"To think that this kind of deal can be made as well!" Yunan was almost scared out of his skin when the exclaiming voice of old Death rang in his ear. As Always, Yunan could never detect the old man when Death was actually trying not to be found.
One look between the witch and Death told Yunan that the two were neither strangers nor liked to be in each other's presence. The simple nod they shared was the only sign of an old enmity buried in time, one that was held back by a flimsy yet long-standing truce.
"I'd advise you against taking the deal, all witches are cheaters and hoodwinking harlots, but I guess the sight of you pulling your hair out of regret would be a refreshing scene". Death was strangely crude with his words, but Yunan did not care much, he only scratched his head before responding sheepishly.
"I might be the one ripping her off this time, forget that for now, let me finish this deal and we can see to your needs". With those words, Yunan sent Death to Dreamscape before focusing on the recovered witch.
"I agree to strip you of your power and to remove the karma related universe from existence, the payment is all the karma you have on you, as well as all the power you have gained, you are then to be sent to a safe universe where you can start over as mortal, this is the deal we are having, do you agree?".
Yunan produced a ball of light on his fingertip, it was his way of swearing an oath on his divinity, the witch did the same and when the two balls of light touched, Yunan could feel the contract taking hold.
The witch smiled a wicked smile at Yunan before shoving her palm inside his chest and with a muffled sonic boom, her entire palm was inside his ribcage, holding his heart rather forcibly.
Yunan had yet to react to the feeling of his heart being restricted when he felt another jolt, and then another, each beat of his heart in the hand of the witch brought a jolt that stunned him out of his thoughts. Jolt after jolt spread through Yunan's body and soul until he could no longer tell what was going on.
Sometime later Yunan woke up feeling bloated and hungover, he was still in place, the witch was nowhere to be seen, Death was chuckling to himself at the dumb-looking Yunan who was still unable to think freely.
"You woke up faster than she expected, she said you would take a year, it took you 4 hours, I do hope you will hold a grudge against her for this" Death knew what Yunan was most concerned about and thus gave him the answers he sought first, before even helping him to his feet. Tasha was there too, she seemed more concerned with refilling Deaths drink and snacks than about what was to happen to Yunan.
"To think that even with consume, it took me 4 hours to wake up and still feel bloated like a stuffed turkey, was that why you came? To keep an eye on me?" Yunan was muttering audibly and jumping from one idea to another, so his sentence was not very coherent. But the gist of it was understood by the two who were present.
"Nah, I missed these poison lotus fruits, and my boss is feeling like you should be a bit more discreet, keeping the Primordials in check is not a solution that can be effective for long, try not to cause too much trouble, for a while, just until you can take a Primordial on in a fight, and I am to escort you until a certain point where you will be required to do something for my boss, hence, here I am".
The groggy Yunan barely registered all of that, he plopped down at the table and started chugging the lava wine to restore his energy and state faster.
As Yunan rested and restored himself bit by bit, Effort was slowly digesting a stupendous amount of karma and a strange divinity related to karma. According to the primary analysis Yunan made on the energy of the divinity, it was related to purifying karma and digesting bad karma, it was like as if it was a syphon of bad karma that did not originate from a person's bad deeds and words.
After sharing the findings with Death, the old man did not seem very surprised, he felt melancholic and had a look of nostalgia on him.
The Witch was originally a flower worshipped by some local villagers in a hunting village as a flower of protection, as the faith from the villagers gathered, the flower grew in proportions, and it soon became divine and not long after, the flower gained sentience and did her job as the protector of the little village.
Some years later, those from the karmic universe arrived in her village and infected it with their bad karma, Death was still on his third universe back then and came to harvest the lives who were infected with too much bad karma, the two came into conflict multiple times, and eventually, they came to a truce, as long as the flower could remove the bad karma before it caused the deaths of the villagers, Death would not come for her people.
To keep the karmic universe agents from sowing the bad karma, the flower turned into a wood-witch and started selling her services as someone who took away bad karma, and from then on the wood-witch grew in strength, fought Death a few times, absorbed enough bad karma and for her protective divinity to mutate into something else, something that Effort seemed to find very appetizing.
"Thanks for the meal, I sent the flower back home, she was very thorough in paying for our service, she left everything but the root of her origin, a nice flower, well, I now have information, memories and even feeling that I have n idea what to do with, come and help me go through this stuff". Effort sent a message to Yunan as the three were talking about the history between Death and the wood-witch.