They'd all gathered at the bonfire to regroup and recharge Beatrice's magic. Siegmeyer had no trouble opening the door. "Door does not open from this side" meant little in the face of his cyclopean strength. This meant that the group could completely avoid the region of the sewers filled with basilisks, which was great considering that Lex and developed a real-world aversion to frogs after his first playthrough. After the incident with the Black Knight, he didn't want to have another breakdown.
Especially not since Beatrice was already having problems with the rats for some reason. Worse, since Oswald was dead, they had no source of purging stones if any of them were cursed by the basilisks' breath. They'd be forced to detour through New Londo to reach Ingward and his restorative magic. While it was certainly possible to get through to the last Sealer, it would be rather harrowing at this level – he'd not even put points into Vitality yet. And of course, Beatrice had her history of attacking ghosts without using a transient curse.
Still, he had to risk at least one basilisk, probably. Hopefully no more.
"So you're telling me that the Knight of Thorns is some sort of Undead bogeyman to you?"
"The Darkwraiths don't range very far from Lordran," Oscar said. "They've attacked nearby countries many times. The attacks grow worse as the curse spreads. These attacks could be how they gain new members. The curse makes people desperate. Willing to do anything for power."
Siegmeyer nodded.
"Catarina has not had much trouble with the curse. From what I've been told, I am the first knight to fall. But even we have heard of Kirk. Worse than a murderer, they say. A fiend who takes pleasure in making his victims suffer before he drains them of their humanity."
"Right, so, if we take a certain passage down here, he will try to ambush us and take our humanity. Since I know where his phantom will appear, we could avoid him entirely."
"Why wouldn't we?" Siegmeyer asked.
"A counter-ambush," Oscar said distantly, already thinking of plans.
"Sort of. We are going to ambush him, but I need all of you to not hurt him."
"What?!" Siegmeyer and Oscar said at once.
"I need him to deliver a message. To be honest, I don't know even as much about him as you do. What I do know is what actions he is fated to perform as part of the Fate of the Undead. Specifically, I know where his ultimate allegiance lies. If my plan works, we'll have a much easier time in completing our quest."
"Mmm. I don't know if I like the sound of a plan that depends on such a villain."
"Lex," Oscar said sternly, looking him in the eye, "you said no more secrets. What, exactly, is this plan, and how will it make things easier?"
"Right, sorry. First: Kirk isn't a Darkwraith. Maybe he was before, but he isn't now."
Siegmeyer tried to speak but stumbled over the words from shock. Oscar was a little more articulate.
"Kirk is one of the most – if not the most – infamous Darkwraith. You say he isn't one?"
"Sometimes the tools the Darkwraiths use to invade other worlds get damaged or wear out. Even in their broken state, they can usually be used for one last invasion. Worse, their own protections are damaged as well, so those who aren't Darkwraiths can use them."
"Invade other worlds?"
"Appear as hostile black-slash-red phantoms, I mean."
Oscar nodded slowly.
"It's nearly risk-free for them, and nets them humanity if they murder someone, so the unscrupulous try to get hold of these 'cracked red eye orbs' when they can. Still, the unbroken orbs can only be created by the Darkwraiths' master, so it can be hard to collect a large number of the broken ones unless a Darkwraith is giving them out to spread chaos. A true Darkwraith with an unbroken orb can invade ceaselessly until it breaks or a defeat drives them hollow."
"We must stop this nefarious 'master' as soon as we are able!" Siegmeyer cried, rising with fury.
"We've already changed fate, but in the countless paths I have foreseen, no Undead has been able to harm him. If we go after Darkstalker Kaathe, we'll need a solid plan. For now, though, Kirk is our concern."
"Oh, indeed. I am terribly sorry. Please continue," he said, sitting back down.
"So you can see, if Kirk was a true Darkwraith, he'd be much more terrifying. Whether he has broken that dark Covenant or never swore to it to begin with, he has sworn to another. He is a Chaos Servant."
"I can see that he's less dangerous to the world if he's not a Darkwraith," Oscar said, crossing his arms. "How does serving the demons make him less dangerous to us?"
"Easy. At least one of us – probably me – is going to become a Chaos Servant as well.
"Wha-!"
"Chill! Okay? They don't serve demons; they serve a witch. One of the seven Daughters. She is deathly ill, so she was turned into a Fire Keeper to keep her alive. The Servants collect humanity – admittedly sometimes through the brutal murder of innocents – to strengthen her fire and ease her pain. She's probably too delirious to even consider where they're getting it from."
Siegmeyer softened a little, but Oscar was unimpressed.
"I fail to see how this helps us."
"Her bonfire is directly beneath the second Bell, and the most trusted Servants may use the Daughters' private path from the fire to the very heart of Lost Izalith. Which is great because the outskirts are full of lava, and there's only one ring in Lordran to protect against that. Trying to share the ring by passing it between us is just asking me to mess up and drop it in the lava somewhere."
Oscar sighed. Siegmeyer started his trademark humming. Eventually, the former spoke.
"This may be a necessary evil. We'll try to capture the Knight of Thorns first and then decide."
"Even if we have to kill Kirk, I'm going to go ahead and join the Covenant while I'm there. There aren't any benefits to staying a Sunbro until we get hold of Gwyn's soul."
"You… you would abandon a divine Covenant because it stops benefiting you?"
"Well, when you say it like that, it sounds bad, but yeah. It's not like there are any oaths or anything. They're all just like 'hey, join our club, and we'll give you free stuff.' So I'm going to ditch a dead end forbidden cult with a missing patron for a heretical cult with actual benefits and a patron you can't help but feel sorry for."
"I'm sorry, Lex, but this is stupid. You may have divine knowledge of Lordran, but your judgment is awful. Worse than awful. A child would know better than to pity a Chaos demon."
"But Oscar," Siegmeyer interrupted, "aren't you curious as to why these cutthroats would give away their ill-gotten gains? What malady ails this Chaos witch?"
"Ahh. See, that's just it," Lex said, looking Oscar straight in the eye. "Have you heard of blightpus?"
"Of course I have. The blight is nasty, unholy infection that causes the head to bloat until it bursts. The infected become a danger to everyone around them. The cysts burst if the blood flow ever stops, too. The only recourse… is to burn the victims alive…
The gods were be merciful and exiled them. The victims and their caretakers built Blighttown. Whenever new victims were discovered, they were went to Lordran for quarantine."
"Interesting," Lex said, nodding. "Well, you'll be pleased to hear that while the blight is probably the reason why the swamp water is so poisonous that extended contact can kill you, there aren't any blight victims left. I mean, all the hollows down there are horrifying mutants, but none of us will risk getting blighted… Yet another reason I should have been the Nerevarine… But yeah!
When two of the Daughters of Chaos crawled up out of the ruins of Izalith, one took pity on the blight sufferers. Since fire can purge the toxins and the Daughters are currently full of lava, she thought she could maybe suck the blightpus out like a normal poison. Incidentally, sucking out normal poisons is a bad idea anyway, but you see where this is going. She succeeded but is now blind, lame, and delirious. As a Fire Keeper, she is supposed to be immortal, but every moment of her life, she lives in fear of succumbing to the poison."
Oscar stared into the bonfire, ashamed of his previous comments. Siegmeyer swallowed hard. Beatrice merely rolled her eyes. After a while, Siegmeyer broke the silence.
"This knight of Catarina would consider it an honor to serve beside you, Prophet Lex. I will not join in such brigandry, of course, but I can spare some humanity for such a selfless heroine."
"I… may have been too harsh. I didn't know. I can't promise that I'll join you… but I will reserve judgment until I have met the witch myself."
Lex turned to Beatrice and stared. After a moment, Oscar looked at her too.
"Sob stories are a dime a dozen. I'm not giving my hard-earned humanity to some vapid bitch who doesn't realize that deadly poison is deadly."
"Beatrice!" Siegmeyer scolded. "That was uncalled for! You don't need to agree, but don't speak ill of someone who would sacrifice her own well-being for the sake of others!"
"Stop trying to act like my pops, fatass. He was a total dick, so you're not convincing at all."
Siegmeyer tried to speak, but Beatrice kept on.
"Shitty prophet, where does the Knight of Pricks show up? Let's get this charity crap on the road so we can ring that stupid Bell."
Lex sighed.
"All right, keep your hat on. Oscar, Siegmeyer, let's go. The faster we get this done, the sooner we can help the Chaos witch, whose name is incidentally concealed from me. Money says it starts with 'Quel-,' though."
They rose and headed through the long tunnel leading away from the bonfire. A feral hollow, resurrected by the bonfire, blocked their path, but Beatrice blasted it before it noticed even Siegmeyer's clanking footsteps. They entered the next room and descended a ladder that had been previously concealed by a number of boxes. Beyond the door that Siegmeyer had bent open was a long staircase descending to a lower level. There were a few slimes and giant rats throughout the long room, but they ignored them and continued to another tunnel with walkways on either side.
Beatrice, furious at her earlier incident, wiped them out with a soul vortex before any of the men could react. They continued to a platform linking the walkways.
"Oscar, you're the fastest one among us. I want you to run around the next bend and brutally murder the thing that's there. If it starts spitting stuff, run away as fast as you can."
The elite knight nodded and jogged around the corner. Suddenly, his steps in the shallow water accelerated to a breakneck sprint, and his sword tore into flesh. When he appeared around the corner again, he was practically stomping.
"You! Why didn't you tell me it was a basilisk?!"
"I didn't know if it would mean anything to you, and after that long talk about the Chaos Servants, I felt we'd wasted enough ti-"
A red-black portal had appeared at his feet.
"Everyone, get ready!"
Lex and Siegmeyer stepped to either side and held their long swords at the ready, while Beatrice backed up several paces and raised her staff preemptively. Oscar approached from the front. As the phantom rose from the stone platform, the elite knight held his sword to the invader's throat.
"Hold," he commanded.
The Knight of Thorns stood stock still. Then he didn't. In a flash, he fell backward and kicked out his legs, grabbing Oscar. When his elbows hit the ground, he flexed and flipped the Astoran overhead. Siegmeyer roared as he quickly curved his hammering blow away from his ally. Lex had tried a quick thrust instead, but the invader simply dropped to the stone and rolled under the blade.
The cleric screamed and crumpled as Kirk's armor spikes tore effortlessly through his robes and into his shins. The all-too-real fake Darkwraith glanced backward at a flash of light and rolled the other way just before a soul spear burst against the floor. Siegmeyer swung low, his too-long blade sparking against the stone, but Kirk just thrust his arms down and his hips up and bounced into the air, still spinning as he cleared the sword. He took his feet while facing away from the onion knight, Oscar charging from the other side. In one elegant move, he leaned backward, kicking away the knight in front and bowling over the one in back with a shield bash.
Now, a soul spear and a great lightning spear came at cross angles. He spun on the one foot he had on the ground and hooked Oscar with his spiked sword, using him as a human shield. The elite knight fell to his knees. Soul force billowed out of his helmet. As the last wisp escaped, a tiny black sprite followed, and his body faded away.
"Oh god! Oscar! I- I- k…killed…" Lex whimpered.
"Suck it up, kid! He'll be back in what – thirty seconds?" Beatrice yelled. "We've got bigger problems! Like why the hell you thought we could take this guy!"
Lex was too stunned to answer. Worse, he was too stunned to fight. Seeing this, the Knight of Thorns turned back to Siegmeyer, who had just scrambled to his feet. Before he could react, Kirk clotheslined him into the sewer wall. He followed up with a murderous elbow to the underside of the onion helmet, smashing the knight's head against the wall again and again as it bounced.
"Lex!" Beatrice screamed. "I can't get a clean shot like this! Get in there you shit!"
At last the cleric snapped out of his trance and rushed forward blindly. Kirk parried the flailing swing and dug the flat of his sword into his side. Lex recoiled in pain, tearing himself open without the Knight of Thorns moving a muscle. Behind them, Siegmeyer fell on his face, souls pouring out from under the battered helmet. Terrified, Lex tripped on the slick walkway, and his sword skittered across the stone. Beatrice sighed and saluted.
"He who fights and runs away lives to fight another day. I'd prefer to keep my humanity, so I'll be seeing you in a bit, kid!"
Kirk abruptly twisted his body backward, hurling his shield like a discus. The witch was too fast, however, rolling away and around the corner with plenty of time to spare. With that kind of distance, there was no way the Knight of Thorns would be able to catch her, so he turned back to his previous victim.
"Please, Kirk! We didn't mean any harm! We were just trying to be careful!"
Lex scrambled away from the knight but soon found himself against the wall. Unfortunately, his sword had bounced the other direction, so he was even worse off than when he had started.
"Wait! Please! I want to serve the Fair Lady! I know a faster way of harvesting humanity!"
The Knight of Thorns did not falter in his approach, but he did not kill the cleric immediately. He picked Lex up by the collar with his free hand and held his barbed sword to one cheek, delicately grazing it so as to draw a single trickle of blood.
"I'm listening," he said at last, his voice like salt and ash and barbed wire.
"I'm the prophet of-"
Kirk slid his sword along Lex's face, drawing more blood.
"Faster."
"Oolacile!" Lex screamed desperately. "Time travel! Collect it straight from the Abyss!"
Kirk slammed Lex against the wall as he had Siegmeyer.
"This nonsense…"
"The pendant! Manus will come for it! His Want defies time! Please! I can take you there!"
By now, he was crying, and snot was pouring down his face. Kirk let him down.
"I hear no lie. Madness, perhaps. Madness is befitting a Servant. You seem to know of the Fair Lady. Bring all the humanity you have, and we shall speak further."
With that, he threw the sniveling cleric at the wall and drew a black crystal from his belt. He grasped it tightly, and his phantom flickered and faded, leaving Lex alone with his fears in the cold, wet Depths.