The smoke doesn’t kill me fast enough, the fire consuming my sluggish body in a wave of agonizing heat I can’t even muster the energy to escape. My skin goes black, cracking like dried earth, my body twitching as the fire eats through my muscles and bone. Varia’s magic tries desperately to heal me, but the fire is never satisfied, roaring through my body as if it’s nothing more than kindling, energy for it to feed on.

Finally, a hunger greater than my own.

Sometimes, when death hurts especially hard, my mouth whimpers unbidden things, begging the gods for my mother. My father. Someone. Anyone.

The fire rages, consuming me, consuming my small, scared voice.

The last thing I see is the white wall surrounding South Gate, the brass door I walk through every morning taunting me. The valkerax is down there. I’m so close to my heart, and yet still so far.

Finally, mercifully, I die.

It takes magic longer to heal a burned Heartless, but eventually, it does. I wake up to ashes surrounding me, the house I collapsed beneath now nothing more than a pile of black. The fire continues to rage, but it’s moved on, beyond South Gate’s immediate vicinity, eating up the roofs of distant buildings. My clothes are gone but Father’s sword is at my side, the metal hot and singeing my hands as I pick it up. The brass door that leads to the the valkerax still stands strong, taunting.

I stare at it as best my re-forming eyes can. I’ve died a dozen ways. And fire is, still, the worst of all. My head is reeling, my body tingling like it’s being stabbed countless times even as it heals. Someday, someday soon, I won’t have to keep dying like this. Someday, the agony of being brought back after terrifying pain won’t ever be a part of my life again.

“I’m coming, Father,” I murmur through my chapped lips, staring at his rusted sword in my hand. “For you and Mother.”

My body is nearly whole, and I stagger to my slowly healing charred feet and make for the road again before the smoke can kill me once more.