“Take a seat.” The female knight ordered me. Or maybe I should call her the genderbent hero? Well, whatever. Let’s just do as asked.
After I took the seat, the ‘interrogation’ began. Well, perhaps more like an interview, but I’ll call it an interrogation. Because who on Earth would show up to an interview dressed in a full suit of armor, with a weapon at hand and with both a priest and a sage by their side.
Oh yeah. This isn’t ‘on Earth’, so I guess that explains it. … That is a lie. It still really doesn’t explain anything.
“It is a pleasure to meet you, System Support Holder Brian Wood. My name is Wendy Hero. I am here as the representative of the Adventurer’s Guild.” The female knight… again, more like the genderbent hero, introduced herself. And her last name is Hero? What is that about? Why would they allow the last name Hero? … Unless..?
But before I had time to ponder on that more, the next person introduced themselves.
“I am Ian Cobba, and here on the behalf of the Sage’s Tower.” The Sage looking guy introduced himself. I’m not 100% positive, but I do think he is an actual Sage in the tower. I feel like Mariina might have even mentioned Sir Ian at some point, but I might be wrong.
“And I am Sepher White, here on behalf of the Goddess’ Church.” And then the priest. And Goddess’ Church? Is that the official name of it? Everyone always just calls it ‘The Church’, so I didn’t know.
Okay. So we have the representatives of the three major powers of the Hero’s country. The Church, the Tower and the Guild. I guess this is a bit more serious than I was expecting.
… and ‘a bit’ might be an under exaggeration. This seems very serious.
“It is a pleasure. As you already know, I am Brian Wood.” I responded, trying to be somewhere between humble and authoritative. “... so? May I ask what this meeting is about? I know the excuse, but I feel like you have a different reason for this meeting.”
“I should have expected that nothing would get past you.” Lady Wendy said.
“... Yeah. It isn’t difficult to guess with this lineup.”
“... I see. We shall drive to do better in the future. But as to why we have invited you, and thank you for arriving so soon, Seph, if you would.”
“Please don’t shorten my name, Lady Wendy.” Sepher complained a bit, before he spoke to me. “We have called you here after a vision given to a few clergymen by the Goddess’ Angel. Angel Sicily has informed us of upcoming dangers and requested that we give System Support Holder Brian Wood our full support in dealing with the problems.”
Sicily? Another System Agent, I’d guess. Wonder who she belonged to? And how can a System Agent appear before someone who isn’t a System Support Holder? Do they have a way of doing it with just anyone? Or maybe it is something linked to Holy Magic?
“I see. What did this angel tell you?” I asked.
“Don’t you know?” The Sage asked, before Sepher had the time to.
“I have an idea, but it is better to compare what we know. You may have heard something I haven’t, as I’ve never been in direct contact with Age… excuse me, Angel Sicily.”
“Does that mean … that you have been in contact with a Goddess’ Angels?” Sepher asked.
“Yes, though only one of them.” I answered honestly. I mean, the Goddess doesn’t count, as she isn’t ‘an angel’, so it is only Aulis. And I guess we were indirectly in contact with Agent Joan, but that was only her sending a mission for Alice. The Goddess was the one that informed me of that mission. Actually, I think she was trying to give it to me at first, until I suggested giving it to Alice instead. Just because I didn’t want more on my plate.
“... May I ask how it happens with you?”
“Seph, get back on track. You can bother Sir Wood about that later.” Lady Wendy interrupted before I had the time to answer.
“Y-Yes, Ma'am.” Sepher said. He sounded a bit nervous, so maybe my theory on Lady Wendy is actually correct. “We have seen visions of these miasma blobs. I believe one appeared near Oroco City just a bit ago, and Sir Wood dealt with it. We learned that more of them will be appearing, and that only Sir Wood can fix them, and that we are to help you in this endeavor.”
“... okay. Well, that is good. So you know basically all of it.” I just lied to them, because if they weren’t informed of the true nature of the ‘miasma blobs’, maybe they shouldn’t be.
“Do you not know more about it?” Sage Ian asked.
“I know a bit more, but not that much. The miasma blobs are… they are an ancient curse left on the world by the Demon Lord.” I began telling them a story that was basically a mix of a lie and the truth. Since the System Agents didn’t reveal the true nature of the dimensional fissures, neither will I.
“By the Demon Lord?” Wendy asked.
“Yes, as far as I know. They have been suppressed for a long time, as the Goddess, when she appeared during the time of the Hero, was able to seal them away. But her power isn’t infinite and has begun to waver. Because of that, those miasma blobs are starting to appear, and as her power weakens even more, they will be appearing at an accelerated rate.” I kept up my lie, while also still keeping the facts almost straight. I mean, the dimensional fissures began appearing because the Demon Lord misused a Chaos God Dungeon causing the Dimensional Barrier to weaken. And the Goddess was able to fix the barrier using the Hero’s unique skill as the material for a new barrier, so it is basically the truth.
“Are you saying … that it is our Goddess’ fault?” Sepher asked, sounding quite peeved.
“Of course not. In all honesty, it is our fault.”
“What do you mean by that?” Lady Wendy asked.
“We are simply too weak.” I answered. “Any System, no matter how perfect, will need maintenance. That includes the protection the Goddess gave us, keeping us safe from the miasma blobs. It is our fault that after the passing of the Hero and his party members, no human group has ever been powerful enough to summon the Goddess here again. Had she been able to appear again, she would have been able to reinforce the protection she gave us. But because we are weak, she couldn’t.” I lied again, but it should sound acceptable to them.
“... I see. Then, is there something we can do?” Lady Wendy asked.
“Yes, there are.” I stated. I have a few things in mind, so let’s see which ones of them will this trio approve of.
“I do not like this.” Lady Wendy said. “Everything you have offered is just a temporary solution.”
“Yeah. They are a bit like putting a bandaid onto a bleeding artery. But until we find a way to summon the Goddess, or a being of equal power, there is nothing we can do.”
“Is that even possible?” Sage Ian asked.
“... in theory. I mean, the Hero’s party was able to make the Goddess appear, so it should be possible. Did they leave any notes about that, by the way?”
“There isn’t much. There is the Hero’s diary, but for an unknown reason, a lot of it is just blank.” Lady Wendy answered. I can think of a reason why they would be blank, but I won’t mention it at this time.
“We do have the notes left by Great Sage Arcadia.” Sage Ian said. “She spoke of three Ultimate Powers becoming one, and that one being the Goddess. But we don’t know what that means.”
“... Ultimate powers, huh?” I pondered that statement. What could that refer to? An ultimate skill, maybe? Maybe if three people all sacrifice an ultimate level skill, the Goddess will appear? But we don’t even have a single person with an ultimate skill. In fact, I didn’t even know that ultimate skills were a thing. Maybe they aren’t even a thing, and this ‘ultimate power’ refers to something else. But what?
“Do you perhaps know what these Ultimate Powers are?” Lady Wendy asked.
“No clue.” I admitted. “I mean, I can throw out guesses, but the serious answer is that I don’t know. Is that really all the Hero and his party left about it?”
“... Yes. We believe there might have been more, but it was likely written in the Hero’s diary.”
“... and it is blank.” I recalled.
“Yes.”
Of course it can’t be that easy. Can’t have previous people leaving me notes. Actually, the Goddess didn’t tell me about it either. She said something about being special. The Hero and his companions were special in some way that I am not. I think that is what she said. But she also said that I could reach that special level. So maybe it really is the Ultimate skill level. Maybe we need three people with Ultimate skills?
Should I ask if they know of that?
“A quick question. Do any of the notes left by the Hero and his party mention Ultimate Skills?” I asked.
“Ultimate skills?” Lady Wendy questioned. She then took a look at the other two at the table, but both of them just shook their heads. “I apologize, but no. We don’t know them. Do you think that these ‘Ultimate Skills’ could be the Ultimate Powers Great Sage Arcadia wrote about?”
“... I’m not sure either.” I admitted. “But that is the only thing I can come up with.”
“So with three people with an Ultimate Skill, we could summon the Goddess again?” Lady Wendy asked.
“Again, I don’t know. But that is the best I can come up with with the info we have.”
“So we are aiming for something that hasn’t been seen since the Hero’s time. Just fantastic news.” Sage Ian said sarcastically.
“Well, at least we aren’t dealing with a crazy world destroyer while we do so.” I joked.
After that, we continued talking about the ‘miasma blob’ suppression plan. This would involve me making the ‘miasma detectors’, which in truth would be Dimensional Barrier Detectors. Then, after I get some data with them, I should be able to use that data to make the WDBDD, or the Weakening Dimensional Barrier Detection Device, that will give us alarms before the barrier breaks. That was what the Goddess asked, and with the Guild, the Church and the Tower on my side, spreading these devices shouldn’t be too difficult.
And to power them, we can use the Mana Flowers. Plant a small patch of mana flowers next to each guild building, add a Dimensional Barrier Detector, and then we can use the Guild communicators to … well, communicate.
And while all of that is going on, both I and the Guild, will aim for someone who will get an Ultimate Skill. Me with my access to cheatcodes called my cards, and the Guild with the Skill Orbs and EXP Potions that they get out of this Castle Dungeon.
After our meeting concluded, Sepher asked to join him for lunch. While I know it will just lead to him questioning me about stuff, I don’t mind. So I agreed to join him, so that we could have some dialog about how we each interact with the System Agents. Well, he calls them angels, but they are basically the same.
I guess I’ll tell you all how those with the Holy Magic skill can interact with System Agents, since you already know how we, System Support Holders, do it. For them, it involves a Holy Magic spell called Visionary Rogation. When using it, sometimes Angels will send a message to the person using the spell. It isn’t like with us, where we can have open dialog with a System Agent, but more like a prerecorded message that the clergymen can then hear/see. Most of the time, it is just small things, like warnings about emergencies to come, but recently, a lot of them have seen visions about the ‘miasma blobs’, and about me.
I really don’t like the fact that they first had visions about the Fissures, and then visions about me. It makes me seem way too evil for no reason. But apparently Sepher got a more complete message about what is happening, so he was able to get the entire truth.
Also, I guess this is about as good of a time as any to mention that Sepher was more than a bit envious of the fact that I can actually talk to the ‘Angels’. It is a good thing I never mentioned that I actually have spoken with the Goddess multiple times. I’m not sure how he would react if I did.
After lunch, there was one more thing I wanted to do before I flew back Home. Meeting Cailie. I’ve honestly been a bit worried about her, and how she is doing, so I’ve almost come to just meet her a few times. But because of the entire ‘flight plan’ thing, I didn’t want to visit for just that. I really need to learn teleportation, just so I can get here without a flight plan.
Or maybe I should have asked for some sort of unlimited access pass along with the guild communicator. Well, I didn’t think about that in time, so whatever. I’ll just have to deal with the legal bullshit.
But enough about that. Let’s go find out how Cailie has been fairing.
“Take a seat.” The female knight ordered me. Or maybe I should call her the genderbent hero? Well, whatever. Let’s just do as asked.
After I took the seat, the ‘interrogation’ began. Well, perhaps more like an interview, but I’ll call it an interrogation. Because who on Earth would show up to an interview dressed in a full suit of armor, with a weapon at hand and with both a priest and a sage by their side.
Oh yeah. This isn’t ‘on Earth’, so I guess that explains it. … That is a lie. It still really doesn’t explain anything.
“It is a pleasure to meet you, System Support Holder Brian Wood. My name is Wendy Hero. I am here as the representative of the Adventurer’s Guild.” The female knight… again, more like the genderbent hero, introduced herself. And her last name is Hero? What is that about? Why would they allow the last name Hero? … Unless..?
But before I had time to ponder on that more, the next person introduced themselves.
“I am Ian Cobba, and here on the behalf of the Sage’s Tower.” The Sage looking guy introduced himself. I’m not 100% positive, but I do think he is an actual Sage in the tower. I feel like Mariina might have even mentioned Sir Ian at some point, but I might be wrong.
“And I am Sepher White, here on behalf of the Goddess’ Church.” And then the priest. And Goddess’ Church? Is that the official name of it? Everyone always just calls it ‘The Church’, so I didn’t know.
Okay. So we have the representatives of the three major powers of the Hero’s country. The Church, the Tower and the Guild. I guess this is a bit more serious than I was expecting.
… and ‘a bit’ might be an under exaggeration. This seems very serious.
“It is a pleasure. As you already know, I am Brian Wood.” I responded, trying to be somewhere between humble and authoritative. “... so? May I ask what this meeting is about? I know the excuse, but I feel like you have a different reason for this meeting.”
“I should have expected that nothing would get past you.” Lady Wendy said.
“... Yeah. It isn’t difficult to guess with this lineup.”
“... I see. We shall drive to do better in the future. But as to why we have invited you, and thank you for arriving so soon, Seph, if you would.”
“Please don’t shorten my name, Lady Wendy.” Sepher complained a bit, before he spoke to me. “We have called you here after a vision given to a few clergymen by the Goddess’ Angel. Angel Sicily has informed us of upcoming dangers and requested that we give System Support Holder Brian Wood our full support in dealing with the problems.”
Sicily? Another System Agent, I’d guess. Wonder who she belonged to? And how can a System Agent appear before someone who isn’t a System Support Holder? Do they have a way of doing it with just anyone? Or maybe it is something linked to Holy Magic?
“I see. What did this angel tell you?” I asked.
“Don’t you know?” The Sage asked, before Sepher had the time to.
“I have an idea, but it is better to compare what we know. You may have heard something I haven’t, as I’ve never been in direct contact with Age… excuse me, Angel Sicily.”
“Does that mean … that you have been in contact with a Goddess’ Angels?” Sepher asked.
“Yes, though only one of them.” I answered honestly. I mean, the Goddess doesn’t count, as she isn’t ‘an angel’, so it is only Aulis. And I guess we were indirectly in contact with Agent Joan, but that was only her sending a mission for Alice. The Goddess was the one that informed me of that mission. Actually, I think she was trying to give it to me at first, until I suggested giving it to Alice instead. Just because I didn’t want more on my plate.
“... May I ask how it happens with you?”
“Seph, get back on track. You can bother Sir Wood about that later.” Lady Wendy interrupted before I had the time to answer.
“Y-Yes, Ma'am.” Sepher said. He sounded a bit nervous, so maybe my theory on Lady Wendy is actually correct. “We have seen visions of these miasma blobs. I believe one appeared near Oroco City just a bit ago, and Sir Wood dealt with it. We learned that more of them will be appearing, and that only Sir Wood can fix them, and that we are to help you in this endeavor.”
“... okay. Well, that is good. So you know basically all of it.” I just lied to them, because if they weren’t informed of the true nature of the ‘miasma blobs’, maybe they shouldn’t be.
“Do you not know more about it?” Sage Ian asked.
“I know a bit more, but not that much. The miasma blobs are… they are an ancient curse left on the world by the Demon Lord.” I began telling them a story that was basically a mix of a lie and the truth. Since the System Agents didn’t reveal the true nature of the dimensional fissures, neither will I.
“By the Demon Lord?” Wendy asked.
“Yes, as far as I know. They have been suppressed for a long time, as the Goddess, when she appeared during the time of the Hero, was able to seal them away. But her power isn’t infinite and has begun to waver. Because of that, those miasma blobs are starting to appear, and as her power weakens even more, they will be appearing at an accelerated rate.” I kept up my lie, while also still keeping the facts almost straight. I mean, the dimensional fissures began appearing because the Demon Lord misused a Chaos God Dungeon causing the Dimensional Barrier to weaken. And the Goddess was able to fix the barrier using the Hero’s unique skill as the material for a new barrier, so it is basically the truth.
“Are you saying … that it is our Goddess’ fault?” Sepher asked, sounding quite peeved.
“Of course not. In all honesty, it is our fault.”
“What do you mean by that?” Lady Wendy asked.
“We are simply too weak.” I answered. “Any System, no matter how perfect, will need maintenance. That includes the protection the Goddess gave us, keeping us safe from the miasma blobs. It is our fault that after the passing of the Hero and his party members, no human group has ever been powerful enough to summon the Goddess here again. Had she been able to appear again, she would have been able to reinforce the protection she gave us. But because we are weak, she couldn’t.” I lied again, but it should sound acceptable to them.
“... I see. Then, is there something we can do?” Lady Wendy asked.
“Yes, there are.” I stated. I have a few things in mind, so let’s see which ones of them will this trio approve of.
“I do not like this.” Lady Wendy said. “Everything you have offered is just a temporary solution.”
“Yeah. They are a bit like putting a bandaid onto a bleeding artery. But until we find a way to summon the Goddess, or a being of equal power, there is nothing we can do.”
“Is that even possible?” Sage Ian asked.
“... in theory. I mean, the Hero’s party was able to make the Goddess appear, so it should be possible. Did they leave any notes about that, by the way?”
“There isn’t much. There is the Hero’s diary, but for an unknown reason, a lot of it is just blank.” Lady Wendy answered. I can think of a reason why they would be blank, but I won’t mention it at this time.
“We do have the notes left by Great Sage Arcadia.” Sage Ian said. “She spoke of three Ultimate Powers becoming one, and that one being the Goddess. But we don’t know what that means.”
“... Ultimate powers, huh?” I pondered that statement. What could that refer to? An ultimate skill, maybe? Maybe if three people all sacrifice an ultimate level skill, the Goddess will appear? But we don’t even have a single person with an ultimate skill. In fact, I didn’t even know that ultimate skills were a thing. Maybe they aren’t even a thing, and this ‘ultimate power’ refers to something else. But what?
“Do you perhaps know what these Ultimate Powers are?” Lady Wendy asked.
“No clue.” I admitted. “I mean, I can throw out guesses, but the serious answer is that I don’t know. Is that really all the Hero and his party left about it?”
“... Yes. We believe there might have been more, but it was likely written in the Hero’s diary.”
“... and it is blank.” I recalled.
“Yes.”
Of course it can’t be that easy. Can’t have previous people leaving me notes. Actually, the Goddess didn’t tell me about it either. She said something about being special. The Hero and his companions were special in some way that I am not. I think that is what she said. But she also said that I could reach that special level. So maybe it really is the Ultimate skill level. Maybe we need three people with Ultimate skills?
Should I ask if they know of that?
“A quick question. Do any of the notes left by the Hero and his party mention Ultimate Skills?” I asked.
“Ultimate skills?” Lady Wendy questioned. She then took a look at the other two at the table, but both of them just shook their heads. “I apologize, but no. We don’t know them. Do you think that these ‘Ultimate Skills’ could be the Ultimate Powers Great Sage Arcadia wrote about?”
“... I’m not sure either.” I admitted. “But that is the only thing I can come up with.”
“So with three people with an Ultimate Skill, we could summon the Goddess again?” Lady Wendy asked.
“Again, I don’t know. But that is the best I can come up with with the info we have.”
“So we are aiming for something that hasn’t been seen since the Hero’s time. Just fantastic news.” Sage Ian said sarcastically.
“Well, at least we aren’t dealing with a crazy world destroyer while we do so.” I joked.
After that, we continued talking about the ‘miasma blob’ suppression plan. This would involve me making the ‘miasma detectors’, which in truth would be Dimensional Barrier Detectors. Then, after I get some data with them, I should be able to use that data to make the WDBDD, or the Weakening Dimensional Barrier Detection Device, that will give us alarms before the barrier breaks. That was what the Goddess asked, and with the Guild, the Church and the Tower on my side, spreading these devices shouldn’t be too difficult.
And to power them, we can use the Mana Flowers. Plant a small patch of mana flowers next to each guild building, add a Dimensional Barrier Detector, and then we can use the Guild communicators to … well, communicate.
And while all of that is going on, both I and the Guild, will aim for someone who will get an Ultimate Skill. Me with my access to cheatcodes called my cards, and the Guild with the Skill Orbs and EXP Potions that they get out of this Castle Dungeon.
After our meeting concluded, Sepher asked to join him for lunch. While I know it will just lead to him questioning me about stuff, I don’t mind. So I agreed to join him, so that we could have some dialog about how we each interact with the System Agents. Well, he calls them angels, but they are basically the same.
I guess I’ll tell you all how those with the Holy Magic skill can interact with System Agents, since you already know how we, System Support Holders, do it. For them, it involves a Holy Magic spell called Visionary Rogation. When using it, sometimes Angels will send a message to the person using the spell. It isn’t like with us, where we can have open dialog with a System Agent, but more like a prerecorded message that the clergymen can then hear/see. Most of the time, it is just small things, like warnings about emergencies to come, but recently, a lot of them have seen visions about the ‘miasma blobs’, and about me.
I really don’t like the fact that they first had visions about the Fissures, and then visions about me. It makes me seem way too evil for no reason. But apparently Sepher got a more complete message about what is happening, so he was able to get the entire truth.
Also, I guess this is about as good of a time as any to mention that Sepher was more than a bit envious of the fact that I can actually talk to the ‘Angels’. It is a good thing I never mentioned that I actually have spoken with the Goddess multiple times. I’m not sure how he would react if I did.
After lunch, there was one more thing I wanted to do before I flew back Home. Meeting Cailie. I’ve honestly been a bit worried about her, and how she is doing, so I’ve almost come to just meet her a few times. But because of the entire ‘flight plan’ thing, I didn’t want to visit for just that. I really need to learn teleportation, just so I can get here without a flight plan.
Or maybe I should have asked for some sort of unlimited access pass along with the guild communicator. Well, I didn’t think about that in time, so whatever. I’ll just have to deal with the legal bullshit.
But enough about that. Let’s go find out how Cailie has been fairing.
