Jack's vision slowly came into view, with the feeling of lying down; he stared straight into an inky abyss of darkness, in the absence of light and the feeling of claustrophobia closing in, made him feel crushing despair.

[OH GOD. I'M DEAD-I'M DEAD-I'M DEAD... I'm dead.....] Jack's thoughts roared in his mind, as they soon came to a shortstop.

Jack's last memory had him eating at home alone, as always. He was eating his simple microwaved box meal. He thought to be adventurous in his monotonous life, and try the chicken pasta flavor. Little did he know that this slight discourse caused his death, choked to death by a piece of hardened microwaved noodle, a truly pathetic way to die.

Jack lived his life alone. No family, as he outlived his parents. No siblings, No spouse, and no children to save him from his moment of mortality, and likely no one to check for his death, until his absences from work could no longer be explained.

Jack laid in the darkness, still alone. As jacks thoughts shifted from his pathetic death and to his use to be miserable life, peace came to him.

[At least I don't have to deal with life anymore... No more work or bills, no more anything.] Jack thought happily, as his thoughts soon turned to the deafening silence of his own thoughts.

[They say we come into this world alone, and we leave this world alone.] Jack became philosophical. [But I had a mother... Is that really alone?]

This uneasy peace and philosophical pondering went on for countless time before it occurred to Jack to come to an understanding of his current situation.

Jack felt he was lying down, but, if he was dead, how would he perceive this? He could still feel. Jack tried to feel his body. He had the sensation that he was moving and that he was surrounded in a box, but no sense of touch was connecting to his mind. He could feel the pressure he used to press inside his container, but not the feeling of what he was touching, a most disconcerting feeling. It kind of had that feeling when your hand is asleep from being pressed.

[So I was recovered and laid to rest in a coffin??? Who the hell puts someone in an unpadded coffin??? I mean it's nice... but....] While Jack could not feel if he was touching wood, stone or metal, he could feel with pressure, it was solid. No padding. He didn't even have a pillow for his head.

Jack always knew, when he would die, he would be cremated due to being without anyone to care for his death. Why was he in a coffin? Even a coffin as odd and unadorned as this was still a gift by humanity to him, at his time of death.

At least he died with an intact body, and not in a car crash, he always feared.

While pondering the odd state he was in, and the feeling of the box, he thought to touch his face.

A hard feeling returned to his hands... He touched his eyes, but the feeling that this returned horrified him. There was no squishy feeling. No sensation of a spongy feeling skin would have; even if he could not tell by his lacking sense of touch, he could still feel if it was springy like flesh. However, the most terrifying was his eyes. Where the sensation of a squishy feeling of an eye should be.... was a hole.

Using both hands, Jack groped both his eye sockets. That's right. These were eye sockets, and no eyes were there. Was this Purgatory? Hell?

After the passing of an unknown time of dread and horror, Jack calmed down to wonder how he could see. He saw endless darkness but felt he was "seeing" this and not just the absence of sight. He pondered still that he had never been blind before, so how would he know.

Soon he heard muffled voices that slowly came into a sense of vague chanting. This lasted for a while. He could hear! This made Jack, who had been completely deprived of his senses for a long time to be joyed, just by the feeling of some kind of stimulation. These voices sounded like a choir for a church, but also like a ritual he would find in the games he liked to play.

Jack tried to urge his voice to make contact but found no sound was made. He tried speaking different languages he could think of but to no avail.

Soon the chanting voices died down, and for a long time, silence once again reigned. Jack had no clue of the passage of time, but since he could hear, time felt to length from the want of more stimulation in a deprived environment.

After this period of time finally passed, the sound of voices returned. This time it was not choir-like, but conversation, much closer this time.

While muffled, a sweet feminine sounding voice drifted into Jack's domain. "Did it work?"

"Of course... it worked." a rather hesitant, but astute sounding gentleman replied in a short way.

"Then why isn't the Holy Witch King awaking?" the troubled sounding sweet voice responded, in a hurried manner.

"He's been asleep for a little over a thousand years. I have trouble waking up after a few years, let alone a thousand." A gruff sounding voice responded, followed by laughter!

"Yeah, and you didn't single-handedly vanquish a full five armies using the Holy light, did you?!" The female voice sounded annoyed and anxious.

"No, I make currency!" with a gruff retort, soon followed another bout of laughter.

Jack now had no idea what this conversation was about, or about whom. All he knew was that he wanted to make contact, so he began to hit the inside of his, assumed, coffin.

"Hush, Business Head John!! ...Do you hear that?" The feminine voice shrieked in excitement.

"Countess Leslie, what are you yelling at me for?" The gruff voice scoffed.

"No, no... I hear it too." sounded the Gentlemen's voice.

"Now that you say it... I think so too... Do you think some vermin got into the Holy Witch Kings tomb?" Business Head John asked jokingly.

"What are you saying, you stupid tycoon... Get the priest to come exhume the tomb... Something went wrong." Countess Leslie commanded.

Jack heard all kinds of noises soon after, and soon a crack of light flooded his abyssal state.

As soon as he could he lifted himself out of his confinement to look around... Horror beyond what he had already felt previously at the knowledge of his assumed death... caused his mind to break down, unable to process what was going on in his field of view.

The room he observed was something from his novels and games he read and played. A medieval room made of, what Jack assumed were, bones filled with light courtesy of the jewels on the walls. He looked down from his rest to see that his container was a black stone tomb, adorned with golden, holy images and runes.

He glanced up to see who the voices belonged to, and this is where the terror arose. Surrounding him where ghastly figures.

[I died and went to Hell... What did I do exactly to deserve this....]

Jack's mind broke further, but in this madness, he found himself surprisingly calm.

There were skeletons wearing white robes, a number of seven of them. Behind them were three figures, a slim skeleton wearing noble vestments and a silver monocle over his right hollowed eye, a large fat Zombie with a bloated barbarian build, but in the clothes of a merchant, and lastly, a zombie woman. Her face was colored a gray undeath, otherwise with a human look, but with the beauty to cause the collapse of nations. The most interesting thing besides her beauty was her hands. This female undead had pure white skeletal hands. She also looked to be a well-endowed lady. Who knew about the rest of her? Some dark part of Jack's brain wondered about the parts that made her female... Were they intact?

Jack was losing it. He lay back down in his Tomb, not knowing what to do or say. Even if he could say anything at all, what would he say?

A hurried voice came from afar and made its way into the tomb.

"I should have come here, to begin with, undead be damn the instructions, only I can awake the Holy Witch King properly!" A harsh and uptight voice called out.

"We did exactly as his Grace left for us. Who are you to question his Grace?"

"I am SECOND ONLY to his Grace, here! I have kept this kingdom running for his Grace for over a thousand years!" The voice came fast.

A snort was heard. "If by second, you mean, second place." Laughter filled the room and echoed from Business Head John, leaving no face for the undead that just entered in large strides.

"YOU?!"

"Calm down, Grand Minister Lucius." The Skeletal gentlemen replied.

With a huff, Grand Minister Lucius walked to the side of the tomb of the Holy Witch King.

"Your Grace, What is wrong? What can I do for you?" Grand Minister Lucius bowed down in front of the raised tomb that was at the center of the room surrounded by a pious undead priest.

"Your grace???" Jack thought... He rose back up and looked down on the kneeling figure of Grand Minister Lucius. Grand Minster Lucius appeared with a white robe with gold inlays with red trim. Upon his head was a pious pope's hat, in the same design as his robe. The hat had an emblem on it. An emblem that looked oddly familiar to Jack. A crest. This crest was of a Skull with no lower jaw, with a half sun above the skull and upside down angel wings on the left and right respectively.

Jacks mind buzzed with a thought, a fragment of memory, long forgotten, and so he spoke unconsciously, as a sharp pain stabbed into his mind. Not with a voice, but with his mind aloud.

"May Holy undeath reign within the Holy Kingdom of Deagoth." A heroic and virtuous voice sounded and filled the room and halls surrounding the tomb. This was Jack's voice!

All within the room knelled quickly, and responded in the same!

""""""""""May the Undeath of his Grace last forever!""""""""""

Jack was frightened by not only this response... But his own! How did he know this, whose voice was this? This wasn't his voice! What language was he speaking!? How could he understand them? Himself? In Jack's joy of hearing voices, he didn't stop to ask why he could understand this arcane language that was being spoken.

Jack had no idea of any of these questions. He kind of just wanted to lie back down and not think about it. This was always Jack's way of solving things. Was this the right way? Not even close, but this was Jack's way.

Jack's head was busting, and before Jack started to lie back down for the second time, Countess Leslie raised her head and spoke. "My Grace, My love. Please let me bathe you and ready your throne, for the worst has come to pass!"

Jack looked over at this decayed beauty. Still amazed by how a dead face could look so good. Jack felt a stirring in his soul... Oddly not his body. Jack lifted his hands and seen they too were skeletal. Yes. He was undead.

Jack thought and spoke trying to formulate the feeling he had earlier, and what information he gathered from listening earlier. If nothing else about Jack, he was quick-witted. He could pick up information like a computer, and a perfect memory... When he wanted too...

"Yes... Countess Leslie... I would like that...." His voice, while still heroic... paused a bit too long between his sentences, sounding like an elder who could not articulate a full sentence.

Overcome with joy as never seen before, Leslie moved quickly to a side hall and called in her handmaidens. They came in, and pushed the priest aside, much to the dislike and distaste of Grand Minister Lucius, who at this point had been completely disregarded.

These handmaidens wore plain white dresses on their skeletal frames, with gold trim. A few of them still had some fleshy parts. An Upper arm here, A chest, with what could be considered breasts, and a leg here.

Jack looking over to the figure of Grand Minister Lucius who was still kneeling, unlike many in the room who have already started to stand up, could tell that he was not pleased. Jack had no clue what was going on but knew that he was spoken to as his Grace. He could only think that he must be important. Why? Jack couldn't be bothered to wonder at this point. Nothing made sense, but Jack didn't want to leave Lucius in a position where he was left without face. Everyone in this world needed their face and some reputation to live... Or be dead with... Jack couldn't be made to deal with the phrasing of this.

"Grand... Minister... Lucius... We will talk... Later... Thank you..." Jack concentrated as much as he could... Still feeling out the way to communicate.

"Yes! Yes, your Grace!" Grand Minister Lucius was like a man in a desert who just was handed a gourd of water, grateful to save face, and to be commanded by his grace.

The Skeletal Gentleman, known as Marquis Mark, and Business Head John walked out together, leaving the Holy Palace.

Lead away by these undead handmaidens, Jack quickly and carefully learned to walk. The feeling of his skeletal feet on the floor wasn't so much of a problem, but the way to balance when you don't have flesh on your feet was odd. Helped by the maidens, he was lead out of his tomb, and into the hall. Out of the hall, and up to a long spiral of steps and lastly into what could only be assumed was his private quarters.