High Inquisitor Patrus was smiling.

While he did not know who the group was that had attacked the spider’s nest, and he did not fully agree with their methods of endangering potential innocents — hah, as if any who willingly remained in this pit of vice could truly be considered innocent — he could appreciate the irony of them using the Foe’s magic against them and drawing away the muscular demon.

With the large, muscular demon out of the picture, he no longer had to conserve his strength for a potential battle. He could afford to spend a little to make sure this one stayed down.

“For Mitla.”

He felt the surge of power across his tenuous connection to Mitla, the little idol in his pocket glowing as the Blessing surged through his sword, causing fire to spring up all along its length.

The demon screamed in pain as Mitla’s holy fires licked at its flesh and in that moment, Patrus couldn’t help but feel righteous.

Here was one of the oldest enemies of humanity itself, one of the original monsters of the world that had corrupted and snuffed out countless innocent lives, screaming in pain as Mitla’s holy fire exacted vengeance for all of its crimes.

He would have killed many more while he’d been in the city, searching for his prey, but the entire time he’d been in this Mitla-forsaken city he had had to delay their retribution. Random slayings would have drawn attention and Mitla Himself drove him in pursuit of a far more vital holy task.

Yet now, finally, he could deliver this just punishment without endangering his primary purpose.

As the vile demon sank to its knees, Patrus pulled on his blade, sliding it free with a wet, sucking sound, kicking the demon over onto its face as he did.

It was highly probable that all those who protected the spider were going to need to die, just for safety. And it would start with this one. The new demon who had joined her retinue.

He watched dispassionately as the demon attempted to crawl away, dragging itself along by its arms, whimpering and sniveling in pain while its legs twitched uselessly. It seemed he’d damaged it’s spinal column.

Patrus patiently stepped around the pathetic creature, until he was standing right in its path.

It twisted its neck to look up at him, fear in its eyes, and Patrus was struck by just how much its face resembled that of a terrified girl.

Disgusting.

He raised his sword, intent on skewering this vile deceiver’s brain, when it flicked its wrist and a puff of bluish magic shot up towards his face.

Immediately, he jerked backwards even as an instinctive pulse of holy power radiated out from him, disintegrating whatever devious spell the creature on the ground had thrown before it could even touch him.

That was not good. While Mitla’s power was limitless, his connection to his God was not. He only had so much to draw on before the little idol in his pocket, flawed product of human hands that it was, would no longer be able to hold the strain and would shatter. He was trying to carefully control how much he used, and being forced to defend himself against vile magics used far more than he could afford, given how he still had to face the spider herself.

By the time he looked back, however, the cowardly demon was gone. It had scrambled away, attempting to escape by crawling under a nearby cart, already on fire.

Injured as it was, however, it was not fast enough.

With an angry snarl at his prey’s attempted escape, Patrus ran the two steps it took him to bring him close enough and managed to grab the demon’s ankle just before it could disappear underneath, eliciting another cry of pain from the creature.

Dragging it free, he threw it to the side, sending it sliding along the road and leaving a streak of blood from its wound as it did.

Before it could try to crawl away again, his sword found its mark, skewering through its chest, pinning it to the road below.

By this point, it was barely moving. When he placed his foot on its neck and lifted his weapon, it made no reaction but to mewl weakly.

Pathetic.

A heavy chop connected with its head, partially embedding itself in its skull.

It twitched several more times before the body went limp. It was already dead, its eyes empty and vacant.

Then the dead demon’s hand uncurled, revealing something small and green in its palm glinting in the sunlight filtering through the smoke.

Curious, Patrus bent down, gingerly picking up the small, metallic looking green square from the corpse that was already starting to bubble and boil as it broke down into a black, tarry soup.

Why had it been carrying this strange device?

A single soft footstep was the only warning he received.

Instincts screaming, he leapt out of the way, just barely in time to avoid a sword which struck the road where he’d been mere moments before.

Quick as lightning, a second blow followed the first, and he barely had time to get his own sword in the way, deflecting the strike harmlessly to the side… only to be attacked a third time as the blade of his attacker reversed direction at frightening speed and attempted to plunge through a gap in his defence.

Twisting his body, Patrus slid past the weapon, narrowly missing being skewered, and swung out with his own sword, driving his assailant back and finally getting a moment to breathe and think.

It was the young man. The one that had accompanied the spider.

“I remember you,” Patrus spoke as the two combatants began slowly circling, eyeing each other warily. “You are the one who had the nerve to quote scripture at me.”

No response.

“That was not a very honourable attack just now, attempting to strike while my back was turned.”

Samual stared at him with a hard expression on his face.

“Honour is a myth,” he replied quietly, never taking his eyes off Patrus. “In a fight you either win or die..”

“Oh?” Patrus replied, a slow smile forming on his face. “Does that make me the winner? Since I am not dead?”

A slight shrug and a single word was the only reply his assailant gave.

“Yet.”

Samual and the Inquisitor were surprisingly evenly matched.

Neither of them were fighting at their full strength, both lacking the enhancing armour that they’d worn back in the Nightmare. But that did not mean either of them were fighting at anything remotely resembling a ‘human’ level.

They moved faster than Rita had ever thought humanly possible, blades a blur as they scythed through the air, missing each other by scant millimeters.

And when their swords clashed, deafening clangs echoed out through the warzone that was now the road in front of Gora’s apartment as sparks cascaded from the impact points.

“What’s going on?” Timothy whined weakly from where he was still hiding behind the bed.

After sending Samual out to go help, Rita had remained at the window, keeping an eye on what was happening down below, but Timothy had steadfastly refused to come out from behind the bed.

Rita would have called him a coward, but she understood. If she hadn’t gone through her own baptism-by-fire back in the Nightmare, she would probably have done the same. Actual danger was fucking terrifying.

“Samual is fighting a Mitlan Inquisitor,” Rita said grimly.

“An I-I-Inquisitor!?” Timothy stammered. “Here?”

Rita nodded. “Same one we met on the road in. Same one that tried to kill us all.”

“Y-Y-You never mentioned that!” Timothy stammered. “Wait, is this the same one that Gora told me about?”

“Probably,” Rita said, shrugging, before turning back to peer out the window. “Shit.”

“What? What’s happening?” Timothy squeaked.

“Samual’s losing.”

A deflected blow from Samual’s sword struck the underside of a tipped over carriage, causing the entire thing to crack along the direction of the blow in a shower of splinters. A second, follow up strike was deflected harmlessly upwards, leaving him exposed to the follow-through attack from the Mitlan inquisitor.

As the blade unerringly sought out his chest, Samual was forced to dip just a little deeper into Krutus’s power to duck back and roll with the blow enough so that the mail armour didn’t buckle under it.

It turned a thrust that would have surely impaled him into a hard punch in the chest.

Opening up the gap between him and his opponent, Samual settled back into a fighting stance while eying the man in front of him.

Old? Comparatively, yes. Bigoted? Undoubtedly.

But did the old man know how to handle a sword?

Without question.

Being the younger fighter, Samual had the edge in speed, in strength and the ability to heal even serious wounds through the power that Krutus granted him, as he had done with the injuries he’d sustained from the explosion that had caved in the front of Gora’s apartment.

And despite all those advantages, by the second exchange he’d known he was outmatched. It simply wasn’t enough. Whatever slight disadvantage the Mitlan High Inquisitor had physically was more than made up for with sheer skill.

Samual was proficient with a wide range of weapons. From maces, to swords, flails, even lances so that he would be ready for any hypothetical mounted combat. But what you needed to truly master a weapon was focus and time. Focus, Samual had plenty of. He prided himself on his focus. But what he lacked was time. He simply hadn’t had the time to delve too deeply into the art of any individual weapon, because he’d had so much else he’d also needed to focus on.

The Mitlan did not have this issue, it seemed. He was older, his hair mostly grey, but it seemed he’d spent that time judiciously. He used the sword like an extension of his own body. Every motion was considered, every step done with the long experience of knowing exactly why his balance was adjusted just so, not just for what was happening now, but for what was happening three steps from now.

Where Samual struck, the old man’s sword was already there, perfectly positioned to parry. And whenever the Inquisitor struck, it was as if he knew what Samual would expect the least or have the most difficulty to defend against.

Every exchange, every blow, every counterattack left Samual feeling wrong-footed, outmatched and outmaneuvered, as if the very landscape of the battle was conspiring against him.

Here, truly, was a master of the art of fighting with the sword. Samual had already learnt more from a minute of fighting with the man than he’d learnt in the past year from his own attempts. Which, admittedly, hadn’t been very much. He’d been quite busy.

Normally, in such circumstances, when faced with a foe more skillful than himself, he could fall back on his trump card: Krutus. He could simply dive deep into his god’s painful gifts for a burst of speed and power that no amount of skill could compensate for, to simply overwhelm and destroy his opponent in one decisive blow that could shatter rock.

But it wasn’t just the Inquisitor’s mundane skill that stymied Samual. He, too, was able to dip into a well of supernatural power, augmenting his speed and strength just enough to be able to keep up with Samual when he let loose.

And so, their fight became the last thing Samual wanted it to be: a battle of endurance.

In theory, the longer the fight went on, the better it was for Samual. It was only a matter of time until Gora returned and shifted the balance in his favour. Surely not even the inquisitor would be able to defeat them two-on-one?

Unfortunately, things weren’t quite that simple. Firstly, Samual had been forced to quickly heal his body from injuries he’d sustained in the explosion before the fight had even started. Then, he’d gone all out in the first few moments of the fight, hoping to finish his opponent quickly before the Inquisitor could properly react.

That had failed miserably. Without his armour and due to the nature of Mitla’s blessings, Samual had assumed the Inquisitor would have a very tenuous connection to his god, if at all. Yet somehow, the old man had not only dodged his surprise assault with seemingly preternatural awareness, but had also dipped into some kind of well of power to match his own.

It wasn’t quite a match, but it was close enough that the difference in skill could carry the day.

No, raw power was not going to bring Samual victory here. He was outclassed and outmatched. And that meant he had to fight smarter. He had to slow the fight down.

The two warriors slowly circled each other in the burning street.

“I must thank you,” Samual spoke, momentarily dipping his sword in respect. “It might not have been your intention, but I am learning an incredible amount from you here in this fight.”

The Inquisitor nodded his head briefly in recognition. “You fight like one who had no teacher. Not badly, just lacking in guidance. It is unfortunate you forsook the faith. You would have made a fine Inquisitor.”

“You know I am Mitlan?” Samual asked.

“Of course, Samual. I know a lot about you,” the Inquisitor replied, switching to Divine, the Mitlan language.

For a single moment, Samual froze.

“I see,” he said, a little shaken but quickly rallying. “So you know who I am.”

“I do,” the Inquisitor replied, taking a slow, cautious step forward.

“I didn’t expect the familial issues of a minor landowner from a distant village would warrant inquisitorial interest,” he replied, stepping back to keep pace with the Inquisitor. “Should I feel honoured or concerned?”

In truth, he was concerned. The tiniest embers of a humanity that he’d long thought that he’d stamped out was flickering to life. Not for his parents. They had cast him out and deserved no further consideration in his mind. Blind zealots, they could burn for all he cared. But there was one member of his family he still cared for…

“Neither,” the Inquisitor shrugged, taking another step. “I only happen to know of you through your brother.”

Samual kept his face perfectly blank, but inside his emotions raged.

When his family had banished him from the village, his brother had been away, visiting his uncle in another town. He’d never even had the chance to say goodbye.

If they’d hurt him, he was going to turn the Holy Mitlan Empire into a wasteland.

“In fact,” the Inquisitor continued when Samual didn’t immediately respond, “what you should feel is proud. Unlike you, Tomaas stayed true to Mitla’s teachings. He has become a fine Junior Inquisitor.”

Samual blinked. Tomaas became… an Inquisitor? His Tomaas? His gentle little kid brother who got upset when Samual pulled off insects’ legs? That Tomaas? How?

“Of course, I am going to have to tell my apprentice that I had to kill his brother in the execution of Mitla’s Will,” the old man added sadly, “and that is not a conversation I am looking forward to.”

Then he lunged forward.

While they’d been speaking, he’d slowly edged closer and closer, and Samual had barely enough time to bring up his own sword to parry before the Inquisitor’s powerful overhead blow scraped along the metal, throwing off a shower of sparks.

It was then that Samual discovered his mistake. When he attacked, the older and more experienced Inquisitor simply held him off, waiting for him to tire himself out. But when he stepped back and gave the initiative to the older man, that was so much worse.

Several more lightning quick attacks followed as the Inquisitor battered at his defences, each time sending Samual scrambling to defend in time to prevent himself from being eviscerated by the older man’s sword, each blow driving him back.

Desperately, he tried to open up a gap between himself and his opponent to give himself a chance to regain his balance and composure, but the Inquisitor pressed him mercilessly. He darted forward every time Samual attempted to leap back, making sure he didn’t get a moment to recover.

Finally, Samual simply couldn’t keep up anymore. A powerful blow landing before his feet were properly set sent him stumbling, off balance, forcing him to scramble to hurriedly block a follow up.

Only for the second attack to be a feint.

It was a moment of painful clarity when Samual realized that he’d made a mistake. That he’d over-committed and left himself exposed, his sword nowhere where it needed to be to be able to block the real attack. That he had been outmatched.

There was only one way remaining for him to win.

Throughout the battle so far, he’d started getting a feel for how powerful the Inquisitor could become. How heavy he could lean into Mitla’s power. And while it was significant, at least for short bursts, Samual was sure he could do more. He could go over the top.

It meant drawing deeper on his well of power than he’d ever tried without the use of his armour, but if there was one person Samual believed in absolutely, it was himself. He was going to have to draw so deep and so hard that, for one, brief moment, even the Inquisitor simply could not or dared not keep up.

And then, he would turn the man’s finishing strike into a deadly overextension and finish the battle in a single blow.

He dug deep into his god’s power. Tendrils of power flooded his body, surging through his muscles and sharpening his focus. And in their wake, came the pain. Spears of agony lanced through his limbs, it felt like his heart was pumping razor blades through his bloodstream.

He screamed in pain. And as he screamed, he kicked off the ground, making up for what he lacked in stability and poise with sheer, brute strength, spinning back towards his opponent and swinging his sword around with every ounce of his newfound strength and speed.

His blood felt like it was boiling, his heart was thundering harder in his chest than any human heart had any right to beat and his vision had turned red along the edges. Hit or miss, this was going to be his last strike. But it was perfectly aimed to catch the attacking Inquisitor in the chest, and more than powerful enough to simply bisect the man on a clean hit.

Even if the Inquisitor’s own blow landed, even if he impaled Samual up to the hilt through his heart, there would be no stopping him.

It was mutually assured destruction.

Which was why Samual was shocked when his blade struck nothing but empty air where the Inquisitor was supposed to be.

Instead it kept going, nearly wrenching Samual’s arms out of his sockets, before it struck a barrel that had fallen off one of the carts during the chaos, turning it to nothing but a cloud of splinters.

Gasping, Samual felt his whole body shudder with the whiplash of the power he’d just drawn on, forcing him to lean on his sword.

As blood started to run from his mouth and nose, Samual looked up to find the Inquisitor standing a few steps away, staring at him with a grim look on his face.

He hadn’t committed.

He’d driven Samual into a corner and then… and then he’d just stepped back.

He’d stepped back because he’d known exactly what Samual was going to do.

He’d been two steps ahead the entire time.

Samual gave a faint, bloody smile, before suddenly falling into a coughing fit, sending sprays of blood spattering across the smooth stone of the road surface.

“Good try,” the man stated solemnly, “but I believe this is over now.”

As he stepped closer, Samual tried to lift his sword again, but his muscles felt like jelly. Unable to even stay on his feet, he collapsed to his knees. Blood was now running freely from his nose, his ears, even his eyes.

“Quick power is never the answer, young Samual,” the Inquisitor said grimly as he stood over the young paladin.

Samual spat a glob of bloody phlegm to the road below him. Shakily, he raised his head, and fixed the Inquisitor with a bloody glare.

“Do you think,” he rasped slowly, blood burbling, “that I do not know this?” He gave another bloody cough. “Some of us,” he went on bitterly, “simply don’t have the luxury of time.”

So this was it. This was how he died. This was how his fate came to pass. All of his scheming, all of his planning, all of the tree’s nonsense, all for nothing.

The inquisitor leaned down next to him, resting his hand on Samual’s head. “Samual, Mitla urges me to bring you back. To return you to your own people. Repent your sins and face trial for your transgressions; die as one of the faithful, not isolated and alone as a heathen. Please. Think of your brother.”

Was that his ticket out? Pretend to agree with the old fool, then, when he’s had time to recover, beat him the only way that made sense: with a club, from behind, in a dark alley? Because fighting him face to face was lunacy.

He’d already opened his mouth to do it. To roll the dice on that one, final gamble, when a new voice entered the fray.

“Hey!” a familiar female voice called out. “I hear you’re looking for me?”

Samual craned his neck and his eyes widened.

Eight spider legs crunched through the rubble, stepping out through the hole in Gora’s apartment.

“Hey, I hear you’re looking for me?”

On the outside, Rita put up a brave face as the Inquisitor stood up from where he’d been kneeling next to Samual, but on the inside, she was desperately wishing Alice was awake so that she could yell at her about what a monumentally stupid idea this was.

She’d just seen the guy beat up Samual. Samual. The man who was consistently wiping the floor with her every time they sparred.

And here she was picking a fight. Fantastic.

“The monster of the hour arrives. You are done sending out proxies then?” the old man asked, turning to face her. “I am glad. No others need to die in your stead today.”

“I-I’m going to be honest with you, I’m still not quite clear on why I need to die so badly,” Rita stammered, doing her best not to let the tip of her spear shake.

The old man’s eyes narrowed. “You slew an Inquisitor and my ward. That is a crime punishable by death even if it had not been a personal slight on my honour.”

“But he attacked me first! And then he got better!” Rita argued, exasperated.

“Enough. We’ve already spoken of this. It is time for you to face your punishment,” the Inquisitor said grimly, raising his sword in front of his body in his fighting stance. “Now lower your spear and I will make your death swift.”

“We’ll see about that,” Rita replied, shifting her feet, “because… you’ll have to catch me first!”

Then, in what was quickly becomign her signature move, she turned and ran for it.

Down the road she skittered, risking a glance over her shoulder just to confirm that the Inquisitor, after throwing a quick look back towards Samual, had set off in pursuit.

Good! Her plan was working. If he was chasing her, he wasn’t killing Samual. Now if only she’d figured out a next step beyond ‘lose the old guy somehow’ before jumping into it with all eight feet!

She had to break line of sight. That much was common sense. But how? Looming, tightly packed buildings of smooth magestone crowded the streets in this area of Grailmane and it wasn’t like she could disappear into a crowd. She could try ducking into one of the shops she saw along the side of the road, but if they didn’t have a back entrance or she couldn’t go through it for some reason, she’d be trapped.

She wove between startled pedestrians, uninvolved bystanders who’d thought themselves at a safe distance to observe the chaos and more than a few stationary carts, blocked by the fiasco behind her. The crowd seemed to be steadily thickening.

Unfortunately, with her legs angled sideways, she was rather wide compared to a normal human. Certainly wider than the Inquisitor. Most people tried to get out of her way, but some were slow to react and others fingered weapons and forced her to take a wide berth rather than risk a confrontation, wasting even more time.

The Inquisitor, on the other hand, didn’t seem as bothered about avoiding confrontations. Screams of pain sounded out from behind her as some of those aggressive bystanders unintentionally did what little they could to make up for the time that they had cost her.

Rita swore under her breath. Up ahead, she could see what had to be one of Grailmane’s major thoroughfares. Thick crowds of people bustled up and down the road and the noise was steadily ramping up.

That was a problem. The relatively thinner crowds in the road she was in were already getting to be a problem, how much worse would it be over there, in the packed masses? Nevermind the possibility of someone just shoving a knife in her in passing. This was Grailmane, after all.

Jerking her head from side to side, she searched frantically for an alternative path, some side-road or something which she could use to sidestep the congested mess.

A-ha! Between two of the large, smooth magestone buildings, the entrance to an alley beckoned, slinking deeper into the urban maze. It was perfect!

Normally, dark, suspicious alleys would be something to avoid. They were a good way to either come face to face with the seedy underbelly of the city — or in Grailmane’s case, just the seedy belly — or trap yourself in a dead end.

In this case, the alley was neither dark, being brightly lit by the eternal noonday sun far above, nor did it contain any kind of belly, seedy or otherwise. It was, however, a dead end, something Rita saw the moment she peered in from the street. That didn’t stop her, though. In fact, it was perfect, because she had things that the Inquisitor lacked: eight legs and sharp toe-claws for climbing.

The alley itself was surprisingly barren and empty. No bags of garbage, random detritus or sleeping homeless folk. Nor did it have any doors on either side, something Rita found a bit odd but didn’t have time to ponder. After all, why have an alley that doesn’t go anywhere?

Instead, she skittered through the desolate passage, reaching the far wall as quickly as she could.

The wall was was about two or three meters high and seemed to be fused smoothly with the buildings on either side in a manner that would look disturbingly organic if it wasn’t how literally all the buildings here looked. The walls to the side were close enough together that if needed, she would probably be able to brace her legs against them if she tried. All in all, not the easiest climb, but she was reasonably confident that with the added assistance of the bucket-load of terrified adrenaline pumping through her body, it was eminently doable.

Flattening herself against the wall in the way she’d discovered works best, her feet hooked themselves into the smallest divots and imperfections and quickly she began hoisting herself up the sheer stone wall with eight powerful legs.

With any luck, she would up and out of reach of the old bigot by the time he caught up with her.

Then a surge of something pulsed through the stone pressing against her body and suddenly, it was perfectly, unnaturally smooth. Not a single crack or divot could be found. It was like a mirror’s surface.

Scrabbling in vain for something to hold on to, Rita slid down and crashed unceremoniously to the ground in a heap.

She quickly scrambled to her feet.

The alley wall still looked exactly as it had looked before, but a cautious touch confirmed that it’s texture had completely changed. Where before it had sported small signs of weathering, ordinary cracks and pits that naturally formed with time that she could hook her sharp claws into, now there was nothing. Nothing but a smooth, unblemished, unbroken finish.

Rita carefully backed away from the suddenly altered alley wall. Suddenly, this place was giving her a bad vibe. She didn’t want to be here anymore.

Somewhat awkwardly, Rita turned around to head back to the mouth of the alley, only to find it blocked by a familiar figure.

The Inquisitor had caught up with her.

Just as a feeling of cold dread settled in her stomach, a voice popped into her mind.

“Ughhh… what happened?”