History Main / EnemiesWithDeath

** Thanatos tries to use the insta-death on a non-fighter ([[spoiler:Seiya's long lost sister]]) but the lowest ranked saints manage to block it (at great damage). It's implied that the nearly godly main characters would be immune, what with divine blood protection.

** What is important to remember is Komachi is just a ferryman shinigami who takes the spirits over to meet the Yama, not a reaper shinigami who comes to collect the person when their time is up. However, Tenshi the Celestial is immortal through the fact she has defeated every reaper shinigami who has come for her, which makes the fight against her in Komachi's storyline a CrowningMomentOfAwesome.

[[quoteright:330:[[VideoGame/CastlevaniaSymphonyOfTheNight https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Castlevania_SotN_Death_7271.jpeg]]]]
[[caption-width-right:330:He's not kidding, he [[BagOfSpilling steals]] all your [[ATasteOfPower stuff!]]]]

* In ''VideoGame/OdinSphere'', several of the characters have to fight Odette, the Lady of Death, for various reasons. Gwendolyn [[spoiler: succeeds in killing her.]] [[FromBadToWorse This wound up being something of a mistake]], since it winds up [[spoiler: triggering the apocalypse, killing all but four people on the planet.]]

* Used for the DownerEnding in ''Literature/{{Revival}}'' by Creator/StephenKing: when the protagonist gets a glimpse of what lies beyond the world we know, his BigNo offends Mother, an EldritchAbomination who appears to be a CosmicEntity responsible for the miserable state of human souls in the afterlife. Though he escapes immediate retribution, he's not looking forward to what she'll have in store for him.

Some heroes are PalsWithJesus, others have [[DidWeJustHaveTeaWithCthulhu Tea With Cthulhu]], and the least fortunate are Enemies With Death.

* In the ''Literature/MalazanBookOfTheFallen'' a legendary Malazan general started out as a disciple of Hood, the God of Death but felt betrayed by his god when his beloved daughter died. He declared himself an enemy of the god and spent decades pursuing a way to kill Hood. Hood himself really does not have any strong feeling on the matter.

* In the ''IronDruidChronicles'' the protagonist has the inverse problem. A female goddess of Death of his religion is rather fond of him and likes to use him for sex. This has given him a form of immortality but has also made him a mortal enemy of one of the gods of Love. Since in that pantheon all the gods are very nasty, vengeful and quite barbaric, the difference is mostly academic. The god has tried to make the protagonist's life miserable for two millenia and is always looking for a way to kill the protagonist.

* [[OurLichesAreDifferent Haldos]], the first Lich and UnreliableNarrator from ''VideoGame/NexusWar'' learned his powers in a bid to overthrow [[DontFearTheReaper Hashaa]], the pantheon's death god. Hashaa responded with a BoltOfDivineRetribution that wiped out Haldos' power base in one blow, though he survived in a lesser (but still [[ThatOneBoss dangerous) state.

* The ''Franchise/FinalDestination'' films have the protagonists fight Death in the form of a faceless ButterflyOfDoom that's out to get them for ''not'' dying when they should have. Except it is revealed (or [[RetCon retconned]]) in the fourth movie that [[spoiler:the characters DID die when and how they were supposed to- the visions that saved them from dying ''were sent by Death itself!]]'' Suck on that, causality!

** In ''Discworld/{{Hogfather}}'', [[PsychoForHire Mr. Teatime]] devises plans for killing Death, as well as seemingly every other anthropomorphic personification on Discworld. In his spare time. And nearly pulls off the one against the Hogfather ([[YouMeanXmas a Santa Claus expy]]) until Death and his daughter Susan get involved.

* In the Literature/{{Fafhrd And The Gray Mouser}} stories the Death of their world is something like a cosmic bureaucrat that answers to some vague pan-dimensional forces. He has to meet particular quotas of who dies within allocated time periods (measured in mortal heartbeats) and is only really allowed to do so by manipulating natural events. He can't snap his fingers and kill somebody unless they have a severe medical condition, but he can make sure that they might have a nasty incident with some badly maintained masonry. The exceptions to this rule are the protagonists, who once attempted to steal his mask; since then he's had it in for them and has resorted to toying with reality by teleporting crazed berserkers into their living quarters.

* In the Literature/{{Fafhrd And The Gray Mouser}} stories the Death of their world is something like a cosmic Bureaucrat that answers to some vague Pan-dimensional forces. He has to meet particular quotas of who dies within allocated time periods, measured in mortal heartbeats, and is only really allowed to do so by manipulating natural events. He can't snap his fingers and kill somebody unless they have a severe medical condition but he can make sure that they might have a nasty incident with some badly maintened masonry. The exceptions to this rule are the protagonists who once attempted to steal his mask, since then he's had it in for them and has resorted to toying with reality by teleporting crazed berserkers into thier living quarters.

** Turns out there wasn't much room for, say, airholes...

--> '''Death:''' [[AC:Rather cramped in here, isn't it?]]
*** Turns out there wasn't much room for, say, airholes...

* [[Comicbook/DoctorStrange Shuma Gorath]] and the other Many-Angled Ones alter reality in the dimensions they take root in to remove Death so that life will grow out of control and become cancerous, spawning more [[EldritchAbomination Eldritch Abominations]] like themselves. And even Death itself (as in the cosmic anthropomorphic personification of death) can't permanently kill them.
** Marvel's Cancerverse is the living result of one of these alterations through an in-universe DealWiththeDevil. It took [[spoiler: A multi-versal invasion, brining in other [[EldritchAbomination EldritchAbominations]], and a moment of stupidity on part of Thanos to bring Death back, and even then it's temporary since Death's gone again]].

* ''TwistedMetal 2''[='=]s Mr. Grimm ''is'' in fact the Grim''m'' Reaper. He's pretty weak but has the single most powerful projectile in the game. His reason for entering the tournament is to make people die faster to feed his hunger for souls. [[JackassGenie He gets his wish.]] [[spoiler:For a while. When global war breaks out, its only so long until everyones dead and there's no more deaths, ever again.]]

[[folder: Mythology and Fairy Tales]]
* Classic fairytale "Literature/GodfatherDeath". Death became Godfather because he was "the only just person in the universe" (even Death can be flattered), and he granted his godchild to become the ultimative infallible doctor: when he sees him on the head side of the bed, the person is doomed, but if on the other side, the person will recover. Things go rapidly downhill when the local princess is terminally ill and the love-struck doctor [[ExactWords rotates the bed]] to trick Death. It was even the second time he pulled off that stunt, first time he got away with a warning, but now he [[IncrediblyLamePun reaps what he sowed.]]
[[/folder]]

* Classic fairytale "Godfather Death". Death became Godfather because he was "the only just person in the universe" (even Death can be flattered), and he granted his godchild to become the ultimative infallible doctor: when he sees him on the head side of the bed, the person is doomed, but if on the other side, the person will recover. Things go rapidly downhill when the local princess is terminally ill and the love-struck doctor [[ExactWords rotates the bed]] to trick Death. It was even the second time he pulled off that stunt, first time he got away with a warning, but now he [[IncrediblyLamePun reaps what he sowed.]]

* ''SaintSeiya'' has the heroes fight Hades, god of the underworld... and his minion gods Thanatos and Hypnos, gods of death and sleep, respectively. Just how powerful they are [[MisappliedPhlebotinum or how wisely they use their abilities]] is debatable, as they both physically fight the saints [[CaptainObvious (and lose)]] rather than kill them by natural causes or make them comatose, respectively.

* At the end of the ''Franchise/{{Neopets}}'' War of the Obelisk plot, the Awakened, an army of the undead, are [[BossBattle pitted against]] Death. They fear him because he is a threat to their immortality. It also would appear that he is [[AnnoyingYoungerSibling the little brother]] of [[UndeadChildren the leaders of the Awakened,]] [[CreepyTwins Lanie and Lillie]]. As they encourage the dead to rise from their graves, and he wants the dead to stay dead, they are at odds with each other.

* At the end of the ''Franchise/{{Neopets}}'' War of the Obelisk plot, the Awakened, an army of the undead, are pitted against Death. They fear him because he is a threat to their immortality. It also would appear that he is [[AnnoyingYoungerSibling the little brother]] of [[UndeadChildren the leaders of the Awakened,]] [[CreepyTwins Lanie and Lillie]]. As they encourage the dead to rise from their graves, and he wants the dead to stay dead, they are at odds with each other.

* At the end of the ''Franchise/{{Neopets}}'' War of the Obelisk plot, the Awakened, an army of the undead, are pitted against Death. They fear him because he is a threat to their immortality. It also would appear that he is [[AnnoyingYoungerSibling the little brother]] of [[UndeadChildren the leaders of the Awakened,]] [[CreepyTwins Lanie and Lillie]], and their nemesis.

** Death is usually a pretty nice guy, or neutrally doing his job, but in [[Discworld/TheColourOfMagic the first book]], [[CharacterizationMarchesOn before his characterisation was quite settled]], he could be slightly malevolent, and annoyed that he couldn't tell when [[CosmicPlaything Rincewind]] was going to die. He stopped actively going after Rincewind as early as [[Discworld/TheLightFantastic the second book]], and took the view of [[AC:I'll get him eventually. I get ''everyone'', eventually.]]

--> [[AC:Rather cramped in here, isn't it?]]
:: Turns out there wasn't much room for, say, airholes...

** Marvel's Cancerverse is the living result of one of these alterations through an in-universe DealWiththeDevil. It took [[spoiler: A multi-versal invasion, brining in other EldritchAbominations, and a moment of stupidity on part of Thanos to bring Death back, and even then it's temporary since Death's gone again]].

* In ''OdinSphere'', several of the characters have to fight Odette, the Lady of Death, for various reasons. Gwendolyn [[spoiler: succeeds in killing her.]] [[FromBadToWorse This wound up being something of a mistake]], since it winds up [[spoiler: triggering the apocalypse, killing all but four people on the planet.]]
* Although the Queen of Maggots in ''TheCatLady'' is, by her own admission, not truly "death", she may as well be given her ability to resurrect the dead and prevent souls from passing on into the afterlife. The game provides an excellent example of what happens when you annoy Death: she picks a recently-deceased soul, resurrects them, and makes them functionally immortal while telling them that the only way they get out of their crapsack life is by murdering the hell out of you.