So, Saint Odo of Grace won! The update will appear later today. Before then, have something else. This is technically styled after works from a somewhat later time than the Quest should mimic, but I could not help myself.
The Golden Legend of Saint Odo of Grace
Odo comes from the the word
odun that is how the word praise looks in the language of the Liefs, and so his life was one of raising his voice to up high to venerate the Saints with utmost devotion. His father was Adon and mother was Ethla, and he was born in the city of Grace. From his earliest years, he was well devout and oftentimes would stay in a temple until late and night, and only leave when his mother came to plead for him to return home; he complied but he always knew that his real home is in the house of the Saints. His father wished him to become a warrior, at which Odo wept many tears, for he wanted to offer his life to holy works instead of war, but he was a good son and would not disobey his son.
The Saints, however, who always aid those that would be close to their hearts, heard of his plight and sent down a servant of theirs, by the name of Sebastian, who was a very holy man. He arrived in the city of Grace to become the bishop, and during a prayer that he presided over, he heard a voice sweet and filled with sadness, and the lamentation shook his heart. He ordered the one who prayed to be brought before him, and so was young Odo put before the bishop and asked: "Why is your prayer so sweet, and yet so sad?" and he answered: "For it is my desire to lead a life of a pious man, but my father will have me become a warrior and be married to a woman". And so Sebastian the bishop asked for the father of Odo to be brought before him and asked him: "Do you not see that your son's heart belongs to the Saints, not to the things of the earth? Let him be released from your rule, so that he may be granted a tonsure by me" and the father of Odo, stricken by the piety of Sebastian the Bishop soon complied, and Odo was accepted into the bishop's service, and performed admirably in all tasks set before him.
All the time, he also fasted and performed mortifications of flesh, until his face, which was very beauteous, grew pale and desiccated, but even then, he would not allow himself rest and comfort and slept on bare stones of the floor and ate only rotten bread and stale water. And soon his body was covered by a terrible stench, and even other men who served Sebastian the bishop asked for Odo to be thrown from his mansion, for he looked worse than a slave and a beggar, and flies surrounded him. But he would not allow that, until Odo himself asked to leave, for even to sleep under a roof seemed too much of a luxury to him, and he would rather go to live in a cavern with wild beasts around him. And so he did, and became an eremite outside the walls of the city, and would not see a man for ten years.
After that time, however, he heard a voice telling him to return to the city of Grace, which now was deprived of both of its holy men (for Sebastian the bishop passed away of old age) and returned to idolatry. And he entered the city's main square, covered in mud and filth, and with a bread that reached from his chin to the ground, and saw that the people of the city were corrupt to the core, and piety and good religion had been all but exiled from the city's walls, and all praised their idols and performed great depravities.
And people of the city gathered around him, for they thought him a quaint sign, in the manner of a jester or a barbarian, and to them, he spoke against their sins, and his voice was like thunder or a bell of bronze, and all that heard him were cowed.
But then came the soldiers of the city's lord, who was first in all manner of blasphemy, and said: "If he is allowed to preach for longer, he will surely turn the people of the city from their ways!" and they grabbed him from the square and threw him into prison, without bread or water, so that he would waste away. But miracle of miracles, when each day they would come to see if he had already wasted away, they would find him in health even better than the day before, and after a month, he looked as hale and young as he had been when he was a lad and around him was the fragrance of flowers and incense. For he had beheld the name of God in the times of his hermitage, and so became one of the Saints.
And that he could not be tormented with hunger, it angered the lord of the city, who ordered him drawn to the main square and hacked to death with axes, and with prayer on his lips, he departed from the word of the living to the world of true life, to watch the name of God in full forevermore. And the hands of those who tortured him were all instantly touched by rot, and on the lord of the city such terrible retribution was invested that it is sufficient to say that upon his demise, his body was thrown into a ditch for dogs to gnaw on, for no one would allow it to be buried in their land.
A certain man was ambushed on the road by terrible brigands, who robbed him of all of his possessions and left him bleeding. And he was found by another man, who was crooked, and who saved him to sell him as a slave, and put him in irons and mistreated him severely. But they passed by a shrine in which a relic of Saint Odo was held, and the man prayed for his deliverance, and suddenly his irons rusted away in an instant, and wounds were mended as well. He fled from his captor and hid in the church, and when the crooked man came after him and demanded from the monks to release him back to him, he suddenly found that he cannot move his legs and was forced to kneel by a divine force, and would not stand up until he gave all of his possessions to the man he wanted to enslaved. And thus was faith rewarded and injustice punished.
