There I was, sailing through what had to be the Void—just like Akatosh described. At this point, I was pretty sure it really was him. Nothing else explains a cosmic dragon shouting in my head and killing me with two thirds of the Soul Tear shout.
To pass the time, I started thinking about what kind of person I wanted to be in my next life. And then it hit me.
A Witch-King.
A bonafide Witch-King.
Insert Image of a Witch-King here
In my heart, a Witch-King is a powerful warrior-mage clad in cool, dark armor, often crowned with a helm or crown of doom to complete the image. He commands loyal armies of soldiers and servants who bend to his every whim and fancy. A true Witch-King is usually capable of wielding darker forms of magic—shadow, soul, necromancy, blood, and the like—as well as frost magic, cold and merciless, much like his own heart.
Sometimes, a Witch-King wields an artifact mace, crushing the insects who dare to call themselves his opponents. Other times, he favors an artifact sword—perhaps one that imprisons the soul of a powerful lich, or one forged from the souls of the damned themselves, screaming in agony every time the blade is swung.
Good examples of what I classify as "Witch-Kings" include Sauron, Morgoth, and the Witch-King of Angmar from The Lord of the Rings. Another strong example is Arthas Menethil from World of Warcraft, who is technically a Lich King—a subspecies of Witch-King in my personal classification.
In Harry Potter, both Voldemort and Gellert Grindelwald are considered "Dark Lords," which I also view as a subspecies of Witch-King. Across fantasy as a whole, Witch-Kings and Witch-Kings-in-the-making appear frequently, often under different titles: Dark Lord, Demon Lord, Lich King, Sorcerer King, Lord of Shadows, Lord of Souls, and many other names that exemplify a Witch-King's flair for theatrics and their inherently dramatic nature.
I always wanted to be one in secret as a kid. Villains are always cooler. Heroes lose everything—families, loved ones, their sanity, sometimes all three. Captain America never even got to dance with Peggy until he gave up being a hero. Meanwhile the villains and anti-heroes? They usually survive at least until they complete their purpose or until the end of whatever piece of fiction they are portrayed in and they do it with style. They get the cool powers and artifacts like the one ring to rule them all. They also look awesome while wearing it.
Sauron "dies" but still comes back as a giant flaming undying eyeball. Madara Uchiha gets ridiculous magic eyes, cheats death, and returns for an encore after his resurrection. Orochimaru literally refuses to stay dead and knows pretty much all of the jutsu's. Blade kills vampires in sunglasses at night without ever losing them. John Wick survives four movies and kills nearly five hundred people with nothing but a pen, determination, a suit, and pure spite.
And Naruto? He loses his parents, grows up a starving orphan, has a demon fox stuffed in him, gets ostracized by his village, and then loses his best friend just when life starts looking up. All that for the privilege of saving people who hated him. Yeah… no. Not the life I want.
Harry Potter? Lost his parents, lives in a closet, was abused and starved by what was left of his family the Dursleys. Eventually saves the day but at the expense of losing his mentor/teacher Dumbledore's life. Again with the sacrifice. It seems to be an essential theme for heroes. I don't want that for myself.
So that settles it. I'll do whatever job Akatosh wants from me, but I won't be a hero but essentially a fixer who solves his problems. Aside from that, I'm aiming for giving off Witch-King vibes by the time I grow up with the end goal of graduating as a legitimate Witch-King. Cool magic, cool armor, cool weapons. Maybe a mace and/or a sword. And a back-up plan for dying in the form of some sort of immortality would be great too, like Voldemort's horcruxes, Sauron's one ring, or simply an extended maybe even immortal lifespan. Dying sucks, I found out. No one's ever ready for it; everyone panics when the real moment hits.
Oh—and Witch-Kings get armies. And loyal servants that cater to your whims. Heroes can keep their self-sacrifice and emotional trauma. I'll handle the throne room.
I keep drifting. I have no idea how much time has passed—maybe none, maybe centuries. Hard to tell when you're a soul with no body in an infinite void without shape. Every so often something drifts by. Shapes I don't understand. Maybe universes, visualized in a way my mind can handle. Maybe not. There's debris too, probably cast off detritus from broken realities. And off in the far distance are giant horrors with too many tentacles that I refuse to look at directly.
Fun place.
I'm being pulled somewhere, faster than thought. Eventually, I slow down near something I can only describe as the "physical form of a dimension," because my brain refuses to process anything more accurate.
As I drift closer, something flashes in front of me—a crystalline shape. Three crystals fused together. It's actually kind of pretty.
Insert image of crystal here
Then I slam straight into it.
And keep going.
A moment later, there's a crystal star looking thing sticking out of me. It looks like three crystals fused together at the center. Out of my soul. Cracks spider across my soul when it should not be crackable. Something leaks out—a thin trail of glowing mist that I can only in horror assume is my soul-stuff.
Great. First time traveling through the Void and I already broke myself.
All I can do is hope Akatosh has a cosmic repair kit that can fix souls.
I pass through what feels like a barrier and drift into a space at the far edge of what I later come to find out is Aurbis. Three beings wait there. Gods, entities, higher powers whatever you want to label them as—no point pretending they're not.
One is a dragon seemingly made of time itself. One looks like a divine sage with a single eye left. And the last… the last is man-shaped, sort of, with too many arms and an aura that's both chaos and silence at the same time.
Akatosh—the dragon—leans in.
Insert image of Akatosh here
"Welcome, traveler."
He pauses. "Oh dear. That wasn't supposed to happen. We attempted to guide your path, but the Void is unpredictable. We should repair that before we answer your questions."
I look down at the crystalline shard jutting out of my soul.
"Yeah," I say. "Please fix the crystal sticking out of me."