Michael had to admit, in their long, long existence as a holy servant of the divine, they had screwed up a few times. Early on in their career, those screw-ups took the form of slight mistakes when guiding heroes, such as advising the Hero of Mosorova to go after a colossus he wasn’t quite ready to take on, while later, they involved small issues like giving the pontiff the wrong tea at a political function and completely unintentionally starting a war between Luceneva and Mosorova.

Thinking about it, they might have contributed more than they considered to Mosorova no longer existing as a nation…Regardless, those were ultimately small screw-ups that might have had unintended consequences.

They were not as big as, for a completely random example, blowing up a temple. Michael had certainly never done anything as bad as blowing up one of the holiest places in the Light Lands, a sacred site dedicated to one of the chief deities of the Daybreak Pantheon, filled with irreplaceable relics and untold historical significance. They’d never done anything that bad!

Up until today, that is.

The explosion was large, as one might expect, though large really was an understatement of an adjective. Massive was perhaps better. Enormous could work. Not gargantuan though, it didn’t wipe out the city nor reach high enough to be seen as a mushroom in the distance. It was more like a sea urchin in form, if anything; bits and pieces shooting off in all directions and inadvertently taking out some seagulls.

Not much could survive being in the center of an explosion like that, but Michael was an angel, and angels could survive a great deal, especially given that the explosion was ultimately holy in nature and thus had a surprisingly restorative effect on the angel-turned-missile, who went rocketing out from the depths of the shattering temple until they hit a sufficiently sturdy object that stopped their momentum.

Even then, it took the angel a second to get their bearings as they found themself going from the corrupted depths of the temple to the bright, sunny sky outside. They blinked, their eyes adjusting to the sudden light, before they noticed they seemed to be embedded in a…leg?

A glance upward showed that they were indeed smashed into the shin of the enormous statue of King Richard. Funnily enough, they didn’t actually seem to be smashed in that deep, despite their impromptu and uncontrolled flight. Must be a very sturdy statue.

Michael turned their attention back to the deck of the ship and found the curious sight of Centola and Marlowe staring at them, their mouths agape as the pair looked at the angel in pure disbelief.

“...Ah, hello,” Michael greeted in lieu of anything else to say. The awkwardness of the situation crept up on them along with the realization that they had more than likely disrupted the wedding, which they had also failed to attend properly. Which made them something of a wedding crasher, didn’t it? Hm, they didn’t particularly like that idea, it sounded rowdy. “My apologies, I was…investigating some leviathans…that blew up the temple.”

“...What?” Marlowe asked first, bewildered.

“Leviathans blew up the temple,” Michael readily lied through their teeth, “It’s a horrible tragedy that was completely their fault.”

“Wh–But we weren’t–”

Everyone paused as a faint creaking noise sounded out from behind Michael. The angel glanced back as they pushed themself out from the indentation, then winced when they saw the golem they had smashed into the rose-gold statue. “Ah…sorry.”

“Ugh, damn it Avachi,” one of the other golems muttered under her breath–or whatever golems had as an equivalent–which earned a faint whimper from her embedded sister.

“Ah, that one was Avachi then,” Michael noted, before turning back to the group, “Again, I can only offer my sincere apologies for–...”

Then they actually noticed what was currently going on.

Specifically, they noticed the various blood soaked bodies strewn about the boat, as well as the weapons the mercenaries had drawn.

“...” Michael straightened, their eyes flicking from the armed mercenaries to the guests being held hostage, then noted two more things of interest. The first being her group of companions hiding beneath a table; Anaya and Giacomo had a dwarven man under the table with them, presumably Asher, though it was hard to tell given Anaya had her hands over his throat and appeared to be pushing healing magic into a wound there, and Noriko seemed to be trying to signal something to Michael as she kept Queen Alice behind her.

Michael wasn’t the best with hand signals, but they could get the gist that the mercenaries had turned on the party and were currently a threat to their companions’ lives.

The second thing they noticed was Margrave Brascul choking out a mercenary in white beneath a table while everyone else’s attention was focused on the angel in their midst.

“Hm. It appears things have…escalated in my absence. Is there a particular reason your two groups decided to, from the looks of things, violently execute all of the Sapphire Serpents onboard?” the angel inquired, somewhat more politely than the situation warranted.

“...” Marlowe and Centola looked at each other, before the White Fur’s boss tried for a grin. “Well, you know–”

“FOR FUCK’S SAKE, MICHAEL, THEY’RE TRYING TO TAKE THE BOAT HOSTAGE!” Anaya snapped, glaring over at the angel, who stiffened at her ire then cleared her throat.

“Right, I was just–Never mind.” With that, they flared their wings–Then had to raise their arms to block a flaming fist before it could smash into their face.

Michael’s eyes widened for a moment before they narrowed again and the angel ducked beneath a blazing kick that nearly slammed into their head, courtesy of the remaining golem sisters, who regarded them with amusement and irritation, respectively.

“Sorry about this, angel, but the boss is the boss and you seem like you’ll be trouble,” Vesu chatted cheerfully, looking as though she was enjoying every moment, while Mera simply glared at Michael before trying to drive another spinning kick into their head.

While Michael was busy blocking and dodging some very heavy strikes from the pair of golems, whose small frames belied a great deal of force and literal firepower, Margrave finished choking a merc until he stopped moving, then grabbed the cutlass from his belt and leapt out from under the table she was under, driving the sword through the back of the nearest mercenary in red before grabbing the Fury’s flintlock and firing straight for Centola.

Of course, things couldn’t be that easy, though Graves didn’t expect Centola to shove one of his own men in front of the bullet. Perhaps she should have though. “Craven bastard.”

“Oh shut up! Don’t act like you’re better than me!” he sneered, “You think you can–”

It took Graves less than a second to leap close enough to swing her sword down on Centola’s head, so it came as some surprise to see him manage to draw his own saber and bring it up to block her blade.

“You really do think you’re better than me, huh?” Centola snarled, a mad look in his eyes as he pushed his blade towards his shorter foe, looming over her with red-eyed resentment, “I was still a paladin, you stupid wretch! Do you really think I can’t fight?!”

“I think you talk too much.”

As the sound of steel clashing echoed out across the boat, Marlowe glanced over her assembled subordinates, most of whom were still staring in blatant shock at the flurry of violence, up until she whistled to catch their attention. “Well? Come on, go kill the captain and the angel or you’re not getting paid.”

That seemed to bolster their spirits well enough, though it didn’t take too long for the mercs to realize they were most definitely outclassed when it came to their opponents. As evidenced by Graves almost casually decapitating three of the while still fending off strikes from Cenola.

“Well that’s scary,” Marlowe noted, a little impressed despite herself, before she glanced over at the cowering king of Luceneva, who was hiding around the back of his big, stupid statue. “Hm…well, the temple was a bust, so I might as well finish this job.”

She casually strolled across the deck, keeping an ear out for any sudden blades or bullets going towards her while also avoiding the fiery battle of golem and angel, all while drawing an axe from her belt to drive into the craven king’s head. It was almost funny to see him actually perk up as she approached.

“M-Marlowe, there you are! Look, whatever Circe is paying you, I can double it! No, triple! Quadruple! I-I can give you more wealth than you can ever dream of as long as you protect me!”

“Oh your majesty, what a tantalizing offer!” She smiled, showing her teeth again. “It’s a shame I can’t accept it. I’m in this for ideological reasons, not monetary ones.”

“...w-what?”

Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

“I’m going to kill you because I believe all shallow royalty should die bloody deaths for the sake of a deeper world, not because I’m getting paid. Does that help explain things?”

“N-No!?”

“What a shame. I suppose you’ll die ignorant then.” She flexed her hand, letting claws form at the ends of her fingers as she flashed a cruel grin, right before a blade went straight through her neck and her head went clean off.

“Y’know, this gal wasn’t sure if that would work,” Noriko admitted, her katana in hand as she flicked it clean of blood, “It seems like most of the people she goes up against these days are way hardier than that.”

“GYAH! PLEASE DON’T KILL ME!” Richard shrieked, before fleeing towards the other end of the boat.

“...Alright, that was just rude.”

“You would know, you bint.”

Noriko blinked, then glanced at the head on the ground, which was glaring at her. “...Oh. Huh…This gal feels like this would’ve been more surprising before she met Seona.”

“Who?” Marlowe asked, her blonde hair twisting and reforming into scarlet tentacles that pushed her head up, her face a pale white speckled with red.

“A dullahan, she’s nice,” Noriko explained, before tilting her head, “So is this a thing all leviathans can do?”

“Please, we're hardy people but only those of us gifted with the blessings of the prophet can live beyond life. Why, this is actually my third time ‘dying’!”

“This gal feels like she should be more fazed by that.”

“Oh don’t worry, I can help with that!” And Marlowe’s headless body promptly tried to bury an axe in Noriko’s own head, with the ninja narrowly blocking the blade with her sword. She moved swiftly, striking at the arm holding the axe and lopping it off entirely, only for the leviathan to catch the axe in its other hand and resume trying to chop at her.

“Gh–You know, persistence is an annoying trait–” she started to complain, before she felt something grab onto her leg. A glance down showed a severed hand–or maybe arm was more accurate since the whole thing was still attached–squeezing her shin. “GYAH! Ah, w-worse than the dullahans, much worse than the dullahans!”

Anaya watched the chaos for a moment, taking in the violence across the deck, before letting out a slow, exasperated sigh as she continued healing Asher’s neck. “Giacomo, can I be honest with you?”

“Huh? Oh, ah…sure? Yes, ah, you can be honest, Sister,” Giacomo replied as he stayed close to his brother, keeping half his attention on him and half on the on-going battle.

“I have no idea what’s going on at this point.”

“Oh. Ah…and that is meaning…?”

“I’m just…kind of baffled and exasperated at this point with everyone around me. There’s so much going on and I’m trying real hard to focus on what I can focus on, but everything’s just…so big and so unwieldy and I’m just losing track of it all.”

“Ah, io capisco. The world is complicated, Sister. Overly so, really, because there are far too many people all having ideas and making decisions all at once. It makes things maybe more difficult than it has to-”

“H-Hey, this is really interesting and philosophical and all, but can you two please keep me from dyin’,” Asher requested, his voice hoarse and body sluggish.

Anaya sighed. “You’re going to be fine. Well, presuming that giant tidal wave doesn’t kill us in the next few seconds.”

“...” Giacomo turned his head towards the ruin of the Water Temple, which had been churning and boiling for the past minute or so, and just now erupted in a massive wave of water rushing straight for their shitty little boat in the middle of the bay. “...huh.”

Asher craned his head where his little brother was looking, then let out a slow, raspy sigh of his own. “Well that’s just not fair at all.”

The wave didn’t particularly care what was fair and what wasn’t. It simply barreled its way along, pulling up wreckage and ruin in its wake. Distantly, those in the city could hear what they would later call the enraged scream of the water goddess as she discovered just what had happened to her temple, though others would point out it was more likely the result of the elemental within the core being unleashed and letting loose its fury against its imprisonment.

This would cause a religious schism in the Faith of Water that would cause untold devastation and petty arguments in the far future, but that wasn’t particularly relevant to the bunch of people currently being carried aloft by a gigantic wave. Really, what was more relevant to them was how they were all rapidly approaching the city of Orindaco.

----------------------------------------

Darius Centola slowly blinked awake amid broken stone and wood. Water dripped from the hole in the ceiling above him, where he could vaguely see a boat smashed into the dome of the palace above him.

“...” He slowly sat up, blinking at the devastation around him, the palace utterly destroyed and soaked with seawater, before a slow grin spread across his face. “I’m alive…? Ahaha…ahahahaha! I’m alive! No, what am I saying, of course I’m alive! I will always survive!”

The exiled paladin let out a loud, triumphant laugh as he stood, raising his hands above his head in show of his victory. “I WILL LIVE FOREVER! FOR I AM THE CHOSEN OF THE GODS!”

Those just so happened to be Darius Centola’s last words as the soaked, bedraggled elf failed to notice the enormous statue of King Richard had remained on the wedding barge up above, still standing tall and proud. Up until gravity asserted its dominance over the inanimate king and pulled it from its perched, right through the already shattered roof of the archducal palace, and right through the idiot standing below, who went from an arrogant elf to slightly less arrogant bloody paste in the seconds it took for the statue to hit the floor.

“Oof…that looks expensive to replace,” Josephine mumbled from her place on Michael’s back, her arms wrapped tight around the angel’s neck so she didn’t wind up falling to the ground below. Not that there was much ground, considering the flooding.

“Yeah that looks worse than what happened back home,” Noriko commented, sitting on one of Michael’s arms as the angel did their best to hold her up.

Anaya, who was sitting in the crook of the other arm, grimaced. “…I suppose it’s too much to hope for some divine intervention this time?”

Michael paused as Anaya and Noriko looked at them. “…I’m one angel, I can’t fix everything.”

“Well, hey, bright side, that wall of water did come from the water temple, right?” Josephine pointed out, “There’s good odds that it means the water was charged with life magic and might actually heal any wounds it caused.”

“Does that prevent drowning?” Anaya asked.

“…it might?” Josephine shrugged as Anaya gave her a look. “Hey, I can breathe in water just fine, drowning is a weird concept to me.”

“Ah, well, it looks like most people are getting up on roofs?” Giacomo pointed out from his place clinging onto Michael’s leg.

Which prompted a pause from the angel as they glanced down and noted that not only was Giacomo hanging onto their left leg, but his brother Asher was hanging onto his waist. That, and Brascul was holding onto their right foot, and looking fairly displeased with everything going on.

“...Hm.” On the one hand, they didn’t really like people hanging onto their legs. On the other hand, they didn’t really want to drop Giacomo. They were considering kicking Brascul off though…No, that would be callous. “Is the king still alive?”

“Ah…maybe? I can see the first and third queens together, they’re on the roof of that one strip club with the seashell thing…there’s also a lot of young men with them?”

“Those are probably her sons,” Anaya noted, “Nice to hear that worked out for them and no one else.”

“Hey now, there are other people alive, not just the royals. And the king might’ve died, so that evens it out, yes?”

“No, I can see him,” Brascul spoke up, “He’s on top of the Furies' headquarters.”

Michael glanced over and indeed spotted the king clinging onto a flagpole atop the Vermillion Furies’s place of business. “...where did his pants go?”

“Presumably the ocean took them.”

“Ah.”

“...Are you going to pay for all of this?” Brascul asked, glancing up at Michael.

“...ah…” They had a feeling a few diamonds might not actually solve this issue. “...I could ask the Faith of Light to support your city in this trying time.”

“Hm. Can I get that in writing?”

“If you write a claim, I will do whatever is needed to authorize it.”

Brascul smirked. “Deal.”

Miles and miles away, Gabriel felt a faint disturbance in the world, as though the Faith of Light’s coffers had abruptly screamed out in agony, before shaking it off. It was probably nothing.

Michael, meanwhile, paused as they noticed a very different sibling flying over to them. “Oh, Uriel, you’re okay. Good.”

“It is good to see you are well as well, Michael!” their yellow-winged sibling replied, perhaps more chipper than the situation warranted, “I’m surprised to see you here already! I wound up soaring much further than this, wound up in…oh, what’s that one Lucenevan dukedom? The one with the name that sounds like another place’s name.”

“...” Michael had no idea what their sibling was talking about, so they turned their attention to the golem in Uriel’s arms, who waved cheerfully at them. “Why do you have Vesuvi?”

“Oh, well that’s a funny thing! I actually encountered this golem on my way back here. She suddenly collided into me and, well, I just carried her along.”

“Hey there, angel,” the golem greeted, her face much more obviously made of clay after all the paint to make her look human had washed away, “No hard feelings for earlier, right?”

“...hm.”

“Oh? What happened earlier?” Uriel asked, curious.

“Nothing you need to worry about, big guy~” Vesuvi replied, casually rubbing Uriel’s pectorals, “I’d rather focus on what you and I have going–”

“She tried to kill me,” Michael stated.

“Oh, alright.” And Uriel promptly dropped Vesuvi.

“I’LL WRITE YOU!” she called out, before landing with a heavy splash in the water below.

“Hmph. Right, I should probably find somewhere to put you all down…” Michael murmured, before pausing as a new voice caught her attention.

“HEY REDWING!” shouted Crab from down below as he stood alongside Carp and the other Brown Hares on top of their pub, which appeared to be floating along, unmoored from the rest of the somewhat sunken city. “WHAT THE FUCK!?”

“...hm. Yes, this one might be somewhat more difficult to repair than our other excursions.”

“You think?” Anaya huffed, before settling in as the populace of Orindaco found themselves having to adjust to their watery city now being significantly more underwater than it was previously.

For the water-breathing members of the populace, it was actually something of an improvement. For the rest, well…yeah, it kinda sucked.

Though hey, at least a fair few of them got to brag about being rescued by mermaids. Truly, every cloud has a silver lining.