Reincarnated as the Death God's Vessel

The silence was punctuated only by the beat of Lidien's heart.

As he deactivated his Incite of Blood, Lidien's pain from his Sparkline eased but never went away.

He walked ahead, without altering his course while his Blood Form was still active.

Lidien didn't stop. Seconds bled into minutes, minutes into hours, until a single day stretched in his perception into months.

Yet, as his sparkline was not getting overused by actively using the Blood Form, Lidien realized that his subjectivity of time was getting slower... as if he was so bored of walking that the time seemed to stretch to years...

And the only driving force for him walking was his unquenchable hate to kill the Skinless Leopard that used Lily's skin... fueled by the thought of his sparkline not burning.

Until...

The Dark Mist slowly grayed, until the light of the burning sun licked his face, safely exiting the Dark Mist without losing his mind to the slow passing of time.

Lidien smiled, as he thanked the pain in his Sparkline for maintaining his almost broken sanity.

After a few steps, Lidien glanced back. The Bone Orchards were gone. Not retreated, not hidden... just gone.

Behind him stretched only endless desert, as if the forest had never been there to begin with.

"Where am I?"

Lidien felt everything slowing down, even his own heartbeat almost stopping.

As he kneeled from his heavy body, and scanned around, he saw the Skinless Leopard, lying on the hazy ground... her skin, Lily's skin... already melted, not from the heat... but from the Skinless Leopard dying.

Lidien gripped the sand where his hand held to support himself... he was feeling drowsy but he knew if he passed out he would surely not wake up and would die like the Skinless Leopard.

Lidien activated his Incite of Blood once more, regulating his blood flow... making him think rapidly for a solution to his heart slowing down.

A familiar sensation that he couldn't forget as he was doing it every day... It was the same sensation when he used the method of entering his Dreamflow.

Then...

Suddenly...

A voice resounded in his mind, jolting him back awake. It said,

'Fool, regulating is different from controlling.'

Lidien slumped on the sandy ground face-first, his eyes staring at the corpse... no, it wasn't just the corpse of the Skinless Leopard, but hundreds of protruding bones so ancient that the Necrotic Essence and ghosts of different kinds of people were smiling at him.

Welcoming him to join the Kingdom of the Dead.

Lidien didn't have the strength to move... his heartbeat slowed down, coming to a stop.

But his mind didn't surrender...

As his heart stopped its beating, and he himself refused to enter the Dream... the remaining oxygen in his brain helped him do one thing.

To will his blood to flow, regardless of a heart that no longer beat.

In that single moment, much shorter than a fraction of a second, Lidien continued his blood's flow by making his blood-like verve manifest as a conveyor of blood.

It was from his heart, to the lungs, to the brain at first... until he willed it to the limit, sending it all to every part of his body.

As his understanding of Blood deepened, he felt a shackle attached to his soul loosen.

As a crimson black halo suspended over his head, signifying that Lidien... a Blessed of Death, had reached the Sky Stage.

"Ah ha.. Hahaha! AHAHAHA!"

His laughter echoed across the dead sands, a sound of pure, unadulterated triumph.

As his laughter died, he smiled towards the ghosts, mocking them.

"Tell me, everyone... do you want to leave this place?"

Without them answering, Lidien produced his Absorption Vortex, suctioning all the Necrotic and Soul Essences without care.

"Well, I don't take no for an answer..."

His eyes slitted as his smile turned ear to ear, watching and listening to the wailing screams of the ghosts being sucked in by Lidien.

As everything died down, even his heart not beating... replaced by the sandy wind whizzing.

Without the ancient ghosts and Necrotic Essences blocking his sight, Lidien stared at the Ancient Castle in the middle of the desert.

"Am I inside a Rift?"

Lidien walked slowly, feeling his feet sink shallowly into the sand every time his foot took a step.

Unlike the Rift of the Shattered Mirrors, where its entrance looked like a portal that was cut in the middle of space.

The Rift that Lidien entered was different, for it was still sealed and there was no owner deactivating the seal placed outside of it.

A few minutes passed just from walking, Lidien stared at the towering castle, its exterior was dilapidated and most of it had already fallen from the long passage of time.

Shaking his head, he entered inside... and only the soft tapping of his leather boots echoed within.

The Throne hall was almost the same as where Lady Rose stayed, however, unlike the polished blade attached to the throne reflecting someone's image.

The Throne seat design was like a fountain of blood, however... the blood was paused, suspended without moving.

Lidien walked towards the throne, alert for any sign of traps activating...

Then, he touched the blood, suspended midair, and felt it was like a jelly that had been put in a freezer, frozen forever.

As his hands traced the throne's rest, his intrusive thoughts won.

Smiling, Lidien sat on it, laughing madly as he thought of himself.

The King.

However, it was too late for him to regret it...

When he heard the Monarch of Blood speak once again.

'Survive, for this will change your life.'

Lidien's arms stuck to the rest and he was unable to unstuck them, as his eyes stared at the hall, he saw hundreds of phantoms of history, not ghosts... kneeling in front of him.

Then his consciousness was ripped from his body and sucked downward, into a depth that made his Dreamflow feel like a shallow puddle by comparison.

Lidien, sitting on the Throne, smirked... as the phantoms of history chanted his name.

His lost true name.

"Blodmire!"