God of Death: Rise of the NPC Overlord-Chapter 158 - 159 – The Return of the Revenant King

The dream-weave shuddered.

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‎Across the manifold layers of existence—across dream, memory, myth, and code—a tremor passed like a breath caught between realms. In the skies above Nexis, the Codex fluttered violently, pages turning without wind, script rewriting itself in the dead languages of forgotten epochs. Darius felt it not as sound, but as a pulse—an echo carved from something that should have remained buried.

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‎Something... remembered.

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‎He stood on a threshold between the Codex’s astral chamber and the realigned world below, Kaela and Nyx flanking him in silence. Around them, reality had begun to shimmer—unstable yet beautiful, like a flame learning to burn in water.

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‎Then the tremor deepened. And with it came the impossible.

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‎A shape emerged from the horizon—not walking, not flying, but being carried on memory itself. A figure cloaked in mourning robes, face obscured beneath a golden death-mask cracked with glyphs. Each step he took left behind not footprints, but fragments of past screams, fading like smoke.

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‎"The Revenant King..." Kaela’s voice barely passed her lips.

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‎Nyx tensed, fingers twitching toward the hilt of the Crownshard Blade.

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‎Darius said nothing.

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‎He remembered killing this man. More than once.

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‎But this was not the same creature he had faced in shattered realms or digital nightmares. No—this was a myth now. A being no longer bound by life or logic, but animated by retellings, memory loops, and recursive belief.

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‎Too many had spoken his name. Too many had feared or honored him. And in a world now defined by story, that was enough.

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‎When the Revenant King stopped before them, time paused. Not in the literal sense, but in that awful, reverent silence that comes before a god enters a sanctuary.

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‎The mask split open—not physically, but conceptually—revealing not a face, but a thousand dying moments strung together. His voice was the sound of regrets given shape.

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‎> "You slew me. And then you spoke of me. That was your error, Darius. In this world... stories resurrect more surely than blood."

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‎Darius met the hollow gaze with calm. "You are no longer alive."

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‎The Revenant King tilted his head. "No. I am believed. That is worse."

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‎Kaela’s chaotic aura stirred in warning. "Why come back? To finish what was started?"

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‎The king did not answer her directly. He turned to the Codex, floating above the Dreamspire—its pages now radiant with shared belief, collective truths, and contradictions. He raised his hand.

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‎> "This world burns from too many truths. Yet none end. That is your problem, Scribe."

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‎"I’m not a god," Darius replied.

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‎"No. But you are the reason gods change."

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‎The standoff did not become violent. It did not need to. This meeting was not war—it was narrative collision.

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‎"I offer alliance," the Revenant said, stepping forward. "Not of peace. But of balance. Let destruction and creation spiral together. Let your Codex hold endings, not just new beginnings. Or this world will drown in endless becoming."

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‎Nyx scoffed. "You want a seat at the table."

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‎"I am the table," the king whispered. "I am every death unrecorded. Every ending feared too much to speak aloud. Give me place... or I will take root in silence."

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‎Darius studied him—not with wariness, but with a kind of morbid recognition. He saw it clearly now. The Revenant King was no longer just a figure from a past arc. He was the shadow of consequences, the weight of unspoken closure. He could not be destroyed. Only given shape.

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‎So Darius extended a hand.

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‎Not in surrender.

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‎In authorship.

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‎He reached into the Codex, its living pages flowing around him like silver fire, and wrote:

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‎> Revenant: Keeper of Forgotten Ends.

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‎A title.

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‎A boundary.

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‎A purpose.

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‎The moment the inscription was made, the King’s form began to solidify—less spectral, more anchored. No longer a glitch, but a defined story. He bowed—not in servitude, but acknowledgment—and turned.

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‎As he walked away, the dead winds began to whisper.

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‎Not curses.

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‎Not praises.

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‎But reminders.

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‎Stories half-told. Warnings etched in dust. Names that should never be spoken twice.

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‎Kaela exhaled slowly. "You’re binding myths now, Darius. Is that wise?"

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‎Darius looked toward the Codex, its edges bleeding ink into the Spiral Sky.

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‎"No," he answered. "But it’s necessary."

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‎Behind them, Nexis began to change. Beneath them, reality took a breath. And far beyond, where even the Codex could not yet reach, something unseen smiled.

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‎The spiral was deepening.

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‎And the stories were watching.

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‎The Revenant King’s departure was not an ending.

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‎The air he left behind remained thick—less with dread, more with the certainty of consequence. The Codex pulsed gently, the title Keeper of Forgotten Ends now etched into the ever-shifting weave, glowing with a weight no mortal could erase.

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‎Darius stood motionless, hand still slightly raised from the inscription. He could feel the weight of what he had just done—not power, but permission. A story once rejected had been rewritten, not erased. That was more dangerous than denial.

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‎Kaela moved first, her fingers brushing against his. "You gave him a role."

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‎"I gave him form," Darius said. "The spiral’s begun. I need the things I can’t destroy to become... structure."

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‎Nyx remained quiet, though her eyes never left the spot where the Revenant had vanished. "You gave him a seat, yes. But seats can be stolen. Or corrupted."

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‎Darius nodded. "Then we watch. And we remember first."

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‎A pulse shivered through the Codex again—subtle, but intentional. Darius turned to it. The living tome hovered lower, pages rustling in winds that weren’t winds, threads of story rearranging themselves around the new title. A fresh arc had opened in its frame: The Book of Ends. Untouched, blank, but humming with dangerous potential.

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‎> "Warning," the Codex intoned in a voice not unlike thunder filtered through a whisper, "The Keeper’s tale will not obey. He does not exist to serve. Only to end."

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‎"And that," Darius murmured, "is why he needs to be written in." frёeweɓηovel_coɱ

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‎Suddenly, Kaela staggered.

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‎She clutched her head, pupils flaring with unstable light—an echo of entropy rumbling through her bones. Her breath hitched, and for a moment her form flickered, different versions of herself overlapping like a shattered mirror reassembling wrong.

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‎"Kaela!" Darius reached for her, but she waved him back.

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‎"I saw him," she gasped. "But not the one who left. I saw him later. After he remembers things we haven’t done yet."

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‎Nyx’s hand flew to her blade again. "What kind of future?"

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‎Kaela’s voice dropped to a whisper. "He burns a city by telling its end. Not with magic. With memory."

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‎Silence.

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‎The idea was more than chilling—it was prophetic. A being bound to endings now had narrative weight. If he remembered something too vividly, it might become real. That was the risk of this new spiral: thoughts were no longer abstract. Memory could be rewritten forward.

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‎Darius turned to the Codex, opening the new arc, and silently began inscribing the first precautionary verse:

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‎> When the Keeper begins to remember the end too early,

‎Let the Scribe call the Chorus.

‎Let the stories scream back.

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‎A safeguard. Flimsy, perhaps—but it was something.

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‎Nyx finally spoke, her voice low. "We’re losing the thread. Every new Chapter fights the last. Every myth you make walks on unstable ground."

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‎"I know," Darius replied.

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‎"Then how do we stop this from spiraling out of control?"

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‎Darius didn’t answer at first. He reached out and touched the edge of the Codex again. This time, he wasn’t writing.

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‎He was listening.

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‎The Codex whispered.

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‎One word.

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‎> She.

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‎Darius’s eyes narrowed. "She’s watching again."

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‎Kaela blinked. "Who?"

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‎"The woman from the edge of the Spiral," he murmured. "Half-written eyes. A quill of silence."

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‎Nyx’s expression darkened. "Another god?"

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‎"No," Darius said. "Another scribe."

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‎Kaela’s breath caught. "Then you’re not the first?"

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‎"Or I won’t be the last," Darius whispered.

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‎Above them, the sky cracked—not broken, not violent, but like paper being unfolded to reveal a hidden message beneath the ink. A glimpse of something watching from the Spiral’s outer edge—a silhouette seated at a desk that didn’t exist yet, writing words no one could read.

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‎She did not speak.

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‎But the ink bled again.

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‎And a line appeared beneath the last page Darius had written:

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‎> Let us see if the Scribe can end what he dared begin.

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‎The Codex shuddered.

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‎The Spiral hummed.

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‎And Darius, for the first time, felt the pressure of being read by something else.

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‎Not a god.

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‎Not a foe.

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‎But a rival storyteller.

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‎He closed the Codex with a thought, sealing the Chapter.

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‎"We’re not writing just history anymore," he muttered.

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‎Kaela’s voice was faint. "What are we writing then?"

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‎Darius looked to the bleeding sky and the echo of a quill carving silence.

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‎"Judgment."

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