A Paladin/Cleric fantasy in a vaguely Americana setting. After a certain tragedy and improptu eye transplant, Sherman must learn the ways of the Order as he fights back against the ever-growing horde of the Contemptible Contagion.
Per Deum Lux
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Prologue
John's sour mood had been steadily getting worse for a month, and it looked like it wasn't about to get better any time soon.
Each morning, he woke up to a nagging cow of a wife, dragging him out of his blessed four hours of sleep. The kids would already be up, screaming and charging around the house like a trio of humanoid typhoons. His breakfast would consist of only black coffee and a bitter orange—the doctor said that anything more would be "bad for his heart"—and took a full hour to corral the kids into the car for work. He'd be lucky if Joel didn't throw up in the back seat before he got there, with the other two hellions screeching and singing in horrible off-key pop trash the entire half hour it took to get there. Another hour to work—traffic, as always, was stop-and-go the whole way there—to clock into a job that worked him far too long and paid him far too little.
Nine hours of meetings, bosses, office politics, and bullies later, he got home to a home that was no more organized than the aftermath of an earthquake. His dinner— reheated leftovers that were starting to go bad—was washed down with water and a pharmacy's worth of medications. Then, he spent his final hours doing the paperwork for that stupid lawsuit, the deadline for which loomed ever and ever closer. Then, he'd fight his constant, mounting anxiety and ulcer until a stressful sleep overtook him.
John didn't know how much more of this he could handle before he just snapped, like a support beam that had been rotted out by mold and rain. Where had it all gone wrong? Where had his life turned into such a nightmare? He remembered being happy, once. He remembered having a reason for why he ground his heart into pulp and his soul into dust. He remembered thinking that it was all worth it, in the end, if he could just hold on a bit longer.
He didn't remember what that reason was anymore.
Today, the traffic was particularly egregious. Some moron had gone of the center divide, causing a six-car pileup that promised another stern talking-to. He wouldn't get fired, oh no. He wasn't that lucky. To make his luck worse, there was some construction going on around the building where he worked, meaning that he had to walk several blocks around to get to the entrance. What a rotten start of a day. He—
He paused mid-step, narrowly avoiding getting rainwater on his suit pants. What was that sound just now? He strained his ears, searching for that odd noise over the din of construction and traffic. It had sounded like . . . almost like a chuckle, or distant thunder. He glanced up and down the alleyway, concerned if there were some drug addicts or homeless people he should worry about. Finding nothing, he shrugged, blamed it on his nerves, and went to work.
"And just where have you been?!" his boss demanded.
He mumbled a half-hearted apology and tried to get to his desk. A pudgy arm blocked the way.
"You know, I've had it about to here with you, Stevenson," his boss chided, wagging a sausage-like digit under John's nose. "Late constantly? Never paying attention during meetings? You're bringing company morale down! You're hampering the efficiency of the workers!"
John barely noticed his coworkers looking on in sympathetic embarrassment. He was more preoccupied with keeping his face from morphing into the mask of fury he knew reflected his heart.
His boss prattled on for a few minutes more in full view of the office, berating and degrading him in corporate-friendly, HR-approved vocabulary. Then, blessedly, he left to go snack on his third donut of the hour and harass some poor intern.
"I'm sorry about that," said Stacey, one of his office mates. She was a pretty thing, with a kind smile and a word of encouragement for everyone. "He's been harsh on everyone today."
He grunted, his face softening just a tad from its stoic, controlled mask. "That bad?"
"You don't know the half of it," said annoying-yet-harmless Chad, rolling his chair on over to them. "He came in furious today. Probably due to the construction making him take the long way around."
"Gods know he can't fit through the alleyways around here," John muttered, causing Stacey to laugh. It sounded like the gentle chime of summer bells, light and full of life. Before long, he felt himself smiling for probably the first time in days. It felt good.
"Hey, the rest of the guys were going to go bowling this Saturday," Chad said. "You wanna join us? I know your life's been hell lately. Might be good to take some time off."
He frowned. That did sound like a good idea. He deserved some time off, anyways. Chad apparently took his silence as an invitation to sweeten the deal, because he followed that up with, "Well, the guys, Stacey, Cammy, and some of the other people in the office, that is."
He caught Stacey's smile out of the corner of his eyes. For a brief moment, that sounded really good. Just him, away from all of his problems, together with the few people he could consider friends in any capacity . . . and pretty Stacey was there as well, with her dazzling smile, her deep eyes—
With a jolt that jarred him down to his very core, he realized just what he was doing. No, he thought to himself, horrified. No, even if his wife was far from the looker she used to be, and even if he was sure she hated his guts for her own mess of issues, he was not about to cheat on his wife. He politely declined, his face once more schooling itself into a steel mask.
The rest of the day passed by in horrid tumult. He didn't eat lunch or dinner, consumed by that queasy feeling of guilt for even that brief moment of wandering.
"And what in the gods' name do you think you're doing?" his wife demanded as he sat down on the couch, TV on in an attempt to drown his internal tempest.
"I—"
"I swear to all that is holy, you never actually help out around where it's needed," she continued on, steamrolling his words before they had a chance to live. "You know that there's too much to be done, and yet here you are, watching TV! It's like you don't even care, do you? If you really did care, you'd already have that leaky faucet taken care of! Sometimes, it feels like I'm the only one who does anything around here!"
As she continued on, he felt the guilt within him immediately come under attack by a sudden, strange surge of defiance. No, he wasn't going to feel guilty about this. He had every right to feel the way he did! It was only natural! Maybe he would go on Saturday, if just to get some respite from that horrid hag. And if she found out? Good! Let her! Maybe that'd shut her up! No—he'd make sure she knew! Maybe then she'd give him the godsdamned quiet he godsdamned deserved!
Guilt went on a counter-offensive, stabbing him with poisoned knives in all his soft places. You horrible man, it said in dulcet tones. You know how hard your wife works, how much she loves you, and this is how you repay her?
Is THIS how she repays ME!? Defiance demanded.
Look at you. Weak. Pathetic. A snivelling little worm of a man. Lowest of the low.
How DARE you say that! I REFUSE to feel that way!
"—and then Charlie's medical bills—you're not even listening, are you?! Again! You're not even trying! I bet you don't even want to try! You're just like your no-good father—abandoning everything the moment the going gets rough!"
"Don't you EVER say that to me again!" John suddenly snapped. The inside war suddenly stopped, replaced by a burning fire that threatened to char his heart black. "Don't you EVER compare me to that—that pile of garbage, you hear?!"
His wife looked stunned for a second before immediately taking a defensive position. "Oh, NOW you decide to talk back! Gods in pantheon above, I swear, it's like you only listen when it's about you, isn't it?!"
"I am nothing like my father, you hear?!"
"You're sure doing a good job of showing that, aren't you?! Who's had to bring Joel home from baseball every day? Not you, that's for certain! Who's had to call those insurance providers, since you've not done that, despite the fact that you said you would? Oh, by the way—the sink's still not fixed, if you haven't noticed!"
"Woman, I swear, if you say one more thing—"
"You'll hit me?" his wife said. He froze, and she had the gall to look smug. "And then what? You'll be just like your father!"
"You—"
"Mom, dad, stop fighting!" Charlie was crying, now.
"Oh, look at what you've done!" his wife snapped, immediately turning to Charlie, who had been at the table doing some homework. "Ssh, ssh, it's okay, Charlie. Daddy was just going to apologize, wasn't he?" she shot him a venomous glare.
"You—"
Charlie began crying again, and in the other room, Joel was yelling something, and now the dog was barking, and his wife was lecturing again, and the noise, noise, noise, noise, NOISE—
A ringing in his skull, shuddering all the way down to his tailbone, and an inky-black feeling like tar—
He had to get out. He had to get some air. He had to leave.
He didn't remember leaving his house, or getting in his car, or even driving to the freeway. Before he knew it, he was going ninety miles an hour down Highway V23.
The ringing in his head hadn't stopped. That feeling of inky-black welling up inside him continued to rise, filling up past his eyes.
A siren joined the mix, bright red and blue colors piercing through the black of the night.
"Do you know how fast you were going?" said the officer—a fat, doughy man looking far too confident and self-important.
John just wanted it all to stop. All the noise, that disgusting feeling inside, the blackness creeping around the edges of his eyes.
"I'm going to need you to step out of your vehicle nice and slow-like," said the officer.
"Do you want everything to stop?" said the man in the hat, whispering sweet nothings from just behind his ear in the same tone of Guilt and Defiance. "For them to all leave you alone. For them to all give you the respect you deserve. For you to finally take your life back."
Oh, gods, did he wish.
"Of course I do," he whispered.
"What's that?" said the officer. "Speak up. Hey, I said speak up!"
"Shut up."
"Watch it," the officer warned, one hand on his baton. "Do you know who you're—"
"I said shut up!" John roared in a voice like a waterfall—when did I sound like that?—and the ink spilled up and over his eyes.
The cop screamed as a something surged up and out, drawing strength and form from the night. It shambled over, slamming into the cop and sending him into the highway sign twenty feet above. It unfurled ebon wings and took to the skies, opening its pale skull in a silent howl. Like a bolt of black lightning, it shot away into the moonless sky, swallowed up by the clouds and gone from sight.
John did not see any of this. He remained, boneless and unmoving, with wide-open eyes and frothy mouth, on the cracked asphalt of the freeway. He didn't move when a car ran over his limp leg, didn't move when a horrified driver illuminated him with his phone, and didn't move when rushed paramedics carted him and the officer away to the hospital.
All John saw was darkness. All he heard were the echoes of his own screams and the laughter of the man in the hat.
Each morning, he woke up to a nagging cow of a wife, dragging him out of his blessed four hours of sleep. The kids would already be up, screaming and charging around the house like a trio of humanoid typhoons. His breakfast would consist of only black coffee and a bitter orange—the doctor said that anything more would be "bad for his heart"—and took a full hour to corral the kids into the car for work. He'd be lucky if Joel didn't throw up in the back seat before he got there, with the other two hellions screeching and singing in horrible off-key pop trash the entire half hour it took to get there. Another hour to work—traffic, as always, was stop-and-go the whole way there—to clock into a job that worked him far too long and paid him far too little.
Nine hours of meetings, bosses, office politics, and bullies later, he got home to a home that was no more organized than the aftermath of an earthquake. His dinner— reheated leftovers that were starting to go bad—was washed down with water and a pharmacy's worth of medications. Then, he spent his final hours doing the paperwork for that stupid lawsuit, the deadline for which loomed ever and ever closer. Then, he'd fight his constant, mounting anxiety and ulcer until a stressful sleep overtook him.
John didn't know how much more of this he could handle before he just snapped, like a support beam that had been rotted out by mold and rain. Where had it all gone wrong? Where had his life turned into such a nightmare? He remembered being happy, once. He remembered having a reason for why he ground his heart into pulp and his soul into dust. He remembered thinking that it was all worth it, in the end, if he could just hold on a bit longer.
He didn't remember what that reason was anymore.
Today, the traffic was particularly egregious. Some moron had gone of the center divide, causing a six-car pileup that promised another stern talking-to. He wouldn't get fired, oh no. He wasn't that lucky. To make his luck worse, there was some construction going on around the building where he worked, meaning that he had to walk several blocks around to get to the entrance. What a rotten start of a day. He—
He paused mid-step, narrowly avoiding getting rainwater on his suit pants. What was that sound just now? He strained his ears, searching for that odd noise over the din of construction and traffic. It had sounded like . . . almost like a chuckle, or distant thunder. He glanced up and down the alleyway, concerned if there were some drug addicts or homeless people he should worry about. Finding nothing, he shrugged, blamed it on his nerves, and went to work.
"And just where have you been?!" his boss demanded.
He mumbled a half-hearted apology and tried to get to his desk. A pudgy arm blocked the way.
"You know, I've had it about to here with you, Stevenson," his boss chided, wagging a sausage-like digit under John's nose. "Late constantly? Never paying attention during meetings? You're bringing company morale down! You're hampering the efficiency of the workers!"
John barely noticed his coworkers looking on in sympathetic embarrassment. He was more preoccupied with keeping his face from morphing into the mask of fury he knew reflected his heart.
His boss prattled on for a few minutes more in full view of the office, berating and degrading him in corporate-friendly, HR-approved vocabulary. Then, blessedly, he left to go snack on his third donut of the hour and harass some poor intern.
"I'm sorry about that," said Stacey, one of his office mates. She was a pretty thing, with a kind smile and a word of encouragement for everyone. "He's been harsh on everyone today."
He grunted, his face softening just a tad from its stoic, controlled mask. "That bad?"
"You don't know the half of it," said annoying-yet-harmless Chad, rolling his chair on over to them. "He came in furious today. Probably due to the construction making him take the long way around."
"Gods know he can't fit through the alleyways around here," John muttered, causing Stacey to laugh. It sounded like the gentle chime of summer bells, light and full of life. Before long, he felt himself smiling for probably the first time in days. It felt good.
"Hey, the rest of the guys were going to go bowling this Saturday," Chad said. "You wanna join us? I know your life's been hell lately. Might be good to take some time off."
He frowned. That did sound like a good idea. He deserved some time off, anyways. Chad apparently took his silence as an invitation to sweeten the deal, because he followed that up with, "Well, the guys, Stacey, Cammy, and some of the other people in the office, that is."
He caught Stacey's smile out of the corner of his eyes. For a brief moment, that sounded really good. Just him, away from all of his problems, together with the few people he could consider friends in any capacity . . . and pretty Stacey was there as well, with her dazzling smile, her deep eyes—
With a jolt that jarred him down to his very core, he realized just what he was doing. No, he thought to himself, horrified. No, even if his wife was far from the looker she used to be, and even if he was sure she hated his guts for her own mess of issues, he was not about to cheat on his wife. He politely declined, his face once more schooling itself into a steel mask.
The rest of the day passed by in horrid tumult. He didn't eat lunch or dinner, consumed by that queasy feeling of guilt for even that brief moment of wandering.
"And what in the gods' name do you think you're doing?" his wife demanded as he sat down on the couch, TV on in an attempt to drown his internal tempest.
"I—"
"I swear to all that is holy, you never actually help out around where it's needed," she continued on, steamrolling his words before they had a chance to live. "You know that there's too much to be done, and yet here you are, watching TV! It's like you don't even care, do you? If you really did care, you'd already have that leaky faucet taken care of! Sometimes, it feels like I'm the only one who does anything around here!"
As she continued on, he felt the guilt within him immediately come under attack by a sudden, strange surge of defiance. No, he wasn't going to feel guilty about this. He had every right to feel the way he did! It was only natural! Maybe he would go on Saturday, if just to get some respite from that horrid hag. And if she found out? Good! Let her! Maybe that'd shut her up! No—he'd make sure she knew! Maybe then she'd give him the godsdamned quiet he godsdamned deserved!
Guilt went on a counter-offensive, stabbing him with poisoned knives in all his soft places. You horrible man, it said in dulcet tones. You know how hard your wife works, how much she loves you, and this is how you repay her?
Is THIS how she repays ME!? Defiance demanded.
Look at you. Weak. Pathetic. A snivelling little worm of a man. Lowest of the low.
How DARE you say that! I REFUSE to feel that way!
"—and then Charlie's medical bills—you're not even listening, are you?! Again! You're not even trying! I bet you don't even want to try! You're just like your no-good father—abandoning everything the moment the going gets rough!"
"Don't you EVER say that to me again!" John suddenly snapped. The inside war suddenly stopped, replaced by a burning fire that threatened to char his heart black. "Don't you EVER compare me to that—that pile of garbage, you hear?!"
His wife looked stunned for a second before immediately taking a defensive position. "Oh, NOW you decide to talk back! Gods in pantheon above, I swear, it's like you only listen when it's about you, isn't it?!"
"I am nothing like my father, you hear?!"
"You're sure doing a good job of showing that, aren't you?! Who's had to bring Joel home from baseball every day? Not you, that's for certain! Who's had to call those insurance providers, since you've not done that, despite the fact that you said you would? Oh, by the way—the sink's still not fixed, if you haven't noticed!"
"Woman, I swear, if you say one more thing—"
"You'll hit me?" his wife said. He froze, and she had the gall to look smug. "And then what? You'll be just like your father!"
"You—"
"Mom, dad, stop fighting!" Charlie was crying, now.
"Oh, look at what you've done!" his wife snapped, immediately turning to Charlie, who had been at the table doing some homework. "Ssh, ssh, it's okay, Charlie. Daddy was just going to apologize, wasn't he?" she shot him a venomous glare.
"You—"
Charlie began crying again, and in the other room, Joel was yelling something, and now the dog was barking, and his wife was lecturing again, and the noise, noise, noise, noise, NOISE—
A ringing in his skull, shuddering all the way down to his tailbone, and an inky-black feeling like tar—
He had to get out. He had to get some air. He had to leave.
He didn't remember leaving his house, or getting in his car, or even driving to the freeway. Before he knew it, he was going ninety miles an hour down Highway V23.
The ringing in his head hadn't stopped. That feeling of inky-black welling up inside him continued to rise, filling up past his eyes.
A siren joined the mix, bright red and blue colors piercing through the black of the night.
"Do you know how fast you were going?" said the officer—a fat, doughy man looking far too confident and self-important.
John just wanted it all to stop. All the noise, that disgusting feeling inside, the blackness creeping around the edges of his eyes.
"I'm going to need you to step out of your vehicle nice and slow-like," said the officer.
"Do you want everything to stop?" said the man in the hat, whispering sweet nothings from just behind his ear in the same tone of Guilt and Defiance. "For them to all leave you alone. For them to all give you the respect you deserve. For you to finally take your life back."
Oh, gods, did he wish.
"Of course I do," he whispered.
"What's that?" said the officer. "Speak up. Hey, I said speak up!"
"Shut up."
"Watch it," the officer warned, one hand on his baton. "Do you know who you're—"
"I said shut up!" John roared in a voice like a waterfall—when did I sound like that?—and the ink spilled up and over his eyes.
The cop screamed as a something surged up and out, drawing strength and form from the night. It shambled over, slamming into the cop and sending him into the highway sign twenty feet above. It unfurled ebon wings and took to the skies, opening its pale skull in a silent howl. Like a bolt of black lightning, it shot away into the moonless sky, swallowed up by the clouds and gone from sight.
John did not see any of this. He remained, boneless and unmoving, with wide-open eyes and frothy mouth, on the cracked asphalt of the freeway. He didn't move when a car ran over his limp leg, didn't move when a horrified driver illuminated him with his phone, and didn't move when rushed paramedics carted him and the officer away to the hospital.
All John saw was darkness. All he heard were the echoes of his own screams and the laughter of the man in the hat.
Chapter 1-1
When Sherman Hok'ee Knox was still very young, and his Grandmother was still alive, she would often tell the young boy not to go out on nights where the moon was new.
"It's a bad sign, my Sherman," she would say. "Nothing good comes out at night, least of all when there's no moon."
"Like the wendigo?" the young Sherman had asked, excited. He had always enjoyed Grandmother's story time, especially during spooky nights where the wind howled and the clouds covered the stars.
"Not just that one," she said, gently ruffling his hair. "There are other things out there, and no less dangerous. Why, that reminds me of the time that Coyote—"
"Woman, are you filling that hok'ee brat's head with nonsense again?!" Grandfather's voice cut her off like a knife in the dark. "What did I say last time?!"
Grandmother looked pained before smiling sadly. "Give me a moment, Sherman. I'm going to make sure that your grandfather doesn't hurt himself."
"He's drunk again," Sherman said, pulling his knees to his chest.
It wasn't a question, and Grandmother didn't have the heart to lie. Instead, she disappeared out of his room and headed down the hall, her gentle footsteps gradually replaced by heated voices and occasional shouts. Sometimes Grandmother would come back to finish her story, and sometimes Sherman would turn off his own light and pull the covers up tight, doing his best to ignore the sound of his Grandmother's tears in the hallway. He learned quite early on that real monsters don't come from stories and fables.
The memory of nights like that always resurfaced on moonless nights, clinging to the back of Sherman's head like moss on a tree. He took a deep breath, pushing down his worries. Tonight wasn't a night for stewing in his own mind. Tonight was a night for celebration, for revelry! Such thoughts had no room on Graduation Night!
Sherman pulled his Takeda Stormchaser 530 into the parking lot of Barney Bigg's Bar and Grill. He checked his phone, scrolling past the flood of messages and typed in a quick arrival message. Then, he fixed his hair in the motorcycle's mirror, straightened his tie, and pushed open the bar doors to a chorus of cheers and applause.
"There he is!" cried Johnny Crowe. "There's good 'ol 82!"
Sherman was immediately pulled into a group hug by a small swarm of football players, one he eagerly leaned into.
"You're finally here!" said Karey Wheeler.
"What took you so long, man?!" said Oliver Takeda.
"Sorry, sorry," Sherman laughed, the mood of the gathering sweeping his worries away. "I got held up after the ceremony."
"They got you working for that internship already?" Karey asked, aghast. "C'mon, man, it's our graduation day!"
"It's not that bad," he said sheepishly, slightly defensive. "Professor Dominguez gets back from his trip today and asked if I could help prepare some files he was looking for."
"Nerd!" someone called out, and Sherman was assaulted by a vocal avalanche of like pejoratives. He rolled his eyes, letting the good-natured ribbing fill him with some of that warm affection his classmates so easily infused in him.
The door jingled, and yet another of Sherman's late classmates arrived, and Sherman joined in the chorus of cheers as they welcomed the newcomer.
The hours passed by as the graduation party continued on in full force. There was singing, drinking, dancing, and even an impromptu wrestling match that ended in a broken bench and an irate bartender. The students that caused that—two guys from the football team—would be called in the future to work off their debt.
Sherman himself didn't drink too much—he had seen the dangers that overindulgence could do. So, he stayed sober, in control, and aware for any further incidents. Nonetheless, he had a good time. He was cheering and clapping along with his friends as Johnny flawlessly performed a spectacular breakdance routine when his phone buzzed.
Meet me at my office as soon as you can. Tonight, if possible.
--Dominguez
Sherman's eyebrows raised. In all his time with the Archaeology Department, he had never known the professor to be so curt like this. Professor Antonio Dominguez was typically of a more relaxed, genial sort. This message was practically the equivalent of a shouted demand.
Sherman stood from his stool, drawing a few stares. "Sorry, guys," he apologized. "I have to go." He was met with a chorus of "awwws" and "boos". "The Professor just got back. Seems like it's important."
"Nerd!" Oliver shouted, currently putting Marlin Sweeney in a headlock. Marlin echoed the sentiment.
"You're such a teacher's pet," Karey teased.
Sherman feigned offense. "Excuse you. I am no teacher's pet—" he ignored the immediate response of "No, you are" and continued on. "—and I'm sure whatever Professor Dominguez has is important enough to call me away."
"Antony's just come back from a trip, right? To Auld Yorkland?" Johnny said, not bothering to stop his dance.
"Yup. Come back from a pre-Lionian ruin, actually. They've been trying to get into that place for quite some time now."
Johnny completed a spin and vaulted to his feet. He wobbled, his balance compromised slightly from the festivities, and pointed to the door. "Yo, so he's got some, like, Montana Steve treasure with him?" he asked.
"I . . . maybe?" Sherman asked, considering. Something like that would be cause for the Professor's strange behavior. "I doubt it, but I won't say it's impossible."
"Yeah! Actual treasure!" Johnny cheered. The crowd cheered with him, though it was debatable if they had heard what he had said or if it was Johnny's natural charisma.
"This is straight out of a movie, or something!" said Emma Blackadder, her eyes shining.
Sherman held up his hands. "I doubt it's treasure, or ancient artifacts, or anything fancy like that. More than likely it's just something important for my internship."
"C'mon, let's go!" Oliver shouted, already heading towards the door. Marlin took the opportunity to dump a pitcher of water on Oliver's head, and then cackled as he danced out of range of retaliation.
"Guys, please," Sherman half-heartedly pleaded, fighting the smile that threatened to form. "I suppose you can come if you want, just . . . don't expect anything."
His words fell on deaf ears as a fair chunk of the graduation party filtered out of the bar to head to their cars. Sherman shook his head, followed them outside, and once again found himself on the road towards the University of Nortasura, Santa Carmen.
The dark road from the restaurant to the university campus was brighter than it had been before, now illuminated by the headlights of a quarter-dozen cars. Not everyone decided to go on Sherman's spontaneous adventure—as a matter of fact, the majority decided to stay where there was food, drink, and music. The ones that had come—Johnny, Karey, Oliver, Marlin, Emma, and a few others—were dormmates, fellow football players, or from his department. Over the years, he had grown rather fond of those silly people that had intruded in onto his life, and was glad he had let them.
The hour was past midnight by the time they arrived at the Archaeology Department. The light in Professor Dominguez's study was on, and Sherman could see the Professor's salt-and-pepper hair through the blinds of the lit window. The door was unlocked, and Sherman quickly entered and made his way up to the third floor where the Professor's office was.
"Professor!" Sherman said, breaking out into a wide grin.
Professor Dominguez looked up sharply, a worried face relaxing with relief when he saw the young man. "Sherman! There you are!"
The Professor was a man of average height, his neck slightly stooped from constantly bending over dusty tomes. He was clad in his normal dress shirt, slacks, and vest, with his tweed jacket draped over the back of his chair and round hat atop its peg. He would walk around the classroom with a spring in his step and a twinkle in his eye, ready to lecture about whatever strange quirk of history they were learning about for that day.
He paused suddenly, as if he were remembering something that he had since forgotten. "Ah, that's right. Congratulations on your graduation! Top of the class and everything!"
"One of them," Sherman said fairly. "And the only reason why I made top ten is because of Jimothy's accident."
Dominguez harrumphed. "My boy, nonsense. You achieved that spot through your own hard work. Take pride in yourself."
Sherman felt his chest swell with pride, and he couldn't help but smile wider. "Thank you, Professor."
"Of course, my boy," the Professor said with a twinkle in his eye. "But, ah, now's not the time for that. Take a look at this."
Sherman idly saw the first of the cars pull into the driveway as Professor Dominguez opened a desk drawer and pulled out a bundle of cloth. Grasping the cloth in two hands as if it were a particularly precious jewel, he gingerly set it upon the desk and set about at untying the kerchief with fingers that seemed to Sherman to tremble slightly.
" . . . Professor, what is it?" Sherman asked once the cloth had fallen away.
"It's a bad sign, my Sherman," she would say. "Nothing good comes out at night, least of all when there's no moon."
"Like the wendigo?" the young Sherman had asked, excited. He had always enjoyed Grandmother's story time, especially during spooky nights where the wind howled and the clouds covered the stars.
"Not just that one," she said, gently ruffling his hair. "There are other things out there, and no less dangerous. Why, that reminds me of the time that Coyote—"
"Woman, are you filling that hok'ee brat's head with nonsense again?!" Grandfather's voice cut her off like a knife in the dark. "What did I say last time?!"
Grandmother looked pained before smiling sadly. "Give me a moment, Sherman. I'm going to make sure that your grandfather doesn't hurt himself."
"He's drunk again," Sherman said, pulling his knees to his chest.
It wasn't a question, and Grandmother didn't have the heart to lie. Instead, she disappeared out of his room and headed down the hall, her gentle footsteps gradually replaced by heated voices and occasional shouts. Sometimes Grandmother would come back to finish her story, and sometimes Sherman would turn off his own light and pull the covers up tight, doing his best to ignore the sound of his Grandmother's tears in the hallway. He learned quite early on that real monsters don't come from stories and fables.
The memory of nights like that always resurfaced on moonless nights, clinging to the back of Sherman's head like moss on a tree. He took a deep breath, pushing down his worries. Tonight wasn't a night for stewing in his own mind. Tonight was a night for celebration, for revelry! Such thoughts had no room on Graduation Night!
Sherman pulled his Takeda Stormchaser 530 into the parking lot of Barney Bigg's Bar and Grill. He checked his phone, scrolling past the flood of messages and typed in a quick arrival message. Then, he fixed his hair in the motorcycle's mirror, straightened his tie, and pushed open the bar doors to a chorus of cheers and applause.
"There he is!" cried Johnny Crowe. "There's good 'ol 82!"
Sherman was immediately pulled into a group hug by a small swarm of football players, one he eagerly leaned into.
"You're finally here!" said Karey Wheeler.
"What took you so long, man?!" said Oliver Takeda.
"Sorry, sorry," Sherman laughed, the mood of the gathering sweeping his worries away. "I got held up after the ceremony."
"They got you working for that internship already?" Karey asked, aghast. "C'mon, man, it's our graduation day!"
"It's not that bad," he said sheepishly, slightly defensive. "Professor Dominguez gets back from his trip today and asked if I could help prepare some files he was looking for."
"Nerd!" someone called out, and Sherman was assaulted by a vocal avalanche of like pejoratives. He rolled his eyes, letting the good-natured ribbing fill him with some of that warm affection his classmates so easily infused in him.
The door jingled, and yet another of Sherman's late classmates arrived, and Sherman joined in the chorus of cheers as they welcomed the newcomer.
The hours passed by as the graduation party continued on in full force. There was singing, drinking, dancing, and even an impromptu wrestling match that ended in a broken bench and an irate bartender. The students that caused that—two guys from the football team—would be called in the future to work off their debt.
Sherman himself didn't drink too much—he had seen the dangers that overindulgence could do. So, he stayed sober, in control, and aware for any further incidents. Nonetheless, he had a good time. He was cheering and clapping along with his friends as Johnny flawlessly performed a spectacular breakdance routine when his phone buzzed.
Meet me at my office as soon as you can. Tonight, if possible.
--Dominguez
Sherman's eyebrows raised. In all his time with the Archaeology Department, he had never known the professor to be so curt like this. Professor Antonio Dominguez was typically of a more relaxed, genial sort. This message was practically the equivalent of a shouted demand.
Sherman stood from his stool, drawing a few stares. "Sorry, guys," he apologized. "I have to go." He was met with a chorus of "awwws" and "boos". "The Professor just got back. Seems like it's important."
"Nerd!" Oliver shouted, currently putting Marlin Sweeney in a headlock. Marlin echoed the sentiment.
"You're such a teacher's pet," Karey teased.
Sherman feigned offense. "Excuse you. I am no teacher's pet—" he ignored the immediate response of "No, you are" and continued on. "—and I'm sure whatever Professor Dominguez has is important enough to call me away."
"Antony's just come back from a trip, right? To Auld Yorkland?" Johnny said, not bothering to stop his dance.
"Yup. Come back from a pre-Lionian ruin, actually. They've been trying to get into that place for quite some time now."
Johnny completed a spin and vaulted to his feet. He wobbled, his balance compromised slightly from the festivities, and pointed to the door. "Yo, so he's got some, like, Montana Steve treasure with him?" he asked.
"I . . . maybe?" Sherman asked, considering. Something like that would be cause for the Professor's strange behavior. "I doubt it, but I won't say it's impossible."
"Yeah! Actual treasure!" Johnny cheered. The crowd cheered with him, though it was debatable if they had heard what he had said or if it was Johnny's natural charisma.
"This is straight out of a movie, or something!" said Emma Blackadder, her eyes shining.
Sherman held up his hands. "I doubt it's treasure, or ancient artifacts, or anything fancy like that. More than likely it's just something important for my internship."
"C'mon, let's go!" Oliver shouted, already heading towards the door. Marlin took the opportunity to dump a pitcher of water on Oliver's head, and then cackled as he danced out of range of retaliation.
"Guys, please," Sherman half-heartedly pleaded, fighting the smile that threatened to form. "I suppose you can come if you want, just . . . don't expect anything."
His words fell on deaf ears as a fair chunk of the graduation party filtered out of the bar to head to their cars. Sherman shook his head, followed them outside, and once again found himself on the road towards the University of Nortasura, Santa Carmen.
The dark road from the restaurant to the university campus was brighter than it had been before, now illuminated by the headlights of a quarter-dozen cars. Not everyone decided to go on Sherman's spontaneous adventure—as a matter of fact, the majority decided to stay where there was food, drink, and music. The ones that had come—Johnny, Karey, Oliver, Marlin, Emma, and a few others—were dormmates, fellow football players, or from his department. Over the years, he had grown rather fond of those silly people that had intruded in onto his life, and was glad he had let them.
The hour was past midnight by the time they arrived at the Archaeology Department. The light in Professor Dominguez's study was on, and Sherman could see the Professor's salt-and-pepper hair through the blinds of the lit window. The door was unlocked, and Sherman quickly entered and made his way up to the third floor where the Professor's office was.
"Professor!" Sherman said, breaking out into a wide grin.
Professor Dominguez looked up sharply, a worried face relaxing with relief when he saw the young man. "Sherman! There you are!"
The Professor was a man of average height, his neck slightly stooped from constantly bending over dusty tomes. He was clad in his normal dress shirt, slacks, and vest, with his tweed jacket draped over the back of his chair and round hat atop its peg. He would walk around the classroom with a spring in his step and a twinkle in his eye, ready to lecture about whatever strange quirk of history they were learning about for that day.
He paused suddenly, as if he were remembering something that he had since forgotten. "Ah, that's right. Congratulations on your graduation! Top of the class and everything!"
"One of them," Sherman said fairly. "And the only reason why I made top ten is because of Jimothy's accident."
Dominguez harrumphed. "My boy, nonsense. You achieved that spot through your own hard work. Take pride in yourself."
Sherman felt his chest swell with pride, and he couldn't help but smile wider. "Thank you, Professor."
"Of course, my boy," the Professor said with a twinkle in his eye. "But, ah, now's not the time for that. Take a look at this."
Sherman idly saw the first of the cars pull into the driveway as Professor Dominguez opened a desk drawer and pulled out a bundle of cloth. Grasping the cloth in two hands as if it were a particularly precious jewel, he gingerly set it upon the desk and set about at untying the kerchief with fingers that seemed to Sherman to tremble slightly.
" . . . Professor, what is it?" Sherman asked once the cloth had fallen away.
I realize I probably should have done this earlier, but hello. This is a story that's been kicking around in my head for a bit and I wanted to challenge myself by posting it in this format. Hopefully y'all will enjoy it.
Chapter 1-2
The object that stood before them was a curious relic of stone. It was a small pyramid, as long and wide as a man's arm and slightly taller, engraved a curious insignia: an eye, set within a triangle, surrounded by a sunburst etching. The symbol was engraved on each of the pyramid's sides, with no such marking on the bottom of the pyramid.
"This, my dear Sherman," the Professor said, leaning in conspiratorially, "is an artifact form pre-Lionian Auld Yorkland. I trust you can follow that trail?"
Sherman attempted to cast his mind back to his recent lessons on the place, attempting to swim through the sea of muddled information and useless information that finals and graduation had left him with. It took him an embarrassingly long time, but, eventually, he resurfaced with the tail-end of a thought.
"A stone pyramid with eyes on all sides," he muttered. "that reminds me of that one symbol used by the Kingdom of Liberthasia. The . . . Eye of Prudence?"
"The Eye of Providence," corrected the Professor gently. "The symbol of the Divine Eye that watches over all mankind. Remember, what meaning did this symbol have in that kingdom?"
Again, he leapt back into the murky depths of memory, and again her resurfaced with prize in hand. "The Kingdom of Liberthasia used the Eye of Providence in a number of places," he recited, recalling that particular passage of a far-too-expensive textbook, "but none moreso than the Templars of the Seven Torches. This organization was dedicated to a 'Pantheon of Light' that was claimed to protect the world from evil." Even as he spoke, his voice halted as his mind caught up to what he was saying. "Professor, are you telling me that this relic is from an esoteric order of knights and wizards?"
"Indeed," Professor Dominguez replied, his eyes shining proudly. "My boy, this is what I've been trying to find for years. You know that one tale of my great-grandfather's diary I've told before in class?"
"Yes?"
"That was the key to finding this," he said, puffing out his chest. "Papi Tito, explorer extraordinaire, leaving one last gift for his family."
"Yo, Sherman, is that—"
Johnny burst onto the scene with the grace of a drunken panda, which may not have been entirely inaccurate to his current state. Professor Dominguez started, and Sherman rushed over to place himself between the overly-excitable man and the hundreds of valuable objects in the Professor's office.
"You have to stay outside," Sherman warned. "Especially now. You're in no space to be near such delicate things."
"Aw, c'mon!"
"No, Johnny."
Johnny must still have had some part of his mind clear, because he caught the suddenly-stern look on Sherman's face and nodded. "Fine, fine, I getcha, Sherm. I'll make sure everyone else stays away as well."
With that, he immediately turned around and repeated what Sherman had just told him to the crowd of onlookers that had just stepped into the hall.
"All right!" someone said back.
" . . . So, Sherm," Johnny said. "Is that—"
Sherman sighed, the corners of his mouth twitching. "It actually is."
Johnny grinned. "Mad rad, my dude."
"Mad rad," Sherman said back, shaking his head. "I'll see if I can't snap some pics for the group, but no promises. You know how the Professor can be about such things."
Johnny waved him off, using the wall to balance as he made his way back to their friends. Sherman turned back to the Professor, who had quickly draped the kerchief over the artifact during the confrontation.
"What, Professor?" Sherman chuckled, taking out his phone. "You don't need to worry about Johnny. He's loud and kind of annoying, but he's a good man. He won't steal."
" . . . It's not Mr. Crowe I'm worried about," Professor Dominguez said, a touch of worry in his voice that Sherman hadn't noticed before. "I . . . well. I can't say, but I've been having the strangest feeling ever since I got back. Like something watching me."
"Maybe it's a night spirit," Sherman said wryly. "You know, a wendigo or bigfoot or a vampire."
" . . . I wouldn't use those names lightly, Sherman. You of all people should know not to do that."
His mind flashed back to his Grandmother's tales, a cold comfort on lonely nights. "Professor, monsters in those stories aren't real. They're just made up to scare kids, or they're used to explain natural phenomenon."
"I thought you were religious," Professor Doinguez said, an eyebrow raised.
Sherman snorted. "I'm a proud member of the Church of the Light, yeah. But the gods made the world in a rational way, with things that can be explained through logic, reason, and natural science. Monsters like that fly against their will."
" . . . Maybe," Dominguez said, though he sounded only as if he were merely humoring Sherman. "Be warned, Sherman. I believe the world is not at all as it appears to be."
Sherman shrugged at that. Professor Dominguez did hold a few strange beliefs, so this latest one about childhood night terrors didn't surprise him. "If you say so, Professor." He paused. " . . . Can I take a few pictures for the guys?"
Reluctantly, it seemed, Professor Dominguez re-opened the parcel. Sherman took a few photos before leaving with a bow and a word of thanks. He jogged down the hallway to meet back up with his friends, leaving the Professor to wrap the artifact back up and put it away.
"Show us!" Karey said the moment the young man walked into view.
He handed over his phone, allowing the group to ogle the curious relic. "You probably shouldn't go back there," Sherman began as he noticed one student slump against the wall, " . . . especially in your all's current states."
"You hear that? No bothering the professor!" Johnny barked, which seemed to get more of a response.
"Just what is this thing?" someone asked.
"A pyramid, duh." Marlin chuckled.
"Well, duh. I meant what is it?"
"The Professor's still trying to figure that one out. Honestly, it could be anything." Sherman paused. "I bet it some religious artifact."
"Boring," Oliver complained.
"Boring?" Sherman repeated, eyebrows raised. "This could be the discovery of a lifetime, and you call it boring?"
"Yeah," Oliver said. "Where's your sense of excitement? It could be from some precursor race or from an alien visit! Maybe it was given to us by the gods!"
That got a few chuckles. "What, you think the gods are just going to leave their stuff lying around like that?" Karey said.
"I'm pretty sure that's blasphemy," Marlin said. "Too bad, Oliver. You're going to die."
"We'll be sure to attend your funeral," Sherman said.
"Aw, forget all of you," Oliver grumbled. "The artifact looked stupid anyways."
The gathered graduates laughed, and Oliver soon joined them. The minutes began to fly by as they talked about secret relics and remnants of old civilizations and conspiracy theories, and Sherman smiled to himself as a comfortable warmth settled into his chest. Yes, these were good people. Even if he never saw them again, he'd always enjoy the time he had with them. He—
That train of thought was stopped by a crashing noise and a yell. He stood up, leaving the others behind as he quickly headed over to the Professor's office. "Professor? Is everything all right?" he asked.
He turned the door, expecting to see the Professor on the floor, surrounded by some clutter and fallen artifacts. He would smile and laugh, before taking Sherman's hand and offer to help clean up the place. "Merely knocked something over," the Professor would say, and they'd have a laugh.
Instead, he found Professor Dominguez lying a pool of his own blood as a nightmare monster stared him straight in the eyes.
"This, my dear Sherman," the Professor said, leaning in conspiratorially, "is an artifact form pre-Lionian Auld Yorkland. I trust you can follow that trail?"
Sherman attempted to cast his mind back to his recent lessons on the place, attempting to swim through the sea of muddled information and useless information that finals and graduation had left him with. It took him an embarrassingly long time, but, eventually, he resurfaced with the tail-end of a thought.
"A stone pyramid with eyes on all sides," he muttered. "that reminds me of that one symbol used by the Kingdom of Liberthasia. The . . . Eye of Prudence?"
"The Eye of Providence," corrected the Professor gently. "The symbol of the Divine Eye that watches over all mankind. Remember, what meaning did this symbol have in that kingdom?"
Again, he leapt back into the murky depths of memory, and again her resurfaced with prize in hand. "The Kingdom of Liberthasia used the Eye of Providence in a number of places," he recited, recalling that particular passage of a far-too-expensive textbook, "but none moreso than the Templars of the Seven Torches. This organization was dedicated to a 'Pantheon of Light' that was claimed to protect the world from evil." Even as he spoke, his voice halted as his mind caught up to what he was saying. "Professor, are you telling me that this relic is from an esoteric order of knights and wizards?"
"Indeed," Professor Dominguez replied, his eyes shining proudly. "My boy, this is what I've been trying to find for years. You know that one tale of my great-grandfather's diary I've told before in class?"
"Yes?"
"That was the key to finding this," he said, puffing out his chest. "Papi Tito, explorer extraordinaire, leaving one last gift for his family."
"Yo, Sherman, is that—"
Johnny burst onto the scene with the grace of a drunken panda, which may not have been entirely inaccurate to his current state. Professor Dominguez started, and Sherman rushed over to place himself between the overly-excitable man and the hundreds of valuable objects in the Professor's office.
"You have to stay outside," Sherman warned. "Especially now. You're in no space to be near such delicate things."
"Aw, c'mon!"
"No, Johnny."
Johnny must still have had some part of his mind clear, because he caught the suddenly-stern look on Sherman's face and nodded. "Fine, fine, I getcha, Sherm. I'll make sure everyone else stays away as well."
With that, he immediately turned around and repeated what Sherman had just told him to the crowd of onlookers that had just stepped into the hall.
"All right!" someone said back.
" . . . So, Sherm," Johnny said. "Is that—"
Sherman sighed, the corners of his mouth twitching. "It actually is."
Johnny grinned. "Mad rad, my dude."
"Mad rad," Sherman said back, shaking his head. "I'll see if I can't snap some pics for the group, but no promises. You know how the Professor can be about such things."
Johnny waved him off, using the wall to balance as he made his way back to their friends. Sherman turned back to the Professor, who had quickly draped the kerchief over the artifact during the confrontation.
"What, Professor?" Sherman chuckled, taking out his phone. "You don't need to worry about Johnny. He's loud and kind of annoying, but he's a good man. He won't steal."
" . . . It's not Mr. Crowe I'm worried about," Professor Dominguez said, a touch of worry in his voice that Sherman hadn't noticed before. "I . . . well. I can't say, but I've been having the strangest feeling ever since I got back. Like something watching me."
"Maybe it's a night spirit," Sherman said wryly. "You know, a wendigo or bigfoot or a vampire."
" . . . I wouldn't use those names lightly, Sherman. You of all people should know not to do that."
His mind flashed back to his Grandmother's tales, a cold comfort on lonely nights. "Professor, monsters in those stories aren't real. They're just made up to scare kids, or they're used to explain natural phenomenon."
"I thought you were religious," Professor Doinguez said, an eyebrow raised.
Sherman snorted. "I'm a proud member of the Church of the Light, yeah. But the gods made the world in a rational way, with things that can be explained through logic, reason, and natural science. Monsters like that fly against their will."
" . . . Maybe," Dominguez said, though he sounded only as if he were merely humoring Sherman. "Be warned, Sherman. I believe the world is not at all as it appears to be."
Sherman shrugged at that. Professor Dominguez did hold a few strange beliefs, so this latest one about childhood night terrors didn't surprise him. "If you say so, Professor." He paused. " . . . Can I take a few pictures for the guys?"
Reluctantly, it seemed, Professor Dominguez re-opened the parcel. Sherman took a few photos before leaving with a bow and a word of thanks. He jogged down the hallway to meet back up with his friends, leaving the Professor to wrap the artifact back up and put it away.
"Show us!" Karey said the moment the young man walked into view.
He handed over his phone, allowing the group to ogle the curious relic. "You probably shouldn't go back there," Sherman began as he noticed one student slump against the wall, " . . . especially in your all's current states."
"You hear that? No bothering the professor!" Johnny barked, which seemed to get more of a response.
"Just what is this thing?" someone asked.
"A pyramid, duh." Marlin chuckled.
"Well, duh. I meant what is it?"
"The Professor's still trying to figure that one out. Honestly, it could be anything." Sherman paused. "I bet it some religious artifact."
"Boring," Oliver complained.
"Boring?" Sherman repeated, eyebrows raised. "This could be the discovery of a lifetime, and you call it boring?"
"Yeah," Oliver said. "Where's your sense of excitement? It could be from some precursor race or from an alien visit! Maybe it was given to us by the gods!"
That got a few chuckles. "What, you think the gods are just going to leave their stuff lying around like that?" Karey said.
"I'm pretty sure that's blasphemy," Marlin said. "Too bad, Oliver. You're going to die."
"We'll be sure to attend your funeral," Sherman said.
"Aw, forget all of you," Oliver grumbled. "The artifact looked stupid anyways."
The gathered graduates laughed, and Oliver soon joined them. The minutes began to fly by as they talked about secret relics and remnants of old civilizations and conspiracy theories, and Sherman smiled to himself as a comfortable warmth settled into his chest. Yes, these were good people. Even if he never saw them again, he'd always enjoy the time he had with them. He—
That train of thought was stopped by a crashing noise and a yell. He stood up, leaving the others behind as he quickly headed over to the Professor's office. "Professor? Is everything all right?" he asked.
He turned the door, expecting to see the Professor on the floor, surrounded by some clutter and fallen artifacts. He would smile and laugh, before taking Sherman's hand and offer to help clean up the place. "Merely knocked something over," the Professor would say, and they'd have a laugh.
Instead, he found Professor Dominguez lying a pool of his own blood as a nightmare monster stared him straight in the eyes.
Chapter 2
The monster before him resembled, mostly, some kind of twisted bird. Though its body was as pitch-black as ink's shadow, Sherman could vaguely make out a hunched body, digitigrade legs that ended in backwards hands, wings that looked like they were made out of bone, and spiny crest. The only part of the creature that wasn't black was its blood-red skull, shaped halfway between a plague doctor's mask and a saw. It stared at Sherman out of dark, empty sockets, and Sherman felt that if he stared into those black pits he would be driven mad.
Sherman stumbled back, fumbling with trembling fingers for his handgun. His fingers grasped naught but air and belt-leather, and the coherent part of Sherman cursed the fact that he had left his gun at home as per graduation rules.
"Hey, what's going on?" Johnny's voice said from down the hall.
"S-stay back!" Sherman shouted, his voice quavering slightly.
The creature began to slowly walk—no, crawl, with its long bone-wings tap-tap-tapping on the hard floor—towards Sherman, its head staying completely motionless even as its body moved around it.
"Sherman, what—oh gods what is that?!" Johnny cried.
Sherman didn't answer. He kept on backing up, until, with a start, he realized his back was at the opposite wall.
Someone let out a scream.
The thing's head slowly, ponderously, deliberately, swiveled on over to the gathering crowd of horrified graduates milled. It opened its great beak, and there was a low whistling sound. It snapped its beak shut with a click, and with a trilling, unnatural screech, began to charge the students.
Sherman couldn't move. He couldn't will his body to run, or distract the beast, or do anything. He felt as if his limbs were encased in solid stone, his heart in the coldest ice. The screams started, and Sherman couldn't move.
Something hit him in the chest, and it seemed like time started again. He gasped, fumbled, and caught the strange pyramid—strangely light—and started at Professor Dominguez, who was, by miracle of the gods, still alive. The man had dragged himself to his feet, and was clutching the desk for support.
"Sherman!" the Professor boomed, authority radiating off of him. "That Contagion must not be allowed to have that Eye! Get out of here, as far away as you can! Help will surely be on the way!"
"Professor, your injuries—"
"Too late for me, my boy. There's only one thing I can do." The Professor stepped out into the hallway, limping and trailing blood onto the floor. He placed one bloody palm onto Sherman's shoulder, and then shoved him away. "Now fly! Flee this place!"
He then turned. "Creature! F-foul beast of the night! Here I am—your prey yet lives!"
He screamed a primal scream, and, with strength that Sherman didn't know that the older man had in him, charged down the hall. Sherman, acting on pure obedient student instinct, fled. Somehow, he found himself back on his motorcycle, gunning the engine, and speeding off into the night.
For a moment, he thought he was safe. He sped down the vacant street, ignoring the red lights and stop signs as he clutched the relic to his chest. Nothing was on his mind save the his Professor's last order.
Flee.
An inhuman cry split the night. There was a rush of wind, then pain, and suddenly Sherman found himself on the asphalt. His motorcycle had run headfirst into the wall, and the pyramid—
There!
He scrambled, crawling on bloody elbows. He reached out, and, suddenly, a sharp, red spear lanced through his arm. He screamed.
The thing pulled back its beak, looking at him with those infinite holes. It set off warning bells in the back of Sherman's head. It was wrong—corrupt. Impure. Hateful. Spiteful. Alien. Deplorable. It was wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong—
The thing slowly looked over to where the pyramid was. It let out a low gurgle, a click, and, with lighting fast speed, tore the top half of Sherman's ear off.
He screamed again. He screamed as jabbed at his other arm, his back, his neck, taking out chunks each time it did. Why was it doing this? How was it doing this? Why him? Why did it want the artifact? Why did he abandon his friends? Why did he freeze up like that? Was this even real? Where was everybody else? Was he going to die?
I don't want to die, he screamed a wordless scream. Somebody, help me. Please, gods, help me.
His finger brushed the pyramid, and the artifact shone with a bright light.
There was a sound like a hammer on a bell, backed by a choir of angels. The creature shrieked, flapping its wings as it attempted to get away. The eyes on the artifact glowed, and the relic began to twist, bend, break, and fold in on itself.
For the second time that night, Sherman could only watch in stunned silence.
The glowing mass that had once been the pyramid suddenly broke apart into a million tiny motes of light. They swirled about in the air for a fraction of a second, and, suddenly, there was a great flash.
Sherman opened his eyes—
The world turned into words.
airoxygenstreetstonelightfearpainbloodironmotorcylceconfusionpainContagiongasdarknighthumanstarslight
His vision exploded into symbols and letters. Everything was text. The ground, the sky, his hands. It was if the entire world had suddenly changed into text. He could recognize some of them, could read some of them. They didn't go away when he blinked or screwed his eyes shut.
He made the mistake of looking up, and his vision was filled with infinite overlapping text.
It was too much to handle. Sherman collapsed, his vision fading at the edges, the words starting to disappear. Yet even as the blackness claimed him, he thought he saw a flash of silver. A black-red mass hit the stone floor, and the last thing Sherman saw before he slipped to unconscious was a sword that shone with a soft light.
---
He stood on a wind-swept plain underneath a dark, stormy sky. The black clouds flashed with violet lightning, illuminating the grass that wasn't already fuel for the flames in the distance. The howling gale sounded like a wounded wolf's cry, chilling and mournful. In the distance, the city burned.
He tried to take a step back as the ground ripped open and twisted, gnarled hands reached out, grasping at the air like drowning men grasping for salvation. He scrambled, but the hands latched onto his feet, his ankles, his shins, his legs, pulling him down into the earth. He tried to scream, but the only sound that came out of his mouth was the crackling fire and h owling wind.
There was a peal of lightning, and a sound like ten thousand choirs singing. Light burst forth from the clouds, slamming into the field in a flood of power. He then saw her.
A woman—that is, if a star could be a woman—descended from the clouds, clothed in radiance and crowned with fire. In her right hand was a torch of white flame, and with her left she reached down and grasped his waiting hand. At her touch, strength filled him like a bolt of lightning, and the hands around him burned and fled into the shadows.
As she pulled him to his feet, she spoke. It was as if the stars themselves sang, like the hearts of man burst into chorus all at once. Yet she spoke no words that he could understand. Her words echoed across the mountains like an earthquake and slid off his mind like water.
She began to glow, brighter and brighter, until it was like looking at the sun itself. He closed his eyes, flinching back, as he was pulled into the air. The earth fell away beneath him, and the clouds parted, revealing a golden sky, a grand temple, and an eternal fire that stretched from horizon to horizon.
There were six stars that shone out of that great, infinite flame. The goddess, the seventh, continued to speak those not-words that shook him to his very core.
Then, he understood.
"Awaken, son of light," said the goddess. "Wake and choose."
Suddenly the fire engulfed him, and the light grew brighter, brighter, and
Sherman stumbled back, fumbling with trembling fingers for his handgun. His fingers grasped naught but air and belt-leather, and the coherent part of Sherman cursed the fact that he had left his gun at home as per graduation rules.
"Hey, what's going on?" Johnny's voice said from down the hall.
"S-stay back!" Sherman shouted, his voice quavering slightly.
The creature began to slowly walk—no, crawl, with its long bone-wings tap-tap-tapping on the hard floor—towards Sherman, its head staying completely motionless even as its body moved around it.
"Sherman, what—oh gods what is that?!" Johnny cried.
Sherman didn't answer. He kept on backing up, until, with a start, he realized his back was at the opposite wall.
Someone let out a scream.
The thing's head slowly, ponderously, deliberately, swiveled on over to the gathering crowd of horrified graduates milled. It opened its great beak, and there was a low whistling sound. It snapped its beak shut with a click, and with a trilling, unnatural screech, began to charge the students.
Sherman couldn't move. He couldn't will his body to run, or distract the beast, or do anything. He felt as if his limbs were encased in solid stone, his heart in the coldest ice. The screams started, and Sherman couldn't move.
Something hit him in the chest, and it seemed like time started again. He gasped, fumbled, and caught the strange pyramid—strangely light—and started at Professor Dominguez, who was, by miracle of the gods, still alive. The man had dragged himself to his feet, and was clutching the desk for support.
"Sherman!" the Professor boomed, authority radiating off of him. "That Contagion must not be allowed to have that Eye! Get out of here, as far away as you can! Help will surely be on the way!"
"Professor, your injuries—"
"Too late for me, my boy. There's only one thing I can do." The Professor stepped out into the hallway, limping and trailing blood onto the floor. He placed one bloody palm onto Sherman's shoulder, and then shoved him away. "Now fly! Flee this place!"
He then turned. "Creature! F-foul beast of the night! Here I am—your prey yet lives!"
He screamed a primal scream, and, with strength that Sherman didn't know that the older man had in him, charged down the hall. Sherman, acting on pure obedient student instinct, fled. Somehow, he found himself back on his motorcycle, gunning the engine, and speeding off into the night.
For a moment, he thought he was safe. He sped down the vacant street, ignoring the red lights and stop signs as he clutched the relic to his chest. Nothing was on his mind save the his Professor's last order.
Flee.
An inhuman cry split the night. There was a rush of wind, then pain, and suddenly Sherman found himself on the asphalt. His motorcycle had run headfirst into the wall, and the pyramid—
There!
He scrambled, crawling on bloody elbows. He reached out, and, suddenly, a sharp, red spear lanced through his arm. He screamed.
The thing pulled back its beak, looking at him with those infinite holes. It set off warning bells in the back of Sherman's head. It was wrong—corrupt. Impure. Hateful. Spiteful. Alien. Deplorable. It was wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong wrong—
The thing slowly looked over to where the pyramid was. It let out a low gurgle, a click, and, with lighting fast speed, tore the top half of Sherman's ear off.
He screamed again. He screamed as jabbed at his other arm, his back, his neck, taking out chunks each time it did. Why was it doing this? How was it doing this? Why him? Why did it want the artifact? Why did he abandon his friends? Why did he freeze up like that? Was this even real? Where was everybody else? Was he going to die?
I don't want to die, he screamed a wordless scream. Somebody, help me. Please, gods, help me.
His finger brushed the pyramid, and the artifact shone with a bright light.
There was a sound like a hammer on a bell, backed by a choir of angels. The creature shrieked, flapping its wings as it attempted to get away. The eyes on the artifact glowed, and the relic began to twist, bend, break, and fold in on itself.
For the second time that night, Sherman could only watch in stunned silence.
The glowing mass that had once been the pyramid suddenly broke apart into a million tiny motes of light. They swirled about in the air for a fraction of a second, and, suddenly, there was a great flash.
Sherman opened his eyes—
The world turned into words.
airoxygenstreetstonelightfearpainbloodironmotorcylceconfusionpainContagiongasdarknighthumanstarslight
His vision exploded into symbols and letters. Everything was text. The ground, the sky, his hands. It was if the entire world had suddenly changed into text. He could recognize some of them, could read some of them. They didn't go away when he blinked or screwed his eyes shut.
He made the mistake of looking up, and his vision was filled with infinite overlapping text.
It was too much to handle. Sherman collapsed, his vision fading at the edges, the words starting to disappear. Yet even as the blackness claimed him, he thought he saw a flash of silver. A black-red mass hit the stone floor, and the last thing Sherman saw before he slipped to unconscious was a sword that shone with a soft light.
---
He stood on a wind-swept plain underneath a dark, stormy sky. The black clouds flashed with violet lightning, illuminating the grass that wasn't already fuel for the flames in the distance. The howling gale sounded like a wounded wolf's cry, chilling and mournful. In the distance, the city burned.
He tried to take a step back as the ground ripped open and twisted, gnarled hands reached out, grasping at the air like drowning men grasping for salvation. He scrambled, but the hands latched onto his feet, his ankles, his shins, his legs, pulling him down into the earth. He tried to scream, but the only sound that came out of his mouth was the crackling fire and h owling wind.
There was a peal of lightning, and a sound like ten thousand choirs singing. Light burst forth from the clouds, slamming into the field in a flood of power. He then saw her.
A woman—that is, if a star could be a woman—descended from the clouds, clothed in radiance and crowned with fire. In her right hand was a torch of white flame, and with her left she reached down and grasped his waiting hand. At her touch, strength filled him like a bolt of lightning, and the hands around him burned and fled into the shadows.
As she pulled him to his feet, she spoke. It was as if the stars themselves sang, like the hearts of man burst into chorus all at once. Yet she spoke no words that he could understand. Her words echoed across the mountains like an earthquake and slid off his mind like water.
She began to glow, brighter and brighter, until it was like looking at the sun itself. He closed his eyes, flinching back, as he was pulled into the air. The earth fell away beneath him, and the clouds parted, revealing a golden sky, a grand temple, and an eternal fire that stretched from horizon to horizon.
There were six stars that shone out of that great, infinite flame. The goddess, the seventh, continued to speak those not-words that shook him to his very core.
Then, he understood.
"Awaken, son of light," said the goddess. "Wake and choose."
Suddenly the fire engulfed him, and the light grew brighter, brighter, and
Chapter 3
Sherman gasped awake.
"Are you all right?" said a stranger's voice.
He blinked, the memory of his strange dream fading away. He soon realized two things: the first, he hurt all over. The next, he was in a hospital, covered in bandages and with an IV drip in his arm.
He looked over to the nurse that had spoke. "I . . . ." he began, his throat dry. "I could use some water."
The nurse nodded, taking his temperature before leaving to fulfill his request. Sherman leaned back into his pillow, letting his memories sort themselves out in his head.
"You're awake."
Sherman looked up. A wiry, thin man limped into the room, his prosthetic leg clacking on the smooth hospital tile. He stood slightly stooped, and the way he leaned on his cane, combined with his fancy-looking three-piece suit, weathered face, and greying hair gave Sherman the impression of the way he supposed grandfathers were supposed to look. Yet despite his appearance, the old man protruded an aura of strength.
"I am," Sherman agreed, trying to prop himself up to greet the stranger. A thought sparked in the back of his mind, vague and formless, and Sherman let it go until it manifested properly. "Whom do I have the pleasure of meeting?"
The old man gave him a critical eye, looking down a hawkish nose at the invalid Sherman. It took him a second to say anything, during which Sherman couldn't help but feel like he made some kind of mistake.
"What have you done with the Eye of Providence?" he said at last.
Sherman's eyes went wide. "You—how do you know about that?"
The old man tapped his cane upon the ground, a sharp, solid crack that seemed to reverberate throughout the room. "I know you're a smart kid, Knox. You—" he paused, his eyes narrowing. "Wait."
He held out a gnarled hand, which, to Sherman's shock, started glowing with a faint white light. There was a feeling like a hot wind blowing from his toes up to his head, lingering just a second at his eyes, before the feeling suddenly vanished.
" . . . I see," the old man said, his hand fading as it lowered. "This . . . this is a problem."
With that, he turned and stalked out of the room, leading a worried, frustrated, and utterly flabbergasted Sherman behind.
Sherman was informed that he had been in some kind of accident—a gas explosion at the University—and was found by that old man in the middle of the street. That sounded mostly right, though half-remembered nightmares of darkness and blood nagged at him. He was told that he was lucky, for a number of people were in critical condition who were there at the same time.
The old man re-appeared approximately an hour or so later, waiting until the nurse had finished with her check-up and let him know that he had a clean bill of health, and they just wanted to keep him one more night in case.
"Have you had strange dreams lately?" the old man asked bluntly as soon as the nurse was gone.
Sherman blinked, surprised. "I, er, no—"
Darkness, hands, light, radiance, fire, eternity
" . . . yes? Though I assume that's because I was in an accident."
"You dreamt of the Goddess of Freedom, kid?"
He opened his mouth, then closed it. "Is that who she was?"
The old man closed his eyes, exhaling slowly. "All right, kid. Because I hate beating around the bush, I'm gonna get straight to the point. Lady Liberthasia herself has chosen you to be one of her War-Priests—a Cleric of the Order of the Sacred Torch. You know that monster that attacked you the other day?"
"That—that was real?!" Sherman's eyes flew open. "That thing—that bird—wait, no the Professor! Is he—"
"Dead," said the old man bluntly. "And I don't like the chances for your friends. Sorry, kid."
Sherman exhaled slowly. He could feel a well of emotion surging up, mixing with all the strange and horrible new information he was just given—but not yet. Hold on for just a bit longer. " . . . So a monster killed my friends?"
The old man nodded. "The Contemptible Contagion. As a Cleric, it's your job to hunt them down and prevent such things from happening again. Your training will begin as soon as you're free from this hospital."
Sherman took another deep, calming breath. In, out. In, out. Focus. " . . . I see," he said. "And if I say no?"
"You can't," said the old man. "Especially not you."
" . . . What do you mean?"
"I don't know how you've done it, but you've got the Eye of Providence in your eye, kid," the old man said, shaking his head. "That's a relic the Order needs."
"If it's in there, can't you just remove it?"
"What, you think I can? I can take out your eye, if that's what your asking. You fine being half-blind, kid?"
Sherman took yet another breath. In, out, in, out, in, out.
The old man, at long last, seemed to take pity on him. "It's a lot," he agreed. "Take what time you need. We'll be waiting for you when you are."
With that, he turned and limped out of the door.
Sherman waited several moments before leaning back into his pillow. He closed his eyes, took a final, shuddering breath, and allowed himself to mourn.
---
He didn't see the old man the next day. The person who came to greet him, to his surprise and relief, was one Gabriel Johnson.
"Pastor," he greeted with a nod of his head.
Pastor Gabriel Johnson of the Church of the Torch of Winstead Park was practically the opposite of the old man from the previous day. He was tall, oval-shaped, and dressed in his usual collared shirt and jeans. Furthermore, he almost always had a brilliant smile and a friendly word for anyone he met, church-goer or no. "Sherman, my lad!" the Pastor said, his excellent moustache bristling as he spoke. "How are you?"
Sherman thought it over. "Pretty bad," he said honestly. "I still ache, I've just been told I've been drafted in some kind of monster war, and my friends—" he stopped, emotion suddenly closing his throat.
Pastor Gabriel gave him a sad, sympathetic smile. "Indeed. I am so, so sorry, Sherman. Is there anything I can do for you?"
Sherman took a moment to compose himself, wiping his nose on the back of his hand. "Sorry," he apologized out of habit.
"Don't be sorry, lad. You've been through a lot through the past few days. That, and Sword-Brother Francisco isn't . . . the most genteel of people."
"I take it that's who was here yesterday? You know him?"
"He didn't even give you his name?" Gabriel said with a huff, a current of surprised frustration entering his voice. "No, that makes sense for him. Yes, to answer your question, I do know him. I am, after all, well aware of the Order and its practices. I have to be."
"So it's real?" Sherman asked. "A secret church society dedicated to fighting monsters?"
"You have the gist of it, lad." The Pastor drew up a chair, sighing softly as he sat down next to Sherman's bed. "I'll admit, I don't know too much, as the goddess has not seen fit to bless me with the constitution of her warriors. I do know that it is a great honor."
"I'm sure," Sherman said off-handedly. "I just . . . ."
Pastor Gabriel leaned forward. "What's on your mind?"
Sherman took another breath. For all the time he had been attending the Church, for all the time he had known Pastor Gabriel, he had always proven a reliable confident, even to the sins and doubts Sherman would have thought were taboo or even blasphemous. He supposed that one more confession couldn't hurt. "I . . . just wish I had a choice," he admitted. "The goddess . . . I'm sure she has a plan. But why me? Why now? Why like this? Why my—" he broke off.
"Oh, lad," Pastor Gabriel said. He waited until Sherman had gotten composed once again before continuing. "Well, there's one thing you're wrong about. You do have a choice in all of this."
"I . . . I do?"
"Of course. That's another thing I'll need to talk to Francisco about," Gabriel muttered. "No, you do have a choice, lad. You wouldn't be the first, or the last, to get that specific call from the goddess and reject it. It is not a command, and thus not a sin to reject. It is merely an offered opportunity."
Sherman felt one of his many weights lift off of his chest. "I see," he said, exhaling. "But what about my eye?"
"Yes, that's a tricky bit of business," Gabriel agreed. "But there are plenty of ways for you to utilize the Eye in ways that don't involve becoming a Cleric. And if you'd have it removed entirely? We'll find a way—one that doesn't involve you losing an eye."
Another weight removed, and Sherman leaned back in his bed, feeling like he had just run a marathon. "Thank you," he said after a long second.
"Of course," Gabriel said, smiling warmly.
Pastor Gabriel left after some more small talk, once more reassuring Sherman that he would be there for him. It reassured Sherman that his Pastor, as always, was there to lean on.
He was unable to see his friends in intensive care. It was probably for the best, as Sherman didn't know if he could handle seeing his friends in such a state, the scales between life and death slowly tipping towards one side.
His motorcycle, outside of a few scratches and dents, seemed to have made it out of the incident in functional order. He figured that a good drive would clear his head, so he took to the road and hit the back country trails.
He let the tempest of feelings and emotions play out silently in his head as he sped along the highway, letting the cool mountain breeze wash over and through him. Part of him still couldn't believe that the Professor and his other friends were dead. Part of him could very much believe it, and raged at the goddess for allowing this to happen. Part of him had already begun to accept that well, that was life, there's not much he could do but move on.
Well, there was one thing he could do. It would solve much of the tumult inside him.
True, but he didn't like being coerced.
Coerced? No. The goddess was giving him an opportunity of both vengeance and protection. To strike back against the very evil that tore his friends from him.
Vengeance? Is that really why he should be doing this?
It was better than doing nothing. Besides, it's not like it's only vengeance. He had plenty of other reasons.
These and other similar thoughts raced through his head during his ride and during the following week. He measured his options, compared his prospects, and called Pastor Gabriel once or twice. He visited his friends that had been released from the hospital, each of them coping in their own way. Some, like Emma were reclusive, still in shock. Others, like Johnny tried to pretend that nothing happened. Marlin refused to see Sherman entirely. Sherman let him be.
It was after Professor Dominguez's funeral where he made his decision.
The funeral was a sober affair—the man was beloved by the faculty and the student body. Practically the entire archaeology department showed up to attend. There was hardly a dry eye, for the service, despite being short, was powerful and moving.
Sherman soon found himself on the front doorstep of the Church of the Torch of Winstead Park, which had functionally been his second home for the past ten years. Taking a deep breath, he made his way around to the offices, and notified the receptionist that he was there to see Paster Gabriel.
The wait was short. Apparently, the Pastor had been waiting for him—him, and Blade-Brother Francisco. Both of them were situated in the Pastor's office, the former behind his desk and the old man leaning against the wall, cane in hand.
"Sherman," the Pastor greeted, taking off his glasses when he entered the room.
"I've come to join the Order," Sherman said immediately. No sense in beating around the bush. He figured that Francisco would appreciate that.
He was right—he thought he saw the older man's lips twitch upwards in a grim smile. "Told you," Francisco said.
"Sherman, are you sure?" the Pastor asked. "This is a very large step for you to take."
"I am."
"Then welcome to the Order, kid," Francisco said. He placed a sticky note on the desk as he walked on by, giving Sherman a rough pat on the shoulder. "Your training begins right away. Be there within the hour."
Sherman watched him go, turning back to examine the sticky note. On it were written directions to a public park not too far away. It was one that he'd been to many times before, preparing for the current football season. "That's . . . that's it?"
Gabriel sighed. "Once again, that man has absolutely no sense of propriety. But yes, that's . . . about it." He gave Sherman a discerning look. "Sherman, is this really what you want to do?"
Sherman paused before nodding. "It is. I . . . I don't want what happened to me to happen to other people."
And to make those things pay.
Gabriel didn't seem terribly satisfied with that answer, but he let the matter drop.
"No initiation ceremony or anything?" Sherman asked after a second. "I thought there would be more pomp and circumstance to joining a secret organization. And more paperwork, too."
"Don't get your hopes up. You might have paperwork to do yet," Gabriel said wryly. "I don't actually understand how the process really works myself, and I'm curious to see how it's done. Blade-Brothers are a strange, rare beast, and not many are inducted into the Order very often. I'd like to tag along, if you don't mind."
"I don't," Sherman said. "I think I'd almost prefer you along."
Gabriel smiled and made a note to his secretary, and the two left the Church, taking the Pastor's car through the city to where Sherman's new life would begin.
"Are you all right?" said a stranger's voice.
He blinked, the memory of his strange dream fading away. He soon realized two things: the first, he hurt all over. The next, he was in a hospital, covered in bandages and with an IV drip in his arm.
He looked over to the nurse that had spoke. "I . . . ." he began, his throat dry. "I could use some water."
The nurse nodded, taking his temperature before leaving to fulfill his request. Sherman leaned back into his pillow, letting his memories sort themselves out in his head.
"You're awake."
Sherman looked up. A wiry, thin man limped into the room, his prosthetic leg clacking on the smooth hospital tile. He stood slightly stooped, and the way he leaned on his cane, combined with his fancy-looking three-piece suit, weathered face, and greying hair gave Sherman the impression of the way he supposed grandfathers were supposed to look. Yet despite his appearance, the old man protruded an aura of strength.
"I am," Sherman agreed, trying to prop himself up to greet the stranger. A thought sparked in the back of his mind, vague and formless, and Sherman let it go until it manifested properly. "Whom do I have the pleasure of meeting?"
The old man gave him a critical eye, looking down a hawkish nose at the invalid Sherman. It took him a second to say anything, during which Sherman couldn't help but feel like he made some kind of mistake.
"What have you done with the Eye of Providence?" he said at last.
Sherman's eyes went wide. "You—how do you know about that?"
The old man tapped his cane upon the ground, a sharp, solid crack that seemed to reverberate throughout the room. "I know you're a smart kid, Knox. You—" he paused, his eyes narrowing. "Wait."
He held out a gnarled hand, which, to Sherman's shock, started glowing with a faint white light. There was a feeling like a hot wind blowing from his toes up to his head, lingering just a second at his eyes, before the feeling suddenly vanished.
" . . . I see," the old man said, his hand fading as it lowered. "This . . . this is a problem."
With that, he turned and stalked out of the room, leading a worried, frustrated, and utterly flabbergasted Sherman behind.
Sherman was informed that he had been in some kind of accident—a gas explosion at the University—and was found by that old man in the middle of the street. That sounded mostly right, though half-remembered nightmares of darkness and blood nagged at him. He was told that he was lucky, for a number of people were in critical condition who were there at the same time.
The old man re-appeared approximately an hour or so later, waiting until the nurse had finished with her check-up and let him know that he had a clean bill of health, and they just wanted to keep him one more night in case.
"Have you had strange dreams lately?" the old man asked bluntly as soon as the nurse was gone.
Sherman blinked, surprised. "I, er, no—"
Darkness, hands, light, radiance, fire, eternity
" . . . yes? Though I assume that's because I was in an accident."
"You dreamt of the Goddess of Freedom, kid?"
He opened his mouth, then closed it. "Is that who she was?"
The old man closed his eyes, exhaling slowly. "All right, kid. Because I hate beating around the bush, I'm gonna get straight to the point. Lady Liberthasia herself has chosen you to be one of her War-Priests—a Cleric of the Order of the Sacred Torch. You know that monster that attacked you the other day?"
"That—that was real?!" Sherman's eyes flew open. "That thing—that bird—wait, no the Professor! Is he—"
"Dead," said the old man bluntly. "And I don't like the chances for your friends. Sorry, kid."
Sherman exhaled slowly. He could feel a well of emotion surging up, mixing with all the strange and horrible new information he was just given—but not yet. Hold on for just a bit longer. " . . . So a monster killed my friends?"
The old man nodded. "The Contemptible Contagion. As a Cleric, it's your job to hunt them down and prevent such things from happening again. Your training will begin as soon as you're free from this hospital."
Sherman took another deep, calming breath. In, out. In, out. Focus. " . . . I see," he said. "And if I say no?"
"You can't," said the old man. "Especially not you."
" . . . What do you mean?"
"I don't know how you've done it, but you've got the Eye of Providence in your eye, kid," the old man said, shaking his head. "That's a relic the Order needs."
"If it's in there, can't you just remove it?"
"What, you think I can? I can take out your eye, if that's what your asking. You fine being half-blind, kid?"
Sherman took yet another breath. In, out, in, out, in, out.
The old man, at long last, seemed to take pity on him. "It's a lot," he agreed. "Take what time you need. We'll be waiting for you when you are."
With that, he turned and limped out of the door.
Sherman waited several moments before leaning back into his pillow. He closed his eyes, took a final, shuddering breath, and allowed himself to mourn.
---
He didn't see the old man the next day. The person who came to greet him, to his surprise and relief, was one Gabriel Johnson.
"Pastor," he greeted with a nod of his head.
Pastor Gabriel Johnson of the Church of the Torch of Winstead Park was practically the opposite of the old man from the previous day. He was tall, oval-shaped, and dressed in his usual collared shirt and jeans. Furthermore, he almost always had a brilliant smile and a friendly word for anyone he met, church-goer or no. "Sherman, my lad!" the Pastor said, his excellent moustache bristling as he spoke. "How are you?"
Sherman thought it over. "Pretty bad," he said honestly. "I still ache, I've just been told I've been drafted in some kind of monster war, and my friends—" he stopped, emotion suddenly closing his throat.
Pastor Gabriel gave him a sad, sympathetic smile. "Indeed. I am so, so sorry, Sherman. Is there anything I can do for you?"
Sherman took a moment to compose himself, wiping his nose on the back of his hand. "Sorry," he apologized out of habit.
"Don't be sorry, lad. You've been through a lot through the past few days. That, and Sword-Brother Francisco isn't . . . the most genteel of people."
"I take it that's who was here yesterday? You know him?"
"He didn't even give you his name?" Gabriel said with a huff, a current of surprised frustration entering his voice. "No, that makes sense for him. Yes, to answer your question, I do know him. I am, after all, well aware of the Order and its practices. I have to be."
"So it's real?" Sherman asked. "A secret church society dedicated to fighting monsters?"
"You have the gist of it, lad." The Pastor drew up a chair, sighing softly as he sat down next to Sherman's bed. "I'll admit, I don't know too much, as the goddess has not seen fit to bless me with the constitution of her warriors. I do know that it is a great honor."
"I'm sure," Sherman said off-handedly. "I just . . . ."
Pastor Gabriel leaned forward. "What's on your mind?"
Sherman took another breath. For all the time he had been attending the Church, for all the time he had known Pastor Gabriel, he had always proven a reliable confident, even to the sins and doubts Sherman would have thought were taboo or even blasphemous. He supposed that one more confession couldn't hurt. "I . . . just wish I had a choice," he admitted. "The goddess . . . I'm sure she has a plan. But why me? Why now? Why like this? Why my—" he broke off.
"Oh, lad," Pastor Gabriel said. He waited until Sherman had gotten composed once again before continuing. "Well, there's one thing you're wrong about. You do have a choice in all of this."
"I . . . I do?"
"Of course. That's another thing I'll need to talk to Francisco about," Gabriel muttered. "No, you do have a choice, lad. You wouldn't be the first, or the last, to get that specific call from the goddess and reject it. It is not a command, and thus not a sin to reject. It is merely an offered opportunity."
Sherman felt one of his many weights lift off of his chest. "I see," he said, exhaling. "But what about my eye?"
"Yes, that's a tricky bit of business," Gabriel agreed. "But there are plenty of ways for you to utilize the Eye in ways that don't involve becoming a Cleric. And if you'd have it removed entirely? We'll find a way—one that doesn't involve you losing an eye."
Another weight removed, and Sherman leaned back in his bed, feeling like he had just run a marathon. "Thank you," he said after a long second.
"Of course," Gabriel said, smiling warmly.
Pastor Gabriel left after some more small talk, once more reassuring Sherman that he would be there for him. It reassured Sherman that his Pastor, as always, was there to lean on.
He was unable to see his friends in intensive care. It was probably for the best, as Sherman didn't know if he could handle seeing his friends in such a state, the scales between life and death slowly tipping towards one side.
His motorcycle, outside of a few scratches and dents, seemed to have made it out of the incident in functional order. He figured that a good drive would clear his head, so he took to the road and hit the back country trails.
He let the tempest of feelings and emotions play out silently in his head as he sped along the highway, letting the cool mountain breeze wash over and through him. Part of him still couldn't believe that the Professor and his other friends were dead. Part of him could very much believe it, and raged at the goddess for allowing this to happen. Part of him had already begun to accept that well, that was life, there's not much he could do but move on.
Well, there was one thing he could do. It would solve much of the tumult inside him.
True, but he didn't like being coerced.
Coerced? No. The goddess was giving him an opportunity of both vengeance and protection. To strike back against the very evil that tore his friends from him.
Vengeance? Is that really why he should be doing this?
It was better than doing nothing. Besides, it's not like it's only vengeance. He had plenty of other reasons.
These and other similar thoughts raced through his head during his ride and during the following week. He measured his options, compared his prospects, and called Pastor Gabriel once or twice. He visited his friends that had been released from the hospital, each of them coping in their own way. Some, like Emma were reclusive, still in shock. Others, like Johnny tried to pretend that nothing happened. Marlin refused to see Sherman entirely. Sherman let him be.
It was after Professor Dominguez's funeral where he made his decision.
The funeral was a sober affair—the man was beloved by the faculty and the student body. Practically the entire archaeology department showed up to attend. There was hardly a dry eye, for the service, despite being short, was powerful and moving.
Sherman soon found himself on the front doorstep of the Church of the Torch of Winstead Park, which had functionally been his second home for the past ten years. Taking a deep breath, he made his way around to the offices, and notified the receptionist that he was there to see Paster Gabriel.
The wait was short. Apparently, the Pastor had been waiting for him—him, and Blade-Brother Francisco. Both of them were situated in the Pastor's office, the former behind his desk and the old man leaning against the wall, cane in hand.
"Sherman," the Pastor greeted, taking off his glasses when he entered the room.
"I've come to join the Order," Sherman said immediately. No sense in beating around the bush. He figured that Francisco would appreciate that.
He was right—he thought he saw the older man's lips twitch upwards in a grim smile. "Told you," Francisco said.
"Sherman, are you sure?" the Pastor asked. "This is a very large step for you to take."
"I am."
"Then welcome to the Order, kid," Francisco said. He placed a sticky note on the desk as he walked on by, giving Sherman a rough pat on the shoulder. "Your training begins right away. Be there within the hour."
Sherman watched him go, turning back to examine the sticky note. On it were written directions to a public park not too far away. It was one that he'd been to many times before, preparing for the current football season. "That's . . . that's it?"
Gabriel sighed. "Once again, that man has absolutely no sense of propriety. But yes, that's . . . about it." He gave Sherman a discerning look. "Sherman, is this really what you want to do?"
Sherman paused before nodding. "It is. I . . . I don't want what happened to me to happen to other people."
And to make those things pay.
Gabriel didn't seem terribly satisfied with that answer, but he let the matter drop.
"No initiation ceremony or anything?" Sherman asked after a second. "I thought there would be more pomp and circumstance to joining a secret organization. And more paperwork, too."
"Don't get your hopes up. You might have paperwork to do yet," Gabriel said wryly. "I don't actually understand how the process really works myself, and I'm curious to see how it's done. Blade-Brothers are a strange, rare beast, and not many are inducted into the Order very often. I'd like to tag along, if you don't mind."
"I don't," Sherman said. "I think I'd almost prefer you along."
Gabriel smiled and made a note to his secretary, and the two left the Church, taking the Pastor's car through the city to where Sherman's new life would begin.
Chapter 4-1
The park was around ten square acres of green turf and open field. Lone trees sporadically dotted the park, with a cluster of them off in one corner of the property forming a small wooded area. On the other side was a sand pit, jungle gym, parking lot, and "enrichment center" building that had bathrooms and other facilities for the park staff to use.
It was a midweek afternoon, and, given that Sherman's University ended early, there were relatively few people out and about. There were some families playing on the metal play structure and a few people playing with their dogs in the nearby grassy fields.
Sherman and Gabriel crossed the entire field to make it to the wooded section where Blade-Brother Francisco was waiting. The old man, remarkably, was leaning against a tree trunk as he stood upon a branch more than fifteen feet in the air.
"How—" Sherman began.
"Beats me," Gabriel said, once again shaking his head. "That man . . . ."
"You're here too, Pastor?" Francisco said as they approached.
"Is there a problem with that?"
"Some might think. I don't care. Watch if you want, just don't get in his way."
Gabriel shook his head before clapping Sherman on the shoulder. "You've got this, lad."
Sherman nodded. He watched as Francisco leapt out of the tree in an arcing tumble and landed on one leg. "I take it that's something I'll need to be able to do?"
"Eventually," Francisco agreed. "For now, though, just focus on one thing."
He reached behind a tree and tossed a wooden training sword to Sherman. He caught it and stared at it. "What's this?"
"Survive."
In an instant, Francisco fell upon Sherman like a fiend from the Three Hells. The old man's cane swept up and out like a sword, instantly striking Sherman in the shoulder and nearly causing him to drop his sword. Sherman tried to get some space, but no matter what the old man was there, stabbing, slashing, attacking from each angle. Sherman managed to deflect a few hits, and managed to tank the majority of them thanks to his natural bulk, but the blows were starting to add up.
Sherman's back hit a tree, and he realized that he'd need to go on the offensive or risk defeat. There was little time to think. Even now Francisco's blows rained down upon him. So, he hurled his sword straight at his opponent.
Francisco easily batted the sword away with a twist of his cane. Yet in that very motion, Sherman lunged forward, tackling the older man to the ground. Sherman's arms were longer, his muscles larger, and his weight greater, and quickly slammed the older man to the ground. For a second, he was worried that he had hurt Francisco. He wasn't quite used to fighting crippled old men, after all. However, the acrobatics he had displayed earlier gave him some reprieve from that worry.
The edge of the sword pressed up against his neck pushed those thoughts away entirely.
"Good," Francisco said, pushing Sherman away with a startlingly strong hand. He stood up, and gave the weapon that took the cane's place a twirl. "You're going to need those kinds of instincts to survive as a Cleric." He paused, glancing at his sword for a second. He then twirled it around once more, and when it had completed its revolution, the cane was once more in his hand.
"How . . . ?" Sherman asked, blinking. Surely that was some mere sleight-of-hand trick, right?
"What, did you think that Clerics fought the Contagion with mortal weapons, did you? No sword or gun's going to kill those things." Francisco opened his hand, and, to Sherman's shock, the cane faded away. He held out his other hand, and the cane appeared in a flash of white light.
"Your Holy Weapon is your primary tool against the Contagion threat. Each Holy Weapon takes a form unique to its wielder." Fransico drew the length of the sword from the cane, which shone with a soft light even in the bright day.
Something clicked in Sherman's mind. The shape of that sword . . . "That was you who saved me!"
"Yes." Francisco sheathed the sword, and suddenly leaned against the cane, looking very, very tired. "I, too, was the one who failed to save the Professor. I had failed to detect the Contagion until it was too late. Hate me if you must. I'm here to train you so you don't fail like I did."
Sherman didn't know what to say to that, so instead he asked, "So how do I get my own Holy Weapon? Where do I get one?"
"It can't be given to you. It must come from within."
" . . . What?"
"That's something I can't help you with, kid. You've had the dream, you've made the decision to become a Cleric. The next step is to be able to call upon the weapon formed from your heart." He straightened. "In the meantime, I want to test your athleticism."
He made Sherman run some obstacles that he had set up before hand—dashes, sprints, tree climbing, bag boxing, jumping from tree to tree, and other physical tests that Sherman hadn't gone through since his football days. Midway through, Pastor Gabriel left, apologizing about his need to get back to work. After that, he went back to sparring with Francisco. He went home to his apartment that evening, tired and confused, but this time with something of a goal in mind.
Given that he had just graduated with a degree in archaeology, Sherman did not have a proper job yet. He currently had a small part-time delivery service where he bustled food and equipment parts and other such things from place to place, sometimes even from town to town. It wasn't the best job in the world, but it had helped him pay through college, and let him cover the bills for the apartment he rented with several other guys from Uni. That left plenty of time for him to get into shape for becoming a Cleric.
Training was grueling. He met Francisco at the park at dawn, getting physical fitness drills done before weapons drills. Sherman, after all, didn't know what kind of form his Holy Weapon would take, so Francisco made him learn the basics for all kinds of weapons—swords, spears, bows, shields, throwing knives, et cetera. After that, he took a break to do some "meditation exercises," as Francisco called them, where he focused on the various teachings of the Church. Those were mostly an exercise in futility, but there were flashes of something that kept Sherman trying, day after day, hour after hour. Then, it was sparring until Francisco had enough or Sherman collapsed. Often Sherman would need to leave for a delivery, whereupon they would continue when he got back. This process continued for several weeks, with nothing to show for it.
Sherman's frustration at being unable to get this simple task done continued to mount, day after day, failure after failure. It didn't help matters any that Francisco continuously refused to give him any advice on the matter, telling him to work out, do some meditation, and pay attention in Church service. Sherman really didn't know what that last bit had to do with summoning a supernatural weapon intended to slay monsters of the night, and, of course, Francisco refused to elaborate.
It was nearly a month into that basic training that the Cleric decided to take Sherman out on an expedition.
"One of the Contagion's been spotted around here," Francisco said, reading a message on his phone. "Well call it early here. Now, you're going to experience what Cleric duty typically involves."
As night fell, Francisco drove Sherman out into the suburbs that intersected the forest and the foothill of the mountain the University town was located on. They passed a gated community and turned onto a road that was significantly less paved than the main streets they had just turned from. They traveled through a dark back-country, leaving the suburbs behind and heading out into the hills. They stopped several times along that road, pulling over as Francisco instructed Sherman to set up a peculiar device at each stop.
"This is what's known as a Relic," Francisco said, handing Sherman a silver spike with an odd, hexagonal head. "These are tools developed by the Order to supplement a Cleric's Holy Weapon."
He then demonstrated how to set up the device, driving it into the ground and holding out a glowing palm over it. The head opened up like a blossoming flower, revealing a curious crystalline tip that shone faintly in the moonlight.
At the next stop, he instructed that Sherman trigger the Relic himself. Reluctantly, and with no small amount of worry, Sherman took the Relic and drove it into the gravelly soil as he had seen. Then, he held out his hand, and waited.
"C'mon!" Francisco said after a minute. "Hurry up! What are you waiting for?"
"I don't seem to be able to do this."
"Kid, I don't want to hear any excuses."
"I mean I can't, because you never taught me." Sherman snapped, almost immediately regretting it.
Francisco paused. "I never did?"
"No, you didn't."
Francisco shook his head. "Then why didn't you say so?" he asked. "Kids these days. Never speaking up when they should."
Sherman's eyebrow twitched slightly, but he managed to keep a lid on his frustration. "How do I go about doing . . . whatever it is you did?"
"Spending Divine Energy? Focus on the Wellspring inside you and picture what you want to manifest."
Sherman blinked, taken aback. "I . . . what do you mean?"
"Haven't you noticed that new energy inside you whenever you pray or do something that aligns with the Virtues?"
Sherman opened his mouth to deny, but he paused. He had felt something like that when he would pray to the goddess at night. He said a quick but sincere prayer of thanks and guidance, and, sure enough, he was suddenly aware that there was a tingle, or buzz, or hum, that vibrated right on the outskirts of sense. The more he focused on it, the more distinct it became, quickly taking up residence somewhere in the center of his heart. It thrummed slightly with an unknown rhythm and meter, and Sherman felt lighter, somehow.
"Like that. Now shove it in that Relic."
Sherman frowned, looked down, and nearly gasped. His hand—it was glowing with that same soft light that Francisco's had been. He stretched out his hand, imagining glow reaching out from his hand and touching the spike's head. There was a flicker, then a buzz, then a feeling like the inside of his heart extending through his chest and arms then finally emerging from his palm. The light shone brighter, and the spike's head opened in that petal-like way that it had for Francisco.
"That . . . that's Divine Energy?"
Francisco nodded. "Congratulations. Now get back inside, we have more to do."
As they drove away, Sherman spoke back up, still starting at his hands. "So what are we doing, anyways?"
"Setting a perimeter. The Silverspikes of Saint Vesuvius emit a field that allows to draw the Contagion's attention. However, these things don't really work around people—don't ask me why, I don't know—so we need to be out in the hills a bit."
Sherman nodded. As they drove, Sherman tried to replicate the feat he has just pulled off, adjusting variables here and there to figure out how exactly it would work. He was able to summon that energy to his hands approximately six out of every ten tries by his estimates.
"Don't wear yourself out, kid," Francisco said. "I appreciate the hustle, but Divine Energy don't recharge fast. Keep somma your juice for emergencies."
The moon was bright in the sky by the time they finished their last Silverspike setup. Then, they drove back to the place Francisco said was the middle of the network of spikes they had set up, and, then, they waited.
It was a midweek afternoon, and, given that Sherman's University ended early, there were relatively few people out and about. There were some families playing on the metal play structure and a few people playing with their dogs in the nearby grassy fields.
Sherman and Gabriel crossed the entire field to make it to the wooded section where Blade-Brother Francisco was waiting. The old man, remarkably, was leaning against a tree trunk as he stood upon a branch more than fifteen feet in the air.
"How—" Sherman began.
"Beats me," Gabriel said, once again shaking his head. "That man . . . ."
"You're here too, Pastor?" Francisco said as they approached.
"Is there a problem with that?"
"Some might think. I don't care. Watch if you want, just don't get in his way."
Gabriel shook his head before clapping Sherman on the shoulder. "You've got this, lad."
Sherman nodded. He watched as Francisco leapt out of the tree in an arcing tumble and landed on one leg. "I take it that's something I'll need to be able to do?"
"Eventually," Francisco agreed. "For now, though, just focus on one thing."
He reached behind a tree and tossed a wooden training sword to Sherman. He caught it and stared at it. "What's this?"
"Survive."
In an instant, Francisco fell upon Sherman like a fiend from the Three Hells. The old man's cane swept up and out like a sword, instantly striking Sherman in the shoulder and nearly causing him to drop his sword. Sherman tried to get some space, but no matter what the old man was there, stabbing, slashing, attacking from each angle. Sherman managed to deflect a few hits, and managed to tank the majority of them thanks to his natural bulk, but the blows were starting to add up.
Sherman's back hit a tree, and he realized that he'd need to go on the offensive or risk defeat. There was little time to think. Even now Francisco's blows rained down upon him. So, he hurled his sword straight at his opponent.
Francisco easily batted the sword away with a twist of his cane. Yet in that very motion, Sherman lunged forward, tackling the older man to the ground. Sherman's arms were longer, his muscles larger, and his weight greater, and quickly slammed the older man to the ground. For a second, he was worried that he had hurt Francisco. He wasn't quite used to fighting crippled old men, after all. However, the acrobatics he had displayed earlier gave him some reprieve from that worry.
The edge of the sword pressed up against his neck pushed those thoughts away entirely.
"Good," Francisco said, pushing Sherman away with a startlingly strong hand. He stood up, and gave the weapon that took the cane's place a twirl. "You're going to need those kinds of instincts to survive as a Cleric." He paused, glancing at his sword for a second. He then twirled it around once more, and when it had completed its revolution, the cane was once more in his hand.
"How . . . ?" Sherman asked, blinking. Surely that was some mere sleight-of-hand trick, right?
"What, did you think that Clerics fought the Contagion with mortal weapons, did you? No sword or gun's going to kill those things." Francisco opened his hand, and, to Sherman's shock, the cane faded away. He held out his other hand, and the cane appeared in a flash of white light.
"Your Holy Weapon is your primary tool against the Contagion threat. Each Holy Weapon takes a form unique to its wielder." Fransico drew the length of the sword from the cane, which shone with a soft light even in the bright day.
Something clicked in Sherman's mind. The shape of that sword . . . "That was you who saved me!"
"Yes." Francisco sheathed the sword, and suddenly leaned against the cane, looking very, very tired. "I, too, was the one who failed to save the Professor. I had failed to detect the Contagion until it was too late. Hate me if you must. I'm here to train you so you don't fail like I did."
Sherman didn't know what to say to that, so instead he asked, "So how do I get my own Holy Weapon? Where do I get one?"
"It can't be given to you. It must come from within."
" . . . What?"
"That's something I can't help you with, kid. You've had the dream, you've made the decision to become a Cleric. The next step is to be able to call upon the weapon formed from your heart." He straightened. "In the meantime, I want to test your athleticism."
He made Sherman run some obstacles that he had set up before hand—dashes, sprints, tree climbing, bag boxing, jumping from tree to tree, and other physical tests that Sherman hadn't gone through since his football days. Midway through, Pastor Gabriel left, apologizing about his need to get back to work. After that, he went back to sparring with Francisco. He went home to his apartment that evening, tired and confused, but this time with something of a goal in mind.
Given that he had just graduated with a degree in archaeology, Sherman did not have a proper job yet. He currently had a small part-time delivery service where he bustled food and equipment parts and other such things from place to place, sometimes even from town to town. It wasn't the best job in the world, but it had helped him pay through college, and let him cover the bills for the apartment he rented with several other guys from Uni. That left plenty of time for him to get into shape for becoming a Cleric.
Training was grueling. He met Francisco at the park at dawn, getting physical fitness drills done before weapons drills. Sherman, after all, didn't know what kind of form his Holy Weapon would take, so Francisco made him learn the basics for all kinds of weapons—swords, spears, bows, shields, throwing knives, et cetera. After that, he took a break to do some "meditation exercises," as Francisco called them, where he focused on the various teachings of the Church. Those were mostly an exercise in futility, but there were flashes of something that kept Sherman trying, day after day, hour after hour. Then, it was sparring until Francisco had enough or Sherman collapsed. Often Sherman would need to leave for a delivery, whereupon they would continue when he got back. This process continued for several weeks, with nothing to show for it.
Sherman's frustration at being unable to get this simple task done continued to mount, day after day, failure after failure. It didn't help matters any that Francisco continuously refused to give him any advice on the matter, telling him to work out, do some meditation, and pay attention in Church service. Sherman really didn't know what that last bit had to do with summoning a supernatural weapon intended to slay monsters of the night, and, of course, Francisco refused to elaborate.
It was nearly a month into that basic training that the Cleric decided to take Sherman out on an expedition.
"One of the Contagion's been spotted around here," Francisco said, reading a message on his phone. "Well call it early here. Now, you're going to experience what Cleric duty typically involves."
As night fell, Francisco drove Sherman out into the suburbs that intersected the forest and the foothill of the mountain the University town was located on. They passed a gated community and turned onto a road that was significantly less paved than the main streets they had just turned from. They traveled through a dark back-country, leaving the suburbs behind and heading out into the hills. They stopped several times along that road, pulling over as Francisco instructed Sherman to set up a peculiar device at each stop.
"This is what's known as a Relic," Francisco said, handing Sherman a silver spike with an odd, hexagonal head. "These are tools developed by the Order to supplement a Cleric's Holy Weapon."
He then demonstrated how to set up the device, driving it into the ground and holding out a glowing palm over it. The head opened up like a blossoming flower, revealing a curious crystalline tip that shone faintly in the moonlight.
At the next stop, he instructed that Sherman trigger the Relic himself. Reluctantly, and with no small amount of worry, Sherman took the Relic and drove it into the gravelly soil as he had seen. Then, he held out his hand, and waited.
"C'mon!" Francisco said after a minute. "Hurry up! What are you waiting for?"
"I don't seem to be able to do this."
"Kid, I don't want to hear any excuses."
"I mean I can't, because you never taught me." Sherman snapped, almost immediately regretting it.
Francisco paused. "I never did?"
"No, you didn't."
Francisco shook his head. "Then why didn't you say so?" he asked. "Kids these days. Never speaking up when they should."
Sherman's eyebrow twitched slightly, but he managed to keep a lid on his frustration. "How do I go about doing . . . whatever it is you did?"
"Spending Divine Energy? Focus on the Wellspring inside you and picture what you want to manifest."
Sherman blinked, taken aback. "I . . . what do you mean?"
"Haven't you noticed that new energy inside you whenever you pray or do something that aligns with the Virtues?"
Sherman opened his mouth to deny, but he paused. He had felt something like that when he would pray to the goddess at night. He said a quick but sincere prayer of thanks and guidance, and, sure enough, he was suddenly aware that there was a tingle, or buzz, or hum, that vibrated right on the outskirts of sense. The more he focused on it, the more distinct it became, quickly taking up residence somewhere in the center of his heart. It thrummed slightly with an unknown rhythm and meter, and Sherman felt lighter, somehow.
"Like that. Now shove it in that Relic."
Sherman frowned, looked down, and nearly gasped. His hand—it was glowing with that same soft light that Francisco's had been. He stretched out his hand, imagining glow reaching out from his hand and touching the spike's head. There was a flicker, then a buzz, then a feeling like the inside of his heart extending through his chest and arms then finally emerging from his palm. The light shone brighter, and the spike's head opened in that petal-like way that it had for Francisco.
"That . . . that's Divine Energy?"
Francisco nodded. "Congratulations. Now get back inside, we have more to do."
As they drove away, Sherman spoke back up, still starting at his hands. "So what are we doing, anyways?"
"Setting a perimeter. The Silverspikes of Saint Vesuvius emit a field that allows to draw the Contagion's attention. However, these things don't really work around people—don't ask me why, I don't know—so we need to be out in the hills a bit."
Sherman nodded. As they drove, Sherman tried to replicate the feat he has just pulled off, adjusting variables here and there to figure out how exactly it would work. He was able to summon that energy to his hands approximately six out of every ten tries by his estimates.
"Don't wear yourself out, kid," Francisco said. "I appreciate the hustle, but Divine Energy don't recharge fast. Keep somma your juice for emergencies."
The moon was bright in the sky by the time they finished their last Silverspike setup. Then, they drove back to the place Francisco said was the middle of the network of spikes they had set up, and, then, they waited.
Chapter 4-2
"When I eventually go to kill that Contagion," Francisco said suddenly, "stay with the car. I don't got my Armor on me, so I won't be able to protect you as efficiently. Stay put."
Sherman nodded. Another minute of silence passed before he asked, "So, what are they?"
"Hm?"
"The monsters—the Corruptive Contagion?"
"Contemptible Contagion. And beats me, I don't know."
" . . . Really?"
"Don't give me that look, kid. I'm not one of them scholars or biologists or whatever it is that study those freaks. I just get called in to kill the things." He continued his vigil out of the car window, scanning the darkness before glancing at his phone. "They're supposed to attracted to human emotions and suffering. That's all I know."
Another pause. Then, suddenly, Francisco's phone let out a shrill ping, startling Sherman.
"There it is! Hold tight, kid!"
With a screech of his tires, Francisco put the car into its top gear before shooting down that barely-paved asphalt path. Sherman was forced to grab onto the panic bar as Francisco took the sharp turns at upwards of fifty miles an hour. The bright beams of light illuminated the passing trees as they sped out of the country back towards the city.
They soon arrived at an illuminated street somewhere between the back country, the city proper, and the suburbs. Sure enough, a strange, misshapen, inky-black thing that looked like the mix between a snake and a crocodile wearing a crimson mask crawled with surprising speed in the direction of the city.
The car screeched to a halt and Francisco was out, blade drawn, before the car had ceased moving completely.
Sherman watched in awe as Francisco and the thing dueled. Francisco's blade cut gleaming swaths of light through the darkness, illuminating the inky body of the creature with each feint and thrust, while the Contagion twisted and slunk out of the way with feline grace. It was fascinating, almost, and Sherman found himself nearly mesmerized by the deadly display. Once, Francisco scored, drawing a gash of inky blood from the Contagion. Twice, the Contagion scored, its long fangs scraping against Francisco's arm and its claws snagging at his legs. Sherman was so engrossed in the fight—with every bit of ground gained and lost, with the way Francisco was steadily gaining the upper hand, with the fact that such things even existed outside the realm of fiction—that he almost didn't notice the second Contagion.
It was a small movement that tipped him off. A ripple in the dark. He tore himself away from the fight and peered, suspicious, into the shadows beyond the light. His hand dropped to the handgun at his waist as he tuned out the sounds of combat from outside. Francisco had said that the things weren't vulnerable to "mortal weapons," but it was better than nothing. He scanned, his eyes narrowing further as he attempted to see anything out of the ordinary. He strained, focusing all his effort into finding whatever it was—then, the world seemed to go strange. He felt the Divine Energy twist inside him, moving up towards his right eye, and suddenly, for a fraction of a second, he saw the outline of another one of the crocodile-snake creatures against the dark.
He threw open the car door and automatically drew his pistol. The strange effect had faded, but now that Sherman was at a different angle and knew where to look, he could see the roiling, inky ebon of the reptilian creature. He watched as it slowly crept away from the light—then, with startling speed, shot away across the street, as fast as a car, in the direction of the suburbs.
Sherman opened his mouth to shout a warning to Francisco, but he saw that the Cleric was still dealing with the first Contagion. Were he to shout, the Cleric's concentration might be broken, leading to him getting hurt. If not, the Contagion would more than likely get away. He had a choice to make. Say nothing? Wait until afterwards?
He took a deep breath and drew his gun. He flipped off the safety, aimed at the rapidly-retreating Contagion, and fired.
To Sherman's horrified amazement, he saw the point of impact the bullet made on the creature—a slow ripple from the base of the Contagion's neck. It reminded him of those slow-motion ballistic dummy videos somewhat. He saw the bullet slowly emerge from the center of the ripple and drop to the floor, crumpled and misshaped.
It immediately whipped its long, snakelike head around. Even from that distance, Sherman could see its empty black eye-holes boring into him. Sherman took an involuntary step back, his quivering hands throwing off his aim. He took another breath to steady himself, forced his hands to stop shaking, and fired again.
The thing opened its jaw in a silent hiss of anger as the bullets struck it twice more. Once again, the shots had no effect aside from making it angry. The moment that second shot was fired the beast sprinted at him.
For a second, Sherman was frozen in the grip of startled terror. He had made a huge mistake. What was he thinking? Francisco had told him to wait in the car. How stupid was he to make himself a target like that? He had no means to defend himself—
Even as the beast bore down upon him, its jaws snapping close right where his face was mere seconds ago as he threw himself out of the way, he steeled himself. No. He was a Cleric. He was chosen by the gods themselves. He would not be a victim to these foul creatures again! He would defeat this thing, here and now, and nobody else would suffer like he did!
A fire sparked inside his breast.
Holy goddess of light, he prayed, grant me your strength. Let me strike down the foes of the Light and rid this world of their accursed menace!
He held onto that feeling of stubborn determination, of defiance, of survival, of righteous anger in the midst of fear. He searched inside for that wellspring of Divine Energy that Francisco had taught him how to access, and focused, even as he retreated from the Contagion's lunging fangs.
In the back of his mind, a name echoed.
What's that?
. . .
I can't hear you.
. . .
I see. So that's what you are.
The beast's jaws latched onto his wrist, and pain surged through Sherman's body. It threatened to pull him off-balance—yet even as he screamed out in agony, he planted his feet and extended his other hand. He felt a surge of power, and his hand suddenly shone with the light of a hundred torches.
<IMPACT RICHTER>
The light swirled and took form. A long handle and broad hammer-head, formed of a white metal and inlaid with golden designs, gave off a soft gleam in the streetlight.
Sherman raised the sledgehammer—it was as light as a feather in his hand—and swung with all of his might.
Though the thing tried to get out of the way, the hammer-head slammed into the Contagion's main body with a sound like a gong and a gunshot. The beast buckled, the fangs on his arm loosening, and Sherman tore his arm free. It scrabbled, attempting to flee. Sherman gripped Impact Richter in both hands, and, with a mighty yell, smashed the thing's head into the pavement below. The Contagion's head, caught between the mighty divine hammer and the now-shattered pavement, gave way.
He stood, breathing heavily, staring at the dissolving corpse on the ground as Francisco rushed on over.
"I heard gunshots and a cry. I thought I told you to—"
He broke off, noticing the dead Contagion, the wounds on Sherman's arm, and, most importantly, the glowing hammer.
"Well now," he said. "Congratulations, kid. Color me surprised."
Sherman nodded. Another minute of silence passed before he asked, "So, what are they?"
"Hm?"
"The monsters—the Corruptive Contagion?"
"Contemptible Contagion. And beats me, I don't know."
" . . . Really?"
"Don't give me that look, kid. I'm not one of them scholars or biologists or whatever it is that study those freaks. I just get called in to kill the things." He continued his vigil out of the car window, scanning the darkness before glancing at his phone. "They're supposed to attracted to human emotions and suffering. That's all I know."
Another pause. Then, suddenly, Francisco's phone let out a shrill ping, startling Sherman.
"There it is! Hold tight, kid!"
With a screech of his tires, Francisco put the car into its top gear before shooting down that barely-paved asphalt path. Sherman was forced to grab onto the panic bar as Francisco took the sharp turns at upwards of fifty miles an hour. The bright beams of light illuminated the passing trees as they sped out of the country back towards the city.
They soon arrived at an illuminated street somewhere between the back country, the city proper, and the suburbs. Sure enough, a strange, misshapen, inky-black thing that looked like the mix between a snake and a crocodile wearing a crimson mask crawled with surprising speed in the direction of the city.
The car screeched to a halt and Francisco was out, blade drawn, before the car had ceased moving completely.
Sherman watched in awe as Francisco and the thing dueled. Francisco's blade cut gleaming swaths of light through the darkness, illuminating the inky body of the creature with each feint and thrust, while the Contagion twisted and slunk out of the way with feline grace. It was fascinating, almost, and Sherman found himself nearly mesmerized by the deadly display. Once, Francisco scored, drawing a gash of inky blood from the Contagion. Twice, the Contagion scored, its long fangs scraping against Francisco's arm and its claws snagging at his legs. Sherman was so engrossed in the fight—with every bit of ground gained and lost, with the way Francisco was steadily gaining the upper hand, with the fact that such things even existed outside the realm of fiction—that he almost didn't notice the second Contagion.
It was a small movement that tipped him off. A ripple in the dark. He tore himself away from the fight and peered, suspicious, into the shadows beyond the light. His hand dropped to the handgun at his waist as he tuned out the sounds of combat from outside. Francisco had said that the things weren't vulnerable to "mortal weapons," but it was better than nothing. He scanned, his eyes narrowing further as he attempted to see anything out of the ordinary. He strained, focusing all his effort into finding whatever it was—then, the world seemed to go strange. He felt the Divine Energy twist inside him, moving up towards his right eye, and suddenly, for a fraction of a second, he saw the outline of another one of the crocodile-snake creatures against the dark.
He threw open the car door and automatically drew his pistol. The strange effect had faded, but now that Sherman was at a different angle and knew where to look, he could see the roiling, inky ebon of the reptilian creature. He watched as it slowly crept away from the light—then, with startling speed, shot away across the street, as fast as a car, in the direction of the suburbs.
Sherman opened his mouth to shout a warning to Francisco, but he saw that the Cleric was still dealing with the first Contagion. Were he to shout, the Cleric's concentration might be broken, leading to him getting hurt. If not, the Contagion would more than likely get away. He had a choice to make. Say nothing? Wait until afterwards?
He took a deep breath and drew his gun. He flipped off the safety, aimed at the rapidly-retreating Contagion, and fired.
To Sherman's horrified amazement, he saw the point of impact the bullet made on the creature—a slow ripple from the base of the Contagion's neck. It reminded him of those slow-motion ballistic dummy videos somewhat. He saw the bullet slowly emerge from the center of the ripple and drop to the floor, crumpled and misshaped.
It immediately whipped its long, snakelike head around. Even from that distance, Sherman could see its empty black eye-holes boring into him. Sherman took an involuntary step back, his quivering hands throwing off his aim. He took another breath to steady himself, forced his hands to stop shaking, and fired again.
The thing opened its jaw in a silent hiss of anger as the bullets struck it twice more. Once again, the shots had no effect aside from making it angry. The moment that second shot was fired the beast sprinted at him.
For a second, Sherman was frozen in the grip of startled terror. He had made a huge mistake. What was he thinking? Francisco had told him to wait in the car. How stupid was he to make himself a target like that? He had no means to defend himself—
Even as the beast bore down upon him, its jaws snapping close right where his face was mere seconds ago as he threw himself out of the way, he steeled himself. No. He was a Cleric. He was chosen by the gods themselves. He would not be a victim to these foul creatures again! He would defeat this thing, here and now, and nobody else would suffer like he did!
A fire sparked inside his breast.
Holy goddess of light, he prayed, grant me your strength. Let me strike down the foes of the Light and rid this world of their accursed menace!
He held onto that feeling of stubborn determination, of defiance, of survival, of righteous anger in the midst of fear. He searched inside for that wellspring of Divine Energy that Francisco had taught him how to access, and focused, even as he retreated from the Contagion's lunging fangs.
In the back of his mind, a name echoed.
What's that?
. . .
I can't hear you.
. . .
I see. So that's what you are.
The beast's jaws latched onto his wrist, and pain surged through Sherman's body. It threatened to pull him off-balance—yet even as he screamed out in agony, he planted his feet and extended his other hand. He felt a surge of power, and his hand suddenly shone with the light of a hundred torches.
<IMPACT RICHTER>
The light swirled and took form. A long handle and broad hammer-head, formed of a white metal and inlaid with golden designs, gave off a soft gleam in the streetlight.
Sherman raised the sledgehammer—it was as light as a feather in his hand—and swung with all of his might.
Though the thing tried to get out of the way, the hammer-head slammed into the Contagion's main body with a sound like a gong and a gunshot. The beast buckled, the fangs on his arm loosening, and Sherman tore his arm free. It scrabbled, attempting to flee. Sherman gripped Impact Richter in both hands, and, with a mighty yell, smashed the thing's head into the pavement below. The Contagion's head, caught between the mighty divine hammer and the now-shattered pavement, gave way.
He stood, breathing heavily, staring at the dissolving corpse on the ground as Francisco rushed on over.
"I heard gunshots and a cry. I thought I told you to—"
He broke off, noticing the dead Contagion, the wounds on Sherman's arm, and, most importantly, the glowing hammer.
"Well now," he said. "Congratulations, kid. Color me surprised."
Chapter 5
"What's your Weapon's name, kid?" Francisco asked the next day.
They stood once more in the park, situated amongst the trees like they had been for the past month. Sherman's left arm was in a sling. Apparently, now that he had manifested his Divine Weapon, he would recover quite a bit faster than "mere mortals"—but also Contagion left wounds that were hard to heal, which meant that for the time being Sherman needed to keep his arm in as gentle of a state as possible.
Sherman held out his hand, recalled the feeling of the previous night, put his will and effort into calling forth the sledgehammer from the depths of his soul. In a burst of light, it appeared.
"Impact Richter," Sherman said. "At least, that's what feels right."
Francisco nodded. "Good. You've managed to both summon your Divine Weapon and you've gotten your first Contagion kill. Sometimes it takes months or even years for that to happen for a Cleric."
Francisco summoned his own Weapon, the cane-sword appearing in a flicker of light.
"Gentleel Vesalius has served me for nigh on thirty years at this point. You must come to understand your Weapon as well as you know the back of your own hand or your own face, kid. Especially since there's more to your Weapon than its appearance."
"What do you mean?"
"Tell me, kid. Notice anything strange about your hammer?"
Sherman frowned, hefting it. "It's way lighter than a hammer this size should be. Yet I can still feel a weight to it."
He gave a practice swing, the sledgehammer wooshing though the air almost like a sword. "Yeah. I can feel weight. It doesn't hurt, but I can tell that it's there."
"Each Divine Weapon will have a number of special things to 'em aside from their ability to harm Contagion," Francisco said. "For example, I never have to sharpen Vesalius. It will never rust, grow dull, or break. It will always be the right weight. I can leave it at home, fly all the way to Almoai, and it'll appear in my hands in an instant if I desire." He paused. "Plus, it works as a light if I don't have one."
Sherman frowned. "Really? That feels . . . sacrilegious."
"Nothin' in the texts sayin' I can't." He shrugged. "In any case, there's another real important thing to know about your Weapon."
"Uh-huh?"
Francisco pointed the tip of his sword at Sherman, who immediately fell into a defensive stance, hammer raised. Yet instead of fighting, Sherman suddenly found that his arm—where the Contagion had attacked him—began to feel better. He dropped his hammer and began to unbind his sling. He was greeted with the sight of pink flesh that, while still wounded and damaged, was a far cry from the open wounds they had been mere moments before.
"Each Divine Weapon has a special ability that only it can do," Francisco said. "Mine can use a bit of your stamina and calories to speed up your healin'. What your Impact Richter can do is something you're gonna have to figure out for yourself."
Sherman nodded, still staring in wonder at his arm. Francisco helped wrap the bandage up, and Sherman noticed that he had suddenly grown hungry. Movement caught his eye, and Sherman instinctively caught the energy bar Francisco had tossed him.
He quickly scarfed the bar down, thinking as he did. There was a moment yesterday when his eye had gone all strange, right? Was that his hammer could do?
"Francisco, last night I felt something strange," he said.
"Hm?"
He explained what had happened, about how he was able to see the Contagion for a brief second.
"A strange feeling in your eye then you saw it?" Francisco mused. "I don't know. If your Weapon took the form of a glass eye, or a pair of spectacles, maybe. What eye was it?"
"My right," Sherman said, and suddenly realized what the Cleric was getting at. "Are you saying that it might be that Eye of Providence?"
"Could be. I don't know much about that, either. Just know it's valuable."
He frowned, a months-old memory scratching at his mind. "That reminds me. On the night of the attack, my vision went all strange. It seemed as if the entire world had been turned into . . . words."
"Hm," Francisco said, frowning. "Once again, I don't know what to tell you, kid. Sure wounds like something an Eye of Providence would do, but I don't know. I'll ask about it. In the meantime," he said, nodding towards the Impact Richter, "get to gettin' good with that hammer of yours."
With a nod, Sherman took up his Divine Weapon and began to train.
Sherman was glad for Francisco's requirement that he practice with multiple weapons. Even outside of the "just in case" scenarios that Francisco talked about, Sherman found himself adopting multiple fighting styles into what he used for the hammer. He formed the basis for his techniques from his training with halberds, spears, and other polearms. Add a dash of kendo, a sprinkling of zweihander, and soon Sherman found himself with something that, if not comfortable, seemed to suit the sledgehammer best. The regular weapons training, while not ceasing outright, certainly took a back seat to Sherman becoming more and more proficient with his Divine Weapon.
Training continued on as normal. In addition to the physical workouts, sparring, and Sherman's own weapon drills, Francisco added a new challenge designed specifically to get Sherman to manipulate Divine Energy.
"You've got the feel for it," Francisco said. "There's plenty of little things you'll need to learn how to do with it than summon your Weapon or activate Relics. There's an entire library of Divine Techniques out there for Clerics to use, and you'll need to learn at least a handful of them if you want to survive in the field."
As opposed to the physical training—which he excelled at, given his past history of football—Sherman's attempts at manipulating his own Divine Energy seemed to be doomed to failure. He managed only the gentle light he had managed earlier, and getting that to increase in intensity seemed an entire mountain all on its own.
"Well, Clerics all have their strengths and weaknesses," Francisco allowed. "Some are good with their Weapon, some are good with Techniques. You'd better hope your ability's a good one if you can't use Techniques."
So, Sherman redoubled his efforts. Though, eventually, he was paid for his efforts, he was paid little, and improvement in the way of Energy manipulation was a long way in coming.
"Hm," Francisco said one day. The old man was sitting on a tree branch, looking at his phone as Sherman continued his
Sherman paused in the middle of a spear form adjusted for the Impact Richter. "What is it?" he asked, wiping sweat from his brow.
"It seems that you're not the only Cleric to awaken recently," he said. "Seems there's been a number in this country alone, let alone worldwide. Hm."
"You said that Clerics are rare to awaken, right?"
"I did, and they are. The fact that so many Clerics are being made in such a short period of time . . . ." he paused, frowning. "And right after the Eye of Providence was found. I don't like it."
"Isn't that a good thing?"
"Yes," Francisco said, "and no. It could just mean that there's a sudden insurgence of Cleric-compatible people out of nowhere."
"There could be a Revival in the faith going on in the country," Sherman suggested.
Francisco snorted. "Yeah, right. There's a few other possibilities, but the one that worries me is that the gods want more Clerics for something in the future. Like they're drafting soldiers for war, or somethin'."
"The Contagion? Maybe they're formed in cycles. Once every fifty years or so."
"Hm," Francisco said noncommittally. "Whatever it is, it's bad news for you, kid. Hopefully you won't have to go through your Trials before you've even figured out what your Divine Weapon does."
"I take it that's a future step? The Trials, that is."
"Sharp kid," Francisco nodded. "When a fledgling Novitiate—that's you—is determined by his teacher to be ready, they go all the way to the Holy See of the god that granted them their powers to take a trial alongside the other Novitiates. Pass, and you become a Neophyte Cleric, assigned to a squadron of other Neophytes and lead on missions under a Cleric of rank Archbishop or higher."
"And that's you?"
Francisco barked a short, coarse laugh. "What, me? Naw, kid, I'm just a War-Bishop. That's one step above War-Priest, which is one step above Neophyte." He tapped his wooden leg on the tree trunk he was sitting next to. "Leg's not exactly good for promotion. Plus, it sounds like too much work. Let the youngsters full of spice and whiskey go for it. I'm fine with where I am right here."
He trailed off, and Sherman thought he detected a wistful note in the older man's tone. However, he said nothing more on the matter, instead barking at Sherman to continue his training.
Sherman went with Francisco on every single Contagion hunt the old man went on. It turned out that Sherman's previous victories over the beasts weren't necessarily a perfect indicator of future successes—as a matter of fact, out of the two cases that popped up over the next few months, Sherman was unable to take kill any Contagion without outside assistance. Thankfully, he didn't suffer any other such dramatic wounds as he had suffered during his first Contagion kill.
"Well, it's too be expected, after all. You're still a Novitiate—still green. Guess you got lucky on that first one."
Francisco didn't seem to think of it as too big a deal, so Sherman decided to feel the same, forcing away worries and thoughts of incompetency—thoughts that weren't quite helped by his lack of progress in either his Weapon or his Energy.
"How often do Contagion pop up?" Sherman asked as they drove home from Sherman's fourth Contagion encounter. "Is this frequency normal? Or is it a bit light, given that we're all the way out here in the country?"
"It's . . . still considered in the normal range, especially for out here," Francisco said. "There's more in the cities or bigger towns. You'll see an uptick in Contagion generation during Finals week or after a playoff game or Election season . . . or after a disaster, or in a warzone. Those are particularly dangerous to deal with."
If they're attracted to human emotion, I can see the link, Sherman mused internally. Something's still bothering him, though.
He said as much aloud, and Francisco sighed. "Like I said, you're a sharp kid. Four Contagion in four months? In summer vacation, all the way out here? It's not unheard of, but it's not like they show up every time someone has a bad day. It takes quite a bit for them to appear. It's just . . . I don't like it."
And he's already worried about all the new Clerics, Sherman recalled. "You think it's connected to the new Clerics showing up?"
"I don't know," was the answer.
In the end, however, the event that ended Sherman's official training with Francisco wasn't a big, flashy event. It wasn't the identification of his Divine Weapon's ability, nor was it a breakthrough in his Techniques, nor was it a sudden outbreak of Clerics. No, the event was merely a deadline.
" . . . Tasi's tea," Francisco swore at his phone.
Sherman paused in the middle of his work-out. "What is it?" he asked.
Francisco tossed him the phone, speaking as Sherman read. "Trials for all Novitiates who have manifested their Divine Weapons," he said. "Harvest festival."
"That's a month from now," Sherman said, his own eyebrows creasing. "Isn't that too soon? I'm pretty sure I'm not ready."
"You aren't," Francisco agreed bluntly. "But it seems like you don't have any choice. Just what are they thinking? Don't the know that this is how—" he cut himself off. "Kid, how's it all going?"
"Not good enough," Sherman said. "I can make my hand glow, but that's about it."
"You'll never need a flashlight again," Francisco muttered. "All right. I didn't want to do this, since it has a chance of harming you, but it seems I have no choice. Kid, hold this image in your mind."
Francisco raised his hands and sword towards Sherman. Immediately, Sherman felt three things at once—incredible power, burning pain, and a soothing cool. It lasted for only seven seconds, but those seven seconds were agony. He grit his teeth, preventing himself from crying out. Then, it was gone, leaving only a lingering ache and a tiredness in his limbs. Once again, he began to feel hungry.
"What . . . ." Sherman panted, "What in the light was that?!"
"Sorry, kid. Had to hit you with the only enhancement Technique I knew," Francisco said. He grimaced, clearly displeased with what he had just done. "No time to take it low and slow. It boosts your strength at the cost of pain, but I used Vesalius to repair what damage it caused."
"A little warning would have been better," Sherman muttered, irritated. Sure, no lasting harm, no foul, but he didn't exactly appreciate what, in a different circumstance, could have been actual torture.
"Would it have helped?"
"Maybe!"
Francisco paused. "Yeah, you're right. My bad, kid. I'll make it up to you later. But first—do you have that image in your head? Not the pain, not my ability, but of the strength."
Sherman paused, putting aside his irritation and indignation for the moment. He focused, keeping that feeling in mind. Once more, he gave a mental prayer, also taking hold of that feeling.
Suddenly, for an instant, there was a spark, and Sherman's body flooded with energy. It was gone quickly, and that strength he felt was marginal—but it was there. He could tell. There was something else, too, a foreign feeling of a battery buzzing inside his heart. In a single heartbeat, that core of power had sent out a pulse of energy to his body. No, not so much a pulse, as it was a great machine that had been turned on for a fraction of a second.
"I think so," he realized. "I think I felt something. And there's this weird sensation—like I've got a new muscle or something, but not a muscle."
"That's the Divine Energy inside you, kid. All right. Maybe you won't die horribly after all." He breathed out. "Good. This last month, you're going to be workin' 'till you drop."
Francisco was true to his word. Francisco, from the time Sherman arrived to the time he left, expected Sherman to be "flexing" that Divine Energy muscle, keeping it on and supplying him power. It was rough going at first—Sherman would often last only several seconds before feeling the spark sputter and vanish—but he kept going on at it. Slowly, the time Sherman could spend holding onto that connection grew, and before the month was up, he was able to go a full training day with Divine Energy empowering him. It became almost as second nature, as easy as breathing or walking.
The power boost he got from that constant background energy flow was slight but noticeable. Sherman soon found that the weights he had lifted before—which, while formidable, were nowhere near what professional athletes could lift—were now easy and comfortable to do. Within the span of a month, he had gone from "strong and fit, yet not professionally so" to someone who could keep up with Olympic athletes. He could run faster, jump higher, react quicker, and punch harder. Things hurt less in general, and he found himself to heal even more quickly as normal. He didn't tire as easily. His senses seemed more—more vibrant, more acute. It wasn't enough to overwhelm him, but it was enough that he was often surprised by how he could notice freckles on a person's face from all the way across the park.
In the end, however, he neither manifested the Impact Richter's ability nor significantly improved the other aspects of his Divine Energy usage. It disappointed him, but it couldn't be helped.
At last, the day came. Francisco had bought the two of them tickets on a plane ride over to Brightfire, the Holy See of Liberthasia, Goddess of Freedom. Given that Sherman lived in the northern part of the West Coast, and Brightfire was located in the Midwest of the Commonwealth of Columbia, the flight itself would be six hours long roundabouts, and a roadtrip was out of the question.
They packed and got their affairs in order. Soon, they found themselves on Flight 130, bound from Santa Carmen, Nortasura, to Brightfire, Arina.
"I hate going back to Brightfire," Francisco muttered as they settled themselves. "Everybody there's a stuck-up pain in the keister." He paused. "Well, there's a few reliable folks. But my point stands."
"That doesn't surprise me," Sherman muttered.
"Respect your elders, kid," Francisco said, pulling out a sleeping mask to drape over his face.
Some minutes passed and the plane's engines began to whir.
"For the record," Sherman said as they began to take off, "I forgive you."
"Hm?" Francisco muttered.
"For the thing you did last month that helped me unlock my Divine Energy."
"You've been on that for a month?" he asked.
"No," Sherman said. "I just . . . well, never got around to it. We were always busy. So, I forgive you."
"I haven't apologized."
"I know. I'm forgiving you anyways."
"Hm. Maybe you shouldn't."
"It's part of the Pantheon's teachings."
"I know. Still, though. Sometimes people don't deserve forgiveness."
" . . . Yeah. I know that."
Francisco lifted his mask to glance at him, but when Sherman said no more, he put the mask back on. Sherman soon found himself nodding off as well. The airplane's engines thrummed, humming in a relaxing manner that Sherman could feel in his bones. He fell asleep in the sky, thirty thousand feet above the ground.
They stood once more in the park, situated amongst the trees like they had been for the past month. Sherman's left arm was in a sling. Apparently, now that he had manifested his Divine Weapon, he would recover quite a bit faster than "mere mortals"—but also Contagion left wounds that were hard to heal, which meant that for the time being Sherman needed to keep his arm in as gentle of a state as possible.
Sherman held out his hand, recalled the feeling of the previous night, put his will and effort into calling forth the sledgehammer from the depths of his soul. In a burst of light, it appeared.
"Impact Richter," Sherman said. "At least, that's what feels right."
Francisco nodded. "Good. You've managed to both summon your Divine Weapon and you've gotten your first Contagion kill. Sometimes it takes months or even years for that to happen for a Cleric."
Francisco summoned his own Weapon, the cane-sword appearing in a flicker of light.
"Gentleel Vesalius has served me for nigh on thirty years at this point. You must come to understand your Weapon as well as you know the back of your own hand or your own face, kid. Especially since there's more to your Weapon than its appearance."
"What do you mean?"
"Tell me, kid. Notice anything strange about your hammer?"
Sherman frowned, hefting it. "It's way lighter than a hammer this size should be. Yet I can still feel a weight to it."
He gave a practice swing, the sledgehammer wooshing though the air almost like a sword. "Yeah. I can feel weight. It doesn't hurt, but I can tell that it's there."
"Each Divine Weapon will have a number of special things to 'em aside from their ability to harm Contagion," Francisco said. "For example, I never have to sharpen Vesalius. It will never rust, grow dull, or break. It will always be the right weight. I can leave it at home, fly all the way to Almoai, and it'll appear in my hands in an instant if I desire." He paused. "Plus, it works as a light if I don't have one."
Sherman frowned. "Really? That feels . . . sacrilegious."
"Nothin' in the texts sayin' I can't." He shrugged. "In any case, there's another real important thing to know about your Weapon."
"Uh-huh?"
Francisco pointed the tip of his sword at Sherman, who immediately fell into a defensive stance, hammer raised. Yet instead of fighting, Sherman suddenly found that his arm—where the Contagion had attacked him—began to feel better. He dropped his hammer and began to unbind his sling. He was greeted with the sight of pink flesh that, while still wounded and damaged, was a far cry from the open wounds they had been mere moments before.
"Each Divine Weapon has a special ability that only it can do," Francisco said. "Mine can use a bit of your stamina and calories to speed up your healin'. What your Impact Richter can do is something you're gonna have to figure out for yourself."
Sherman nodded, still staring in wonder at his arm. Francisco helped wrap the bandage up, and Sherman noticed that he had suddenly grown hungry. Movement caught his eye, and Sherman instinctively caught the energy bar Francisco had tossed him.
He quickly scarfed the bar down, thinking as he did. There was a moment yesterday when his eye had gone all strange, right? Was that his hammer could do?
"Francisco, last night I felt something strange," he said.
"Hm?"
He explained what had happened, about how he was able to see the Contagion for a brief second.
"A strange feeling in your eye then you saw it?" Francisco mused. "I don't know. If your Weapon took the form of a glass eye, or a pair of spectacles, maybe. What eye was it?"
"My right," Sherman said, and suddenly realized what the Cleric was getting at. "Are you saying that it might be that Eye of Providence?"
"Could be. I don't know much about that, either. Just know it's valuable."
He frowned, a months-old memory scratching at his mind. "That reminds me. On the night of the attack, my vision went all strange. It seemed as if the entire world had been turned into . . . words."
"Hm," Francisco said, frowning. "Once again, I don't know what to tell you, kid. Sure wounds like something an Eye of Providence would do, but I don't know. I'll ask about it. In the meantime," he said, nodding towards the Impact Richter, "get to gettin' good with that hammer of yours."
With a nod, Sherman took up his Divine Weapon and began to train.
Sherman was glad for Francisco's requirement that he practice with multiple weapons. Even outside of the "just in case" scenarios that Francisco talked about, Sherman found himself adopting multiple fighting styles into what he used for the hammer. He formed the basis for his techniques from his training with halberds, spears, and other polearms. Add a dash of kendo, a sprinkling of zweihander, and soon Sherman found himself with something that, if not comfortable, seemed to suit the sledgehammer best. The regular weapons training, while not ceasing outright, certainly took a back seat to Sherman becoming more and more proficient with his Divine Weapon.
Training continued on as normal. In addition to the physical workouts, sparring, and Sherman's own weapon drills, Francisco added a new challenge designed specifically to get Sherman to manipulate Divine Energy.
"You've got the feel for it," Francisco said. "There's plenty of little things you'll need to learn how to do with it than summon your Weapon or activate Relics. There's an entire library of Divine Techniques out there for Clerics to use, and you'll need to learn at least a handful of them if you want to survive in the field."
As opposed to the physical training—which he excelled at, given his past history of football—Sherman's attempts at manipulating his own Divine Energy seemed to be doomed to failure. He managed only the gentle light he had managed earlier, and getting that to increase in intensity seemed an entire mountain all on its own.
"Well, Clerics all have their strengths and weaknesses," Francisco allowed. "Some are good with their Weapon, some are good with Techniques. You'd better hope your ability's a good one if you can't use Techniques."
So, Sherman redoubled his efforts. Though, eventually, he was paid for his efforts, he was paid little, and improvement in the way of Energy manipulation was a long way in coming.
"Hm," Francisco said one day. The old man was sitting on a tree branch, looking at his phone as Sherman continued his
Sherman paused in the middle of a spear form adjusted for the Impact Richter. "What is it?" he asked, wiping sweat from his brow.
"It seems that you're not the only Cleric to awaken recently," he said. "Seems there's been a number in this country alone, let alone worldwide. Hm."
"You said that Clerics are rare to awaken, right?"
"I did, and they are. The fact that so many Clerics are being made in such a short period of time . . . ." he paused, frowning. "And right after the Eye of Providence was found. I don't like it."
"Isn't that a good thing?"
"Yes," Francisco said, "and no. It could just mean that there's a sudden insurgence of Cleric-compatible people out of nowhere."
"There could be a Revival in the faith going on in the country," Sherman suggested.
Francisco snorted. "Yeah, right. There's a few other possibilities, but the one that worries me is that the gods want more Clerics for something in the future. Like they're drafting soldiers for war, or somethin'."
"The Contagion? Maybe they're formed in cycles. Once every fifty years or so."
"Hm," Francisco said noncommittally. "Whatever it is, it's bad news for you, kid. Hopefully you won't have to go through your Trials before you've even figured out what your Divine Weapon does."
"I take it that's a future step? The Trials, that is."
"Sharp kid," Francisco nodded. "When a fledgling Novitiate—that's you—is determined by his teacher to be ready, they go all the way to the Holy See of the god that granted them their powers to take a trial alongside the other Novitiates. Pass, and you become a Neophyte Cleric, assigned to a squadron of other Neophytes and lead on missions under a Cleric of rank Archbishop or higher."
"And that's you?"
Francisco barked a short, coarse laugh. "What, me? Naw, kid, I'm just a War-Bishop. That's one step above War-Priest, which is one step above Neophyte." He tapped his wooden leg on the tree trunk he was sitting next to. "Leg's not exactly good for promotion. Plus, it sounds like too much work. Let the youngsters full of spice and whiskey go for it. I'm fine with where I am right here."
He trailed off, and Sherman thought he detected a wistful note in the older man's tone. However, he said nothing more on the matter, instead barking at Sherman to continue his training.
Sherman went with Francisco on every single Contagion hunt the old man went on. It turned out that Sherman's previous victories over the beasts weren't necessarily a perfect indicator of future successes—as a matter of fact, out of the two cases that popped up over the next few months, Sherman was unable to take kill any Contagion without outside assistance. Thankfully, he didn't suffer any other such dramatic wounds as he had suffered during his first Contagion kill.
"Well, it's too be expected, after all. You're still a Novitiate—still green. Guess you got lucky on that first one."
Francisco didn't seem to think of it as too big a deal, so Sherman decided to feel the same, forcing away worries and thoughts of incompetency—thoughts that weren't quite helped by his lack of progress in either his Weapon or his Energy.
"How often do Contagion pop up?" Sherman asked as they drove home from Sherman's fourth Contagion encounter. "Is this frequency normal? Or is it a bit light, given that we're all the way out here in the country?"
"It's . . . still considered in the normal range, especially for out here," Francisco said. "There's more in the cities or bigger towns. You'll see an uptick in Contagion generation during Finals week or after a playoff game or Election season . . . or after a disaster, or in a warzone. Those are particularly dangerous to deal with."
If they're attracted to human emotion, I can see the link, Sherman mused internally. Something's still bothering him, though.
He said as much aloud, and Francisco sighed. "Like I said, you're a sharp kid. Four Contagion in four months? In summer vacation, all the way out here? It's not unheard of, but it's not like they show up every time someone has a bad day. It takes quite a bit for them to appear. It's just . . . I don't like it."
And he's already worried about all the new Clerics, Sherman recalled. "You think it's connected to the new Clerics showing up?"
"I don't know," was the answer.
In the end, however, the event that ended Sherman's official training with Francisco wasn't a big, flashy event. It wasn't the identification of his Divine Weapon's ability, nor was it a breakthrough in his Techniques, nor was it a sudden outbreak of Clerics. No, the event was merely a deadline.
" . . . Tasi's tea," Francisco swore at his phone.
Sherman paused in the middle of his work-out. "What is it?" he asked.
Francisco tossed him the phone, speaking as Sherman read. "Trials for all Novitiates who have manifested their Divine Weapons," he said. "Harvest festival."
"That's a month from now," Sherman said, his own eyebrows creasing. "Isn't that too soon? I'm pretty sure I'm not ready."
"You aren't," Francisco agreed bluntly. "But it seems like you don't have any choice. Just what are they thinking? Don't the know that this is how—" he cut himself off. "Kid, how's it all going?"
"Not good enough," Sherman said. "I can make my hand glow, but that's about it."
"You'll never need a flashlight again," Francisco muttered. "All right. I didn't want to do this, since it has a chance of harming you, but it seems I have no choice. Kid, hold this image in your mind."
Francisco raised his hands and sword towards Sherman. Immediately, Sherman felt three things at once—incredible power, burning pain, and a soothing cool. It lasted for only seven seconds, but those seven seconds were agony. He grit his teeth, preventing himself from crying out. Then, it was gone, leaving only a lingering ache and a tiredness in his limbs. Once again, he began to feel hungry.
"What . . . ." Sherman panted, "What in the light was that?!"
"Sorry, kid. Had to hit you with the only enhancement Technique I knew," Francisco said. He grimaced, clearly displeased with what he had just done. "No time to take it low and slow. It boosts your strength at the cost of pain, but I used Vesalius to repair what damage it caused."
"A little warning would have been better," Sherman muttered, irritated. Sure, no lasting harm, no foul, but he didn't exactly appreciate what, in a different circumstance, could have been actual torture.
"Would it have helped?"
"Maybe!"
Francisco paused. "Yeah, you're right. My bad, kid. I'll make it up to you later. But first—do you have that image in your head? Not the pain, not my ability, but of the strength."
Sherman paused, putting aside his irritation and indignation for the moment. He focused, keeping that feeling in mind. Once more, he gave a mental prayer, also taking hold of that feeling.
Suddenly, for an instant, there was a spark, and Sherman's body flooded with energy. It was gone quickly, and that strength he felt was marginal—but it was there. He could tell. There was something else, too, a foreign feeling of a battery buzzing inside his heart. In a single heartbeat, that core of power had sent out a pulse of energy to his body. No, not so much a pulse, as it was a great machine that had been turned on for a fraction of a second.
"I think so," he realized. "I think I felt something. And there's this weird sensation—like I've got a new muscle or something, but not a muscle."
"That's the Divine Energy inside you, kid. All right. Maybe you won't die horribly after all." He breathed out. "Good. This last month, you're going to be workin' 'till you drop."
Francisco was true to his word. Francisco, from the time Sherman arrived to the time he left, expected Sherman to be "flexing" that Divine Energy muscle, keeping it on and supplying him power. It was rough going at first—Sherman would often last only several seconds before feeling the spark sputter and vanish—but he kept going on at it. Slowly, the time Sherman could spend holding onto that connection grew, and before the month was up, he was able to go a full training day with Divine Energy empowering him. It became almost as second nature, as easy as breathing or walking.
The power boost he got from that constant background energy flow was slight but noticeable. Sherman soon found that the weights he had lifted before—which, while formidable, were nowhere near what professional athletes could lift—were now easy and comfortable to do. Within the span of a month, he had gone from "strong and fit, yet not professionally so" to someone who could keep up with Olympic athletes. He could run faster, jump higher, react quicker, and punch harder. Things hurt less in general, and he found himself to heal even more quickly as normal. He didn't tire as easily. His senses seemed more—more vibrant, more acute. It wasn't enough to overwhelm him, but it was enough that he was often surprised by how he could notice freckles on a person's face from all the way across the park.
In the end, however, he neither manifested the Impact Richter's ability nor significantly improved the other aspects of his Divine Energy usage. It disappointed him, but it couldn't be helped.
At last, the day came. Francisco had bought the two of them tickets on a plane ride over to Brightfire, the Holy See of Liberthasia, Goddess of Freedom. Given that Sherman lived in the northern part of the West Coast, and Brightfire was located in the Midwest of the Commonwealth of Columbia, the flight itself would be six hours long roundabouts, and a roadtrip was out of the question.
They packed and got their affairs in order. Soon, they found themselves on Flight 130, bound from Santa Carmen, Nortasura, to Brightfire, Arina.
"I hate going back to Brightfire," Francisco muttered as they settled themselves. "Everybody there's a stuck-up pain in the keister." He paused. "Well, there's a few reliable folks. But my point stands."
"That doesn't surprise me," Sherman muttered.
"Respect your elders, kid," Francisco said, pulling out a sleeping mask to drape over his face.
Some minutes passed and the plane's engines began to whir.
"For the record," Sherman said as they began to take off, "I forgive you."
"Hm?" Francisco muttered.
"For the thing you did last month that helped me unlock my Divine Energy."
"You've been on that for a month?" he asked.
"No," Sherman said. "I just . . . well, never got around to it. We were always busy. So, I forgive you."
"I haven't apologized."
"I know. I'm forgiving you anyways."
"Hm. Maybe you shouldn't."
"It's part of the Pantheon's teachings."
"I know. Still, though. Sometimes people don't deserve forgiveness."
" . . . Yeah. I know that."
Francisco lifted his mask to glance at him, but when Sherman said no more, he put the mask back on. Sherman soon found himself nodding off as well. The airplane's engines thrummed, humming in a relaxing manner that Sherman could feel in his bones. He fell asleep in the sky, thirty thousand feet above the ground.
Chapter 6
In the months following Professor Dominguez's funeral, Sherman's life had been nothing but distractions and work. Practically from sunup to sundown, he was out and about, either training or working. He had very little time for rest and relaxation, save for church services on Sunday, mealtime, and the long rides his job would occasionally require of him. His apartment mates, whom he regarded as "close friends," occasionally popped in to wonder where he had been recently. He had previously been free enough to go out and hang with them on the regular, but that had stopped after his graduation.
"New side gig," he had said. They seemed to take that on its face, congratulated him on the "raise," and generally let things be.
He still visited Pastor Gabriel constantly. The Pastor would occasionally visit his practice at the park with Blade-Brother Francisco, trying to help out where he could. Sherman as well often sought him out, seeking advice and counselling on the situation. As a matter of fact, even with how little Sherman had progressed in terms of his Impact Richter's ability and his Divine Energy manipulation, he was sure he wouldn't have gotten as far as he did without Gabriel's help.
"Don't worry about your job and expenses for now," Gabriel said a month before the Trials. "Just focus on your Cleric duties. It's the church's job to help you all out—as a matter of fact, we have a specific portion of our budget set aside for this very purpose."
That was a load off of Sherman's back. What wasn't was how little things had seemed to change for his college friends. No matter how many times he visited over the four months of the attack, it was always the same. Marlin, in particular, was always home, always telling Sherman that he didn't want to see anybody. Johnny, on the other hand, was never home, presumably always off on some errand or engagement.
Sherman couldn't blame them, to be honest. If he hadn't had a new sense of purpose and a goal, he might have retreated himself.
However, it seemed that the flight to Brightflame had a curious effect. As Sherman grew closer and closer to his destination, he found that the worries of his home life were further and further away from his mind. Instead, a looming anxiety, uncertainty, and a small amount of excitement took its place.
Even from the air Sherman could tell that the city of Brightflame was something else. The "Crown Jewel of the Midwest" certainly lived up to the name. The city was filled with bright, shining towers that stood tall and proud like vigilant spears. A sea of green trees broke up the modern design, giving the place an almost natural feel. Yet the most impressive thing was what had to have been the Holy See, the capital of those who worshipped Lady Liberthasia. In the direct center of the city was a smaller city that more resembled a fortress than anything else. It was surrounded on all sides by an enormous wall hundreds of feet tall and clearly wide enough for people to drive on. In there was the largest building—a massive cathedral, with spires reaching higher than all the other skyscrapers around it. In the courtyard of the Holy See was an enormous statue of Lady Liberthasia facing the west, one hand bearing a torch and the other outstretched to the horizon.
"Wow," Sherman said, his eyes widening. He had been to big cities before—even lived in one for a while—but this was something else. "I had no idea we had cities like this."
"It's a lot," Francisco agreed. The earlier announcement from the pilot that they were descending seemed to have woken him up. "Even if I don't care for the pomp and circumstance of the place, it's certainly a respectable sight."
"I'm not surprised," Sherman mused. "This entire place is rather . . . ."
"Gaudy? Overbearing? Shiny?"
"Ostentatious," Sherman settled. "Humility is a virtue, after all. Yet so is proclaiming the glory of the gods via good works."
"Hm."
The plane landed without issue at Brightflame International Airport. Sherman was hit with a blast of heat the moment he stepped outside of the plane—a muggy, wet heat that clung to him and threatened to drench his shirt in sweat. It was a completely different heat than the dry summers he was used to on the West Coast. He didn't exactly care for it, but in the end being too hot was being better than being too cold.
The airport was crowded. As a matter of fact, it was the most crowded airport that Sherman had ever seen. There were people of all shapes, sizes, and colors out and about, coming from all places in the country and even outside of it. As they made their way to the baggage claim, he began to notice that a disproportionate number of them seemed to bear symbols, iconography, and paraphernalia relating to the Pantheon of Light.
"There's a lot of Pantheans here," Sherman said as they waited for their luggage, two checked-in bags each.
"Of course. We're in the world capital for Liberthasian worship. This is practically the city's main export."
Sherman glanced around, looked at the amount of posters and merchandise that dealt with the Pantheon, its teachings, its lore, and its worshippers in some way or another, and found that he couldn't exactly disagree.
By the time they had gotten their luggage, grabbed a public bus, made their way to the Holy See, gotten past the line inside the Holy See, and arrived at the hotel they'd be staying at for a day or two, it had been four hours since touchdown, ten hours since takeoff, twelve hours since they got to the airport, fourteen hours since Sherman had woken up early that morning, and already dark due to the three hour time difference between the two places.
"Get some rest, kid," Francisco said as Sherman placed his bags in the corner of their shared room, "Gods know you'll need it for what's ahead."
Heeding that advice, Sherman took a quick shower and immediately passed out in his bed.
Given that they had arrived on a Thursday and the first important event was on a Saturday, Sherman was allowed to take Friday off. Francisco told him to go explore the town, get some rest, do whatever—just be up bright and early on Saturday morning at 6:00 AM to get ready for the 7:30 morning service. That was something that Sherman, as a Cleric, had to attend. Francisco then proceeded to toss five twenty-loaf notes on the bed and leave.
Even though he was still tired, Sherman knew that slacking off on training—at least a little bit—would go against all the work he had done that summer. He grabbed a towel and headed down to the hotel's gym.
The gym, as he figured, was small and lacking in most amenities. There was only a single multi-exercise machine along with a few free weights and an exercise ball in a room about the size of an apartment bedroom. Still, Sherman had made do with worse before during his high school and college football days. He quickly ran into a second problem—he had far outgrown the weight limit that the simple hotel gym offered. As a matter of fact, he was sure that it wouldn't have been effective for him before he started his Divine Energy physical training. Even though he gave the exercise room his best shot, he left disappointed. He washed his face and was soon out on the streets of Brightflame.
Like the day before, it was hot and muggy, even at approximately eight in the morning. He heard a couple of people complaining about the heat as he left the hotel, internally sympathizing with the evident tourists. They faded from his mind as he stepped out into the hot air and bright morning sun, already focused on his task at hand.
Sherman, whenever he traveled for an away game, always had something of a little ritual he liked to do when he had the time. First thing would be to find a local burger place—preferably not a chain, but that'd do in a pinch—and get a full meal for breakfast. That was something that the football team had roped him into doing, and something that he'd roped others into doing long since.
Sherman found a burger place easy enough. Even at this early in the morning, the restraint seemed quite full of bustling employees and hungry customers. Thankfully, this one didn't only serve breakfast before 10, and thus Sherman was able to get his cheeseburger, fries, and vanilla cola without any issue.
The football team's reasoning was simple: in order to beat someone, you had to understand him. The best way to understand somebody was to see what his home was like. The best way to do that was to see what kind of food he ate. Therefore, ordering a local cheeseburger and soda was the best way to understand his enemy.
Sherman, back when he was still ignorant in the ways of science and warfare, had said that seemed like a mere excuse to get fast food. The response he got was to let the results speak for themselves. Seeing as they won, and that every time they did win they had ordered some kind of local food beforehand, Sherman was "forced" to concede the logic behind such actions.
The meal itself wasn't the best he'd ever had, but it was far better than the generic fast food he'd been expecting, especially given the cheap price. Satisfied, Sherman left the restaurant to head to the second item on his to-do list: to obtain a Diagonal Picture of the Most Interesting Thing In Town.
The requirements of Most Interesting Thing were, of course, subjective, and varied from person to person. The most common unifier, then, was that it was not allowed to be directly related to the reason why they were there. In short, it had to be something interesting, not just work. In Sherman's case, that meant no pictures of the Church-made architecture, or Clerics, or the massive cathedral in the center of town. He decided to head on out via foot, briefly lamenting the lack of his motorcycle.
Even though the Holy See, the walled sub-city inside Brightflame proper, was designed for foot travel, Sherman found that it was many square miles large, and there would be no way he'd be able to explore the entire city in a single visit, let alone one afternoon. Still, he gave it his best shot, and had explored a good section of the city before he got hungry enough for lunch. A street food truck parked by a nearby park served his purposes, and soon he had both a tasty Yorkland-style hot dog and a shady tree to relax under.
His leisure, however, was soon interrupted by a deluge of car horns. He frowned, setting aside his second hot dog to see a cavalcade of black-and-silver cars, slowly making their way up Main Street to the central cathedral, Our Lady of the Brightflame. He looked on with a curious and steadily-growing crowd at the procession, watching with some fascination as drivers proceeded to lean out the window and yell at some of the pedestrians who weren't quick enough to scramble out of their way.
"What's going on?" he heard someone ask.
"Beats me," someone else said. "Hey, wait, isn't that the Zakynthos logo? That's the Z and there's the iris."
"The Zakynthos Group? What's an arms manufacturing company doing here?"
"Beats me."
"Aren't they supposed to have ties with Grant Grahamford?"
"The general? What's he got to do with any of this?"
"Doesn't he attend Our Lady of the Bright Flame? And isn't he in town this weekend?"
"Oh, is that why there's so many people here? Huh. Didn't think there were such things as celebrity generals."
"Neither did I, but you saw those crowds."
Sherman stopped paying attention there and returned his focus to the cavalcade. Movement was slow, tempers were rising, and men in black suits were starting to get out of the cars. Sherman tilted his phone forty-five degrees and took a diagonal shot of the commotion. Even if were headed to the same place, there was no way it was connected to his Cleric business. After all, Francisco had told him that while there were many that did know about Clerics, it was mostly a well-kept secret by the Church.
He watched as the men in black suits yelled at a few pedestrians, before they noticed that some of the crowd had their phones out. They got back inside, and the cars made their slow, stop-and-go way down Main Street towards the cathedral.
With two sights and a lunch down, Sherman figured it was probably best to figure out where he'd leave his signature. That was the easiest to do, with the only rule being "no vandalization."
Whereas the buildings outside the wall were composed of modern material and of a modern fashion, the buildings inside the Holy See were typically composed of stone. The architecture appeared to be a hundreds-year-old take on thousand-year-old building styles, updating it with the proper techniques at the time while still keeping the same marble decorations, reliefs, patterns, and devices that characterized so much of the Old Jovian art style. Our Lady of the Bright Flame followed that same design, and from everywhere in Holy See—and even most places in Brightflame proper—one could see the high arches, massive pillars, vaulted ceilings, and enormous carvings of saints, prophets, holy figures, and religious iconography that surrounded the outside of the cathedral.
Sherman didn't end up going anywhere near that massive building that day. Instead, he ended up finding an antiques shop off the main street. He bought something that reminded him of Professor Dominguez, got permission from the clerk to leave his signature on the doorframe, and headed out to a recommendation for a light dinner. Then, he went back to his hotel room to unwind, relax, and prepare for what would undoubtedly be one of the most important days of his life.
"New side gig," he had said. They seemed to take that on its face, congratulated him on the "raise," and generally let things be.
He still visited Pastor Gabriel constantly. The Pastor would occasionally visit his practice at the park with Blade-Brother Francisco, trying to help out where he could. Sherman as well often sought him out, seeking advice and counselling on the situation. As a matter of fact, even with how little Sherman had progressed in terms of his Impact Richter's ability and his Divine Energy manipulation, he was sure he wouldn't have gotten as far as he did without Gabriel's help.
"Don't worry about your job and expenses for now," Gabriel said a month before the Trials. "Just focus on your Cleric duties. It's the church's job to help you all out—as a matter of fact, we have a specific portion of our budget set aside for this very purpose."
That was a load off of Sherman's back. What wasn't was how little things had seemed to change for his college friends. No matter how many times he visited over the four months of the attack, it was always the same. Marlin, in particular, was always home, always telling Sherman that he didn't want to see anybody. Johnny, on the other hand, was never home, presumably always off on some errand or engagement.
Sherman couldn't blame them, to be honest. If he hadn't had a new sense of purpose and a goal, he might have retreated himself.
However, it seemed that the flight to Brightflame had a curious effect. As Sherman grew closer and closer to his destination, he found that the worries of his home life were further and further away from his mind. Instead, a looming anxiety, uncertainty, and a small amount of excitement took its place.
Even from the air Sherman could tell that the city of Brightflame was something else. The "Crown Jewel of the Midwest" certainly lived up to the name. The city was filled with bright, shining towers that stood tall and proud like vigilant spears. A sea of green trees broke up the modern design, giving the place an almost natural feel. Yet the most impressive thing was what had to have been the Holy See, the capital of those who worshipped Lady Liberthasia. In the direct center of the city was a smaller city that more resembled a fortress than anything else. It was surrounded on all sides by an enormous wall hundreds of feet tall and clearly wide enough for people to drive on. In there was the largest building—a massive cathedral, with spires reaching higher than all the other skyscrapers around it. In the courtyard of the Holy See was an enormous statue of Lady Liberthasia facing the west, one hand bearing a torch and the other outstretched to the horizon.
"Wow," Sherman said, his eyes widening. He had been to big cities before—even lived in one for a while—but this was something else. "I had no idea we had cities like this."
"It's a lot," Francisco agreed. The earlier announcement from the pilot that they were descending seemed to have woken him up. "Even if I don't care for the pomp and circumstance of the place, it's certainly a respectable sight."
"I'm not surprised," Sherman mused. "This entire place is rather . . . ."
"Gaudy? Overbearing? Shiny?"
"Ostentatious," Sherman settled. "Humility is a virtue, after all. Yet so is proclaiming the glory of the gods via good works."
"Hm."
The plane landed without issue at Brightflame International Airport. Sherman was hit with a blast of heat the moment he stepped outside of the plane—a muggy, wet heat that clung to him and threatened to drench his shirt in sweat. It was a completely different heat than the dry summers he was used to on the West Coast. He didn't exactly care for it, but in the end being too hot was being better than being too cold.
The airport was crowded. As a matter of fact, it was the most crowded airport that Sherman had ever seen. There were people of all shapes, sizes, and colors out and about, coming from all places in the country and even outside of it. As they made their way to the baggage claim, he began to notice that a disproportionate number of them seemed to bear symbols, iconography, and paraphernalia relating to the Pantheon of Light.
"There's a lot of Pantheans here," Sherman said as they waited for their luggage, two checked-in bags each.
"Of course. We're in the world capital for Liberthasian worship. This is practically the city's main export."
Sherman glanced around, looked at the amount of posters and merchandise that dealt with the Pantheon, its teachings, its lore, and its worshippers in some way or another, and found that he couldn't exactly disagree.
By the time they had gotten their luggage, grabbed a public bus, made their way to the Holy See, gotten past the line inside the Holy See, and arrived at the hotel they'd be staying at for a day or two, it had been four hours since touchdown, ten hours since takeoff, twelve hours since they got to the airport, fourteen hours since Sherman had woken up early that morning, and already dark due to the three hour time difference between the two places.
"Get some rest, kid," Francisco said as Sherman placed his bags in the corner of their shared room, "Gods know you'll need it for what's ahead."
Heeding that advice, Sherman took a quick shower and immediately passed out in his bed.
Given that they had arrived on a Thursday and the first important event was on a Saturday, Sherman was allowed to take Friday off. Francisco told him to go explore the town, get some rest, do whatever—just be up bright and early on Saturday morning at 6:00 AM to get ready for the 7:30 morning service. That was something that Sherman, as a Cleric, had to attend. Francisco then proceeded to toss five twenty-loaf notes on the bed and leave.
Even though he was still tired, Sherman knew that slacking off on training—at least a little bit—would go against all the work he had done that summer. He grabbed a towel and headed down to the hotel's gym.
The gym, as he figured, was small and lacking in most amenities. There was only a single multi-exercise machine along with a few free weights and an exercise ball in a room about the size of an apartment bedroom. Still, Sherman had made do with worse before during his high school and college football days. He quickly ran into a second problem—he had far outgrown the weight limit that the simple hotel gym offered. As a matter of fact, he was sure that it wouldn't have been effective for him before he started his Divine Energy physical training. Even though he gave the exercise room his best shot, he left disappointed. He washed his face and was soon out on the streets of Brightflame.
Like the day before, it was hot and muggy, even at approximately eight in the morning. He heard a couple of people complaining about the heat as he left the hotel, internally sympathizing with the evident tourists. They faded from his mind as he stepped out into the hot air and bright morning sun, already focused on his task at hand.
Sherman, whenever he traveled for an away game, always had something of a little ritual he liked to do when he had the time. First thing would be to find a local burger place—preferably not a chain, but that'd do in a pinch—and get a full meal for breakfast. That was something that the football team had roped him into doing, and something that he'd roped others into doing long since.
Sherman found a burger place easy enough. Even at this early in the morning, the restraint seemed quite full of bustling employees and hungry customers. Thankfully, this one didn't only serve breakfast before 10, and thus Sherman was able to get his cheeseburger, fries, and vanilla cola without any issue.
The football team's reasoning was simple: in order to beat someone, you had to understand him. The best way to understand somebody was to see what his home was like. The best way to do that was to see what kind of food he ate. Therefore, ordering a local cheeseburger and soda was the best way to understand his enemy.
Sherman, back when he was still ignorant in the ways of science and warfare, had said that seemed like a mere excuse to get fast food. The response he got was to let the results speak for themselves. Seeing as they won, and that every time they did win they had ordered some kind of local food beforehand, Sherman was "forced" to concede the logic behind such actions.
The meal itself wasn't the best he'd ever had, but it was far better than the generic fast food he'd been expecting, especially given the cheap price. Satisfied, Sherman left the restaurant to head to the second item on his to-do list: to obtain a Diagonal Picture of the Most Interesting Thing In Town.
The requirements of Most Interesting Thing were, of course, subjective, and varied from person to person. The most common unifier, then, was that it was not allowed to be directly related to the reason why they were there. In short, it had to be something interesting, not just work. In Sherman's case, that meant no pictures of the Church-made architecture, or Clerics, or the massive cathedral in the center of town. He decided to head on out via foot, briefly lamenting the lack of his motorcycle.
Even though the Holy See, the walled sub-city inside Brightflame proper, was designed for foot travel, Sherman found that it was many square miles large, and there would be no way he'd be able to explore the entire city in a single visit, let alone one afternoon. Still, he gave it his best shot, and had explored a good section of the city before he got hungry enough for lunch. A street food truck parked by a nearby park served his purposes, and soon he had both a tasty Yorkland-style hot dog and a shady tree to relax under.
His leisure, however, was soon interrupted by a deluge of car horns. He frowned, setting aside his second hot dog to see a cavalcade of black-and-silver cars, slowly making their way up Main Street to the central cathedral, Our Lady of the Brightflame. He looked on with a curious and steadily-growing crowd at the procession, watching with some fascination as drivers proceeded to lean out the window and yell at some of the pedestrians who weren't quick enough to scramble out of their way.
"What's going on?" he heard someone ask.
"Beats me," someone else said. "Hey, wait, isn't that the Zakynthos logo? That's the Z and there's the iris."
"The Zakynthos Group? What's an arms manufacturing company doing here?"
"Beats me."
"Aren't they supposed to have ties with Grant Grahamford?"
"The general? What's he got to do with any of this?"
"Doesn't he attend Our Lady of the Bright Flame? And isn't he in town this weekend?"
"Oh, is that why there's so many people here? Huh. Didn't think there were such things as celebrity generals."
"Neither did I, but you saw those crowds."
Sherman stopped paying attention there and returned his focus to the cavalcade. Movement was slow, tempers were rising, and men in black suits were starting to get out of the cars. Sherman tilted his phone forty-five degrees and took a diagonal shot of the commotion. Even if were headed to the same place, there was no way it was connected to his Cleric business. After all, Francisco had told him that while there were many that did know about Clerics, it was mostly a well-kept secret by the Church.
He watched as the men in black suits yelled at a few pedestrians, before they noticed that some of the crowd had their phones out. They got back inside, and the cars made their slow, stop-and-go way down Main Street towards the cathedral.
With two sights and a lunch down, Sherman figured it was probably best to figure out where he'd leave his signature. That was the easiest to do, with the only rule being "no vandalization."
Whereas the buildings outside the wall were composed of modern material and of a modern fashion, the buildings inside the Holy See were typically composed of stone. The architecture appeared to be a hundreds-year-old take on thousand-year-old building styles, updating it with the proper techniques at the time while still keeping the same marble decorations, reliefs, patterns, and devices that characterized so much of the Old Jovian art style. Our Lady of the Bright Flame followed that same design, and from everywhere in Holy See—and even most places in Brightflame proper—one could see the high arches, massive pillars, vaulted ceilings, and enormous carvings of saints, prophets, holy figures, and religious iconography that surrounded the outside of the cathedral.
Sherman didn't end up going anywhere near that massive building that day. Instead, he ended up finding an antiques shop off the main street. He bought something that reminded him of Professor Dominguez, got permission from the clerk to leave his signature on the doorframe, and headed out to a recommendation for a light dinner. Then, he went back to his hotel room to unwind, relax, and prepare for what would undoubtedly be one of the most important days of his life.
Chapter 7
That day had to be one of the most boring days of Sherman's life.
As instructed, he had been up bright and early the next day—as a matter of fact, he was up before Francisco. They put on their Saturday best—which, for Sherman, was a halfway-decent suit that still fit him from prom—and joined an ever-growing river of people marching their way up Main Street to head to morning service at Our Lady of the Bright Flames. It was the only chapel in the Holy See, after all, and had more than enough room to seat the entire population of the city—at least, that's what Sherman had been told yesterday. He wondered just how the cathedral could fit so many people inside. They passed by no shortage of vendors selling holy artifacts, trinkets, balms, incense, and other such material. It was in poor taste—after all, the Scriptures taught against such practices. Food, however, was fine, and Sherman ended up buying a sweet-and-savory breakfast pastry for both him and Francisco. It wasn't that bad, all things considered.
By the time they arrived, the massive bells in the even more massive spires were ringing a deafening proclamation of the time, and that service would be starting soon. Sherman and Francisco squeezed through the door, and Sherman soon got his answer to the seating question.
They were ushered this way and that and up and down hallways until they eventually emerged at what seemed to be the biggest sports stadium Sherman had ever seen. The entire place was like a massive arena, with thousands—if not tens of thousands—of seats. They were tiered, all leading down to a central arena, where a raised podium was backed by an army of orchestral musicians and chorists. At various points massive screens had been installed, presumably to focus on the preacher and aid with his sermon. At the very, very top of the cathedral was a massive stain-glass dome of a roof, depicting the Seven Gods of the Pantheon of Light, with Lady Liberthasia in the center. As always, in one hand, she bore a torch. The other was outstretched, whether in welcome or in command Sherman did not know.
As more people began to fill in the seats, the noise began to rise, and Sherman began to feel a little overwhelmed. The only churches he had been to previously were small, intimate affairs, with the largest one seating maybe two hundred people on a good day. This . . . this super church was something new, and it wasn't something Sherman was sure he liked.
Francisco patted him on the shoulder, clearly sensing Sherman's trepidation. "Yeah, I feel the same way, kid."
Eventually, the bell struck the hour, and the choir immediately burst into song. It was the type of grand performance that Sherman would have expected from a classical concert or an opera house. Every note was perfect, every singer on-key and on pitch, all instruments tuned to perfection. The songs they sang were a mix of ancient psalms, old hymns, and even modern worship music, which felt strange given the setting. The music was so loud and the bass so tangible that Sherman almost began to worry that the roof would cave in.
In contrast to the bombastic display of music that assaulted them so early in the morning, the message—delivered by a bent, balding old man—was as dry and boring as the desert sand. It was probably the most basic message Sherman had ever heard. It wasn't challenging, it wasn't inspiriting, it didn't cut down to the very soul, exposing unseen sin or errant ways. No, it was safe, tame, and very, very boring. Sherman had to fight the whole time to not fall asleep. Once again, he found he preferred the message style of his old church.
The service went on, and on, and on, for hours and hours. There were many, many times where Sherman had to stifle a yawn or prevent himself from nodding off. Francisco had no such reservations, and had even fallen asleep soon after the music stopped. Yet though Sherman could see the odd person struggling with similar issues in that massive crowd of dozens of thousands present, the vast majority were listening in stoic silence or raptured attention. There was the odd murmur of agreement or mutter of "amen!", but the vast majority of the room was as silent as a tomb save for the preacher who seemed a mile away.
Sherman, bored out of his mind, decided to see just what kind of people were in the crowd. After all, this weekend was the weekend where all the new Novitiates gathered for the Trials, which meant that this place was supposed to be swarming with Clerics. How many of these people were of the Order? How many were teachers or Novitiates like him? One in every thousand? Half that? Double that?
He let his eyes wander over the massive crowd. The vast, vast majority of the people were in either suits or elegant dresses both in a variety of colors, though mostly in black and white. The next most common group was those in military outfits, both the ceremonial uniform and camouflaged fatigues. There was an entire section of people all in red, next to orange, yellow, green, blue, and finally violet, making a visible rainbow even from all the way up where Sherman was. Nearby, there were a handful of people in more casual clothes, from polos and jeans to Kahuna-style palm tree-patterned button-down shirts and cargo shorts. The preacher himself was draped in ceremonial-looking robes, with a long tassel bearing a stylized torch-flame on both sides. The choir in the back were all wearing black choir robes, and the orchestra was clad in black suits and dresses.
After what seemed like hours, the sermon finally wrapped to a close. The audience stood and clapped, cheering, as the band struck up two final songs to sing. Sherman himself gave a polite clap, but in the end felt it a hollow thing. All this physical grandeur, all this money, all this time—and yet the sermon itself was hardly of any substance. What a shame. Pastor Gabriel could do more with a hundredth of a hundredth of this place's budget.
As people began to file out of the sanctum, Sherman was prevented from joining by Francisco. The Cleric shook his head. "Just wait. We're not in any rush."
"Don't we have somewhere to get to?"
"We do," Francisco agreed, "but that can wait until afterwards. Just wait for now. Sit back down."
Unsure, Sherman did as told. As the people filed out, Sherman began to notice that, in fact, there were a number of other groups waiting around just like he was. Mostly, they were the odd family here and there that were waiting around for practicality's sake—the lines out were very long, after all, and there was no point in standing just to wait. Yet aside from them there were pairs of people, one older and one younger, or trios with one older and two younger. There was a group of about ten all in black complete with black sunglasses. Some of the military people had stayed behind as well. Sherman observed them, and noted that some of them were doing the same.
"Check your phone, kid," said Francisco suddenly as the last of the crowd was finally standing to leave.
He frowned and did so, having turned his phone off for the service. He had a single message from an unknown messenger. As he read it, his breath caught in his chest and his eyes widened.
"NOVITIATE OF THE ORDER OF THE SACRED TORCH," it read. "BE AT FLOOR 100 BY 1:30 PM. ATTENDANCE MANDATORY."
"You've got a summons, kid," Francisco said, finally rising himself as he put his own phone away. "A real troublesome one at that. Best not keep them waiting."
Sherman nodded and followed the Cleric out of the room. As they left, Sherman noticed that, at last, the other groups were leaving as well.
So those are the other Novitiates, Sherman thought. I wonder what they're all like.
They reached a hallway, and Sherman turned aside to use an elevator.
"Wait, kid, not that one," Francisco said, leading him to a different elevator.
"Aren't we going—"
Inside the elevator Francisco selected was a doorman clad in a white suit. The Cleric flashed something on his phone at him, and the doorman nodded, pressing a button as Sherman got in.
"We can't take normal elevators," Francisco explained. "No clue why they don't allow normal ones to go to the top. Makes no sense."
The ride up was long and slightly awkward, with neither Francisco nor the doorman speaking the entire way up. After several minutes of pure silence, the bell dinged on floor one hundred.
"This isn't the top floor, though," Sherman said as the door closed behind them.
"Hm? No, of course it's not. There's about ten more above us." Francisco shook his head.
Floor 100 was far, far different than the rest of the cathedral. Back down below, the walls had been white, decorated with pictures and artwork and illuminated with bright light in a way that reminded Sherman of that fancy hotel he had stayed at once for football. It was all glitz and glamour and showy construction, designed to show off the wealth to the congress passing through its halls on the way to the various sanctuaries. This place, however, seemed formed of dull gray stone. A crimson carpet ran down the hallway to a set of wooden double doors, and the suits of armor lining the walls reminded Sherman of a castle.
"Right through there," Francisco said, adjusting his hat. "Go on, kid."
Sherman nodded, took a deep breath, and opened one of the large double doors.
The nearly cavernous open room must have been two or even three floors tall. Dozens of large, round tables stood in the center, surrounded on all sides by soft chairs, covered in a white tablecloth. Banners of white, red, blue, and gold draped down from the ceiling, displaying images of heroes of the faith and saints. Even the carpet was fancy, seemingly flecked with silver and gold thread. At the top was a similar stained-glass dome to the one that was in the cathedral's main theater: the images of the gods of the Pantheon of Light, with the Goddess of Freedom in the middle surrounded by the other six. Yet unlike the one down below, this image depicted the gods not as they traditionally were, in robes and with their associated iconography. These gods were dressed in full suits of armor and carrying weapons. Liberthasia, for example, s torch was replaced with a flaming sword, and in her other hand she held a flag. It was strange, seeing the gods in such a manner. Typically, the emphasis of the gods was on their connection to the Light and its teachings, and less the story of how the Pantheon was formed in the first place.
Already the tables were halfway full, with around seventy sharply-dressed people seated sporadically throughout the affair. Some tables were completely full—like one table that had that group of sunglasses and suits—while others had one or two at most.
Francisco sat down at an empty table and Sherman followed suit. Fancy-looking silverware and plates were already set down at the table, and a variety of breads, cheeses, and other similar things were on the table. Sherman glanced around, and, seeing that Francisco and others had already started partaking in the food laid before them, followed suit.
"A lunch party?" Sherman asked quietly as he buttered a roll.
"Hm," Francisco said. "Something like that. Lotta talking, though."
As the clock ticked closer to 1:30, more and more people began to fill up that spacious room. They ended up having to bring in more tables to handle all the Clerics and Novitiates that were arriving. Soon, the room was abuzz with chatter, small talk, and curious and nervous wonderings as to what, exactly, was going on.
The clock struck 1:30, and the doors burst open.
A little old man walked in, and Sherman realized that it was the preacher who had spoke that morning. Suddenly, the room rose from their seats to stand—including Francisco. Sherman scrambled to follow suit, nearly knocking over his chair in the process. Elsewhere in the room, someone did knock over their chair, eliciting a pained grunt. The man walked through the pathway that had been set up in the middle of the tables to the long table at the head of the room. He sat at its center, and was soon joined by his procession—men in suits, women in dresses, both in choral robes, both in ceremonial uniforms. Finally, at last, five people entered, taking up spaces on either side of the preacher. The first was a tall, elegant, dark-skinned woman in a long white dress with an equally white hat, adorned in expensive-looking jewelry. The second was a tanned man in full military fatigues with bars and stripes pinned to his breast, his hair cropped combat-short. The third was a swarthy man in a long, red-and-white striped jacket, complete with a tall hat upon his head. The fourth was pale, dark-haired woman in a smart pantsuit, a briefcase tucked under her arm. The last was a blonde man in honest-to-gods knight armor, complete with a flowing white cape. All of them had one article in common—a shining gold brooch pinned to the left breast. The last sat at the preacher's right hand, while the first at his left.
"Now presenting the His Holiness the Pope of the Church of the Seven Flames of Liberthasia, Pietro MacArthur Solomon" said the man in armor. "All stand and present yourselves."
Francisco stood at attention, his face stone. Sherman copied him, making the same strange salute—both arms bent, his left arm forward and up, his right arm forward and left, crossed at the wrists.
"All non-Cleric personnel be seated," said the spokesman. "All Clerics and Novitiates, remain standing."
"Now presenting the Cardinals of Freedom's Torch. Presenting the Choir Director, Natasha Hosier." The elegant woman bowed slightly.
"Presenting Grahamford F. Bradley, Four-Star General of the Commonwealth of Columbia." The military man nodded.
"Presenting Ringmaster Otto van Barnum of Barnum's Travelling Fun Fair Festival." The pin-striped man tipped his hat.
"Presenting Dr. Salkhouse Quaker, M.D." The woman in the suit gave a sharp nod.
"And presenting Washington Pendragon, Mayor of Brightflame City," he said, before giving a half bow of his own. "All be seated and heed the words of His Holiness."
As they sat, the preacher—Pope, rather—stood and began to speak.
"Welcome back, Blade-Brothers of the Order of Liberthasia," he said, and his voice was stronger and more passionate than it was during the sermon. "And welcome, Novitiates. Doubtless this is all a confusion to you, and I admit that current circumstances are . . . unique. But first—I am sure you are all hungry. Let us sharpen our attentions on the whetstone of lunch, then."
He clapped, and food was wheeled out on rolling carts. Servers passed on by, handing out roast chicken, sandwiches, prime rib, slices of pizza, mashed potatoes, vegetable stir-fry, and all sorts of other foodstuffs to the various assembled. It all seemed to be traditional Columbian fare, though there were some foreign options scattered about here and there. Francisco ended up with a steak and Sherman ended up with a plate of pasta. It was actually pretty good, all things considered.
The Pope let them eat for a few minutes before he started to speak. "I trust that your Cleric teachers have informed you of the basics of Cleric work," he said. "You are all here to drive back and eliminate the Contemptible Contagion, monsters of shadow and fear that prey upon humanity. Each of you has been chosen by Lady Liberthasia herself. You have traveled here from across the country—no, the world—in order to join our esteemed ranks. For that, you will be taking a series of Trials. You will be receiving the time and date of the trials on your phones tomorrow morning, so be ready."
His speech went on, talking some about the Order, what it meant to be a Cleric, and some of the specific rules and conduct that Clerics were expected to abide by. It was stuff Sherman had all heard before—always put the people first, behave in a manner that reflects well on the Church, and use your abilities to help out people in need. Common stuff, really, though the speech was more convincing here than the other had been hours ago. Was it the intimacy of the room, Sherman wondered, or was the Pope using his better material for them? If so, why?
Lunch went on, and eventually dessert was brought out—a slice of chocolate cake. Sherman had had better.
Eventually, the Pope dismissed them, and they all slowly began to file out of the room. Some stuck around and tried to talk with each other. Sherman wondered if he should, but Francisco started to head out straight away, and he didn't want to be left behind.
"That was . . . ." Sherman began when they were alone.
"A pain," Francisco said.
Sherman agreed, but didn't want to say it, so he didn't. Instead, he asked, "Can you tell me anything about these Trials?"
"No."
" . . . Really?"
"Can't," Francisco said, his usual frown deeper than normal. "Would that I could, but I can't. Not a peep."
"Any advice at all?"
" . . . None that I haven't said in the past four months," Francisco said. "Trust in your training and your instincts. That's what'll keep you alive."
The rest of the evening passed without affair, and Sherman, tired from the day's ordeal, decided to head to bed early. He laid out everything for the next day—a mixture of football and hockey gear from his highschool and college days, including his jersey and his motorcycle helmet.
With everything set up for the next day, he hit the sack to prepare for whatever would come for him, joining the already-asleep Francisco in the realm of sleepers.
He was awoken by his phone blaring an emergency alarm at 12:01 AM.
"BE AT JOHN H TERN NATIONAL PARK AT 2:30 AM," an anonymous message said. Sherman was unsure of how it managed to trigger his phone's emergency alert, but it had all the same. "FAILURE TO ARRIVE WILL MEAN INSTANT DISQUALIFICATION."
As instructed, he had been up bright and early the next day—as a matter of fact, he was up before Francisco. They put on their Saturday best—which, for Sherman, was a halfway-decent suit that still fit him from prom—and joined an ever-growing river of people marching their way up Main Street to head to morning service at Our Lady of the Bright Flames. It was the only chapel in the Holy See, after all, and had more than enough room to seat the entire population of the city—at least, that's what Sherman had been told yesterday. He wondered just how the cathedral could fit so many people inside. They passed by no shortage of vendors selling holy artifacts, trinkets, balms, incense, and other such material. It was in poor taste—after all, the Scriptures taught against such practices. Food, however, was fine, and Sherman ended up buying a sweet-and-savory breakfast pastry for both him and Francisco. It wasn't that bad, all things considered.
By the time they arrived, the massive bells in the even more massive spires were ringing a deafening proclamation of the time, and that service would be starting soon. Sherman and Francisco squeezed through the door, and Sherman soon got his answer to the seating question.
They were ushered this way and that and up and down hallways until they eventually emerged at what seemed to be the biggest sports stadium Sherman had ever seen. The entire place was like a massive arena, with thousands—if not tens of thousands—of seats. They were tiered, all leading down to a central arena, where a raised podium was backed by an army of orchestral musicians and chorists. At various points massive screens had been installed, presumably to focus on the preacher and aid with his sermon. At the very, very top of the cathedral was a massive stain-glass dome of a roof, depicting the Seven Gods of the Pantheon of Light, with Lady Liberthasia in the center. As always, in one hand, she bore a torch. The other was outstretched, whether in welcome or in command Sherman did not know.
As more people began to fill in the seats, the noise began to rise, and Sherman began to feel a little overwhelmed. The only churches he had been to previously were small, intimate affairs, with the largest one seating maybe two hundred people on a good day. This . . . this super church was something new, and it wasn't something Sherman was sure he liked.
Francisco patted him on the shoulder, clearly sensing Sherman's trepidation. "Yeah, I feel the same way, kid."
Eventually, the bell struck the hour, and the choir immediately burst into song. It was the type of grand performance that Sherman would have expected from a classical concert or an opera house. Every note was perfect, every singer on-key and on pitch, all instruments tuned to perfection. The songs they sang were a mix of ancient psalms, old hymns, and even modern worship music, which felt strange given the setting. The music was so loud and the bass so tangible that Sherman almost began to worry that the roof would cave in.
In contrast to the bombastic display of music that assaulted them so early in the morning, the message—delivered by a bent, balding old man—was as dry and boring as the desert sand. It was probably the most basic message Sherman had ever heard. It wasn't challenging, it wasn't inspiriting, it didn't cut down to the very soul, exposing unseen sin or errant ways. No, it was safe, tame, and very, very boring. Sherman had to fight the whole time to not fall asleep. Once again, he found he preferred the message style of his old church.
The service went on, and on, and on, for hours and hours. There were many, many times where Sherman had to stifle a yawn or prevent himself from nodding off. Francisco had no such reservations, and had even fallen asleep soon after the music stopped. Yet though Sherman could see the odd person struggling with similar issues in that massive crowd of dozens of thousands present, the vast majority were listening in stoic silence or raptured attention. There was the odd murmur of agreement or mutter of "amen!", but the vast majority of the room was as silent as a tomb save for the preacher who seemed a mile away.
Sherman, bored out of his mind, decided to see just what kind of people were in the crowd. After all, this weekend was the weekend where all the new Novitiates gathered for the Trials, which meant that this place was supposed to be swarming with Clerics. How many of these people were of the Order? How many were teachers or Novitiates like him? One in every thousand? Half that? Double that?
He let his eyes wander over the massive crowd. The vast, vast majority of the people were in either suits or elegant dresses both in a variety of colors, though mostly in black and white. The next most common group was those in military outfits, both the ceremonial uniform and camouflaged fatigues. There was an entire section of people all in red, next to orange, yellow, green, blue, and finally violet, making a visible rainbow even from all the way up where Sherman was. Nearby, there were a handful of people in more casual clothes, from polos and jeans to Kahuna-style palm tree-patterned button-down shirts and cargo shorts. The preacher himself was draped in ceremonial-looking robes, with a long tassel bearing a stylized torch-flame on both sides. The choir in the back were all wearing black choir robes, and the orchestra was clad in black suits and dresses.
After what seemed like hours, the sermon finally wrapped to a close. The audience stood and clapped, cheering, as the band struck up two final songs to sing. Sherman himself gave a polite clap, but in the end felt it a hollow thing. All this physical grandeur, all this money, all this time—and yet the sermon itself was hardly of any substance. What a shame. Pastor Gabriel could do more with a hundredth of a hundredth of this place's budget.
As people began to file out of the sanctum, Sherman was prevented from joining by Francisco. The Cleric shook his head. "Just wait. We're not in any rush."
"Don't we have somewhere to get to?"
"We do," Francisco agreed, "but that can wait until afterwards. Just wait for now. Sit back down."
Unsure, Sherman did as told. As the people filed out, Sherman began to notice that, in fact, there were a number of other groups waiting around just like he was. Mostly, they were the odd family here and there that were waiting around for practicality's sake—the lines out were very long, after all, and there was no point in standing just to wait. Yet aside from them there were pairs of people, one older and one younger, or trios with one older and two younger. There was a group of about ten all in black complete with black sunglasses. Some of the military people had stayed behind as well. Sherman observed them, and noted that some of them were doing the same.
"Check your phone, kid," said Francisco suddenly as the last of the crowd was finally standing to leave.
He frowned and did so, having turned his phone off for the service. He had a single message from an unknown messenger. As he read it, his breath caught in his chest and his eyes widened.
"NOVITIATE OF THE ORDER OF THE SACRED TORCH," it read. "BE AT FLOOR 100 BY 1:30 PM. ATTENDANCE MANDATORY."
"You've got a summons, kid," Francisco said, finally rising himself as he put his own phone away. "A real troublesome one at that. Best not keep them waiting."
Sherman nodded and followed the Cleric out of the room. As they left, Sherman noticed that, at last, the other groups were leaving as well.
So those are the other Novitiates, Sherman thought. I wonder what they're all like.
They reached a hallway, and Sherman turned aside to use an elevator.
"Wait, kid, not that one," Francisco said, leading him to a different elevator.
"Aren't we going—"
Inside the elevator Francisco selected was a doorman clad in a white suit. The Cleric flashed something on his phone at him, and the doorman nodded, pressing a button as Sherman got in.
"We can't take normal elevators," Francisco explained. "No clue why they don't allow normal ones to go to the top. Makes no sense."
The ride up was long and slightly awkward, with neither Francisco nor the doorman speaking the entire way up. After several minutes of pure silence, the bell dinged on floor one hundred.
"This isn't the top floor, though," Sherman said as the door closed behind them.
"Hm? No, of course it's not. There's about ten more above us." Francisco shook his head.
Floor 100 was far, far different than the rest of the cathedral. Back down below, the walls had been white, decorated with pictures and artwork and illuminated with bright light in a way that reminded Sherman of that fancy hotel he had stayed at once for football. It was all glitz and glamour and showy construction, designed to show off the wealth to the congress passing through its halls on the way to the various sanctuaries. This place, however, seemed formed of dull gray stone. A crimson carpet ran down the hallway to a set of wooden double doors, and the suits of armor lining the walls reminded Sherman of a castle.
"Right through there," Francisco said, adjusting his hat. "Go on, kid."
Sherman nodded, took a deep breath, and opened one of the large double doors.
The nearly cavernous open room must have been two or even three floors tall. Dozens of large, round tables stood in the center, surrounded on all sides by soft chairs, covered in a white tablecloth. Banners of white, red, blue, and gold draped down from the ceiling, displaying images of heroes of the faith and saints. Even the carpet was fancy, seemingly flecked with silver and gold thread. At the top was a similar stained-glass dome to the one that was in the cathedral's main theater: the images of the gods of the Pantheon of Light, with the Goddess of Freedom in the middle surrounded by the other six. Yet unlike the one down below, this image depicted the gods not as they traditionally were, in robes and with their associated iconography. These gods were dressed in full suits of armor and carrying weapons. Liberthasia, for example, s torch was replaced with a flaming sword, and in her other hand she held a flag. It was strange, seeing the gods in such a manner. Typically, the emphasis of the gods was on their connection to the Light and its teachings, and less the story of how the Pantheon was formed in the first place.
Already the tables were halfway full, with around seventy sharply-dressed people seated sporadically throughout the affair. Some tables were completely full—like one table that had that group of sunglasses and suits—while others had one or two at most.
Francisco sat down at an empty table and Sherman followed suit. Fancy-looking silverware and plates were already set down at the table, and a variety of breads, cheeses, and other similar things were on the table. Sherman glanced around, and, seeing that Francisco and others had already started partaking in the food laid before them, followed suit.
"A lunch party?" Sherman asked quietly as he buttered a roll.
"Hm," Francisco said. "Something like that. Lotta talking, though."
As the clock ticked closer to 1:30, more and more people began to fill up that spacious room. They ended up having to bring in more tables to handle all the Clerics and Novitiates that were arriving. Soon, the room was abuzz with chatter, small talk, and curious and nervous wonderings as to what, exactly, was going on.
The clock struck 1:30, and the doors burst open.
A little old man walked in, and Sherman realized that it was the preacher who had spoke that morning. Suddenly, the room rose from their seats to stand—including Francisco. Sherman scrambled to follow suit, nearly knocking over his chair in the process. Elsewhere in the room, someone did knock over their chair, eliciting a pained grunt. The man walked through the pathway that had been set up in the middle of the tables to the long table at the head of the room. He sat at its center, and was soon joined by his procession—men in suits, women in dresses, both in choral robes, both in ceremonial uniforms. Finally, at last, five people entered, taking up spaces on either side of the preacher. The first was a tall, elegant, dark-skinned woman in a long white dress with an equally white hat, adorned in expensive-looking jewelry. The second was a tanned man in full military fatigues with bars and stripes pinned to his breast, his hair cropped combat-short. The third was a swarthy man in a long, red-and-white striped jacket, complete with a tall hat upon his head. The fourth was pale, dark-haired woman in a smart pantsuit, a briefcase tucked under her arm. The last was a blonde man in honest-to-gods knight armor, complete with a flowing white cape. All of them had one article in common—a shining gold brooch pinned to the left breast. The last sat at the preacher's right hand, while the first at his left.
"Now presenting the His Holiness the Pope of the Church of the Seven Flames of Liberthasia, Pietro MacArthur Solomon" said the man in armor. "All stand and present yourselves."
Francisco stood at attention, his face stone. Sherman copied him, making the same strange salute—both arms bent, his left arm forward and up, his right arm forward and left, crossed at the wrists.
"All non-Cleric personnel be seated," said the spokesman. "All Clerics and Novitiates, remain standing."
"Now presenting the Cardinals of Freedom's Torch. Presenting the Choir Director, Natasha Hosier." The elegant woman bowed slightly.
"Presenting Grahamford F. Bradley, Four-Star General of the Commonwealth of Columbia." The military man nodded.
"Presenting Ringmaster Otto van Barnum of Barnum's Travelling Fun Fair Festival." The pin-striped man tipped his hat.
"Presenting Dr. Salkhouse Quaker, M.D." The woman in the suit gave a sharp nod.
"And presenting Washington Pendragon, Mayor of Brightflame City," he said, before giving a half bow of his own. "All be seated and heed the words of His Holiness."
As they sat, the preacher—Pope, rather—stood and began to speak.
"Welcome back, Blade-Brothers of the Order of Liberthasia," he said, and his voice was stronger and more passionate than it was during the sermon. "And welcome, Novitiates. Doubtless this is all a confusion to you, and I admit that current circumstances are . . . unique. But first—I am sure you are all hungry. Let us sharpen our attentions on the whetstone of lunch, then."
He clapped, and food was wheeled out on rolling carts. Servers passed on by, handing out roast chicken, sandwiches, prime rib, slices of pizza, mashed potatoes, vegetable stir-fry, and all sorts of other foodstuffs to the various assembled. It all seemed to be traditional Columbian fare, though there were some foreign options scattered about here and there. Francisco ended up with a steak and Sherman ended up with a plate of pasta. It was actually pretty good, all things considered.
The Pope let them eat for a few minutes before he started to speak. "I trust that your Cleric teachers have informed you of the basics of Cleric work," he said. "You are all here to drive back and eliminate the Contemptible Contagion, monsters of shadow and fear that prey upon humanity. Each of you has been chosen by Lady Liberthasia herself. You have traveled here from across the country—no, the world—in order to join our esteemed ranks. For that, you will be taking a series of Trials. You will be receiving the time and date of the trials on your phones tomorrow morning, so be ready."
His speech went on, talking some about the Order, what it meant to be a Cleric, and some of the specific rules and conduct that Clerics were expected to abide by. It was stuff Sherman had all heard before—always put the people first, behave in a manner that reflects well on the Church, and use your abilities to help out people in need. Common stuff, really, though the speech was more convincing here than the other had been hours ago. Was it the intimacy of the room, Sherman wondered, or was the Pope using his better material for them? If so, why?
Lunch went on, and eventually dessert was brought out—a slice of chocolate cake. Sherman had had better.
Eventually, the Pope dismissed them, and they all slowly began to file out of the room. Some stuck around and tried to talk with each other. Sherman wondered if he should, but Francisco started to head out straight away, and he didn't want to be left behind.
"That was . . . ." Sherman began when they were alone.
"A pain," Francisco said.
Sherman agreed, but didn't want to say it, so he didn't. Instead, he asked, "Can you tell me anything about these Trials?"
"No."
" . . . Really?"
"Can't," Francisco said, his usual frown deeper than normal. "Would that I could, but I can't. Not a peep."
"Any advice at all?"
" . . . None that I haven't said in the past four months," Francisco said. "Trust in your training and your instincts. That's what'll keep you alive."
The rest of the evening passed without affair, and Sherman, tired from the day's ordeal, decided to head to bed early. He laid out everything for the next day—a mixture of football and hockey gear from his highschool and college days, including his jersey and his motorcycle helmet.
With everything set up for the next day, he hit the sack to prepare for whatever would come for him, joining the already-asleep Francisco in the realm of sleepers.
He was awoken by his phone blaring an emergency alarm at 12:01 AM.
"BE AT JOHN H TERN NATIONAL PARK AT 2:30 AM," an anonymous message said. Sherman was unsure of how it managed to trigger his phone's emergency alert, but it had all the same. "FAILURE TO ARRIVE WILL MEAN INSTANT DISQUALIFICATION."
Chapter 8
Sherman scrambled out of bed and immediately began to put on his mismatched gear. This was something he had practiced for after Francisco had told him that he'd probably need some kind of protection. It wasn't exactly the most protective suit of armor in the world—it was repurposed sports equipment, after all—but it was certainly better than nothing. As he was finishing putting on his jersey, he noticed that Francisco wasn't there.
He stood after tying his shoes to see that there was a note on the bed. On it, an address was listed, and on the back, a message in Francisco's handwriting.
"Go here. Friend of mine. You'll find what you need. Show him this message."
Sherman frowned and tucked the note into his pocket. As he made to grab his motorcycle helmet, he paused as the sound of a car sped on by. It was followed by another, and another.
Wish Francisco had let us borrow a car, Sherman muttered. For some reason, the Cleric hadn't wanted to rent a vehicle from the local airport, insisting that they use public transportation or walk. Sherman grabbed his backpack filled with emergency supplies, stuffed his helmet in what room remained, and left the hotel to take for the streets.
It took about a solid half hour of walking to reach Ernie's Auto Shop on the corner of 35th and B Street. Sherman frowned. The place looked vacated for the evening. The gate was locked, the cars were covered, and all the lights were off—all except one in the top corner.
"Hello?" he called out, shaking the door handle some. To his surprise, the gate wasn't locked after all—it had only appeared like that. He tentatively stepped into the property and crossed the courtyard, wary of dogs or other unseen threats. He knocked on the door, called out once more, and waited. Once again, nothing. He knocked again.
"We're closed! Beat it or I'll shoot!" said a voice.
"Uh," Sherman said, startled. "Are you Ernie? I—"
"I said beat it! I'm not going to warn you twice!" There was the distinct sound of a shotgun being racked.
"Francisco sent me!" Sherman said frantically. Divine powers or no, he was still deathly allergic to bullets of every kind. "He told me to go here!"
There was a pause. "Sparks, this is about that stupid Trials stuff, ain't it?" the voice said.
"Y-yes?"
More cursing, some clattering, a light switched on, and the door opened a hair. Ernie was a short, balding man with a patchy beard and weary expression. Sherman handed him the note, and he peered at it in the yellow light. He opened the door wider, letting Sherman see the shotgun resting on a wall within arm's reach.
"You must be that Sherman guy Francisco's been going on about," he said, looking him up and down. "Football, huh? You really think that's going to help you?"
"I hope so," he said. "I don't know much about this sort of thing, and I wanted every advantage I could get."
Ernie grunted. "Can't blame you. Here. It's for the Gershwin. I'll open the garage for you."
He tossed Sherman a set of keys.
"Bring it back in one piece," he said, turning away. " . . . Good luck. Oh, and don't say anything about this. Francisco said to leave him out of it, so I assume he'll get in trouble if you do."
He left, closing the door. A moment later, the garage opened up, and Ernie walked out, muttering about Francisco and his stupid favors out of nowhere in the middle of the night. He unlocked the driveway gate and slid it on open.
The motorcycle, the Gershwin Pathfinder, was an old, beaten-up bike that some would have called "a piece of junk." To Sherman, however, it was as beautiful as the morning sun—and not just because it was a solution to his problems. The Gershwin bikes had a sort of charm to them that most modern motorcycles didn't. Sure, it was a bit blocky and clunky, and sure, the design was at least 50 years old, but that just added to the appeal. Sherman put on his helmet, gave his thanks to the still-irritated Ernie, and sped down the road towards the edge of the city.
His phone said that the John H Tern National Park was about a half hour away by car. That gave him a solid hour fifteen or so to work with. Good of Francisco to help him out like that.
. . . Actually, speaking of, Francisco, it rather was convenient that Francisco's acquaintance to help out like that. Or . . . or was it convenience? Was there something going on behind the scenes for this Trial? He didn't have the answers. Best not to dwell on such things right now. Focus on completing the task set before him. He gave his thanks to Liberthasia for Francisco's foresight, and soon arrived at the wall.
He immediately realized he had a problem.
The gates to the city were open, which was normal during daytime. However, currently, there was a series of concrete slabs interspaced in such a way as to prevent cars from driving on through. There were a number of guards posted about, but they made no movement to either help or hinder the growing crowd of angry people gathered at the gate, their cars idling before the roadblock.
"What's going on?" Sherman asked, getting off his bike to approach one of the people near the back of the gathering.
The stranger—a woman in a strange, expensive-looking overcoat—turned and regarded him with a dismissive sniff.
"Hey, bud, back off!" another person cut in. Sherman was practically pushed back by one of those shades-wearing security-types he had seen at both the service earlier that day and in the black cars from the day before—the same black cars that seemed to be stopped here now. "And watch who you're talking to!"
"I'm sorry," Sherman said, feeling more confused than apologetic. "Can you tell me what's going on here?"
"Use your eyes, kid. We need to get out of the city, but those dimwits up front won't let us."
"Oh, you're here for the Trials? Are you all Clerics?"
The woman turned back, regarding him again with a far more critical eye. She snorted and walked away. Sherman blinked.
"Oh, so you know about that, do you?" said the man. "Well, for your information—"
"Damian, leave him," said the woman. "Attend me."
"Right away!" the security man said. "All right, kid. Stay out of our way."
The man walked away, leaving Sherman a tad nonplussed. He decided to find someone else to talk to—someone who wasn't wearing a black suit.
He settled on a man wearing a t-shirt and jeans, who seemed rather amused at the spectacle. "Hello, do you know what's going on?"
"Huh? Road's blocked. Why, you got a football game to go to or something?" the man snickered.
"Something like that," Sherman said.
"Wait, for real?" the man said, taken aback. "At this time at night?" He shook his head. "Well, you're out of luck. Those guys set that up this evening. I own the corner store right over there, and I've been keeping an eye on this. Then, strange people showed up, and caused this whole ruckus."
"So they've just . . . been standing there?" Sherman asked. "Can they do that?"
"I don't know," the man said. "I've only seen them part for an ambulance earlier. Other than that, they're not moving."
"Has . . . has anyone tried to get on through?"
The man chuckled. "No, it's mostly just been yelling and shouts. Nobody's tried ramming through the barricade yet."
Sherman thanked him, and the man went back to watching the spectacle. He saw more people—Novitiates, he assumed—arrived, increasing the crowd's volume. The jeers and complaints were even louder now, coming mostly from the security-type people that were at the forefront of everything along with that woman in the fancy coat.
"Let me through," the woman demanded, and, to Sherman's surprise, held out her hand.
There was a brilliant burst of light, blinding him. When he could see again, a long, wicked scythe was in her hands.
"Let me through, or I will go through you and your little blockade," she announced.
Immediately the guards raised their rifles and riot shields and pointed them at her. That got a response from the security men, all who drew pistols and took cover behind their vehicles. Some people screamed and the many in the crowd began to flee.
"Harm the blockade and we'll shoot," said one of the guards.
"Drop the weapon!" one of the security men screamed.
There was a round of shouting, and, blessedly, people calmed down as the Cleric let her scythe disappeared. The guards returned to their neutral position, and the security force responded by marching right on up to the guards and getting in their faces.
Sherman watched as the security people took those insults without flinching. He paused. Those guards weren't doing an awful lot to prevent the security men from getting close to the gate . . . or through. He watched as one marched right on through to yell at another guard on the other side.
He frowned, going back to his motorcycle. Using his Divine Energy-enhanced strength, he lifted, dragged, and maneuvered his motorcycle through the gaps of the blockade. He then merely walked forward and through.
As he did, he glanced to the side. Not one of the guards made a move to stop him. So, he hopped on, turned the vehicle on, and sped down the main road, ignoring the indignant cries of the Cleric behind him.
On and on the road went, going from inner-city street surrounded by tall skyscrapers on all sides to a freeway where the only thing on the horizon was trees, lamp-posts, and the waning moon. As he did, his mind began to drift, thinking about this whole situation he found himself in. He felt proud, somewhat, that he had made it this far, and eager to prove his worth. He felt irritated at being forced to get up so early, and still a little tired after all the travelling he had just did. Yet overall . . . overall he felt overwhelmed, he'd say. Overwhelmed and underprepared.
He had certainly come far since the frightened victim he had been at the beginning of the summer. His Divine Weapon came whenever he called, and activating the Divine Energy that boosted his physical attributes was as easy as breathing. Yet he knew that was far from enough—and, according to Francisco, not even the baseline for what he should be able to do.
So, what exactly was the Order's aim here? What would they do? What of their tests were normal? That barrier certainly wasn't mere coincidence, was it? Surely not. Yet what were they trying to prove by preventing people from participating in the events that they were forced into doing?
Forced, Sherman realized, was the wrong word. It wasn't like he was forced into doing anything. After all, if Francisco was really so certain about his poor odds, he just wouldn't have let him go, presumably. Or, Sherman could have just refused. He was sure there were plenty of Novitiates out there who had simply not taken the test. It's not as if the Order could make them do this.
Right?
Of course not, Sherman chided himself. That's not possible. And even if it was, they're the good guys. They wouldn't do anything like that.
Yet he didn't know if they were. Just because they were a Panthean organization didn't mean that they were free from sin or corruption. As a matter of fact, an argument could be made that such was more likely the larger it got—and that cathedral had been larger than most sports arenas that Sherman had been to.
Once again, he argued back with himself that that didn't mean they were the bad guys. They fought against the Contagion, which Sherman knew firsthand to be vile and reprehensible monsters that deserved eradication. That much was true.
That just proved the point, didn't it? He didn't know. Francisco had been cagey with his information for some reason. He didn't know. He didn't know what kind of organization the Order was outside of their main goal. He didn't know if they adhered to the Panthean tenants of goodness and righteousness as rigidly as they should. He didn't know if they were heroic defenders of humanity or a superhuman branch of the military controlled by a religious leader.
Sherman, right then and there, vowed that he'd do his best to get what answers he could out of Francisco or whatever source he had available to get that information he so desperately needed.
Still deep in thought, he pulled into the turn-off for the National Park. The toll booth gate was up, and there were lights beyond. He followed the dirt road around a mile or so more before pulling into a gravel parking lot. Turning off the bike and kicking out the stand, he rushed on over to the small, motley crowd of oddly-dressed people all gathered under a floodlight just to read a sign that said, "We're sorry for the inconvenience, but the Trials have been cancelled. Thank you understanding."
Sherman stared in stunned silence before shaking his head. No, that couldn't be right. After that entire production earlier that day? After that entire scene at the gate? There's no way it wouldn't be going on! He took off his helmet if just to get a bit of fresh air and quelled the sudden desire to hurl it at the floor. That would make nothing better.
He checked his phone. Nothing since that initial text at 12:01. It was now 1:45, which meant there was an entire half hour to go until the deadline. He would wait it out.
He watched as people began to clump together in groups, muttering and discussing amongst themselves what was going on. A few clustered around the sign, yelling at each other, taking out their phones to send messages, or other various activities that Sherman couldn't quite make out from there.
People arrived in sporadic waves, car or motorcycle tires rolling to a stop on the gravel. Those weren't the only means of transportation—some arrived by bike, skateboard, or even roller skates. One person dropped in from the dark sky via hang glider, landing in the gravel in an impact that startled nearly everyone there. One person made his entrance via parachute, and was caught in the trees before someone cut him down. Sherman began to see just what a Cleric would entail when a rather large drill burst out of the ground, creating a hole through which several Novitiates stepped out.
Sherman didn't know what he had been expecting Clerics to wear, and was therefore was not surprised when they all showed up in raiment from all walks of life and profession. Some wore simple shirts and jeans, others slacks and blouses. There were no shortage of Clerics in rudimentary and ramshackle body armor, from repurposed sports equipment like Sherman to LARP gear to actual tactical loadouts. Military people showed up in their green-and-brown camouflage, looking stiff and prepared, in contrast to the handful of people that had actually shown up in their pajamas.
Yet just as quickly as people arrived did it seem that they, to Sherman's confusion, began to leave. Quite a few of them stormed off, yelling loudly about being dragged all the way out here just to be rejected. Often, they left before Sherman could tell them to wait. He and a few others managed to keep a few sticking around, but even then a few left even after they tried to help.
"So what's going on?"
Sherman turned to see a man in slacks, a button-down collared shirt, and a pair of brown loafers. He was a thin man with a scraggly blonde facial hair and a messy blonde mop. He held himself with the casual ease of someone who had seen danger before and was confident in his ability to survive further.
"Apparently they've cancelled the Trials," Sherman said. He rested his helmet beneath his arm as he nodded towards a man walking away from the lot. "I'm waiting in case there's been a mistake, but some aren't."
"No shot?" the man said. "Why'd they call us all out here, then?"
"Your guess is as good as mine," Sherman said. He extended his hand. "I'm Sherman."
The man shook it in a strong grip. "Roy."
"So I take it you're new to this Cleric . . . business as well?"
"Something like that," Roy said, scratching the back of his head. "Only been around for a few months. Honestly, I don't really know if I should be here, but I guess this is how things roll around here."
"I'm in the same boat," Sherman said.
They made small talk for a little bit, talking about where they each came from and what they did back home. Roy, as it turned out, was only one province away, Quentus. He was something of a private investigator, hired to sniff out disappearances and leads and other such cases.
"I'm afraid it's not as glamorous as the pictures make it seem," Roy apologized sheepishly. "It's a lot of lost personal items or pets. I don't really get the big cases."
At one point they watched as a squadron of black cars pulled on into the lot, seemingly without care if that there were others about. The Novitiate with the scythe Sherman had seen earlier exited her vehicle with practiced, polished grace, standing right in the middle of the square as if the floodlights were exclusively reserved for her.
"I have arrived," she declared loudly, drawing curious eyes as she stood, arms crossed, in that fancy dress of hers. "What other task is there for me to surmount?"
"It's cancelled," someone said.
"What?!" she snapped, rounding on the poor girl and stalking on over to her—an impressive task to accomplish on gravel in heels. "You! Explain what is happening this instance!"
Sherman checked the time as the interrogation went on in the background. Five minutes. It seemed that people had forgotten to leave, morbidly enthralled as the scythe-Novitiate demanded answers from all those around her, shattering the night calm with her commands. He glanced at Roy, who shrugged.
"There's not going to be a fight, is there?" Sherman asked.
"I doubt it," Roy said, though he seemed slightly tense. "Tensions may be high, but we're all Clerics here. That's got to mean something, right?"
As someone stepped in to yell at the woman, which, in turn, caused her to argue back.
Four minutes left.
With a flash, the woman's scythe appeared, and in response, the man's hands were encased in massive metal gauntlets. Sherman and Roy moved forward, preparing to summon their own Divine Weapons, but they paused when a woman in military fatigues and her hair pulled up into a crimson ponytail stepped between them. She pushed them apart, stumbling a bit, offering them a glare and a quiet word that Sherman couldn't hear. After a tense moment, both decided to stand down, de-summoning their Weapons.
Three minutes left.
People quietly talked amongst themselves, whispering both about what had just happened and what was going to happen. There was a palpable tension in the air, thick enough to reach out and touch. Sherman found himself checking his phone more and more frequently. It was if everyone was waiting for something to happen—but what?
Two minutes left.
One minute left.
There was a sudden shout, a rushing wind, and a man vaulted through the trees and slid to a stop in the midst of the parking lot, sending gravel flying. People stepped back, generally avoiding getting splashed. The fancy black car in the middle of the group wasn't so lucky.
"Boy, just made it!" said the young man, seemingly no older than eighteen. His feet were clad in shining, golden shoes, and at his ankles were flaming wings that lost their fire even as Sherman looked. Wait, was something like that was Francisco was talking about? The young man leaned against the car, ignoring the sunglass-wearing security man who popped his head out of the car to berate the man. He breathed heavily, sweat pouring down his brow. "That sure was a long run, you betcha!"
Ten seconds.
"Wait, you ran all the way—" the man with the metal gauntlets started.
"Nearly got lost—"
There was a strange feeling in Sherman's right eye, and suddenly the world went strange. He staggered back, feeling light-headed.
"Hey, you okay?" Roy asked, kneeling down by him.
Sherman saw a circle, faint and transparent, slowly spiral out from the center of the parking lot and expand all the way out past the borders, disappearing past the lot's boundaries. His eyes widened. Was this--?
The clock struck two-thirty. A dozen phones began to vibrate or chime with timers undoubtedly set for this very moment.
"Congratulations," said a dry, bored voice, and suddenly on top of the car appeared a woman in a hoodie, sweats, and fuzzy slippers. She yawned, scrolling on her phone, clearly reading from some sort of prompt. "Blah blah blah, you passed the first test of the Trial, good job, the gods are pleased with you and stuff. Uh, you forfeit all rights of complaint and grievance by staying here, if you want to opt out do so now, yada yada, all that junk." She stifled another yawn. "All right, now's time for your second Trial. Bring a Keystone to an, uh, Altar, find the way out, kill the Contagion, don't go too far in the wilds or you'll be lost forever. Any questions?"
There was a second of silence before she was bombarded by a thousand questions at once.
"What do you mean that was a Trial—"
"What's a Keystone? What's an Altar?"
"Wait, there's Contagion?"
"My rights—"
"Who are you—"
"Great, good luck," the woman said. She snapped her fingers. The strange circle Sherman saw changed from gray to gold, and the world changed.
He stood after tying his shoes to see that there was a note on the bed. On it, an address was listed, and on the back, a message in Francisco's handwriting.
"Go here. Friend of mine. You'll find what you need. Show him this message."
Sherman frowned and tucked the note into his pocket. As he made to grab his motorcycle helmet, he paused as the sound of a car sped on by. It was followed by another, and another.
Wish Francisco had let us borrow a car, Sherman muttered. For some reason, the Cleric hadn't wanted to rent a vehicle from the local airport, insisting that they use public transportation or walk. Sherman grabbed his backpack filled with emergency supplies, stuffed his helmet in what room remained, and left the hotel to take for the streets.
It took about a solid half hour of walking to reach Ernie's Auto Shop on the corner of 35th and B Street. Sherman frowned. The place looked vacated for the evening. The gate was locked, the cars were covered, and all the lights were off—all except one in the top corner.
"Hello?" he called out, shaking the door handle some. To his surprise, the gate wasn't locked after all—it had only appeared like that. He tentatively stepped into the property and crossed the courtyard, wary of dogs or other unseen threats. He knocked on the door, called out once more, and waited. Once again, nothing. He knocked again.
"We're closed! Beat it or I'll shoot!" said a voice.
"Uh," Sherman said, startled. "Are you Ernie? I—"
"I said beat it! I'm not going to warn you twice!" There was the distinct sound of a shotgun being racked.
"Francisco sent me!" Sherman said frantically. Divine powers or no, he was still deathly allergic to bullets of every kind. "He told me to go here!"
There was a pause. "Sparks, this is about that stupid Trials stuff, ain't it?" the voice said.
"Y-yes?"
More cursing, some clattering, a light switched on, and the door opened a hair. Ernie was a short, balding man with a patchy beard and weary expression. Sherman handed him the note, and he peered at it in the yellow light. He opened the door wider, letting Sherman see the shotgun resting on a wall within arm's reach.
"You must be that Sherman guy Francisco's been going on about," he said, looking him up and down. "Football, huh? You really think that's going to help you?"
"I hope so," he said. "I don't know much about this sort of thing, and I wanted every advantage I could get."
Ernie grunted. "Can't blame you. Here. It's for the Gershwin. I'll open the garage for you."
He tossed Sherman a set of keys.
"Bring it back in one piece," he said, turning away. " . . . Good luck. Oh, and don't say anything about this. Francisco said to leave him out of it, so I assume he'll get in trouble if you do."
He left, closing the door. A moment later, the garage opened up, and Ernie walked out, muttering about Francisco and his stupid favors out of nowhere in the middle of the night. He unlocked the driveway gate and slid it on open.
The motorcycle, the Gershwin Pathfinder, was an old, beaten-up bike that some would have called "a piece of junk." To Sherman, however, it was as beautiful as the morning sun—and not just because it was a solution to his problems. The Gershwin bikes had a sort of charm to them that most modern motorcycles didn't. Sure, it was a bit blocky and clunky, and sure, the design was at least 50 years old, but that just added to the appeal. Sherman put on his helmet, gave his thanks to the still-irritated Ernie, and sped down the road towards the edge of the city.
His phone said that the John H Tern National Park was about a half hour away by car. That gave him a solid hour fifteen or so to work with. Good of Francisco to help him out like that.
. . . Actually, speaking of, Francisco, it rather was convenient that Francisco's acquaintance to help out like that. Or . . . or was it convenience? Was there something going on behind the scenes for this Trial? He didn't have the answers. Best not to dwell on such things right now. Focus on completing the task set before him. He gave his thanks to Liberthasia for Francisco's foresight, and soon arrived at the wall.
He immediately realized he had a problem.
The gates to the city were open, which was normal during daytime. However, currently, there was a series of concrete slabs interspaced in such a way as to prevent cars from driving on through. There were a number of guards posted about, but they made no movement to either help or hinder the growing crowd of angry people gathered at the gate, their cars idling before the roadblock.
"What's going on?" Sherman asked, getting off his bike to approach one of the people near the back of the gathering.
The stranger—a woman in a strange, expensive-looking overcoat—turned and regarded him with a dismissive sniff.
"Hey, bud, back off!" another person cut in. Sherman was practically pushed back by one of those shades-wearing security-types he had seen at both the service earlier that day and in the black cars from the day before—the same black cars that seemed to be stopped here now. "And watch who you're talking to!"
"I'm sorry," Sherman said, feeling more confused than apologetic. "Can you tell me what's going on here?"
"Use your eyes, kid. We need to get out of the city, but those dimwits up front won't let us."
"Oh, you're here for the Trials? Are you all Clerics?"
The woman turned back, regarding him again with a far more critical eye. She snorted and walked away. Sherman blinked.
"Oh, so you know about that, do you?" said the man. "Well, for your information—"
"Damian, leave him," said the woman. "Attend me."
"Right away!" the security man said. "All right, kid. Stay out of our way."
The man walked away, leaving Sherman a tad nonplussed. He decided to find someone else to talk to—someone who wasn't wearing a black suit.
He settled on a man wearing a t-shirt and jeans, who seemed rather amused at the spectacle. "Hello, do you know what's going on?"
"Huh? Road's blocked. Why, you got a football game to go to or something?" the man snickered.
"Something like that," Sherman said.
"Wait, for real?" the man said, taken aback. "At this time at night?" He shook his head. "Well, you're out of luck. Those guys set that up this evening. I own the corner store right over there, and I've been keeping an eye on this. Then, strange people showed up, and caused this whole ruckus."
"So they've just . . . been standing there?" Sherman asked. "Can they do that?"
"I don't know," the man said. "I've only seen them part for an ambulance earlier. Other than that, they're not moving."
"Has . . . has anyone tried to get on through?"
The man chuckled. "No, it's mostly just been yelling and shouts. Nobody's tried ramming through the barricade yet."
Sherman thanked him, and the man went back to watching the spectacle. He saw more people—Novitiates, he assumed—arrived, increasing the crowd's volume. The jeers and complaints were even louder now, coming mostly from the security-type people that were at the forefront of everything along with that woman in the fancy coat.
"Let me through," the woman demanded, and, to Sherman's surprise, held out her hand.
There was a brilliant burst of light, blinding him. When he could see again, a long, wicked scythe was in her hands.
"Let me through, or I will go through you and your little blockade," she announced.
Immediately the guards raised their rifles and riot shields and pointed them at her. That got a response from the security men, all who drew pistols and took cover behind their vehicles. Some people screamed and the many in the crowd began to flee.
"Harm the blockade and we'll shoot," said one of the guards.
"Drop the weapon!" one of the security men screamed.
There was a round of shouting, and, blessedly, people calmed down as the Cleric let her scythe disappeared. The guards returned to their neutral position, and the security force responded by marching right on up to the guards and getting in their faces.
Sherman watched as the security people took those insults without flinching. He paused. Those guards weren't doing an awful lot to prevent the security men from getting close to the gate . . . or through. He watched as one marched right on through to yell at another guard on the other side.
He frowned, going back to his motorcycle. Using his Divine Energy-enhanced strength, he lifted, dragged, and maneuvered his motorcycle through the gaps of the blockade. He then merely walked forward and through.
As he did, he glanced to the side. Not one of the guards made a move to stop him. So, he hopped on, turned the vehicle on, and sped down the main road, ignoring the indignant cries of the Cleric behind him.
On and on the road went, going from inner-city street surrounded by tall skyscrapers on all sides to a freeway where the only thing on the horizon was trees, lamp-posts, and the waning moon. As he did, his mind began to drift, thinking about this whole situation he found himself in. He felt proud, somewhat, that he had made it this far, and eager to prove his worth. He felt irritated at being forced to get up so early, and still a little tired after all the travelling he had just did. Yet overall . . . overall he felt overwhelmed, he'd say. Overwhelmed and underprepared.
He had certainly come far since the frightened victim he had been at the beginning of the summer. His Divine Weapon came whenever he called, and activating the Divine Energy that boosted his physical attributes was as easy as breathing. Yet he knew that was far from enough—and, according to Francisco, not even the baseline for what he should be able to do.
So, what exactly was the Order's aim here? What would they do? What of their tests were normal? That barrier certainly wasn't mere coincidence, was it? Surely not. Yet what were they trying to prove by preventing people from participating in the events that they were forced into doing?
Forced, Sherman realized, was the wrong word. It wasn't like he was forced into doing anything. After all, if Francisco was really so certain about his poor odds, he just wouldn't have let him go, presumably. Or, Sherman could have just refused. He was sure there were plenty of Novitiates out there who had simply not taken the test. It's not as if the Order could make them do this.
Right?
Of course not, Sherman chided himself. That's not possible. And even if it was, they're the good guys. They wouldn't do anything like that.
Yet he didn't know if they were. Just because they were a Panthean organization didn't mean that they were free from sin or corruption. As a matter of fact, an argument could be made that such was more likely the larger it got—and that cathedral had been larger than most sports arenas that Sherman had been to.
Once again, he argued back with himself that that didn't mean they were the bad guys. They fought against the Contagion, which Sherman knew firsthand to be vile and reprehensible monsters that deserved eradication. That much was true.
That just proved the point, didn't it? He didn't know. Francisco had been cagey with his information for some reason. He didn't know. He didn't know what kind of organization the Order was outside of their main goal. He didn't know if they adhered to the Panthean tenants of goodness and righteousness as rigidly as they should. He didn't know if they were heroic defenders of humanity or a superhuman branch of the military controlled by a religious leader.
Sherman, right then and there, vowed that he'd do his best to get what answers he could out of Francisco or whatever source he had available to get that information he so desperately needed.
Still deep in thought, he pulled into the turn-off for the National Park. The toll booth gate was up, and there were lights beyond. He followed the dirt road around a mile or so more before pulling into a gravel parking lot. Turning off the bike and kicking out the stand, he rushed on over to the small, motley crowd of oddly-dressed people all gathered under a floodlight just to read a sign that said, "We're sorry for the inconvenience, but the Trials have been cancelled. Thank you understanding."
Sherman stared in stunned silence before shaking his head. No, that couldn't be right. After that entire production earlier that day? After that entire scene at the gate? There's no way it wouldn't be going on! He took off his helmet if just to get a bit of fresh air and quelled the sudden desire to hurl it at the floor. That would make nothing better.
He checked his phone. Nothing since that initial text at 12:01. It was now 1:45, which meant there was an entire half hour to go until the deadline. He would wait it out.
He watched as people began to clump together in groups, muttering and discussing amongst themselves what was going on. A few clustered around the sign, yelling at each other, taking out their phones to send messages, or other various activities that Sherman couldn't quite make out from there.
People arrived in sporadic waves, car or motorcycle tires rolling to a stop on the gravel. Those weren't the only means of transportation—some arrived by bike, skateboard, or even roller skates. One person dropped in from the dark sky via hang glider, landing in the gravel in an impact that startled nearly everyone there. One person made his entrance via parachute, and was caught in the trees before someone cut him down. Sherman began to see just what a Cleric would entail when a rather large drill burst out of the ground, creating a hole through which several Novitiates stepped out.
Sherman didn't know what he had been expecting Clerics to wear, and was therefore was not surprised when they all showed up in raiment from all walks of life and profession. Some wore simple shirts and jeans, others slacks and blouses. There were no shortage of Clerics in rudimentary and ramshackle body armor, from repurposed sports equipment like Sherman to LARP gear to actual tactical loadouts. Military people showed up in their green-and-brown camouflage, looking stiff and prepared, in contrast to the handful of people that had actually shown up in their pajamas.
Yet just as quickly as people arrived did it seem that they, to Sherman's confusion, began to leave. Quite a few of them stormed off, yelling loudly about being dragged all the way out here just to be rejected. Often, they left before Sherman could tell them to wait. He and a few others managed to keep a few sticking around, but even then a few left even after they tried to help.
"So what's going on?"
Sherman turned to see a man in slacks, a button-down collared shirt, and a pair of brown loafers. He was a thin man with a scraggly blonde facial hair and a messy blonde mop. He held himself with the casual ease of someone who had seen danger before and was confident in his ability to survive further.
"Apparently they've cancelled the Trials," Sherman said. He rested his helmet beneath his arm as he nodded towards a man walking away from the lot. "I'm waiting in case there's been a mistake, but some aren't."
"No shot?" the man said. "Why'd they call us all out here, then?"
"Your guess is as good as mine," Sherman said. He extended his hand. "I'm Sherman."
The man shook it in a strong grip. "Roy."
"So I take it you're new to this Cleric . . . business as well?"
"Something like that," Roy said, scratching the back of his head. "Only been around for a few months. Honestly, I don't really know if I should be here, but I guess this is how things roll around here."
"I'm in the same boat," Sherman said.
They made small talk for a little bit, talking about where they each came from and what they did back home. Roy, as it turned out, was only one province away, Quentus. He was something of a private investigator, hired to sniff out disappearances and leads and other such cases.
"I'm afraid it's not as glamorous as the pictures make it seem," Roy apologized sheepishly. "It's a lot of lost personal items or pets. I don't really get the big cases."
At one point they watched as a squadron of black cars pulled on into the lot, seemingly without care if that there were others about. The Novitiate with the scythe Sherman had seen earlier exited her vehicle with practiced, polished grace, standing right in the middle of the square as if the floodlights were exclusively reserved for her.
"I have arrived," she declared loudly, drawing curious eyes as she stood, arms crossed, in that fancy dress of hers. "What other task is there for me to surmount?"
"It's cancelled," someone said.
"What?!" she snapped, rounding on the poor girl and stalking on over to her—an impressive task to accomplish on gravel in heels. "You! Explain what is happening this instance!"
Sherman checked the time as the interrogation went on in the background. Five minutes. It seemed that people had forgotten to leave, morbidly enthralled as the scythe-Novitiate demanded answers from all those around her, shattering the night calm with her commands. He glanced at Roy, who shrugged.
"There's not going to be a fight, is there?" Sherman asked.
"I doubt it," Roy said, though he seemed slightly tense. "Tensions may be high, but we're all Clerics here. That's got to mean something, right?"
As someone stepped in to yell at the woman, which, in turn, caused her to argue back.
Four minutes left.
With a flash, the woman's scythe appeared, and in response, the man's hands were encased in massive metal gauntlets. Sherman and Roy moved forward, preparing to summon their own Divine Weapons, but they paused when a woman in military fatigues and her hair pulled up into a crimson ponytail stepped between them. She pushed them apart, stumbling a bit, offering them a glare and a quiet word that Sherman couldn't hear. After a tense moment, both decided to stand down, de-summoning their Weapons.
Three minutes left.
People quietly talked amongst themselves, whispering both about what had just happened and what was going to happen. There was a palpable tension in the air, thick enough to reach out and touch. Sherman found himself checking his phone more and more frequently. It was if everyone was waiting for something to happen—but what?
Two minutes left.
One minute left.
There was a sudden shout, a rushing wind, and a man vaulted through the trees and slid to a stop in the midst of the parking lot, sending gravel flying. People stepped back, generally avoiding getting splashed. The fancy black car in the middle of the group wasn't so lucky.
"Boy, just made it!" said the young man, seemingly no older than eighteen. His feet were clad in shining, golden shoes, and at his ankles were flaming wings that lost their fire even as Sherman looked. Wait, was something like that was Francisco was talking about? The young man leaned against the car, ignoring the sunglass-wearing security man who popped his head out of the car to berate the man. He breathed heavily, sweat pouring down his brow. "That sure was a long run, you betcha!"
Ten seconds.
"Wait, you ran all the way—" the man with the metal gauntlets started.
"Nearly got lost—"
There was a strange feeling in Sherman's right eye, and suddenly the world went strange. He staggered back, feeling light-headed.
"Hey, you okay?" Roy asked, kneeling down by him.
Sherman saw a circle, faint and transparent, slowly spiral out from the center of the parking lot and expand all the way out past the borders, disappearing past the lot's boundaries. His eyes widened. Was this--?
The clock struck two-thirty. A dozen phones began to vibrate or chime with timers undoubtedly set for this very moment.
"Congratulations," said a dry, bored voice, and suddenly on top of the car appeared a woman in a hoodie, sweats, and fuzzy slippers. She yawned, scrolling on her phone, clearly reading from some sort of prompt. "Blah blah blah, you passed the first test of the Trial, good job, the gods are pleased with you and stuff. Uh, you forfeit all rights of complaint and grievance by staying here, if you want to opt out do so now, yada yada, all that junk." She stifled another yawn. "All right, now's time for your second Trial. Bring a Keystone to an, uh, Altar, find the way out, kill the Contagion, don't go too far in the wilds or you'll be lost forever. Any questions?"
There was a second of silence before she was bombarded by a thousand questions at once.
"What do you mean that was a Trial—"
"What's a Keystone? What's an Altar?"
"Wait, there's Contagion?"
"My rights—"
"Who are you—"
"Great, good luck," the woman said. She snapped her fingers. The strange circle Sherman saw changed from gray to gold, and the world changed.
Chapter 9
The gold light faded, and all of a sudden Sherman found himself in the midst of a forest that seemed straight out of a fairy tale.
He stood amidst a clearing of tall trees that reached up and touched a sky filled with silver stars. The trees themselves were adorned with softly-glowing azure lights that floated amidst the trees like strange bugs or floating balls of gas. Grass, flowers, and bushes filled the clearing, and some of the flowers grew up from the ground in twisting clumps, their spiral stalks ending in a softly-glowing petalled head that reminded Sherman of lilies and roses. Though the trees around him were thick, and the night was dark, he could see the gentle moonlight beaming down in rays, casting long shadows through the trees. A gray mist covered the ground, lazily twisting about in whirling and rippling currents. The mist flowed through into the clearing from farther up a mountainside—for that is what he seemed to be on—and upon on out and down through the trees and the rest of the slope. He could hear the sound of a river and a distant waterfall, the occasional hoot of an owl or caw of raven, and the quiet rustle of a gentle breeze in the high leaves.
The first thing he did was fit his motorcycle helmet on his head before summoning the Impact Richter to his hand. There was a flash, and when it had died down, the softly-glowing hammer shed a gentle light bright enough to see the way forward without too much trouble. Recently, every time he did so, there was a spark of something—a feeling that was there one moment and gone the next. Sherman was certain that had to do with figuring out his Richter's ability. Just . . . how?
He took a deep breath, centering himself. All right. Remember what the woman—clearly a Cleric, clearly a Trial proctor—had said. Find a Keystone and take it to an Altar. Don't get lost. Fight off the Contagion, which were here, apparently.
So. Go forth, slay evil, find his way out. Help his fellow Cleric when needed. He got this.
He clutched his hammer, and strode forward. He could definitely run, climb, and do all sorts of athletics in his gear, but it seemed more prudent to go conserve his energy. He gripped his phone in his other hand, ready to use it as a flashlight—it was just under 70%, as he wasn't able to charge it fully the previous evening, and he didn't want to waste the battery by turning it on when he could navigate by moon and hammer-light. He lifted his helmet's visor so as not to fog it up with his breath and to give him a better field of view, and continued on through what seemed like the least dense of the thicket.
Thanks to the bright moonlight and the gentle glow of the strange things on the trees, it was actually surprisingly easy to make his way through the forest. Furthermore, though it at first seemed like he had ended up in the middle of nowhere, after about twenty minutes' walk he managed to find what seemed to be an overgrown pathway. Briefly regretting the fact that the Impact Richter was not a bladed weapon, he turned towards the path that seemed to go up and continued on his way.
Keystone and Altar . . . Keystone and Altar . . . surely he'd know them, right? He'd have to, or else the teleportation woman would have told him ahead of time. It should be obvious, or at least visible—else how else was he supposed to pass if he was looking for a small car key in the middle of this massive mountain forest? Was that what was expected of him? Was his Divine Weapon's ability supposed to be able to help him in something like that? Was that how the test was set up?
He shivered, the chill of the night air far different from that of the Holy See's. Yes, it must have been teleportation. As a matter of fact, yes—he glanced up at the sky through a gap in the trees and saw, indeed, that the stars appeared different. Not much, but enough for him to confirm that he was far, far away from any help.
He continued his climb up the mountainside. Occasionally, he'd see flashes out of the corner of his eyes, but when he turned they had either died down or were so far in the distance he couldn't make out any of it. Rarely, he would hear a strange sound—it sounded like the pop of gunfire mixed with a musical chime. He adjusted his helmet, lowered his head, and was a bit more cautious after that.
Minutes stretched into hours. The night continued to pass on by. The moon began a slow descent, and Sherman was suddenly struck with the thought that, indeed, they must be a different time zone, given that it had been two thirty where they were previously.
He paused, pushing aside a fern. There—that ledge. That would be a good place to get a lay of the land. Feeling renewed, he jogged on over, scrambling over the rocks to reach the stony outcropping that jutted out of the forest like a ship's prow.
There, he took a moment to breathe. It wasn't particularly difficult work so far, but he had been hiking uphill for over an hour in full sports gear. He sat down on the rock, placing his hammer off to the side. He paused, listening, and when he didn't hear any strange gunshots he took off his helmet and let the gentle breeze cool him down.
After a second he stood, gazing down into the valley. The cloud passed in front of the moon, and suddenly, the entire valley was illuminated with a silver light.
He saw a sea of green trees that seemed to stretch on to no end. Each one reached up and stabbed the black sky with a hundred spear-points. Off in the distance, he could see snow-white peaks of mountaintops rise above the horizon, silhouetted against a trillion tiny pinpricks of light amidst a great, dark canvas. The moon, brilliant even in its half-full state, seemed almost a second sun with the way gleamed. Lazy clouds drifted on past, casting even darker shadows upon the trees.
The forest, though dark, was no less colorful and bright. Colorful floating lights, small and innumerable, rose up from the lowest branches up to near the top. They never made it all the way, vanishing and disappearing before they breached the tips of the trees. A rainbow arch, glowing gently, stretched out from one hillside to the bottom, the endpoints of which Sherman could not see. He saw, around one peak, floating rocks that occasionally sparked blue, and he thought he saw in the distance a flickering red-yellow fire atop a mountain peak.
The trees weren't the only thing living in the forest, Sherman saw. Even on his way up he had seen the occasional squirrel and bird scamper amidst the branches, and at one point he had even seen a bright-eyed wolf trot about. The canine had taken one look at him before deciding to head a different direction, saving Sherman the dishonor of fighting a beast with his Divine Weapon. From his position looking out over the valley, there were few animals he could see, given that the trees were so thick and dense and the distances so great. Yet see creatures he did, from a flock of birds flying in a v-formation to a curious forest cat to a great winged beast perched atop one peak in the far, far distance. Sherman had never seen a creature like that before, not outside of documentaries and his books. He fully intended for that to remain that way.
He did, of course, find what he was looking for. He, in fact, found three strange lights that were out of harmony with the rest of the forest, like a machine next to a pristine lake pond.
The first of those were clearly the Altars. The Altar, which shone a neon pink, was at a relatively close-by mountaintop. From what Sherman could see at his distance, it appeared to be a structure of some sort, nestled in between the sparse trees.
The second one must have been the Keystones. It was hard to parse at first, but he soon realized that there was a certain rhythm and pattern to the lights floating up from the trees. They were bound to a certain area, and operated by their own rules. Some of those lights—all conspicuously in that ruby, magenta color of the Altar—floated a little too high above the treetops to be normal before floating back down and then up again several minutes later.
The third one was a bright flash of light that flared up in the forest. Though he wasn't close enough to hear, they doubtless were accompanied by the strange, unnatural, ethereal sounds of Divine Weapons and the battle-cries of Clerics. One in particular seemed close—close enough that Sherman actually did hear the sound of rustling and movement in the brush.
There was another flash.
He got up, putting his helmet back on and taking Impact Richter once more in hand. The direction was uphill still, but he pulled himself up and off the path he had found into the dense tangle of forest floor. Soon, he began to see flashes of light illuminating tree and branch.
He rounded a tree, and there, in the full light of the moon, stood a woman in the camouflage of a military uniform, cap pulled down low over her head. In her hands was a curved, single-edged saber, which shone with a silver flame. In the shadows of the trees he could see the oily, writhing darkness of what were undoubtedly Contagion.
An anger filled his heart, and he hefted his hammer. They hadn't seen him yet. So, crept closer and closer, his grip tightening on his hammer as he got closer and closer to the Contagion. Almost there—
"Stop!" the woman said suddenly, and at that minute Sherman realized that the Contagion were no longer looking at her. Their pitch-black gazes, those sunken pits in the heads of bloated, winged fish, turned towards him.
For a moment, he was frozen, petrified by that horrible, horrible gaze. Then, the fire of anger in his heart flared, and he snarled. In that moment reason returned to him, and he brought his hammer up and behind—just in time to deflect a lunging bite from a fish-Contagion that had somehow snuck up behind him. Clever things.
With a battle-cry he raised his hammer high and brought it down on the thing's side, and there was a sound like a gong as he drove the flying fish into the loamy soil. It opened its jaws in a wordless scream as the light of Sherman's Impact Richter began to destroy its very essence.
The other Contagion shot towards him like an arrow, but the woman was faster. In what seemed the space of an instant she had crossed the gap between them, and her silver blade flashed in the moonlight, carving twin white arcs in through the darkness. The light faded, and the Contagion fell to the floor, headless and dissolving from the neck.
"Thanks," Sherman said, swinging his hammer on the downed skull of the Contagion. Its strange, masklike face shattered, and soon enough the only Contagion left around them was that in their memories. "I'm Sherman."
"Makinleigh Wallace," said the woman.
In the light of the moon, Sherman got a better look at her. Her crimson hair had been tied up in a ponytail that hung out the back of her cap, and her face—though pretty—was set in a stern scowl that meant serious business. With a flourish, she returned the sword to a sheath that Sherman hadn't realized was at her hip.
"You don't happen to have any of those Keystones, do you?" Sherman asked.
She shook her head, finally returning to look back to Sherman. "No, I do not. I don't know what they look like, nor what the Altar is supposed to, either. Do you?"
Sherman nodded and told her of what he had just seen. After that, she frowned to herself before nodding. "I see. I propose that we work together for the time being."
"I was about to suggest the same thing," Sherman said.
She nodded, and the two were off—the military woman and the man in football pads.
The way into the valley was easy going as Makinleigh's weapon—the Moonstone Dragoon—was able to cut a path through the tangle of brush before them. They advanced slowly, using the light of their weapons to help illuminate their way forward
" . . . So where did you end up?" Sherman asked.
"Lower your voice," Makinleigh said quietly. "Some Contagion hunt by sound."
He nodded, but before he repeat his question, she answered. "Near the top. Be glad you didn't end up on the other side, by the way. It looked even more dangerous than this one."
"Do you think that's what the teleportation woman meant by 'don't stray too far'?"
"Perhaps."
"Do you—"
Suddenly, a roar shattered the silence of the night. Both of them froze, tensing up, before they heard the rushing of wind and shadow passed overhead. The shadow crashed into the trees, and there was a horrendous cracking and popping as dozens of trees bent and broke underneath the weight of . . . something.
Sherman looked at Makinleigh, and he saw the same startled fear that he knew was mirrored in his own face. Yet he saw that fear harden into grim determination, and nodded. Divine Weapon in hand, they charged down towards the threat.
They paused right at the edge of the clearing, hiding behind tree and bush to assess the situation. Sherman peeked around a half-bent log, and nearly dropped the Impact Richter in surprise.
An honest-to-gods dragon was in the middle of the field. Its indigo scales gleamed in the moonlight, its great claws scoured the earth, its leathery wings blotted out the stars, its fire flickered at the edges of its fearsome jaws.
It was also seemingly in terrible pain.
It thrashed around, rolling around and knocking down tree and gouging out chunks of earth with its claws and head. Its bellows were erratic, frantic, and scratchy, unlike the deep, royal bellows that Sherman had heard over video during school.
Then, the light caught something—an oily, writhing darkness that coated the dragon's head like a mass. A white plate hung over one of the dragon's eyes, bearing a black void in the center. The mass seemed to stretch and constrict the dragon, pooling around the fangs and horns and into the jaws.
"It's being attacked by a Contagion!" Sherman said, shocked.
" . . . You're right. Flames," Makinleigh cursed. "I didn't know such things could happen."
"Neither did I," Sherman said.
They stayed there, watching as the Contagion writhed in obvious agony.
"What do we do?" Sherman asked.
"It's suicide to go in there," Makinleigh said. "Wait for the dragon to kill the Contagion, then, when it flies away, we can get that Keystone that's right over there."
She pointed with her sword, and Sherman saw that indeed there was a magenta, crystalline key pressed into the dirt. Indeed, it was far enough away that it was a danger to go and retrieve it. So, they sat there as dragon fought abomination, waiting for the noble beast to triumph over hellish fiend. At least, that's what Makinleigh was certain of. Sherman wasn't. Contagion, after all, seemed to be immune to everything physical. That surely applied to dragons, yes? Could you kill a Contagion with a big enough gun? A hot enough fire? A sharp enough sword?
No, you couldn't. That dragon, sooner or later, would lose. And then—
--and then what?
Sherman blinked, realizing he didn't know what the Contagion did when they killed. After all, Francisco had only mentioned that they killed people. They didn't exactly go after animals, did they? As Sherman watched, he began to feel a similar strange sensation in his right eye.
This sensation again, he thought as his vision blurred for a second. This must be the Eye of Providence. But why now? How? How do I stop this . . . or use it on command? Can I?
For an instant, words flashed across his vision. He instinctively closed his eyes in pain, and when he opened them again, the words were gone. Yet as he did, he realized that some of the words actually stuck out to him.
LESSER INDIGO VALLEY DRAGON, JUVENILE
GREENWHISTLE FERN
HOVERLIGHTS, NATURALLY, OCCURING
PUPPET-TYPE CONTAGION, FAIRY-CLASS
DRAGONFIRE, INDIGO
CRYSTALLINE KEY, ENCHANTED
Those were . . . those were descriptions of what he saw. Was that what the Eye of Providence could do? Tell what things were? If so, could it see through walls? Tell an object's composition? Reveal someone's name he hadn't known before? And how was it in the language he knew? Wasn't this a relic from a bygone age? What did this all mean? How—
Wait. The Contagion was a "Puppet-Type?"
Oh, flames.
"It's trying to control the dragon," Sherman realized. "It's not trying to kill it at all!"
"What? What do you mean? How do you know?"
"I don't know, but that's a Puppet-Type Contagion. That means—"
"—I didn't know there were such things," Makinleigh said, her eyes going wide under her hat. "Is that something they can do? When was my tutor going to tell me about this?"
Sherman was wondering the same thing. He tried to figure out just what to do—
--and the Contagion screamed.
It was the most revolting sound Sherman had ever heard before. It was like a dozen knives scraping on rusted chalkboards, the wailings of a damned woman, and the fears of an abused child. It wavered and echoed, oscillating through the valley, and Sherman felt like he was going to both throw up or remove his eardrums with a power drill—or both at once. Then, blessedly, it stopped.
For a moment, silence, save for the dragon's continued anguish and the sundering of trees. Then, the treetops began to rustle, and accompanied by a strange, chirping chorus, hundreds of inky-black, masked Contagio swarmed out of the leaves. They were in all shapes and sizes, from minute things that resembled froglike snakes to lion-sized beasts that bore the skulls of boars. They leapt, flew, and crawled towards the dragon, passing by Sherman and Makinleigh with nary a second thought. Then, to Sherman's horrified fascination, they dissolved into streams of inky-black matter, strangely still visible in the midnight air, and became as ribbons that melded together and attached themselves to the Puppet-Type. The dragon's face and neck were wrapped with cords of midnight, and what appeared to be a spine rose out of the center of the Contagion's mass, branching out into a dozen different strings that made to wrap around the dragon's wings and limbs. The Contagion's mask was now accompanied by countless others, full- and half-masks running down the dragon's neck and head and snout, each with at least one of those fathomless eyeholes.
"So that's how . . . ." Makinleigh said breathlessly. "Flames, flames, flames and burning light. Hells and damnation."
Sherman took a step back. How? How was he supposed to defeat this? Could he, if he knew his Impact Richter's ability? No, there was no way. Surely the Organization didn't intend for this to be their challenge. There was no way they'd let Contagion roam free and attack other living things unchallenged so that they could later be used as Trial fodder.
Was this why Francisco was upset? Did he know about this?
Sherman stared at the dragon, slowly being taken over by the puppeteer. He felt horrible—but what could he do? It's not like he could charge in there and save the day, especially not without his Divine Weapon at proper power. He'd be getting himself killed. He only had one or two proper kills, and those of clearly low-level brutes. He'd retreat, making sure to get the Keystone when the time was right. Surely the proper Clerics would handle this. As a matter of fact, they'd be here any moment now!
Any moment now!
Any moment now . . . !
Any moment now.
Any moment now . . . .
The dragon howled in anguish, the puppet yanking its jaw at unnatural angles. The mass lifted slightly as the dragon bucket its head, revealing a scarred, bleeding, crying socket where an eye once was.
Professor Dominguez lying in a pool of his own blood—
A furnace blazed to life inside Sherman's chest, and he felt himself snarl. How dare they? How DARE they?! How DARE this corruption be allowed to exist?!
No. No more pain, no more death, no more tears.
Clerics existed to save the innocent from the Contemptible Contagion, to excise their pollution and bring light to the darkness. This dragon didn't do anything to deserve it.
Sherman stood, his hammer now shining brighter than ever before.
"Hey!" Makinleigh snapped, turning to him with a startled look on her face. "What—"
"We're Clerics. We exist to banish the darkness, not run and flee while the innocents suffer," Sherman declared.
"That's a dragon. It can take care of itself—"
"No, it can't. It will die unless I kill the fiend first." His grip tightened painfully on the handle of his hammer. "On my hammer I vow this—I, Sherman, will banish this vile shadow wherever it may lurk. This, I swear."
His heart beat, and Sherman thought the power in him thrummed with excitement.
Makinleigh looked at him, but there must have been something on his face that made her pause. She scowled then sighed. "You're not going to get yourself killed on my watch. We'll do this tactically. Come here."
He bent low, and she whispered something into his ear. After a second, he nodded, his eyes widening. "You—"
"Later," she said. "On my mark."
She flourished her sword, which gleamed coldly with silver moonlight. Sherman's own hammer blazed with a golden glow. He bent down halfway, entering a semi-sprinter's position with his left hand touched down on the dirt.
Three.
Two.
One.
The dragon's cries became choked and it strangled.
"Now!" Makinleigh commanded, and Sherman was off like a bullet, with Makinleigh right beside him.
Divine Energy burned in his veins as he barreled forward at super-Olympic speeds, hurtling into the clearing like a train. One step. Two steps. Three.
He could feel the Contagion's not-eyes swivel and gaze down upon the two Novitiates. Out of the corner of his vision he could see one tendril shape into a mass of something and streak towards them. He leapt forward, but it would be too late. The Contagion would swat him right out of the air.
Makinleigh hurled her sheath up as far as she could, and her Moonstone Dragoon flashed—
--and, suddenly, they were thirty feet in the air, plummeting towards the dragon.
Sherman felt his stomach lurch at the sudden change in direction—but there was no time. No thinking, no reacting, nothing besides doing.
He screamed a primal scream, and he felt the Impact Richter shine as bright as a star.
The hammerhead slammed into the Contagion's spine with the sound of a gong—and, from the point of impact, the air seemed to ripple and shake like a sonic boom. The spine dented, and the dragon's wings jerked as the some of the lines holding it snapped and twisted.
The Novitiates landed on top of the Contagion's mass, their fall broken by the strange, inky anatomy. They immediately went to work, Makinleigh hacking and stabbing as she fought to get to her feet. Sherman rolled off the side, landed on the ground, and swung at another tendril that went right for him. His blow diverted the attack's course, sending it right into the ground—and, to Sherman's astonishment, bits and pieces of the offending limb started to break apart, dissolving into nothing more than night air.
"Look out!" Makinleigh warned, and Sherman turned to see one of the strings that had around the Dragon's neck come alive with a snake's head, lunging towards him. He flinched—
There was a crack of a musical gunshot, and suddenly the snake's head burst apart.
"Clerics! FORWARD!" cried a loud, golden voice.
With a great battle-cry, a dozen Novitiates swarmed out of the trees. Sherman's eyes widened. Of course! They were probably not only been in the area, looking for the Keystone, but also curious about the dragon. Bright weapons—torches in the night, banishing away the dark—were raised, and suddenly instead of fighting a dragon and two strange ants the Contagion was forced to contend with an army that attacked from all sides.
Gunfire rang out from the trees, sniping limbs and tendrils that got too close to Clerics for comfort. From the Puppet-Type's body an inky-black tiger emerged, bearing long fangs and claws the size of branches. Yet it had scarcely left the main mass of the Contagion's body when it was immediately beset up on by a pair of Clerics—one with a scythe made of bones, and the other with two, massive, mechanical fists. The iron fist knocked the Contagion's head back with a vicious uppercut, and the scythe extended, severing the thing's neck. The other fist lashed down, smashing the half-mask it wore.
"I told you to stay out of my way!" the scythe-Cleric snapped, and Sherman realized that she was the same woman he had seen both at the blockade and who had gotten into the fight that Makinleigh had broken up.
"And I told you to stay out of mine!" the gauntlet-Cleric retorted, and Sherman could tell by the voice that it was the one that the Scythe-Cleric was arguing with.
"Not now!" Makinleigh snapped. With a flick of her wrist, she sent her sheath—where had she gotten it back from?—into the air. Her sword came up, drawing a thin blue line of light into the air. That light ballooned out into a circle, and in a smooth motion she thrust her sword through it, the blade reappearing out of a similar circle in midair behind them. The saber pierced a Contagion that had snuck up behind them. The thing squealed soundlessly, and an arrow from the treeline sank into the mask, cracking it in half. The thing went still.
"How dare you speak to me like that—"
"Hey, aren't you the lady from—"
"Later! Focus on the objective!"
The scythe-Cleric looked like she wanted to argue, but gauntlet-Cleric sprinted past her, hurtling a fist into another Contagion. Sherman leapt over him, smashing it into the floor. A tendril whipped towards him in response. The gauntlet-Cleric caught the thing in his massive hands, and with a fearsome war-cry and a herculean pull, ripped the thing in two.
"Fine!" scythe-Cleric said, and casually swung her scythe around once, twice, and then brought it up and down in a vicious overhead. It once again extended—no, not extended. The spine-bones that made up the scythe seemed to grow, making it seem the remains of a strange, long serpent. The blade carved through the last tendrils holding one of the wings, and the dragon's cry of pain turned into a bellow of triumph.
Emboldened by the victory, the Novitiates pressed their attack. A swordsman severed the other tendrils on the other wing, and Makinleigh's portals caught him before he could be swatted out of the air in retaliation. A Cleric with a pole vaulted up and over lashing tendrils, catching someone that had been tossed into the air. That same person proceeded to pivot, summon a machine gun, and fill the side of the Puppet-Type with dozens of bullets. One Cleric was hurling fireball after fireball into the mass of Contagion that were also being trampled under the dragon's feet by this point, and another had climbed up onto a Contagion's back, stabbing it over and over again with a wicked-looking knife.
"It's working," Sherman marveled. "We're doing it!"
The attacks definitely seemed to be doing their job. The dragon, naturally tough, powered through whatever Cleric attacks hit it, instead focusing all its effort into tearing the parasite from off its head. The Puppet-Type lost more and more mass as it recreated more and more of the legion of Contagion that made it, going from covering the entire torso, to the neck and head, to part of its jaws. The dragon even yanked part of it away, finally catching some of it in a lucky bite, and tore the thing in half. It hurled the quivering mass into a waiting sword.
The Puppet-Type screeched once more, its horrible, horrible cry. All cowed, even the dragon, and it unlimbered itself from the head of the beast. It scrambled away, attempting to grow wings and take off.
It didn't get very far. Sherman's hammer slammed into it, and there was a mighty noise as the earth itself shattered under his vengeful blow.
For a moment, there was silence. Then, with a mournful, yet victorious cry, the dragon roared, shooting a jet of indigo-blue fire into the night sky. In that beautiful moment, all were illuminated, basking in the glory of their impossible victory. Then, the dragon took flight, disappearing into the night.
Novitiates collapsed, leaned against their weapons and trees, exhausted. Very few had made it out of that fight unscathed in some way or another. Many had gotten cuts, gashes, and bruises. One had a tree branch sticking out of his leg. Another was limping on a leg that bent the wrong way. There were a few unmoving bodies that people immediately went over to check, worried looks on their faces. Makinleigh herself was sitting down, watching as the argumentative pair re-ignited their disagreement.
Sherman, though—Sherman felt better than he had ever felt in his life. His cuts and bruises didn't hurt, and the rib that he was sure was cracked seemed fine, or numb, or both. His attention was completely on the wonderful sensation that pulsed inside of him, and on the bright, golden hammer in his hands.
As he watched, the light on the hammer faded. It revealed nothing but the same old, gilded, embossed hammer that Sherman had been summoning for the past few months. Nothing had changed.
Yet on the inside something had. Sherman felt a connection that he had only hints of before. He felt an entire wellspring of energy inside him, just waiting to be unleashed. That wasn't all—his hammer now felt far, far stronger than it had before. Those powerful shockwaves, those earth-shattering blows . . . was that his ability? Was that the Impact Richter's true potential?
He felt it. The ability to break, the ability to turn the ground and the air itself into a wave of force . . . that's what he could do.
The Impact Richter, the shockwave hammer.
He stood amidst a clearing of tall trees that reached up and touched a sky filled with silver stars. The trees themselves were adorned with softly-glowing azure lights that floated amidst the trees like strange bugs or floating balls of gas. Grass, flowers, and bushes filled the clearing, and some of the flowers grew up from the ground in twisting clumps, their spiral stalks ending in a softly-glowing petalled head that reminded Sherman of lilies and roses. Though the trees around him were thick, and the night was dark, he could see the gentle moonlight beaming down in rays, casting long shadows through the trees. A gray mist covered the ground, lazily twisting about in whirling and rippling currents. The mist flowed through into the clearing from farther up a mountainside—for that is what he seemed to be on—and upon on out and down through the trees and the rest of the slope. He could hear the sound of a river and a distant waterfall, the occasional hoot of an owl or caw of raven, and the quiet rustle of a gentle breeze in the high leaves.
The first thing he did was fit his motorcycle helmet on his head before summoning the Impact Richter to his hand. There was a flash, and when it had died down, the softly-glowing hammer shed a gentle light bright enough to see the way forward without too much trouble. Recently, every time he did so, there was a spark of something—a feeling that was there one moment and gone the next. Sherman was certain that had to do with figuring out his Richter's ability. Just . . . how?
He took a deep breath, centering himself. All right. Remember what the woman—clearly a Cleric, clearly a Trial proctor—had said. Find a Keystone and take it to an Altar. Don't get lost. Fight off the Contagion, which were here, apparently.
So. Go forth, slay evil, find his way out. Help his fellow Cleric when needed. He got this.
He clutched his hammer, and strode forward. He could definitely run, climb, and do all sorts of athletics in his gear, but it seemed more prudent to go conserve his energy. He gripped his phone in his other hand, ready to use it as a flashlight—it was just under 70%, as he wasn't able to charge it fully the previous evening, and he didn't want to waste the battery by turning it on when he could navigate by moon and hammer-light. He lifted his helmet's visor so as not to fog it up with his breath and to give him a better field of view, and continued on through what seemed like the least dense of the thicket.
Thanks to the bright moonlight and the gentle glow of the strange things on the trees, it was actually surprisingly easy to make his way through the forest. Furthermore, though it at first seemed like he had ended up in the middle of nowhere, after about twenty minutes' walk he managed to find what seemed to be an overgrown pathway. Briefly regretting the fact that the Impact Richter was not a bladed weapon, he turned towards the path that seemed to go up and continued on his way.
Keystone and Altar . . . Keystone and Altar . . . surely he'd know them, right? He'd have to, or else the teleportation woman would have told him ahead of time. It should be obvious, or at least visible—else how else was he supposed to pass if he was looking for a small car key in the middle of this massive mountain forest? Was that what was expected of him? Was his Divine Weapon's ability supposed to be able to help him in something like that? Was that how the test was set up?
He shivered, the chill of the night air far different from that of the Holy See's. Yes, it must have been teleportation. As a matter of fact, yes—he glanced up at the sky through a gap in the trees and saw, indeed, that the stars appeared different. Not much, but enough for him to confirm that he was far, far away from any help.
He continued his climb up the mountainside. Occasionally, he'd see flashes out of the corner of his eyes, but when he turned they had either died down or were so far in the distance he couldn't make out any of it. Rarely, he would hear a strange sound—it sounded like the pop of gunfire mixed with a musical chime. He adjusted his helmet, lowered his head, and was a bit more cautious after that.
Minutes stretched into hours. The night continued to pass on by. The moon began a slow descent, and Sherman was suddenly struck with the thought that, indeed, they must be a different time zone, given that it had been two thirty where they were previously.
He paused, pushing aside a fern. There—that ledge. That would be a good place to get a lay of the land. Feeling renewed, he jogged on over, scrambling over the rocks to reach the stony outcropping that jutted out of the forest like a ship's prow.
There, he took a moment to breathe. It wasn't particularly difficult work so far, but he had been hiking uphill for over an hour in full sports gear. He sat down on the rock, placing his hammer off to the side. He paused, listening, and when he didn't hear any strange gunshots he took off his helmet and let the gentle breeze cool him down.
After a second he stood, gazing down into the valley. The cloud passed in front of the moon, and suddenly, the entire valley was illuminated with a silver light.
He saw a sea of green trees that seemed to stretch on to no end. Each one reached up and stabbed the black sky with a hundred spear-points. Off in the distance, he could see snow-white peaks of mountaintops rise above the horizon, silhouetted against a trillion tiny pinpricks of light amidst a great, dark canvas. The moon, brilliant even in its half-full state, seemed almost a second sun with the way gleamed. Lazy clouds drifted on past, casting even darker shadows upon the trees.
The forest, though dark, was no less colorful and bright. Colorful floating lights, small and innumerable, rose up from the lowest branches up to near the top. They never made it all the way, vanishing and disappearing before they breached the tips of the trees. A rainbow arch, glowing gently, stretched out from one hillside to the bottom, the endpoints of which Sherman could not see. He saw, around one peak, floating rocks that occasionally sparked blue, and he thought he saw in the distance a flickering red-yellow fire atop a mountain peak.
The trees weren't the only thing living in the forest, Sherman saw. Even on his way up he had seen the occasional squirrel and bird scamper amidst the branches, and at one point he had even seen a bright-eyed wolf trot about. The canine had taken one look at him before deciding to head a different direction, saving Sherman the dishonor of fighting a beast with his Divine Weapon. From his position looking out over the valley, there were few animals he could see, given that the trees were so thick and dense and the distances so great. Yet see creatures he did, from a flock of birds flying in a v-formation to a curious forest cat to a great winged beast perched atop one peak in the far, far distance. Sherman had never seen a creature like that before, not outside of documentaries and his books. He fully intended for that to remain that way.
He did, of course, find what he was looking for. He, in fact, found three strange lights that were out of harmony with the rest of the forest, like a machine next to a pristine lake pond.
The first of those were clearly the Altars. The Altar, which shone a neon pink, was at a relatively close-by mountaintop. From what Sherman could see at his distance, it appeared to be a structure of some sort, nestled in between the sparse trees.
The second one must have been the Keystones. It was hard to parse at first, but he soon realized that there was a certain rhythm and pattern to the lights floating up from the trees. They were bound to a certain area, and operated by their own rules. Some of those lights—all conspicuously in that ruby, magenta color of the Altar—floated a little too high above the treetops to be normal before floating back down and then up again several minutes later.
The third one was a bright flash of light that flared up in the forest. Though he wasn't close enough to hear, they doubtless were accompanied by the strange, unnatural, ethereal sounds of Divine Weapons and the battle-cries of Clerics. One in particular seemed close—close enough that Sherman actually did hear the sound of rustling and movement in the brush.
There was another flash.
He got up, putting his helmet back on and taking Impact Richter once more in hand. The direction was uphill still, but he pulled himself up and off the path he had found into the dense tangle of forest floor. Soon, he began to see flashes of light illuminating tree and branch.
He rounded a tree, and there, in the full light of the moon, stood a woman in the camouflage of a military uniform, cap pulled down low over her head. In her hands was a curved, single-edged saber, which shone with a silver flame. In the shadows of the trees he could see the oily, writhing darkness of what were undoubtedly Contagion.
An anger filled his heart, and he hefted his hammer. They hadn't seen him yet. So, crept closer and closer, his grip tightening on his hammer as he got closer and closer to the Contagion. Almost there—
"Stop!" the woman said suddenly, and at that minute Sherman realized that the Contagion were no longer looking at her. Their pitch-black gazes, those sunken pits in the heads of bloated, winged fish, turned towards him.
For a moment, he was frozen, petrified by that horrible, horrible gaze. Then, the fire of anger in his heart flared, and he snarled. In that moment reason returned to him, and he brought his hammer up and behind—just in time to deflect a lunging bite from a fish-Contagion that had somehow snuck up behind him. Clever things.
With a battle-cry he raised his hammer high and brought it down on the thing's side, and there was a sound like a gong as he drove the flying fish into the loamy soil. It opened its jaws in a wordless scream as the light of Sherman's Impact Richter began to destroy its very essence.
The other Contagion shot towards him like an arrow, but the woman was faster. In what seemed the space of an instant she had crossed the gap between them, and her silver blade flashed in the moonlight, carving twin white arcs in through the darkness. The light faded, and the Contagion fell to the floor, headless and dissolving from the neck.
"Thanks," Sherman said, swinging his hammer on the downed skull of the Contagion. Its strange, masklike face shattered, and soon enough the only Contagion left around them was that in their memories. "I'm Sherman."
"Makinleigh Wallace," said the woman.
In the light of the moon, Sherman got a better look at her. Her crimson hair had been tied up in a ponytail that hung out the back of her cap, and her face—though pretty—was set in a stern scowl that meant serious business. With a flourish, she returned the sword to a sheath that Sherman hadn't realized was at her hip.
"You don't happen to have any of those Keystones, do you?" Sherman asked.
She shook her head, finally returning to look back to Sherman. "No, I do not. I don't know what they look like, nor what the Altar is supposed to, either. Do you?"
Sherman nodded and told her of what he had just seen. After that, she frowned to herself before nodding. "I see. I propose that we work together for the time being."
"I was about to suggest the same thing," Sherman said.
She nodded, and the two were off—the military woman and the man in football pads.
The way into the valley was easy going as Makinleigh's weapon—the Moonstone Dragoon—was able to cut a path through the tangle of brush before them. They advanced slowly, using the light of their weapons to help illuminate their way forward
" . . . So where did you end up?" Sherman asked.
"Lower your voice," Makinleigh said quietly. "Some Contagion hunt by sound."
He nodded, but before he repeat his question, she answered. "Near the top. Be glad you didn't end up on the other side, by the way. It looked even more dangerous than this one."
"Do you think that's what the teleportation woman meant by 'don't stray too far'?"
"Perhaps."
"Do you—"
Suddenly, a roar shattered the silence of the night. Both of them froze, tensing up, before they heard the rushing of wind and shadow passed overhead. The shadow crashed into the trees, and there was a horrendous cracking and popping as dozens of trees bent and broke underneath the weight of . . . something.
Sherman looked at Makinleigh, and he saw the same startled fear that he knew was mirrored in his own face. Yet he saw that fear harden into grim determination, and nodded. Divine Weapon in hand, they charged down towards the threat.
They paused right at the edge of the clearing, hiding behind tree and bush to assess the situation. Sherman peeked around a half-bent log, and nearly dropped the Impact Richter in surprise.
An honest-to-gods dragon was in the middle of the field. Its indigo scales gleamed in the moonlight, its great claws scoured the earth, its leathery wings blotted out the stars, its fire flickered at the edges of its fearsome jaws.
It was also seemingly in terrible pain.
It thrashed around, rolling around and knocking down tree and gouging out chunks of earth with its claws and head. Its bellows were erratic, frantic, and scratchy, unlike the deep, royal bellows that Sherman had heard over video during school.
Then, the light caught something—an oily, writhing darkness that coated the dragon's head like a mass. A white plate hung over one of the dragon's eyes, bearing a black void in the center. The mass seemed to stretch and constrict the dragon, pooling around the fangs and horns and into the jaws.
"It's being attacked by a Contagion!" Sherman said, shocked.
" . . . You're right. Flames," Makinleigh cursed. "I didn't know such things could happen."
"Neither did I," Sherman said.
They stayed there, watching as the Contagion writhed in obvious agony.
"What do we do?" Sherman asked.
"It's suicide to go in there," Makinleigh said. "Wait for the dragon to kill the Contagion, then, when it flies away, we can get that Keystone that's right over there."
She pointed with her sword, and Sherman saw that indeed there was a magenta, crystalline key pressed into the dirt. Indeed, it was far enough away that it was a danger to go and retrieve it. So, they sat there as dragon fought abomination, waiting for the noble beast to triumph over hellish fiend. At least, that's what Makinleigh was certain of. Sherman wasn't. Contagion, after all, seemed to be immune to everything physical. That surely applied to dragons, yes? Could you kill a Contagion with a big enough gun? A hot enough fire? A sharp enough sword?
No, you couldn't. That dragon, sooner or later, would lose. And then—
--and then what?
Sherman blinked, realizing he didn't know what the Contagion did when they killed. After all, Francisco had only mentioned that they killed people. They didn't exactly go after animals, did they? As Sherman watched, he began to feel a similar strange sensation in his right eye.
This sensation again, he thought as his vision blurred for a second. This must be the Eye of Providence. But why now? How? How do I stop this . . . or use it on command? Can I?
For an instant, words flashed across his vision. He instinctively closed his eyes in pain, and when he opened them again, the words were gone. Yet as he did, he realized that some of the words actually stuck out to him.
LESSER INDIGO VALLEY DRAGON, JUVENILE
GREENWHISTLE FERN
HOVERLIGHTS, NATURALLY, OCCURING
PUPPET-TYPE CONTAGION, FAIRY-CLASS
DRAGONFIRE, INDIGO
CRYSTALLINE KEY, ENCHANTED
Those were . . . those were descriptions of what he saw. Was that what the Eye of Providence could do? Tell what things were? If so, could it see through walls? Tell an object's composition? Reveal someone's name he hadn't known before? And how was it in the language he knew? Wasn't this a relic from a bygone age? What did this all mean? How—
Wait. The Contagion was a "Puppet-Type?"
Oh, flames.
"It's trying to control the dragon," Sherman realized. "It's not trying to kill it at all!"
"What? What do you mean? How do you know?"
"I don't know, but that's a Puppet-Type Contagion. That means—"
"—I didn't know there were such things," Makinleigh said, her eyes going wide under her hat. "Is that something they can do? When was my tutor going to tell me about this?"
Sherman was wondering the same thing. He tried to figure out just what to do—
--and the Contagion screamed.
It was the most revolting sound Sherman had ever heard before. It was like a dozen knives scraping on rusted chalkboards, the wailings of a damned woman, and the fears of an abused child. It wavered and echoed, oscillating through the valley, and Sherman felt like he was going to both throw up or remove his eardrums with a power drill—or both at once. Then, blessedly, it stopped.
For a moment, silence, save for the dragon's continued anguish and the sundering of trees. Then, the treetops began to rustle, and accompanied by a strange, chirping chorus, hundreds of inky-black, masked Contagio swarmed out of the leaves. They were in all shapes and sizes, from minute things that resembled froglike snakes to lion-sized beasts that bore the skulls of boars. They leapt, flew, and crawled towards the dragon, passing by Sherman and Makinleigh with nary a second thought. Then, to Sherman's horrified fascination, they dissolved into streams of inky-black matter, strangely still visible in the midnight air, and became as ribbons that melded together and attached themselves to the Puppet-Type. The dragon's face and neck were wrapped with cords of midnight, and what appeared to be a spine rose out of the center of the Contagion's mass, branching out into a dozen different strings that made to wrap around the dragon's wings and limbs. The Contagion's mask was now accompanied by countless others, full- and half-masks running down the dragon's neck and head and snout, each with at least one of those fathomless eyeholes.
"So that's how . . . ." Makinleigh said breathlessly. "Flames, flames, flames and burning light. Hells and damnation."
Sherman took a step back. How? How was he supposed to defeat this? Could he, if he knew his Impact Richter's ability? No, there was no way. Surely the Organization didn't intend for this to be their challenge. There was no way they'd let Contagion roam free and attack other living things unchallenged so that they could later be used as Trial fodder.
Was this why Francisco was upset? Did he know about this?
Sherman stared at the dragon, slowly being taken over by the puppeteer. He felt horrible—but what could he do? It's not like he could charge in there and save the day, especially not without his Divine Weapon at proper power. He'd be getting himself killed. He only had one or two proper kills, and those of clearly low-level brutes. He'd retreat, making sure to get the Keystone when the time was right. Surely the proper Clerics would handle this. As a matter of fact, they'd be here any moment now!
Any moment now!
Any moment now . . . !
Any moment now.
Any moment now . . . .
The dragon howled in anguish, the puppet yanking its jaw at unnatural angles. The mass lifted slightly as the dragon bucket its head, revealing a scarred, bleeding, crying socket where an eye once was.
Professor Dominguez lying in a pool of his own blood—
A furnace blazed to life inside Sherman's chest, and he felt himself snarl. How dare they? How DARE they?! How DARE this corruption be allowed to exist?!
No. No more pain, no more death, no more tears.
Clerics existed to save the innocent from the Contemptible Contagion, to excise their pollution and bring light to the darkness. This dragon didn't do anything to deserve it.
Sherman stood, his hammer now shining brighter than ever before.
"Hey!" Makinleigh snapped, turning to him with a startled look on her face. "What—"
"We're Clerics. We exist to banish the darkness, not run and flee while the innocents suffer," Sherman declared.
"That's a dragon. It can take care of itself—"
"No, it can't. It will die unless I kill the fiend first." His grip tightened painfully on the handle of his hammer. "On my hammer I vow this—I, Sherman, will banish this vile shadow wherever it may lurk. This, I swear."
His heart beat, and Sherman thought the power in him thrummed with excitement.
Makinleigh looked at him, but there must have been something on his face that made her pause. She scowled then sighed. "You're not going to get yourself killed on my watch. We'll do this tactically. Come here."
He bent low, and she whispered something into his ear. After a second, he nodded, his eyes widening. "You—"
"Later," she said. "On my mark."
She flourished her sword, which gleamed coldly with silver moonlight. Sherman's own hammer blazed with a golden glow. He bent down halfway, entering a semi-sprinter's position with his left hand touched down on the dirt.
Three.
Two.
One.
The dragon's cries became choked and it strangled.
"Now!" Makinleigh commanded, and Sherman was off like a bullet, with Makinleigh right beside him.
Divine Energy burned in his veins as he barreled forward at super-Olympic speeds, hurtling into the clearing like a train. One step. Two steps. Three.
He could feel the Contagion's not-eyes swivel and gaze down upon the two Novitiates. Out of the corner of his vision he could see one tendril shape into a mass of something and streak towards them. He leapt forward, but it would be too late. The Contagion would swat him right out of the air.
Makinleigh hurled her sheath up as far as she could, and her Moonstone Dragoon flashed—
--and, suddenly, they were thirty feet in the air, plummeting towards the dragon.
Sherman felt his stomach lurch at the sudden change in direction—but there was no time. No thinking, no reacting, nothing besides doing.
He screamed a primal scream, and he felt the Impact Richter shine as bright as a star.
The hammerhead slammed into the Contagion's spine with the sound of a gong—and, from the point of impact, the air seemed to ripple and shake like a sonic boom. The spine dented, and the dragon's wings jerked as the some of the lines holding it snapped and twisted.
The Novitiates landed on top of the Contagion's mass, their fall broken by the strange, inky anatomy. They immediately went to work, Makinleigh hacking and stabbing as she fought to get to her feet. Sherman rolled off the side, landed on the ground, and swung at another tendril that went right for him. His blow diverted the attack's course, sending it right into the ground—and, to Sherman's astonishment, bits and pieces of the offending limb started to break apart, dissolving into nothing more than night air.
"Look out!" Makinleigh warned, and Sherman turned to see one of the strings that had around the Dragon's neck come alive with a snake's head, lunging towards him. He flinched—
There was a crack of a musical gunshot, and suddenly the snake's head burst apart.
"Clerics! FORWARD!" cried a loud, golden voice.
With a great battle-cry, a dozen Novitiates swarmed out of the trees. Sherman's eyes widened. Of course! They were probably not only been in the area, looking for the Keystone, but also curious about the dragon. Bright weapons—torches in the night, banishing away the dark—were raised, and suddenly instead of fighting a dragon and two strange ants the Contagion was forced to contend with an army that attacked from all sides.
Gunfire rang out from the trees, sniping limbs and tendrils that got too close to Clerics for comfort. From the Puppet-Type's body an inky-black tiger emerged, bearing long fangs and claws the size of branches. Yet it had scarcely left the main mass of the Contagion's body when it was immediately beset up on by a pair of Clerics—one with a scythe made of bones, and the other with two, massive, mechanical fists. The iron fist knocked the Contagion's head back with a vicious uppercut, and the scythe extended, severing the thing's neck. The other fist lashed down, smashing the half-mask it wore.
"I told you to stay out of my way!" the scythe-Cleric snapped, and Sherman realized that she was the same woman he had seen both at the blockade and who had gotten into the fight that Makinleigh had broken up.
"And I told you to stay out of mine!" the gauntlet-Cleric retorted, and Sherman could tell by the voice that it was the one that the Scythe-Cleric was arguing with.
"Not now!" Makinleigh snapped. With a flick of her wrist, she sent her sheath—where had she gotten it back from?—into the air. Her sword came up, drawing a thin blue line of light into the air. That light ballooned out into a circle, and in a smooth motion she thrust her sword through it, the blade reappearing out of a similar circle in midair behind them. The saber pierced a Contagion that had snuck up behind them. The thing squealed soundlessly, and an arrow from the treeline sank into the mask, cracking it in half. The thing went still.
"How dare you speak to me like that—"
"Hey, aren't you the lady from—"
"Later! Focus on the objective!"
The scythe-Cleric looked like she wanted to argue, but gauntlet-Cleric sprinted past her, hurtling a fist into another Contagion. Sherman leapt over him, smashing it into the floor. A tendril whipped towards him in response. The gauntlet-Cleric caught the thing in his massive hands, and with a fearsome war-cry and a herculean pull, ripped the thing in two.
"Fine!" scythe-Cleric said, and casually swung her scythe around once, twice, and then brought it up and down in a vicious overhead. It once again extended—no, not extended. The spine-bones that made up the scythe seemed to grow, making it seem the remains of a strange, long serpent. The blade carved through the last tendrils holding one of the wings, and the dragon's cry of pain turned into a bellow of triumph.
Emboldened by the victory, the Novitiates pressed their attack. A swordsman severed the other tendrils on the other wing, and Makinleigh's portals caught him before he could be swatted out of the air in retaliation. A Cleric with a pole vaulted up and over lashing tendrils, catching someone that had been tossed into the air. That same person proceeded to pivot, summon a machine gun, and fill the side of the Puppet-Type with dozens of bullets. One Cleric was hurling fireball after fireball into the mass of Contagion that were also being trampled under the dragon's feet by this point, and another had climbed up onto a Contagion's back, stabbing it over and over again with a wicked-looking knife.
"It's working," Sherman marveled. "We're doing it!"
The attacks definitely seemed to be doing their job. The dragon, naturally tough, powered through whatever Cleric attacks hit it, instead focusing all its effort into tearing the parasite from off its head. The Puppet-Type lost more and more mass as it recreated more and more of the legion of Contagion that made it, going from covering the entire torso, to the neck and head, to part of its jaws. The dragon even yanked part of it away, finally catching some of it in a lucky bite, and tore the thing in half. It hurled the quivering mass into a waiting sword.
The Puppet-Type screeched once more, its horrible, horrible cry. All cowed, even the dragon, and it unlimbered itself from the head of the beast. It scrambled away, attempting to grow wings and take off.
It didn't get very far. Sherman's hammer slammed into it, and there was a mighty noise as the earth itself shattered under his vengeful blow.
For a moment, there was silence. Then, with a mournful, yet victorious cry, the dragon roared, shooting a jet of indigo-blue fire into the night sky. In that beautiful moment, all were illuminated, basking in the glory of their impossible victory. Then, the dragon took flight, disappearing into the night.
Novitiates collapsed, leaned against their weapons and trees, exhausted. Very few had made it out of that fight unscathed in some way or another. Many had gotten cuts, gashes, and bruises. One had a tree branch sticking out of his leg. Another was limping on a leg that bent the wrong way. There were a few unmoving bodies that people immediately went over to check, worried looks on their faces. Makinleigh herself was sitting down, watching as the argumentative pair re-ignited their disagreement.
Sherman, though—Sherman felt better than he had ever felt in his life. His cuts and bruises didn't hurt, and the rib that he was sure was cracked seemed fine, or numb, or both. His attention was completely on the wonderful sensation that pulsed inside of him, and on the bright, golden hammer in his hands.
As he watched, the light on the hammer faded. It revealed nothing but the same old, gilded, embossed hammer that Sherman had been summoning for the past few months. Nothing had changed.
Yet on the inside something had. Sherman felt a connection that he had only hints of before. He felt an entire wellspring of energy inside him, just waiting to be unleashed. That wasn't all—his hammer now felt far, far stronger than it had before. Those powerful shockwaves, those earth-shattering blows . . . was that his ability? Was that the Impact Richter's true potential?
He felt it. The ability to break, the ability to turn the ground and the air itself into a wave of force . . . that's what he could do.
The Impact Richter, the shockwave hammer.
Chapter 10
Roy Blackhorn peeked up from behind the bush he was hiding behind as the last of the dragon's roars finished fading away. He still kept Wilderwest Rose, a silver revolver with light red engravings of rose petals, up at the ready.
"Is it gone?"
He glanced to the side to see a black-haired Tamagahara woman in a green jumpsuit holding a large, six-barreled minigun in both hands. Kotone Takeda looked up nervously from where she gripped her Divine Weapon in a white-knuckled grip.
"I think so," he said. Just in case, though, he waited another minute before rising, helping Kotone up as he did.
The two carefully picked their way through the tangle of woods. Roy used a flashlight to light the way, holding it with his right hand as he kept Rose aimed forward with his left. Behind him, Kotone kept her own gun at the ready, ready to be brought up at a moment's notice.
The pair were lucky, in Roy's opinion. They had found each other practically from the moment they had appeared in this strange place. Though they had nearly shot each other, they both realized that the other wasn't a Contagion, and they easily agreed to work towards the common goal of survival and victory.
"How are you doing on ammunition?" Roy asked suddenly.
There was a rustling sound. "Fine," Kotone said. "I've got enough for now. Do you?"
Mentally, he did some math. The revolver was full, and he had two more speedloaders and some loose bullets in his pockets, so he was fine. Probably.
"I'm good," he said, and they continued on their way, searching for the soft-glowing ruby-magenta color of the Keystones.
It seemed to Roy that Divine Weapons seemed to favor ones that were intended to be used in melee or close-quarters combat. Sure, the very make and material of whatever hallowed, godly metal that the Rose was made of could be used to bludgeon a Contagion to death, and he didn't need to repair it or maintain it like he would with his "mortal" guns. However, any ammunition would need to be provided himself. He'd have to convert each individual bullet into its Divine equivalent using a Technique he was taught. He supposed he was lucky that the Rose was chambered in a relatively cheap bullet size—he couldn't imagine what it would be like if his Divine Weapon was a rocket launcher or something.
Or, worse, he could have had Kotone's Divine Weapon.
All of that being said, he didn't exactly have an unlimited budget, Divine Energy pool, or time, hence why he only had a few dozen bullets on him at this point. He'd have to use his shots wisely. He supposed it would have helped if he had known his Weapon's unique ability, but, alas, he did not. As a matter of fact, not very many people had. There was that person with the drill, and that other guy with the flaming shoes, but he didn't think there were many others.
Roy and Kotone pressed on, stopping every so often in order to listen for approaching Clerics or wildlife or Contagion. The trees were thick, which offered ample cover for both predator and prey. Roy didn't expect to see any animals here after the dragon, but he wasn't about to underestimate the forest.
The gentle glow of the natural tree-lights added enough light to see by, but not enough light that Roy still elected to use his flashlight. He shivered, wondering just how exposed he was, and if the Contagion were tracking his moves, even now.
"What I wouldn't give for some night vision," he muttered.
"Me too," Kotone said. "I wish I had brought my NODs."
He paused, looking back. "You've got some? What kind?"
"PXB-6."
He gave a low whistle. "Now that's a pretty toy, ain't it."
"Tell me about it," she grumbled. "Cost me an arm and a leg, and that was after all the connections I pulled. But it's been worth every penny so far."
"Oh? You an airsofter?"
"Airsoft, hunting, urban exploration, collection, maintenance. Plus, you know. Don't want to be caught blind if someone robs me at night."
He nodded. Hobbyists, it seemed, often had high quality gear relating to their chosen field. It would make sense that Kotone would have the various pieces of tactical gear if she was a hardcore airsofter. At the very least, he didn't have to worry about her freezing up on the battlefield—her earlier performance against the Contagion had proven that.
A sudden rustle, and both Novitiates froze immediately. Roy cursed internally. Why did they have to go running their mouths like that? What, just because all the beasts had been scared away by the dragon meant that there wasn't Contagion around?
They shrank back against a tree, getting low into the ground. They had their weapons up and ready, hearing the rustle get louder and louder—not coming to them, but going past. Roy frowned, risking a peek from behind their improvised cover.
One of the Contemptible Contagion—a lionlike thing with a square head, a jagged white mask, and two shark tails for legs—lumbered on by in a strange, limping gait. Its head was bent low to the ground, sweeping from side to side. Suddenly, it paused, lifting its head up. Roy couldn't see any visible features on the thing, for it seemed to lack eyes or a mouth of any kind. He slowly began to raise the Wilderwest Rose up to a firing position, gently cocking the hammer back into place.
Even as he aimed, it shuffled off, continuing its odd, drunken gait, crashing trees and bushes.
"Taking the shot," Kotone said, already beginning to rev up her minigun's gatling barrel.
"Wait," Roy said. She paused, giving him an inquisitive glance. He frowned. "I've never seen a Contagion act like that before. Have you?"
"No," she said. "But I'm not in the habit of watching monsters."
Roy, however, was. Cleric Novitiate though he may be, he was first and foremost a detective. It was his job to notice strange things, and he did that by watching and listening. He had seen many Contagion in the seven months since he had first gotten that strange dream, and they tended to act either like mindless machines, almost, or feral predators. They didn't stumble about drunkenly and occasionally peer about as if they were afraid someone was following them. In his profession, different meant something was up, and when something was up, bad things were sure to follow.
So, he quietly began to follow, keeping his eyes on the Contagion in front of him and his ears open for any other sounds of Contagion behind or around them. Kotone followed closely behind, clearly nervous but not wanting to be left alone in a strange forest with man-killing monsters. They followed it down the mountain, stopping when it did, starting when it did. Eventually, they saw it break out into a clearing.
Roy held up a hand. He motioned around, and the pair hiked up a hill, still keeping the clearing in sight. They eventually found themselves on a small cliff face, still within cover of tree, looking down at something of a small valley. There, Roy saw several things.
First, he noticed that there were no fewer than two dozen Contagion of all shapes and sizes in the clearing, all misshapen with unnatural angles. All of them had bone-white masks, each with eyes as black as the void of space. He shivered, letting the thrill of fear that struck him every time he saw those eyes pass through him.
Second, he noticed that, perched on a rock out in the open, there was the softly-glowing magenta crystal of a Keystone.
Third, he noticed the dark mass gathered at the base of the lump. He noticed the distinct smell of blood a second later.
Fourth, and most importantly, he noticed the twelve-foot-tall giant of a Contagion crouched at the base of the wall they were above, its gnarled hands outstretched like a conductor leading an orchestra. It, too, had a bone-white mask—and no eyeholes that Roy could see.
"Flames," Kotone swore softly. "What in the—"
"A trap," Roy muttered. He didn't like this. He didn't like this one bit. He immediately checked behind him, afraid to see another giant Contagion reaching down for him and Kotone. He saw nothing except for the quivering shadows of the trees in the faint light.
Think. Take stock of the situation. So the Contagion could think, or at least some of them could. Why wasn't he told about this? Why wasn't he informed? Was that the next step of his training? No, wouldn't it make more sense to tell Novitiates like him of what he was expecting? His teacher wasn't keeping information from him on purpose, was he? No, that wouldn't make sense. So did he not know?
Then again, his teacher had said he wasn't ready. Was that related to this? Was there certain knowledge that was held back from Novitiates to prevent them from being too scared? Or, worse, were they not told for their own safety?
Regardless. They had before them a Contagion that could lead Clerics into traps. That's wasn't too far out of the picture—there were animals that had been known to do the same thing. The real strange thing here was that this giant-looking Contagion, with its long, four-jointed arms and shaggy face, was commanding Contagion that looked nothing like it, save for the fact they all shared the same color mask. At least, he gathered it was a trap. It could be a coincidence that they followed an oddly-acting Contagion to a strange clearing, a coincidence it was making the motions of a puppeteer or a conductor, and a coincidence that this was far enough away from the beaten path that nobody would find them—
--and oh, great, they had broken one of the rules.
So. Options.
The first would be to try to sneak in and grab the Keystone. If he had some kind of lasso or grapple, maybe, but he had neither.
The next would try to kill them all. He had the bullets for it, and was sure he could kill each of the lion-sized Contagion in one shot. The issue was he didn't know how many bullets it would take to kill the big one.
The third option that he could think of in that moment would be to beat a tactical retreat and try to get a Keystone from another location. This seemed to be the wisest option, given that he'd not only never fought this many Contagion before, let alone one of that size, let alone one that could theoretically think.
" . . . Let's get out of here," he muttered.
"Agreed," Kotone said. He turned, and even in the low light he could see that she was as white as a sheet. "I've—I've got a bad feeling about this."
Silently, using every bit of stealth he'd gained from tracking targets and his days in the police force, he silently turned to leave that valley.
Then, and only then, did he hear the cries for help.
"Please! Someone! Anyone! Help!"
The Novitiates froze, and Roy realized, with horror, that what he had assumed to be the body of an animal was in fact a person.
He grit his teeth, turning back. Though he wished that it might have been a mistake—it was not. There was a person out in the middle of that field, a thin, trembling hand outstretched. The Contagion were staring directly at the person, and the giant—
The giant was scanning the treeline, its great, misshapen head swiveling back and forth.
So, it was as he feared. A trap, complete with human bait.
To step foot into such an obvious death sentence would be foolhardy. He'd be doing nobody any good by dying here. The plan didn't change—leave and get help.
And yet.
And yet.
The chance of that person surviving decreased by the second. They would undoubtedly not live through the night.
He glanced at Kotone. She was staring, horrified, down into the valley, her hands clutched in a white-knuckle grip.
Roy stood.
"Hey! What are you doing?! Are you crazy?!" Kotone hissed, reaching up to yank him back down. "We have to—"
"Save him," Roy said softly, hating every moment of it. He wasn't a praying man, but in that moment, he sent a prayer to Liberthasia, to the Unknown Soldier, to the Grim Reaper, to each of whatever gods were listening in turn.
By Light I vow, as I face the dark,
I pray my gun won't miss its mark.
If tonight I must meet my end
I know to Heaven I will ascend.
He smoothly, calmly, raised Wilderwest Rose up, re-thumbing the double-action hammer.
"Kotone," Roy said, "we have to try."
Kotone snarled, opening her mouth to argue, but the words died before they left her lips. A resigned sadness came over her as she stared at her gun. "We do," she bit out, seeming to hate the very notion itself. "Gods, why didn't I just say no?"
"Tell me about it," Roy muttered. "The little ones before the big one?"
"Got it."
"On my mark."
He took a breath, said one last prayer, and leapt into action.
---
Persephone Zakynthos sneered as yet another Contagion fell before her Reaper Necropolis. The skeletal scythe cleaved through their inky black flesh—matter?—like a hot knife through butter, effortlessly parting limb from torso and head from shoulders. That is, if the Contagion had heads and shoulders to cleave. Mostly she just cut them in half. Disgusting things, no more worthy to be cut by her Divine Weapon than the dirt beneath her feet. Yet she did so, even though it was like using a cannon to swat a fly.
She idly glanced at the very manifestation of the light in her soul, the gift from the gods themselves, her very own Necropolis. What a wonderfully macabre, yet unquestioningly divine, form it took! It was truly, truly, a masterpiece of art, of human mortality, yet of unconquering spirit! Those peasants and boors who called it "grotesque" and "unwieldy" could never understand in a million years the holy elegance of the shape of her soul. Why, she could—
"Come on!" roared the tagalong, punching a Contagion into a tree with those massive iron hands of his. His voice grated on her ears, all coarse and rough and way too loud. "Yeah! Take that!"
Now that was a crude Divine Weapon if there ever was one. The twin gauntlets were blocky and ungainly, looking like oversized hockey or soccer gloves than proper weapons befitting a Cleric. There was no elegance, no artistry, none of that spark that made a piece of art . . . well, art. He looked like a cartoon, swinging metal hands around as he pleased, occasionally hurling them at a distant Contagion only for the gauntlet to rebound back to his waiting arm. Ugh. Boorish barbarian.
"Shut up," she said as politely as she could, which, she thought, was much more than he deserved.
Either the brute was deaf (which she suspected) or dumb (equally likely), since he didn't dignify her with the proper response, continuing to yell his strange vocalizations as he brutalized fiend and flora alike. She'd take apologies, she'd take silence, hells, she'd even take witty repartee or the attempt thereof. This baseborn, prude, behavior? No, she couldn't abide that. The sooner she passed the Trial and got away from the brute, the better.
Another Contagion leapt out of the shadows at her, its black jaws open in a silent hiss. She used the momentum from a previous swing to slice it out of the air, letting its black ichor and ebon entrails and whatever else it considered anatomy spill on past her.
A spare inky black drop splattered onto her pristine dress. She felt her eye twitch and her stomach twist in revulsion.
Just where was this Light-blinded Keystone, anyways?
"You'd think we'd run into one by this point," she muttered to herself. With a last flick of her scythe, she cleaned the blade free of any refuse the Contagion might have got on it.
"Huh?"
Oh, now the fool was paying attention?!
"I said," she emphasized, schooling her face to be a calm mask, "that we should have run into a Keystone by this point."
"Keystone?"
Her eye twitched again. "Were you not paying attention to anything that was said?"
"It was kinda hard to? I mean, she showed up, said some stuff, then we were here all of a sudden."
His ears definitely didn't work. "What have do you think we've been doing this entire time?"
"Fighting Contagion, what else? That's what Clerics do."
Not untrue, but she wasn't about to let him score that victory. Instead, she said, "You do know this is a Trial, correct?"
"Uh, yeah? What else would it be?"
Twitch. Twitch. "Very well, let me tell you our objective. We're here to take a Keystone to an Altar and open a way to the next stage of the Trial."
"The dragon wasn't it?" the brute asked, and he had the audacity to be honest.
"Of course not!" she snapped.
"Then why'd it show up?"
A good question. It was one that warranted investigation. After all, the Trials were supposed to be a series of challenges that any sufficiently-capable Novitiate—that is, a Novitiate that had awakened his Divine Weapon, sufficient field experience, and at least one solo Contagion kill—should be capable of doing. Proper, full-on Clerics would have swept the location beforehand, ridding it of all but the most manageable of Contagion that even Novitiates could handle. There were supposed to be proctors watching this whole thing, waiting to disqualify anyone based on improper conduct or rescue Novitiates who were in actual, serious danger.
That is, that's what was supposed to have happened. Instead, they got a dragon and a monster.
She suppressed a shudder. She would never admit this, but even she had been given pause—not fear, no, not fear—when that strange thing had appeared. She was further loathe to admit that it was only after the hammer Novitiate and the portal-saber Novitiate had charged in that she had finally broke past whatever spell it had put on her.
She banished the black memory with a shake of her head. "That's not for us to know. I suspect it's merely a part of the Trial. But the important part is that we need to find Keystones to unlock the way the Altar will present to us."
"Oh, you mean these things?"
"Yes, those—"
She stared as he brought out a brilliant magenta key. "W-whuh—where did you get that?!"
"Oh, I found it," he said.
"Where!?"
"Around," he said, shrugging. "On a tree somewhere. They're all over the place, and I saw people grab 'em, so I figured that I should as well. What, you don't have yours yet?"
Twitch. Twitch. Twitch. "Ugh. Fine. Let's just go find the Altar. It's an azure monument that should be in a clearing—"
Rustle, snap.
"Oh, whoops," said the brute, and in his massive fingers was the Keystone, in two pieces.
Twitch. Twitch. Twitch. Twitch.
Persephone did her best not to scream.
---
Roland Solwarden deactivated Radiant Britannica, the blade of light's vibrant hum ceasing with a snap-hiss. He kept the winged hilt in his hand, though. The Britannica was a strange Divine Weapon, preferring to be kept out whenever possible. He didn't know where a Cleric's weapon was sent to when dismissed, but what he did know was that, for some reason, Britannica occasionally refused to activate shortly after summoning. That had nearly come at a bloody cost at some point.
He turned back to the deactivated Altar gate, the glow from which still hadn't completely faded yet. He hadn't expected the Altar to have an actual keyhole, nor had he expected it to open inwards to bear him to this strange place—the deck of an oil rig, in the middle of a vast, placid ocean. The sun was shining overhead, and though the heat was good after the night's chill, Roland could already tell that it was bound to be scorching hot soon.
Roland took stock of his situation. Clearly, this was the next part of the Trial. Would a proctor come to tell him his task? Later, when more people had arrived? He doubted that he'd have to hunt more Contagion, as surely that fight with the puppet and the dragon had been enough, hadn't it? Presumably, this would test other skills, such as rescuing civilians from danger. He was a Cleric, after all, and that didn't just mean monster hunting.
He didn't see anyone around, so doubtless he would have to venture forth into the bowels of the oil rig to determine his next course of action.
The Altar behind him—placed in the middle of a helicopter landing pad—suddenly thrummed, and Roland bore witness the strange, mind-altering sight of the Altar swinging inwards and away in on itself, leaving only an Altar-shaped hole in reality through which a pair of Clerics stepped.
"Woah," one of them said.
"Where is this place?" said the other.
"We appear to be on an oil rig in the middle of the ocean," Roland supplied helpfully. They turned to face him, slightly startled, and he continued. "Keep your guard up. The next Trial might already be underway."
They did, clutching their Divine Weapons, a coin whip and a glass hand mirror, tightly. Roland kept his lookout as more and more Clerics appeared. By the time a dozen and a half had arrived, the sun had since driven away the chill of the night, and sweat was beginning to form on his brow.
For what seemed to be a half hour the congregation stood there, waiting, wondering, worrying. At long last, then, it seemed like no more would arrive. This is what his teacher was talking about, then, when he had said that though many were called, few would pass the Trials. Roland would not have been surprised if even fewer made it all the way through the Trials to the vaunted rank of Neophyte.
"Hey, Roland," said one of the Novitiates—a thin, reedy woman with an axe twice her size. She tended to drag the thing along the ground, as if she were unable to carry the thing. "I think we found something."
Roland had since sent out several Novitiates to explore the rig as he watched out for any sign of trouble. He had a curious effect on people, in that they just seemed to want to follow his commands. He didn't think it was his Divine Weapon's power, though he could have been wrong. No, this quirk of his life had been around since he was but a young boy. It was only for the grace of the gods and the stern discipline of his father that he had not turned out to be a horrible tyrant.
"Show me," he requested, and was lead away from the helipad to side section of the rig. They passed a beaten-down door bearing a curious indentation and found what appeared to be a stairway leading down into the further depths.
"This stairway should not exist," said a man with a crystal ball that floated above his head. "There's nothing but air and ocean spray on the other side of this wall."
Roland nodded, the hallway to the outside. Indeed, there was nothing but a sheer drop outside of that wall. Upon his return, he asked, "Has anyone gone down the stairs yet?"
"Not yet."
He nodded, and, with a crack-hum, brought the brilliant golden blade of Radiant Britannica to life. It cast a bright glow that bathed the stairs in a yellow light that extended an impossible distance.
"We'll wait for the other scouts to return," Roland said.
The report of the scouts brought back all the confirmation Roland needed. This entire oil rig was abandoned, from the offices to the machine-rooms and mess halls down below. There was nobody, not human nor beast nor Contagion, in sight.
"This is undoubtedly our next Trial," Roland said once everyone was gathered. "I and a team will head down into the darkness first and see the way forward. Then, you all will follow behind when the coast is clear or the order is given."
Roland chose from them a team of Clerics that he gathered might work best with his particular skills—axe and crystal ball, along with a longbow and a pair of short swords. Flanked by his party, and holding Radiant Britannica high, he gave a Cleric instructions on what to do if or when they do not hear word from him, and he descended into the light-devouring abyss that awaited him below.
---
"That light-damned old man," Francisco Camarata snarled as he burst open the doors to the main chamber of Our Lady of the Flames. He ignored the eyes he drew as he marched right on through the massive hall, opening the door to the inner hallways with as much anger as the outside doors.
"Brother Francisco! There you are!"
He ignored Sister Lucille Erhart, not stopping until her delicate hand gently—yet firmly—pulled him aside. The younger Cleric had a concerned look on her face, her lips set in a thin line. "Brother Francisco, what is the matter? Are you all right?"
"I'm going to give His Holiness a piece of my mind," he growled, ignoring the urge to swat his former student's hand from his shoulder.
"This is about the Trial, isn't it?" she asked.
"Of course it is! Who in their right mind—"
"Peace, Brother," she said. "I understand your worries. But everyone's doing what they can right now."
"There's a dragon involved, Lucille! A dragon, and Leveled Contagion!"
Lucille's eyes widened slightly and the color drained from her face. "Leveled? I had heard about the dragon, but . . . ." She shook her head. "Even so. There's nothing we can do right now."
"Like hells there's not. I'm going to—"
"Brother Francisco, please," she said, and there was a note of pleading in her voice. At last, that seemed to give him pause. "I know things are going wrong right now. But you can't go marching on up to the Pope like this! Trust that the people whose job it is to handle the Trials are on it!"
He took a long, frustrated breath, feeling a bit of the anger and fury fade away, revealing a worried tension the had been hiding. "This wasn't supposed to happen."
"No," she agreed, and Francisco saw the same fear in her eyes that he knew were in his. "The Trials this early, Leveled Contagion, dragons, the Pope's odd orders, the new influx of Novitiates—none of it. But isn't that what you taught us? To do what we can with what we can, and not worry about things we can't control?"
"I think this is a completely different situation," he groused, but in his heart he knew she was right. He sighed. "When did you get so wise?"
She smiled slightly. "I'm not wise yet. I'm just repeating some things I once heard—that's all."
He shook his head, taking another deep breath and steadied himself against the temptation to give into sudden weariness. "Right. Was there something you needed from me?"
"Actually, yes," she said. "You should have gotten the orders, but you've been assigned to a mission."
He frowned. "A mission? Me?"
"They're assigning all the senior Clerics they can spare," she said. "I've been assigned elsewhere, or else I'd join you."
"They got you lookin' for me just for that?"
"Yes, when the briefing's already started," she said wryly.
He swore and took off at a brisk limp, pulling out his phone and scrolling through his messages until he found the message.
EMERGENCY ORDER
TO: FRANCISCO CAMARATA
TIME: IMMEDIATELY
BRIEF LOCATION: OUR LADY OF THE FLAMES, 4th FLOOR, JUDE HALL
MISSION TYPE: B-RANK INVESTIGATION
MISSION DETAILS: INVESTIGATE THE ANOMOLOUS INVENTS OF THE ONGOING NOVITIATE TRIALS
He quietly slipped into the back of the briefing room, finding it jam-packed with dozens of Clerics of all types, most of them already geared and armored up.
"Glad you could finally join us, Camarata!" said Archbishop Wallace, a portly-yet-well muscled man with a thin moustache. The room gave a light chuckle. Before Francisco could respond, Wallace immediately turned on the projector and dimmed the lights.
"At 0330 local time our sensors picked up the presence of a Level 2 Fairy-Class Puppeteer Contagion located in the Whitespine Mountains, approximately fifty miles where the current Trial was taking place," Wallace said. "Even as a Team was being sent to take care of the problem, our sensors picked up that it had attempted to commandeer a juvenile indigo lesser dragon. During the ensuing struggle, the pair ended up flying into Glowing Tree Valley, interrupting the ongoing Trial. There have been confirmed injuries."
As he spoke, the projector showed a variety of pictures—the map of the Whitespine Mountains, an image of the Fairy-Class with some technical data, and even a hazy satellite photo of downed trees where the dragon had fallen into Glowing Tree Valley.
Francisco's hand tightened involuntarily. How close was Sherman to this? Was he all right? Was he safe? He could only pray that Sherman was far, far away from there, or, better yet, had been one of the few to advance onto the next stage already. He wasn't ready to face a Leveled Contagion yet. Not yet, especially, not without him knowing his Weapon's ability.
His breath hitched as the next slide revealed another Leveled Contagion—an Ogre-Class Conductor Contagion with the singular, telling eye of a Cyclopes. The fact that there was a Cyclopes in the area was bad news.
Just what in the Light was going on?!
"Furthermore, our sensors have suddenly been alerted to the existence of a number of other Leveled Contagion, including but not limited to a Level 3 Cyclopes, a Level 2 Basilisk, and a Level 5 Landshark," said Wallace, and a mutter ran through the room. "The full list of Leveled Contagion detected has been provide, and is being constantly updated as we get new information. Your mission will be to first retrieve all the Novitiates from the Trial grounds and then to eliminate all the Contagion in this area. You will be serving as backup for the local Chapter of Contagion that have already been dispatched to the area. Any questions?"
"Yeah, just why weren't the Contagion detected before then?" someone asked, echoing Francisco's own thoughts.
"That issue is currently being looked into," said Wallace. "For the meantime, please focus your attention on the mission. Any more questions?"
There were a handful of other questions asked, mostly pertaining to some of the other details of the mission, but most of those details were already in the mission briefing provided. With the questions answered, the Clerics were ushered out of the room to the transportation chambers, where they were teleported in groups over to the local Cleric Chapel in charge of the current mission.
Francisco hated the kind of group teleportation that the Order seemed to favor—that stomach-bending twisting of time and space that was only made worse by his anxiety and worry. This time, however, he was grateful for the speed.
He exited the transportation room—a strange, round chamber, featuring stained-glass murals of the gods set in metal frames that stretched from floor to ceiling—and reported to the Mission Officer. He got his team and where to meet up, and was soon strapped into a transport helicopter along with some Clerics he had never seen before. Soon, they were speeding through the black night to the valley he hoped wasn't a mass grave.
Liberthasia, Jondhoe, whomever is listening. You know I'm not much of a praying man. But please—please let Sherman be all right.
Please.
---
The man in the hat watched as the great ships, laden with bright stars, descended into the valley of lesser lights. He took a step back into the shadows, letting the bright glare of the sun pass him by and over him. He let go of the chain that constricted the muzzle of his dear pet, and, with a bow, disappeared backwards into the night.
"Is it gone?"
He glanced to the side to see a black-haired Tamagahara woman in a green jumpsuit holding a large, six-barreled minigun in both hands. Kotone Takeda looked up nervously from where she gripped her Divine Weapon in a white-knuckled grip.
"I think so," he said. Just in case, though, he waited another minute before rising, helping Kotone up as he did.
The two carefully picked their way through the tangle of woods. Roy used a flashlight to light the way, holding it with his right hand as he kept Rose aimed forward with his left. Behind him, Kotone kept her own gun at the ready, ready to be brought up at a moment's notice.
The pair were lucky, in Roy's opinion. They had found each other practically from the moment they had appeared in this strange place. Though they had nearly shot each other, they both realized that the other wasn't a Contagion, and they easily agreed to work towards the common goal of survival and victory.
"How are you doing on ammunition?" Roy asked suddenly.
There was a rustling sound. "Fine," Kotone said. "I've got enough for now. Do you?"
Mentally, he did some math. The revolver was full, and he had two more speedloaders and some loose bullets in his pockets, so he was fine. Probably.
"I'm good," he said, and they continued on their way, searching for the soft-glowing ruby-magenta color of the Keystones.
It seemed to Roy that Divine Weapons seemed to favor ones that were intended to be used in melee or close-quarters combat. Sure, the very make and material of whatever hallowed, godly metal that the Rose was made of could be used to bludgeon a Contagion to death, and he didn't need to repair it or maintain it like he would with his "mortal" guns. However, any ammunition would need to be provided himself. He'd have to convert each individual bullet into its Divine equivalent using a Technique he was taught. He supposed he was lucky that the Rose was chambered in a relatively cheap bullet size—he couldn't imagine what it would be like if his Divine Weapon was a rocket launcher or something.
Or, worse, he could have had Kotone's Divine Weapon.
All of that being said, he didn't exactly have an unlimited budget, Divine Energy pool, or time, hence why he only had a few dozen bullets on him at this point. He'd have to use his shots wisely. He supposed it would have helped if he had known his Weapon's unique ability, but, alas, he did not. As a matter of fact, not very many people had. There was that person with the drill, and that other guy with the flaming shoes, but he didn't think there were many others.
Roy and Kotone pressed on, stopping every so often in order to listen for approaching Clerics or wildlife or Contagion. The trees were thick, which offered ample cover for both predator and prey. Roy didn't expect to see any animals here after the dragon, but he wasn't about to underestimate the forest.
The gentle glow of the natural tree-lights added enough light to see by, but not enough light that Roy still elected to use his flashlight. He shivered, wondering just how exposed he was, and if the Contagion were tracking his moves, even now.
"What I wouldn't give for some night vision," he muttered.
"Me too," Kotone said. "I wish I had brought my NODs."
He paused, looking back. "You've got some? What kind?"
"PXB-6."
He gave a low whistle. "Now that's a pretty toy, ain't it."
"Tell me about it," she grumbled. "Cost me an arm and a leg, and that was after all the connections I pulled. But it's been worth every penny so far."
"Oh? You an airsofter?"
"Airsoft, hunting, urban exploration, collection, maintenance. Plus, you know. Don't want to be caught blind if someone robs me at night."
He nodded. Hobbyists, it seemed, often had high quality gear relating to their chosen field. It would make sense that Kotone would have the various pieces of tactical gear if she was a hardcore airsofter. At the very least, he didn't have to worry about her freezing up on the battlefield—her earlier performance against the Contagion had proven that.
A sudden rustle, and both Novitiates froze immediately. Roy cursed internally. Why did they have to go running their mouths like that? What, just because all the beasts had been scared away by the dragon meant that there wasn't Contagion around?
They shrank back against a tree, getting low into the ground. They had their weapons up and ready, hearing the rustle get louder and louder—not coming to them, but going past. Roy frowned, risking a peek from behind their improvised cover.
One of the Contemptible Contagion—a lionlike thing with a square head, a jagged white mask, and two shark tails for legs—lumbered on by in a strange, limping gait. Its head was bent low to the ground, sweeping from side to side. Suddenly, it paused, lifting its head up. Roy couldn't see any visible features on the thing, for it seemed to lack eyes or a mouth of any kind. He slowly began to raise the Wilderwest Rose up to a firing position, gently cocking the hammer back into place.
Even as he aimed, it shuffled off, continuing its odd, drunken gait, crashing trees and bushes.
"Taking the shot," Kotone said, already beginning to rev up her minigun's gatling barrel.
"Wait," Roy said. She paused, giving him an inquisitive glance. He frowned. "I've never seen a Contagion act like that before. Have you?"
"No," she said. "But I'm not in the habit of watching monsters."
Roy, however, was. Cleric Novitiate though he may be, he was first and foremost a detective. It was his job to notice strange things, and he did that by watching and listening. He had seen many Contagion in the seven months since he had first gotten that strange dream, and they tended to act either like mindless machines, almost, or feral predators. They didn't stumble about drunkenly and occasionally peer about as if they were afraid someone was following them. In his profession, different meant something was up, and when something was up, bad things were sure to follow.
So, he quietly began to follow, keeping his eyes on the Contagion in front of him and his ears open for any other sounds of Contagion behind or around them. Kotone followed closely behind, clearly nervous but not wanting to be left alone in a strange forest with man-killing monsters. They followed it down the mountain, stopping when it did, starting when it did. Eventually, they saw it break out into a clearing.
Roy held up a hand. He motioned around, and the pair hiked up a hill, still keeping the clearing in sight. They eventually found themselves on a small cliff face, still within cover of tree, looking down at something of a small valley. There, Roy saw several things.
First, he noticed that there were no fewer than two dozen Contagion of all shapes and sizes in the clearing, all misshapen with unnatural angles. All of them had bone-white masks, each with eyes as black as the void of space. He shivered, letting the thrill of fear that struck him every time he saw those eyes pass through him.
Second, he noticed that, perched on a rock out in the open, there was the softly-glowing magenta crystal of a Keystone.
Third, he noticed the dark mass gathered at the base of the lump. He noticed the distinct smell of blood a second later.
Fourth, and most importantly, he noticed the twelve-foot-tall giant of a Contagion crouched at the base of the wall they were above, its gnarled hands outstretched like a conductor leading an orchestra. It, too, had a bone-white mask—and no eyeholes that Roy could see.
"Flames," Kotone swore softly. "What in the—"
"A trap," Roy muttered. He didn't like this. He didn't like this one bit. He immediately checked behind him, afraid to see another giant Contagion reaching down for him and Kotone. He saw nothing except for the quivering shadows of the trees in the faint light.
Think. Take stock of the situation. So the Contagion could think, or at least some of them could. Why wasn't he told about this? Why wasn't he informed? Was that the next step of his training? No, wouldn't it make more sense to tell Novitiates like him of what he was expecting? His teacher wasn't keeping information from him on purpose, was he? No, that wouldn't make sense. So did he not know?
Then again, his teacher had said he wasn't ready. Was that related to this? Was there certain knowledge that was held back from Novitiates to prevent them from being too scared? Or, worse, were they not told for their own safety?
Regardless. They had before them a Contagion that could lead Clerics into traps. That's wasn't too far out of the picture—there were animals that had been known to do the same thing. The real strange thing here was that this giant-looking Contagion, with its long, four-jointed arms and shaggy face, was commanding Contagion that looked nothing like it, save for the fact they all shared the same color mask. At least, he gathered it was a trap. It could be a coincidence that they followed an oddly-acting Contagion to a strange clearing, a coincidence it was making the motions of a puppeteer or a conductor, and a coincidence that this was far enough away from the beaten path that nobody would find them—
--and oh, great, they had broken one of the rules.
So. Options.
The first would be to try to sneak in and grab the Keystone. If he had some kind of lasso or grapple, maybe, but he had neither.
The next would try to kill them all. He had the bullets for it, and was sure he could kill each of the lion-sized Contagion in one shot. The issue was he didn't know how many bullets it would take to kill the big one.
The third option that he could think of in that moment would be to beat a tactical retreat and try to get a Keystone from another location. This seemed to be the wisest option, given that he'd not only never fought this many Contagion before, let alone one of that size, let alone one that could theoretically think.
" . . . Let's get out of here," he muttered.
"Agreed," Kotone said. He turned, and even in the low light he could see that she was as white as a sheet. "I've—I've got a bad feeling about this."
Silently, using every bit of stealth he'd gained from tracking targets and his days in the police force, he silently turned to leave that valley.
Then, and only then, did he hear the cries for help.
"Please! Someone! Anyone! Help!"
The Novitiates froze, and Roy realized, with horror, that what he had assumed to be the body of an animal was in fact a person.
He grit his teeth, turning back. Though he wished that it might have been a mistake—it was not. There was a person out in the middle of that field, a thin, trembling hand outstretched. The Contagion were staring directly at the person, and the giant—
The giant was scanning the treeline, its great, misshapen head swiveling back and forth.
So, it was as he feared. A trap, complete with human bait.
To step foot into such an obvious death sentence would be foolhardy. He'd be doing nobody any good by dying here. The plan didn't change—leave and get help.
And yet.
And yet.
The chance of that person surviving decreased by the second. They would undoubtedly not live through the night.
He glanced at Kotone. She was staring, horrified, down into the valley, her hands clutched in a white-knuckle grip.
Roy stood.
"Hey! What are you doing?! Are you crazy?!" Kotone hissed, reaching up to yank him back down. "We have to—"
"Save him," Roy said softly, hating every moment of it. He wasn't a praying man, but in that moment, he sent a prayer to Liberthasia, to the Unknown Soldier, to the Grim Reaper, to each of whatever gods were listening in turn.
By Light I vow, as I face the dark,
I pray my gun won't miss its mark.
If tonight I must meet my end
I know to Heaven I will ascend.
He smoothly, calmly, raised Wilderwest Rose up, re-thumbing the double-action hammer.
"Kotone," Roy said, "we have to try."
Kotone snarled, opening her mouth to argue, but the words died before they left her lips. A resigned sadness came over her as she stared at her gun. "We do," she bit out, seeming to hate the very notion itself. "Gods, why didn't I just say no?"
"Tell me about it," Roy muttered. "The little ones before the big one?"
"Got it."
"On my mark."
He took a breath, said one last prayer, and leapt into action.
---
Persephone Zakynthos sneered as yet another Contagion fell before her Reaper Necropolis. The skeletal scythe cleaved through their inky black flesh—matter?—like a hot knife through butter, effortlessly parting limb from torso and head from shoulders. That is, if the Contagion had heads and shoulders to cleave. Mostly she just cut them in half. Disgusting things, no more worthy to be cut by her Divine Weapon than the dirt beneath her feet. Yet she did so, even though it was like using a cannon to swat a fly.
She idly glanced at the very manifestation of the light in her soul, the gift from the gods themselves, her very own Necropolis. What a wonderfully macabre, yet unquestioningly divine, form it took! It was truly, truly, a masterpiece of art, of human mortality, yet of unconquering spirit! Those peasants and boors who called it "grotesque" and "unwieldy" could never understand in a million years the holy elegance of the shape of her soul. Why, she could—
"Come on!" roared the tagalong, punching a Contagion into a tree with those massive iron hands of his. His voice grated on her ears, all coarse and rough and way too loud. "Yeah! Take that!"
Now that was a crude Divine Weapon if there ever was one. The twin gauntlets were blocky and ungainly, looking like oversized hockey or soccer gloves than proper weapons befitting a Cleric. There was no elegance, no artistry, none of that spark that made a piece of art . . . well, art. He looked like a cartoon, swinging metal hands around as he pleased, occasionally hurling them at a distant Contagion only for the gauntlet to rebound back to his waiting arm. Ugh. Boorish barbarian.
"Shut up," she said as politely as she could, which, she thought, was much more than he deserved.
Either the brute was deaf (which she suspected) or dumb (equally likely), since he didn't dignify her with the proper response, continuing to yell his strange vocalizations as he brutalized fiend and flora alike. She'd take apologies, she'd take silence, hells, she'd even take witty repartee or the attempt thereof. This baseborn, prude, behavior? No, she couldn't abide that. The sooner she passed the Trial and got away from the brute, the better.
Another Contagion leapt out of the shadows at her, its black jaws open in a silent hiss. She used the momentum from a previous swing to slice it out of the air, letting its black ichor and ebon entrails and whatever else it considered anatomy spill on past her.
A spare inky black drop splattered onto her pristine dress. She felt her eye twitch and her stomach twist in revulsion.
Just where was this Light-blinded Keystone, anyways?
"You'd think we'd run into one by this point," she muttered to herself. With a last flick of her scythe, she cleaned the blade free of any refuse the Contagion might have got on it.
"Huh?"
Oh, now the fool was paying attention?!
"I said," she emphasized, schooling her face to be a calm mask, "that we should have run into a Keystone by this point."
"Keystone?"
Her eye twitched again. "Were you not paying attention to anything that was said?"
"It was kinda hard to? I mean, she showed up, said some stuff, then we were here all of a sudden."
His ears definitely didn't work. "What have do you think we've been doing this entire time?"
"Fighting Contagion, what else? That's what Clerics do."
Not untrue, but she wasn't about to let him score that victory. Instead, she said, "You do know this is a Trial, correct?"
"Uh, yeah? What else would it be?"
Twitch. Twitch. "Very well, let me tell you our objective. We're here to take a Keystone to an Altar and open a way to the next stage of the Trial."
"The dragon wasn't it?" the brute asked, and he had the audacity to be honest.
"Of course not!" she snapped.
"Then why'd it show up?"
A good question. It was one that warranted investigation. After all, the Trials were supposed to be a series of challenges that any sufficiently-capable Novitiate—that is, a Novitiate that had awakened his Divine Weapon, sufficient field experience, and at least one solo Contagion kill—should be capable of doing. Proper, full-on Clerics would have swept the location beforehand, ridding it of all but the most manageable of Contagion that even Novitiates could handle. There were supposed to be proctors watching this whole thing, waiting to disqualify anyone based on improper conduct or rescue Novitiates who were in actual, serious danger.
That is, that's what was supposed to have happened. Instead, they got a dragon and a monster.
She suppressed a shudder. She would never admit this, but even she had been given pause—not fear, no, not fear—when that strange thing had appeared. She was further loathe to admit that it was only after the hammer Novitiate and the portal-saber Novitiate had charged in that she had finally broke past whatever spell it had put on her.
She banished the black memory with a shake of her head. "That's not for us to know. I suspect it's merely a part of the Trial. But the important part is that we need to find Keystones to unlock the way the Altar will present to us."
"Oh, you mean these things?"
"Yes, those—"
She stared as he brought out a brilliant magenta key. "W-whuh—where did you get that?!"
"Oh, I found it," he said.
"Where!?"
"Around," he said, shrugging. "On a tree somewhere. They're all over the place, and I saw people grab 'em, so I figured that I should as well. What, you don't have yours yet?"
Twitch. Twitch. Twitch. "Ugh. Fine. Let's just go find the Altar. It's an azure monument that should be in a clearing—"
Rustle, snap.
"Oh, whoops," said the brute, and in his massive fingers was the Keystone, in two pieces.
Twitch. Twitch. Twitch. Twitch.
Persephone did her best not to scream.
---
Roland Solwarden deactivated Radiant Britannica, the blade of light's vibrant hum ceasing with a snap-hiss. He kept the winged hilt in his hand, though. The Britannica was a strange Divine Weapon, preferring to be kept out whenever possible. He didn't know where a Cleric's weapon was sent to when dismissed, but what he did know was that, for some reason, Britannica occasionally refused to activate shortly after summoning. That had nearly come at a bloody cost at some point.
He turned back to the deactivated Altar gate, the glow from which still hadn't completely faded yet. He hadn't expected the Altar to have an actual keyhole, nor had he expected it to open inwards to bear him to this strange place—the deck of an oil rig, in the middle of a vast, placid ocean. The sun was shining overhead, and though the heat was good after the night's chill, Roland could already tell that it was bound to be scorching hot soon.
Roland took stock of his situation. Clearly, this was the next part of the Trial. Would a proctor come to tell him his task? Later, when more people had arrived? He doubted that he'd have to hunt more Contagion, as surely that fight with the puppet and the dragon had been enough, hadn't it? Presumably, this would test other skills, such as rescuing civilians from danger. He was a Cleric, after all, and that didn't just mean monster hunting.
He didn't see anyone around, so doubtless he would have to venture forth into the bowels of the oil rig to determine his next course of action.
The Altar behind him—placed in the middle of a helicopter landing pad—suddenly thrummed, and Roland bore witness the strange, mind-altering sight of the Altar swinging inwards and away in on itself, leaving only an Altar-shaped hole in reality through which a pair of Clerics stepped.
"Woah," one of them said.
"Where is this place?" said the other.
"We appear to be on an oil rig in the middle of the ocean," Roland supplied helpfully. They turned to face him, slightly startled, and he continued. "Keep your guard up. The next Trial might already be underway."
They did, clutching their Divine Weapons, a coin whip and a glass hand mirror, tightly. Roland kept his lookout as more and more Clerics appeared. By the time a dozen and a half had arrived, the sun had since driven away the chill of the night, and sweat was beginning to form on his brow.
For what seemed to be a half hour the congregation stood there, waiting, wondering, worrying. At long last, then, it seemed like no more would arrive. This is what his teacher was talking about, then, when he had said that though many were called, few would pass the Trials. Roland would not have been surprised if even fewer made it all the way through the Trials to the vaunted rank of Neophyte.
"Hey, Roland," said one of the Novitiates—a thin, reedy woman with an axe twice her size. She tended to drag the thing along the ground, as if she were unable to carry the thing. "I think we found something."
Roland had since sent out several Novitiates to explore the rig as he watched out for any sign of trouble. He had a curious effect on people, in that they just seemed to want to follow his commands. He didn't think it was his Divine Weapon's power, though he could have been wrong. No, this quirk of his life had been around since he was but a young boy. It was only for the grace of the gods and the stern discipline of his father that he had not turned out to be a horrible tyrant.
"Show me," he requested, and was lead away from the helipad to side section of the rig. They passed a beaten-down door bearing a curious indentation and found what appeared to be a stairway leading down into the further depths.
"This stairway should not exist," said a man with a crystal ball that floated above his head. "There's nothing but air and ocean spray on the other side of this wall."
Roland nodded, the hallway to the outside. Indeed, there was nothing but a sheer drop outside of that wall. Upon his return, he asked, "Has anyone gone down the stairs yet?"
"Not yet."
He nodded, and, with a crack-hum, brought the brilliant golden blade of Radiant Britannica to life. It cast a bright glow that bathed the stairs in a yellow light that extended an impossible distance.
"We'll wait for the other scouts to return," Roland said.
The report of the scouts brought back all the confirmation Roland needed. This entire oil rig was abandoned, from the offices to the machine-rooms and mess halls down below. There was nobody, not human nor beast nor Contagion, in sight.
"This is undoubtedly our next Trial," Roland said once everyone was gathered. "I and a team will head down into the darkness first and see the way forward. Then, you all will follow behind when the coast is clear or the order is given."
Roland chose from them a team of Clerics that he gathered might work best with his particular skills—axe and crystal ball, along with a longbow and a pair of short swords. Flanked by his party, and holding Radiant Britannica high, he gave a Cleric instructions on what to do if or when they do not hear word from him, and he descended into the light-devouring abyss that awaited him below.
---
"That light-damned old man," Francisco Camarata snarled as he burst open the doors to the main chamber of Our Lady of the Flames. He ignored the eyes he drew as he marched right on through the massive hall, opening the door to the inner hallways with as much anger as the outside doors.
"Brother Francisco! There you are!"
He ignored Sister Lucille Erhart, not stopping until her delicate hand gently—yet firmly—pulled him aside. The younger Cleric had a concerned look on her face, her lips set in a thin line. "Brother Francisco, what is the matter? Are you all right?"
"I'm going to give His Holiness a piece of my mind," he growled, ignoring the urge to swat his former student's hand from his shoulder.
"This is about the Trial, isn't it?" she asked.
"Of course it is! Who in their right mind—"
"Peace, Brother," she said. "I understand your worries. But everyone's doing what they can right now."
"There's a dragon involved, Lucille! A dragon, and Leveled Contagion!"
Lucille's eyes widened slightly and the color drained from her face. "Leveled? I had heard about the dragon, but . . . ." She shook her head. "Even so. There's nothing we can do right now."
"Like hells there's not. I'm going to—"
"Brother Francisco, please," she said, and there was a note of pleading in her voice. At last, that seemed to give him pause. "I know things are going wrong right now. But you can't go marching on up to the Pope like this! Trust that the people whose job it is to handle the Trials are on it!"
He took a long, frustrated breath, feeling a bit of the anger and fury fade away, revealing a worried tension the had been hiding. "This wasn't supposed to happen."
"No," she agreed, and Francisco saw the same fear in her eyes that he knew were in his. "The Trials this early, Leveled Contagion, dragons, the Pope's odd orders, the new influx of Novitiates—none of it. But isn't that what you taught us? To do what we can with what we can, and not worry about things we can't control?"
"I think this is a completely different situation," he groused, but in his heart he knew she was right. He sighed. "When did you get so wise?"
She smiled slightly. "I'm not wise yet. I'm just repeating some things I once heard—that's all."
He shook his head, taking another deep breath and steadied himself against the temptation to give into sudden weariness. "Right. Was there something you needed from me?"
"Actually, yes," she said. "You should have gotten the orders, but you've been assigned to a mission."
He frowned. "A mission? Me?"
"They're assigning all the senior Clerics they can spare," she said. "I've been assigned elsewhere, or else I'd join you."
"They got you lookin' for me just for that?"
"Yes, when the briefing's already started," she said wryly.
He swore and took off at a brisk limp, pulling out his phone and scrolling through his messages until he found the message.
EMERGENCY ORDER
TO: FRANCISCO CAMARATA
TIME: IMMEDIATELY
BRIEF LOCATION: OUR LADY OF THE FLAMES, 4th FLOOR, JUDE HALL
MISSION TYPE: B-RANK INVESTIGATION
MISSION DETAILS: INVESTIGATE THE ANOMOLOUS INVENTS OF THE ONGOING NOVITIATE TRIALS
He quietly slipped into the back of the briefing room, finding it jam-packed with dozens of Clerics of all types, most of them already geared and armored up.
"Glad you could finally join us, Camarata!" said Archbishop Wallace, a portly-yet-well muscled man with a thin moustache. The room gave a light chuckle. Before Francisco could respond, Wallace immediately turned on the projector and dimmed the lights.
"At 0330 local time our sensors picked up the presence of a Level 2 Fairy-Class Puppeteer Contagion located in the Whitespine Mountains, approximately fifty miles where the current Trial was taking place," Wallace said. "Even as a Team was being sent to take care of the problem, our sensors picked up that it had attempted to commandeer a juvenile indigo lesser dragon. During the ensuing struggle, the pair ended up flying into Glowing Tree Valley, interrupting the ongoing Trial. There have been confirmed injuries."
As he spoke, the projector showed a variety of pictures—the map of the Whitespine Mountains, an image of the Fairy-Class with some technical data, and even a hazy satellite photo of downed trees where the dragon had fallen into Glowing Tree Valley.
Francisco's hand tightened involuntarily. How close was Sherman to this? Was he all right? Was he safe? He could only pray that Sherman was far, far away from there, or, better yet, had been one of the few to advance onto the next stage already. He wasn't ready to face a Leveled Contagion yet. Not yet, especially, not without him knowing his Weapon's ability.
His breath hitched as the next slide revealed another Leveled Contagion—an Ogre-Class Conductor Contagion with the singular, telling eye of a Cyclopes. The fact that there was a Cyclopes in the area was bad news.
Just what in the Light was going on?!
"Furthermore, our sensors have suddenly been alerted to the existence of a number of other Leveled Contagion, including but not limited to a Level 3 Cyclopes, a Level 2 Basilisk, and a Level 5 Landshark," said Wallace, and a mutter ran through the room. "The full list of Leveled Contagion detected has been provide, and is being constantly updated as we get new information. Your mission will be to first retrieve all the Novitiates from the Trial grounds and then to eliminate all the Contagion in this area. You will be serving as backup for the local Chapter of Contagion that have already been dispatched to the area. Any questions?"
"Yeah, just why weren't the Contagion detected before then?" someone asked, echoing Francisco's own thoughts.
"That issue is currently being looked into," said Wallace. "For the meantime, please focus your attention on the mission. Any more questions?"
There were a handful of other questions asked, mostly pertaining to some of the other details of the mission, but most of those details were already in the mission briefing provided. With the questions answered, the Clerics were ushered out of the room to the transportation chambers, where they were teleported in groups over to the local Cleric Chapel in charge of the current mission.
Francisco hated the kind of group teleportation that the Order seemed to favor—that stomach-bending twisting of time and space that was only made worse by his anxiety and worry. This time, however, he was grateful for the speed.
He exited the transportation room—a strange, round chamber, featuring stained-glass murals of the gods set in metal frames that stretched from floor to ceiling—and reported to the Mission Officer. He got his team and where to meet up, and was soon strapped into a transport helicopter along with some Clerics he had never seen before. Soon, they were speeding through the black night to the valley he hoped wasn't a mass grave.
Liberthasia, Jondhoe, whomever is listening. You know I'm not much of a praying man. But please—please let Sherman be all right.
Please.
---
The man in the hat watched as the great ships, laden with bright stars, descended into the valley of lesser lights. He took a step back into the shadows, letting the bright glare of the sun pass him by and over him. He let go of the chain that constricted the muzzle of his dear pet, and, with a bow, disappeared backwards into the night.
Last edited:
- Location
- England
Should be "one".
Thanks! Appreciate it.
Chapter 11
Sherman never found a replacement Keystone. Despite the fact that he and Makinleigh searched what seemed to be the entire forest for it, they were unable to find another Keystone before they were unceremoniously transported back to the clearing where they had left.
"What's going on?" someone—the scythe Novitiate from earlier—demanded. The moment she spoke, a dozen other questions and worries flooded the deep purple and blue morning sky.
"Gathered Novitiates," said a voice like clear crystal, and as commanding as iron. Immediately all fell silent as the bent, thin form of the Pope walked out of the shadows, leaning on his staff, flanked by a half-dozen Clerics in shining, silvery armor.
For a second the Pope looked at the assembled Novitiates. Sherman saw a hardness in the old man's eyes, a burning steel that belied his age. He felt some sort of judgment pass over him along with the pope's bright blue gaze, and as it passed, Sherman was unsure if he had been left wanting. Beside him, Makinleigh had stiffened to attention, her arms clasped rigidly behind her back, her feet shoulder-width apart.
"Gathered Novitiates," said the Pope again, and Sherman unconsciously drew himself up slightly. "It has come to my attention that a number of events had occurred outside of the purview of the Trials. We have been made aware of the dragon incident with the Fairy-Class Puppeteer Contagion as well as a number of other incidents that have occurred within the examination zone boundaries. This incident is currently under investigation by some of our top Clerics."
A murmur ran through the crowd, and Sherman exchanged a frown with Makinleigh. So the Trial had been compromised? That was almost certainly preferable to that being the intended exam, but that came with its own host of problems and implications. Was it an issue of security? Of the exam proctor's negligence? Or . . . was it something else? Sherman took a breath and put those thoughts on hold. Later. The Pope was speaking.
"Some of you may have noticed that we are missing a number of Novitiates that entered the Trial with you. This is no cause for alarm. There have been no deaths amongst your number, and the injured are currently being taken care of. Furthermore, a group has managed to advance to the next stage of the Trials as normal."
The Pope paused before continuing. "In light of these . . . special circumstances, a review will be held of each Novitiate's individual performances. Depending on your actions taken during the first part and your results accomplished, you may move onto the next step, automatically graduate to Neophyte status, need to take a remedial exam to move on, or outright fail this year's Trials. Results will be forthcoming at least before the week's end. The Order can and will provide for any additional fees that might be incurred during this time, and various amenities will be provided during the remainder of the Trials."
He paused once again, glancing out over the Clerics. "With this in mind, if there are any Novitiates that wish to back out now and prepare for next year's Trials, you may do so at this opportunity. This will not be held against you in your future endeavors. If you do wish to discontinue, please inform Brother Prometheus at any point in the week."
He gestured to a Cleric off to his side, who stepped forward and gave a slight bow.
"Finally, please note that some the Cleric tutors who arrived with you will be unavailable for the foreseeable future. They have been called for emergency duty and will return as soon as their task is done. Please be patient. That is all. Once again, Our Lady of the Flames is currently open for amenities and lodging for those who need it. We have provided cars to take you back into town if you so desire."
He cast one last glance out at the enraptured Novitiates. "Go with the grace of the light, my children, and walk in the will of the gods. Good morning to you all."
With that, he was escorted out of the gravel parking lot and into a car that sped off down the road, leaving several armored Clerics and a murmuring crowd of Novitiates in his wake.
"I really hope that everyone turns out all right," Sherman said to Makinleigh when the dust settled.
"I hope the same as well," Makinleigh replied.
They watched as Novitiates began to head to the provided cars which began to take off when enough Clerics had been gathered. A small but significant number of Novitiates had congregated around Brother Prometheus, and all were talking in low tones.
Sherman didn't begrudge them their choice. As a matter of face, he had considered it himself. Francisco had said that he wasn't ready, he had just awakened his Divine Weapon, and the Trials were clearly compromised. It would be a tactically prudent move to take a step back and re-assess the situation.
Yet something pushed Sherman on. There was a small, still voice telling him to press on for just a bit longer, to hold out for just a short bit more.
"Are you going to continue?" Makinleigh asked. Sherman noticed that a slight frown creased her brow as she looked out at Brother Prometheus across the clearing.
"I don't think so," Sherman said, and felt a steely resolve inside him suddenly. "No," he repeated with more certainty. "Though I won't hold it against those who wished to. This is clearly a more dangerous situation than had been promised."
"Poor intel costs lives," Makinleigh agreed. "Though, unfortunately, I must press on as well."
Sherman blinked, surprised. "You wanted to quit?" he asked.
For a split second, Sherman thought Makinleigh's focused and stern had broken, replaced by a startled and frantic visage that seemed out of place on her. Yet just as soon as he had blinked Makinleigh had returned to normal. " . . . I would ask that you don't say anything about this, but . . . yes, the thought did enter my mind."
He shrugged. It wasn't his place to pry, as strange as it may be. "So, what now? Are you heading back?"
"Soon, but I will be staying with my unit at our pre-established location," she said. "So this will be goodbye."
"For now," he said.
She considered that, then nodded. "For now. We still have the rest of the Trials."
They shook hands.
"I hope to see you again soon, Sherman," she said. "May the light of the gods go with you."
With that, she turned and walked away.
Sherman decided to check to see if Roy had made it back. He wandered around, checking here and there, but could not find the other man. A whisper of worry formed in the back of his mind.
"I'm sure he's fine," he said to himself as he got onto his borrowed motorcycle. "He might have gone onto the second round, or he left beforehand. Even if he had gotten injured, there were no deaths, so he's probably fine."
He caught the eye of the gauntlet-using Novitiate who had been paired with the scythe-lady. He gave a wave and got one in return. He gunned the throttle, kicked up the stand, and headed home in the early morning light, still wearing his now-battered football gear.
The rest of the week was slow going for Sherman. He came back to his hotel room to find Francisco gone, with no note or text to tell him where he was going. Figuring he was probably one of the Clerics who were on the emergency mission, he put the matter from his mind.
On Tuesday morning—when the final part of the test was supposed to be—he packed up his things and checked out of the hotel, for their stay only covered that long. He moved his things into one of the Cleric-ready rooms at Our Lady of the Flames. The impressive thing was that they had enough room at the cathedral to give each of the Novitiates there individual rooms without doubling up, even if they had converted a series of offices and boardrooms into impromptu guest houses.
The Gershwin motorcycle, he found, was his to borrow for the week. Ernie had initially wanted it back, but then changed his mind, finding delight in having Francisco "owe him big time" or something similar. Sherman immediately began to feel bad for his mentor. With friends like these and so on.
After a day of rest, he sought out a solitary place at the John H Tern National Park. There, he ran through his exercises, trained, and tried to figure out just what the Impact Richter, the Shockwave Hammer, could do.
He knew instinctively that he could use it to produce shockwaves from the hammer-head. He also knew that there was more to this weapon than he knew at present. So, what next? Was it only the hammer-head that produced shockwaves? Did he have to hold onto the weapon to activate the ability, or could it be triggered remotely? Did each activation "cost" Divine Energy? Did the shockwaves hurt him? Could he selectively choose what he impacted and what he didn't?
He discovered that, as long as he held Impact Richter, he could channel a surge of kinetic energy from his palm. It wasn't quite a ranged technique like a fireball from a videogame, but he wouldn't need to touch his target to deliver a blow. He discovered that if he channeled the shockwave into the hammer before throwing it, it would hold onto the "charge" until impact, and then would remain inert until he touched it again. He discovered that he could also increase the intensity of the shockwave, and, fortunately, he was immune to blowback from his own ability. He was allowed to keep his legs, something he was very grateful for.
He discovered, most of all, that Impact Richter seemed to want to be in motion. It was a strange sensation—not quite a whisper in the back of his mind, but more an impression that was tacked onto the space the hammer's name occupied in his soul. The hammer left rest easy, going into motion at a mere nudge or even what seemed to be the thought of moving. Furthermore, when it going, it was often hard to stop—save for unleashing the generated shockwave upon an unsuspecting tree or section of ground. Sherman had nearly destroyed his motorcycle on one occasion—he had gotten so into swinging the Divine Weapon around and around, finding that he could accumulate more and more force with each motion, he had failed to notice that there was no appropriate place to release the force. He ended up stumbling around, practically carried by the hammer's enthusiasm, smashing a small crater into the floor and knocking over his motorcycle.
That occasion wasn't the first time that Sherman wondered if his Divine Weapon was alive, or psychic, or something similar. It had a name, after all. It seemed to want movement, to rejoice in motion and to loathe inaction. Was this normal for Divine Weapons? They were a manifestation of his soul, weren't they? He didn't exactly think he was a person who needed to be active. Was it based on a part of him long forgotten or an unrealized desire? His love for motorcycles and riding, perhaps? If so, why not be a motorcycle? He could ask Francisco when he got back, but he had the feeling that the Cleric would be no help at all in this area as usual.
Speaking of Divine Energy, he'd probably need to find some sort of teacher for that. The manipulation thereof was an important part in Cleric work, right? He could activate certain artifacts that required it, and he could enhance his physical capabilities, but what about healing? Was that something he could do? Could he summon Liberthasia's flame or her lights? Once more, this was an area that Francisco was seemingly lacking in teaching-wise.
So. To take stock, he was physically strong, fast, and tough, and had a hammer that could generation kinetic force. He was clearly meant for close-quarters combat, to break down defenses and barricades. He was fine with that—eager, even, be it his own enthusiasm or some will of the hammer to shatter obstacles before him. The problem, as he had seen earlier, was that Contagion weren't often content to sit idly by and let him run until he got in range. Plus, there were many that took forms akin to birds or slithering, writhing things that were hard to pin down. So, in order to combat particularly agile or flying Contagion, he'd need to either learn a ranged Divine Energy technique, or to work with another Cleric, or to figure out if his shockwaves could be used at a range, like some kind of special move from an anime.
This, of course, was another are which he needed information. Were Clerics supposed to work together? Alone? One master, one pupil? In squadrons like a military unit? Did Clerics specialize? Was Sherman's job not to be a front-line combatant, but to smash down physical obstacles and tough hides and then get out of the way of heavier firepower? He wasn't supposed to do this all by himself, was he?
So. Once more, his primary issue was information. He could try to blame Francisco all he wanted, but complaining didn't mean anything. If he was to be a proper Cleric, he'd need to take initiative.
That's how Sherman found himself in the library of Our Lady of the Flames after his workout sessions, pouring over any texts vaguely related to the Contagion that he could get his hands. The on-site librarian wasn't able to help him much, for it seemed that even in the Order's home church knowledge about the Contagion was rather limited. He had tried looking up information about the Contagion online or in the church library back home, but aside from maybe one or two articles on a mostly-dead forum from twenty years ago, no information was available. This was the best chance to find out what he could on his own accord.
It took a few days, but in the end he was able to gather a small number of books that pertained to the Contagion—a few journals from Clerics, a study by the Order, and a book comparing Contagion to many beasts and monsters found in the various mythologies and histories from around the world. Interestingly, these seemed to be the only copy of these particular articles in existence. They were neither in his library database or online from what he could tell.
Sherman had slowly started to feel that, even all things considered, this Order business was a tad bigger than he had initially imagined.
The first few journals were from an assortment of Clerics during what was something called "the Great Tribulation." During said Tribulation—which Sherman quickly realized was a euphemism for the first of the Three World Wars—the Contagion spawned in record numbers following a "period of drought." The accounts in the journals lined up with what Sherman knew already—that Contagion appeared more during times and places of strife, such as wars or disasters.
The study by the Order was dry and difficult to get through, using much technical language that Sherman didn't quite understand. What he did glean that the Order had a proper classification system of the Contagion, though that wasn't fully detailed in the document.
The final book, titled "Monsters and Myth: The Unconscious Shadow of the Contagion" was an analysis on how the various identified and recorded Contagion seemed to match up in places with monsters from mythology. Vampires, kelpies, mokele-mbembe, wendigo, kappa, zombies, etc.
Sherman lingered on the wendigo entry—it was a slightly different telling than what he had heard before—before he looked up at a noise.
"Yes?" he asked.
Before him stood a woman of Eastern descent in a pink off-brand tracksuit, partially covered in bandages.
"You're that guy that's been researching Contagion for the past few days, right?" she asked.
A Cleric, then. "I have been, yes," he confirmed. "And you are?"
She gave a small start. "Ah. My apologies," she said politely. "My names is Kotone Takeda. I was hoping you had some information on certain Contagion, Mr. . . . ?"
"Sherman," he said, rising and extending his hand. She glanced down at her hand swaddled in bandages, and Sherman sat right back down, doing his best to ignore the sudden awkwardness. "And I don't know if you'll be able to find what you're looking for. I don't know too much about the Contagion myself."
She swore softly. "Well, thanks anyways," she said, standing back up, her mouth downturned in frustration. "I'll not bother you any more."
"Well, wait a minute," Sherman said. "Don't be too hasty. Just because I don't have the specific information you need doesn't mean that there isn't something here you can't use."
He slid the book on over to her, and Kotone, after a moment of consideration, sat down at the long table he was at and began to read. He initially thought about asking if she needed help with her bandaged arm, but she seemed to be doing all right, and was so engrossed in her research that he didn't feel it right to interrupt.
Over the next few hours, a curious thing happened. Several other Novitiates, some of whom Sherman had seen around previously, came up to them. It seemed that Sherman wasn't the only one who had questions about the Puppeteer Contagion from the Trial. A common theme—in addition to the lack of sufficient training—seemed to be that the Novitiates lacked a great deal of information about the Contagion as a whole. Was that a symptom of the strange circumstances they were clearly in? A normal part of Novitiate training? If so, why? That just seemed like a good way to get your recruits killed.
Sherman had been in charge of organizing study groups for some on the football team back in high school and college ("Sherman, you know what you're doing! Help a brother out!") and thus took up the task of doing the same here. People began to share what they knew about the Contagion, putting together bits and pieces of information they had gathered individually.
The Contemptible Contagion, it seemed, was a catch-all term for the strange creatures formed of an unknown substance that preyed on humans. They could take a variety of forms, most notably resembling a gross caricature of animal parts, but mechanical and object-type shapes had been observed. One thing they all shared was that they would all have some sort of mask on their body. They were classified in both strength and function, as many Contagion had supernatural abilities on top of their existing lethality. The weakest Contagion were called "Unleveled," which were the strongest Contagion that Novitiates were allowed to engage with.
The Contagion were attracted to human emotions and human presence. It wasn't confirmed if they fed on human suffering or strife, but all Contagion were known to go to great lengths to attack humans. Given that their intellect ranged from animalistic to plantlike, this didn't always work out for their best. Nobody knew where Contagion came from or went after an attack, but it was known that Contagion numbers would swell around wars, disasters, and other form of great sociological strife.
The Contagion seemed to be weakened, if not outright repulsed and harmed, by anything related to the Pantheon of Light. This, naturally, was due to the fact that the Pantheon had gathered together in the first place to drive back the Contagion at the world's start. Sherman wasn't too sure on that one, but a number of people present seemed to believe it, so he resolved to ask an authority on that later.
The ten or so Clerics that had formed "The Library Study Group," as some had taken to calling it, were rather disappointed that they didn't seem to have much more information on the Contagion outside of hearsay and rumors. With that subject as exhausted as it could be at that moment, they turned their eyes onto other subjects to collaborate on—namely, the issue of Divine Weapons. Everyone there was able to manifest their Weapon, but only about six of them were able to use their unique abilities that the Weapons bore with them. Furthermore, all were lacking in experience using said abilities, as most had awoken their abilities right before or during the Trials. So, at Sherman's advice and leading, they all gathered back at the National Park to test their abilities, to experiment, and to train.
All of them, save Sherman, who had been called to Our Lady of the Flames for a personal meeting with the Pope.
"What's going on?" someone—the scythe Novitiate from earlier—demanded. The moment she spoke, a dozen other questions and worries flooded the deep purple and blue morning sky.
"Gathered Novitiates," said a voice like clear crystal, and as commanding as iron. Immediately all fell silent as the bent, thin form of the Pope walked out of the shadows, leaning on his staff, flanked by a half-dozen Clerics in shining, silvery armor.
For a second the Pope looked at the assembled Novitiates. Sherman saw a hardness in the old man's eyes, a burning steel that belied his age. He felt some sort of judgment pass over him along with the pope's bright blue gaze, and as it passed, Sherman was unsure if he had been left wanting. Beside him, Makinleigh had stiffened to attention, her arms clasped rigidly behind her back, her feet shoulder-width apart.
"Gathered Novitiates," said the Pope again, and Sherman unconsciously drew himself up slightly. "It has come to my attention that a number of events had occurred outside of the purview of the Trials. We have been made aware of the dragon incident with the Fairy-Class Puppeteer Contagion as well as a number of other incidents that have occurred within the examination zone boundaries. This incident is currently under investigation by some of our top Clerics."
A murmur ran through the crowd, and Sherman exchanged a frown with Makinleigh. So the Trial had been compromised? That was almost certainly preferable to that being the intended exam, but that came with its own host of problems and implications. Was it an issue of security? Of the exam proctor's negligence? Or . . . was it something else? Sherman took a breath and put those thoughts on hold. Later. The Pope was speaking.
"Some of you may have noticed that we are missing a number of Novitiates that entered the Trial with you. This is no cause for alarm. There have been no deaths amongst your number, and the injured are currently being taken care of. Furthermore, a group has managed to advance to the next stage of the Trials as normal."
The Pope paused before continuing. "In light of these . . . special circumstances, a review will be held of each Novitiate's individual performances. Depending on your actions taken during the first part and your results accomplished, you may move onto the next step, automatically graduate to Neophyte status, need to take a remedial exam to move on, or outright fail this year's Trials. Results will be forthcoming at least before the week's end. The Order can and will provide for any additional fees that might be incurred during this time, and various amenities will be provided during the remainder of the Trials."
He paused once again, glancing out over the Clerics. "With this in mind, if there are any Novitiates that wish to back out now and prepare for next year's Trials, you may do so at this opportunity. This will not be held against you in your future endeavors. If you do wish to discontinue, please inform Brother Prometheus at any point in the week."
He gestured to a Cleric off to his side, who stepped forward and gave a slight bow.
"Finally, please note that some the Cleric tutors who arrived with you will be unavailable for the foreseeable future. They have been called for emergency duty and will return as soon as their task is done. Please be patient. That is all. Once again, Our Lady of the Flames is currently open for amenities and lodging for those who need it. We have provided cars to take you back into town if you so desire."
He cast one last glance out at the enraptured Novitiates. "Go with the grace of the light, my children, and walk in the will of the gods. Good morning to you all."
With that, he was escorted out of the gravel parking lot and into a car that sped off down the road, leaving several armored Clerics and a murmuring crowd of Novitiates in his wake.
"I really hope that everyone turns out all right," Sherman said to Makinleigh when the dust settled.
"I hope the same as well," Makinleigh replied.
They watched as Novitiates began to head to the provided cars which began to take off when enough Clerics had been gathered. A small but significant number of Novitiates had congregated around Brother Prometheus, and all were talking in low tones.
Sherman didn't begrudge them their choice. As a matter of face, he had considered it himself. Francisco had said that he wasn't ready, he had just awakened his Divine Weapon, and the Trials were clearly compromised. It would be a tactically prudent move to take a step back and re-assess the situation.
Yet something pushed Sherman on. There was a small, still voice telling him to press on for just a bit longer, to hold out for just a short bit more.
"Are you going to continue?" Makinleigh asked. Sherman noticed that a slight frown creased her brow as she looked out at Brother Prometheus across the clearing.
"I don't think so," Sherman said, and felt a steely resolve inside him suddenly. "No," he repeated with more certainty. "Though I won't hold it against those who wished to. This is clearly a more dangerous situation than had been promised."
"Poor intel costs lives," Makinleigh agreed. "Though, unfortunately, I must press on as well."
Sherman blinked, surprised. "You wanted to quit?" he asked.
For a split second, Sherman thought Makinleigh's focused and stern had broken, replaced by a startled and frantic visage that seemed out of place on her. Yet just as soon as he had blinked Makinleigh had returned to normal. " . . . I would ask that you don't say anything about this, but . . . yes, the thought did enter my mind."
He shrugged. It wasn't his place to pry, as strange as it may be. "So, what now? Are you heading back?"
"Soon, but I will be staying with my unit at our pre-established location," she said. "So this will be goodbye."
"For now," he said.
She considered that, then nodded. "For now. We still have the rest of the Trials."
They shook hands.
"I hope to see you again soon, Sherman," she said. "May the light of the gods go with you."
With that, she turned and walked away.
Sherman decided to check to see if Roy had made it back. He wandered around, checking here and there, but could not find the other man. A whisper of worry formed in the back of his mind.
"I'm sure he's fine," he said to himself as he got onto his borrowed motorcycle. "He might have gone onto the second round, or he left beforehand. Even if he had gotten injured, there were no deaths, so he's probably fine."
He caught the eye of the gauntlet-using Novitiate who had been paired with the scythe-lady. He gave a wave and got one in return. He gunned the throttle, kicked up the stand, and headed home in the early morning light, still wearing his now-battered football gear.
The rest of the week was slow going for Sherman. He came back to his hotel room to find Francisco gone, with no note or text to tell him where he was going. Figuring he was probably one of the Clerics who were on the emergency mission, he put the matter from his mind.
On Tuesday morning—when the final part of the test was supposed to be—he packed up his things and checked out of the hotel, for their stay only covered that long. He moved his things into one of the Cleric-ready rooms at Our Lady of the Flames. The impressive thing was that they had enough room at the cathedral to give each of the Novitiates there individual rooms without doubling up, even if they had converted a series of offices and boardrooms into impromptu guest houses.
The Gershwin motorcycle, he found, was his to borrow for the week. Ernie had initially wanted it back, but then changed his mind, finding delight in having Francisco "owe him big time" or something similar. Sherman immediately began to feel bad for his mentor. With friends like these and so on.
After a day of rest, he sought out a solitary place at the John H Tern National Park. There, he ran through his exercises, trained, and tried to figure out just what the Impact Richter, the Shockwave Hammer, could do.
He knew instinctively that he could use it to produce shockwaves from the hammer-head. He also knew that there was more to this weapon than he knew at present. So, what next? Was it only the hammer-head that produced shockwaves? Did he have to hold onto the weapon to activate the ability, or could it be triggered remotely? Did each activation "cost" Divine Energy? Did the shockwaves hurt him? Could he selectively choose what he impacted and what he didn't?
He discovered that, as long as he held Impact Richter, he could channel a surge of kinetic energy from his palm. It wasn't quite a ranged technique like a fireball from a videogame, but he wouldn't need to touch his target to deliver a blow. He discovered that if he channeled the shockwave into the hammer before throwing it, it would hold onto the "charge" until impact, and then would remain inert until he touched it again. He discovered that he could also increase the intensity of the shockwave, and, fortunately, he was immune to blowback from his own ability. He was allowed to keep his legs, something he was very grateful for.
He discovered, most of all, that Impact Richter seemed to want to be in motion. It was a strange sensation—not quite a whisper in the back of his mind, but more an impression that was tacked onto the space the hammer's name occupied in his soul. The hammer left rest easy, going into motion at a mere nudge or even what seemed to be the thought of moving. Furthermore, when it going, it was often hard to stop—save for unleashing the generated shockwave upon an unsuspecting tree or section of ground. Sherman had nearly destroyed his motorcycle on one occasion—he had gotten so into swinging the Divine Weapon around and around, finding that he could accumulate more and more force with each motion, he had failed to notice that there was no appropriate place to release the force. He ended up stumbling around, practically carried by the hammer's enthusiasm, smashing a small crater into the floor and knocking over his motorcycle.
That occasion wasn't the first time that Sherman wondered if his Divine Weapon was alive, or psychic, or something similar. It had a name, after all. It seemed to want movement, to rejoice in motion and to loathe inaction. Was this normal for Divine Weapons? They were a manifestation of his soul, weren't they? He didn't exactly think he was a person who needed to be active. Was it based on a part of him long forgotten or an unrealized desire? His love for motorcycles and riding, perhaps? If so, why not be a motorcycle? He could ask Francisco when he got back, but he had the feeling that the Cleric would be no help at all in this area as usual.
Speaking of Divine Energy, he'd probably need to find some sort of teacher for that. The manipulation thereof was an important part in Cleric work, right? He could activate certain artifacts that required it, and he could enhance his physical capabilities, but what about healing? Was that something he could do? Could he summon Liberthasia's flame or her lights? Once more, this was an area that Francisco was seemingly lacking in teaching-wise.
So. To take stock, he was physically strong, fast, and tough, and had a hammer that could generation kinetic force. He was clearly meant for close-quarters combat, to break down defenses and barricades. He was fine with that—eager, even, be it his own enthusiasm or some will of the hammer to shatter obstacles before him. The problem, as he had seen earlier, was that Contagion weren't often content to sit idly by and let him run until he got in range. Plus, there were many that took forms akin to birds or slithering, writhing things that were hard to pin down. So, in order to combat particularly agile or flying Contagion, he'd need to either learn a ranged Divine Energy technique, or to work with another Cleric, or to figure out if his shockwaves could be used at a range, like some kind of special move from an anime.
This, of course, was another are which he needed information. Were Clerics supposed to work together? Alone? One master, one pupil? In squadrons like a military unit? Did Clerics specialize? Was Sherman's job not to be a front-line combatant, but to smash down physical obstacles and tough hides and then get out of the way of heavier firepower? He wasn't supposed to do this all by himself, was he?
So. Once more, his primary issue was information. He could try to blame Francisco all he wanted, but complaining didn't mean anything. If he was to be a proper Cleric, he'd need to take initiative.
That's how Sherman found himself in the library of Our Lady of the Flames after his workout sessions, pouring over any texts vaguely related to the Contagion that he could get his hands. The on-site librarian wasn't able to help him much, for it seemed that even in the Order's home church knowledge about the Contagion was rather limited. He had tried looking up information about the Contagion online or in the church library back home, but aside from maybe one or two articles on a mostly-dead forum from twenty years ago, no information was available. This was the best chance to find out what he could on his own accord.
It took a few days, but in the end he was able to gather a small number of books that pertained to the Contagion—a few journals from Clerics, a study by the Order, and a book comparing Contagion to many beasts and monsters found in the various mythologies and histories from around the world. Interestingly, these seemed to be the only copy of these particular articles in existence. They were neither in his library database or online from what he could tell.
Sherman had slowly started to feel that, even all things considered, this Order business was a tad bigger than he had initially imagined.
The first few journals were from an assortment of Clerics during what was something called "the Great Tribulation." During said Tribulation—which Sherman quickly realized was a euphemism for the first of the Three World Wars—the Contagion spawned in record numbers following a "period of drought." The accounts in the journals lined up with what Sherman knew already—that Contagion appeared more during times and places of strife, such as wars or disasters.
The study by the Order was dry and difficult to get through, using much technical language that Sherman didn't quite understand. What he did glean that the Order had a proper classification system of the Contagion, though that wasn't fully detailed in the document.
The final book, titled "Monsters and Myth: The Unconscious Shadow of the Contagion" was an analysis on how the various identified and recorded Contagion seemed to match up in places with monsters from mythology. Vampires, kelpies, mokele-mbembe, wendigo, kappa, zombies, etc.
Sherman lingered on the wendigo entry—it was a slightly different telling than what he had heard before—before he looked up at a noise.
"Yes?" he asked.
Before him stood a woman of Eastern descent in a pink off-brand tracksuit, partially covered in bandages.
"You're that guy that's been researching Contagion for the past few days, right?" she asked.
A Cleric, then. "I have been, yes," he confirmed. "And you are?"
She gave a small start. "Ah. My apologies," she said politely. "My names is Kotone Takeda. I was hoping you had some information on certain Contagion, Mr. . . . ?"
"Sherman," he said, rising and extending his hand. She glanced down at her hand swaddled in bandages, and Sherman sat right back down, doing his best to ignore the sudden awkwardness. "And I don't know if you'll be able to find what you're looking for. I don't know too much about the Contagion myself."
She swore softly. "Well, thanks anyways," she said, standing back up, her mouth downturned in frustration. "I'll not bother you any more."
"Well, wait a minute," Sherman said. "Don't be too hasty. Just because I don't have the specific information you need doesn't mean that there isn't something here you can't use."
He slid the book on over to her, and Kotone, after a moment of consideration, sat down at the long table he was at and began to read. He initially thought about asking if she needed help with her bandaged arm, but she seemed to be doing all right, and was so engrossed in her research that he didn't feel it right to interrupt.
Over the next few hours, a curious thing happened. Several other Novitiates, some of whom Sherman had seen around previously, came up to them. It seemed that Sherman wasn't the only one who had questions about the Puppeteer Contagion from the Trial. A common theme—in addition to the lack of sufficient training—seemed to be that the Novitiates lacked a great deal of information about the Contagion as a whole. Was that a symptom of the strange circumstances they were clearly in? A normal part of Novitiate training? If so, why? That just seemed like a good way to get your recruits killed.
Sherman had been in charge of organizing study groups for some on the football team back in high school and college ("Sherman, you know what you're doing! Help a brother out!") and thus took up the task of doing the same here. People began to share what they knew about the Contagion, putting together bits and pieces of information they had gathered individually.
The Contemptible Contagion, it seemed, was a catch-all term for the strange creatures formed of an unknown substance that preyed on humans. They could take a variety of forms, most notably resembling a gross caricature of animal parts, but mechanical and object-type shapes had been observed. One thing they all shared was that they would all have some sort of mask on their body. They were classified in both strength and function, as many Contagion had supernatural abilities on top of their existing lethality. The weakest Contagion were called "Unleveled," which were the strongest Contagion that Novitiates were allowed to engage with.
The Contagion were attracted to human emotions and human presence. It wasn't confirmed if they fed on human suffering or strife, but all Contagion were known to go to great lengths to attack humans. Given that their intellect ranged from animalistic to plantlike, this didn't always work out for their best. Nobody knew where Contagion came from or went after an attack, but it was known that Contagion numbers would swell around wars, disasters, and other form of great sociological strife.
The Contagion seemed to be weakened, if not outright repulsed and harmed, by anything related to the Pantheon of Light. This, naturally, was due to the fact that the Pantheon had gathered together in the first place to drive back the Contagion at the world's start. Sherman wasn't too sure on that one, but a number of people present seemed to believe it, so he resolved to ask an authority on that later.
The ten or so Clerics that had formed "The Library Study Group," as some had taken to calling it, were rather disappointed that they didn't seem to have much more information on the Contagion outside of hearsay and rumors. With that subject as exhausted as it could be at that moment, they turned their eyes onto other subjects to collaborate on—namely, the issue of Divine Weapons. Everyone there was able to manifest their Weapon, but only about six of them were able to use their unique abilities that the Weapons bore with them. Furthermore, all were lacking in experience using said abilities, as most had awoken their abilities right before or during the Trials. So, at Sherman's advice and leading, they all gathered back at the National Park to test their abilities, to experiment, and to train.
All of them, save Sherman, who had been called to Our Lady of the Flames for a personal meeting with the Pope.
Chapter 12
Lieutenant Makinleigh Wallace, daughter of war heroes Jack and Sheila Wallace, leader of the Howling Hellsing Platoon, recipient of the Mauve Heart award, model feminist working woman and practically the poster child for the armed forces, sat quaking in her boots and internally pleading to be anywhere but where she was at that current moment.
Oh, she didn't show it on the outside, of course. Her face and bearing had long since become the perfect picture that everyone assumed her to be. It was her every waking thought that begged her stoic muscles to bolt out of the door than spend one more minute up in the presence of what assuredly was death itself. Though the Pope looked like a kindly grandfather, she knew that it was like looking at a statue of a similar likeness: friendly and soft on the surface, but made of unyielding, crushing stone. What is there to do when you have earned the wrath of a mountain? Of the sea? Of the sky and stars? She had felt his power, that immeasurable well of Divine Energy. If her own wellspring was a bright candle-flame, then the Pope was the very sun itself.
There was a sudden knock at the door, and Makinleigh nearly jumped out of her skin.
"Who is it?" the Pope asked.
"Sherman. I'm here for an interview?"
Ah, alas, that fool! That poor, innocent soul! He didn't realize he was stepping, willingly, into the jaws of death, into the hungry lion's den!
Now, to an outside observer, these worries of Makinleigh's might seem exaggerated at best and outright fabrications at worst. The observer would be mostly correct—Makinleigh is possessed of a particularly bad habit wherein she tends to assume the worst about a situation, especially those of the uncomfortable social variety. There is some justification, though—Makinleigh was correct about the Pope's raw level of power, and the Pope could easily destroy both her and Sherman with a mere thought and minor effort of will. She was also aware that the Pope was someone with great influence, having connections to other important figures all across the globe. Finally, she knew from firsthand experience that the Pope seemed to have uncanny insight into a person's secrets and their hidden desires and fears, be it through some trick of Divine Weapon, wisdom granted from the gods, the rare gift of telepathy, or the mere uncanny ability to read a person by a glance. Makinleigh, having practically been raised on the battlefield, was used to classifying things by how much they posed to her, those under her charge, and her mission.
Her mission, her ultimate goal, the task that dangled so precariously on the Pope's all-seeing knife? To prevent anyone from knowing that Makinleigh Wallace, hero of the Battle of Four Armies and inspiration for warriors everywhere, was a massive coward and fraud.
Makinleigh wanted nothing more to do than to leave the life of conflict behind and live a pretty, pastel, and peaceful life in an enormous mansion on the beachside. She wanted her days to be filled with flowers and sweet things and lace, not bullets and blades and bitter rations. She hated the tacky uniforms, the unwashed odor of soldiers, the bloody mud of the trenches, the thick haze of gunpowder and dust, the sound of morning drills and of explosions blasting apart hill and house. She hated it, and she hated that part of herself that was absolutely fine with leaving the army without notice to live a life in the lap of luxury.
She hated the fact that she could never truly understand a soldier's struggle, for Makinleigh Wallace was a natural at all things war. She could almost reflexively see avenues of attack, of defense, of mobilization. She had barely trained, especially in comparison to those around her, relying almost completely on a natural instinct to carry her through. She saw her "fellow" soldiers look at her with respect, with jealousy, with admiration, with envy.
"Hero of the Nation!" they cried, eyes bright and a fire in their hearts. "Lead us onwards to victory!" And she did.
"Look at her," they sneered, teeth clenched and rancor in their hearts. "I can't stand to see her breeze through yet another battlefield as if nothing could touch her." And she did.
"My daughter," said her war hero parents, proud and warm, "you bring great honor to us. We can trust in you to take care of the things we cannot." And she did.
"Remember me," said the dying soldier, pressing a locket in her hands. "Tell my wife I love her." And she did.
"Let me leave!" her heart cried. "Let me be free of this life of death and blood, of toil and sorrow!"
Yet she never did. For how could she? How could she betray everyone like that? How could she say no to her parents, who looked at her with such joy? How could she say no to the men and women under her command, who viewed her as their rock? How could she say no to the Capitol, who knew where she lived?
So, she turned her outside to stone, even as her soul despaired at her lot in life. She kept marching on, through rain and mud, through fire and blood, since that is what a good soldier did. She kept her face blank and stern, since that's what they expected of her. For everything would come crashing down the moment her mask slipped even a little.
"Traitor," her parents would say. "How could our daughter despise us like this?"
"Traitor," her squad would say. "Now who shall we look to? Who shall we follow?"
"Traitor," the government would say. "Abandoning your country warrants swift death."
"Traitor," the dead would say. "After all we have sacrificed for you, this is how you repay us?"
She wasn't sure the Pope knew, but she sure as the hells wasn't going to make it easy for him to see through her like that.
Sherman walked in the room, and she was mildly surprised at his appearance. She had only seen him in the low light and with a motorcycle helmet on, and was not expecting him to be fair to look upon. She lamented that she could not tell him to run, to save himself. Yet why? What justification would she have? This was just an interview, they said. It wasn't an interrogation by the world's strongest Cleric, oh no. To give away her hand would mean certain doom.
"Have a seat," the Pope said. Imperceptibly, Makinleigh's eyes narrowed as her combat instincts screamed. Was that the barest hint of a smile? It could be. Be on the lookout for any similar movements.
Sherman nodded and took a seat next to her across from the startlingly sparse desk of the Pope. It resembled the desk of any higher-up that Makinleigh had ever had to report to before. A computer, a writing pad, documents, a lamp, a picture. File cabinets to the side. A bookshelf. All things she had seen before.
Granted, most generals didn't have a window overlooking a several hundred foot drop, but the principle was the same.
"It has come to my attention that you two were present at the incident with the a Level 2 Fairy-Class Puppeteer Contagion at the Trial," the Pope said.
Makinleigh steeled herself. Thus, her great trial began.
"We were," said Sherman. She said nothing, but nodded along. Not agreeing would do more harm than good at this point.
The Pope nodded. He wasn't asking for new information, Makinleigh knew. He had already verified that they were. He was asking to set the tone of the conversation, to make sure that things went his way. She had seen it time and time before with superiors who had called in a particularly errant soldier to discipline them. "I would like to hear the story from your point of view. Please, tell me as much as you can remember."
What was his game here? What was he trying to do? Was this, too, part of the Trial? She didn't think that she was under suspicion of any kind of heresy or whatever was taboo in the Cleric world, but she didn't want to assume.
Before she could speak (read: since she wasn't speaking), Sherman launched into a fairly-accurate recollection of their most recent mission. Makinleigh despaired, seeing him just give away their information for free like that. That poor fool! Without even knowing his angle! Yet she couldn't help but admire that simple heart.
All throughout the interrogation, the Pope had listened politely, nodding and encouraging Sherman without interrupting or interjecting, all the while scratching notes away on a pad in front of him. When Sherman was finished, the Pope continued to write for a few minutes before he stopped writing.
"Very good," he said, turning to Makinleigh. "If you don't mind, Miss Wallace, I would hear your version of events."
Her eyes narrowed slightly. "I was there right alongside him."
"Even so," the Pope said in a kindly tone, "indulge me, if you would."
Makinleigh cast her thought as to the events that had transpired a week previously. She combed through the details, wondering if there was any detail that would get them immediately killed.
This is obviously a trap, she thought to herself. But for what? What is his aim? Why?
In the brief minute she thought—under guise of recollection—she could find no reason for a trap. Conventional wisdom told her that charging into a known trap without knowing the trigger would be a very, very bad idea. However, she had just been asked a direct question from the Pope himself, and to refuse answer would be equally, if not more, bad.
She gave her recollection, from her entrance into the Trial zone to the sudden transport away after the Contagion was defeated. She measured her words carefully, weighing each to see if one had any hidden or double meaning that could reveal her worries and secrets, as she did whenever she was called to report to a higher authority. The report ended up being rigid and mechanical in the end, but the Pope didn't seem to mind. Much as he had with Sherman, he nodded and wrote his notes down as she talked. Though she tried, she couldn't get a good look at what he was writing down without giving herself away. In the end, the pair of them sat in silence as the Pope finished writing down some thoughts, flipped back and forth on a few other sheets, and, eventually, closed his notebook.
"Thank you for your time," the Pope said. "I understand that this interview—as much as an interrogation it might have felt, Miss Wallace, and for that I apologize—was strange and sudden."
Light, he saw that—
"In apology, I will let you two in on a little secret," the Pope said, once more smiling kindly like a doting grandfather. "Based on your performance during the Trials, you will not need to take any further steps. You will be advancing to Neophyte status, effective Wednesday. Please be ready for your next assignment." He stood, and the other two followed suit. "Now, if you two do not mind, I must bid you good day. I have a busy schedule and another round of interviews that I must conduct."
He gestured to the door, which opened, and he sat back down. Makinleigh shared a suspicious glance with Sherman's surprised one, and the pair advanced out of the room and made their way down the hall to the elevator. The entire time, Makinleigh fell into a deep thought, reflecting on that conversation.
So the Pope knew that I was uncomfortable? What does that mean? Can he read emotions? He can't read minds, can he? And what did he mean by advancing us? This must be some sort of trick. How much does he know? How much does he see? Why advance us? What sets us apart from the rest? Surely, there's no reason, right? Unless . . . does Sherman know something? Does the Pope have some sort of blackmail hanging over him? Does he want to keep us close? Or maybe—maybe does he expect favors? Fast track us for our loyalty? . . . Are these even things that Clerics do? But why? Why us? And why now? As a matter of fact—
"Well, that's a relief," Sherman sighed, breaking Makinleigh out of her inner turmoil. "I thought for sure we'd have to try again next year."
" . . . About becoming Neophytes?"
He nodded. "Yeah. I'll admit, I don't feel that ready for it, but if the man in charge of this whole operation says that we're on the right track, then we must be."
She made a noncommittal noise.
"You don't agree?"
"I . . . don't know. I don't like special treatment," she said honestly, and was surprised to find herself speaking so. A part of her immediately panicked, worried that even saying that much would ruin her—and how did he coax such a thing out of her? But when he nodded, earnest sympathy in his eyes, she felt herself relaxing slightly.
"I hear ya," he said. "It's never good to be singled out because of something you can't control."
She nodded, and as they talked, she found herself relaxing more and more. A part of her marveled. Was it his honesty? The fact that they had already trusted their lives to each other? The contrast to many of the others she had seen in her life? She didn't know, but when the elevator ride ended and they went their separate ways, Makinleigh Wallace thought that she wouldn't mind having Sherman along on her journey to become a Cleric.
Oh, she didn't show it on the outside, of course. Her face and bearing had long since become the perfect picture that everyone assumed her to be. It was her every waking thought that begged her stoic muscles to bolt out of the door than spend one more minute up in the presence of what assuredly was death itself. Though the Pope looked like a kindly grandfather, she knew that it was like looking at a statue of a similar likeness: friendly and soft on the surface, but made of unyielding, crushing stone. What is there to do when you have earned the wrath of a mountain? Of the sea? Of the sky and stars? She had felt his power, that immeasurable well of Divine Energy. If her own wellspring was a bright candle-flame, then the Pope was the very sun itself.
There was a sudden knock at the door, and Makinleigh nearly jumped out of her skin.
"Who is it?" the Pope asked.
"Sherman. I'm here for an interview?"
Ah, alas, that fool! That poor, innocent soul! He didn't realize he was stepping, willingly, into the jaws of death, into the hungry lion's den!
Now, to an outside observer, these worries of Makinleigh's might seem exaggerated at best and outright fabrications at worst. The observer would be mostly correct—Makinleigh is possessed of a particularly bad habit wherein she tends to assume the worst about a situation, especially those of the uncomfortable social variety. There is some justification, though—Makinleigh was correct about the Pope's raw level of power, and the Pope could easily destroy both her and Sherman with a mere thought and minor effort of will. She was also aware that the Pope was someone with great influence, having connections to other important figures all across the globe. Finally, she knew from firsthand experience that the Pope seemed to have uncanny insight into a person's secrets and their hidden desires and fears, be it through some trick of Divine Weapon, wisdom granted from the gods, the rare gift of telepathy, or the mere uncanny ability to read a person by a glance. Makinleigh, having practically been raised on the battlefield, was used to classifying things by how much they posed to her, those under her charge, and her mission.
Her mission, her ultimate goal, the task that dangled so precariously on the Pope's all-seeing knife? To prevent anyone from knowing that Makinleigh Wallace, hero of the Battle of Four Armies and inspiration for warriors everywhere, was a massive coward and fraud.
Makinleigh wanted nothing more to do than to leave the life of conflict behind and live a pretty, pastel, and peaceful life in an enormous mansion on the beachside. She wanted her days to be filled with flowers and sweet things and lace, not bullets and blades and bitter rations. She hated the tacky uniforms, the unwashed odor of soldiers, the bloody mud of the trenches, the thick haze of gunpowder and dust, the sound of morning drills and of explosions blasting apart hill and house. She hated it, and she hated that part of herself that was absolutely fine with leaving the army without notice to live a life in the lap of luxury.
She hated the fact that she could never truly understand a soldier's struggle, for Makinleigh Wallace was a natural at all things war. She could almost reflexively see avenues of attack, of defense, of mobilization. She had barely trained, especially in comparison to those around her, relying almost completely on a natural instinct to carry her through. She saw her "fellow" soldiers look at her with respect, with jealousy, with admiration, with envy.
"Hero of the Nation!" they cried, eyes bright and a fire in their hearts. "Lead us onwards to victory!" And she did.
"Look at her," they sneered, teeth clenched and rancor in their hearts. "I can't stand to see her breeze through yet another battlefield as if nothing could touch her." And she did.
"My daughter," said her war hero parents, proud and warm, "you bring great honor to us. We can trust in you to take care of the things we cannot." And she did.
"Remember me," said the dying soldier, pressing a locket in her hands. "Tell my wife I love her." And she did.
"Let me leave!" her heart cried. "Let me be free of this life of death and blood, of toil and sorrow!"
Yet she never did. For how could she? How could she betray everyone like that? How could she say no to her parents, who looked at her with such joy? How could she say no to the men and women under her command, who viewed her as their rock? How could she say no to the Capitol, who knew where she lived?
So, she turned her outside to stone, even as her soul despaired at her lot in life. She kept marching on, through rain and mud, through fire and blood, since that is what a good soldier did. She kept her face blank and stern, since that's what they expected of her. For everything would come crashing down the moment her mask slipped even a little.
"Traitor," her parents would say. "How could our daughter despise us like this?"
"Traitor," her squad would say. "Now who shall we look to? Who shall we follow?"
"Traitor," the government would say. "Abandoning your country warrants swift death."
"Traitor," the dead would say. "After all we have sacrificed for you, this is how you repay us?"
She wasn't sure the Pope knew, but she sure as the hells wasn't going to make it easy for him to see through her like that.
Sherman walked in the room, and she was mildly surprised at his appearance. She had only seen him in the low light and with a motorcycle helmet on, and was not expecting him to be fair to look upon. She lamented that she could not tell him to run, to save himself. Yet why? What justification would she have? This was just an interview, they said. It wasn't an interrogation by the world's strongest Cleric, oh no. To give away her hand would mean certain doom.
"Have a seat," the Pope said. Imperceptibly, Makinleigh's eyes narrowed as her combat instincts screamed. Was that the barest hint of a smile? It could be. Be on the lookout for any similar movements.
Sherman nodded and took a seat next to her across from the startlingly sparse desk of the Pope. It resembled the desk of any higher-up that Makinleigh had ever had to report to before. A computer, a writing pad, documents, a lamp, a picture. File cabinets to the side. A bookshelf. All things she had seen before.
Granted, most generals didn't have a window overlooking a several hundred foot drop, but the principle was the same.
"It has come to my attention that you two were present at the incident with the a Level 2 Fairy-Class Puppeteer Contagion at the Trial," the Pope said.
Makinleigh steeled herself. Thus, her great trial began.
"We were," said Sherman. She said nothing, but nodded along. Not agreeing would do more harm than good at this point.
The Pope nodded. He wasn't asking for new information, Makinleigh knew. He had already verified that they were. He was asking to set the tone of the conversation, to make sure that things went his way. She had seen it time and time before with superiors who had called in a particularly errant soldier to discipline them. "I would like to hear the story from your point of view. Please, tell me as much as you can remember."
What was his game here? What was he trying to do? Was this, too, part of the Trial? She didn't think that she was under suspicion of any kind of heresy or whatever was taboo in the Cleric world, but she didn't want to assume.
Before she could speak (read: since she wasn't speaking), Sherman launched into a fairly-accurate recollection of their most recent mission. Makinleigh despaired, seeing him just give away their information for free like that. That poor fool! Without even knowing his angle! Yet she couldn't help but admire that simple heart.
All throughout the interrogation, the Pope had listened politely, nodding and encouraging Sherman without interrupting or interjecting, all the while scratching notes away on a pad in front of him. When Sherman was finished, the Pope continued to write for a few minutes before he stopped writing.
"Very good," he said, turning to Makinleigh. "If you don't mind, Miss Wallace, I would hear your version of events."
Her eyes narrowed slightly. "I was there right alongside him."
"Even so," the Pope said in a kindly tone, "indulge me, if you would."
Makinleigh cast her thought as to the events that had transpired a week previously. She combed through the details, wondering if there was any detail that would get them immediately killed.
This is obviously a trap, she thought to herself. But for what? What is his aim? Why?
In the brief minute she thought—under guise of recollection—she could find no reason for a trap. Conventional wisdom told her that charging into a known trap without knowing the trigger would be a very, very bad idea. However, she had just been asked a direct question from the Pope himself, and to refuse answer would be equally, if not more, bad.
She gave her recollection, from her entrance into the Trial zone to the sudden transport away after the Contagion was defeated. She measured her words carefully, weighing each to see if one had any hidden or double meaning that could reveal her worries and secrets, as she did whenever she was called to report to a higher authority. The report ended up being rigid and mechanical in the end, but the Pope didn't seem to mind. Much as he had with Sherman, he nodded and wrote his notes down as she talked. Though she tried, she couldn't get a good look at what he was writing down without giving herself away. In the end, the pair of them sat in silence as the Pope finished writing down some thoughts, flipped back and forth on a few other sheets, and, eventually, closed his notebook.
"Thank you for your time," the Pope said. "I understand that this interview—as much as an interrogation it might have felt, Miss Wallace, and for that I apologize—was strange and sudden."
Light, he saw that—
"In apology, I will let you two in on a little secret," the Pope said, once more smiling kindly like a doting grandfather. "Based on your performance during the Trials, you will not need to take any further steps. You will be advancing to Neophyte status, effective Wednesday. Please be ready for your next assignment." He stood, and the other two followed suit. "Now, if you two do not mind, I must bid you good day. I have a busy schedule and another round of interviews that I must conduct."
He gestured to the door, which opened, and he sat back down. Makinleigh shared a suspicious glance with Sherman's surprised one, and the pair advanced out of the room and made their way down the hall to the elevator. The entire time, Makinleigh fell into a deep thought, reflecting on that conversation.
So the Pope knew that I was uncomfortable? What does that mean? Can he read emotions? He can't read minds, can he? And what did he mean by advancing us? This must be some sort of trick. How much does he know? How much does he see? Why advance us? What sets us apart from the rest? Surely, there's no reason, right? Unless . . . does Sherman know something? Does the Pope have some sort of blackmail hanging over him? Does he want to keep us close? Or maybe—maybe does he expect favors? Fast track us for our loyalty? . . . Are these even things that Clerics do? But why? Why us? And why now? As a matter of fact—
"Well, that's a relief," Sherman sighed, breaking Makinleigh out of her inner turmoil. "I thought for sure we'd have to try again next year."
" . . . About becoming Neophytes?"
He nodded. "Yeah. I'll admit, I don't feel that ready for it, but if the man in charge of this whole operation says that we're on the right track, then we must be."
She made a noncommittal noise.
"You don't agree?"
"I . . . don't know. I don't like special treatment," she said honestly, and was surprised to find herself speaking so. A part of her immediately panicked, worried that even saying that much would ruin her—and how did he coax such a thing out of her? But when he nodded, earnest sympathy in his eyes, she felt herself relaxing slightly.
"I hear ya," he said. "It's never good to be singled out because of something you can't control."
She nodded, and as they talked, she found herself relaxing more and more. A part of her marveled. Was it his honesty? The fact that they had already trusted their lives to each other? The contrast to many of the others she had seen in her life? She didn't know, but when the elevator ride ended and they went their separate ways, Makinleigh Wallace thought that she wouldn't mind having Sherman along on her journey to become a Cleric.
Sorry for the late chapter. I've got some things going on right now--a return to school and a wedding to attend--so the next chapters will be slow in the coming. Thank you all for your patience.