The journey to Helheim required preparation that border on ritual.
"You can't just walk into the realm of the dead," Chang'e explained as she drew symbols on the floor with phosphorescent chalk. "The living repel it. Your divine energy will trigger every defensive ward Hel has established."
"So how do we get in?" Maxime asked.
"We die. Temporarily."
Nyx's head snapped up.
"Absolutely not."
"It's the only way," Chang'e continued calmly. "Helheim accepts only the dead. To enter, we must convince the realm we belong there."
"And how exactly do we 'temporarily die'?" Maxime's tone was skeptical.
Chang'e held up a vial—liquid that glowed with sickly green light.
"Essence of Lethe. It will stop your heart, cease your breathing, suppress your divine signature. For all intents and purposes, you'll be corpses."
"For how long?" Nyx demanded.
"Six hours. Maybe eight if your constitution is strong." Chang'e set the vial down carefully. "Plenty of time to find Hel, negotiate for the fragment, and return to the entrance gate."
"And if we're not out in eight hours?"
"Then death becomes permanent."
Maxime felt his Prescience activate, showing the immediate futures:
ACCEPT ESSENCE OF LETHE:
60% chance: Successful entry to Helheim
30% chance: Death becomes permanent due to complications
10% chance: Hel detects the ruse, kills them on entry
FIND ALTERNATIVE ENTRY:
40% chance: Odin's forces detect breach attempt
35% chance: Defensive wards kill them
25% chance: Successful alternate entry (method unknown)
The numbers weren't great either way.
But the Lethe option had better odds.
"We do it," Maxime decided. "We drink the Essence."
"Maxime—" Nyx started.
"We don't have time to find alternatives. Seven days. Three fragments. We need to move fast."
Through their Link, she felt his determination—and his fear. He was terrified. But he was also committed.
She closed her eyes, took a breath, then nodded.
"Fine. But I drink first. If something goes wrong, I want you alive to get help."
"Absolutely not—"
"Non-negotiable." Her voice was steel. "I'm older, stronger, more experienced with death magic. I survive what you can't."
Through the Link, he felt her absolute certainty. And her fear—not of death, but of watching him die.
"Okay," he conceded. "You first."
Chang'e divided the essence into three vials.
"Drink it all at once. The transition will be violent. Your body will fight it. Don't resist—let death take you."
She handed the first vial to Nyx, who examined it with ancient eyes.
"I've tasted death before. This will be... unpleasant."
She drank.
The effect was immediate.
Nyx gasped, clutching her chest. Her eyes went wide. She fell to her knees, convulsing.
"NYX!" Maxime lunged for her, but Chang'e held him back.
"Don't interfere! She has to die completely or the realm won't accept her!"
Through the Link, Maxime felt everything.
Her heart stuttering. Her lungs seizing. Her divine essence flickering like a candle in wind.
Then—nothing.
The Link went dead.
Not severed. Not blocked. Just... absent. Like calling into a void.
[PRIMORDIAL LINK: SUSPENDED]
[NYX STATUS: DECEASED (TEMPORARY)]
[DURATION: 8 HOURS MAXIMUM]
Nyx collapsed, eyes staring sightlessly at the ceiling. Her skin took on a corpse's pallor. Her chest didn't move.
She was dead.
Really, truly dead.
Maxime felt panic rising.
"She'll return," Chang'e said quietly. "In eight hours, the essence will metabolize. Her divine constitution will restart her heart. But for now, she's gone."
She handed him the second vial.
"Your turn."
Maxime stared at the green liquid.
Every instinct screamed not to drink it. But they were on a clock. Seven days. Three fragments.
No time for hesitation.
He drank.
The essence tasted like grave dirt and winter frost and the moment before waking from a nightmare.
Then it hit.
His heart stopped.
Not slowed—stopped. Completely. No beats. No pulse.
His lungs froze mid-breath.
His blood ceased flowing.
His divine energy—the Passion, the Radiance, the Resonance, the Insight, all of it—went dark.
He was dying.
No—he was dead.
The world faded to gray, then black.
And then—
He was standing.
The apartment was gone. Chang'e was gone. Nyx's body was gone.
He stood on a shore of black sand under a sky of perpetual twilight. Behind him, an ocean of dark water stretched to infinity. Ahead, a gate of bone and iron.
[LOCATION: HELHEIM - ENTRANCE]
[STATUS: DECEASED (TEMPORARY)]
[TIME REMAINING: 8:00:00]
A countdown appeared in his vision. Eight hours.
Nyx materialized beside him, looking disoriented.
"That was... unpleasant."
"Understatement."
She looked down at herself—still wearing her stellar night dress, but it seemed faded, less substantial.
"We're in the realm of death. Our divine powers will be suppressed here. Reduced by at least 50%."
[WARNING: DIVINE SUPPRESSION ACTIVE]
[ALL ATTRIBUTES REDUCED BY 50%]
[SKILLS EFFECTIVENESS REDUCED BY 30%]
Great. So he was effectively Level 12 in a realm full of death gods.
Chang'e appeared, looking unfazed by the transition.
"The gate," she said, pointing. "We pass through and find Hel's hall. It should be—"
"North," a new voice finished.
A figure stood by the gate—tall, gaunt, wrapped in funeral shrouds. His eyes were empty sockets, his skin like parchment.
[GARMR — LEVEL 38]
[GUARDIAN OF HELHEIM'S GATE]
[STATUS: EVALUATING]
"Three foreign dead," Garmr's voice was wind through tombs. "Two gods, one goddess. Bearing the stench of temporary death."
His empty gaze fixed on Maxime.
"And one of you carries fragments of Eros Primordial. How... interesting."
"We seek audience with Hel," Nyx said carefully. "We mean no disrespect to her domain."
"Audience." Garmr laughed—a sound like bones rattling. "The living pretending to be dead, seeking the queen of death herself. The arrogance."
He stepped closer, and the air grew colder.
"Give me one reason not to rip your souls from those false corpses and scatter them across the void."
Maxime felt his Prescience activate, seeing one second ahead:
Garmr would attack. Would attempt to grab Maxime. Would trigger—
Maxime spoke before the future arrived.
"Because Hel is expecting me."
Garmr paused.
"Expecting you?"
"She holds one of Eros's fragments. She knows I'm collecting them. She's been waiting."**
It was a gamble. But Maxime's Temporal Sight had shown fragments calling to each other. If that was true, Hel would have felt his approach.
Garmr was silent, as if listening to a voice only he could hear.
Then he stepped aside.
"The queen says you may enter. But know this, false dead—if you linger past your time, if your temporary death becomes permanent, you belong to Helheim. Forever."
He gestured, and the gate of bone and iron swung open.
"Follow the path north. Do not deviate. Do not touch the water. Do not speak to the other dead. And do not, under any circumstances, accept food or drink from anyone."
"Why?" Chang'e asked.
"Because anything consumed in the realm of death binds you here. One sip of water. One bite of bread. And your eight hours become eternity."
The warning settled like ice in Maxime's chest.
They passed through the gate.
Helheim was beautiful in the way decay is beautiful.
The landscape stretched in rolling hills of ash-gray grass, dotted with trees whose leaves were silver and black. Rivers ran with water so clear it looked like liquid starlight, but Maxime remembered the warning—don't touch it.
And the dead walked.
Thousands of them. Millions, maybe. Spirits in various states of transparency, some almost solid, others barely visible. They moved with purpose, walking paths only they could see, speaking in languages that predated civilization.
None of them looked at the living.
"They can't see us," Nyx whispered. "Not really. We're as ghostly to them as they are to us."
They followed the path north, and gradually the terrain changed. The grass became darker. The trees more twisted. The sky—already dim—grew oppressive.
A hall emerged from the mist.
Massive. Ancient. Built from bones of creatures that predated gods. Its walls were ribs, its roof a skull larger than any being should possess. Windows glowed with cold blue light.
[ÉLJÚÐNIR - HEL'S HALL]
[DIVINE PRESENCE: HEL — LEVEL 37]
[WARNING: DEATH GODDESS IN NATIVE DOMAIN - POWER EFFECTIVELY DOUBLED]
So Level 37 became Level 74 in terms of actual threat.
Against Maxime at effective Level 12.
"We're so fucked," he muttered.
"Eloquent," Nyx said dryly. "But accurate."
They approached the hall's entrance—a doorway carved to look like a screaming mouth.
"Last chance to turn back," Chang'e offered.
"Not an option."
Maxime stepped through the screaming mouth.
The interior was a feast hall, but wrong.
Long tables laden with food that looked delicious but smelled of rot. Goblets filled with wine that gleamed like mercury. And at every seat, dead warriors—einherjar who'd died in battle but been rejected by Valhalla, sent here instead.
They ate and drank, never satisfied, forever hungry.
At the far end, on a throne of intertwined corpses, sat Hel.
She was beautiful and hideous simultaneously.
Her left side was stunning—perfect skin, elegant features, eyes like winter stars. Her right side was rotted corpse—flesh hanging in strips, bone visible, eye socket empty save for a glowing ember.
This was the goddess who'd tried to keep Freyja. Who'd engineered Eros's death.
Who'd waited three thousand years.
[HEL — LEVEL 37 (EFFECTIVE 74 IN HELHEIM)]
[GODDESS OF DEATH, DISHONOR, AND THE FORGOTTEN (NORSE)]
[CHARISMA: 95]
[STATUS: AMUSED]
"Eros."
Her voice was dual-toned—melodious beauty from the left side, hollow rasp from the right.
"You came. I knew you would. I've been waiting since I felt the fourth fragment integrate."
She descended from her throne with impossible grace, her rotted side moving as fluidly as her living side.
"Tell me, little god. Why should I give you my fragment? The piece of you I've cherished for three millennia?"
Maxime felt his Empathic Reading struggle. Hel's emotions were... split. The living side felt genuine affection, even love. The dead side felt nothing but cold calculation.
"Because you engineered his death," Maxime said quietly. "Because you wanted him here. In your realm. Forever."
Hel smiled—beautiful on one side, skeletal grin on the other.
"Clever. Yes, I orchestrated it. Not alone—Zeus and Odin were eager participants. But I suggested the Temple of Oblivion. I ensured Nyx would be imprisoned. I made certain Eros would die without allies."
Nyx's shadows flared, but Maxime raised a hand, stopping her.
"Why?" he asked.
Hel's living eye gleamed.
"Because I loved him. Truly, desperately, completely. And he rejected me." Her rotted hand gestured at her dual nature. "He said I was too broken. Too divided. That he couldn't love half a person."
She circled him, and Maxime felt his Prescience warning of danger—but not immediate. Not yet.
"So I broke him instead. If I couldn't have him whole, I'd have him in pieces. Fragments scattered. Powerless."
She stopped directly in front of him, her faces inches from his.
"And now you come, wearing his skin, asking for the piece I took. The fragment of Eternal Bonds—the power to forge connections that transcend death itself."
She reached out with her beautiful left hand, touching his cheek.
"Why should I give it to you?"
Maxime met her dual gaze—living star and empty socket.
"Because keeping it is keeping you trapped. You engineered his death and you've been in hell ever since. Not Helheim. Your own personal hell. Waiting for him to come back and love you."
Hel's expression flickered.
"And you think you're different? That you'll love me where he wouldn't?"
"No," Maxime said honestly. "I can't love you. I'm already bonded to Nyx. But I can offer you something he never did."
"Which is?"
"Recognition that you deserved better than rejection. That your nature—living and dead, beautiful and rotted—isn't brokenness. It's wholeness. You're the goddess of death. You're supposed to embody duality."
He took a risk, stepping closer.
"Eros was wrong to reject you. He was wrong about a lot of things. And you deserved an apology."
Through his Empathic Reading, he felt something shift in Hel. The living side's affection warred with the dead side's calculation.
Then she laughed—both voices simultaneously, creating eerie harmony.
"An apology. From a god who's been dead three thousand years, delivered by a mortal accountant wearing his corpse."
She pulled back, moving to a side chamber.
"Come. Let me show you something."
They followed—warily—into a room that made Maxime's stomach turn.
It was full of bodies.
Preserved corpses, arranged like dolls. And they all looked like him. Like Eros.
"Mortal lovers," Hel explained casually. "Over three millennia, I found forty-seven men who resembled him. I brought them here. Kept them. Loved them."
She gestured at the collection.
"None of them lasted. None of them were real. Just echoes."
She turned to Maxime.
"But you. You're different. You have his fragments. His power. His essence."
Her beautiful side smiled.
"Stay with me. Willingly. Let your eight hours expire. Become truly dead. Join my collection—not as a corpse, but as my eternal companion."
[TIME REMAINING: 4:23:17]
Four and a half hours left.
Maxime felt the offer's weight. Hel wasn't threatening. She was proposing.
"And if I refuse?"
"Then you get nothing. No fragment. No escape. I'll hold you here until your time runs out and death becomes permanent anyway."
"That's murder," Nyx growled.
"That's love," Hel corrected. "I've waited three thousand years. I can wait another eight hours."
Maxime activated Temporal Sight.
[MANA: 520/820 - HALVED TO 260/410]
The futures branched:
ACCEPT HEL'S OFFER:
100% chance: Death becomes permanent
80% chance: Eternal existence as Hel's companion
20% chance: Eventually escape (timeline: centuries)
REFUSE AND FIGHT:
95% chance: Death in combat (Level 12 vs effective 74)
5% chance: Escape without fragment
REFUSE AND NEGOTIATE:
60% chance: Hel remains unmoved
30% chance: Hel offers alternative deal
10% chance: Hel gives fragment freely (condition unknown)
USE EMOTIONAL INFLUENCE:
70% chance: Hel detects manipulation, attacks
25% chance: Partial success, opens negotiation
5% chance: Full success, Hel surrenders fragment
The numbers were terrible.
But there was one option Temporal Sight hadn't calculated.
Maxime looked at the preserved corpses. At Hel's dual nature. At the desperate loneliness radiating from both sides of her being.
And he understood.
"You don't want me," he said quietly.
Hel's eyes narrowed.
"Excuse me?"
"You want what I represent. The ghost of Eros. The possibility that someone might finally choose you."** He gestured at the corpses. "But I'm not him. And even if I stayed, even if I became your eternal companion, I'd just be another echo. Another fake."
He took a step closer.
"You deserve real love, Hel. Not imitation. Not copies. Real connection with someone who sees both your sides and chooses them both."
Her rotted hand clenched.
"You don't know what I deserve."
"You're right. I don't. But I know what you don't deserve—another three thousand years waiting for a dead god to validate you."
Through Empathic Reading, he felt her emotions fractioning. The living side wanted to believe him. The dead side wanted to trap him.
He made his choice.
"Keep the fragment," he said.
Everyone stared.
"What?" Nyx's voice was sharp.
"Keep it," Maxime repeated. "If holding it makes you happy. If it's all you have left of him. Keep it."
Hel's expression was unreadable.
"You'd give up? Just like that?"
"I'd accept that I can't take it by force. That manipulation won't work. That you hold all the power here."** He met her dual gaze. "And that maybe your need for it is greater than mine."
Silence filled the hall of corpses.
Then Hel began to cry.
Both eyes—living and dead. Tears that glowed with blue light.
"No one has ever..." Her voice broke. "Three thousand years. No one has ever just... accepted that I might matter more than their goals."
She moved to a pedestal Maxime hadn't noticed—and there, glowing softly, was the fragment.
"Eternal Bonds. The power to forge connections that survive death, time, distance. Anything."
She picked it up with her beautiful hand.
"Eros used it to build his network of lovers. To ensure no one ever forgot him." Her rotted side smiled. "But you'd use it differently. Wouldn't you?"
"I'd try to."
Hel extended the fragment.
"Take it. Not because I'm giving up. But because you're the first person—god or mortal—who treated my pain as real rather than inconvenient."
Maxime took the fragment carefully.
The integration was gentle this time. No pain. Just... warmth.
[FRAGMENT INTEGRATED: ETERNAL BONDS (6/8)]
[LEVEL 24 → LEVEL 28]
[DIVINITY: 70% → 84%]
[ATTRIBUTES UPDATED - CURRENTLY SUPPRESSED BY 50%]
Force: 86 → 102 (effective 51)
Agility: 83 → 98 (effective 49)
Endurance: 94 → 112 (effective 56)
Mana: 820 → 1000 (effective 500)
Charisma: 122 → 135 (effective 67.5)
[NEW SKILL: SOUL BINDING (RANK S)]
[DESCRIPTION: Form permanent connections with willing participants. Bonds grant shared abilities, emotional resonance, and cannot be broken except by mutual consent or death. Maximum bonds: 10]
[NEW PASSIVE: BOND SENSE (RANK A)]
[DESCRIPTION: Always aware of bonded individuals' status, emotions, and approximate location regardless of distance or dimensional barriers.]
Maxime gasped as the power settled. Even suppressed by Helheim, it was enormous.
"Thank you," he said.
Hel smiled—sadly, beautifully, hopefully.
"Prove me right. Be better than him. Build instead of break."
She gestured, and a portal opened—leading back to the gate.
"Go. Before your time expires. And Eros-who-is-Maxime?"
He turned.
"Don't come back. Not until you're ready to stay forever."
It wasn't a threat. It was a plea.
They left through the portal.
[TIME REMAINING: 2:47:33]
They materialized at the gate. Garmr nodded, unsurprised.
"Hel grants passage. Rare. Go, false dead. Before death becomes truth."
They ran for the shore, for the boundary between life and death.
And as the countdown reached zero—
Maxime woke gasping in the Kolkata apartment.
Alive.
Heart pounding.
Fragment integrated.
Six down. Two to go.