Chapter Eight: Church

Pain. The pain was indescribable. The searing burn of a blade through flesh, it's unlike anything else. Be it sword, spear, crossbow bolt, or some other tool of death, they all hurt going in.

They hurt so much.

The unbelievable misfortune Subaru Natsuki possessed in order to suffer these machinations as many times as he had recently was not lost on him. He'd always harbored an inkling of suspicion that those who may govern the world in any spiritual sense may have some form of vendetta against him. Maybe he'd committed some sacrilegious crime in a previous life, and was now doomed to this Sisyphusian fate in a dark, dank, and unfamiliar world. Maybe.

Or maybe this is their idea of a prank. Ha.

But the pain doesn't leave. Not fully. They don't tell you how the brain, in a desperate attempt to adapt to such trauma, begins creating similar signals throughout the body. "Phantom pains," they call it. Even if a limb is removed, a survivor may randomly feel as if it is being removed again, months or years or even decades after the injury. The pain never really leaves.

"I wonder if they knew that," Subaru mutters to himself, his consciousness fresh, not quite complete.

"Subaru?" The voice was light, and soft. The concern it carried was in stark contrast to all his other experiences these last few hours.

"That's gotta be Rem," he says, twisting his eyes in preparation to open them. "I take it you guys came to save me."

"Now now, Barusu," a voice obviously belonging to Ram chimed in, "is that self-pitying tone any way to show your relief for being reunited with your beloved Finger Maidens? You truly have no shame."

He let out a dry chuckle, her banter genuinely lightening his psychological burden, if even only a bit. "How thoughtless of me." He finally mustered the energy to pry his lids apart. As his vision focused, he made several immediate observations.

For one, the rough, uneven ceiling of the boss cave - covered in stalactites and having several openings to the sky above - had been replaced by the purposefully laid brick of a man-made structure. Come to think of it, didn't he faint in ankle-deep water? The battle-worn boy turned his head to the left to find the girls a few meters from him, a Site of Grace separating them. "Um…where am I?"

The pink-haired maid let out a sigh. "You're near the exit of the ruin."

"How did I get here?"

Rem brought a knuckle to her mouth and cleared her throat. "I c-carried you, Subaru." She seemed almost…embarrassed?

Subaru slowly raised an eyebrow. "What do you mean you carried me?"

"Um…I'm not sure how to answer that question, Subaru."

"I just mean you're…you know?" He held his right hand horizontally before his face and leveled his palm about half a foot from the ground. "So small."

Ram met his face with a disappointed glare. "We are demons, Barusu. Carrying someone as skinny and empty-headed as you is no great task."

Before reason could intervene, Subaru shot into a seated position. "Demons?! Agh!" He quickly grasped his left bicep with regret.

"Careful, Subaru!" Rem said, making her way over to him and pulling his sleeve up to investigate his injury. "We're able to heal wounds to a certain extent, but we can't replenish blood, and there's only so much we can do for a limb that had little-to-no blood flow for as long as your arm did. You'll need to take it easy for a bit."

He looked down at his arm to find a pretty unfortunate scene. The limb was a dark purple at least to his elbow, he wouldn't know exactly how far until his jacket was removed. There were scars shaped like small cuts adorning the entire appendage from elbow to wrist, seemingly where his thorny blood had exploded from his body in order to cast his nightmare spell.

The pain was severe now that he'd regained his bearings.

He shifted his focus to the blue hair mere inches from his face. "What do you mean by 'demons'?"

She raised her head to look him in the eyes, a somewhat worried expression on her face. "Have you never heard of demons before?"

"Well, yeah, of course I've heard of them, but their likeness seems to differ a bit from culture to culture and, honestly, I've never heard them described as pretty girls in maid outfits before."

Turning her head to hide the deepening tint on her cheeks, Rem spoke to the broken brick floor. "I'm not sure what you mean when you say they 'differ from culture to culture,' but as far as I'm aware there is only one kind of demon, and my sister and I are born of that race."

Subaru leaned back on his good arm and heaved a sigh to the ceiling. "So what's the deal, you guys have super strength? Anything else?"

Ram stood and crossed her arms. "Your ignorance boggles the mind, Barusu." She took a few steps until she was in front of her charge and crouched, wrapping her left arm around her knees and holding her right out before her with the index finger extended. "Those of the demon clan are famous for two things. The first is our superhuman physical attributes, and the second," she extended her middle finger alongside the first, "is our affinity for demon magic."

The boy's eyes widened in genuine wonder at this. "'Demon magic,' huh? That sounds pretty cool."

Ram turned her palm face up and shrugged. "It's nothing too special, certainly no marvel when compared to the magic found in these lands."

Subaru straightened his torso and pointed an accusatory finger at the monotone maiden. "Wait, if you two are so strong, what the hell do you need me for? Why not just go get this…'Elden Ring' for yourselves?!"

The two maids looked at one another in confusion before returning their gazes to the tracksuit-clad teen. "Subaru," Rem started, prompting him to turn his attention to her, "we aren't Tarnished. We have no way of turning runes to strength, our capabilities are severely limited. The demigods who protect the shards of the Elden Ring are far too powerful for us to contend with."

Subaru felt a small jab in his chest and turned back to find Ram with a finger extended and prodding his jacket. "That's why, as Finger Maidens, we need to lead a Tarnished to obtain power through the Grace of the Erdtree and reclaim the Elden Ring."

Subaru rubbed his head as if he'd been struck. "This is a lot to take in, I don't really understand much of it."

"You're certainly an odd Tarnished, Barusu. I've never met a member of your people who knew nothing of the Elden Ring."

"Yeah, well, let's just say I don't get out much." Subaru slowly pushed himself to his feet, the pain and light-headedness finally beginning to subside. "But wait, if you two can fight, why did I need to do all that alone? Couldn't you at least have helped me through that cave?"

He turned as he heard Rem rising to her feet. She bowed politely. "I apologize, Subaru, but we simply have no need for a Tarnished with no sense for battle. We needed to know you were at least capable."

He swallowed the lump in his throat. "So if I'd not made it through the cave-"

"-we'd have left you to die, yes," Ram interrupted. "This land is harsh, Barusu. If you can't stand on your own strength here, the strength you'd gain through us moving forward would be wasted."

Subaru let out a sigh, staring at the ceiling once again and trying hard to forget his very real experience of not living up to their expectations more than once. "I guess that makes sense." He took a deep breath, and with a brisk slap to the face with his uninjured hand, he expelled it hard. Finding his staff and sword laying next to where he'd awoken, he retrieved them and slid them into opposing belt loops on his pants. "Alright! What's next?"

Ram crossed her arms and tilted her head to the side, her eyes closed nonchalantly. "The next step of your journey is entirely up to you, Barusu. We are here to guide, but we aren't meant to lead. Barring specific circumstances that would render us incapable of accompanying you further, as long as your eventual goal is the Elden Throne, all else is inconsequential."

"So typical RPG mechanics, huh?" He began to pace the rectangular room looking down inquisitively, ignoring the very confused faces of his new traveling companions. "I suppose that probably means this is an open world. Would have to be, right? Linear progression in real life would just be weird and immersion-breaking." He halted his pacing when a glimmer of white caught his attention. He looked up and saw three large, glimmering windows, similar to the 'door' that led to the boss earlier. "What's that?" he asked, pointing at the windows.

Ram turned in the direction of his finger and placed her hands on her hips. "That is a fog wall. It's a magical barrier. They tend to have specific rules for opening."

Subaru walked closer and began to inspect the walls, but what really drew his eye was the statue to the left of them. It was some sort of podium, on top of which sat some kind of smiling goblin creature, with another crouched atop its back. "Pretty ugly."

Rem made a distasteful face. "Stone imps. Unreasonable monsters."

Subaru placed a hand on the top imp's head, immediately prompting the expected message across his vision.

'USE STONESWORD KEY? [YES] [NO]'

He focused on the 'yes' option.

'NO STONESWORD KEY IN INVENTORY.'

"Hm. Kind of annoying, giving me the option when you know I can't say yes."

"Subaru? What's wrong?"

"Ah, nothing, Rem-Rem. Just thinking out loud." He slowly pulled his injured arm above his head to meet his opposite hand and stretched until his back popped. "Alright. Let's get going! I'm stoked to see what's next!"

Without waiting for an answer, he turned to his left and began marching toward the exit. He climbed the short staircase and immediately found a circular platform surrounded by six wide pillars. In the center of the platform, there seemed to be a button.

"An elevator?" he mused to himself, letting out a small chuckle at the thought of activating it by standing on the giant button. "Such a video game design. What's next? Am I gonna have to send it back down to create a shortcut for later?"

Before the two girls could inquire about his ramblings, he stepped onto the platform and turned to beckon for them. As they took their places at his sides, he stepped his right foot on the center of the mechanism and shifted his weight onto it. The circle sunk into the surrounding stone, and the elevator began to simultaneously climb while rotating clockwise.

Subaru caught his balance after a short stumble, clearing his throat and placing his hands on his hips in what he felt was a confident pose. The lift quickly reached its destination and came to a halt, causing another stumble from the rigid young man, which elicited a small laugh from his blue-haired companion.

Ignoring his own embarrassment, Subaru strode forward cautiously, finding another staircase immediately outside of the elevator. He ascended them and came to a large stone door with two white-flame torches on either side.

He placed both hands on the cool engraved surface, a smirk on his face. "Right! Our adventure begins…NOW-hk!" As he attempted to put a climactic stamp on his declaration, he pushed hard on the door, which didn't budge an inch, causing him to tap his forehead against the hard barrier with his effort. "Um…that's weird. It's locked."

"Oh, Subaru…" Rem chided, before placing a hand on his shoulder to request his movement. Once he'd vacated his spot, she crouched and gripped the bottom of the door with both hands, lifting it smoothly in one motion. It slid upward and locked into place above them, revealing the exit.

"I knew that," he said matter-of-factly, the redness of his cheeks very noticeable. He reclaimed the lead and stepped outside for the first time in what felt like days, and the sight nearly floored him.

The first thing that caught his eye was the rolling hillside. The foliage enamored him, the vibrant greens and golds and reds. There seemed to be some form of ruins dotting the landscape, but there was no real sense of uniformity to them at all. Almost as if they'd all…landed there?

The next thing he saw were the great cliffs ahead, harboring a large castle atop their peaks. Extended from them was what could only be a massive bridge, very obviously made my man. It looked old and broken, but the scale of it was astounding.

Third, he noticed a…um…a uh…hm.

"What the fuck is that?"

The two maidens looked to him to obtain a reference for what he was inquiring about. His expression was dumbfounded, as he pointed to the sky in the direction of the gargantuan golden tree in the distance.

"Do you mean the Erdtree?" Rem inquired.

"That's the Erdtree?!" he shouted over his shoulder incredulously. "That's what I'm supposed to be going to?!"

The now all too familiar sigh of an impatient Ram pulled his attention over his opposite shoulder. "Barusu, I refuse to believe you truly know that little about this land and its importance to your people. How on earth can you not know of the Erdtree?"

"Look, I don't know how else to explain things but just hear me when I say I'm not from around here and treat me like a tourist."

"A…'tourist'?" Rem repeated in confusion.

"It doesn't matter, just act like I'm a baby!"

"Not a problem," Ram retorted a bit too quickly for Subaru's comfort. "Yes, that is the Erdtree. It is the source of Grace, and your goal if you are to become the Elden Lord."

"Just how big is that thing? How am I supposed to have a reference for how far away it is?"

Rem took a step to his side and glared up at the massive tree with him. "Don't worry about that, Subaru. Your best option is to take this journey one step at a time. This shared goal of ours is no small one. Countless Tarnished have attempted to do what you are, and very few have even seen any real progress at all. Focus on what is in front of you."

This message seemed to help a bit, as Subaru took a deep breath and lowered his gaze until he noticed a structure on a nearby hill. "Oh cool, it's an old church."

Just as he made this observation, the front wall of the building exploded outward in a giant cloud of dust.

"What the hell?!" He placed a flat hand above his eyes in an attempt to focus his vision. The first thing he saw was a very large man atop a very large horse. They were both adorned in ornate golden armor, and the man carried a round shield and halberd both larger than Subaru himself. "Who the hell is that?"

"I'm not sure," Ram answered. "We have not been to this side of the cave. We arrived by boat on the beach opposite here."

"He's massive!"

The large cavalryman turned his steed and took a wild swing with his halberd at something still hidden by the now-ruined church. As his swing passed inside, a dark figure leapt over the blade and rolled along the grass outside. When it recovered, Subaru noticed it was a person in a black cloak.

"It's a human! We've gotta help!" Subaru shouted. Before his allies could argue, he took off down the stairs and across the field. He began pushing up the hill when he heard a man's playful voice ring out ahead.

"Freezing Mist!"

He lifted his gaze just in time to see the field ahead of him explode in a large, glittered cloud. It cleared quickly, revealing the large man and his horse frozen almost completely solid. On the other side, where Subaru could not see, he then heard a woman's voice, high-pitched yet authoritative.

"Great Glintstone Shard!"

Both the man and his steed suddenly shattered into a thousand pieces of ice. From their crumbling form, a large blueish-green ball came flying towards Subaru and his party. They all hit the ground, just narrowly avoiding the mass of…magic? Had to be. Distracted for a moment watching its path behind them, Subaru turned back to look for the person who'd casted it. He found the cloaked figure with their back once again facing them.

"Hey!" Subaru shouted, jumping to his feet. This caught the person's attention, causing them to look over their shoulder in his direction. They made eye contact for a moment, before the mysterious figure disappeared around the corner of the crumbling church.

"Wait, come back!" He tried following them, but was stopped by Ram's hand on his shoulder.

"Barusu!" He turned to look at the young maiden. "Please stop running off with no plan! That person could kill you!"

"I don't think she will!" he exclaimed, once again attempting to follow the unknown mage.

"'She'? How do you know they're a 'she'?" Rem asked. He turned to her.

"I saw her face!" he shouted almost enthusiastically, a toothy grin flashing along his face. "And if there's one thing I know about isekai tropes, the protagonist never gets killed by the pretty white-haired elf girl with purple eyes!"

He gave them no time to argue before continuing on after her, his disgruntled friends begrudgingly in tow.