Chapter 1: The Sackman Cometh
He was a simple man, with simple needs.
That was all John ever wanted. A simple, unsophisticated life filled with all the simple pleasures of life. Food, drink, friendship, love, and all the similar things. Why bother with all the complicated economics, business and politics when you can just sit back, relax and enjoy life as it is? There's no use crying over spilled milk. And that's what John taught himself to believe:
Always look on the bright side of life. After all, being made an orphan and thankfully adopted by some sympathetic folks at a nearby village doesn't allow you to desire much.
It was a fairly uneventful day for the people of the town of Arden. Picking grain, harvesting crops, planting new ones, cutting down trees to make space for agriculture, metalworking, raising barns, and the likes of it. Well, it would be another day, if it weren't for a mysterious being, emerging from the forest, infiltrated into the town and began to wreak havoc. Even after it has been driven away, the people still speak fear of it. It was...unnaturally tall, with long, branch-like fingers decorated with razor-sharp talons at each tip, it's legs not different from that of a goat, hooves and all. The most defining feature of all was, in fact, a pair of elongated, curving horns emerging from the edge of its forehead, almost reminiscent of...a devil. Its eyes shone red in low-light conditions, filled and tempered with absolute hatred of all sentient life. Its rough, leather-like skin was a color of pale undeath, sending shivers upon the spines of those who witness it. But fret not, as their spines would soon be removed by the beast anyway.
But before the beast makes its escape, it manages to get two last slaughters at a nearby farmhouse. Once the carnage was done, the beast simply...leaves, seemingly having enough blood for the day. Even if it the thing doesn't want to, it will have to eventually, as the people was absolutely furious, brandishing their torches, pitchforks, shovels, and whatever tools they can get their hands on that can be used as an improvised weapon. The villagers bursted inside the residence...only to find copious amounts of blood slathered across the wooden mahogany walls, signifying that rather brutal killings happened here. The angry mob become considerably less angry, and more concerned to whether or not the tenants survived. Their steps slowed down, as they approach the room that the blood seems to run from...and was greeted with a horrible sight as the creeking of the ruined door was heard.
Two mangled corpses, barely recognizable and mutilated beyond any hope of saving was lying around a baby crib. Though difficult, but the villagers managed to see who is the mother and father.
The mother, still dressed in her sunny waistcoat and brown petticoat, the latter which was torn to pieces, was missing her left arm and right leg, fresh ichor still spurting out of the stump like a miniature fountain. A horizontal cut ran across her throat, confirming her death. Her once fair skin was now an undeathly pallor, as white as snow. Her beautiful face has frozen up in horror, as her blue eyes stared into the distance.
The father, however, was in far worse condition. He appears to have been eviscerated, his entrails spilling out like a mass of fleshy ropes, followed by an exorbitant amount of blood, as expected from such a grievous injury. The entire upper half of his head has been cleanly bitten off, leaving behind a slacking lower jaw and tongue, exposing the spinal cross-section and throat. His right hand was still holding tightly onto an axe, courtesy of rigor mortis, so it is likely he didn't went out without a fight. His overalls was stained with just as much blood from the creature as it was from him. Both of his tibia bones has been ripped out, crippling the corpse.
However, miraculously enough, the infant inside the crib was virtually untouched by the beast, for unknown reasons. Did the beast possess a humanity and would not stoop as low as to murder a defenseless baby, or did it simply did not see the infant? The villagers mostly suggest the latter choice.
Unlike most babies in this kind of situation, this one was quiet. Very quiet. Despite his parents having just been slaughtered in the visceral fashion, he did not seem to be the least bothered. His baby blue eyes was staring at whoever that is looking at him with utmost concentration and curiosity, to an almost uncanny degree. After rescuing the child and giving the unfortunate couple a proper funeral and burial, the villagers discussed in the town hall to decide who would raise the child. While many people refused, claiming the child is cursed for surviving such an encounter, while others responded with the fact that they were already struggling to provide for themselves and their families, and simply could not afford to take care of another mouth to feed. Finally, after much debate, a widowed mother and her daughter come up and readily adopt the child, despite the protests from others claiming the child to be, ridiculously enough, witch-spawn. As the child's name was never known, the woman came up with an appropriate name for him, for God was gracious for giving her this sweet boy.
He was to be called John. Without a last name, though, but that's a story for later.
As time waits for no one, 17 years passed by like the wind, and John is all grown up by now.
Rock-solid, sinewy biceps formed from years of lifting haystacks, shoveling payloads of dirt and tilling the fields with a hoe, abs that looked like they were sculpted by the finest ancient Greek architects, powerful calves reinforced by pushing heavy furniture for the rich nobles, who payed him little in return. Oh well, then he would just push said furniture out of the windows if they didn't live up to their promise. What can they do, intimidate him with those flabby folds and noodle arms?
A single vertical scar (which he received from a childhood accident) decorated his youthful, stone-cold face, which is further accentuated by a chiseled facial musculature, sharp chin and some hints of a pair of killer sideburns. His skin was a light tan, due to all the time he spend outside the hot, burning sun. His hair was light brown, kept in a simple, spikey mess that makes the whole mass of hair almost looked like a porcupine.
And finally, standing at a mountainous 6 foot 4, he's quite the buff lad for his mere age of 17.
Of course, these features make him very popular with the ladies in town, as many has attempted to sway him to their bountiful busoms and larger-than-life posteriors, all concealed over a thin layer of fabric. Not that John ever cared though, he was too busy helping his family to even pay a sideway glance.
John was currently taking care of his mother's lavenders, meticulously pruning their excess branches while trying his best to avoid accidentally snipping off the petals. Speaking of his mother...she was coming from behind him now, intending to surprise her adoptive son.
Penelope was quite the beauty, with a long, flowing white hair that is tied into a humble bun, and fair skin that, for reasons unknown to the many women in town, remain untainted by the sunlight beating down on the earth. Her figure, while not the most voluptious, is still very much curvy and smooth, which makes it even more of a surprise once you learn that she is actually in her 40s. With a not-so-modest pair of breasts and packing quite the package in the ass department, John has to constantly dissuade (in essence, beating the crap out of them) other townsfolk from flirting too much with his mother, which just help fueling the fire that is John's supposed Oedipus syndrome, much to his chagrin. She always wore the same homely light yellow dress with a white (having long since gone grey) apron draped over it, and Mary Janes on her feet. Even though John kept telling his mother to let him buy new clothes for her, she kindly denied nonetheless.
As John was pruning away the plant, she leaned forward and pressed her mammaries upon his back with a joyful smile, causing the young man to shot his arms up and nearly throw her over his back. However, he recognized that same feeling of her breasts everywhere, so he just looked at his mother with a pair of tired eyes.
"Mum, not now. I'm busy takin' care of the lavenders here. It's a delicate job." Said a bored John, dropping the pruning shears to hug his mother's busom. Penelope giggled like she was a teenager once again and hugged her adoptive son in return too.
"Oh, John, you hard-working boy. It's almost lunch, why don't you come in for the meal? The lavenders can wait, you know. The bacon pies can't." Penelope showcased her sense of humor, prompting a small, dry laugh from John. Getting up and dusting the branches off of his overalls, he walked inside, with his mother pulling his right arm.
"Has sis returned yet?" John offhandedly mentions his sister, who he hasn't seen for 3 years already. "Wonderin' if she even remember us."
"Oh, you know Nadia, she's a busy girl. But I'm sure she's out there, doing her best to give our little home a stable roof." Penelope helped calm her son's doubts. "Now, instead of focusing too much on such things, why don't we have a meal?" The white-haired mother gave her son a warm smile.
Grinning back, John sits down the table.
A couple of bites later...
After finishing his mother's world-famous bacon pies, he did a stereotypical chef's kiss to her, making the mature beauty red-faced for a bit, before returning to the garden to continue pruning the rest of the lavenders. Humming happily, John was content with the life he is living. Just some farming and gardening with his beautiful mother, surrounded by helpful townspeople and getting to enjoy her bacon pies.
But woe betide him, as fate seems to have other plans for him. One he never would expect in a million years...
Several cloaked figures approached him from the town entrance. They were all wearing obscuring, elegant sangria-purple cloak and hoodie, with golden-yellow touches on the outlines. Metallic clinks and clacks can be heard as the figures are walking towards John, as if they were carrying something. Something that cannot be not for inflicting pain. The people saw them, and immediately stay out of the way, rushing inside their homes and closing the doors and windows shut. Children stopped frolicking around and rushed towards their parents' embrace too. The feeling of something bad about to happen is so palpable that you can cut it with a butter knife. And the sudden silence only helped further bolstering the sense of dread.
Their footsteps are so slow, yet so deafening at the same time.
Thump. Thump. Thump.
John, who was preparing to taking care of the weeds in the garden with a sickle, noticed them. Raising an eyebrow in confusion, he stood up and walked towards the cloaked figures, sickle still in his hand.
"What can I help ya folks with? Make it quick, gotta take care of the weeds." John crossed his arms, adopting a stance that tells everyone he's not tolerating any kind of tomfoolery. Not that it helped shunning the cloaked individuals away.
"Are you the one they called John?" A voice called out from the seven figures. A female one, with a noticeably cold tone to it.
That make the young man quite...uneasy. "...Yes? How do ya know my name? And for what?" His grip on the sickle tightened. A weird feeling on his back is telling him should run. Run as fast as he can, and never look back.
But John is no coward. So he stood his ground.
A terrible mistake.
"Oh, nothing much." A gruff, male voice rang out. He walked right up to John, his right arm went inside his cloak, as if to grab something. "It's just..." The male figure looked up, his hoodie slightly fell back, revealing a cruel grin and a bearded chin. His right arm seems to have find its desired object, and out came a blade made entirely from light, swinging towards John's face.
John's survival instincts kicked in for a second, and he dodged it, the blade very narrowly misses his chin, as he fell on his ass, hyperventilating. To be fair, anyone would be too if they had just avoided getting their face cleaved in half. Not to mention, by a weapon made of, literally, hard light. How the hell such a weapon exist?!
John didn't even get a moment to gather his nerves together, as the female from before rushed forward as well and thrusts her light spear at the young man's torso. Once again, he narrowly dodged it, but the spear manage to sever his left Achilles tendon, causing a searing pain to explode inside his system and disabling the afflicted leg. "AAARGGH!"
As his heel bleeds heavily and his mobility crippled, John's mind was in red alert right now. He desperately screamed out. "Why?! WHY ARE YOU DOING THIS?" John yelled in pained indignation, truly confused as to why complete strangers are trying to kill him.
"Normally, we wouldn't reveal such details to our prey..." Another woman in the group stepped up, her right hand running down her chest seductively, outlining her considerably-sized pair of milk jugs.
"But considering you are going to perish, we might as well does so as your last wish." Another man joined the woman, finishing off her sentence. "Let's just say...our leader wished to see you dead. He has a...vision, so to say, that you will prove to be a thorn in our side in the future. So he decided to destroy the seed before it can grow." The man then broke into a fit of laughter. However, unlike most laughs, his was meant to mock at the poor human who was at their mercy at the moment.
"But why? I didn't do crap to your leader or whatever!" John raised his voice at the cloaked figures again, this time in anger rather than confusion. "Just leave us alone!"
"My apologies, but orders are orders. To be fair with you, I'll much rather do something else right now than wasting time conversing with a worthless human like you. Like this..." The woman then hungrily grabbed the man's crotch, prompting an aroused grunt from him.
The wounded young man merely winced in disgust, before he is kicked in the face by the light spear-wielding woman, who was now sneering condescendingly at him. "Enough of this fruitless talk. Let's get to the...main course, shall we?" That being said, the woman softly caresses her light spear with an almost sadomasochistic feel to it, her fingers dancing around the thing like it was, lack of a better word, a dick.
John, feeling his death fast approaching, called out to them. "Fine! You can kill me or whatever...but leave my family alone!" That statement make the woman's eyes lit up with cruelty.
"Oh...caring for someone, I see? Don't worry, as long as they didn't witness it, we would have no problem with them..." The spear-wielding woman leaned down to a crawling John and mockingly kissed his forehead, causing him to recoil out of sheer disdain.
But then, as if life truly was messing with him right now, his mother ran out the door, her face betrayed her feelings of worry and fear.
"John! What happened?! I heard your scream, I thought something bad happened-" Penelope's sentence was cut off completely as she saw her beloved son, bleeding on the ground and surrounded by cloaked figures. She slowly brought her hand to cup her mouth in abject horror.
The spear-wielder said nothing, and simply gave John a sadistic grin. John's blue eyes widened in realization, and he desperately limp towards his statue of a mother and shot out his hand. "MUM, RUUUNN!" John yelled out at the top of his lungs...
But it was late. Too late. As soon as the words left his mouth, the spear-wielding woman wordlessly motioned the other members to attack with a sway of her head. In a flash, two cloaked figures rushed at Penelope with such absurd speed John finds it impossible to even follow them with his eyes. And with the same speed, the two figures stabbed Penelope, one light spear through her chest from the front, and another one through her stomach, from the back. John's poor mother didn't even have the moment to register the strike or even bid her last goodbyes to her crippled son before the light leave her eyes, and her body was allowed to drop unceremoniously on the lavenders that she loved so much, blood flowing out of her wounds. Her hopeful green eyes are now much duller and the crimson liquid stained her apron.
John was open-mouthed in horror, as grief comes crashing in huge waves of tears. A drop, then another one, fell down his cheeks. His loving mother...died before him, and he was completely powerless to stop it from happening. He thumped his fist in futile rage.
As he silently weep, the figures were preparing their respective weapons to finish off what they have started. The big-breasted woman whip out her own light spear, with much more intricate details, while the man just sports an impossibly long sword made entirely from light.
However, what they didn't know, was that they triggered something else within the usually mild-mannered John. Not sadness. Not anguish.
ANGER.
Pure, unrelenting, unbridled rage and hatred swells upon enormously inside the 17-year-old's soul. The sense of grief gets washed away like dust in the wind.
His muscles bulged...
Jaws clenched...
Left grip on sickle tightened...
"You...fucking..." John was positively shaking with anger. His face was contorted with permanent fury.
The spear-wielding woman, who he assumed to be the captain of these figures, turned around. "Ooh?"
"BITCH!" And with that, John uses all of his strength to pounce towards the woman and swings the sickle towards her body as hard as he can, driving the blade into her collarbone and creates a long vertical slit as he fell down. The attack was filled with every sense of the word 'hatred', and the other figures know that, as they were surprised by the sheer amount of guts this mortal has, daring to try something like this and even wounding one of them.
The woman, however, merely break into a wicked cackle. "I should have known...you would try something like this." Despite having a sickle in her collarbone, she doesn't seem to be anything other than slightly annoyed. As if the attack didn't even affect her at all. Still, John persisted, still having the blade inside her flesh.
"But I must say...you have some balls for such a disgusting little insect, drawing blood from me." The woman's hand shot out and grab John by the throat, and lift his entire body up with little difficulty. The young man squirmed as vigorously as possible, but he just couldn't budge from the woman's grip. What are these people made of?!
"W-what the...hell are ya?" John sputtered out a few words as he's getting choked.
"Curious, aren't we? Why don't you stick around..." Her light spear formed again and without hesitation, she slices off John's left arm, which was holding the sickle. He screams in agony as the limb and the bloody weapon dropped to the ground. "And find out?"
John, now missing an arm and near-death, merely gave her a glare that is glaced with venom and fire. The woman tutted in a very sexual manner, as if she was a dominatrix, disciplining her slave. Speaking of BDSM...she finally took off her cloak.
...Revealing a very mature figure, dressed in the most obscene fashion possible. Black, strap-like objects (almost resembling leather) around and under her breasts, a thong-like piece held around her hips by three thin straps, gloves that ran right up her forearms with miniature lengths of chains hanging from them, shoulder guards on her shoulders with three large spikes sprouting from her right shoulder, and black thigh-high heel boots. John was briefly thrown off by the strange and impractically-revealing choice of clothing, before the pain and anger kicks in again.
But then another thing caught his attention.
A pair of large, black-feathered wings sprawls from her back, slightly flapping around and articulate, as if they are real. Wait...they actually are. What is this woman? A seemingly human-looking woman with wings, inhumanly strong and fast, and wields a spear made from physical light. Almost as if she was...some kind of Angel.
But she couldn't be one. Angels are not like this, killing someone as innocent as his mother and acting so..overtly sadistic. Besides, her wings are black, unlike the Angels' usual pure white. This one is more like...a Fallen Angel.
"Well then...any last words, worthless human?" The winged woman flashed John a smirk, flaunting her superiority over the choking young man.
John responded with a bloodied spit to her face. "Go to Hell." His face was one of hatred.
"Don't worry..." The winged female wiped away the spit on her left cheek with a disgusted scowl. "I'll send you there soon. Don't give me that look. Blame God for making you like this." And with that final sentence, she stabbed her spear through John's abdomen. An excruciating pain ravaged his senses as the woman removed her spear and released John from her grip.
"Gh...hah...hah..." John clutches his wounds, holding in his life liquid, which was currently spilling out like a small river.
"Time to end this." The winged woman slowly walked towards the dying John, before stepping on his punctured abdomen, giving him a good view of her ass and partially-visible labia.
John gathered the last remnants of his strength and grabbed the woman's foot, lifting it up from his wound. "If I die here...I'LL HAUNT YOU! I WILL NEVER STOP, I WILL NEVER REST, UNTIL EVERY LAST ONE OF YOU ARE DEAD, BY MY OWN HANDS!" John spat out every word like it was the most vile poison, digging his nails into her calf, as blood leaked from his mouth.
"Oh? I'm looking forward to it then. Hohohohoho!" The woman laughed cruelly, before kicking John's remaining arm away and with a single sweep of her spear, slices his throat and severed his carotid artery too, thus leaving him to bleed out. John struggled on for a few more seconds, before ultimately died, his facial features still scrunched up in fury.
Swinging her spear to remove the blood, the fallen angel dispelled her weapon and walked back to the figures. "Our job here is done. Let us leave."
"Defiant till the end, eh? He's stubborn, I'll give him that." Another male voice gave his opinion.
"The line between tenacity and stupidity is ice thin, Lucius." A female voice replied to the male, now revealed to have been named Lucius.
"Still, I wonder...is this really necessary, Raynare? Must this human really die?" Lucius asked the winged woman, her name now revealed as well.
"Why don't you ask him that? As far as I'm concerned, I'm only happy to kill him because he spat at me. Other than that, nothing else. It's an order." Raynare now possess a much more neutral look than her earlier 'better-than-thou' sneer.
"True, true. But still...do you think he's serious about his threat over there? I mean, we do live in a world where the supernaturals exist." Lucius expressed his mild concern.
"Right...but I don't think so. After all, say, even if some powerful being come across him, why would they give a mere mortal like him the time of the day?"
"Well...you're not wrong." Lucius gave her a simple nod.
"Let's leave now. Lucius, can you erase the memories of the people here? I must report back to the chief." And with that, Raynare, along with the rest of the cloaked figures, unfurled their wings and took off into the sky. Lucius stayed back to perform a town-wide mind wipe.
John's body lay there, in a pool of his own blood, plagued by rage and hatred to the very end. A normal man with simple needs, demanding nothing more from life, met a brutal death. Is this the end of his story?
-0-
John felt nothing.
Where was he?
Slowly opening his eyes, the freshly-deceased young man was treated to a sight of...emptiness. Just...emptiness. An infinite black void, with huge clouds of fog surrounding the place.
And then John heard voices. Many voices.
Specifically, those of suffering. Lamentations and curses from the many souls around him filled his ears.
John looked down to his own body. It was...desecrated. The stomach wound, slit throat and left stump was still there. Anger filled his soul once again, as he furiously screamed into the heavens.
"Those fuckers..killed my mum..." John's right hand clenched into a fist. How is he going to find them? Doesn't matter. He will find them, and kill them, no matter what. Only when he killed all of them, will his mother and him be avenged.
"You seem quite irritated, mortal." A feminine voice called out to John. The human soul instantly turned back, with a very angry look on him.
"Who said that?!"
A girlish giggle erupted from somewhere, before it replies. "Me, of course." John looked to the front, and saw the source of the voice.
A teenage girl, no older than 15, with an alien, ashen-gray skin tone, mystical purple eyes and shoulder-length silver hair. She is dressed in a classy gothic-lolita fashion, with a long-sleeved black blouse and a flowing, dove grey dress with white frills running down from her waist. A small crinoline is used to hold out her skirt, giving her backside a puffy appearance. A poke bonnet covers most of her head, leaving only two bangs of silver to poke out by the sides of her flawless, delicate doll-like face. Her thin lips was curving into small smile.
"And you are?" Asked John, considerably less wrathful now. Also, he was trying to be polite to the girl who barely reached his chest.
"Oh, little old me? I am merely the overseer of this place. You can call me...Sanguis." The girl started to walk around him. "You are in Purgatory, mortal. Seems like you have died quite recently."
"And how do you know that, Sanguis?" John stepped back in suspicion.
"Calm your nerves, mortal. I meant you no harm at all. And well...the way you died is still quite visible. After some time at this place, they will fade away."
"Oh...I see." John sat down on the...uh, infinite void below him? "You must be the top dog of this place."
"I am not a dog, mortal. And besides, you must have been dead."
John tried to retort her, but decided to keep quiet.
"You are adjusting well enough for someone who just perished. But it doesn't matter...I have seen the way you died. It was...torturous, if I was to be truthful. It's clear that your mother and you don't deserve to die that way."
John looked down with a somber gaze, before looking back up, realizing something. "My mum! Is she-"
"Of course, your kind mother. Fortunately, her soul has been accepted to Heaven."
John smiled at that. At least his mother deserved something better.
"Then why am I here? Did I do something wrong in life?"
"Oh, no, it's not because you sinned or anything. It is more because...you interest me, mortal. Specifically, your soul." With that, the lolita reached into John's chest and pulled out a glowing, pulsating orange sphere. Despite being on the receiving end, John felt no pain at all.
"Usually, I wouldn't even bat an eye at a mortal like you, because I thought you were just like the countless souls around me," She then pointed to the other souls around. They were blue in color, unlike John's orange. "But upon closer inspection, I see that you are different. You, who were stronger. You, who were more tenacious. You...I like better." The doll-like overseer's voice deepened by a few pitches, with an additional reverberating effect.
John was unnerved, to say the least. This...girl is probably something he can't even hope to comprehend in terms of power.
"And given the circumstances of your death, I can see you bear a tremendous grudge upon you and your mother's killers." The lolita patted John on the back, whose face scrunched up in unrelenting anger once again. "Believe me, rage, if carefully harnessed, is a powerful thing."
"Just get to the point. What do you want?" Said John, finding his ground.
"My my, getting bold, are we? You do know I can just tear out your soul and shatter it like glass, correct?" Her purple irises gained a dangerous glint.
"I don't care. I only wanted to kill them." Said John, with zero fear in his voice.
"And...that is exactly why I chose you. Most would have beg for their lives. You don't. Your hatred is far stronger than your fears. So I offer you a choice, mortal."
"It's John. I have a name, you know."
"Well then...John, I offer you a choice. Either to remain here until I can discuss a few things with Michael for you to ascend to Heaven and join your mother. Or...become my Gatherer, and enact righteous vengeance on those who have wronged you." Sanguis extended her hand, as if to waiting for John to gave her a handshake.
John contemplated to himself. On one hand, he could be with his mum for eternity, and to enjoy a life of bliss, like he always wanted with her. But on the other hand, that means many more will suffer, just like him, at the hands of those...beings. His feelings suggested the former, but his conscience suggested the latter. What will he follow?
John knows exactly what to choose. Besides, he wanted to fulfill his promise with those crows.
"Heaven sounds tempting...but I'll go for you. After all, my mum has gotten all she wanted, eternal happiness up there. She doesn't need this meddling son to go with her." John looked at her hand...before shaking it. "Fine. I will be your...erm, Gatherer."
And with that, Sanguis chuckled deeply. "I know you were worthy after all. Your rage...and hate...it's all so exhilarating to me."
Suddenly, a purplish magical seal appeared underneath John, and, without warning, several energy tendrils sprouted out and starts empowering John. To the man himself though, it was nothing short of, say, extremely painful.
"AAAAAHHH!" John yelled as every fiber of his wounded body feels like it's getting destroyed and healed back together simultaneously. His veins were pulsing uncontrollably, and his skin is getting scorched like the fires of Hell. Multiple runes were getting engraved upon his body.
Sanguis, on the other hand, was now levitating in the air, sparks of purple energy-like rays surrounding her body as her eyes now become significantly more draconic in appearance. A cruel grin was present on her thin lips.
"I, the Deathless Dragon, shall make you my new Gatherer of Souls, whose rage will be my sword, and whose sword, my shield. We shall become power unchained, fear unleashed, and rage unquelled! We shall make the impossible possible and the dead undead. The path to domination shall be paved with the corpses of our enemies! We shall scourge the dimensions, despair shall spread before us like a plague, striking fear into those who dare stand against us! Rise, one who is named John, as my power is now mine... as it is now yours!"
And with that, a spiral of spirits shot out from the dark, grim sky and engulfed John's being, and nothing come to his mind anymore.
-0-
"How does it feel?" Sanguis's soft, finger-licking smooth voice vibrated in the void.
"Horrible, isn't it? But...wonderful, yes?" Sanguis chuckled.
"Who you were before...is insignificant. Who you are now...is inconceivable."
"But from what I can observe...the Three Factions are about to have a massive...playtime with each other."
"So you will be my ultimate weapon."
A beam of orange light shot out from a hastily-dug grave titled only as 'John, a kind son and helpful member of the community'.
And then a hand bursts out of it. Not just any hand, but a flaming, ashen-gray one, bounded in chains.
Then another one shot out, also on fire and chained. Soon enough, they lift an entire human body out of it.
This was John. Emphasis on the word 'was'.
His overalls and shirt was no more. Now, it was just layers of fabric wrapped around his body, while the baggy sleeves reveal his ashen and stained skin, with bandages wound tightly around his feet, legs and other parts of his torso. Several lengths of chain were also wrapped around his chest and arms, with two cuffs around his wrists, still attached to chains.
John forcibly ripped from his chains, leaving on the cuffs on him. Sparks of fire were formed as chains were broken. Before we can get a good look at his face, however, a burlap sack was quickly burned upon his head, obscuring the entire thing. A large sack appeared behind his back, attached to him by a piece of rope, and on it, burned a symbol of a half-square with a line running down from it, with a single dot in the middle.
"So for now, you shall remain under my control, until the time is right to set you free. Vengeance is a fickle thing, and is best served...cold. So I grant you...your weapons."
John dug his left hand into the dirt, which lit up with a violet color. He pulled out a sickle. Not just any sickle, but a razor-sharp, long one engraved with various runes across the blade and the metallic handle. If anything, this particular sickle looked like it's not meant for agriculture at all. A length of chain emerges from John's left sleeve and attach itself into the bottom of the sickle's handle. The blade glowed a faint orange.
He then dug his right hand into the dirt, and pulled out an axe. Again, not just any old axe, but a double-bladed one with a curved metal grip, engraved with various symbols, with a single, red gem located at the eye of the axe. The whole thing glowed with a red, metallic sheen.
"The scythe of Abbadon and the Bloodlust Axe, made only for Gatherers. Until we talk again, John. For one, must always, reign beneath..."
John stood up to his full height this time, before opening his eyes. But since his entire head is covered by a burlap sack, instead, they just appear as two glowing white spots. He doubles over before unleashing a feral roar.
The Roar That Was Heard Throughout The Dimensions.
"The Deathless!" And with that, Sanguis's laugh echoed across the realms.
John lives again...and The Sackman is out for blood.
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A MASKEDENGINEER PRODUCTION
PUBLISHED BY THIS WEBSITE
Highschool DxD
REVENGEANCE
(The Sackman stands in the intro, crossing his axe and sickle while looking at the viewer with glowing white eyes through his sack mask.)
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And that is the first Chapter, The Sackman Cometh. Thank you, those of you who are interested in my story to give it a chance. I've been a fan of the manga and anime for quite a few years now, so this is my first fanfic dedicated to the series. I'll also be making use of several elements from Metal Gear Rising: Revengeance (hence the name), Devil May Cry and God of War, so do be noted. And for those who are wondering, yes, John will be getting a harem, albeit an unwanted one, since the only boner he has (for the moment) is a hateful one. Also, this chapter took place a couple of centuries before canon, so the next one will take place in the present. All manners of questions and criticisms are allowed, so feel free to give me your opinions. More chapters to come, so stay tuned.