Returned

Koelhar could not believe Kyserine's words.

A bracelet, of all things that could kill.

"You can't be serious!" Koelhar disapprovingly said.

"Are you questioning my knowledge?!" Kyserine bellowed. "Do not touch that bracelet at all costs! It's cursed!"

"Have you gone mad?!" Koelhar could not believe that a bracelet could kill a mage. "Its just a bracelet!"

"It could be enchanted with god knows what, Koelhar!" Kyserine yelled at his face. "It could kill us all for all we know!"

Koelhar rubbed his face in disappointment, the old man has gone and lost his marbles over some bracelet from a peasant at the border.

"Listen, Kyserine!" Koelhar impatiently growled. "Strong enchantments that could kill require a strong and stable base material! Do you think that those flimsy braided strings could, in theory, hold such a powerful inscription?!"

Koelhar grabbed Kyserine's collar and violently shook the old magus. "PULL YOURSELF TOGETHER KYSERINE!"

Koelhar put down the mage who seemed to calm down a bit.

"I understand… there is no way that a peasant's bracelet could do that…" Kyserine rubbed his temple. "Go and continue to inspect the tower. I'll settle some things here…"

Koelhar just clicked his tongue and turned towards the tower and saw Sir Gunther descending the stairs.

"Sir Gunther, has there been significant damage done to the tower?" Sir Koelhar spoke.

"Yes, Sir." Sir Gunther removed his helmet and pinched his nose.

Sir Gunther seemed extremely stressed out.

"They nearly chiseled out the tower for stones to throw at us, a number of resonance stones seemed to have been chipped off along with the walls too…"

Koelhar sighed in dismay.

The rebels had probably thrown the resonance stones at them too during the siege. They'd have to find the stones manually through the thousands of stones thrown.

"How in the world did they even cut off the phylactery from the Resonance stones when they didn't know what the resonance stones were for?!" Koelhar could not believe how stupid the rebels were.

Resonance stones were a marvelous product from the countless years of training that was required to understand and master the Principles of Entanglement. They were originally magic cores from beasts that were processed with the most cutting edge equipment and a dedicated mage. The value of such stones was already high but even made higher as they only came in pairs.

Of one was lost, the other became obsolete. They can't even replace them since they didn't have a Magus for that.

Koelhar scratched his head in irritation. The rebels had really pissed him off by leaps and bounds.

"Is there any good news at all?" Koelhar sighed. "The day couldn't get any worse than this…"

"It's already evening, sir…" Sir Gunther coughed. "The airlock for the main Altar of the Sun God has been opened, Sir. I think that is some good news…"

"That's good." Koelhar breathed a sigh of relief. "At least we can end a day with some small victory…"

Just when Koelhar was about to take a short rest, a scream broke out from outside, followed by surprised chatters from the soldiers stationed outside.

"What in the world is it now?!" Koelhar threw his helmet at the wall with frustration.

He was tired, angry, irritated and sad throughout the entire day and when he finally had the chance to get some rest, another incident broke out.

'What the fucking hell…' Koelhar seethed. 'Give me a break, this is just…'

When Koelhar opened the door to the front courtyard of the tower, he could see two figures cornered by confused soldiers.

It was Kyserine and his apprentice.

But his apprentice wasn't dead.

Instead, the man had a puny knife wrapped around Kyserine's throat.

"What the absolute fuckery is this…" Koelhar could not help cursing. A dead man was breathing and standing in front of him was enough reason for the Knight to use foul language.

"STAY AWAY!" The apprentice screamed in hysteria. "I'LL KILL THIS OLD MAN IF YOU COME NEAR!"

"What the hell…" Koelhar held his mouth.

Was the apprentice out of his mind? No, he was dead, of course he's out of his mind. But why the hell did he suddenly turn violent?

Thoughts raced through Koelhar's mind like a storm.

'No matter, I have to resolve this situation quickly…' Koelhar shrugged his thoughts.

Koelhar immediately made his presence known to the apprentice and spoke.

"What is the meaning of this?!" Koelhar bellowed. "How can you raise your hand against your master like that?!"

The man turned toward Koelhar and used Kysrine's body as a shield.

"SH-SHUT UP!" The man stammered. "I…I D-DON'T KNOW THIS MAN! O-OR ANY OF YOU!"

The man pointed the knife at Koelhar. "STAY AWAY FROM ME!"

Koelhar wrinkled his brows, the apprentice seemed to have lost his memory.

Not only dying for a few minutes, the man had come to life again with no memories.

Koelhar decided to control the situation.

"Calm down!" Koelhar spoke clearly. "We are your allies! There is no need for you to be afraid!"

The man glanced around nervously.

"PUT DOWN YOUR WEAPONS! O-OR THIS OLD MAN WILL DIE!" The apprentice demanded.

Koelhar Glanced at Sir Gunther, who was making his way to the exit.

Sir Gunther noticed his look and nodded at Koelhar.

Koelhar looked at the encirclement of soldiers and raised his hand.

"Lay down your arms!" Koelhar ordered.

The other soldiers immediately put down their weapons.

The apprentice noticed this and shoved Kyserine away from him and bolted for the exit gates of the courtyard.

Just when the man was about to pass through the gates, Sir Gunther rounded from the corner and smashed a gauntleted fist against the man's abdomen with frightening force, instantly knocking out the man.

The man knelt to the ground and flopped down like a corpse, twitching as he laid down on the ground with fluids foaming at his mouth.

"What the fuck was that?" Koeelhar asked Kyserine who was being assisted by a healer to get up.

"I… I don't know…" Kyserine seemed lost.

Koelhar simply waved it off with a sigh.

[Could the day get any worse?] Koelhar thought back to his words.

'Yes. Yes it does.' was the answer.

_________________________________________________________________________________________________________

Eurika smashed a locked door to a cellar room in the inner sanctum.

"This room is clean!" Eurika called out.

She had been continuously clearing out rooms in the deeper parts of the sanctum with her squad.

"The rooms seem to be clear, there are no traces of those filth stepping into this area." The Inquisitor rubbed his chin.

There was only silence as all of them looked to the dark corner of the room that led to the dungeons below.

This was where the first waking memory of the Repentant Sinners took place. Their first memory after being reborn back into the grace of the Sun God.

This place held a special place in their heart, it was where their journey began as one of the favored by the Sun God.

The Inquisitor broke down the locked door. "Let's go."

Eurika followed closely behind the Knight as they walked through the moss covered halls and down a spiraling staircase.

"Something feels wrong here…" The Inquisitor mumbled. "It smells like burnt flesh."

Eureka was all too familiar with this smell. This was the same scent from the square when they purged heretics in holy fire.

"Did they purge someone down here?" Eureka asked. "It smells like a purge…"

Erika was going to say something when he saw the sight of more than 30 bodies who were halfway burnt up, only deformed red flesh that was halfway melted remained and some bones was sticking

"haaaa…vvveee…uuuuuu..ssss" One of them whined, a blood red eye twitched inside a socket of a lump of flesh.

"What in the devilry is this?!" The Inquisitor readied his sword. "What monsters have snuck up into the Dungeons!"

The Knight of the Inquisition stabbed the head of the lump of flesh as it had a disturbing last exhale of air.

"Good lord…" One of the members of the squad gasped behind them. "They're Templars, Sir!"

"What?!" The Inquisitor looked around. "Impossible! The Templars are protected by the blessing of the Sun God! They wouldn't be-"

The Inquisitor then noticed that each one of the bodies had a puddle of gold next to their necks.

These were half melted, but they can make out the gold chain and the sun pendant that it was in its original form.

'These are Templars?!' Eurika gasped. 'How could they have been brought upon harm! They were blessed by the Sun God!'

Templars were a rank above Priests that never left the inner sanctum of the Church and held the secrets of the Sun Library.

No way were they not trained to fight and use magic, they were even blessed by the Sun God. What kind of monster could do such a thing to the ones highly favored by the Sun God was beyond anyone in the hall.

"You…" A voice called out from further down the hall in front of a huge opened Iron door. "Come…"

They took a while to notice him but there was one person who only had his face and neck burnt.

He was covered by a few less burnt bodies and was somehow still capable of speech.

"What happened here?!" The Inquisitor demanded. "I need answers!"

The burned man simply groaned and spoke.

"No… Time…Need… open… comm… uinication... room…" The man coughed. "Tell… the … capital…"

"What?!" The Knight exclaimed. "Why?!"

"Only… Inquisiti…on..open… doorss…" The man coughed up more blood. "No… time…waste.."

The Knight grabbed the Templar's robe and pulled him up from the bodies that covered him.

"Answer me properly you… wha-!!"

The Templar was wearing an Archbishop's robe.

The knight immediately put down the Archbishop and bowed.

"Forgive me, Archbishop Weissner!" The Knight trembled. "I was not able to recognize you!"

Eurika and the others likewise knelt down and bowed their head in reverence.

The Archbishop was only a rank below the Pope, the most influential being in the country, any form of disrespect was absolutely not forgivable.

The archbishop coughed more blood, his body trembling with every exhale.

"Not… worry…" The archbishop wheezed. "Just.. follow… order…"

"Yes, your Holiness." The knight replied. "What message shall I deliver him?"

Archbishop Weissner stopped for a bit to catch his breath and wheezed out.

"Thhe… Shadow… hass.. returned…"