I opened up the doors to my office . A small modest room with a rug in the middle, a cabinet, bookshelf, a mirror, a portrait hanging on the wall and of course the desk with a chair. I looked outside of the window located on one of the sides of the room where darkness prevailed.
I might be in the middle of the night, but I still have some work to do. Thankfully, I finished most of it earlier.
The reason why I wasn't able to get it done earlier is because today was a feast organised as a celebration of my birthday. Yet another year of my existence. The Roble Holy Kingdom sure didn't hold on their spending for such an occassion.
Our headquarters is located in this country. Mainly because they allow us easy and mostly unrestricted operations. They might have their own main religion, but unlike theocracy, they do not try to trample on any other beliefief.
Without a doubt, they will ask for some favour later.
I might be one of the head priests, the ones at the top of the organisation. We don't really have a leading figure, but a council that from time to time gathers and makes decisions. Speaking of one of those gatherings is gonna happen in a few days, most likely due the whole chaos that was caused by the soul queen appearing in Re-Estize kingdom. We also heard that there was a clash between her and the theocracy.
I hope they will get destroyed. Those annoying fools have been asking for it for many years.
Once inside the office I stood before the mirror to check my apperance. Even if am alone here this doesn't mean that I can just ignore that. Someone with my position needs to look tidy and well after all.
I am an elf, you can very rarely find us in human kingdoms. Our race resides in a single country as opposed to humans who are divided between different lands.
The wrinkles on my face and few strands of white hair easily seen when compared with their normal brown color, reminding of my many years during which I fulfil my purpose.
I also take a glance at my white robes adorned with golder linings and a crown symbol on the chest that seem to be too big for me. In fact all the high priests wear them like that and everyone thinks that is jsut how they are meant to be worn. The truth is different.
Many forget that we once were normal priests who climbed the ranks, becoming spiritual guides and soul guardians later. The latter position is something more akin to a holy knight who uses spiritual energy in battle. This means that all of us are proficient in combat, even if we get rusty with time.
One of the many perks of being proficient in it is ageing slower. I, for one, remember the times even before the six great gods or players came to this land. Those in the know fear them mostly, but we don't care, even if it seems that our goddess is one of them. After all, what does it change? She is our god still, governs the afterlife and keeps the balance anyway.
I sat down on a chair and started reviewing the few documents that were still left. I am glad I thought beforehand that a feast might happen and do most of it before noon. Otherwise, I would have to stay the whole night here.
The first document is a report from one of our many informants. We know very well that the key to success is information. Merchants won't earn if they don't know what a certain area needs and soldiers won't win wars without information about enemy movements. We, for one, gather whatever might prove useful.
The report comes from a spiritual guide of E-Rantel. A priest that finished his training and can be given responsibility with managing a temple. It's about what happened there. To sum it up everything was fine until a great pressure descended and most of the people lost consciousness while some even died. The statue in the temple came to life and started emmiting blue light from vein like lines on it. It only lasted a few minutes, after which it went quiet.
I read the rest of the report. Oh, it seems there were necromancers attacking the town. That might be a reason for goddess fury. Her hatred for 'rogue' necromancers is certain. Rouge, in this case, means the necromancer who was not given permission by death to use such magic. That makes them use an incomplete version of it, which means creating filthy abominations in terms of spiritual matters compared to 'normal' undead.
At least we know what really happened.
Moving on to another. It comes from our spy in Slane Theocracy. This particular spy is extremely valuable. It cost us a lot to enable him to infiltrate higher echelons of their structures. A price we are willing to pay since they are our greatest enemy and obstacle. The spy gave intel about a very interesting thing. A member of the black scripture called Thousand Leagues Astrologer, who is an expert in divination, lost her mind. The spy doesn't exactly know what happened, but she knows that she was tasked with using divination on our goddess. A foolish idea. The rest, we can only guess, is due to a lack of information, but by logic, she succeeded, and something happened to her. The most probable option is interference of death itself. It would be worrying that even if sealed, it could still affect the world in such a manner. As a devout believer, I will leave this for the soul queen to take care of.
She is covered in her room, not able to sleep due to nightmares, and getting panic attacks when someone even tries to ask about what happened. The same also happens when someone mentions a soul queen or divination in her presence. It seems that it will be hard for her to do her job again.
Now, with theocracy finally getting the soul queen and the whole afterlife angry, it's only a matter of time before it falls. With all their unwillingness to get into mortal affairs, they will not let it slide. Although its end is set in stone, we, as believers, should not stay without doing anything. That would be unbecoming. Right now, it's too late, but tomorrow during the council, I will do my best to convince all the others to gather our members, especially the Soul Guardians, to fight them. It's not gonna be hard since we have similar opinions, adding to that the fact that I am one of the founders.
The Roble Holy Kingdom will be against it, afraid that it will drag into an open war with theocracy. The core of our organisation is faith, so when our god calls, we answer no matter what. If they oppose, then we will leave for another country. Although the only remaining ones we can go to are Re-Estize and Elven kingdom, the second one will only let us go there for pure spite toward theocracy. The dwarves... they have their own things to do and will not agree. Such an operation will be costly and will mostly empty our coffers, but there will be no other choice. There is also a possibility that the Roble Holy Kingdom will back down since a good part of the taxes come from our businesses, and money speaks the loudest.
I stood up and went to the mirror, grabbed its edge, and pulled, opening up the hidden storage area where my armour and equipment were. The heavy armour with a helmet covers the whole head beside the face, which is protected by a metal mask. I remember the times when fighting the filth of humankind and other races. I still recall the beastly screams of beastmen that attacked the city.
"Let's see if it still fits."
I took off my robes, revealing fully sculpted muscles that were hidden behind the 'too big robes', and put on the armour. It's been some time since I've done it, so it was awkward fumbling while trying to put certain parts correctly.
After putting it on and moving a little to check if it still fits I grabbed my sword. Everyone if they saw it would say it's two handed greatsword, but not for me. Right after I grabbed the last piece a square shield almost as big as me lifting it and attaching in the other hand. I thanked our goddess that the floors are made of stone reinforced with metal or I would have dented it and left marks from weights alone.
"It still fits."
I smiled, getting actually excited.
"After so many years, people will see 'The Eclipse' once more."