1 Prologue

It was a dark and moonless night, honestly a perfect night to explore a supposedly haunted castle. One could hear the crows singing a sad melody and the wind rustling, protesting in the sinister night. Fog was omnipresent, waiting to engulf whoever would be courageous enough to brave it.

Interrupting this strange scenery, fifty ironclad men and women could be seen heading to the half-demolished stronghold in the distance.

Sarah Williams, the leader of the group of men and women, was a 42-year-old mercenary and a seasoned veteran. Born from a poor family, both her parents died in a bandit ambush when she was only 13. She then lived on the street for the next 3 years and enrolled in the army as soon as she turned 16. She served in the army for 12 years, rising up to the rank of captain and decided to create her mercenary team with her friend Vance. Thus, the Crimson Blades were born. She had gotten into the mercenary business to make more money and have more freedom.

For 14 years, she continued to expand her group and got gradually more reputable, rising to the top and receiving better contracts. They were now the best, and each member were the best that the kingdom had.

As for their leader, Sarah Williams, she was arguably one of the best warriors in the kingdom. Despite her age, she was still in peak physical condition and exceptionally lethal in combat.

She was 175 cm tall (5ft9) and had a powerful build, she did not look feminine at all. She had short jet-black hair and sharp features. Her burly appearance, scars and menacing glare added to her fierce and merciless look, but she could absolutely not be considered a beauty. She was quite the opposite, not attractive at all.

Hanging on her back was a huge greatsword, a Zweihänder to be precise, almost the same height as her that she was particularly deadly with. She wasn't nicknamed "The Chopper" for no reasons and naturally had a very good reputation as a mercenary and warrior. This was why the Church chose her mercenary team to recover the Holy Artifact that they were desperately looking to obtain.

The athletic woman, accompanied by her mercenary troop, was walking, on her guard, slowly approaching the ruined building. There was a tense atmosphere as they advanced in the desolate plains, waiting for something to happen, but nothing happened…

She recalled the deal she made with the Church. They had promised them 10 000 gold pieces if they could retrieve a pearl with a red spiral pattern inside it. Of course, there had to be something sketchy with this deal, 10 000 gold pieces was a fortune, but she accepted it anyway.

She was fearless and could afford to be fearless, what could possibly stop the Crimson Blades in this world? Almost nothing. They were elites, mercenaries with more than a thousand completed missions, they were the cream of the cream of the mercenary world. Everywhere they went, they would be respected and feared.

They just had to explore a desolated castle and take a pearl with a red pattern inside it. It was an easy and simple task, but the strange part was that nothing strange happened yet. Why would there be such a huge reward for a mission any mercenary group could complete? And why did they hire the Crimson Blades in particular?

The calmness of the mission had everyone on the edge.

Once the mercenaries arrived near the castle, they felt as if something was wrong, everything was calm, too calm, but it was too late to go back. They had already accepted the mission and it would stain their reputation if they got back empty-handed.

Sarah anxiously looked around, her black eyes inspecting the ramparts and windows of the castle, waiting for something to happen. She felt something was wrong and couldn't help but ask the question that burned her lips, even if she already knew the answer.

-Is this the place where the treasure is?

-This is it, Vance quickly responded, looking on a map then at their surroundings.

-Well, let's not waste our time anymore, Vance, Harkdul, Mya and Rhilo come with me to explore this damned place and get the treasure. While we are gone, the others guard this place, we may not be the only group that the Church hired and we wouldn't want somebody else to get the reward.

After ordering her subordinates around, Sarah left with the chosen members and entered the forsaken castle by the main entrance. The immense wooden doors made creaky sounds as they opened, as if purposely playing with their nerves.

When they were all inside, the entrance now silently closed itself and they realized it was too late to get out of there, they had to survive whatever was inside this building. They realized that darkness was the true king of this palace, it was almost impossible to see more than one meter in front of oneself... All of those factors caused fear to be instilled in everyone's heart.

Harkdul, a huge warrior more than two meters tall that looked like a mountain looked nervously at the darkness ahead, trying to know where they were. He had a light-brown, impressive beard and his hair was very short. The warrior from a country in the north took out a torch from his bag and tried to light it.. After several attempts, he finally succeeded to lit the torch. Light repelled the darkness inhabiting the place. At last, they saw what the interior of the old and decrepit castle looked like.

They were in a huge room, decorated with half-torn discolored banners from another era. They could see disturbingly big cobwebs covering the floor and holes in the walls, probably created by rodents.

They advanced toward the middle of the room and saw two corridors, one heading left and on heading right. Their footsteps and the creak of their armor resonated horribly in the empty hall, making them even tenser. Even though the castle was supposed to be empty, they all had a bad premonition.

"This castle is really getting on my nerves, why is it so creepy… Couldn't it be just a normal abandoned castle? Meh… Let's go to the right path and try to find this "Holy Treasure" soon, I just entered but I can't wait to be out of here." (text between " " is the MC's thoughts)

-Right, Sarah ordered, and the group followed her without hesitation.

They headed to the path on the right and after walking for approximately half a minute, they saw an old staircase that looked as if it could collapse at any time in front of them. The group unwillingly and hesitantly started to walk toward it and, unsurprisingly, as soon as Sarah put a foot on it, it collapsed and caused an immense cloud of dust to invade the corridor. After having recovered from the surprise, they heard a worrisome number of squeaks getting closer to them and a flock of rats ran past them, as if they were escaping from somewhere…or someone.

"Oh lord…What is there ahead to make such a large number of rats run for their life? This exploration is getting more and more disturbing… If it wasn't for the enormous reward, I would've long left this cursed place. I hope the pearl isn't going to be too hard to find."

When all of the rats were gone and the dust cloud dispersed, they saw a huge hole in the wall behind the staircase. Curious, but careful, Sarah got near it and decided to go and see what was beyond. After all, they were supposed to find an artifact and if they didn't explore the castle, they would never find it.

The hole led them to a vast banquet hall, almost as big as the lobby and, strangely, the torches were lit, but that was not the most disturbing thing in this room. In the middle of the room, there was an immense table with over 20 chairs and motionless skeletons sitting on them, as if they died in the middle of a feast. The food was still intact and looked fresh, but everyone knew that they should not touch it.

Finding nothing resembling a pearl in the banquet hall, they hurried and tried to leave the accursed room, but as they were about to step out, the door closed without any warning and the skeletons stood up.

Startled, the team turned around to face the skeletons. Sarah drew her sword and charged toward the undead, swinging her greatsword wildly as bones flew everywhere. The rest of the men and women did nothing, they knew not to get near their boss when she was fighting.

After she finished venting her anger on those poor skeletons, they hurriedly left hoping not to ever face those things again. Nobody dared to speak.

"What is up with this place… First a holy artifact, next terrified rats fleeing and now skeletons sitting on chairs and attacking us… Let's finish the mission and get out of here fast."

During the following two hours, the small troop continued and explored more and more strange and inexplicable rooms. They destroyed a large number of skeletons and got gradually more on their nerves, overreacting every movement that they caught. They saw a plethora of incomprehensible scenes like multiple skeletons looked like they were doing everyday actions, skeletons inside armors in front of most of the rooms and on the castle walls, skeletons inside beds that would be sleeping if they were alive, etc. The weird displays put everyone on the edge and made them all very susceptible.

Sarah multiple time thought she was going to become crazy if she stayed inside the castle for one minute more but the huge reward and the fact that she could not go back motivated her to continue to search.

"What the hell happened there, it looks like everyone suddenly died at the same time, without warning and then became undead?. It looks like the work of the "devils" that the Church loathes but everyone knows those stories are just to scare children. Still, I hope I can get out of here fast."

After exploring the whole castle, the group arrived in front a room that looked like the throne room. It was the only room left unexplored, the pearl had to be here. Guarding it, there were two big metal doors with writings from an unknown language inscribed on them.

Without further waiting, the mercenaries neared the door and the doors quietly opened themselves. At this point, everyone was already on the verge of a breakdown, nothing surprised them anymore and they just wanted to leave.

When they got inside, what instantly caught their attention was the throne made of a dark alloy and the skeleton sitting on it, which was holding a transparent pearl with a red spiral-shaped pattern in its left hand and a bone dagger in its right hand.

Everyone felt their heart beat faster as they found what they were desperately searching for. Sarah immediately rushed toward the skeleton and tried to snatch the pearl away from it.

When she was about to take the pearl, the skeleton king stood up without any warning and cut two of Sarah's finger with it's dagger. Furious, Sarah did not even use her greatsword but instead destroyed the monster's head with her bare fists by hitting it until it shattered then proceeded to destroy every single one of its bone in pure rage and to vent herself. She felt good.

She eventually calmed down and took the pearl and the dagger and inspected them.

The dagger was pretty short, only 30 cm (1ft), but extremely sharp. Also, it absorbed all the blood that touched it, causing the blade turned more and more crimson.

The pearl was rather big, it was the size of a fist. It also had a spiral-shaped pattern inside it and the interior of the pearl looked endless. As she was focussing her gaze inside the gem, time seemed to flow slower and slower. When she stopped looking inside it, time restarted to flow normally, but Sarah could now feel a faint pulse coming from it, as if it had a beating heart.

Before she could share this strange phenomenon with the other members, she felt a sharp pain and something cold enter her back through the opening of her armor. She immediately knew that she had been stabbed in the back.

Mustering the energy she had left, she turned her head to see which member betrayed her. To her horror, she saw Vance with an expressionless look on his face. Sarah had founded her Crimson Blades with Vance and trusted him with her life. He was the last person that she would've expected to betray her. She muttered, feeling lost:

-Why… I would've never thought it would be you who would end my days…

-10 000 gold really is a lot of gold… He chuckled with a mocking grin on his face. And I may be able to negotiate with the Church for even more saying that the leader of Crimson Blades heroically died while retrieving the Holy Artifact. Don't worry, your sacrifice will not be in vain. Alas, Harkdul was really devoted to you, so I had to "sacrifice" him as well.

At this very moment, Sarah realized that this man was never her friend, it was all fake. She wasn't even angry, she only felt resignation and accepted that this would be how she would die.

As they were talking, Sarah's blood dripped on the dagger and the pearl and, unnoticed, the items continued to absorb it, turning the pattern inside the pearl and the dagger's blade more and more crimson. Still without anyone paying attention to it, the pearl started to glow faintly. And, unbeknownst to her, to more blood dripped onto the pearl or the dagger, the more they seemed to fuse with her, entering her flesh.

"I guess this is how my life will end, killed for a bag of gold by the person I trusted the most in the world. Well, I imagine I deserved it, I wasn't a particularly good nor fervent person and I did my share of bad deeds. This is far from the end I pictured for myself, I foolishly hoped to die surrounded by my children and grandchildren, in a cozy country cottage…"

And when the strange pearl and the dagger with a crimson blade were completely fused with her right hand palm and left-hand palm respectively, Sarah died.