Learn Dutch: Hoe de piraat komt te sterven, blijft een mysterie. - How the pirate ends up dying remains a mystery.

The construction komen te + infinitive expresses a resulting state or how a situation turns out (like "ends up dying"). With verbs for dying (sterven or overlijden), adding komen te is also a very common stylistic choice in stories or the news. It sounds a bit more dramatic or formal, somewhat like "comes to meet his end" rather than just "dies".

Why is the verb blijft right after the comma? Shouldn't there be a subject there?

The entire first clause (Hoe de piraat komt te sterven) is the subject of the sentence! Because Dutch uses the V2 (verb-second) rule for main clauses, the conjugated main verb blijft must take the second slot. Since the first slot is completely filled by that "How..." clause, blijft naturally comes immediately after the comma.

In the subordinate clause, could the verbs go in the reverse order: te sterven komt?

No, with the komen te + infinitive construction, the conjugated verb (komt) almost always comes before the te + infinitive at the end of a subordinate clause. This is stricter than the standard "red/green" word order flexibility you might remember using with modal verbs (where both kan zien and zien kan are allowed).

I usually see doodgaan or overlijden for "to die". When should I use ?