Chapter 056: The Cathedral

My plan was simple.

Enemy probably outnumbers us? Fine! Outgun us? No problem! Can multiply endlessly and theoretically can overwhelm literally everything in this caves, devouring all organic matter and so on (including children)? Sure.

After all, we have a fire magic specialist archmagician on board. We just have to keep her alive long enough to finish incantations for the spells that will literally kill everything with fire, right?

Jokes aside, this required some preparations precisely to avoid being overwhelmed and suffering loses to our non-combatants. I could do a lot to kill my boredom, but putting innocent people at risk wasn’t included.

Besides, Leria would kick me outside into the raging blizzard if I tried. Naked, probably.

So, I called a strategy meeting. Both adventuring parties, Firewing and the two priests that pretty much represented our civilians. Also Kytar, as the head of workforce.

It was completely successful. In other words, I wasn’t kicked outside naked into the raging blizzard.

Firewing agreed that it was possible to be done, and that it was unlikely that anything short of Zhrkrh himself could survive a single of her magic spells. He was a notorious archdaemon, but one that wasn’t known for the strength of his servants. He was famous mostly because of his spawns uncovered in mines that murdered miners before being banished by the first adventure party to come visit the place.

So all we had to do was to keep her alive and undisturbed long enough to finish modifying the basic spells of hers into the version that was undetectable by even most thorough scrying attempts of Black Hand.

But before that - defense.

It took half a day for Firewing (and our enchanter that pretty much ended up her assistant and student, even if reluctantly) to create proper enchantments.

Thankfully she had resources for that. She stole a lot of mana crystals when she was leaving the Ambryxis’ service. They were a funny, but industrially invaluable resource, created when magic was compressed even denser than in anomalies, to the point that became solid.

There was a hundred different subtypes of them (red attuned to Fire Magic, blue to Water Magic… and a lot of those really weird for weird types of magic). Most of them were created in Dungeons, but there were also entire geological layers formed by collapsed ancient anomalies and magical disasters of great proportions.

They weren’t the only anchor material. But most of the others were either weaker (jewels) or more specialized (for example saint’s bones were potent anchor material… but only for theurgies of that particular God). So 95% of enchanters worked on them. And there was even a special, non-aligned type of mana crystals perfect for precision work and overlapping magical mechanisms.

This work was bound to cost us most of those non-aligned crystals. One to prevent things from traversing through in the wrong direction without having a linked ‘key’. Which was pretty much Arcane Magic, similar to the simple Arcane Shield. Then said key (only one, so we had to move through as a group). Then another item - and it was the most tricky of them all - to modify air circulation.

Then they also made several potent Fire Magic mines to be installed in the corridor to buy us time in case of things going downhill… and, finally, an Explosive Magic device that was made to collapse the corridor completely in case things went really downhill.

Better safe than sorry. Especially with two hundred non-combatants right behind your back.

This cost us a significant part of our mana crystals but it was enough to make sure that everything short of Zhrkghasfg had literally snowman’s chance in hell to reach the inhabited part of the Hold. With even Zhpfdsfd himself having barely higher ones, as we were going to collapse the corridor if he was there (which was unlikely) and since he didn’t come here while the corridor was already collapsed…

We installed everything, then had Kytar and his workers unearth the tunnel. While we - both parties and Firewing - remained on standby right behind them.

It was going to take a while.

***

Finally, the collapse was (more or less) cleared. The way was clear.

We tested the enchantments once again. Just in case. The cold air was stopped just as it should. There was no direct risk of all of us freezing to death (probably many times over, as the Gore Altar would keep resurrecting us over and over again).

Good. Everything is prepared.

We depart into the newly opened part of the Hold.

***

Very soon the corridor ended… and battle started.

We emerged from it into another cavern. It was cold. Hoarfrost everywhere. Safely minus thirty or something. Ghrr. Thankfully I didn’t have time to grumble because of enemies that were awaiting us.

Well, they probably stood around for centuries. Daemons. We still surprised them.

Five Eldritch Knights. Three… wait, the heck is that?

Ascended

Category: Eldritch/Pentagram

Type: Beast/Husk

Threat Grade: Silver X

End result of a fusion between a mortal body and a spawn of Zhrkhr. Powerful - and surprisingly intelligent - footsoldiers.

Tall. Lithe. With prolonged upper limbs. They lacked clothing, but were completely asexual. The changes their bodies suffered under the influence of a spawn of Zhrkhr pushed them deep deep into the uncanny valley.

Their eyes were wide. They looked less like eyes than like a holes in their heads, leading into the black… something, normally hidden beneath their skulls. Their eyes were marked with grim that seemed to seep from these holes.

Bleh. I would have said something like WE ARE SO DEAD but if I said that out loud Simea would be quite vocal about me being more optimistic so… OUR CHANCES OF SURVIVING THIS ORDEAL ARE CLOSE TO NIL.

...without Firewing, that is.

“BACK TO THE CORRIDOR!” I shouted. We obviously lacked manpower to hold all of them at once. It would be a very short battle followed by enemy victory if we tried to fight them in relatively open space of the cave. In corridor, however…

The enemy obviously wasn’t very good in terms of coordination. For some reason the light side daemons were much better in that regard. Rather than helping each other they actually interrupted their own attacks. Fools. Strong, but still fools. Simea, Warforged and the hobgoblin Blood Knight held the line, while everyone else kept casting every single debuff or buff they could.

They held the line just barely. Focused primarily on trying to survive, they couldn’t really cause much damage. Metalist managed to impale one of the Eldritch Knights, but… well, it didn’t make a lot of difference last time and it didn’t now.

Then Firewing finished her incantation. Lots of whiteflame pillars erupted from the ground. All Eldritch Knights and all but one of the Ascended instantly suffered enough damage to knock them out of the fight. Daemons banished, husks merely burned to cinders. The last Ascended was badly scorched by the flame.

Archmagicians. This level of firepower… despite being limited by the need to hide from Black Hand’s scrying attempts… Well, we just got our hands on a person that could easily play an end boss of a long quest chain in the middle of a game. No way was I not going to use a person that could fight toe-to-toe with archdaemons, daemon lords, aura masters and so on.

Our warriors immediately pressed forward. Even heavily wounded, an Ascended was still a Silver X creature. Firewing wasn’t going to help - we talked about that before we departed. Leaving some of them to us was going to be beneficial for our training.

Besides, what sort of fun it would be if she just burned everything to the ground?

The Ascended was armed with a sword. One much too short for his arms. Despite this, it was still deadly. It might have been a simple long sword… but with the size of its arms it had the range of a polearm.

Though, that particular sword was a bit too close to the fire. Part of it melted. Which weakened the Ascended more than the third degree burns on half of its body. It must be nice not being able to feel pain, I guess.

There were also some hexes. Mostly Shadow and Doom Magic. It also seemed to be able to spawn lesser spawns of Zhrkrh that... kinda… were born through its eye sockets. Through a process that looked surprisingly a lot like real birth.

God, I can’t unsee that, right?

Unfortunately for it, we made some progress in terms of skill. Especially magic. The lift of Vaera’s curse was one thing - we had a great spell/hex teacher of our own, right here. Sure, with how much time she spent on trying to be everywhere, Firewing had little time left to teach us new magic. But ‘little’ didn’t mean ‘no’.

If my estimates were correct, my party alone would have succeeded in killing Red Mist. Before her Revelation, of course. Which meant that we finally entered a realm of fighting Gold ranked enemies. Of course it still depended on many factors - enemy weaknesses and how much we could exploit them, enemy status of an Unique or lack of it, surroundings and even plain luck.

Alright, I know, there is no luck. Only Gods’ will. Damn, I seriously hope luck is still a thing. Otherwise we would be entering an even more disturbing level of surveillance and control.

If everything (and I really mean that) worked perfect, we might just be able to face a Gold V enemy, especially after we trained our new spells and hexes properly.. With Kovacs group we had at least theoretical chances of surviving combat with a Smiling Man. No chance of defeating him unless we could push him into a massive blast furnace or collapse a tunnel on him. Just a chance to survive and force it to retreat or escape without casualties. It was still a great leap in strength.

Too bad it ended. There was little more Firewing could teach us on our current level. Even the best architect won’t build a stone castle on sand. Not before making proper foundation, that is. And that was going to take a while.

The Ascended fell. After getting partially burned and hit by a hail of debuffs there was no other way it could end. Our warriors practically chopped it into pieces.

***

“...it has some usage as a mutagen. With a proper dose it causes one’s brain to start working better. Much better. Side effects may include sudden mutations or deaths due to internal bleeding, so it is mostly for the desperate.” Firewing concluded her lecture. I finished slicing off the edible part of the mushroom few seconds later.

SKILL LEVEL UP

Herbalism

Rarity: Common

Your proficiency in gathering alchemical ingredients common to woods, plains and other natural places. Includes plants, mushrooms, stalks, molds, mosses… and a lot more.

13->14

Your chance of successfully harvesting an ingredient is increased by 5%.

Neat.

“Alright, I seriously don’t get how it’s possible for a mushroom to grow in this icebox.” Simea was obviously getting more and more irritated by the cold. At least judging from the redness of her face and other, less visible symptoms.

Well, everyone was. It was still like -30C here and we were making a lot of pauses due to additional forms of training.

“Aether can influence biology. Create entire divergent ecosystems that thrive off it, rather than on things we consider ‘normal’, like photosynthesis.” I shrugged.

The mushroom I just harvested was definitely divergent from normal biology. Almost a meter high, and it looked like a mushroom that was twisted around. And around. And around again, until it looked like clothes wringed out of laundry that someone twisted in a form that looked a bit like a mushroom.

All of the life in the caves was tainted. Eldritch, but not corrupted by Pentagram. Which meant that it was edible.

It was still in a rather toned down variant, at least according to Firewing. The cold wasn’t deadly, but it certainly wasn’t pleasant. More things were going to grow when the place starts getting hotter. But there were still a lot of alchemical ingredients to gather - three of them being rather weird drugs, a few other usable as poisons or healing implements, and that particular mushroom (Posterum Horribilis or something like that) could be used as a mutagen.

Locals had entire branch of agriculture that dealt merely in cultivating mutagenic plants. Local wealthy (and adventurers in the ‘proper’ Training Guilds) loved the stuff. It was costly, but after ten years of using it (it was more like a supernatural food supplement, but there were also those that worked much stronger and faster) you ended up faster, smarter, stronger and prettier than you should be.

And your kids were going to be like that as well, even if effects deteriorated after two or three generations if they weren’t reinforced. Otherwise it would be too perfect, and local countries would long ago improve their entire population into biological perfection.

We had a bit of time to look through the mushrooms, molds and so on, that seemed to grow in that cave. We managed to liberate it, after all. Two days of battling our way through the small armies of Silver grade creatures. Ascended, Eldritch Knights, some Watchers and Ascended Magicians later on. No Spawns of Zhrkrhrkrhrk. At least not in the pure form.

They would obviously devour every plant growing here to fuel their own growth if they were here. But as to why they weren’t here… I had no clue.

I was happy with the progress. The new part of the Hold wasn’t fit for colonization - mostly because of the number of passages we would have to barricade. There was a small lake deeper in the cavern (frozen now… and two or three times bigger than the one in first cavern). It had four small rivers supplying it with water.

It seemed that the Ardent Flame used the rivers as communication routes. Sure, the current was strong… but not as strong as the local equivalent of a motorboat we found lying beside the edge of the water. Magic powered, obviously. It wasn’t really required right now, as the water was frozen solid and we could walk around as long as we weren’t trying to do something funny. Like, use Firewing’s magic or jump around while on ice.

However, the fact that we couldn’t colonize didn’t mean we couldn’t use it. There were eldritch-tainted aetherwarped plants growing everywhere, ready to be gathered and sold in the city. Sure, we had to wait for a while for our trainees to grow enough to be able to keep the gatherers secure just in case something funny happened, but…

New possibilities kept opening in front of us. Firewing. Dungeon. New sources of income and power. Gods’ way to even the odds on our crusade. I could feel their finger in this. The fact that our progress seemed to speed up wasn’t very reassuring. Were they accelerating the plan or was it planned like that already? And why has this whole speed up started right around the time that Players have started encountering Glitches?

Leria returned from the reconnaissance. I could see she discovered something important.

“Guys, I think there’s a lot of Overtyrant’s magic seeping from one of the tunnels.”

Interesting.

***

A cathedral. There was an entire cathedral dedicated to Overtyrant in these damn caves. And it wasn’t even profaned. After we got closer, my amalthian senses were in almost complete overdrive because of it.

Feels like home. When I lose myself in it for a while, I’m torn apart by the need to go help the poor, sick and misguided to my utmost abilities… and the need to have local sinners’ ripped apart limb by limb if they continue their misdeeds and refuse to do penance for their sins.

Overtyrant. Ugh. Definitely not my type of God, but I had to agree he was on the right side of the front.

It also explained the lack of corruption in nearby waters. The river split into two right beside the entrance to the cathedral. My guess was that the other way led straight to the inhabited part of the place. Might also explain why people’s health kept improving so fast. Nothing better for health that drinking blessed water, this stuff could seriously slow down even cancer, especially if the source of the blessing was potent.

Too bad it required genuine faith to work. Might have been another thing to sell. I mean, where are we going to find a significant khardic/irnithian population?! It was already a miracle we find those people.

There was a rather limited dock… and what I presumed to be an inactive teleportation device right next to it. After we walked further there was a small garden-like place. A large door before us, that presumably led into the cathedral proper.

Leria pushed them open. Then the two of us entered the cathedral. The rest remained, as there was obviously no threat to us inside. We all knew that. I wasn’t sure why we made the decision to go in alone, but it kinda happened. Something was calling us inside.

The conditions of the cathedral were, obviously, pristine. Garden seemed to be in perfect condition as well. I had no idea what sort of being was this place’s guardian spi… ok, probably a deity. At least judging from the power level.

Shit, this thing could be close to Ambryxis’ level of power. How?!

Pews show no signs of deterioration, despite the age. The cloth covering the altar looked brand new. There were exquisite murals on the walls, ceiling and even the columns supporting said ceiling. Scenes from khardic lore. The life of the Prophetess and various saints. Some military art depicting what I presumed to be a general Vassyria’s War of Symphony. A few abstract symbols that I believed where supposed to represent Overtyrant himself.

Wow, even candles are burning. It’s like the time stopped here.

There were also bodies. Probably of those that fled into the cathedral when the (still) mysterious enemy attacked the place. They didn’t deteriorate as well. Humans, elves, beastmen and so on, some of them clad in armors, sitting in pews or lying on mattresses. They looked like they were sleeping.

Probably had good dreams, judging from the looks on their faces.

“So, finally you come.” The voice came from all directions at once. Male and… well, calm. Friendly. Soft. But also sad and even… melancholic.

So, the guardian deity of the place decided to show his face? Or at least talk to us, since there was obviously no face to speak off. Nice.

“Yes, we did. Who are you?” Leria was the first one to speak.

“I am Yhrezerach. And you carry my ring, just as it was supposed to happen.” There was an omnidirectional sigh. Sounded weird. Ring… oh, yes, the artifact ring called Gift of Yhrezerach we found during out first trip into the second level. I totally forgot about it. “So I guess that his newest gambit seems to be working. How nice.”

Most greater servants of monotheistic religions tended to have a meaningful names. Robinson supposedly stole the idea shamelessly from Christianity, where all angels mentioned by Bible had meaningful names. Like st. Michael, whose name literally meant “Who is like God” in Hebrew.

I had a talk with our resident khardic priests about the name of the being responsible for the creation of the ring-artifact we found. Yhrezerach supposedly meant something along “Evil dies neverending death” in an archaic form of vasyrrian. With “dies neverending death” being an idiom for being cast away from the Symphony.

He was most likely an Archshard or even a First Shard of Zealotry, according to the knowledge of our priests. Essentially a khardic archangel/archshepherd (depending on which world’s naming sense you use). An Archshard would make him somewhere around the level of Shereazhyra. A First Shard, at the same time, could bend Ambryxis into a divine form of a pretzel. With one hand. While using the other one to give alms or bless children with luck and health.

“You doesn’t sound too happy about that.” Now, let’s hope he is actually going to talk with me as well.

“He never explains his actions. Gods never do that.” Yhrezerach answered. “It’s all a matter of faith. Just as you, mortals, have the choice between believing in a god or not, we as their servants have a choice between having faith in them and the fact that they are supposed to be on our side and everything they do will ultimately be good… or not. As I said, it’s a matter of faith. Mine was… tarnished to a point after I understood that the first point of this plan was to have Ardent Flame cease to exist and for most of the believers I took care of to die.”

Oh. Overtyrant let them die? If he ordered Yhrezerach to stand down, that would explain why this place fell, despite the guardian having this level of power. Nothing we’ve seen thus far could ever slow him down if he decided to clear the way out. But… this seriously wasn’t like him.

“Despite being cut off here, they still wanted to attack the enemy. To push him out of this sacred place.” A period of silence followed. “And when I told them the truth, they willingly obliged and departed into Symphony without a word of doubt. I was never more proud of them.” Another audible sigh. “Only now I understand, at least partially, what is supposed to happen. And that Overtyrant was right all along.”

“Wh… why?” Was it possible that it was time to actually learn something about what the heck the Gods want from us?!

“Because even if the Flame succeeded… it would fail eventually.” Short silence as we tried to figure out the meaning of the sentence. “It might have succeeded in destroying the evil of Ambryxis, but it would eventually be overwhelmed when the Decemvirate rose.. and its rise was already set in stone hundreds of years before it happened. Ardent Flame’s mission, my entire reason for being here and existing, wasn’t to win against Ambryxis… but to prepare.”

“Prepare?” Leria was the first one to ask.

“For your eventual coming. A perfect, thousand-year long gambit, so typical of Gods.” What? “The existence of the cult and former, but equally depraved, inhabitants of this place, shielded the Hold from the attention of locals. It created the fame of the nearby lands that helps you maintain the secrecy. Me being here prevented the Corruption from spreading and made the place reconquerable and actually possible to be inhabited again. Allowed you to actually use the lower level as your base of operation. And now?”

A chuckle. Bitter one. I had no idea what to say. How to comment that.

“All of the people that willingly died here…” The deity continued. “... Including knights with their equipment ready to be salvaged for symphsteel. Including Merrivar, a magician that fought through enemies all the way to the cathedral from the magician’s quarters, mindlessly clutching the book about the Holy Magic of the Ardent Flame in his hands. Preventing it from being destroyed and allowing you to learn said magic. All the bodies, saved from profanation by my aura, whose proper burial will save the Greyflame from her eventual death. The poor souls from your new vault, whose death allowed you to actually save Greyflame from dying immediately after she managed to get her revenge on Abarrydon. A nearby Dungeon, that just so happens to have assimilated a part of this place and slowly but surely is changing into a khardic. A well hidden archmagician, that you just happened to stumble across among two hundred thousand of Ambryxis’ inhabitants. A Long Night that made you bored enough to push deeper already, reaching this place earlier than our enemies expected. Even my own Gift, returning to the hand of the Chosen One, a perfect and completely understandable flick in my nose for my temporarily broken faith.” Another bitter chuckle. “Luck is a thing, but you are obviously beyond that at this case. There is no luck for you, merely Gods’ will.”

Oh boy. Puzzle pieces fell into place and… wow.

God cared little for mortal lives. After all, what really was death? Not the end, but a change.. What was really important was how you lived, not how long you avoided death. Good Gods were picky, and for some reason their afterlifes tended to be true, eternal paradises. If you lived for a 90 years but was an asshole… well, in most cases it was better to be a stillborn child.

The whole “Do Not Murder” part was mostly because it was hard for to build a stable country/society, especially in harsh moments in history, without murder being explicitly condemned regardless of circumstances… and not because Gods really cared about death on its own. But in that case?

The members of the Ardent Flame that died here went to an afterlife. And they were probably quite happy there. Not to mention being totally chill with the whole sacrificial part - I mean, they did entrust their lives to Overtyrant, and his gambit meant that all of their efforts weren’t in vain.

If this really was a real world, they probably looked at us from the khardic afterlife and cheered each time we banished a daemon from their ancient base. And even if we ended up losing in this instance of the Great Game in the end, they would probably finish the job themselves when the End Times come. Or at least try to. Probably alongside us, especially if Leria converts us all to khardism.

Overtyrant pulled it masterfully. I give him that.

“Now I’m going to help you.” The deity continued. “I still know less than I’d like to and I’m bound by many rules, some of which I do not even understand.” Chuckle. This time less bitter and more… well, I wouldn’t call it cheerful, but at least it didn’t make him sound like a person neck deep in depression and suicidal thoughts. “But I do know, that by reaching this place you changed a lot. Altered the fate of the world. What I told you is merely the tip of the iceberg. There is much left to do, however.”

Couldn’t agree more with that.