(Edited December 26th, 2019)
Chapter 17 – Evil.
A soft drizzle fell in the morning air, the tiny drops of falling water barely distinguishable amidst the monochrome sunlight vaguely radiating through the overcast skies. The gentle rainfall was nothing in the way of their travels and the sun itself was plenty high in the sky, but still, the Shepherd's group stayed stagnant in the silence.
Mikleo stood in the drizzling rain away from the campsite, staring worriedly towards the cliffside trail that curved past the nearby ridge and out of sight. His cape flapped in the breeze as he stood there, motionless.
"What happened with that girl and her father... All of this is just awful." he mumbled, breaking the silence. "…And now Sorey's beating himself up for what happened." he said grimly.
His words carried to Lailah who was quietly combing her hair by the cave entrance. She softly nodded her head. "…I don't think Sorey slept very well last night. I was sure I heard him tossing and turning in his bedroll."
"He probably didn't get a wink of sleep." Edna curled up with her legs against her chest as she sheltered herself from the rain under her umbrella. "Killing another human for the first time had to have been difficult. Especially for someone as originally naïve as him."
"Well, yeah." Rose trotted up to the rest of them, crossing her arms. "Honestly, I had hoped that he would never end up getting to a point like this. The world's got enough killers like me, after all." She shifted on her feet, the charms dangling off her clothing waving in the wind. "…But there's no use crying over spilt milk. It's best to give him some space for right now – this is the sort of thing you have to come to terms with on your own."
"I take it you're talking from experience?" Mikleo asked dully, still staring out into the fog.
"Of course I am." She shook her head. "But you know, it's probably a good thing that Sorey's reacting so harshly to it. If killing is something that comes to you easier than breathing, then you're probably not someone who respects how precious lives really are."
Behind her, partially obscured by the shadows of the cave, Dezel grunted, crossing his arms. "Could've fooled me." he muttered.
Velvet's blade squealed noisily as she ran the grindstone down its length for the umpteenth time amidst the silence that followed. The wind kicked up once more, playing with her hair as she stared at her reflection in the pristine steel that made up her lifeline. After a few more moments of silence, her sword collapsed back into its sheath with a noisy clank.
"I'm going." she stated simply.
The rest of the group watched mutely as she stood up, turning around and leaving down the path that hugged the ridgeline without another word.
Her steel boots clanked rhythmically on the moist stone and gravel underfoot as she followed the path, the drizzle and the mist enveloping her entirely. To her left and off the edge of the cliff, the vast expansive landscape of the Biroclef Ridge spread out amidst the overcast skies, populated by sharp, jagged cliffs and patches of rolling hills topped with vast swathes of forest. Up ahead, the path continued, twisting and turning with seemingly no end in sight.
It wasn't long before she found him amidst the drizzling rain.
Sitting cross-legged underneath a lone tree on the cliffside up ahead, Sorey stared out into the vast expanse of nature in utter solitude. His hands rested on his thighs, his elbows bent, and his entire body hunched and diminutive. Velvet paused there for a second, taking in the sight of the Shepherd sitting there by himself. Then she stepped forward, the metal chains on her outfit clinking in the breeze.
"You'll catch a cold if you stay out here much longer." She came to a halt behind him, her arms crossed and her tattered jacket flapping in the breeze. "The wind and the water won't do you any favors."
Sorey blinked in dumb surprise to the woman's sudden words, jolting out of his thousand-yard stare to glance up at her standing beside him. He found his voice. "Oh. Y-you're right. Sorry, Velvet." he replied with a sheepish grin.
Velvet let out a breath, waving a hand. "Why apologize to me? You're the one who's going to catch a cold." She glanced off towards the cliffside path from which she'd come from, letting her hand rest upon her hip. "Besides, I know if you do get sick or something, everyone would worry. …Then you'd keep beating yourself up even more."
The Shepherd let out a humorless, self-deprecating chuckle in response, scratching the bridge of his nose. "…I know." he breathed, his expression falling. "I know that everyone's probably already worried sick about me. I know I should be grateful that they all have my back, every step of the way. I know that I should be with them even right now, so that they can help me get through this. But…"
His gaze drifted down, his back hunching further.
"But you still feel more alone than ever." Velvet finished for him. "Because of that cloak on your back." She crossed her arms, observing him carefully.
Sorey hesitated. Then he quietly tilted his head forward in a soft nod.
"…Yeah."
Above them, the leaves of the lone tree rustled as it swayed from side to side amidst the gentle breeze. Heavier droplets of accumulated rainfall dropped from the leaves down onto the grass at irregular intervals around the two of them, punctuating the silence.
"My sister once said something, a long time ago."
Surprise flitted through Sorey's eyes. He glanced up at her, curiosity breaking through his inner conflict. "Your… sister?" he asked hesitantly.
Velvet nodded, stepping forward into the drizzling rain beyond the shelter of the lone tree. "I was too young at the time to understand what she really meant. My brother could barely even walk at the time." She came to a halt at the edge of the cliff, crossing her arms and staring out into the untamed wilderness beyond in the enshrouding mist.
"'Cry when you're sad. Eat when you're hungry.'" she quoted softly, her gaze distant and unseeing as she recalled the ghost of an age that had long since passed. She turned around to face Sorey's troubled yet curious expression directly; a rare sort of gentleness in her eyes. "'Because feeling these things is proof that you're alive.'"
Sorey blinked. "That you're… alive?" he tasted the words, uncomprehendingly.
Velvet nodded distantly. "In the end, that was all my sister wanted." she breathed. "For herself… my brother, my brother-in-law, and I to share these feelings as one. To live together, as one small, happy family." Warm memories filled her mind – gentle, soothing flashes of bright light, rendered dull and blurry through time and disuse.
"…And we did." she noted matter-of-factly, looking away. "All the way up until that moment ended." The warmth in her voice had faded.
Sorey looked on sadly, watching as the mask that his friend always carried with her slowly took hold of her expression once more. "Velvet…" There it was again. That feeling of disconnection between him and his friend. The pain that she nurtured in her heart; utterly alien to him.
Velvet shook her head in response to his sympathy, forging onward. "Regardless, I've since come to realize what my sister meant when she told me about what it meant to be alive." Her thoughts flashed back to a certain dark seraph who had tried to convince her to join her side a few nights back.
"Life can be full of sorrow. Sorrow for a world that isn't really what we imagined it would be. It's an ugly, sinful world, full of contradictions and grey areas where everything seems fleeting." She turned to face him directly, meeting his eyes. "It takes time to come to terms with this. As a Shepherd, your job is to face these matters head on, and to shift through the matters of the world however you think is best.
"But despite all of it, never forget that you are still alive." She crossed her arms, carefully watching the emotions flitting through his expression as she did so. "Because you're not just a Shepherd, in the end."
She waved a hand errantly in the air. "You're just another living being, doing what you need to do."
Sorey absorbed in her words like a drowning man clutching onto driftwood, deeply considering every syllable with mixed emotions. The pattering of the rain and the rustling of the trees continued in the silence.
"…I see."
He gazed up at her and smiled sheepishly, scratching his head. "You're right, Velvet. I… I guess I got a little too caught up in everything." he admitted quietly. With a grunt, he got to his own two feet, gingerly shaking the blood flow back into his legs.
"Your sister sounds like a very smart woman, Velvet. Thank you for sharing her wisdom with me." He met her gaze earnestly. "I understand. I'll keep going from here, and I'll think about everything you've told me." His face broke into a soft smile, scratching his head sheepishly. "Hey, now that you mention it, I am kinda hungry right now. I guess… I really kinda forgot about being alive for a bit there." he admitted. "Thanks for reminding me."
"It's good you remembered." She tilted her head to the side, raising an eyebrow. "Although you might not stay that way if you stay out here any longer in the rain." She idly played with the straps of her gauntlet blade on her wrist. "…Now, do I have to drag you back to camp or do you prefer to walk?" she asked him casually.
Sorey gulped.
"Th-that won't be necessary!" he reassured hurriedly, jolting into a quick backward trot away from the woman with his hands splayed. "I-I'll see you back at camp then, Velvet!" he grinned before quickly turning around, breaking into a brisk trot down the cliffside path in a comical hurry.
Velvet stood there by herself by the edge of the cliff as the Shepherd disappeared out of sight down in the path, the amused smirk slowly fading from her expression. Her thoughts swirled inside her mind, dissecting the situation as it stood.
It was good that he was headed back towards his friends, she reckoned – back to the company of those he could trust to support him in the darkest of times. Furthermore, she felt confident in his capacity to face the truth of reality, given all of the things he had been through before leading up to this. With this latest development, she knew there was little else to do to in order to spur the development of a powerful, level-headed future Shepherd. Things were looking up.
All around her, the wind picked up, playing with her clothing and causing the chains on her outfit to jangle quietly. Eventually, her gaze rose towards the seemingly empty ridgeline up above. She crossed her arms.
"You can come out now." she announced.
A blur flashed down from the top of the cliff from seemingly nowhere, touching down upon the gravel in front of her with barely a sound. The regally dressed woman stood back up after landing with a practiced swiftness, her flowing azure dress resettling smoothly with the movement. She stood there without uttering a word, openly regarding Velvet amidst the silence of the soft drizzle.
Velvet tilted her head to the side, raising an expectant eyebrow at the other woman.
Seemingly satisfied with her observations, the stranger nodded to herself and opened her mouth. "My master will not be pleased when he learns of my actions, I'm sure. I took many risks to travel so far, leaving my station unattended for so long."
Metal clinked as she raised her gauntleted hand, sweeping a few stray strands of magenta hair to the side. "Yet when I received word of a former Lord of Calamity who had begun traveling alongside the young Shepherd…" She met Velvet's eyes directly, a strange quality to her gaze. "I simply had to come see for myself."
Velvet stared back, carefully considering the newcomer with a sharp eye. "You're a servant of Heldalf's, I take it?"
"Verily." The woman's armored fist pressed up against her corset as she introduced herself, "My name is Maltran, acting military advisor to the Holy Kingdom of Hyland and a dedicated servant to the cause of the great Lord of Calamity Himself."
"Maltran…" Velvet mumbled, her brow furrowing as she brought a finger up to her chin, considering the distinctly familiar name. After a moment she blinked, her hand falling from her face as she looked upon the advisor before her in a completely new light. "You're Alisha's mentor." she realized.
Maltran hummed in agreement, her eyes glinting thoughtfully. "My 'pupil' spoke very highly of you, you know." she remarked. "Seemed to find you as someone to aspire to." Her lips upturned disdainfully. "Not that a sad, foolish princess like herself could ever manage to achieve such feats of will and strength as you."
Velvet's eyes were hard. "…I take it you're a hellion as well." she presumed.
"Naturally." the advisor confirmed. "I lost my faith in humanity a long, long time ago." She crossed her arms. "Now, I follow the true path. That borne of the clean, elegant logic of my master."
"And that meant teaching a princess everything she knew?" Velvet raised an eyebrow. "How?"
Maltran chuckled briefly, shaking her head. "Ironically enough, to start a war, it is most effective to take a starry-eyed pacifist and get them all riled up over something." Her single exposed brown eye met Velvet's amber ones with sympathetic, malicious amusement. "Sometimes all one has to do to achieve what they want is to merely find and shape the right person to fit the right role. That is, to use them to the fullest extent. Do you not agree?"
Velvet's lips were drawn in a thin line. She didn't reply.
The military advisor let out a deep sigh, shaking her head and running a hand over her curled ponytail in exasperation. "I must admit, it took myself far, far longer to drill into that stupid pacifist princess's mind that killing is sometimes necessary as a knight to protect others." She met Velvet's eyes once more, profound respect in her gaze. "I truly do admire you for the work you've done with that weakling Shepherd. You have a gracefulness in your weaving of words and emotion that I never managed with my own tool." Maltran praised deeply. "A splendid job."
Velvet abruptly shifted on her feet, crossing her arms and rapidly tapping her bicep with her index finger. "I'm guessing you didn't travel half the continent just to shower me in praise." she presumed pointedly.
"Indeed." Maltran nodded deeply, slowly stepping forward towards her. "In truth, I come to you, in all my admiration and respect for you and your storied history, as an ambassador to the cause of my master." She came to a halt a few paces away from Velvet, right underneath the same tree under which Velvet had just spoken to Sorey. Her eyes glistened with impassioned fever. "I implore you consider the true benefits of the world he offers. That you might come to recognize the beauty and grace of a world imbued with nothing more but pure, raw malevolence."
She pushed a stray strand of hair away from her face. "You seek to free Maotelus from his bonds, that much is clear. Yet, are they truly bonds? Is it truly so bad for the world to simply sink into a sea of malevolence and let the true nature of all beings come forth? What better way to erase this corrupted, chaotic world with all the humans in in it, than to start anew amidst a world of sin?"
Metal clinked as she raised a single gloved hand towards the other woman in an open gesture. "Join us, Velvet Crowe." she asked boldly. "Abandon this futile quest to forge your own 'pupil' into something to purify Maotelus, and embrace the brilliance of my master, the Lord of Calamity. For His way is the only way the world will truly be free." she finished, her hand held steadily out before her. The drizzling rain continued in the silence, broken only by the soft, continuous rustling of the tree overhead.
Velvet let out a sigh, turning to the side in irritation. "Sorry to disappoint, but I'm not interested."
Maltran's offered hand fell down to her side. Her expression had not changed. "Why then?" she asked simply. "Tell me, what is so abhorrent about leaving the Empyrean as he is now? What is so repulsive about leaving another hellion just like yourself be?"
Velvet's left fist curled harshly.
"Because your master is controlling him like a puppet." she snarled. Hatred quickly arose in her features like bubbles in boiling water; a familiar emotion that wrapped her like an all-too familiar cloak.
"And unlike your 'sad, foolish princess' or my own 'weakling Shepherd…'" the therion growled, tendrils of malevolence beginning to seep out of the cracks and enveloping her form.
"…Laphicet is NOBODY'S TOOL!"
With a rough jerk of her left hand, she sent Maltran flying backwards into the cliff wall in an explosion of malevolence. The armored woman crashed down to the ground with a grunt, regaining her footing with an almost feline grace as rocks and rubble crashed down around her, marring her pristine court clothing in the process. She stood once more, blinking rapidly as she took in the sight.
The pulsating, serrated, and infamous claw of history jutted out from the enraged woman's left arm as she stood there, glaring at Maltran with unparalleled fury and drive. She jerked her claw towards her, angling its oversized palm towards her in a clear threat. "Tell your master that the only day he receives a speck of obedience from me, is the same day that I crush and devour his head!" she spat, her eyes pulsing red.
"Now leave. Or I'll eat you too." Velvet ordered with deadly finality.
Maltran blinked a few more times in astonishment in the wake of the woman's threat. Then, a smile abruptlyerupted upon her face.
The advisor shook her head, her smile widening as she straightened her ruffled clothing. "…You are just as fierce of a woman as my master said you would be." she remarked in a tone of nothing short of awe. She shook her head, straightening her back and bending over in a short bow. "As you say, Lady Crowe. I shall pass on the message to my master."
"Nevertheless, I do hope you will reconsider." She met Velvet's eyes one last time; respect clear in her gaze. "I very, very much look forward to serving you in the near future."
With that, the woman turned on her heel and exploded into a spontaneous plume of malevolence, vanishing from sight in the blink of an eye. Velvet watched as the last remaining flakes of malevolence faded from existence where the woman had stood, her lips pursed.
The therion shook her head, jerking her hand to dispel her hellion claw. Without further ado, she turned on her heel and headed down the cliffside path back towards camp, the last trails of errant malevolence vanishing from her form. Her eyes were dark and emotionless as she stepped away from the scene, full of cold, steeled determination in the aftermath of the reminder of what she stood for.
She'd been delayed too long. It was time to get back to work.
The lone tree waved gently in the winds in the wake of her departure, quietly looking out into the desolate wilderness. Just as it always had.
The walls of the ancient shrine had barely been discernable as different from the surrounding ridge when the group had approached it, following an almost nonexistent path through the rocky landscape. Only the telltale artificial plainness of the structure had actually given it away as manmade amidst a sea of rock and gravel.
Sorey sighed, shaking his head and wiping the sweat off his brow as he trotted back to the others gathered at the blocked entrance to the ancient shrine. "No luck." he announced dully as he hopped down the last boulder onto the level of the others, Mikleo following in his steps. "There doesn't seem to be another way in."
Rose rubbed her neck thoughtfully. "And you're sure this place here," she gestured at the massive boulder in front of them, "is where the entrance should be?"
Mikleo spoke up. "All of the signs agree that this should be the case. The buried pathway leads right up to this point, and the unearthed portions of the façade all point towards the entrance, as is typical of architecture from this era."
"Perhaps there might be a hidden entrance somewhere?" Lailah proposed uncertainly. "Like… a rolling boulder or something like that?"
Sorey smiled weakly. "Well… I guess it might be possible?" he tried.
Behind him, Dezel let out a sigh, readjusting the hat on his head.
"Ugh. Move."
Having apparently lost all patience, Edna stepped forward, grumpily pushing Sorey and Mikleo out of the way as she came to a halt, glaring up at the massive boulder in their path with the tip of her umbrella tapping rhythmically on the stone below. She closed her eyes and began to concentrate, mana flowing through the earth below to pool just under the surface at her feet.
Sorey exchanged worried glances with Mikleo. "Edna, hold on a sec-!" he began, only to have his collar latched onto by Velvet as he was dragged roughly backwards and behind cover with the rest of the seraphim following close behind.
Velvet gave him a look as she manhandled him to a halt. "You're not stopping her." she pointed out blandly. "Get down and shut up."
Sorey gulped. "But the ruins-!"
Rose chuckled nervously, watching as Edna's form began to radiate a warm amber yellow, an ominous humming filling the air. "Listen Sorey, if you're not careful, you might end up becoming part of the ruins yourself." the assassin warned. "Trust me, when a girl gets angry, you don't wanna get in her way."
Lailah smiled shakily, herself settling down behind cover with her hands held together. "Rose does have a point there, Sorey." she tentatively chipped in. "A woman's wrath is truly something to be feared."
Sorey and Mikleo exchanged glances at that. Behind them, Dezel crossed his arms mutely.
Together, the group watched as Edna's arte continued to grow, the humming growing louder and louder until the very ground itself began to tremor. At the peak of it all, the seraph abruptly slammed her eyes open, letting out a ferocious cry as she raised her foot before violently slamming it down, sending enormous cracks forward with a deafening crash rivaling that of thunder.
BOOM!
Shards of rock and debris detonated in a violent explosion as the boulder shattered into thousands of pieces, flying every which way away from the epicenter. The very earth below their feet groaned in protest as it shook, the tremors echoing through the ground for miles around before finally ebbing in strength and fading away. Coughing and waving their hands in front of their faces in the aftermath of the arte, the Shepherd's group stumbled out from behind their cover, blinking as they tried to discern their surroundings amidst a cloud of dust a debris.
With a flick of Dezel's fingers, the world abruptly cleared with a gust of wind, revealing a single yellow-haired figure standing there in the aftermath before the entryway to the shrine, her dress billowing slightly with the induced breeze.
Sorey blinked in surprise. "Edna!" he yelled, breaking into a jog over to her, carefully keeping an eye on the surrounding structure in case of a collapse. The earth seraph didn't respond as he approached, so he put a hand on her shoulder, trying to get her attention. "Edna…?"
"Ouch!"
Sorey jolted back in surprise. "O-oh! I'm sorry!" he apologized immediately. "Are you hurt?"
Edna pouted at him. "…After using Giant's Strength, my body gets all kinds of sore. Can you just try not to touch me?" she grumbled.
"A-alright." Sorey agreed hesitantly. "T… that was amazing, Edna. But you really didn't have to do that."
"I really did." she sighed, gingerly readjusting the closed umbrella in her hand. "The way things were going, we weren't getting into the shrine until the end of next week."
Mikleo walked over, aghast. "But you could've sent the entire thing tumbling down!" he exclaimed with wide eyes. He glanced around in awe, taking in the little bits of boulder resting here and there in astonishment.
"So what? I didn't."
Mikleo opened his mouth and closed it, seemingly helpless against Edna's uncaring attitude of her recklessness.
She let out a huff of exasperation, gingerly opening her umbrella and resting it on her shoulder. "Listen. You especially." She looked pointedly at Sorey, who blinked in the face of her attention. "Yeah you, Mopey. There's something that you need to learn if you're going to keep doing Shepherd nonsense.
"You make choices." she stated in annoyance. "You pick the path of action that you figure is best and then you see it all the way through. Then, you face the consequences, no matter how severe or how misguided your initial choice was or wasn't." The normin doll on her umbrella spun around animatedly as she rotated her umbrella, holding Sorey's gaze. "If you spend your whole life afraid to take another step, you'll never get anywhere."
She abruptly thrust her hand out, snatching the normin doll and squeezing it violently. "So, quit doubting yourself and just get going already!" she demanded hotly.
Sorey blinked. His expression softened as he soon discerned her true meaning behind her harsh words. "Edna…" he breathed.
The seraph abruptly turned around on a dime, hiding behind her slowly rotating umbrella. "Don't read too much into it." she ordered haughtily, her voice once more calm and blasé. "They're just stupid words that my brother told me. That's all."
Silence followed in the wake of her words.
At his side, Dezel raised a hand to adjust the hat on his head. "…It's not bad advice." he remarked. "I'd say the sooner Sorey learns to follow it the better."
Lailah hid her smile behind a fan of casting cards. "Spoken like a true Edna." she commented happily. "Wise words – short and to the point."
"…Just like herself." Mikleo added with a grin.
The glare Edna gave him in return was vicious. Yet she growled wordlessly as she, for once in her life, came up short in insults against the impudent water seraph. Mikleo's grin in her direction was big and smug, yet also soft, in a weird way.
But he was still an insufferably rude water seraph.
Meanwhile, Sorey slowly gathered himself, shaking his head with determination steeling his features. "…Okay." he nodded, holding her gaze. "Then I'll try and keep Eizen's words in mind." he promised. "Thank you, Edna."
"Good." Edna sighed, glancing over her shoulder at them while shutting her umbrella. "So? Are we going or what?" She gestured impatiently towards the doorway emblazoned with the distinct yellow emblem from the mural.
Sorey nodded determinedly. "Right!"
Together, the group turned towards the ancient structure that Edna's arte had unearthed, staring up at the ancient, hallowed walls meshing with the neighboring rock and stone. Chipped stone leftover from the explosion crunched under their boots as they walked underneath the overhang of the façade, stopping at the two large stone doors emblazoned with the strange-looking yellow symbol. Visually examining every inch of the ancient edifice, Sorey slowly reached out with his hand towards the door, seeking to feel its material.
Yet the moment his palm neared the surface, the symbol lit up fiercely, mana billowing out from beyond the doorway with a hollow roar. The group stepped back in surprise as the doors began to move on their own, driven by the Shepherd's touch.
A pungent wave of ancient, stale air washed over them all in an instant, driven out from the depths of the ancient edifice by the opening gates and into the fresh air beyond. Sorey took a deep breath as he stared down into the imperceptible darkness, preparing himself for whatever was yet to come.
He glanced behind him briefly, finding the confident faces of his companions all behind him in the face of it all. He gave them all a nod and turned back towards the obscured, twisting hallway, inside which his trail awaited him.
"Let's go." Without further ado, he moved his foot and stepped forward.
Into the gaping maw of the abyss.
"'The Shepherd is granted four powers: earth, water, fire, and wind. They are the blade that shall cleave the Lord of Calamity.'"
The ancient stone slab stood amidst a tall chamber carved from ancient rock, containing the inscribed letters in the ancient tongue prepared exclusively for the Shepherds of the future. Sorey's brow furrowed as he focused on the next line, his brain working overtime to translate the words into common tongue.
"'Scattered across this land are the shrines of trials.'" he continued, reading aloud to the rest of the group. "'They too are of earth, water, fire, and wind. Tests they are of power and spirit. The power is brought forth in the spirit, and the spirit captures the power. With balance may malevolence be purified; with imbalance does the body smolder and burn.'"
Mikleo exchanged glances with Edna before glancing warily around at their surroundings. A heavy, oppressive air suffocated their surroundings, accompanied by a distant, ominous earthen rumbling that seemed to thrum through the very rock they stood upon. Beyond the monument stood a single stone door, from which the rumbling of the earth seemed to radiate from.
Sorey crossed his arms with a thoughtful expression as he finished translating the inscription. "'Test thyself, Shepherd,'" he read, "'and brandish thy might! Rise to the challenge, and stake thy will on the outcome. Proceed to Morgause, Shrine of the Trial of Earth.' …Is what it says." he finished.
Edna tilted her head to the side. "We were right, then." she concluded, her voice echoing off the surrounding stone walls. "Sorey beats these four trials to get power – power that he currently desperately needs. Convenient."
"A test of power and spirit, huh?" Dezel crossed his arms. "We'd better be ready for whatever lies beyond that door there." He nodded pointedly towards the door at the end of the empty chamber they stood in.
"I bet." Sorey hummed, his hand on his chin. "But there's something more to all of this." He turned around. "Lailah, that crest at the entrance, was that…?"
The fire seraph nodded, threading her fingers in front of her dress. "Yes." she confirmed. "It would appear that this shrine is of Eumacia, one of the Five Lords."
Mikleo's eyes were wide. "I thought as much!" he exclaimed. "Then this shrine constitutes a major discovery! One dating back to the Temperance of Avarost, at least!"
Rose blinked. "Hold up, the Five Lords?" she asked incredulously. "You're telling me they're real, too?"
"Correct." Lailah confirmed. "They maintain the balance of the entire continent of Glenwood. All of Nature is composed of four elements: earth, water, fire, and wind. Each one is governed by one of the four eldest seraphim."
"Eumacia, Amenoch, Musiphe, and Hyanoa." Sorey recalled flawlessly.
The prime lord nodded deeply. "The Shepherd's powers are most likely also the result of a fortification of elemental affinity through the blessings of the Five Lords."
Rose shifted on her feet. "When you put it that way, they sound almost like gods."
Mikleo chipped in, "We feel much the same, actually. They're ostensibly the source of our seraphic artes, but we're basically never aware of them."
The assassin bobbed her head, absorbing all the information like a sponge to water. She furrowed her brow. "Okay. So then, if there's Five Lords and those are four of them, who's the last guy?" she asked.
Lailah blinked rapidly in response to Rose's question. Suddenly, she clapped her hands together with a noisy slap as if struck by spontaneous inspiration. "What does a part cat, part owl say?" she asked brightly.
"Me-owl!" she chirped.
Silence.
"…Guessing it's that pesky oath of hers again." Sorey chuckled, scratching the back of his neck while picking up Rose's question. "In any case, that would be Maotelus, the last of the Five Lords." he answered. Standing in the back of the group, Velvet crossed her arms, listening intently.
Rose tilted her head in confusion. "What makes him so special from the others?"
"Well, that's… kinda unclear." Sorey put a hand to his chin as he thoughtfully retrieved his copy of the Celestial Record from his pack. "Maotelus is a mysterious kind of seraph to begin with." he explained, flipping through the aged pages of the book with one hand. "Like, for the Shepherd's spiritual powers, there's earth, water, fire, and wind, but there isn't one for Maotelus."
Mikleo crossed his arms. "My first thought was that he served as a symbolic figure in Five Lords worship," he noted, "but there may be more to it than that. He really is quite an enigma in his various vague mentions along the winding trail of history."
"…Oh!"
Rose snapped her fingers in the air, spinning on her heel and pointing at Sorey. "I knew I'd heard the name before. Maotelus is the seraph worshiped in the Shrinechurch in Pendrago, isn't he? Don't they say that he blesses the entire continent or something like that?"
"One of the Five Lords living in that crumbling old place?" Dezel huffed in disbelief. "Doubt it. If that were the case, I'd have felt the hints of a presence or domain the last time I was in the city."
"Though," Mikleo reasoned, "we don't really know what to expect for signs of presence of the Five Lords. Given the vast uncertainty regarding the nature of the Five Lords, it's not entirely inconceivable that Maotelus well and truly resides within the Shrinechurch and us seraphim simply can't feel him. It is an ancient building, after all – dating back as far as the Era of Asgard, even."
"Huh." Rose remarked thoughtfully. "To think there are things about this world that even the seraphim don't even know." Her eyes drifted up to the crest engraved into the stone slab in front of them. "…Say. What are the odds that we'll run into Eumacia in the flesh here today in this shrine?"
Mikleo furrowed his brow. "It's possible, I suppose." He shrugged helplessly. "Again, nobody really seems to know anything about the Five Lords – even us seraphim."
Edna tilted her head to the side. "Then why not just go on and see for yourself?" she asked. She gestured her free hand towards the door at the end of the chamber. All around them, the air seemed to grow ever more oppressive with the reminder of where they were and what awaited them beyond the passageway.
Sorey stepped forward. "Yeah. Edna's right." He turned around to face them all, his eyes glinting in anticipation and his copy of the Celestial Record cradled lovingly in his left hand. "We can stand here and talk and theorize about history all we want, but there's nothing as satisfying as figuring it out on your own! You can't fathom the true meaning of legends until you've seen their history with your own eyes, after all."
His expression split into a broad grin as he slipped his copy of the book away and waved his friends onwards. "Looks like we'll just have to see for ourselves if there's anybody home." he supposed brightly. "Come on!" he urged, falling into a light jog towards the chamber exit.
Mikleo grinned back. "Right behind you." he replied, matching the Shepherd's eager pace.
Rose chuckled, holding a hand up to cover her smile. "He looked just like Mayvin when he said that. Looks like the best way to cheer our Sorey up is to get him falling head over heels for a pile of old bricks, huh? Talk about night to day!"
"Indeed." Lailah smiled softly. "To the face of a hopeless romantic."
Edna deadpanned as the rest of the group began to follow Sorey and Mikleo at a more sedate pace. "A charitable way to say naïve simpleton." she grunted.
"Hah." Rose scratched her head, her grin abating slightly. "…Still. Will he be alright?" She shook her head, reasoning, "I doubt this is the last time this kinda thing happens."
"…True." Lailah agreed simply, her eyes falling. She didn't reply further.
Walking alongside them, Velvet silently looked away.
A rumbling groan echoed through the chamber as Sorey and Mikleo managed to activate the mechanism to open the sizable stone doors at the end of the chamber right as the rest of the group arrived.
A low, distant moan echoed through the newly revealed stone hallway, sending abject shivers down their spines and their hands closer to their weapons. The group exchanged glances as the strange, distant sound died down, leaving only the constant rumbling of the earth in its wake.
"…Sounds like someone's not very happy." Rose muttered, squinting into the darkness beyond the illuminated gateway. "Why does this place give me the creeps?" she asked rhetorically.
Dezel readjusted the top hat on his head, grunting. "…I can feel the wind." he said, baring his teeth. "It turns sharply many times, and travels for a long time before barely making it here." He crossed his arms, clicking his tongue. "It's a labyrinth."
Edna sighed, tapping the tip of her umbrella upon the stone bricks below. "They don't want to make it easy for us, do they?" she asked rhetorically. "Oh well."
Sorey glanced over his shoulder at Dezel, considering his options. "If you can feel the wind, could you possibly lead us through to where it's coming from?"
"Of course I can." the seraph answered shortly. "I'm not a wind seraph for nothing."
Velvet glanced over her shoulder at the Shepherd. "…There's no guarantee that the wind's origin is where we need to go." she pointed out. "Are you sure?"
Sorey met her gaze and nodded, holding a fist out in front of him. "My instincts tell me this is the best option given what we know." He glanced briefly to his side, a wry smile gracing his expression. "Besides. If I'm too afraid to take another step, I'll never get anywhere." he quoted.
Edna huffed in idle amusement, playing with the handle of her umbrella. "Now he gets it."
Lailah gave them all an appraising look. "Then it looks like we know our next course of action." she summarized. "As such, please, lead the way, Dezel." she gave the seraph a small bow.
"Fine." The wind seraph stepped forward, taking a steady pace despite the darkness of the dingy hallway. "Just don't blame me when we end up in the wrong place."
"I won't." Sorey promised as he too began walking, following behind the seraph into the labyrinth of stone. The group followed behind him without question, deeper and deeper into the belly of the earth.
The distant ominous rumbling of the world around them continued as they traversed the shrine, their footsteps echoing loudly in the disquiet of the abandoned hallways. The distraught moaning that they had heard earlier continued to emanate out from the distance at irregular intervals, seemingly growing louder and louder the more they walked.
After some time, Sorey put a hand to his chin in thought, voicing his concerns. "These hallways and rooms… They're all so carefully and meticulously handcrafted." he noted quietly, breaking the silence. He turned to Mikleo walking at his side. "Just who do you think made this place? Was it always meant to be a trail for the Shepherd?"
The seraph shook his head. "My initial thought was just that, but after closer examination, there's a distinct sense of organization behind the layout of this place that says elsewise."
"You noticed that too, huh?" Sorey agreed with a distinct glint in his eye. "There's repetitions in the design – consistencies that don't really make sense if you think of it in terms of just a puzzle."
"It's almost as if this place wasn't built as a maze at all, but was meant to serve some other purpose during its conception." his childhood friend observed.
"But why would anyone create such a vast space in the side of a mountain? One so expansive, and so well-crafted as well?" Sorey's intrigued expression deepened. "There had to be some reason. Even during the Temperance of Avarost, tunneling through all this rock couldn't've possibly been a trivial task."
Mikleo nodded slowly, similarly bewitched by the mystery.
The group turned another corner, coming across a hallway with walls on each side broken up by evenly spaced doorways leading to darkened, empty rooms. With Dezel at the forefront, the Shepherd and his followers carefully stepped through the musty air, warily eying each room for threats as they passed.
"…Huh?" Sorey abruptly blinked, suddenly breaking off from the group to enter one of the rooms at the very end of the hallway having caught his attention on something inside. "What's that?"
"Hey-! Sorey!" Mikleo exclaimed after him. "Don't just wander off like that!"
Velvet crossed her arms as Sorey returned to them in the hallway, raising an eyebrow. "What's that?" she asked, gesturing with her head towards the object in the Shepherd's hand.
Sorey held the thing up in his hand to show it to the rest of them. It was a pocket-sized doll made of wood with a single arm ripped off. "Look at this." he urged.
Rose instantly recoiled away with a yelp. "Aack!" she exclaimed in revulsion, stepping as far away from the creepy article in Sorey's hand as she dared. "No way! I've got plenty of nightmare fuel already, thanks!"
Edna tilted her head idly to the side as she gave Sorey an amused look. "Huh." she said dryly. "Didn't know you were into that sort of thing."
Mikleo, on the other hand, immediately derived Sorey's meaning, his expression deepening. "No, I see your point." he said. "There should be no way that such a toy made of wood could have survived so many eons in this place. Nothing else in these ruins have been even remotely this well preserved." He furrowed his brow in confusion. "This doesn't make any sense."
Sorey nodded in agreement, turning to Lailah with the doll in hand. "Lailah," he prompted, "have there been any sort of artes placed on this doll?"
In response, the prime lord shook her head, her long hair swaying behind her. "No." she replied. "I don't sense anything abnormal about it. On all accounts… it just seems like a normal doll."
Sorey's thoughtful frown deepened.
Dezel crossed his arms impatiently. "…Hey." he said, drawing their attention. "You going to stand around playing with toys all day or what?"
Velvet put a hand on her hip. "You're here for a reason." she reminded him as well. "Don't get distracted."
Mikleo's eyes stared at the mysterious object for just a bit longer before turning his gaze back up. "…Well, we can always come back here to examine this place in further detail later." he offered.
Shaking himself, Sorey tore his gaze away from the doll in his hands and focused on the task at hand. "Right." He nodded, agreeing with their points. "Then let's keep going." Absently, the Shepherd bundled the wooden toy up in his hands and slid it into his pocket for later research into its origins.
Together, the group resumed their journey through the abandoned underground network, pushing onward into the darkness with the passage of distant wind guiding their steps.
After an unquantifiable amount of time travelling through darkened corridors, the group was abruptly met by blinding bright light seeping around the next corner, accompanied by the distinct, welcome scent of fresh air invading the dusty, ancient musk that had for so long inundated their senses. Pressing forward, the group blinked blearily as they stepped out into the sunlight, slowly letting their eyes adjust to the drastic change of light to take in their surroundings.
Immense, towering cliffs loomed over their heads, forming a jagged square of open air above that allowed for the sun high in the sky to bask the stone courtyard in brilliant warmth. Walls made of the same stone brick as the rest of the underground structure ringed the area, demarcating it as part of the structure itself. There was no other exit to the featureless courtyard – a vast space of tiled stone with no way to feasibly scale the enclosing cliffs.
Dezel crossed his arms in annoyance. "A dead end, after all." he stated blithely.
"So it seems…" Lailah agreed hesitantly, turning her head and observing every inch of the courtyard walls for anything else that might present itself. All around them, the rumbling of the earth continued in the dejected silence.
Sorey stepped forward towards the center of the massive, empty courtyard, himself too glancing around at the enclosed space. "…Well." he said finally, his voice echoing off the walls of the surrounding cliffs. "Looks like I was wrong, guys." He turned around to face the rest of them. "I'm sorry-"
And then the domain washed over them. The rest of the group stared back at him with wide eyes as the barrier arte took hold around them, encasing them entirely inside of a golden dome of powerful energy.
"Guys!" Sorey yelled in alarm.
He watched as Rose inaudibly ran up to the edge of the barrier and slammed her daggers against the side of it, only to have her weapons bounce off its surface as if it were made of steel. Her mouth opened in an inaudible yell; the barrier having completely her off from him. Velvet slammed her sword against the barrier as well by Rose's side, to the same effect. The seraphim, on the other hand, were completely invisible, the domain having snuffed out his resonance and in turn their ability to stay effective. All the group could collectively do was watch as Sorey reluctantly turned to face the owner of the domain all by himself.
The hellion's hooved feet slammed onto the stones with teeth-rattling force as it stomped towards him, its heavy breathing powerful and full of fury. A bull's head sat atop the towering body of a giant, its bloodshot eyes fixed upon the human before it. It clutched the massive oversized axe in its armored fist, letting out a furious bellow as it lumbered closer towards the Shepherd.
Sorey grit his teeth, quickly weighing his options as the Minotaur approached with earth-shaking steps. He glanced over his shoulder briefly at the opening in the wall where they'd entered the courtyard from before quickly dismissing it as an option. Instead, he reached down and drew his sword, holding it readily at his side as the monster lumbered into a full charge, raising its axe high in the air and ready to swing.
"…Sorry." he said solemnly as it approached. "There's no way I'm going to let you hurt my friends."
With that, he broke into a charge of his own, his boots slamming on the stone tiles below as he ran directly towards the towering monster. The rest of the group could only watch helplessly as the Shepherd faced off against the powerful adversary, while they stood there, trapped like rats.
CRASH!
Shards of rock and stone flew in all directions as the axe of the Minotaur slammed into the ground, the pure strength of its blow sending a shockwave thrumming through the neighboring earth. Sorey had barely managed to avoid the impact, having ducked to the side at the very last moment. He capitalized on the slowness of his opponent's weapon, sprinting in to slice his sword against the fur of the Minotaur's legs.
The barely affected monster retaliated by sweeping its axe in a circle, the lethal metal itself cutting through the wind with a whistle. Sorey once again barely managed to avoid the blow, dropping flat against the ground and rolling away from the slicing blade. Forcing himself to keep moving, the Shepherd slammed his boots onto the stone and pushed, charging towards the hellion once more.
He just had to buy them enough time. The group would find some way to break loose, as long as he succeeded in distracting the hellion for as long as it would take. He had to trust in them, just as they were trusting in him.
With that determination burning in his mind, Sorey let out a determined cry, ducking under another one of the Minotaur's swings and releasing a flurry of strikes, imbuing each of them with as much fire mana as he could muster. The hellion recoiled away from the pain of the strikes, howling inhumanly in indignation before abruptly tensing its body.
Sorey was helpless to stop the monster from lashing out with its powerful leg in a kick that sent him flying. Wind whistled in his ear and agony pulsated in his stomach until he tumbled to a disorienting stop at the other end of the courtyard, the world swaying around him. He shook his head, coughing as he forced air back into his lungs.
His eyes widened as he registered the rhythmic thumping on the ground below, a telltale sign of the charging bull about to run him over.
Without a second thought, the Shepherd pushed off into a frantic roll, barely managing to get out of the way of the giant hellion barreling over where he had just been. The slamming of the giant hooves came perilously close to his head as it passed. In the brief respite that followed the missed charge, Sorey scrambled back to his feet, readjusting the sword gripped firmly in his right hand in preparation for another attack.
Yet he abruptly gasped in dismay and horror as he realized where the Minotaur's missed charge was taking it. Directly towards his trapped friends.
Suddenly, the monster skidded to a complete stop, its hooves grating noisily upon the stones themselves as it did so, coming to a complete halt directly before the trapped humans. Without a single glance at the people trapped in its arte, the Minotaur turned and glared once more at him, a strange emotion visible in its inhumane expression.
Sorey blinked uncomprehendingly at the turn of events, even as the hellion began lumbering over to his position with its axe raising menacingly into the air. It wasn't at all interested in Velvet, Rose, or the other seraphim, he realized. It only seemed to want to attack him, and only him.
…Why?
Out of time to think, Sorey once more dove to the side with gritted teeth, rolling out of the way of that axe crashing down once more upon the stones with an earth-shattering crash. The Minotaur, however, having apparently learned from its past attacks, abruptly twisted around, bringing its axe around in a swift follow-up strike.
CLANG!
Sorey's sword rattled violently in his hands as he redirected the massive axe away from himself by presenting his blade at an upward angle, deflecting it with a healthy helping of mana. Quickly capitalizing upon his opponent's distraction, Sorey chose to get as much distance as possible by sprinting away to an opposite corner of the courtyard. There, he had more time to think – to rack his brain as to what he could have possibly done to enrage the hellion.
This all had something to with a supposed trial, he reminded himself. There was something that those who had designed this task for him expected him to do. Something that would prove him worthy in both power and spirit.
He was missing something; he just knew it! But what?!
He watched as the Minotaur once more began to lumber towards him, its bloodshot eyes glaring directly at him with clear hatred in its inhuman visage. Hatred… for him. And only him.
"…Oh." he breathed, his eyes widening in comprehension.
Suddenly, it all made sense.
Quickly, before the hellion reached him with its blade once more, he shoved his free hand into his pocket and pulled out an old one-armed doll into the light of day, holding it up to the approaching hellion. "Is this yours?" he shouted earnestly. "Have you been looking for this all this time?"
A renewed bellow of rage from the charging Minotaur confirmed his suspicions beyond doubt.
"I'm sorry!" he yelled quickly. "You can have it back!" Then, as fast as possible, Sorey drew his arm back and tossed the wooden doll as hard as he could into the opposite corner of the courtyard.
Instantly, the monster lost all interest in him and instead careened to the side towards the tossed doll with its bellows of rage faltering. Its axe dropped to the stones below with a loud clang, utterly forgotten as it knelt down tenderly on the floor, its animalistic breathing low and soft. The comparatively tiny doll was laughably small in its oversized palms as it collected it with both hands, yet it seemed to lose all tension in its body the moment it had done so – relaxing with untold relief.
Just like that, the domain of the hellion lost its intensity, releasing the arte holding his friends hostage and allowing his seraphic companions to become visible once more. Hurriedly sheathing his sword, Sorey jogged back over to his friends, letting out a sigh of relief in the wake of the ordeal. "That wasn't so hard." he grinned weakly as he approached them.
Mikleo let out a breath himself, shaking his head as they reunited with the Shepherd once more. "You have no idea how worried I was." he sighed. "Worse yet, there was nothing I could do but watch!"
"Join the club." Rose muttered sourly. "Y'know, that kind of stuff just flat out isn't fair." She glared over her shoulder at where the arte had trapped her earlier.
"I don't think the Minotauros was thinking fair when it attacked us." Lailah observed quietly. "It would seem that all it wanted was for Sorey to return what he had inadvertently taken."
Together, the group turned and watched as the hellion in question continued to rock back and forth, carefully playing with the toy in its hands.
"Hmph. Looks like it's just a kid in a scary body." Dezel grunted. "We could purify it now, if you want."
Sorey shook his head slowly, turning away from the quiet monster. "There's no need." he decided. "Its not a threat to anyone."
"…Well, I guess we've solved that mystery." Mikleo supposed with a helpless shake of his head. "But, after it's all said and done, what was actually the point of all that?"
Edna twirled her umbrella underneath the sunlight. "To learn not to touch obviously out of place dolls in ruins?" she suggested.
Sorey shook his head again. "No." he replied. "I think… this was a test of character."
An echoing male voice abruptly rang out of nowhere, responding to Sorey's words.
"Spot on!" it crowed.
A flash of light drew the group's surprised attention to the side as a masked seraph robed in white appeared spontaneously out of nowhere before them, clapping his hand steadily as he faced them all.
Lailah's eyes widened. "The Shepherd Pawan?!" she exclaimed.
The seraph called Pawan grinned underneath the partial mask that covered his face as he gave the prime lord a dainty wave. "Lady Lailah!" he chirped. "Still as lovely as ever!"
In response, Lailah sighed at length, shaking her head. "…And you're as creepy as ever."
Rose blinked. "Wait. Hold up. You're a seraph Shepherd? That's a thing?" she asked in confusion.
Pawan shook his head. "Oh, no, nothing like that." he reassured. "As of now, I am formally known as Pawan, the protector seraph of earth." He followed his introduction up with a short introductory bow. "But I was as a human Shepherd once." he explained, straightening his back. "Before I was reborn as a seraph, that is."
In response to their wide-eyed looks, he blinked, tilting his head. "…Is this news to you?" he asked for clarification.
"Well, yes!" Mikleo took an incredulous step forward. "You're telling me that humans can be reborn as seraphim?!"
"That's right." Pawan replied easily. "Depending on how you die, you can transcend your own race. Strange world we live in." He quickly raised a hand and shook it in front of him, waving off any further questions. "Case in point, the world is still full of mysteries for you all to solve." He raised both hands in a grand gesture towards their surroundings. "Not to mention such was also the rationale behind this entire ordeal."
Sorey stepped forward. "Then, does this mean that we've cleared the trial?" he chose to ask.
Pawan turned his head to the side, drawing the group's attention as the docile Minotaur quietly stood up from its seat in the corner and began walking, leaving through the exit to the courtyard with its doll still held quietly in its hands. "…Indeed you have." the protector seraph said, crossing his arms with satisfaction as the Minotaur disappeared fully back into the darkness. "You did superbly well, Shepherd. You didn't abandon your allies, nor did you mindlessly fight your opponent. In the end, I couldn't have asked for a more prudent display of intelligence and restraint."
He nodded affirmingly to himself. "…Your dedication alongside your strength of character altogether give me leave to think that you are worth of receiving the spiritual power of earth left for the Shepherd by Lord Eumacia." He raised his robed hand, spreading his palm out towards Sorey.
"Or rather, I should say, the power to stand against the Lord of Calamity." he elaborated, closing his eyes and concentrating.
Behind Sorey, Velvet's expression hardened.
Suddenly, a different voice resounded out into the closed courtyard, causing the protector seraph to freeze in shock.
"Pawan. Halt."
The two words were spoken in a simple, commanding tone, yet conveyed an overwhelming, intimidating vastness of sheer power and consequence that caused the hair on the back of everyone's necks to stand up straight in alarm. An instinctive urge surged through them all; the animalistic desire to flee and hide at the presence of a being so many orders of magnitude more powerful than them.
For there was no denying the sheer depth of the domain that inundated the world at that very moment.
"I shall address them. You are dismissed."
"U-understood, Lord Eumacia!" Pawan quickly replied, his back straight and respectful. He sent one last glance in Sorey's direction, his eyes wide and incredulous, before he vanished without another word, leaving the group alone in the presence of a god.
Mikleo gaped in astonishment, uncomprehending in the face of what had just happened. "Lord… Eumacia?" he repeated.
CRASH!
The world abruptly exploded in light as a wide, massive column of neon-yellow energy crashed down from the heavens at an unbelievable speed, sending out a tremor that sent the group stumbling around in the wake of its impact. The sheer volume of otherworldly mana surging through the column and down into the ground itself was completely beyond the realm of comprehension for the seraphim and humans as they looked on in disbelief, watching as the beam of light slowly faded.
Leaving a single form in its wake. A single human form.
Velvet felt the breath leave her chest as she stood there, staring at the form of the Empyrean standing before them all in the center of the courtyard. Disbelief and shock racked her mind in a single instant, mingling with the sudden overwhelming wave of ancient memories and events of a time she had long since dismissed.
For in the stark, jagged lighting of the residual yellow energy surrounding his body contrasting with the harsh and obscured rays of sunlight from above, Melchior Mayvin's stern and chiseled features were cast in a harsh glow.
It was a scene torn straight from her past.
To the side, having been separated away from her amidst the blast, Sorey let the arm shielding his eyes from the brightness drop in surprise. At his side, Mikleo blinked rapidly. "A person…?" he breathed. The rest of the group were similarly confused, staring at form of the newcomer in deafening silence that followed his arrival.
At the water seraph's words, the Empyrean opened his eyes, one of which was mildly obscured through the lens of a darkened monocle. He moved and bent his right arm habitually at an angle behind his body clad in a regal white uniform accented with gold while simultaneously pushing the heels of his clean speck-less boots together. His eyes rested upon them all as he addressed the Shepherd's group with an air of utter authority.
"A form derived of a memory." he uttered. "Long ago, this soul dwelled in the body of a human. Now, it is a part of me."
The rumbling of his otherworldly domain punctuated the silence that followed his declaration. His wizened eyes seemed to burrow deeply into the souls of each person in the group, especially focusing on Sorey. He continued, "The very existence of a being such as myself is vast and complex, spanning eons upon eons of history and stained by the actions and intentions of those who have preceded me."
He held his left hand up in a curled fist, accentuating his statement. "Eras have come and gone; the cycle has repeated itself countless times. The values it stood for have all but been forgotten, the cleansing of the consumed soul having taken its toll. And yet even now, after all this time… the memories of this soul do not permit me to stay silent and watch."
The group watched with bated breath as the monstrously powerful Empyrean shifted on his feet, letting his hands fall back against his sides, his gaze slowly drifting away from the group. "Not when the person that had stained its very existence walked so willingly into my domain, reigniting that burning, seething hatred once more. That everlasting stain that has been wrought upon this soul has lasted far beyond any semblance of reason and rationality that it had once contained."
"For the one that stems from it all has none and will never hold the slightest shame for her sins." Emotion had abruptly swelled and seeped into the Empyrean's eyes as he finally rested his gaze upon the object of his burning hatred.
"A monster of irredeemable sin." he declared. "A stain upon the books of history, and a monument to the depravity of humanity."
"Velvet Crowe. Lord of Calamity."
The crackling of the Empyrean's energy mixed with the constant rumbling of the stones that served as the foundation of the courtyard underfoot. A fell breeze by chance managed to filter in through the opening in the cliffs above, moaning eerily as it filled the motionless space between the mortals and the god standing amidst the courtyard.
Sorey's eyes were wide, his knuckles clenched white upon the pommel of his sword. Amidst the thick silence, he dared to swallow and open his mouth.
"…Velvet?" he breathed, almost imperceptibly.
SQUELCH!
Sorey's heart sank in utter dismay as the claw… that familiar claw appeared as plain as day hanging from Velvet's frame as she stepped forward, raising it towards the form of the Empyrean across from her.
"And you're as irritating of an old man as you ever were, Melchior." the hellion growled back; her eyes contorted in irritation.
She tilted her head mockingly to the side. "Whatever happened to your precious Claudin's ideals? How far one falls. Once the manipulators of nations, the Shepherd's right-hand man, and the most powerful Legate in the world seeking to bend the world to his will." her eyes narrowed. "…Now you're just another pitiful cog in the workings of a pathetic, failing world." she observed poisonously.
The once-Legate wasn't fazed in the slightest by her vitriol. "My other desires as a human have long since faded away with time. Only my hatred for you, Lord of Calamity, has lasted over the eons, persisting far beyond the shadows of desire for reason and ideality." He returned his arm to its habitual position behind his back. "…For I am Eumacia, Empyrean of earth. And I shall do my duty to this world without fail."
"How rich." she spat back, letting her pulsating claw fall back down to her side. "Does that duty of yours entail letting the Fifth Empyrean fall to Malevolence? Standing by and watching as the world is thrown into chaos?" Her face had contorted into a ferocious snarl, her human hand clenched tightly into a fist.
"As insolent as ever." The Empyrean was absolute. "To right the imbalances of the world is the task of the Shepherd, and no other. It is his burden to intervene and correct the damages of time, and to defeat those who pose a threat to the very stability of the world itself."
His eyes glared directly at her with pure, unadulterated hatred; one that had been nurtured over the course of a thousand years. "Such as you."
Visibly collecting himself, the Empyrean's expression returned to neutrality as he turned to face the Shepherd himself directly, his jaw set. "…To that end," he told Sorey, "I remind you of your true task, Shepherd." He slowly raised his left hand up into the air, closing his eyes and focusing.
"Do not forget your duty."
With that, the Empyrean vanished in a blinding bolt of yellow mana that once more slammed into the ground with otherworldly force, the resulting shockwave thrumming throughout the mountain and beyond.
And so, Eumacia, the Elemental Empyrean of earth, departed, having left the young Shepherd with his edict.
The enormous amount of power surging through Sorey's veins – the spiritual power of earth – was completely ignored by the Shepherd in the haunting silence that filled the shrine following the Empyrean's departure. Power meant to forge the blade that shall cleave the Lord of Calamity.
Velvet stood on the opposite end of the courtyard, her back facing away from the group towards where Eumacia had disappeared. On her left side, the massive serrated claw of the masked hellion… of Velvet Crowe hung, pulsating gently in the hellion's relaxed stance. A spontaneous, unnatural breeze blew at in the wake of the Empyrean's departure, tugging at the woman's black coat and cascading hair and making her seem all the more foreign in the shocked silence.
Mikleo was the first to break the silence. "…You."
The seraph took a disbelieving step forward. "You attacked us." he mumbled, staring uncomprehendingly at the monster's blood red claw. "You nearly killed me." The disbelief visibly surged through his expression as he tried in vain to grasp the full scope of her betrayal. "All this time…" he breathed, his eyes bulging. "All this time… you've been a monster."
"Yeah."
Velvet's response was so… infuriatingly nonchalant as she turned to face them, her claw hanging idly at her side as she put her human hand casually on her hip. Her eyes were cold, hard, and utterly unrecognizable as she held Mikleo's gaze with careless, detached apathy. "You just never noticed." she remarked with cold amusement.
"How?! How could you…?" Mikleo squeezed his eyes shut, his fists curling.
"…Was everything a lie?" he asked quietly after a pause, his body trembling with raw emotion. "Everything you told us about why you wanted to travel with us. Everything about your own history. Everything about being our friend…" His eyes abruptly shot up to latch onto hers, almost desperately as he took an incredulous step forward. "Were they ALL lies?!"
At Mikleo's side, Sorey's eyes were unreadable.
Velvet looked on, unaffected by Mikleo's outburst. "I told you right from the start, didn't I?" She waved her human hand idly in the air. "I'm someone that does what needs to be done. That's all."
Rose stepped forward; her own expression deathly serious. "And what is that, exactly?" she asked intently, putting her hands on her hips. "I don't get it. Why'd you go all this way, after all this time, tagging along with Sorey while pretending to be his buddy?"
Velvet's eyes were drawn to the side. "I'm sure Lailah can find a way to explain it to you in a manner that doesn't break her oath." she replied dryly, meeting Lailah's eyes with an idly bemused expression.
Eyes were instantly drawn to Lailah.
Mikleo in particular was aghast. "Lailah… you knew?!" he asked in a shaky breath, betrayal rife in his tone.
Lailah's eyes shook with emotion as she avoided their gazes, fumbling with her hands in front of her dress. "I… I-!" she stammered.
"I wouldn't blame her."
Everyone turned back to Velvet as she casually lifted her claw, letting the malevolence seeping out of it trail after it ominously. "I did tell her I'd eat Sorey if she let it slip after all." she smirked humorlessly. "She was only trying to protect you all from me."
"You'd… what?!" Mikleo gaped.
Velvet raised an eyebrow at him, unimpressed. "You said it yourself. I'm a monster." She slowly clenched her daemon claw into a fist, curling one massive pulsating finger at a time. "If the Shepherd failed to become an adequate tool for me to wield," she explained reasonably, "then I'd devour him and wait for the next one to show up. It was just that simple."
Dezel crossed his arms, his teeth bared. "I take it Sorey fit your criteria?" he growled.
Her eyes fell upon the wind seraph. "Barely." she scoffed. "There were times when I was sure he'd break."
Velvet's eyes went to meet Sorey's directly for the first time, a foreign coldness in her gaze that made her seem completely and utterly unfamiliar to him. "To think such a naïve boy like him could have ever even made it a week as a Shepherd." At her side, the massive claw fell to her side – that constant, constant visual reminder that who he had thought she was had been nothing but a lie. "It was trivial to manipulate him into doing exactly what I wanted him to do, into believing exactly what I wanted him to believe." Her lips twisted into a dark smirk. "To think that a despicable 'Lord of Calamity' such as myself would be able to stay completely undetected, right under his nose." she mocked. "To think that he'd let his guard down so pathetically easily."
Her smile grew, borne of malicious amusement. "To think he thought of me as a friend."
Sorey's teeth gritted. "…Velvet." he growled lowly; his fists curled at his sides.
The emotions ran amok inside of his head, the implications of the horrid revelation flashing through his head in an uncontrollable torrent of utterly vile information, repeating the same conclusion over and over again.
That Velvet was the masked monster.
The thought just didn't seem to compute. His mind simply could not accept it. That his 'friend…' after all this time… had been the hellion that had attacked him and his friends. The masked hellion that had for so long been a strange, enigmatic teacher to him. The masked hellion that had used and hurt an innocent seraph just to test him.
"NO!" a man's frantic, hysterical voice begged. "NO, PLEASE!"
Velvet Crowe…
A mosaic of shifting shadows and brief silhouettes of light. A vision mixed with creeping fingers of obscuring darkness blackening out the world. Amidst it all, a single vague figure could be seen strolling through the chaos.
A Lord of Calamity. The downfall of an entire era of mankind, a thousand years ago. A true, cold-blooded murderer.
No place had been safe from the destruction she had wrought. No life had been safe from her cold, callous steps.
To think, she had been there in the morning after each encounter, acting as if nothing had happened. Every time she had talked about her past, she'd been lying. Everything he thought he knew about the hardened yet well-meaning traveler who he had thought as one of his closest friends along his arduous journey as a Shepherd had been a farce. There was simply no rejecting what Velvet Crowe had been doing the moment she'd crossed paths with him. The conclusion was undeniable; the supporting evidence concrete.
She had been manipulating him since the moment they'd met.
Velvet looked off to the side in the silence that followed, her expression cold. "…What was it you said earlier?" she mused idly. "'You can't fathom the true meaning of legends until you've seen their history with your own eyes?'" She turned back to face him, abruptly letting her claw dissipate back into those covering bandages; the malevolence seemingly vanishing into thin air. "In any case, there was little point in me manipulating you any further. All I need now is to wait until you grow strong enough to do what I need you to do."
She began to walk forward, directly past them towards the exit. "You knowing who I truly am is an inconvenience, but nothing more than that." She tugged a stray strand of the bandage wrapped around her arm as she walked onward, shifting her gaze away from them. "Nothing else has changed."
"Why you-!"
Seething, Mikleo abruptly jerked his staff into existence and settled into a fighting stance. He was abruptly stopped by a closed umbrella blocking his path forward. "Edna?!" he exclaimed.
The earth seraph was uncharacteristically grim. "If you don't want to be eaten alive, stop it." She met Mikleo's eyes strongly. "You're far too weak to take her on as of right now." she warned. "I'm serious."
Mikleo stared at Edna, his boiling emotions surging against her reasoning before ultimately losing the battle. "…Damn!" he cursed, forcing himself to take a step back and settle for glaring hatefully at the monster as she approached.
Velvet gave Edna a small, wordless nod of appreciation as she walked, maintaining a stoic and unreadable expression.
The earth seraph blinked wordlessly in response.
Velvet's shoulder brushed up against Sorey's cloak as she stopped short right behind him, her gaze fixed firmly forward. All around them, the rumbling of the earth underneath the hallowed grounds seemed to be amplified given the proximity of her raw, unobscured presence. The air of a wolf that had finally revealed its true nature.
"Grow strong, Shepherd." she muttered darkly without glancing his way, her voice seeming to echo off the surrounding walls.
"For I have no patience for brittle tools."
With that, the former Lord of Calamity resumed her pace forward, leaving the Shepherd and his companions amidst a courtyard of cold, hard stone.
End of Part 4 – Righteousness.