There once was a man who had lived a very long time and had decided he hated everything.
He hated trees because they were sticky and the leaves made a mess and dropped branches on his head.
He hated rivers because they smelled bad and it was always cold no matter the season.
He even hated the birds and butterflies.
Most of all he hated people. Messy loud obnoxious arrogant people who ruined everything they touched.
The only thing he didn't hate was his dog. His dog was soft and cuddly and would bring him food and always stayed by him. His dog had been with him for a long time and so he'd had a long time to love that dog.
Since he had lived for so long many people would seek him out to learn how he had lived for so long. He would move around a lot to avoid them but they always seemed to find him. Stupid persistent people.
A long time and a couple legends later people no longer sought him out. They hunted him because the legends had been twisted to say he was an evil man who gained immorality by killing and eating the souls of the innocent. So he learned how to fight and found something else he loved besides his dog. He loved swords and bows and axes and knives.
But he still hated the people who made him learn it
One day he found a big black cloak which helped him hide from his enemies. He wore it until it was thread bare and then patched it and it helped him hide for a very long time.
One day an army came after him and his poor dog. He fought until there was a pile of bodies for his dog to maul. And then when they retreated he hated them some more. He hated them in his sleep and in the morning when they started fighting and dying at his hands again. When there was only the commander left he realized how he had lost.
The commander held his dog by the scruff with a sword at his neck. The dog was growling and scratching to no avail. The commander demanded he tell him his secret but he still refused. On his hands and knees he refused because he did not know.
So the commander cut his dogs head off and while the man sank to the muddy bloody ground the dogs head grew back 3 fold and he ate the commander in 1 bite. Because the man wasnt immortal. The dog was.
After they ran away from the battlefield they searched for a quiet place. They searched to the top of mountians and the deaths of vallies. They still had to fight army after army and the man and his dog hated them more and more.
In one deep deep valley they found a hole. And so they followed the hole down down down into the dark. And they found a continent bathed in blue flame and lava and a river of black water. And they loved it. The dog had found a way to remove a persons soul from eating so many people. So he gave the river all the souls he'd collected and the river was full. The man saw the souls and he didnt hate them. He touched a soul and saw its memories and where its next life was and so he picked it up out of the river and guided it to its next life. The dog and the man looked at each other and smiled toothy smiles.
And the dog became death, guider of the dead to the river of the afterlife. Where the man would meet them in his palace, of gold and silver and precious gems that he had pulled from the earth, and send them to their next life.
The end
