Darkness took me—again.
As usual, I strayed from thought and time, but no afterlife. It didn't want me. Rather, none of the many afterlives permeating the realmsverse underworld could hold onto the boy cursed with Extra-Life. This time was even more different. For this death was not the hollow space I often envisioned but more like I'd been sent floating on the sea of Ámsvartnir, wrapped around its pitch-black depths while stars wheeled overhead, waiting for that moment when I would feel life in me again.
This death felt different though. This time, I wasn't alone. There was a mad cackling around me that was no louder than a whisper in my ears.
'Killed you, killed you, it did,' he spoke in that sing-song voice that sent chills up my spine, 'my gift to the naughty kid.'
'Wait,' I frowned, 'You're the cause of what's happening in my park?!'
