Chapter 365

"Dead?" Tia asked and looked over her shoulder.

"Dead." Tina said and looked back over her shoulder at her sister.

Around them lay the corpses of a hundred priests, acolytes, and monks, a field of white robes stained red, confined in a single building.

"Very dead." Cenna added to their answers as he strolled through the door, he let out a low whistle as their eyes shot over to him. "Mighty impressive. Nothing of value was lost, really, except for my time. You two gave me one hell of a chase."

Their eyes turned to the window. "Don't bother. There's no way out. I had this trap laid for you, even Time Turbulence can't get through that." Cenna said and picking up a rock, he threw it at the open high window, the empty air of the great cathedral 'rippled' when the rock struck, and dropped back down to crack and roll over the stone floor of the house of worship.

"You used priests as bait, evil spearman?" Tia asked, her kunai dripped blood as she turned to face him.

"I did. I don't like priests. Every one of them I've ever seen get a look at Zesshi has called her a halfbreed, an animal, or worse. They charge an arm and a leg to heal arms and legs, and make people thank them for it. Using them as bait was probably the best use they ever had, since I at least got to get even with them for all the shit they've pulled over the years." Cenna said with a shrug and tapped his spear on his shoulder.

"Evil mountain is dead, then?" Tina asked, pursing her lips tight when she asked.

"Yes, it was a clean death, and she was very brave." Cenna said, politely bowing his head in her memory.

Tia and Tina put up their Kunai into the guard position and slid their feet back against the nearest corpses, ready to rush.

"So… you want to go down fighting… fine, that's not surprising. May you have better luck in the next life," Cenna said and lowered his spear, snapping it into position in front of himself, "and not interrupt anymore vacations."

The joke fell flat, he shrugged, and charged. They moved as a perfect mirror to one another, evidently ambidextrous, their blades went from hand to hand and they drew two more besides, his eyes however, followed not their hands, but their shoulders. The tiny subtle motions gave away their intent, and his spear was faster than they could ever dream. 'Adamantite ranked without a doubt, a credit to common man… how unfortunate it is to waste them this way.' He thought, and allowed them the dignity of a continued struggle. Cenna's footwork was flawless, he danced atop the corpses as they struggled to get around his guard, disappearing and reappearing out of shadows, in and out of the moonlight, a torch fell from the wall and landed with a clatter as its pitch landed on the robes of a priest and caught, sending flames up within the room.

The trio broke apart briefly in an unspoken truce. "How fitting, your friend died amidst a burning garden of flowers, you die amidst a burning garden of corpses. Red blooms all your own." Cenna said, and the twins inclined their heads in silent approval.

"But, since none of us are fireproof, why don't we end this?" He asked, and it was clearly not an offer, merely a demand given as the fire spread from robe to robe among the corpses of the dead faithful.

They jumped forward both at once, soaring above the spreading fires and above the sea of corpses, they thrust as one, a perfect team to the end, but his spear smacked both aside, then with dexterity impossible for most, he struck them both in the backs of their heads as he went past. No sooner than Cenna landed than he used a burning corpse to brace himself and flipped backward, and while they were recovering, he rotated and shoved his spear through the back of the red ribboned killer.

The other never said a word even though she saw her sister fall, instead she only rushed him, grabbing the spear, and attempting to drive her kunai into his ear.

Tia tasted blood on her throat, looked down, his hand was level, and pierced her throat. His handsome face was expressionless as his fist closed around her spine.

She lived long enough to feel him pull, rotate, and fling her into the stone wall.

It shattered, sending her corpse tumbling out into the night air.

"Gathering up all these priests in the name of protecting them all sure was a pain, and Dominic will be pissed… but that's just a bonus. I suppose I owe you one…" He said as he walked to the hole in the wall, he put one hand on the broken stone and ducked underneath to exit the building and approached the corpse. "You should be with your teammate, your sister, and if I leave you out here, Dominic will want to parade your corpse around like a trophy. I don't like that." He said and looked down at the corpse, the eyes were staring up at the stars, the pools in her eyes that must have been tears, couldn't fall, they were trapped in the now hollow stare like tidal pools after the sea withdrew.

"You didn't say what you wanted done with your corpse, but this is what I assume you'd want, if it's not, you can correct me in the afterlife." Cenna said to her, then securing his spear across his back, he crouched, picked up the corpse beneath her knees and back, and carried her back to the hole in the wall.

The flames were roaring already, and glass shattered somewhere as the heat caused it to crack and burst.

"Rest easy. This won't hurt a bit." Cenna said to the body, then tossed her close to where her sister lay. "There." He said to himself and walked away from the raging conflagration in the dying temple. "Now just one quick word to the local Agante signalman, and I can finally take my time off, and just in time to catch the sweetbark at its best." He licked his lips, and left the fire behind.

Amidst the tumbling stone, the hanzos moved, throwing aside corpse after corpse to select the pair they wanted. Thankfully the pair were small, and even though their skin was charring and eyes were melted and hair was aflame, that made them easy to identify.

The gate opened seconds after their call, and they were in Demiurge's lab again. "These are the last two, right?" He asked, and the Hanzos all nodded.

"They are." The leader replied.

"Marvelous, I'm ready to try to resurrect them. If I'm right, a woven spell bound up in spiritually connected beings can enhance the power balance of the mana infusion post morphomancy and create some greatly enhanced champions… Evileye was the one obstacle since she was already undead… she should become a zombie, but if I do the curse transference before the morphomancy and resurrect her before it expires… if I'm right, she should be fine… but then… Pandora's Actor said he was fond of her so… something suitable to his tastes… yes… I know just the thing."

The hanzo's left the archdevil behind, he hadn't really been speaking to them anyway, only prattling on about incomprehensible things, they on the other hand, only wanted baths, and that was what they went to take, leaving the archdevil laughing happily behind the closed up doors of his work room.

"This can't be right?" Dominic's hands were trembling around the document. "It can't be." He repeated.

Necran Adama, Pontifex Maximus of the Slane Theocracy, seldom attended meetings of the Cardinals, but he did today. "It is." The Pontifex said, his aged face broke into a gap toothed grin. "The war is all but over. They sent that to me three weeks ago, and ever since then our scouts have been reporting dragons flying overhead, unbeatable monsters fending us off from the elf Kingdom, and giant, earthshaking explosions visible from far, far away."

"But-" Dominic frowned.

"You've been so caught up chasing the priest slayers with your Agante and borrowed Black Scripture that you haven't paid attention to anything else. We tried to get you to show up to the meetings, we tried to send you updates, but you just wouldn't listen. You must learn to control your temper." Berenice critiqued him with a click of her tongue at the end, but whether Dominic heard her or not, none of them knew.

"We of the Kingdom of Nazarick do declare the war upon the Kingdom of the Elves for their egregious treatment of our friend, the Queen of the Draconic Kingdom and her entourage, and will regard in like fashion in this matter, the council and government of the Slane Theocracy, for it's duration. Furthermore, we warn that encroachment on captured grounds must be granted by due authorities of the Kingdom of Nazarick wherever our banner shall fly…" Dominic read it aloud and then crumpled the paper in his hand before throwing it onto the table.

"And you're telling me he's already won?!" Dominic demanded.

"No. There are still a few outlying areas, or so the envoy says, but they're in the hinterlands. I'm telling you the war will be over before the tournament ends." The Pontifex said matter of factly.

Maximilian drummed his fingers on the table. "So, what does this mean for our supply of slaves? If we're not taking prisoners of war anymore, that's going to really skew the market."

"We can still use half-elves. If we make a lot more of them, it may take time, but it's faster than waiting for a full blooded elf to grow up, and there are a lot of slave catchers we can use if we just take them… we might have to build more fortifications to cut off escapes on the borders… but as long as we're slow, we can still gain the stock we need." Yvon pointed out.

"Don't be disgusting, Yvon." Berenice said with a sour face.

Ginedine kept his face neutral, "If they really do occupy it, that is… a problem. You realize the larger issue, don't you? You really think the acquisition of new labor is the problem?"

"It isn't?" Dominic asked with a furrowed brow.

"No, not at all. We 'could' potentially replace wood elf slave labor with dark elf slave labor after all. Their plains are just to the north, they don't have large settlements, they're horse people, if we start moving in and building cities, we could expand all the way to the mountains if we took it slow." Ginedine pointed to the map on the wall, "The problem is that we are surrounded. The Holy Kingdom has married itself to the Kingdom of Nazarick. Re-Estize is now a vassal state. If what we're told is true, then Queen Draudillon was rescued by the Allfather. She's basically his puppet. Demalbion was never going to be our ally, the Kingdom of Carne… we almost burned down the Queen's village and murdered her family. They were directly rescued by the Allfather." As he stated each Kingdom's name, he moved his finger to point to it on the map, and it slowly became clear to the others.

"We are surrounded. Encircled by enemies on all sides, and thanks to Raymond's letters, we now know that Zesshi has abandoned us." Ginedine pointed out.

"We don't actually know that, he didn't say it directly." Berenice pointed out.

"He gushes over her like she's his daughter, but not one letter has mentioned her. She's gone and if something had happened to her, he'd have said that, his very lack of mention tells us she's turned traitor." Ginedine snapped out the statement with ironclad certainty. "Face facts, we are encircled by our enemies, and we can't count on the use of the Baharuth Empire's might any longer."

"Zesshi is probably already dead." Dominic said with a bored, bemused look on his face as he finally pulled the chair out and took a seat. "I intercepted her communication with Cenna and sent along her request… but it was… tainted. She'll take her own life for us."

"And… what about Cenna?" Berenice demanded, "You know he thinks of her like a sister, not to mention the other Black Scripture members, they won't take kindly to you having her killed if they find out."

"Who here is going to tell them?" Dominic asked with a shrug and a smug sneer on his face, his curled lip held as his piercing eyes found one person after another, and each in turn looked away.

"Raymond's letters are making the rounds… it looks like he had the story copied a lot, there are underground plays going on all over the place now. 'Aalon and Nua' actually got performed in a public park before the watch shut it down." Yvon cracked his knuckles, "And the 'Horrors of House Hodge' are such that their current heir is having to spend a fortune to keep his reputation from being completely ruined by association."

"We'll tell him to stop. Or just silence the elf cunt." Dominic snapped.

"That's your fault, Dominic, you sent her to him." Maximilian accused, "What were you thinking!"

"He was too fond of Zesshi! He actually considered her to be human!" Dominic slammed his fist on the table. A spiderweb of cracks spread out from his blow when his fist connected, "I figured if he had a pretty one that was compliant that it would only be a matter of time. Then he'd see eye to eye-"

"You're disgusting." Berenice spat the words at him and crossed her arms. "Elf or no elf, that is disgusting."

Dominic glowered at her, and her gaze did not avert. "Disgusting." She repeated in defiance.

"It happens every day, so what? We're the ones chosen by the gods. The rest are lucky they get the privilege of serving us. Raymond should have seen that, he was soft on Zesshi and I didn't want him going soft while going through those heretical Kingdoms. I didn't think he'd become a heretic himself! We should have sent another representative. He was a poor choice." Dominic defended himself until his glower became sullen.

The Pontifex then spoke up, more reasonably than Dominic, he said, "Regardless, the cat has escaped the bag and we can't catch it to put it back in. For now we'll just ban all plays and books that show the elves as anything other than villains or labor, and hope the fad just passes away. We can use criminals to help supplement the labor. And… I have an idea about what to do regarding Demalbion, the beginnings of one at least. But… they're so new, they may fall apart on their own. I'd rather not chance it just yet."

"So we've got nothing. For all this, we've got nothing." Yvon demanded with a weary sigh.