“Anyways, now that you stopped whining-“ I explained while looking at the hammer at the opposite side of the table. Sadly, both Hannah and Tom didn’t want me to be anywhere near it anymore as if I was some kind of maniac going around hitting others with it.
“I´m not whining? My shoulder was just crushed by a certain someone?” said the person who screamed a few minutes ago. He didn’t even look hurt in any way thanks to changing his clothes.
“As I said, now that you have stopped whining, let us come to the real reason why we are here.” Testing the hammer was just one reason I was there. I didn’t know if I wanted to call the results of my testing a success, but whatever.
“And you want me to ignore that you hit me?” Tom asked to which I nod happily.
“Uhh … how about yes?” I asked and gave him my sweetest smile. He didn’t take it that well though and glared at me in return. Maybe it was because he was rather frustrated with his inability to hit me back.
“Fine … at least tell me why we want to eradicate your dad’s faith from this world.” I flinched for a second and then glared at him furiously. He knew since two hundred years that calling Aska my dad was something he shouldn’t do.
“Say that once more and I can assure you the next hammer hits your head.” I hissed through my gnashing teeth. “And now, how about you tell us what you got this far?”
“All followers of the faith of death have been barred from higher positions, including the pope of death himself. I guess that was your doing?” That much was obvious going by circumstantial evidence, wasn’t it?
“Continue.” I said without bothering to answer his question in any way.
“… sadly they aren’t preparing for mass suicide yet, so I really don’t know how you want to eradicate them secretly. They have several bases throughout the country and are – as expected – highly integrated into criminal society. They don’t appear to be at odds with any other faith right now. It is just the usual stuff, so exploiting that is out of the question. As you can see,” he slid a rather long list over to me. “their members are in all sorts of positions nowadays. A high ranking official here, a officer there and so on. It won´t be a heavy blow to the kingdom if they went all missing one day, but it is surely noticeable.”
“Have you found anything out of the ordinary with any members?” I asked because one name on this list was highlighted.
“Hmm … you asked me to search for any hidden geniuses and I think I found one of them.” Tom explained proudly.
“Huh?” I tilted my head and looked at him with disgust. If he really wanted praise, he certainly wouldn’t get it from me.
“May I introduce Richard Dunkelwald? Originally from the faith of darkness, he apparently chose to follow the teachings of death about six years ago. He is an 18 years old … philanthropist. His success with woman is rather outstanding. He got whoever he laid his eyes one without failing even once and none, including wed woman who had their marriage destroyed because of their lovemaking regretted their actions later.” Tom explained and slid a piece of paper with all the information he had about him to me. Born in the far south, he had a normal life until he moved to the city alone with the age of fourteen. And afterwards, he basically invited himself into woman´s houses on a regular basis. There was even a blank field for his address, meaning he probably didn’t even bother to rent a house.
“A real charmer.” I explained. I mean, having many partners was definitely not something I found immoral but he even seemed to ask them for money like some pathetic bastard.
“Most of the woman had bruises afterwards, and some didn’t return to their home later. Every attempt to charge him has been riddled with witnesses retracting their testimony or guards just plainly ignoring obvious evidence. And none felt that something was amiss.” So it weren’t just woman who fell for his charm which seemed more or less like slavery.
“I heard that stabbing yourself is a great way to escape brainwashing ... what about the high society? Did he lay his hands on some nobles?” I asked and raised my eyebrow. I could only hope he didn’t catch a princess along the way as this would make things a lot more difficult.
“I don’t know. His public stunts decreased during the last year, so I assume this to be the case. Or he may have found an interest in adventuring as he founded his own adventuring party half a year ago … full of woman of course. I seriously don’t know what kind of personality that guy has.” But I did. At least I could imagine it because I had been in touch with these people before.
“So we can assume he undermined the church of chaos which got their act together at one point and forced him out. And now he is playing with the church of death. Great … where is he currently at?” I could only hope it wasn’t a brothel. I was really glad I didn’t need to go there anymore.
“As far as I am aware he is staying at a rather pricey inn in the commoner’s district. He always eats around nine which means we can go and observe him.” His proposal was kind of interesting, but I really didn’t want to do all the hard labour. I had Tom for that.
“Hmm … I´d rather not. Have one of your subordinates watch him from afar secretly. It´s best if he doesn’t report to you personally afterwards though.” I couldn’t bear seeing him hurt, not after all that happened. Tom was a bit uncomfortable with my crocked smile as I stared at his shoulder and looked away from me awkwardly. “What do you know about Duke White?”
“Married into the family because of a missing male heir. He is kind to his subjects and understands that farmers can´t pay their due because of a bad harvest. Apparently married the duchess out of love and was quite overwhelmed with his new tasks after marrying into the family. Fiercely loyal to the crown, not a warrior and certainly no strategist. The best word to describe him would be an administrator.” Not excelling at anything, not bad at anything. I seriously didn’t know what to make of the duke, especially because Luna was a bit nervous about his arrival. I could only hope he didn’t do anything bad to her or Mary otherwise I wasn’t so sure he would survive very long.
“Very well then. It does seem as if I will have a little conversation with him. Is there anything else?” I asked and just stood up as Tom signalled me there was indeed something on his mind.
“Oh, there is.” He said and rang a bell underneath the table. Surprisingly, the same butler who greeted us earlier came into the room while carrying a sword wrapped in a blue cloth. I looked at him for several seconds and tried to understand if he didn’t hear the screams earlier, or just didn’t care. Carefully, he placed the sword right in front of me, bowed deeply and left without saying anything.
“I assume you know what this is?” Surely I did. In front of me laid the doggo slayer which was pretty obvious as the soul within the sword concentrated on the point furthest away from me. We already had the pleasure to converse a little bit two hundred years ago after all. “Hannah told me you may be interested in this?”
“From where do you have that?” I asked with a hint of interest. Either he stole it which wasn’t entirely out of question, or a benefactor wanted to make sure that it went into my hands someday.
“Mary … the old Mary White made sure it was in my hands.” He explained and opened his eyes wide as the sword flung upwards without me or Hannah doing anything obvious. Catching the cloth covering the sword previously before it fell onto the ground I heard in satisfaction how the sword slammed into the chandelier above us loudly. A bit of glass fell onto the table as I stood up and winked towards Tom.
“If this sword dares to come down in the next hour, you may melt it down or stab the whore with it. It´s up to you.” I grinned wryly and nodded to Hannah who was already standing while looking at the sword sticking with the flat side to the nearest metallic surface it could find. “Have a great Saint´s birthday … or however else others are calling this shitty day.”
“The day of salvation.” Tom said while smiling brightly. It somehow made me feel as if smashing his shoulder to pieces made it all worth it.
“Or the day of purification.” Hannah added which made me close my eyes slowly. I hated this day so much that I was itching to make others call it the day of depravity next time.
“Oh, for fucks sake … I need alcohol.” But at that time, I had to live with the fact that my name was tarnished, my honour in pieces and humans would feel better which was exactly not what I wanted.
“You shouldn’t drink alcohol on the way back.” Tom said and I glared at him. He knew I didn’t like it when others told me what to do, and certainly not if they were my subordinates.
“Imagine having a foot fetishist telling you what you aren’t supposed to do.” I sighed loudly and was already on my way towards the door as Tom stood up in anger.
“I´m not a foot fetishist!?” He really tried to save his honour there, but in my eyes, he didn’t have any in the first place after all the things he did.
“He is kind of right though. It is not well received to drink alcohol on this day where everyone is supposed to show their best side.” The thing was though … drinking alcohol was the best part of me. It was always so easy to draw smiles upon others while drunk or on drugs. Otherwise they were in immediate danger of being hurt by me either accidentally like I crushed Tom´s shoulder or on purpose because I wanted to see others in pain.
That was just how I was raised for four hundred something years.
In the end, I drank wine before going onto the streets again and tried my best to make my body understand that I wanted to be drunk which didn’t work out at all. As I was back on the streets with Hannah who obviously left the hammer behind, I could see how others were writing wishes on a piece of paper and letting them fly upwards into the night sky by securing them onto a lamp which floated upwards slowly.
“Do they really think I hear their wishes?” I growled angrily as there were less people around us.
“Sometimes it is much more important to have someone who will always be by your side, than to have someone who will listen to their wishes …” Luckily, I wasn’t by their side. I didn’t even know their names and I definitely didn’t want to be their friends.
“Eh?” I mumbled as I didn’t get what she wanted to say right away.
“Lucinda, most of us hear your voice rather often and unlike you who hates to hear your own voice in the back of your head … most of us think that the gods speak to them through you.” I knew that much. But I still didn’t get why humans thought this way. This system was just borrowing my soul and voice to hold this world in an iron grip. Noting more, nothing less.
“What have the gods ever done to help them except torturing me with this goddamn system? Nothing. Trust me, this world is better off without the gods.” It went quiet between us for a little while as we both knew this conversation would lead nowhere. I didn’t believe on second Hannah had that much faith in the gods herself after everything I had told her. But still, the gods were gods. Beings beyond the understanding of a mortal and even someone like me.
“Anyways, now that you stopped whining-“ I explained while looking at the hammer at the opposite side of the table. Sadly, both Hannah and Tom didn’t want me to be anywhere near it anymore as if I was some kind of maniac going around hitting others with it.
“I´m not whining? My shoulder was just crushed by a certain someone?” said the person who screamed a few minutes ago. He didn’t even look hurt in any way thanks to changing his clothes.
“As I said, now that you have stopped whining, let us come to the real reason why we are here.” Testing the hammer was just one reason I was there. I didn’t know if I wanted to call the results of my testing a success, but whatever.
“And you want me to ignore that you hit me?” Tom asked to which I nod happily.
“Uhh … how about yes?” I asked and gave him my sweetest smile. He didn’t take it that well though and glared at me in return. Maybe it was because he was rather frustrated with his inability to hit me back.
“Fine … at least tell me why we want to eradicate your dad’s faith from this world.” I flinched for a second and then glared at him furiously. He knew since two hundred years that calling Aska my dad was something he shouldn’t do.
“Say that once more and I can assure you the next hammer hits your head.” I hissed through my gnashing teeth. “And now, how about you tell us what you got this far?”
“All followers of the faith of death have been barred from higher positions, including the pope of death himself. I guess that was your doing?” That much was obvious going by circumstantial evidence, wasn’t it?
“Continue.” I said without bothering to answer his question in any way.
“… sadly they aren’t preparing for mass suicide yet, so I really don’t know how you want to eradicate them secretly. They have several bases throughout the country and are – as expected – highly integrated into criminal society. They don’t appear to be at odds with any other faith right now. It is just the usual stuff, so exploiting that is out of the question. As you can see,” he slid a rather long list over to me. “their members are in all sorts of positions nowadays. A high ranking official here, a officer there and so on. It won´t be a heavy blow to the kingdom if they went all missing one day, but it is surely noticeable.”
“Have you found anything out of the ordinary with any members?” I asked because one name on this list was highlighted.
“Hmm … you asked me to search for any hidden geniuses and I think I found one of them.” Tom explained proudly.
“Huh?” I tilted my head and looked at him with disgust. If he really wanted praise, he certainly wouldn’t get it from me.
“May I introduce Richard Dunkelwald? Originally from the faith of darkness, he apparently chose to follow the teachings of death about six years ago. He is an 18 years old … philanthropist. His success with woman is rather outstanding. He got whoever he laid his eyes one without failing even once and none, including wed woman who had their marriage destroyed because of their lovemaking regretted their actions later.” Tom explained and slid a piece of paper with all the information he had about him to me. Born in the far south, he had a normal life until he moved to the city alone with the age of fourteen. And afterwards, he basically invited himself into woman´s houses on a regular basis. There was even a blank field for his address, meaning he probably didn’t even bother to rent a house.
“A real charmer.” I explained. I mean, having many partners was definitely not something I found immoral but he even seemed to ask them for money like some pathetic bastard.
“Most of the woman had bruises afterwards, and some didn’t return to their home later. Every attempt to charge him has been riddled with witnesses retracting their testimony or guards just plainly ignoring obvious evidence. And none felt that something was amiss.” So it weren’t just woman who fell for his charm which seemed more or less like slavery.
“I heard that stabbing yourself is a great way to escape brainwashing ... what about the high society? Did he lay his hands on some nobles?” I asked and raised my eyebrow. I could only hope he didn’t catch a princess along the way as this would make things a lot more difficult.
“I don’t know. His public stunts decreased during the last year, so I assume this to be the case. Or he may have found an interest in adventuring as he founded his own adventuring party half a year ago … full of woman of course. I seriously don’t know what kind of personality that guy has.” But I did. At least I could imagine it because I had been in touch with these people before.
“So we can assume he undermined the church of chaos which got their act together at one point and forced him out. And now he is playing with the church of death. Great … where is he currently at?” I could only hope it wasn’t a brothel. I was really glad I didn’t need to go there anymore.
“As far as I am aware he is staying at a rather pricey inn in the commoner’s district. He always eats around nine which means we can go and observe him.” His proposal was kind of interesting, but I really didn’t want to do all the hard labour. I had Tom for that.
“Hmm … I´d rather not. Have one of your subordinates watch him from afar secretly. It´s best if he doesn’t report to you personally afterwards though.” I couldn’t bear seeing him hurt, not after all that happened. Tom was a bit uncomfortable with my crocked smile as I stared at his shoulder and looked away from me awkwardly. “What do you know about Duke White?”
“Married into the family because of a missing male heir. He is kind to his subjects and understands that farmers can´t pay their due because of a bad harvest. Apparently married the duchess out of love and was quite overwhelmed with his new tasks after marrying into the family. Fiercely loyal to the crown, not a warrior and certainly no strategist. The best word to describe him would be an administrator.” Not excelling at anything, not bad at anything. I seriously didn’t know what to make of the duke, especially because Luna was a bit nervous about his arrival. I could only hope he didn’t do anything bad to her or Mary otherwise I wasn’t so sure he would survive very long.
“Very well then. It does seem as if I will have a little conversation with him. Is there anything else?” I asked and just stood up as Tom signalled me there was indeed something on his mind.
“Oh, there is.” He said and rang a bell underneath the table. Surprisingly, the same butler who greeted us earlier came into the room while carrying a sword wrapped in a blue cloth. I looked at him for several seconds and tried to understand if he didn’t hear the screams earlier, or just didn’t care. Carefully, he placed the sword right in front of me, bowed deeply and left without saying anything.
“I assume you know what this is?” Surely I did. In front of me laid the doggo slayer which was pretty obvious as the soul within the sword concentrated on the point furthest away from me. We already had the pleasure to converse a little bit two hundred years ago after all. “Hannah told me you may be interested in this?”
“From where do you have that?” I asked with a hint of interest. Either he stole it which wasn’t entirely out of question, or a benefactor wanted to make sure that it went into my hands someday.
“Mary … the old Mary White made sure it was in my hands.” He explained and opened his eyes wide as the sword flung upwards without me or Hannah doing anything obvious. Catching the cloth covering the sword previously before it fell onto the ground I heard in satisfaction how the sword slammed into the chandelier above us loudly. A bit of glass fell onto the table as I stood up and winked towards Tom.
“If this sword dares to come down in the next hour, you may melt it down or stab the whore with it. It´s up to you.” I grinned wryly and nodded to Hannah who was already standing while looking at the sword sticking with the flat side to the nearest metallic surface it could find. “Have a great Saint´s birthday … or however else others are calling this shitty day.”
“The day of salvation.” Tom said while smiling brightly. It somehow made me feel as if smashing his shoulder to pieces made it all worth it.
“Or the day of purification.” Hannah added which made me close my eyes slowly. I hated this day so much that I was itching to make others call it the day of depravity next time.
“Oh, for fucks sake … I need alcohol.” But at that time, I had to live with the fact that my name was tarnished, my honour in pieces and humans would feel better which was exactly not what I wanted.
“You shouldn’t drink alcohol on the way back.” Tom said and I glared at him. He knew I didn’t like it when others told me what to do, and certainly not if they were my subordinates.
“Imagine having a foot fetishist telling you what you aren’t supposed to do.” I sighed loudly and was already on my way towards the door as Tom stood up in anger.
“I´m not a foot fetishist!?” He really tried to save his honour there, but in my eyes, he didn’t have any in the first place after all the things he did.
“He is kind of right though. It is not well received to drink alcohol on this day where everyone is supposed to show their best side.” The thing was though … drinking alcohol was the best part of me. It was always so easy to draw smiles upon others while drunk or on drugs. Otherwise they were in immediate danger of being hurt by me either accidentally like I crushed Tom´s shoulder or on purpose because I wanted to see others in pain.
That was just how I was raised for four hundred something years.
In the end, I drank wine before going onto the streets again and tried my best to make my body understand that I wanted to be drunk which didn’t work out at all. As I was back on the streets with Hannah who obviously left the hammer behind, I could see how others were writing wishes on a piece of paper and letting them fly upwards into the night sky by securing them onto a lamp which floated upwards slowly.
“Do they really think I hear their wishes?” I growled angrily as there were less people around us.
“Sometimes it is much more important to have someone who will always be by your side, than to have someone who will listen to their wishes …” Luckily, I wasn’t by their side. I didn’t even know their names and I definitely didn’t want to be their friends.
“Eh?” I mumbled as I didn’t get what she wanted to say right away.
“Lucinda, most of us hear your voice rather often and unlike you who hates to hear your own voice in the back of your head … most of us think that the gods speak to them through you.” I knew that much. But I still didn’t get why humans thought this way. This system was just borrowing my soul and voice to hold this world in an iron grip. Noting more, nothing less.
“What have the gods ever done to help them except torturing me with this goddamn system? Nothing. Trust me, this world is better off without the gods.” It went quiet between us for a little while as we both knew this conversation would lead nowhere. I didn’t believe on second Hannah had that much faith in the gods herself after everything I had told her. But still, the gods were gods. Beings beyond the understanding of a mortal and even someone like me.
