The news about the 'Mokon Massacre' reached the ears of the Holy Order's higher ups in no time.
As if having the entire order of St. Raphael obliterated in a single mission wasn't enough... one of the 5 legendary heroes as well as a disciple of the New Testament had also been reported missing in action.
This was a huge blow to the officials in charge of the entire operation. They had thought that, since two of the most powerful individuals in the theocracy were involved, this would be a piece of cake. None of them ever thought about having a catastrophe like this happen, with THEM holding the reigns.
"The Archon will have us hanged for this.." the supervisor for the operation, a 'Lord Winthropt', says as he reads the report given by the soldiers who had just investigated the anomaly at the forest.
"Have they searched the tomb as well?"
"Not a soul is willing to traverse past the forest in fear of the cultists." The soldier told them. "They might still be in the tomb."
"At full force even." Lord Winthropt nodded, putting the written report down. "What about the individual that you detained?"
"Shen Wolffe, sir." The soldier says. "Wolffe says that he had 'gone for a walk' during the massacre at the forest as per orders of his father. Hearing the screams, Wolffe swiftly makes his way to the camp, but upon his return, everybody had already been killed, with half the forest already burning to the ground."
"Is he still in question?"
"Yes sir." The soldier replied. "He is currently under the supervision of the grand warden."
"That guy is a maniac." One of the officers commented. "He would go through any means necessary to obtain information...
...even if you WERE innocent."
If one noticed the other shiver and pale at the comment, nobody dare point it out.
"Now, now. I will get him out personally after our meeting today." Lord Winthropt says. "Let us get back to the matter at hand---the disappearance of both Lord Gilford and brother Ludwig."
"This is a matter of national security. We must alert the royal army..."
"And have our authority questioned?" A Cardinal of the Order, Dagon Thorn , asked. "We will handle this ourselves!"
"And how do you suppose we do it, Lord Thorn?"
"We can't afford to lose another regiment to those heretics!" Another officer butts in.
"Simple." Dagon says as he lays back on his chair, staring at his comrades as if willing them to oppose.
"Hire the Black Hand."
Everybody more or less let out a mortified gasp. The Black Hand were a group of powerful mercenaries who would work for anyone as long as they could meet their quota. The Black Hand participated in a lot of campaigns during the Great War, and were game changers during most of them. A losing army of about 1,200 men once outdid a greater army of 15,000 just by employing two of the members of the Black Hand.
Their strength wasn't the reason why everybody got anxious, though. Members of the Black Hand, besides being powerful, are ruthless individuals who, in most cases, carry out their missions without any moral restrictions whatsoever. Most, if not all, of the members are 'sadistic killers' that seem to have no regard of life on the battlefield, and are even reported to inflict major damage on the side they are working on.
The battle between the 1,200 and the 15,000 men armies resulted in the victory of the former, however the surviving number of soldiers are only 136 people of the victors. There were even rumors about the two members of the Black Hand killing a few of their allies who allegedly pissed them off, but no proof was there to charge them of any war crimes.
As such, the Theocracy of Creathe had outlawed the hiring of these mercenaries due to their heinous acts and their occasional insubordination.
People like Dagon Thorn, however, thought that certain circumstances require the use of these criminals, and as such sought and managed to discover a few loopholes regarding the recruitment of the mercenaries. This was one of those circumstances.
"The situation is dire, and I had believed that I didn't have a choice." Dagon sighed, as if burdened by his companions' inability to understand his methods. "It's true that the law forbids us to outright hire these people, but if they 'willingly' enlist on their own into our country's Foreign Legion, who are we to stop them, right?"
"You're mad!" Lord Winthropt roared, rage and disgust laced in his voice and present in his face. "The Order strictly forbids the use of these scum!"
"Didn't you hear what I just said?" Dagon huffed incredulously.q
"I heard, Lord Thorn... but I simply cannot accept it." Lord Winthropt says. "Why don't we have a vote?"
"That won't be necessary, Lord Winthropt." Dagon stands. "I have already made the decision for all of you. I will take full responsibility."
A few of the nobles were disgusted by this, including Lord Winthropt.
"This is an outrage!"
"Making decisions without informing the council?!"
"Should we let this coward get away with all of this?"
"I vote to relieve Lord Thorn from his services in the council." One of the officers started.
"I agree." Most of them were already sick of Dagon's methods, and a few already harbored deep resentment towards him because of his actions in the past.
Lord Winthropt stands up and looks at Dagon straight in the eye. "Lord Thorn... because of your foolish actions, especially now that you have overseen the enlistment of these scoundrel into our glorious army... you are hereby dismisse-"
"Scoundrel?"
The officers immediately pointed their attention towards the door, where two individuals stood with weapons equipped. Both had their hoods on, and as such couldn't be identified easily by the men in the room. Dagon, however, seemed relax, as if he already knew that those two would come barging into the meeting without notice.
"Who are you?!" Asked one of the officers.
"Where are our perimeter guards?!" Lord Winthropt shouted.
One of them removes the hood, revealing silver hair and ocean-blue eyes.
"Gentlemen." Dagon says as he goes over the two intruders, putting his hand over the shoulder of the silver-haired individual. "This is Adelfried von Sommer, a 'friend' of mine from the Black Hand. The lady over there is none other than Iris Mildred, also from the Black Hand."
"Pleasure to make your acquaintance." Iris bows her head. Adelfried, however, remained standing. An animalistic grin painted on his face.
"We had just enlisted into your pathetic excuse for a military." Adelfried smirks, revealing a blood-stained scythe in his hands. "Cleared them out in a few seconds. Wouldn't be surprised if you just paid them for standing there."
"Adelfried.." Iris looks at her partner, but her voice lacks the bite of a reproach. "Where are your manners?"
"Oh sorry! It is also a pleasure of mine!!" Adelfried says as he bobbed a mocking display of a curtsy towards the now-frightened individuals. "You don't mind if I told you that I seriously worship that chair you're sitting on, right?"
"What is the meaning of this, Dagon?!" Lord Winthropt turned to the said man, breaking formalities.
"You have insulted these kind people's integrity, Lord Winthropt... and as such, what they are about to do to you is clearly out of my control." Dagon replies with a grin, stepping back and into the door.
"This is treason!"
"Dagon, you bastard!"
"I have to say, buddy." Adelfried says, addressing to Dagon. "These people have been nothing but a 'thorn' on your side all these years, huh?"
"It's not funny, Adelfried." Iris berates him, ironically chuckling herself.
With this, Dagon gives the duo their first order as he opens the door. "How you send them to the afterlife doesn't matter. Just make sure to pin their deaths as actions of the cult."
"With pleasure." Iris says, producing her sword.
"LORD CHAIR!" Adelfried jokingly looks up in the sky with the pretense of calling out a god as he shouts maniacally. "PLEASE ACCEPT THESE BLASPHEMERS AS MY SACRIFICES! Is that how you guys do it?"
"DAGON!!" Lord Winthropt shouts before Iris puts her blade straight into his throat, killing him almost immediately. Adelfried just goes berserk, slicing the heads off of every single person that got in his way. That is, until he trips over a body and directly slams head first into the ground, the impact knocking him unconscious.
Iris merely sighed exhasperatedly, already used to this.
"You're services are no longer needed, Winthropt." Dagon smiles as he closes the door behind him. This was surely the beginning of his rise to power.
...
"Kathlynn." A voice seems to call out to an Apostle of the New Testament, Kathlynn Stark. She had been meditating for a few hours now, until suddenly... a strange familiar voice puts her into attention.
"T-teacher?" She replies in response. "Where are you? I can't see you!"
"The tree, Kathlynn." The voice tells her. "The answer to your question lies on top of the tree."
"Teacher, let me see you!" Kathlynn desperately pleads out.
"Search for the tree, Kathlynn." Was the reply.
"The answer lies at the top of the tree."
Kneeling on the very center of her personal quarters, Kathlynn opens her eyes as the vision seemingly ends.
For two years, she had been attempting to contact her teacher, the late grand cardinal Wilhelm vi Crenovia, who had resigned from his duty to the Church in order to find the 'answer to the question'.
After a few months of sending letters through pigeons, the Order assembled a search party when Lord Crenovia and his group suddenly stopped responding to any form of communication sent by the Church.
The soldiers were aided with a group of expert trackers and several hunting dogs, but to no avail. They return with sorrowful faces as they recovered two of the bodies belonging to members of Lord Crenovia's escort. He had been presumed dead ever since... at least, to everyone but Lord Crenovia's former disciple, Kathlynn Stark.
"My lady?" Her handmaiden spoke as Kathlynn staggered and hurries to her side "Your clairvoyance took a lot longer than usual.."
"Wilhelm is alive." She replies as the maid grabs her a chair to sit on. "The teacher is alive!"
"T-that is great news, my lady." The handmaiden says. "Should I inform Sir Stark of your discovery?"
"Toorin?" Kathlynn asks. "Don't. My brother hates it when I bring the teacher up."
"Was there any reason why Sir Stark abandoned his search for Lord Crenovia, my lady?"
Kathlynn smiles. "My brother only wishes to protect me. All of them are so sure that the teacher had died... I'm the only one who insists otherwise."
The handmaiden bows her head. "I'm sorry, my lady. That must have been a sensitive question."
"No need, Talia." Kathlynn tells her. "You remind me of myself when I was still in the guidance of the teacher. Always asking questions."
Pouring water into a glass, the handmaiden then hands it to Kathlynn, with the latter drinking it as if she hadn't tasted water in days.
"Thank you, Talia." Kathlynn smiles. "But now, I must ask you to do something for me."
"Anything, my lady." Talia, her handmaiden, says.
"Assemble my personal guard." Kathlynn tells her. "And prepare my armor."
"My lady, I don't suppose you-"
"I'm going to search for the world tree, Yggdrasil." Kathlynn says as she stands up with immense valor.
Talia stands in attention. "Yes, my lady."
Kathlynn smiles as she looks out the window, the bright light of the sun shining on her pale face. "Wait for me."
...
It reeked.
If there was anything that Shen Wolffe absolutely hated... it was the amalgamation of horrible odors that seemingly occupied the entirety of the dungeon he was held in.
A garrison of over a hundred guards are stationed all around his cell alone, and a hundred more outside of it. It was as if he were some kind of dangerous criminal.
Shen knew for a fact that he did nothing wrong.
Heretics or not, the captain had given him orders not to let anyone but him get near the captured members of the cult, as they were extremely valuable prisoners that can be used for question or as bargaining chips to the triangle. Shen himself knew that he was overqualified for the job... but he understood the meaning behind it.
He had recently dishonored his family name, and as such was reprimanded severely. Shen's grandfather, the head of the household, got so angry that he forbade Shen from ever using their family name again, to which he resorted to the surname "Wolffe" as a measure of his obedience towards his grandfather and his acceptance of the consequences of his actions.
Being the only one escaping the Mokon massacre, he reported first to his superiors before going to inform his grandfather about his father's--the captain of the retreating group-- passing. Not long after hundreds, if not thousands, of guards apprehended him as was the order of his own grandfather, who had blamed him for his father's death.
What's more was that his grandfather even accused him of siding with the cultists.
Shen never raised his blade, knowing full well that he could annihilate every single one of his grandfather's lapdogs if he so wished. He even felt the guards getting more and more anxious even as they took his own sword from him and placed heavy metal cuffs unto his arms. They were going to question him, and Shen understood that they were only following orders... as he had that night.
What Shen never understood was that instead of being sent to the Supreme Court, where most nobles had gone to if ever they were accused of treason against the state he was sent to the dungeon...
to the grand warden...
to be beaten up and whipped.
Shen never understood why he had to go through horrible torture despite being innocent.
It was then that Shen began to wonder about why he had been silent for so long. Wasn't he from a noble background? Isn't he the best swordsman that his family had produced after a long time?
It was as if Shen was one of the thousands of pathetic scum that plagued the streets of Creathe; murdering, raping and stealing vermin that ought to be wiped off from the face of this world.
It was as if Shen was among those who deserted the royal army during the great war; selfish cowards who had never loved their own country from the start... and instead escaped from their duty in order to save their own skins.
It was as if he was never loved by anyone... not even his family.
Coming into this world at the wrong place, at the wrong time...
His grandfather had cursed the day of his birth, and had hated him ever since. Because of her father-in-law's rebuke, his mother had committed suicide and because of the recent unfortunate events that had fallen upon his family. His father abandoned him... treated him like dirt.
"The Theocracy reeks of corruption."
Shen could hear the voice of the grand warden outside. Lord Harold Geoffrey had always been the cruelest when it comes to interrogation. Because of his immense sadism, he wasn't allowed by the church to operate on nobles.
Instead, they left the lowest of the low; heretics, murderers, traitors and runaway slaves, under his care.
"Shen Wolffe.." Lord Geoffrey smiles as he opens Shen's cell door. "I have come to play with you again."
Up until now Shen had been Geoffrey's new favorite. His emotionless state had left the grand warden at awe... so much so that he was willing to try every method in order to get Shen to even just twitch.
In a matter of just a few hours, Harold thought he had tried everything. From 'nail clipping' to skin burning, Shen Wolffe has yet to let out even a single scream.
"Your new surname fits you, no?" Harold asks as he sits in front of Shen, who the former had deliberately left untied for the reason that if Shen ever attacked him he would therefore be guilty to all crimes he had been charged of. "You had always been your family's loyal dog."
Shen's face betrays nothing, mouth remained shut. Harold looks at him for one moment before he puts a hand on his pocket and produces a knife. "This time, I have decided to take off a few of your fingers. You won't mind, right?"
Still absolute silence.
It came as a surprise, even to the Lord, that his new toy remains unbothered with everything that has been done to him. But for Shen, it is nothing new.
The reason why Shen was so adept at keeping his mouth shut was because he had also been taking lessons from the Creathian Royal Guards, including the part where even though an immense amount of pain had been inflicted upon him, he must always refuse to open his mouth.
"Well, alright." Harold sighs, smiling as he positions himself in front of Shen. Knife on top of his ring finger, Harold continues his interrogation. "Why did you do it?"
Shen shakes his head, staying true to his statement---he did nothing wrong.
Harold, seeing that he is unable to shake the seemingly unbreakable swordsman, proceed to cut through his skin. Shen held back everything that wanted to scream inside himself, as Harold stops midway. "You can still keep your ring finger if you just admit to your crimes."
Shen looks at him for a few seconds before looking down again to Harold's annoyance. Because of Shen's silence, the grand warden continues what he was doing, successfully cutting off a part of his right hand.
Shen felt dizzy. The amount of pain plus the blood loss and fatigue brought about by Harold's actions were unbearable. But for himself and his pride, Shen never let out a sound. He remains to will his mouth shut and his face emotionless
Harold proceeds to place the knife on top of Shen's other ring finger. "This reminds me of what you did that angered your old man's old man so much."
"Don't you dare.." Shen growled his first words since his reporting of the incident, though Harold wasn't really surprised. This had always been a sensitive topic for him.
"Or what, Wolffe?" Harold spits Shen on the face. "You're going to kill me?~"
Shen looked at him with a stoic face but he was almost at his limit.
"I know what you did." Harold mocked him, slowly cutting through his skin again. "I know what she did too."
Shen's other hand closed as anger swelled all over his body.
"Want to know a secret, though?" Harold stops midway again, grinning widely. He moves toward Shen's ear, whispering. "I killed her."
Shen's eyes widen as his assumptions were finally proven correct. His grandfather did this. Harold did this.
They were going to pay.
"In fact, I pummeled the slut first before AND after her death. If you know what I mean~" Harold had the nerve to wink, smiling as he prepares to continue his job. "Man, now that I think about it. At that time, she was really tight. Ah, but that means that she liked it right? Poor girl must've been waiting for you. It was nice how she was always defiant, screaming your name until the very end."
"EVEN AS I RAPED HER!" Harold shouts as he looks at Shen, finally reaching the edge of his other ring finger.
In a fit of pure rage, Shen grabs hold of Harold's hand, where he was holding the knife, attempting to make him release it.
Harold does, but quickly punches Shen in the face using his other arm.
Unfazed, Shen kicks the psychopath on the groin, leaving the head wide open. Using his right hand, Shen uppercuts the grand warden so hard that he reached the ceiling.
The guards had been alerted now. In fact, the entire garrison was already in front of his cell with spears ready.
It was then that Shen realized that he really had been a dog his entire life. He grips the knife closely as if his entire life depended on it.
It was then that Shen decided that he was no longer going to let himself be his family's doormat. He runs over towards the guards and forces the remaining mana that he still had on himself to a single 100-fold strike.
It was then that Shen finally snapped.