Liam kicked off his shoes at the door and got on his knees in front of his grandmother. She stood waiting for him. Her eyes sparked with anger and she smacked his exposed wrist with a stick. It hit the air with a whistling sound every time, leaving his wrists bloodied.

He didn’t even flinch, already used to the pain.

“What did I tell you?! You know we need them, and yet you set the fuckers free everytime! Do you think I want to do this?” She screamed, her face flushing.

“He saved my life.” He expressionlessly looked at her as she breathed heavily through gritted teeth.

“The group needs them, or we will all turn to ash and forever wander the murky depths of the forgotten! You agreed to this. We all did. 

To live forever and be forgotten, or to die young.

Didn’t you dream of being remembered?! Of fame?! Now you’ve got it! It took you centuries and yet you're giving it all up now?!”

“I was repaying the favor.”

“You’ve been letting the dead go now for far too long. It hasn’t happened just once. I’ve noticed you’ve fucked with the souls we’ve stored too.” She looked at him mockingly and threw the stick at his face, her body heaving violently.

As she started to cough into a random handkerchief she pulled out, her face drained of color and she looked upward awkwardly smiling.

“I’m starting to feel death creeping up on me, Nero.” She looked at him pitifully, hoping to earn some sympathy.

“Give me some of the corporal souls you’ve stored, I know you’ve stopped eating them.” She smiled softly at him, patting his head like he was a child.

Liam didn’t know when he started to lose feelings. No love, hate, even his dreams had ceased for him. His ambitions crumbled long before he had the chance to complete them. All of it wasn’t worth it, his worthless dreams weren’t worth living an eternity trying to accomplish.

His relationships he had fond memories of centuries ago became foggy and were now corroded with images of the present. They weren’t worth remembering.

He wanted to forget this suffering and lose himself.

He slowly took out a pendent and pressed the red orb in the middle. Smiling, he looked up at her with gentle eyes and said, “You’ve always had a good sixth sense.”

A wormhole opened up and the reaper, as always, was dressed in black. He stumbled a bit on his robes and looked at the two in confusion.

“Who are you?” He asked.

“Please send our entire being to the river of the forgotten, for we have sinned greatly. We have lived an eternity eating the dead, we’ve supplied their energy within our changed bodies. 

We have contracted with Osmos, a demon, so we could live forever on the souls of the dead.”

The reaper looked on as Liam bowed his head to the ground, not daring to look up. He sighed, and grabbed the old woman in the corner and shoved her into the wormhole.

She screamed wretchedly, her body corroding and falling apart the deeper she fell.

“I can feel evil energy radiating, tell me what I need to know so I can get rid of it.”

The reaper commanded, his demeanor intimidating.

Liam told him the location of the stored souls along with where the rest of his family lived. He hoped they would get their due punishments along with himself.

The reaper mumbled under his breath, agitated, “I wanted to find you all myself and see who was brave enough to steal souls. Who knew it would be a bunch of weaklings.”

When all the information had been collected, the reaper lifted Liam up mildly and threw him into the hole.

As he fell, he felt his body falling apart. The flesh slowly disintegrated as it fell off his bones. He smiled widely. He was finally feeling a sense of long forgotten relief.

He thought back to the show he recently starred in and was a little sad. It was too bad he couldn’t help that soul out more. Without him he would’ve never realized how meaningless all of it was.

As he was about to be burnt to a crisp he realized he’d just come back again when everybody already forgot about him. At that point there would be no difference in floating in the water of the forgotten.

There would be no point. His dreams would be worthless, he’d always someday be forgotten in the passage of time, no matter how many times he came back.

An eternity of pain. An eternity of being forgotten over and over again.

His youthful self had feared never being able to be remembered, and he still did. So living a life like that would just be endless torture. Could you even call that life?

It was best to be forgotten just once. One time was enough.

…

…

…

[/author]

I’ve been burning through chapters, feeling like I wasn’t doing very good, and I wasn’t satisfied by arc 1s ending. Now I am though after writing Liam’s extra, it felt like I was writing randomly.

I was actually not gonna use the reaper at all and just pretend we didn’t need him, but writing Liam’s extra gave me some kind of inspiration, and it feels actually completed now!

Though I know the murder bit was sped up, and it feels like everything ended too quickly, I think it’s for the best.

I’m all honesty, Liam and Caige were more like star crossed lovers. 

One was a ghost, who couldn’t even touch someone, let alone communicate with Liam. (Liam can ‘feel’ dead energy, not ‘see’ or ‘hear’ it.

And the other, was destined to an eternity of suffering.

The two meeting really only represented that they were each other’s salvation.

Without Liam, Caige would’ve never completed his mission.

And without Caige, Liam would’ve never realized his future.

Anyway, that’s all I have to say.

I thank you for your support on my journey so far in.

(Btw F in chat for Liam if you’ve read this far lol)[/author]