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The crackling of the bonfire entered his ears before anything else did.
The bright flash of the Darksign faded from his vision in patches. The familiar warmth pressed against him from all sides. He did not know how a sword embedded in ash and bone managed to produce that feeling. He had stopped questioning it somewhere between the first hollow and the magic ring.
RRRAAAAGHHHHKK
The Asylum Demon filled the gap beyond the large open doors.
Naruto had approximately one second to process this before the demon swung his hammer.
Both doors tore free of their hinges simultaneously, each one becoming a massive projectile. The first door crossed the courtyard and hit the far wall at full velocity. Stone exploded outward in a cascade of dust and rubble. The wall folded inward before the force punched through it entirely, chunks the size of a grown man's torso raining down across the courtyard floor. The pillars caught the worst of the shockwave and simply came apart, the upper section tilting sideways in slow, terrible increments before hitting the ground.
The demon surveyed its work.
While Naruto held perfectly still against the wall beside the doorway, cloak pulled tight around him.
Ninja Art: The Cloak of Invisibility Jutsu!
It was a generous name for being just the Transformation Jutsu applied through a cloak treated with chakra reactive dye. The dye responded to a sustained chakra flow, bending light around the wearer.
A simple camouflage technique that any halfway decent genin could spot if they were looking for it. Against a demon that was specifically waiting for a boy to dramatically explode out of the rubble and attack it?
It was enough.
The demon made a sound of dissatisfaction and turned back toward its area, squeezing its massive frame through the ruined doorway and disappearing from view.
Naruto let out a breath he had been holding for the last minute.
He stayed still for another ten seconds. Then he moved toward the hidden door set into the courtyard's eastern wall, partially obscured by the debris from the demon's entrance and easy to miss.
He pulled a senbon from his inventory and crouched in front of the lock. It took him forty seconds to lockpick the old rusted door and rush up the stairs to the second floor.
Naruto was looking for any signs of Oscar when the Knight's Crest ignited on pure instinct, his awareness snapping upward as he saw it.
An iron ball coming down the upper staircase toward him.
The boy backflipped, letting the ball pass beneath him before it hit the wall behind him and took a section of it clean out.
"Didn't I encounter this exact same trap last time?"
The hollow that ran down was, without any question, the same one Oscar had cut down in this exact spot the last time they had walked this floor together.
"What is going on here?"
Naruto stepped to the side and decapitated it in one motion, the Astora Straight Sword already back in guard before the body had finished falling. He held his hand out and felt the soul absorb into his skin.
Maybe the world fixed up any damage after a while.
He filed it away and kept moving. This world had rules he did not understand yet.
"SENSEI, where are you?!"
Silence.
Then, from somewhere past the broken wall, barely audible over the distant sounds of the demon below:
"N... Naruto."
The boy was through the gap in the wall before the sound had finished reaching him.
The room beyond was small and half collapsed, rubble piled against the far wall where something had impacted it with tremendous force. Sunlight came through a hole in the ceiling in shafts that fell on Oscar.
The knight lay motionless on the rubble. The blue surcoat was dark with something Naruto did not want to look at directly.
Naruto's legs carried him across the rubble, his knees hitting the stone hard as he dropped beside Oscar.
Up close, it was worse.
"Sensei?"
"...You. You're... you're alive."
"Yeah." Naruto's voice came out smaller than he intended. He wiped his face with the back of his hand and tried again. "Yeah, I'm alive. I woke up back in my world, sensei. Found out a whole lot of things about myself." He attempted a grin. "But none of that matters right now because I'm here and we're going to beat that demon and then you're going to eat the food of the gods, dattebayo."
Oscar's chest moved in a silent laugh.
"...Food of the gods," the knight repeated, faint and fraying at the edges.
"Ramen," Naruto said firmly. "Trust me."
"...I am sorry, Naruto."
"What for?" Naruto was already pulling the medical kit from his inventory, hands moving fast, trying to look for injuries. "Do not apologize, just tell me where it hurts the most and I'll..."
"...Save them." Oscar's hand moved slightly. "Save them... for yourself. Oh, one more thing... Here, take this."
[ You have obtained an Estus Flask ]
"I got these for you." Naruto said, ignoring the message as his hands were shaking badly enough that the medicinal pills rattled in their container. He pressed them still against his knee. Come on. Calm down.
"So you don't get to tell me to save them. That's not how this works."
"Naruto. I am... beyond this. I can feel it."
A pause that went on long enough that Naruto's chest tightened.
"My mind... it is already... slipping. I will go Hollow... soon."
"What does that mean."
"When humans die... they can rise again as undead. The curse... sees to that." Oscar's breathing was shallow and deliberate. "An undead can die multiple times. But every death... takes their memories. The pieces of yourself that... make you who you are. Until nothing remains... but the shell. An undead turns into a hollow."
"You mean... you're going to become like those things in the asylum."
Oscar said nothing.
"Then we go back." The words came out before Naruto had finished thinking them. "Sensei, we go back to Konoha. I'll beg the old man to help you, we'll figure something out, there has to be something."
"...Naruto."
"There has to be."
"Naruto."
Everything blurred through Naruto's tears.
"We all... must stop at the end of our journey, someday," Oscar said.
"Please. Sensei, please don't go. Please don't... don't leave me."
"...I am sorry, my squire. I cannot... keep my promise."
That did it.
The tears broke free all at once, streaming down his face faster than he could wipe them away. Naruto clenched his jaw until it ached, trying to hold the rest of it in, trying to be something other than a kid sitting in the rubble of a broken asylum crying over a friend dying.
It was unfair.
"...Do not cry, Naruto." Oscar's voice had that faint edge to it. "Be... brave."
"I'm trying." Naruto pressed the back of his hand against his mouth. "I'm trying, sensei, I just... I don't know how. I don't know how to do this."
"...Bravery is not... the absence of fear. Or pain. It is... standing despite them. This world is cruel, Naruto. It does not deserve... your innocent tears." Oscar's voice was thinning at the edges. "Standing tall... when everything falls. That is... what it means."
Naruto wiped his face with the back of his hand. Then the other hand. His eyes were swollen and burning. He could not make himself stop entirely, but he sat up straighter, his spine finding something to brace against.
"I'll be brave, sensei," he whispered. "I will. I promise."
A silence settled between them.
Naruto's body was shaking from the thing building in his chest that wanted to become a scream. That wanted to send him charging at the Asylum Demon with everything he had left until one of them stopped existing.
"...Naruto."
Oscar's voice cut through the fog.
"Yes, sensei."
"...The bonfire sword." A pause. "Bring it... to me."
"Yes, sir."
Naruto did not ask why. He just formed the hand sign and hundreds of clones burst into existence, flooding out of the room and down into the courtyard below, their voices rising in a chorus of battle cries as they swarmed the Asylum Demon from every direction. The sound of the fight rolled up through the stone like thunder.
While the demon's attention pulled entirely toward the wave of clones climbing its legs and throwing themselves at its face, the original crossed the courtyard, both hands closing around the coil sword buried in the bonfire's ash, and pulled.
He was back at Oscar's side before the last clone had finished popping.
"...Thank you," Oscar said.
Sometime while Naruto had been gone, Oscar had removed his armor. The Elite Knight set lay in pieces around him, arranged with a care that hurt to look at, each piece placed deliberately despite everything. What remained was just a hollow faced, blonde haired man.
He did not look smaller without the armor.
"Sensei, what are you going to do with this sword."
"...Die as Oscar the knight. Rather than wander... as a mindless hollow." Oscar's eyes found Naruto's and held. "It is... a better end. You understand."
Naruto pressed his lips together and nodded once, because Oscar deserved a dignified death even if Naruto would have fought tooth and nail to find another way.
"I leave... my armor... to you."
"No. Sensei, I can't."
"...Naruto. It is the dream... of every knight. To pass their blade and armor... to their squire." A breath that cost him. "To know that what they carried... will be carried... forward." He reached up slowly, both hands lifting the helmet, his arms trembling with the effort.
"This is... my wish."
Naruto took it with both hands.
It sat on his head and dropped immediately down over his eyes.
Oscar snorted. "It seems... you will have to grow... into it."
Despite everything, Naruto laughed too. Wet and broken, yet real.
What followed was slow and careful and tender in a way that Naruto knew he would never have words for.
"Listen closely... my squire," Oscar said while guiding him through each piece. A knight performing a knightly duty to the very end. "The precepts... of a Knight of Astora."
Naruto nodded.
"...A knight's purpose... is to serve. To stand between those who cannot protect themselves... and the things... that would destroy them. Not for glory. Not for reward. Because it is... right."
The boy carved it in.
The dozen precepts that followed, Naruto carved those in too.
"...And finally." Oscar gathered himself. When he spoke again, his voice had dropped to almost nothing, and Naruto had to lean until their foreheads were nearly touching to catch it.
"A knight does not measure himself... by how brightly... he burns. He measures himself... by how long... he keeps the flame... alive. When everything is dark... when he is alone... when there is no one... left to see him stand."
The gaps between words were very long now.
"That is when... it matters... most."
Silence.
"Now... stand tall... for me."
Naruto looked like a child wearing an older man's armor. Yet Oscar looked at him. Something in his expression traveled a great distance and arrived somewhere peaceful.
[ You have equipped the Elite Knight Armor Set ]
The armor began to shrink.
The leather warming against his skin, the straps drawing in, the plates finding the angles of his shoulders, chest and legs like they were remembering a shape they had always been meant to hold.
When it finished, the armor fit him like it had been made for him.
Naruto looked down at his hands inside the gauntlets.
"...I said you would grow into it." A pause long enough that Naruto thought that was all. "...I did not mean... quite so quickly."
"I also once got stuck in a trash can for forty minutes trying to prank the old man. The armor probably figured I could not do worse than that."
"Perhaps it simply recognized... a future knight."
"A very short knight."
"The best ones often are."
They laughed together.
The silence that followed was different from the ones before it.
Naruto looked at his master and felt something settle over him that he did not have a word for yet. He had spent his whole life cataloguing the people around him without meaning to. The Third Hokage was a grandfather. Iruka was the cool older brother. Teuchi was the uncle and Ayame was the big sister.
He had never had a father.
He had never let himself want one badly enough to name the wanting.
But watching the light go slowly out of the eyes of this man, Naruto understood with a quiet and complete certainty that Oscar had become exactly that. Not because of time or anything that could be measured. Just because of how it felt to be seen, taught and chosen by him.
And now he was going to lose him.
"...Help me," Oscar said quietly. "I do not have... the strength."
His hands were shaking when he helped Oscar lift the coiled sword. Together they guided the blade and Naruto kept his eyes open because Oscar deserved a witness. Looking away would have been the easier thing and Oscar had taught him that easy and right were not the same.
The sword found its place in Oscar's chest with a squelch sound.
"...Regrettably, I have failed in my mission... But perhaps you can keep the torch lit... There is an old saying in my family... Thou who art Undead, art chosen... In thine exodus from the Undead Asylum, maketh pilgrimage to the land of Ancient Lords... When thou ringeth the Bell of Awakening, the fate of the Undead thou shalt know... Well, now you know... And I can die with hope in my heart..."
"Was that your dream, sensei?"
Oscar nodded.
"Then I'll carry it. I will become the Chosen Undead. I swear it. Dattebayo."
Oscar looked at him for a long moment.
"...I could not have asked for a better squire."
Naruto looked down.
The burning sensation had started across Oscar's skin, yet the man asked, "...What is the matter."
"Do I deserve this, sensei." The words came out louder than he intended. "Back home I am a failure. People hate me for something I did not do. I have lost count of how many times I have fallen short of everything I was supposed to be." He swallowed. "I do not want to fail this. Your dream. Your legacy. This..." He choked on whatever word was supposed to come next and gave up trying to find it.
"...You will not fail."
There was no hesitation in Oscar's voice. Not even a pause.
Naruto smiled at that.
The flames were spreading now, moving up from Oscar's hands, climbing slowly.
"...One last thing, Naruto."
"Yes."
"...Live for yourself." Each word arrived separately now as Oscar's dying words. "Not to prove something... to someone else. Not to earn... what should have always been yours. The world is yours... do not spend it... looking for permission... to exist in it."
Naruto's throat closed.
"I promise," he managed.
The light left Oscar's eyes the way light leaves a room when the last candle goes out. Gradual. Then complete.
Naruto knelt beside his master in the rubble of the broken asylum and cried without trying to be brave about it, without trying to be anything about it.
Just a boy in grief. Just two words that were not enough and were all he had.
Thank you, sensei.
Goodbye.
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Author Note
Before we move on, a moment of silence for Oscar of Astora.
...
...
...
Alright. Q and A time.
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Q. What is the Curse of the Undead?
For those of you who do not know the lore of Dark Souls.
Let us get into this.
The curse of undeath was created when Gwyn, Lord of Sunlight and ruler of the Age of Fire, began to feel threatened by the descendants of the Furtive Pygmy. Humans were immortal beings, born from the Dark yet able to live in a world enlightened by the Fire, whose souls did not lose power despite being endlessly split and multiplied.
According to the Primordial Serpent Kaathe, the gods were intimidated by this unexplored potential of the Dark Soul. They had briefly glimpsed the smidgen of life emanating from the primordial human knights and feared the eventual overthrow of Anor Londo and its Age of Fire. Therefore, a complex and ingenious apparatus was set in motion with the goal to mold humanity into a subservient, weak people that would not only serve the Age of Fire but also refuse to relinquish it to make way for the Age of Dark.
The knights of the human armies were the first ones to be marked with a Sigil of Fire that would contain their Darkness and numb their abilities. The strength of Fire was strong enough to leave an imprinted mark that would become, through a few generations, genetically inherited by every newborn. The seal restrains the Darkness within Man, and once the consciousness of that part of the self is lost, Humanity's presence and nature remain unknown, its abilities nullified, its feelings ignored, its role forgotten. When a human dies, its Darkness is not strong enough to keep it alive, and death affects men just as it would affect any other creatures born from Fire. However, their Humanity is still present within their bodies and, unless it gets pillaged, there it shall remain forever.
When the First Flame begins to fade, it cannot sufficiently power the Darksign, which therefore cannot contain Humanity any further, and humans slowly revert to their original immortal form, being revived from death. However, Humanity has never been acknowledged, understood, and trained, and after a lifetime constricted it is deprived of any lucidity and control and, most importantly, it holds no trace of the self like the soul did. Therefore, gathering souls is essential to retain sanity, for strength is the only defense against the mind's decay.
Unlike the living, the Undead do not perish with death. Instead, they are resurrected at bonfires. However, in time they gradually lose their sanity and intelligence, a process called Hollowing. This covers many stages of sanity and consciousness until the last trace of identity is lost. An Undead that has fully lost its sanity is known as a Hollow.
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Q. Why did the world reset?
If you have played Dark Souls, this one is already familiar. Resting at a bonfire resets the world. Enemies respawn. The loop continues.
Funny enough, there is actually a lore reason for this game mechanic.
According to Solaire: "We are amidst strange beings, in a strange land. The flow of time itself is convoluted, with heroes centuries old phasing in and out. The very fabric wavers, and relations shift and obscure. There is no telling how much longer your world and mine will remain in contact."
That is the foundation for the reset.
Time in Lordran does not move forward the way it does everywhere else. It folds, loops, and bleeds into itself. Ancient kings still walk their old halls. Dead gods still haunt their temples. Nothing truly ends because time itself has forgotten how endings work.
The bonfires are anchors in that distortion. The wiki describes them as: "Bonfires are fueled by the bones of the Undead. They serve as checkpoints and places of rest. When an Undead rests at a bonfire, the world around them resets, enemies returning to their posts as if they had never fallen."
In this story, I treat resets the same way. Every reset is another loop. Another weight added to the burden of being Undead in a world that has forgotten how to move forward.
Naruto does not know any of this yet.
But he will.
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Q: Why did I kill Oscar instead of using his cut storyline?
For anyone who does not know, Oscar originally had a much larger role in Dark Souls before content was cut.
From the wiki: "Oscar was originally meant to play a much larger role in Dark Souls. His removed dialogue suggests that he was supposed to be a summonable character in Anor Londo and the Darkroot Garden. In addition, he seemed fated to confront the player at the end of the game, while serving the primordial serpent that the player did not serve."
Some of his cut dialogue is genuinely fascinating. In Darkroot Garden he was supposed to say:
"You must be the same as I, in search of the grave of Sir Artorias. But be careful. This forest is the territory of a fierce band of thieves. They assault any and all who seek the graves. What if we were to join forces?"
And depending on your ending choices, his final confrontation dialogue was:
"I have waited for thee... Foolish slave of the Gods, and pawn of Frampt... I will kill you... And become the true Dark Lord."
That is genuinely compelling material. A knight who starts as your ally and becomes your enemy depending on the choices you make. A man slowly losing himself to the same forces the game warns you about from the beginning.
I loved discovering it.
Here is the honest truth though.
I did not find any of this until I was already deep into writing this story. By the time I went down the Dark Souls lore rabbit hole and found the cut content, Oscar had already become something specific in this narrative. A mentor. A father figure. The first person in either world who looked at Naruto and decided without hesitation that he was worth teaching and worth staying beside without Naruto having to earn it.
The one guy who would treat Naruto as worthy of respect from the start. The one who will be the first domino to change who Naruto will grow up to be compared to his canon self.
Retrofitting the cut storyline onto that version of Oscar would have meant dismantling everything his relationship with Naruto had already built. It would have meant rewriting chapters, restructuring Naruto's growth, and fundamentally changing what the first arc of this story was about.
I chose not to do that.
But here is where it gets interesting.
Oscar was stabbed by the coil sword. And Dark Souls three established what the coil sword actually does to an Undead. Not kill them, but suspend them. Lock them between states. The wiki's description of Iudex Gundyr sitting in the Cemetery of Ash for an eternity with a coiled sword in his chest, neither dead nor hollow, simply waiting, applies here too.
Oscar is not gone.
He is waiting.
What that means for this story, whether that waiting ends, whether the man who comes back is the same one who was sealed, whether the cut content's darker version of Oscar has any relevance to where this narrative goes, I am not going to answer right now.
Some things are better discovered than explained.
What I will say is this. Oscar of Astora earned his place in this story. He was not going to be a footnote. He was not going to be the NPC who hands you a flask and disappears. He was going to matter, and I hope that came through in how his arc was written.
His story is not finished.
May his flame never fade.
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Thank you. Genuinely. To everyone who has been reading, commenting, leaving reviews, and following along since the beginning. This story exists because of that support, and it gets better because of your engagement with it.
Writing two worlds simultaneously, balancing two sets of lore, two casts of characters, two rule systems that were never designed to interact, is the most ambitious thing I have attempted as a writer. Your enthusiasm makes the difficulty worth it.
Until next time.
Do not you dare go hollow, my friend.
- Adam