Cold winds blew over the mockery of Hell House and above, the sky was filled with death. Sickles spun seeking both flesh and bone, finding neither. Red Lightning was exchanged, and blades clashed. Ever moving, the combatants traded blows trying to circumvent the defenses of their opponent and each frustrated in turn. A thunderclap ripped over the castle as both combatants impacted again. The sky over the battlefield has become clouded, shrouding everything in darkness, with only the flashes of lightning and the numerous torches and braziers below providing any light. Neither combatant really needed any. Now nearly 30 meters away from each other, they both landed on one of the outer walls.

They stared each other down across that distance before pushing off and flying at each other once more, locking up with their scythe blades mere inches from their goals.

"I grow weary of this," Death hissed.

"Then give it up," Maya countered. "I won't let you win, and you will never make me quit."

Death threw her back launching a blast of lightning at her. Maya countered by spinning her scythe fast enough to collect the lightning then swung her scythe, throwing it back as a red energy wave that Death barely avoided, and damaged the tower behind him.

Death growled menacingly. This was going to take all day…

VII: Cheating Death, Part II

Another heavy clash threw Maya back away from Death, but she had learned to use these movement shifts to her advantage, sending numerous sickles at him as she went. Death easily avoided them trying to slam into her again, only to have Maya avoid the path. Landing briefly on a nearby tower, she boosted off in a spinning overhead attack but Death managed to avoid the attack.

Maya dove into the castle courtyard, dodging lightning strikes as he went, throwing her scythe skywards as she summoned another one. Death avoided the attack but took several hits from sickles when the weapon shattered midair. These didn't even slow him down as he dove after her, energizing his scythe before the attack. Maya tried to avoid it, but was hit across the back for her troubles, sending her across the ground, and jolted from the electric fury.

She looked up in time to see death throw a white orb in her direction, and saw it grow into a massive skull over 10 meters high with a gaping maw of sharp teeth ready to snap. She threw herself back, avoiding the unusual attack and got airborne again, coming back at Death even harder.

A direct hit from the scythe threw Death back causing him to let out a pained sound. The follow up blast of lightning added to his hurt, but he managed to block the next attempted strike. He then teleported back away from her and called down columns of pure energy. Maya dodged around them flying at Death as fast as she could colliding with him then slashing viciously with a follow up.

Maya saw he teleported again, this time without his scythe. He reached outwards then pulled in. Maya realized almost too late what was happening. Four holes in reality opened nearby and claw like blades on long thick chains launched from them to try to strike her. She barely managed to dodge.

"You are putting up a far better fight than I ever expected," Death admitted. "Where does this resolve come from? I killed you 24 times and yet you've now become nearly my equal."

"You, who have never known love, will never understand," Maya retorted. "I almost pity you."

"I don't want your pity… I want your soul!" He thrust his hand forward sending forth numerous chains with barbed blades attached, forcing Maya to fly fast and hard to avoid them all. "I can't wait to tear it out of your fucking corpse."

Through the smoke of the impacts, he lost sight of his target, as he pulled the chains back, a scythe flew from the smoke, catching one of the links and pulling hard with a swinging motion. Death found himself being ripped out of the air and slammed into one of the walls of the castle hard enough to go through it. Quickly getting up, he saw Maya fly in, launching a series of chains of her own, but these weren't connected to her. He managed to avoid most of them but a couple hit, latched on then buried themselves in the stone floor.

"What?!"

Maya came at him from another angle nailing him hard with the backside of her scythe, sending him towards the door, and ripping the chains out of his bones causing severe damage to his spine and legs. He hit the door hard, ending up in a huge covered skyway with open sides between the outer wall sentry tower and the main keep of the castle. The view of both sides occasionally broken by the appearance of regularly spaced columns. Maya floated in, holding her scythe over her shoulder.

"All those millennia of harvesting, and your imagination on how to use your powers seems rather bland."

Death floated off the floor, his wounds regenerating quickly.

"I have to admit, this is the first time a soul has fought me quite this hard. I suppose you were correct on one thing; I underestimated you. I won't repeat that mistake."

Lighting energy built around him seeming to become absorbed by his body. His hood fell back, his robes turned red, and behind his ribcage a ball of red plasma formed. He threw he head back shrieking as he did with fangs elongating in his mouth.

"Now… where were we..."

He slammed is hands into the ground, causing a series of bladed chains to fire from the ground in a line. Maya dodged the attack only to nearly get cut in half when Death teleported in front of her and managed to get his scythe blade behind her. She nearly hit the ceiling trying to escape the attack. Appearing on the other side of the bridge he summoned a swarm of sickle blades that flew at her at breakneck speeds.

Mana managed to dodge them, but they came back around and tried to hit her again. She slashed at them with her scythe, destroying a few but several managed hit her I the arms and stomach, leaving deep gashes before fading out. Columns of lightning came next, and Maya failed to dodge the last one, the pain forcing her to the ground.

Death considered her a moment watching her struggle to get back up again.

"Aw. She fell down."

Grunting with effort, Maya managed to get back to her feet, but only barely.

"Now do you see the futility? Do you understand the gap in power between us? You could eat the last breath of 10 billion humans and you would still never reach my level of power. What say you now, you worthless whore?"

Maya breathed hard one time… then she cracked her neck and stared back at Death.

"Is that all you got?"

"You delusional…"

"You killed me… 24 times… This is far from the worst pain you've ever inflicted on me. I should thank you… I used to be a mousy little thing, crying over the slightest injury because I was so soft-skinned. Now… pain is a suggestion; one I can ignore. You say you never had a soul fight back this hard. I wonder if you ever had one fight back at all."

"And still, you continue to spout nonsense."

Maya swung her scythe back in two hands. "Let me show you what I learned from all those loses you handed me." She broke into a full run, dodging chains ripping from the ground without missing a step, knocking sickles from the air. Using one hand she pulled her hood back over her head and leapt at Death. He responded with a swing of his scythe, only to watch as she teleported just a few feet to the right, nearly outside the covered skyway. A series of chains nailed him in the ribcage and he suddenly found himself outside again.

Maya whipped his body back in front, delivering a spinning slash with her scythe, as she passed, then spun the other way whipping him around again, and delivering a sharp kick to his body, then once more on the other side and slammed into him. The force of his travel ripped the chains back out of his body, and some of the plasma with his core began to leak.

He roared in pain and annoyance, then heard the bong of another hour passing on the clock. He turned seeing the clock had struct one... far too soon for that to happen.

"Didn't notice it? I slowed down time in this place. I shouldn't be able to do that, right?"

"How?!"

"I can consciously shift the timeframe of every sanctuary I enter. Makes it easier to help reorient souls and prepare to send them off. I can take all the time I need with them. And you are a soul I'm going to be sending off… if you even have one, that is."

He turned back in time to see Maya rushing him again, her hood was fully over her head, and her face was no longer visible, just a black shadow under the hood. Death took the strike head on and was thrown back a bit before he recovered the was tackled by her straight though the clock face. He realized instantly that the temperature around him went from a cold autumn night, to a warm summer day, and found himself in the real world. An impressive house stood before him, but Maya was also there.

Above the grounds, Shinji and his girls watched in awe as Death seemed to be fighting itself from their perspective. Maya used a diagonally oriented spin to avoid another scythe strike while delivering a sharp attack with the back of hers directly into the chest of Death. His ribcage shattered, exposing the plasma that made up his heart.

Before he could recover, Maya's left hand settled over the plasma heart and Death screamed as all of the energy he had attained was being drained away. Maya's wounds disappeared under her robes as the energy undid the damage she had received to her body over the course of this battle.

As the last of the energy was drawn, a whirlpool of dark energy ripped into exitance behind Death and his body shattered into pieces, being drawn into oblivion. The echo of his scream tore across the countryside like a banshee wail, setting the hairs on all of the spectators on their end.. When the last of it was gone, she finally lowered her hand, and the whirlpool of energy collapsed, leaving no trace of Death.

Shinji and his girls watched as the victor of what appeared to be a Death vs Death battle began to descend to ground level, turning towards the crowd. He noted the thigh high boots and feminine shape. He also felt something familiar but it seemed too unbelievable to be true. Gently the figure touched down and slowly walked closer to the gathering, stopping a few meters from the one in front, who just happened to be Ritsuko.

Maya, seeing her sempai again was already trying to hold back tears. She reached up and pulled her hood back, revealing a pale but corporeal Maya. Ritsuko didn't hesitate and stepped forward, hugging the girl wordlessly, as if afraid saying her name would somehow dispel her presence.

"How..," a stunned Misato asked no one. Not a soul there could answer her.

"I'm… I'm home…" Maya nearly cried.

"Welcome home, my love," Ritsuko whispered. Moments later, just as they did at the funeral, the harem gathered around Ritsuko. Only this time, their lost one had returned home to them…

In the dining room of the manor, Maya recounted her story and her experiences to the grateful but confused crowd.

"So, you literally killed Death itself to get back home to Rits," Misato concluded. "If that isn't love, I wouldn't be able to tell you what love even is anymore."

Maya sat on Ritsuko's lap with the older woman's arms firmly wrapped around her. The slight girl was back in casual clothing now, basking in her sempai's embrace. She knew it would be days before she would ever let her go.

"So doesn't that make you Death now?" Mayumi asked.

"It does," Maya noted. "And if you're wondering how I can continue to do my job and be here at the same time… well… it seems I can be in more than one place at once. At least in the other realm."

Asuka took a hold of the front of her, hugging her despite Ritsuko's grip on her. Everyone had been doing the same intermittently, and the redhead was finally taking her turn. Maya was only too happy to receive. While to the girls, she had only been dead nine days, for her, over two years had passed… two very long years.

Hikari stood nearby, watching as her best friend finally let go of the former computer geek. Maya noticed her standing there.

"I… have to apologize for how I talked to you before, Hikari."

"It's okay," the flower girl replied. "You don't have to apologize. I watched Kodama go through a depression. She doesn't like to talk about it, but I know she was contemplating ending herself too. In that instance, she… well… she didn't want to talk either, convinced that no one could help her."

"It's terrible," Maya admitted. "Crushing hopelessness with no end in sight. I think I'm lucky more than anything else." She looked towards Shinji. "But there is something I need to tell you, and it can't wait."

Shinji was expecting it was going to be concerning their relationship. "What is it?'

"I've been waiting what felt like two years to tell you this. When Death first started torturing me by killing me over and over again, he said something to me. I had asked why he was doing to this to me since he knew about you and I pointed out that he was Dracula's friend. He said that you weren't Dracula, and that there was another candidate out there… one with a more solid claim to the title."

"But I have Dominus."

"He knew that," Maya noted. "I got the impression whoever he was talking about was significantly more powerful than you."

The thought that someone could be so far beyond him that they could claim the title of Dark Lord disturbed Shinji.

"I can't worry about that now. We have enough on our plate since the cults renewed their attacks."

"So," Asuka interjected, "Speaking of Kodama, where is she? I figured she would want to be here right now."

Maya smiled softly. "She's doing something for me… something important."

"Something to rub salt into the wound, so to speak."

Kodama finished the incantations, carefully polishing the stone marker that once marked Maya's grave. The body had since disappeared as Maya acquired a new one, but as Maya was not one for leaving well enough alone anymore, the grave marker would serve a new purpose… a monument to Maya's victory over Death itself. Satisfied with the results, Kodama turned and walked back towards the manor. Behind her the stone proudly displayed…

IBUKI MAYA

BORN 11 JULY 1991

DIED 17 JUNE 2017

REBORN 26 JUNE 2017

"DEATH, WHERE IS THY STING

AND GRAVE, WHERE IS THY VICTORY?"

"Maya's return stunned us all, and we are all grateful for her return. It seems not even death could stop the prophecy of the Nine Brides of Dracula from coming to pass, though now I had the worry that someone else could easily destroy me and take the mantle for themselves. It should have come as no surprise to me then that if Death couldn't stop the prophecy, then even centuries of animosity couldn't do it either. There was this girl I met once during the Angel Wars, part of a program that was meant to try to deal with the angels without NERV. While it failed, I had fallen in love with the pilot of the rival mecha, and even after I learned of her betrayal, I never stopped caring for her. I never thought I would see her again… but I would… This time though, she didn't return as a rival… but as my greatest enemy…"

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