“It can’t be a demon.”
Simon looked over his shoulder at Alphonse. The Paladin looked forlorn, and the bleating of the goats following them didn’t help. He had been somewhat in denial since they shared their findings on Pharis, largely because the truth called into question his entire culture. Simon himself sympathized. He himself still struggled to believe it.
Helel had inspired the Church of the Light.
Simon had hoped it had been a normal institution which Helel usurped, but it seemed she was indeed the driving force behind it from the start. He guessed it served multiple purposes: stealing Prayers aimed at the Megalith, eidolons, and Mana Goddess to weaken and sideline them, ensure she could eventually influence her worshipers to free and empower herself, and throw mortals Mardok’s way as sacrificial pawns.
This would also explain why the First Overlord had taken such a malicious approach—even by his usual standards—in dealing with Pharis. He had been working to suppress his strongest rival’s cult.
Louis was right. Their creed was built on rotten foundations from the start. This displeased Simon, since it called all of his plans for the Church Party into question. Empowering them might just mean I’ll fight a stronger Helel down the line.
They had shared the information with the team, who all took it in different ways. Alcyone and Ser Richard had remained quiet, but powered through by telling themselves they would investigate the Light Megalith after dealing with Verney; Frea had seemed confused and silent, if not in outright denial that the Mana Goddess would gift a demon-infested Megalith to others; Belzemine didn’t care; and Voltobauta had simply laughed it off.
At least one of them found it amusing.
“There has to be another explanation,” Alphonse insisted, both to himself and his two teammates.
“I mean, even if it is true, does it truly matter?” Voltobauta asked while up ahead of the group. The night was dark, and the village’s streets were pitch black. “The Light, as a cosmic force, is very real. It’s the belief that something so powerful would care for us mortals enough to bargain with us that is both wrong and deeply deluded.”
Alphonse glared at him. “Why wouldn’t a god answer Prayers?”
“Why would they? A real god would have nothing to prove.”
“People will always demand proof,” Simon replied. Still, Voltobauta had a point. The Light did exist as a cosmic force. Helel was simply usurping its image in the name of her own self-aggrandizement. The Church could be purified once its tenets were reformed to align with their true god, or at least rally around a new idol. “Either way, we’ll have time to check. We should be close.”
“This should be the place,” Voltobauta said, pointing at an innocuous shoemaker’s shop. This was the closest Attic’s entrance they could find to Verney’s castle. “When will he notice our presence?”
“It should take some time, since we’re using a fetch capable of granting authorized entry. I would give it a few minutes as my flock fills his Attic’s entrails. At that point, it’ll be too late.”
“Good. Alcyone tells me they’ve started the banquet with Verney.” The Adventurer could apparently send messages to members of her Party thanks to her additional Perks. “He’ll be busy for a while.”
“Then let’s begin.”
Voltobauta nodded and kicked the shoemaker’s door open. The grinning fetch on the other side of the counter looked up, completely unbothered.
“I’m sorry,” the living automaton said without a care in the world. “We are currently clos–”
Voltobauta transformed into a cloud of mist that flew straight into the fetch’s mouth and nose to possess it. The substance filled the creature and overtook its mind, its eyes matching the vampire’s red hue.
“That was easier than I expected,” Voltobauta said through the fetch’s lips, its grin fading away into a normal expression. “These things truly are empty shells.”
“Let’s open the doorway then.” Simon invited his flock inside the shoemaker’s shop until they cramped it, then gave them one last speech to motivate them. “Death need not be the end of hope! Death is but a journey! Offer the flock your life, and I shall carry your souls on my shoulders to the wolfless lands!”
The goats bleated, to Voltobauta’s amusement. “I have to ask, can you understand what they say?”
“I can,” Simon confirmed. He paid close attention, words emerging from the chaos.
“One flock, one faith, one shepherd!” the lead goat chanted like a deranged fanatic. “We must purge ourselves of the unbelievers, for milk cannot coexist with water! And the shepherd shall see that the floor is clear, free of grass, with not a single weed to bar his path!”
“Our shepherd!” the others bleated. Their brands activated, letting them grow wings and fiery hooves. “Our shepherd!”
“They’re being cute,” Simon told Voltobauta, whose smirk only deepened. He didn’t believe him.
“They remind me of all those girls who follow me around in Valne,” Alphonse admitted. “I just stopped paying attention to them after a while.”
“Have you considered recruiting them as suicide bombers too?” Simon cleared his throat as Alphonse’s gaze became unbearable. “It was a joke.”
“It wasn’t. I can tell.”
“Get a room, you two,” Voltobauta mocked them. The possessed Necromancer opened the Attic’s door in the back of the shop, then guided the flock inside as he unlocked all the doors he could. Simon and Alphonse closed the march, with the goal of infiltrating Verney’s castle through its own backdoor to cut off any potential escape. They both put on their Class outfits, with Simon layering a Nightveil on top.
“I can’t believe it…” Alphonse muttered to himself, looking around at the many doors and corridors. “This Attic… it’s real. You were telling the truth.”
“Did you doubt us?” Simon inquired.
Alphonse scoffed. “Of course I did.”
“And here I thought offering my dragon mount as a sacrifice had formed a bond between us. I’m disappointed.”
“While I’m pretty sure you get levels off it, I have to warn you that using it as a training dummy to be slain for experience and then revived again is morally wrong,” Voltobauta said as they walked through door after door. “You should treat your undead servants better.”
“It was never alive in the first place,” Simon replied. “It’s a piece of my soul.”
“That’s even more messed up. You helped a Paladin beat up a piece of yourself.” Voltobauta glanced at Alphonse. “No offense.”
“It is… fine.” Alphonse was too straight-laced for that kind of banter, and the Attic didn’t improve his disposition. “This place seems normal to my senses at first glance, but the more I look at it, the more it feels… fake.”
“It’s an Abyssal Domain that interferes with divinations,” Simon warned him while they cast their various buffs to strengthen themselves. “Be wary. It wouldn’t surprise me if Verney had left a few guardians inside.”
“Alcyone tells me they are about to engage Verney in a fight,” Voltobauta warned them. “No doubt he’ll call for backup, so this place should be on high alert soon.”
And indeed it was. An alarm rang out in the form of a familiar song echoing through the corridors that immediately diminished Simon’s magic.
Magic sharply debuffed.
Thankfully, Alphonse’s abilities remained as effective as ever. Simon had heard the Paladin gained anti-debuff protections as it leveled up, and it showed.
Alphonse of Lore’s Aura of Bravery granted you immunity to Terror, Madness, and Charm! You gain resistance against hostile mental-affecting effects!
Alphonse of Lore’s Holy Halo granted your weapons the Darkslayer quality! You will also take less damage from miasma or creatures of the Dark!
Alphonse of Lore’s Heroic Destiny gave you an experience bonus! Your current Class will gain +2% EXP for every level that the current Overlord has over you! This stacks with other experience increasing Perks!
This won’t end like our last encounter, Valravn, Simon thought, trembling in anticipation, I can assure you of that.
The trio followed the song and stepped through a door into the very center of the Attic.
Simon immediately recognized the seemingly endless landscape of spiraling rugs under a sky of floating doors, with dim lamps, surrealist paintings, music boxes, and distorted mannequins. The very sight of this warped place unnerved Simon to his core.
Verney was waiting for them, sitting on a leather sofa right next to a black door, a book and a lamp sitting on a small table next to him. A sheathed curved sword in the Fablan style sat against the armrest.
The sight caused Alphonse to shake, not in fear, but in disbelief and fury. It had finally hit him that, yes, the count enjoying himself in the middle of a demonic Domain proved his culpability beyond all doubts.
“Hello, Valravn,” Simon greeted him with delight. This was an unplanned encounter, but a joyful one all the same. “How have you been?”
“Goats?” he wondered in genuine puzzlement upon seeing the flock following the trio of intruders. His eyes widened slightly upon spotting the Paladin of the group. “Alphonse? What are you doing here?”
“Lord Verney.” Alphonse drew his sword in anger. He sensed the Dark radiating off Verney. “I thought you were dining with my father.”
“Your father is dining with an associate capable of taking my form.” Either the seriousness of his situation hadn’t yet hit Verney, or he was trying to pretend nothing was wrong to buy himself more time. “A body double meant to preserve my life from assassins, if you will.”
“Bert or Renal, I would assume,” Simon guessed.
Verney frowned, his gaze wandering to the fetch among them. His eyes widened even further with realization.
“Ah, I see how it is. A coordinated betrayal.” Verney smiled at the fetch, his lips having a cruel edge to them. He had clearly seen through the possession. “I am disappointed, Voltobauta. I thought you would be wiser than to bite the hand that feeds you.”
“I’m a pirate, it’s what I do.” Voltobauta chuckled as his misty form emerged from the fetch’s body, leaving the creature to dissolve into snow as he materialized next to it. “I wasn’t made out to play the henchman.”
“Alas, I fear pirates are instead made to hang from gallows.” Verney rose from his seat and grabbed his sheathed sword in a flash. “I suppose you will not walk away? I abhor violence, and fighting me in this place is folly.”
“Yes, yes, you have a nice and cozy private dimension,” Simon conceded upon summoning his Overlord scepter, “but only one of us has a cult of suicidally loyal explosive goats to call upon, so who’s the real loser here?”
Thomas Verney-Valravn, Archfiend of Wrongness, had no answer to this besides stunned silence.
Simon sicced his goats upon him for his faithlessness. A dozen bleating winged demons rushed at him in a suicidal charge.
Verney ignored them and instead adopted a stance Simon had practiced so many times before. He unsheathed his sword in a lightning-fast Quickdraw, slicking through the goats on his way to the party. Simon’s faithful soldiers were sliced in two by the blow, their holy lives snuffed out in the instant.
A Hastened Alphonse proved more than a match for Verney’s speed. He moved in front of the group and intercepted him, their swords clashing with a steely blow that echoed across the Attic’s heart. A Class outfit taking the form of a black tunic akin to the Warrior now covered the possessed count, with a black headband now surrounding his head.
Alphonse quickly found himself on the defensive as Verney unleashed a flurry of blows so fast the eye struggled to follow. His limbs and sword blurred, which Simon recognized as a mix of the Hasten and Mirage statuses. He struck the Paladin with a sword dance only someone with Perfect Proficiency could pull off, striking at the shoulders and legs.
Voltobauta ran to the side to flank Verney, grabbed his pistol, and opened fire at range. The possessed count responded by kicking Alphonse away so hard that it threw him back, then deflected the manalith bullet with his blade. His sword cut the air and unleashed a crescent-shaped beam of moonlight, which Voltobauta barely avoided by turning into mist.
Simon exploited that brief window of opportunity to sing a song of destruction. “When silence offers no respite, death’s trumpets shall herald your end! Sing my praise, Culebre Chainpiper!”
His servant appeared in a blast of miasma and chaotic cacophony, his horrendous voice drowning out the music boxes’ song.
Culebre’s appearance briefly violated causality, causing a vision of a rotting Attic of extinguished lamps and defaced paintings to briefly overlap with the real one. It only lasted a second, but this caused Verney’s head to snap in Simon’s direction. Had he detected it too?
Either way, what mattered was that the only song Simon could hear was Culebre’s.
Your magic is no longer debuffed!
Perfect. Simon grinned wickedly as he pointed a finger at Verney. How long had he yearned for this moment? “Invert.”
His spell twisted all of Verney’s buffs inside out. His speed became an invisible weight heavier than gravity’s pull, and the afterimages left in his wake vanished a second before Alphonse drove his holy sword into his chest. The possessed count let out a roar of pure agony, yet only darkness and liquid quicksilver poured out of his wound.
Verney merged with his shadow to escape the Paladin’s grip, then reappeared behind Alphonse and kicked him in the back.
“This evil I sensed…” Verney tensed up, his skin paling. “You are the Overlord.”
“You’re all caught up,” Simon replied with a laugh as he called upon the powers of Hell. “Darkbound.”
He began to grow to gargantuan size, a shadow greater than what this feeble pocket dimension could contain. His intention was to squash Verney underfoot like a bug the same way he nearly slew Silk in Frightwall, but the count struck first. He charged at Simon with astonishing speed—if slower than before—avoiding Culebre’s attempt to ram him, and then struck at his foe’s ankle.
“Spellsunder.”
Verney struck Simon, yet his sword didn’t harm the Overlord. The blade appeared to phase through his armor and flesh without harming either, instead cutting the miasma pipeline that connected him to the Abyss.
What the… Simon suddenly lost control of his transformation and began to shrink, the flow of miasma he drained from his goats being disrupted. He felt as if he had pins and needles in his very soul, while finding himself shrinking back down to his original size. I can’t sustain Darkbound!
Even Culebre appeared affected as his body leaked miasma, though he quickly defended his master by blasting Verney with a sonic blast from its trumpet. The impact shattered multiple doors and nearby lamps while sending Verney flying to the foot of a painting. Alphonse and Voltobauta immediately began to attack him at range, the former with Starshots, the latter with a mix of Ectoplasmer spells and pistol shots. Simon attempted to assist them by casting Ruin, yet his own magic fizzled in his hands.
I can’t use spells… Simon grunted as he realized the issue. It wasn’t an ailment, or a draining effect. The bastard had instead disrupted his miasma control so intimately he struggled to maintain Culebre’s manifestation. Need to focus!
“Haven’t you sworn an oath to destroy the Overlord, Alphonse?” Verney inquired while barely deflecting another of Voltobauta’s bullets. He was starting to feel the pressure from being attacked from all sides. “It is against him we should ally.”
“I am calling everything into question,” Alphonse replied, his voice brimming with bitterness as he incanted another Starshot. “What happened to you, Lord Verney?”
Verney responded by leaping into the painting behind as if it were a portal, dodging the Starshot spell and leaping out of another a few dozen meters away. Culebre immediately blasted the painting he exited from with another sonic blast, destroying lots of furniture such as music boxes and paintings, but missing the count.
“My father spoke so highly of you!” Alphonse shouted while casting a healing spell on himself. “Why would you ally yourself with criminals and demons?”
“I grew tired of this pointless war, and of being sacrificed for a lie,” Verney answered, his hand holding his chest. Simon immediately detected the raw miasma radiating from him.
The real battle would start now.
Alphonse squinted behind his helmet. “What lie?”
“Your elf handler didn’t tell you?” Verney sneered in disdain, darkness gathering around him. “Of course she wouldn’t. The Oracle sent her so you would be a good hound and not ask too many questions.”
A pulse of miasma erupted from him, causing all open Attic doors to shut. Space twisted slightly, and a weight fell upon Simon. Vile magic caused Culebre to dissipate into nothingness, a weakened and still as effective song rising from the music boxes.
Valravn the Uncanny Twins trapped you in his Abyssal Domain! All teleportation effects are negated! Illusions and lies can no longer be identified, divinations are impaired, and any spell or effect requiring a willing target will fail!
Alphonse’s Aura of Bravery, Holy Halo, and Heroic Destiny will no longer work on you!
Odd. All System messages showing the rules of a demon’s Domain usually showcased the host’s name merged with that of the Zodiac Fiend, but there was no mention of Verney. This detail unsettled Simon, who could tell it was more important than it seemed.
Doesn’t matter, Simon told himself. Just a few more minutes and his goats would have filled enough corridors to have the Attic collapsing in on itself. This will be over soon.
“Allow me to enlighten you, Alphonse,” Verney said as darkness shrouded his body, “so that you may carry this pain to your grave as I did.”
The count underwent a familiar transformation, his Fencer Class outfit fading away into a hooded tunic that seemed to merge with the shadows. His visage’s features disappeared into a smooth surface of sickly white skin reflecting onlookers, his limbs’ proportions growing slightly off.
“You fight for a ghost, Paladin,” Valravn the Uncanny Twins said, his voice a poisonous whisper, “our goddess killed yours a long time ago.”