The pair continued onward into the tower that the demon had been guarding. Lex grabbed a clump of souls hidden under some boxes, and they continued down the stairs. This tower opened onto a much larger bridge than the one they had just crossed and which ran perpendicular to the former.
"You know, I don't know much about defenses and such," Lex said, "but I haven't the foggiest as to why this exists."
He handed Oscar the binoculars he had taken from the graveyard.
"See, look over there. There's a grated entrance in order to protect against intruders as if the bridge actually led anywhere. Look behind us – it's a damned balcony! What were they trying to defend against?"
Oscar put down the binoculars and followed Lex's flailing gesture. He squinted and raised his visor for the first time. Though an experienced knight, he had a fair, boyish face and clear blue eyes. He looked through the binoculars again.
"It can't be," he said, walking toward the balcony.
Ahead stood the most noble soul in all Lordran. It was a knight in stout armor with a white tunic over it. A brilliant red plume on the helmet wagged in the faint breeze as the knight basked in the light of Lordran's perpetual summer sun.
"Captain!" Oscar cried, running over to him.
"Oh?" the knight said, turning on one foot. "Oscar! I thought I would never see you again!"
Solaire of Astora now turned to face the newcomers, the sun glinting off his helm.
"I mean no offense, but why are you here? Has something happened?"
Oscar approached his fellow knight, a dreary look on his face.
"I was killed, I'm afraid… I was given a duty without honor, and I hesitated. When I woke, I decided to leave before the others learned what had become of me. I followed an old saying passed down in my family to the Undead Asylum, seeking my fate. My mission almost failed there, but I was saved by the prophet here, Lex of Luthor."
He gestured to the cleric, who gave a hearty wave but said nothing.
"Oh, hello there!" Solaire said. "You have my thanks. When I came to this land, I had expected to never see any of my friends again. I would be pleased to count you among their number."
"Likewise," Lex said, nodding. "I actually intend to pledge my service at the altar on the other side of the bridge, but my foresight shows that reaching it will not be an easy task."
"Magnificent! I am blessed to have met such a champion of faith! Both a prophet and a warrior of the sun! Oscar, will you join us as well?"
"This is not Astora, and my knightly vows are ended with my death. I owe nothing now to the Way of White and may even resent it. It may be heresy, but I will join this Covenant."
"This pleases me greatly! I won't keep you from making your vows. But take this."
He placed a stick of soapstone in Oscar's hands.
"We are amidst strange beings, in a strange land. The flow of time itself is convoluted, with heroes centuries old phasing in and out. The very fabric wavers, and relations shift and obscure. There's no telling how much longer your world and mine will remain in contact. But, use this, to summon one another as spirits, cross the gaps between the worlds, and engage in jolly co-operation!
Of course, we are not the only one engaged in this. But I am a warrior of the sun! Spot my summon signature easily by its brilliant aura. If you miss it, you must be blind!"
With that, he chuckled and turned about to gaze off the end of the balcony once more.
"I will stay behind to gaze at the sun. The sun is a wondrous body. Like a magnificent father! If only I could be so grossly incandescent!"
Oscar watched Solaire watching the sun for a moment before joining Lex in the shadow of the upper bridge.
"So you knew Solaire," Lex said. "And it sounds as if you have a story to tell as much as I do."
"It is nothing special," Oscar replied. "The Darksign brings out the worst in people… I do not mean those who bear it. The Undead, even those who kept a firm grasp of their sanity and were otherwise innocent, were taken to that rotting Asylum. When they became too many to cast out, whole towns were left to fend for themselves while the noble houses sealed themselves away and pretended it was not happening.
Do not misunderstand; had I lived, I would have soon inherited my father's county. But my order was commanded to guard such men as my father, the king, and his sons while they tried to feast through the end of the world. In the end, it was not the Undead which overran us. It was our own people."
Oscar took a deep breath.
"I did not tell the captain because I did not want him to blame himself. After he left, we became dispirited and offered less resistance to what my father and the others demanded. I thought that perhaps learning the Fate of the Undead would redeem my family's name."
"A fine gesture," Lex commented, "but sons paying for the sins of their fathers is a story too old for my tastes. What is it that you want, personally? Like in the Asylum, you won't last long if all that's motivating you is obligation – and that I won't shut up and let you die in peace."
"No, that is part of it," Oscar said. "I want to redeem my family's name. I want to make the captain proud. I may also want to find what it means to live for myself. I was groomed for my role from birth, so with only the shadow of death hanging above me, nothing is stopping me from seeing what else there is to life."
He smiled a bit, his eyes growing a bit brighter.
"What about you, Lex? Do you enjoy being a prophet? What god do you serve, who would allow you to join the Covenant of another?"
"Uhhhhhhh… I have certainly enjoyed it this far, though I came into my powers rather, uh, recently. I serve, uh… Slaanesh! The goddess of, uh, perfection. She expects her worshipers to experience as many things as they can so that they might pursue perfection in a perfectly unique manner. Technically."
"Technically?"
"Most adherents are blindly hedonistic. For me, that was more of a fringe benefit. The gods of, uh, Luthor tend to have a fixation on chastity. While we're here in Lordran, I hope to find a special lady friend, if you know what I mean. As for my long-term goals, I intend to go thoroughly mad with power and punch out the Primordial Serpents' teeth."
Oscar gave him a nasty look before shutting the visor of his helmet and looking over the hollows guarding the bridge.
"I know nothing of your homeland, so I will take what you say about your goddess at face value. As for the rest, I fear you may already be hollowing."
Lex rolled his shoulders and grinned.
"Well, you'll be the first to know, won't you?"
He held out his mace and pointed.
"See that staircase on the right, halfway across? And see those scorch marks along the entire length of the bridge? Yeah. We're going to need to outrun that drake we saw earlier. Can you manage in that armor?"
"I don't know. Aren't you the prophet? Shouldn't you know how long it takes to reach the stairs?"
Lex held both hands to his lips in a thoughtful gesture.
"Well, you should be prepared to be burned half to death. Or all the way to death. I'm not sure how durable you are. I'm certainly going to make it, so when you resurrect at the bonfire, just look for the ladder I'm going to drop."
"Shouldn't a warrior of sunlight be more… sunny? Like the captain?"
"The Lord of Sunlight is a hollow, and I am more than justified in being morbid. Now get your fatrolling ass ready to run. On go. Three, two, one, go!"
The pair broke into a dead sprint diagonally across the first half of the bridge. There was a great wingbeat overhead, followed by a roar. Lex took a flying leap down into the stairwell. Out of breath and weighed down by his armor, Oscar dove to the ground and slid onto the top step as a wave of flame surged across the length of the bridge.
"Ow ow ow ow ow!" Oscar said as he continued sliding down, step by step.
The back of his tabard was alight, but he seemed more or less fine. This time, Lex helped him to his feet rather than the other way around. They were in a storage room of some sort.
"This way," Lex said, pointing to a door with still more stairs.
As they entered, Oscar noted that it was indeed the square room containing the bonfire they had left some time earlier. Now, though, they were a few storeys above the ground, and the stairs had crumbled halfway to the ground. Lex walked over to something on the ledge and kicked at it. A rusty iron ladder slid all the way to the ground.
"They must have broken the stairs and taken up the ladder when the Burg went hollow," he said, scratching his chin. "Fat lot of good it did them."
Oscar solemnly considered the sort of desperation must have been involved.
"So we're halfway there," Lex said, changing the subject. "But we're going to cheat a little bit before continuing. You noticed how when the drake blasted the bridge, we got the souls of the hollows it killed?"
Oscar nodded.
"Right, so we are going to abuse the hell out of it. Remember how when I touched the bonfire at the Shrine, it revived the hollows you were standing next to? I'm going to find a safe place upstairs and shout insults at the drake. When it attacks, it'll kill the hollows. Whenever you feel that you've gained their souls, activate the bonfire and reset time."
"That is fiendishly clever."
"You mispronounced lazy."