattered with each blow of its blades, but they reformed as fast as they broke. His muscles tore, then sealed. His lungs filled, collapsed, and filled again. He fought through it all, each moment a crucifixion.
And slowly, impossibly, he began to win.
Its stolen limbs sagged under his assault. Its stitched seams burst open, ichor pouring in black rivulets. He tore one grafted arm free with his bare hands, screaming as his shoulder was cut clean through in the same instant—then reformed as the limb dropped twitching to the stone.
The monster bellowed, stumbling back. Its elegance was gone. Its storm of blades grew ragged, sloppy, desperate.
He saw it. The opening.
With every last ounce of strength, he surged forward, taking the hilt of one of its swords. His hands blistered, skin peeling from the heat of raw strain, then healing again, over and over as he swung in desperation.
The blade cut through in a spray of gore. The Scion shrieked.
He didn't stop. He swung—wild, untrained, but fueled by rage and an infinite well of stamina. Steel bit deep into its torso, carving through flesh and stolen bone. Again. Again. Again. Each strike costing him a wound, but they all sealed before it could slow him.
He became relentless. A storm of flesh answering a storm of blades.
And at last, with a final, furious howl, he drove the stolen sword through the Scion's chest, pinning it to the cracked stone floor.
The beast convulsed. Arms flailed weakly, clawing at the air. Its scream tore across the sea cliffs, a sound of hatred and disbelief. Then silence.
It collapsed, body sagging against the pale stone, black ichor spreading like a halo around it.
He staggered back, chest heaving, hands trembling. Every inch of him was soaked in blood—its, his, both. His body was whole, but his nerves still sang with memory: broken ribs, punctured lungs, skull split in half.
He dropped to his knees, gasping. The stolen sword clattered from his hand.
And for the first time since waking in this world, he laughed. A broken, breathless laugh.
"I… won," he whispered.
The Grafted Scion lay still at last. Its grotesque body sagged, the grafted limbs slack and twitchless, ichor pooling across the pale stone.
From the corpse rose faint golden wisps, drifting upward like embers carried by a slow wind. They moved toward him, ignoring the salt breeze tearing across the cliff. The first touched his skin, and warmth seeped inward—not pain, but a quiet weight, settling into bone and blood.
Runes.
He recognized them instantly, though here they felt nothing like numbers on a screen. These were remnants of souls, fragments of life stripped from the Tarnished this thing had devoured over uncounted nights. They sank into him like coins dropped into a bottomless well. No sudden power surged through him—and without a maiden to channel them, they remained inert. Potential without voice.
Still, their presence pressed inside him. A treasure waiting to be claimed.
At the Scion's side gleamed two relics, lying amid its cooling ichor as though spat out by its death.
The first, an elegant blade: the Ornamental Straight Sword, its silvered edge catching the moonlight. Despite the battle, its surface was unmarred, as though untouched by time. He lifted it carefully, surprised at the balance, the simple beauty. A weapon meant for grace as much as killing.
Beside it, the Golden Beast Crest Shield. Its gilded face bore the stylized form of a great beast, regal and proud, the gold inlay dim but not dulled. Heavy in his grip, but solid—a shield that spoke of lineage, of old vows sworn.
He tested them.
The sword felt awkward in his hand. Too light at first, but the moment he swung it, the truth set in: the blade almost resisted him. His arms lacked the trained precision the weapon demanded. The edge wavered while swinging, he dragged himself off balance by accident, it was as if the sword was mocking his lack of finesse. His body had strength, yes, but not the grace this sword expected.
He raised the shield next. Its weight sank deep into his arm, dragging his shoulder low. He tried to brace it before him, but the heft pulled him sideways, causing his stance to falter. His body screamed that it wasn't ready. He could lift it, yes—but not truly wield it as a defense as one should be able to. Not yet.
He held both at his sides, chest heaving softly, his frustration tempered by reality. These were treasures, but not his weapons—not now. His body was still raw, unshaped, without mastery.
"Too weak," he muttered under his breath, the words tasting bitter.
For now, they were symbols. Promises of what he could grow into. His potential is wide open.
The sea stretched below the chapel like a mouth. Black waves rolled against jagged rock, frothing white where they struck. The rope bridge that once spanned the gap dangled uselessly, snapped and swayed in the wind. No bridge was there to the mainland. No way forward—save down.
He approached the ledge slowly, feet scraping grit over the stone. The drop was not some invisible loading screen here; it was real, dizzying, cruel. His stomach turned as he peered over. The cliffside vanished into a chaos of surf and shadow. A fall like this would pulp a body, dash bone into gravel, scatter blood across the tide.
The idea of jumping clawed at his nerves. Regeneration or not, he remembered the Scion's blades—the pain, the deaths. The thought of reliving every shattered rib, every torn sinew, made his breath falter.
But there was no path. No other choice.
His hand tightened around the sword's hilt, though he couldn't wield it properly. Not yet. He gritted his teeth and laughed once, bitter and low. "Reincarnated… and I still have to throw myself off a cliff."
The wind howled, carrying salt spray to his lips. He stepped back, gave the abyss one last look, and then ran forward before his body could rebel.
The world dropped away.