A/N: Just a bit of a filler story while I try and figure out where I want to go next with The Forgotten Heroes, and also a trial run at branching away from Self inserts. This takes place in the Underworld, between the time when Dakira Synthesis twenty-two and Renly Synthesis twenty-seven were made knights.

The Twenty-Fifth Knight

Chapter One

325 HEC, The thirtieth day of the tenth month

Mateo laid on the cold, marble tiles of the Cathedral, unconscious and unaware of his surroundings.

"Mateo... Wake up, Mateo..."

His eyes opened slowly, adjusting to the light of the room and taking in his surroundings. A beautiful woman with long, pinkish-purple hair laid in the bed before him. A white ribbon hovered around the back of her head like an incomplete halo, and purple silk linens draped her body. Her eyes were like endless pits of amethyst crystals, the kinds his former master had used to smooth and facet into intricate and ornate jewelry. The boy was merely fourteen years old, but the previous day, his home, a small village known as Magna Crystallis, had been intruded upon by a man clad in gleaming white armor, calling himself an Integrity knight.

Many years had it been since the knights had come to his village, the last time having been many decades before Mateo had been born, but they all knew the legends well, and the tales of the Order of the Integrity Knights. They were the ones who carried out the laws of the four empires, the seeming demi-gods that enforced the rulings of the Axiom Church. And Mateo had been taken prisoner for something he didn't understand, and possibly, never would.

"Mateo..." the woman said, her voice as alluring as the songs of the Sirens of the Great Oceans in the myths. "I am the Pontifex of the Axiom Church, Administrator. It has come to my attention that, due to the passing of your parents, who attacked one of my Integrity Knights, you are now an orphan. Is that correct?"

Mateo gulped in fear. He knew exactly what she was talking about. He had been there when it had happened after all. "Y- yes... yes you are, Lady Pontifex," Mateo replied nervously. Administrator smiled.

"You do not have to be afraid of me. I'm sorry if I unnerved you, but I wanted to make sure that I was addressing the correct person," she reassured him. Although her words eased his fears, they did not dispel them entirely. Even though he had never had the luxury of studying the Sacred Arts, he had learned enough by sneakily watching the son of his family's master read textbooks on it to recognize someone who had. The woman in front of him was clearly extremely skilled with the arts, and her very presence sent chills down his spine.

He, like his parents, had been born a slave to a cruel master known as Lord Cytherut, a ruler of the mining district of his village. Cytherut had ruled with an iron fist over the village until Mateo had been caught by one of his guards spying on Cytherut's son through the window. Of course, no one had believed him when he pleaded that he had just been curious about what the boy was reading, and instead they fabricated the tale that Mateo had been plotting to assassinate the son in an attempt to get back at his master for the abhorrent life he and his family had been forced to endure. But the night he was caught, Mateo had broken free from the shackles by using the metal spikes in his cell to pry the chains off of the wrist manacles.

After that, he returned to his home, only to find Cytherut there with a dead guard, and his father lying on the ground, nearly dead himself. His mother was being attacked by Cytherut with a dagger, and in a fit of rage, Mateo had tackled the noble and punched him to death. The next morning, right as Mateo's mother was about to leave with him and his father to flee into the countryside, an Integrity Knight had arrived on a dragon to apprehend the young murderer.

But his parents wouldn't allow it. Rather than letting the knight take Mateo away, they tried to explain the situation to him, but to no avail, as the Knight was adamant that he'd have to take the child. In a last ditch effort, Mateo's parents summoned the courage to attack the knight head-on, hoping to buy Mateo enough time to run away. Unfortunately, the dragon grabbed hold of him with its arm, and the boy could only watch as the knight cut down his family before him, and was then taken to Centoria.

"It has also come to my attention that you murdered the noble that oversaw your village, right?"

Mateo gulped again, unsure of how he could answer that. The last thing he wanted to do was admit to being a murderer at the age of fourteen. He still wore the iron slave harness secured to his chest when he was ten, the harness that hung him from the hooks in the barn ceiling at night when he was allowed to sleep.

Administrator then looked at him with an expression of concern. "Are you ok? Here, let me remove that harness. It looked dreadfully uncomfortable," she said, and with a single tap of her finger on the solid iron, it shattered into millions of pieces like glass. For the first time in four years, Mateo was able to roll his shoulders to stretch and return feeling to the muscles in his back. "Why don't we take care of those injuries while we're at it? System call. Generate Luminous Element, orb shape. Adhere to wounds. Discharge in vortex shape."

five balls of light circled Mateo's body, casting waves of light over his scars. Magically, the wounds vanished back into his skin, like they had never existed in the first place. "That's better, isn't it? Now, would you please answer my question?"

Mateo knew what he had to do. "Yes, Lady Pontifex. I did... Murder... my family's master," he said, before hastily adding onto that admission. "But he was a cruel man, who chose to hang us from the ceiling with those harnesses instead of giving us beds or even blankets to sleep on! And he forced a guard to attack my dad so he wouldn't take the fall for breaking a Taboo, and then when my dad was down, he started assaulting my mother! I had to do someth-"

The Pontifex held up a hand, silently telling him to stop. "It is ok, my child. I already know what transpired. Had I known what your master keeping people as slaves in the first place, let alone what he was putting his slaves through, I would've sent an Integrity Knight to put a stop to it. Unfortunately, he never actually broke a taboo, so I was not alerted to the situation until you killed him. Rest assured, though I cannot bring your family back to life, I will make it up to you by making you an Integrity Knight, so that you may patrol the four Empires to keep watch for any who suffer under cruel masters, as you have suffered."

Mateo paled. "But- But I don't want to be an Integrity Knight! I want to see my parents again in heaven! Please, your majesty... just kill me... let me die so I may see my mother and father..."

The Pontifex sighed from her bed. "As I said, I may not be able to bring your mother and father back, and nor do I wish to end your life. However, there is another way that you can feel a mother's love again. Come to me, Mateo. Let me help you."

Mateo shook his head again. "I don't want to be a part of the church! I just want to die and see my parents again! I've got nothing left here to live for!" he sobbed, his mind flashing back to the limp form of his mother's body impaled on the Integrity Knight's broadsword, her mouth hanging, a circle of blood staining her tunic around the sword.

The Pontifex sighed again. "I see. Very well, you clearly need some time to rest, and come to terms with what has happened," she said, before summoning another sacred art that knocked Mateo out.

When Mateo came to, he was in a large room with circular walls with small pod-like cases all over them. He could hear the faint chanting of sacred arts, but he couldn't determine where it was coming from, nor could he tell what arts were being chanted. Suddenly, Mateo felt an agonizing pain in his head, and his legs went limp.

A small ball bounced into view as he collapsed to the floor, laughing. It unfolded into the shape of a rotund little man dressed like a clown, or a jester, and then he looked at Mateo. "So, you're the one who won't remove your core protection. It's going to be a lot more difficult and painful to take away your memories this way..." he tutted, before laughing hysterically.

"My... My memories?" Mateo groaned.

The clown grinned evilly. "Yep! Those memories that are completely worthless to a good little knight of the church! We're doing you a favor and sealing them away. So be a good little boy and just remove your core protection already so we can go about our extremely busy days!"

Mateo thrashed his head from side to side. "N- No! No, I want to remember my mom and dad! I won't do it!"

The clown laughed gleefully. "I was hoping you'd say that. Forced Synthesis is so much more fun than Voluntary Synthesis," he said, stretching out his hands towards Mateo. "System call! Generate Umbra element! Fog shape! Discharge!"

A smoky black cloud enveloped Mateo, and the pain doubled, then tripled. He writhed on the floor. He had to keep fighting this power, he couldn't surrender his memories. Even as horrible as his life had been, there were many good memories he held onto. Memories of his family, of the other friends he made while whispering of how they could escape and run away at night, memories of the animals he took care of that he grew close to. He wouldn't give them up, not easily at least.

"No... No! I must... dig deeper!" He shouted, as he frantically remembered each memory he loved, and as quickly as possible, memorized every detail about them.

The pain had become unbearable at this point, but Mateo still stubbornly refused to give up. He continued fighting the urge to give in, to let go of everything he held dear, and he felt as though someone or something was forming a barrier around him the more he thought of his friends, his family, the son of Cytherut, who had tried everything he could to help Mateo's family go free, and when that failed, had done everything he could to subtly help them fight back against his father. "William... I won't let them take you too!"

The pain continued for hours, or maybe even days, and Mateo still adamantly refused to let his memories spill through his hands like sand. Eventually, even the clown had stopped laughing and was now summoning dozens of sacred arts to try and break him. Never had the Prime Senator see someone resist the Synthesis ritual for so long, and he was growing tired of this child's impudence.

Still, against all odds, Mateo thrashed out at the shadowy claws that tried to pry their way into his mind, waging a mental war against the Axiom Church's will. His right eye burned harshly, adding to the already inconceivable torture he felt, and Mateo fell to the ground.

"If you want my memories... my friends... my family... my life! You'll have to take them by force!" He shouted defiantly, as his eye burst in a shower of blood. The warm blood streamed down his right cheek, but he ignored it, focusing on that pain and using it as a conduit to keep his mind as sharp as a sword, his willpower as sturdy as an iron wall.

"Why do you insist on being such a bother? You stupid boy, you cannot win!" the clown exclaimed. "Generate umbra element! Lightning shape! Adhere to unit ID: 025!"

A bolt of dark lightning wrapped around Mateo's body, causing him to scream in pain. He saw the lightning form a hand-like shape that plunged into his head and tore out the remaining memories by force, yanking his head forward with each memory. He felt his memories being stripped away. His mind became delirious from the pain, and he saw the faces of his parents be pulled out of his mind, and then crumble into small chunks of stone, before those chunks disintegrated as well. With each memory that was destroyed, Mateo felt like less and less of himself, and he was unable to recall the names or faces of his parents, and then that he even had parents at all.

Tears streamed down his left cheek as he heard the clown laughing like this was the greatest thing he'd ever seen, and after hours upon hours of torturous pain and tears, Then, Mateo felt a new pain in his forehead and briefly saw a strange, amethyst colored prism as it was pushed into his skull. After that, he could no longer recall any memories of his life, and he finally accepted the truth that he had tried for so many hours to deny. His memories were gone. With that, he blacked out, feeling nothing but the cold marble tiles beneath him.

A/N: Dang that ending turned out darker than I imagined it would. Anyway, Let me know what you think of this story, and I'll see y'all next time!