There were once three brothers who were driving along a lonely, winding road at twilight.
In time, the brothers reached a river too deep to wade through and too dangerous to swim across. However, these brothers were very technically skilled, and so they simply used the weapons in their car to cut down branches and make a bridge. They were halfway across it when they found their path blocked by a shriveled old man dressed all in black, leaning on a cane.
And Death spoke to them. He was angry that he had been cheated out of three new victims, for travelers usually drowned in the river. But Death was cunning. He pretended to congratulate the three brothers upon their skills, and said that each had earned a prize for having been clever enough to evade him.
So the oldest brother, a power-hungry angel of the Lord, asked for the strength of a god, so that he would be more powerful than even Death. Death told him how to harness the power of the souls in Purgatory, and how to use it to give him the strength of God himself.
Then the second brother, who was an arrogant man, decided that he wanted to humiliate Death still further, and asked for the power to recall others from Death. So Death brought forth a woman with red eyes, and told the brother that, if he kissed her, she would be required to bring back from the dead any one soul he desired.
And then Death asked the third and youngest brother what he would like. The youngest brother was the humblest and also the wisest of the brothers, and he did not trust Death. He asked simply that Death not follow him. Death, most unwillingly, agreed to stay away.
Then Death stood aside and allowed the three brothers to continue on their way and they did so, talking with wonder of the adventure they had had.
In due course the brothers separated, each for his own destination.
The first brother travelled to Heaven, and used his newfound power to slaughter multitudes of his own kind. Leaving the bodies of his enemies scattered all over the ground, the oldest brother went back down to Earth, where he boasted loudly of the power he now harnessed, and called himself God.
However, Death had not fully explained to the oldest brother what the souls of Purgatory were capable of. Eventually, the angel's vessel began to melt, as the Leviathans he had swallowed tried harder and harder to escape from him. One night, the oldest brother used the last of his strength to wade into a reservoir, where he exploded, unleashing the Leviathans on an unsuspecting world.
And so Death took the first brother for his own.
Meanwhile, the second brother asked the red-eyed woman to bring back his youngest brother, who had been stabbed to death a short time before. To his amazement and delight, the young boy appeared at once before him.
However, Death had not told the second brother that the red-eyed woman was a crossroads demon and that, by bringing back a dead soul, he had traded in his own. One year later, when his time came, the second brother was attacked by the demon's hellhounds, which ripped him apart and dragged his soul down to Hell.
And so Death took the second brother for his own.
But though Death searched for the third brother for many years, he was never able to find him. It was only when he was actually ready to die that the youngest brother finally came to Death at his own will. He sat down next to Death by a roaring fire, and Death congratulated him, this time with the utmost sincerity, on the things he had achieved throughout his long life. They greeted each other as old friends, and the third brother went with him gladly, departing this life as Death's equal.