The Faceless One

Growing up on the streets as a child, I did what I had to survive. Sometimes that meant taking things that weren’t mine. Life was harsh and death was indifferent, so I had no other choice. I may have not been good at it at first, but once I discovered my abilities, I was unstoppable; I easily slipped under the radar of the police every time I took on a new job. After all, who could hunt a faceless girl?

My being a shapeshifter was a blessing in the long run. I accumulated enough wealth and started my own business, but although I was happy and stable, I was still not satisfied. That thrill of being on the run… I began to miss it more and more as time passed by.

And so, I returned to my roots, but stepped up my game. I already had enough wealth, so I switched to stealing rare artefacts instead. I struck several museums and stole many a relic, from stone tablets to jewellery, and even some rare and bizarre weapons. I even bought a separate mansion just to house all the rare antiquities I would collect over the years. The thrill of a new heist always kept me going. I felt unstoppable again.

During one of my regular heists, however, something strange happened: I was captivated by a stone tablet I had not intended to steal that night, but I sensed an odd attraction to it, as if it were calling out to me. There were things inscribed on it in an ancient tongue, but what was more interesting was what seemed to be the depiction of a person transforming into someone else.

Did this tablet have some insight into my shapeshifting abilities or ancestry? My curiosity got the best of me. I stole it along with what I had originally intended to grab: a war scythe that was one of its kind, believed to be forged with ore from a meteorite nearly ten millennia ago, and with a tridecagram each carved into both its staff and its blade.

I stayed up all night, sifting through the pages of many history books I had to find a translation to the texts etched into that tablet. It was nearly 4:00 a.m. when I found the answers I was looking for. ‘The Cycle of the Faceless Ones’, it was called. It spoke of how “those with the gift to change their outer shapes may still remain prisoners to their unyielding inner selves”—how even Death may suffer their insatiable greed in the rarest of aeons. Now a new interest was brewing within me. Could I truly surpass Death itself? The idea was enticing.

To my surprise, when I turned the tablet around, I found that it, too, had a tridecagram carved into its back, and below it was a verse. It read, “With this scythe, I challenge Death.” This was it. My chance at besting the unbeatable and stealing what riches they may have, and perhaps even overcoming the reins of mortality itself… No treasure I had collected in my entire lifetime could compare to whatever awaited me. I had to do it.

I grabbed the scythe and recited the verse on the tablet. A gust of black mist burst into the room and converged at its centre, giving form to a hooded figure. Death was here. They said not a word, but marched forward, pulling out a scythe of their own as they approached me. And then I saw it: their face, or rather their facelessness veiled by the shadow of their cloak. And so I battled my fellow faceless enemy until I sliced their ankles and brought them to their knees. Death dropped its scythe as it bled the same black mist that had engulfed the room upon its arrival. I then drove my blade into Death’s chest and pinned them to the ground. My enemy writhed where they lay, but their struggles soon ceased, and they dissolved into their dark essence.

That same black mist soon began to surround me, swirling upward to engulf me in its shadows. I felt an overwhelming emptiness suddenly consume me, sinking its grip into every fibre of my being. Soon, I found myself covered in a black cloak, the same kind donned by the enemy I had just slain. Before I could even form another thought, I found all my memories decaying before me. And as I slowly lost myself, the last thing I saw was a new verse appear on the tablet before me: “As Death faces their demise, the Faceless One shall take their place—and so the cycle begins anew.”