The staircase of this room was quite bizarre. The steps all twisted and turned in different locations and yet no matter the orientation of the structure, he never once felt the grip of Gaia pulling him back down to the ground. No, this whole thing acted as a miniature version of her pull as there were no worries of being thrown to the ground. Whether this be the act of some Gods or mystical powers, he knew not.

What he did know was that this staircase had several monsters guarding the steps, so much so that it was absolutely infuriating. They were all the same beasts he had faced on the streets: the hulk, the lizards, the horses, and the spiked arm freaks. Such a combination would make any confrontations terrifying and outright dangerous.

That was, if he couldn’t predict their movement. They were all far too easy to read and thus he had no problems going through the stairs. The horses would all rush towards him, an answer that was a simple spear to the head. Spiked arm freaks trying to swing at him? Counter with the blunt end of his weapon and strike them with the pointed head. The hulks trying to smash him into a red paste against the steps? Dodge and stab into the base of their neck, where the flesh was weak enough to allow his spear to go through and the shimmering did not protect at all.

The only exception to all this was the lizard. He had been able to finally figure out what that flaming circle on their head truly did and what he found was absolutely ridiculous. The flames turned into a giant sphere of fire that engulfed the monster completely and all of a sudden he had gone from an easy battle into having to fight a giant fire version of that same enemy. Each of those battles went from doable to an outright danger of having to face, so much so that he started spamming his divinity to get away from fighting such a battle.

Even though he knew that an easy way to dispatch them was to avoid the incoming attack and then counter with a strike towards the center of the sphere, it was better to simply use his ability than deal with all of that. He didn’t know how the Crusader was able to deal with the battles consistently, but he understood that those tactics wouldn’t apply to him.

That being said, he was making good ground. With a few more fights and numerous more steps, he was right in front of the doorway with an exhausted Crusader. The two of them looked at each other for a brief moment, wondering if that was truly everything or if another ridiculous battle would come through. After all, the two had taken opposing stairs and seemingly cleared every last monster in this room.

That was until a blue shimmer began to overrun the entrance. They both groaned at the reaction before getting their weapons up in arms. They had to take a defensive stance, as their energy had taken a toll from the constant battles.

Turns out, they hadn’t needed to worry at all. The shimmering started to shine before sparking and shattering into tiny sparks that sprinkled the whole area.

The lightshow ended. The two kept their guards up for a brief while, waiting for something to happen. After all, having some sort of dramatic moment like that should result in a battle of some sort.

Nothing did. They stood there for a good few minutes before realizing that no, nothing was going to come and they were safe to continue onwards. Then and only then did they put away their weapons and march forwards to the next room.

They found themselves in a long hallway that had a bright light at the end. The whole place was created with paved stone, which made the Spartan start to wonder where exactly in the building they were. Nothing about this matched the architecture they spotted outside and nothing about any of this made sense. Were they going up multiple levels or was this all still on the same area? Did they even make any progress at all?

“So, you came.” The Crusader said as he walked forward, snapping the Spartan out of his thoughts, “Truth be told, I was certain you would have stayed behind or waited for some time.”

“Well, let’s just say if I had left you alone, you’d probably be dead by now.” He replied back, though his reply had no head behind it, “Besides, if I hadn’t come, then you might have been killed by thoes three hulks, no?”

“Hmph. I’m quite certain I would have been able to find a way out of that situation.”

“Are you certain of that?”

The Crusader stopped in his tracks and looked back at the Spartan, clearly unamused by the question. For a brief while, he stayed there and kept staring with heat sparking in his eyes. Then, he burst into laughter at that.

“Ahahah! I won’t lie that I was having trouble, but that was simply because I was trying to avoid using too much of my holy powers. There would be stronger opponents we would need to face after all, no?”

“Hm. That is true.” He nodded.

Actually, that was quite the good point. The Crusader had been trying to reserve the usage of his divinity, most likely since he had such a limited pool and the constant usage of the powers would have left him too exhausted to defend himself well. That was perhaps the whole point of the entire scenario: trying his best to be prepared for the upcoming battles that he did need to keep an eye on his energy.

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Though perhaps that was a flaw that he needed to fix himself. He had been quite lax with the usage of his divinity after touching that black shard. Even if he did not feel the same burn as before, that still didn’t mean he should be using his powers as frequently as he was doing now. If they were to face an enemy on the same level as that horde in the luxury building from earlier, then he had no doubts that having every single last bit of divine power would be necessary.

He frowned at that. He hadn’t told his associate about what happened with the black shard yet, even after everything that happened. The question was if he did want to inform him of what he had witnessed as well as the new flow of power.

While this was advantageous, yes, he worried about one thing: the man’s reaction. He seemed to be hellbent on having things done his way, after all, and he had no clue whether the discovery of this power-boosting attribute would do to him. Would he begin rushing forward to every single fight in hopes of getting more powers to become closer to his God? Or would he denounce this as nothing more than some evil thing that had to be purged?

Either way, he’d have to keep quiet on this for now. This was something that didn’t need to be publicized yet, not until they had one of those shards in front of them.

This talk would need to wait until then.

“What is this?” The Crusader asked in awe as he looked all around him, “Where have we found ourselves?”

The Spartan snapped out of his thoughts and followed suit. His eyes widened as he took in the details of this building in front of them.

Opulent gold and silver covered every single corner of the walls. On top of them laid marble statuettes of harmonious scenes, each of them depicting a moment of time in this town’s history.

The crowning of a baby that laid in a tub of some sort, surrounded by hordes of people who had faces in awe. The crowned boy who sat atop of a strange beast with wings and giant claws that seemed to be up in the air above a crowd that all reeled back in fear. The crowned man that stood amongst two groups flanking him, all the while putting a hand on a pillar that held boxes all throughout its faces.

He blinked. One of the areas that should detail the man as an old person was utterly demolished. Where there should be a stone mural of some sort laid nothing more than shattered stone that was scattered all across. Any kind of historical moment was gone and lost, with nothing but pebbles taking the place of the decoration.

An act of sabotage if he were to guess. Perhaps this was done by the citizens after being abandoned by their king. Either way, this was something quite interesting in itself. This meant this had to be somewhat recent, so either the man described in these murals was one of controversy… or a recent figure.

That wasn’t the same thought the Crusader seemed to have.

“Who dares? Who dares to desecrate such fine art of their lord? What kind of blasphemy is this?” He raged as he turned his attention all around, “Who here would allow this? Do you not have any shame for allowing your liege to suffer such disrespect?”

His words echoed all throughout the room, bouncing off the opulent walls continuously and getting louder with each moment. Then they began to dissipate and go lower, at least for that brief while.

That was when one of the walls began to shiver. Then each of the bricks of gold seemed to fly off the wall and float away, revealing the night sky. Bright stars inhabited the abyss that greeted them and light shadows began to move forward.

Then they came. The same monsters that the duo had faced back earlier. However, when before they either swapped between having two feet or being fused to the floor, these all kept up a similar pattern. They all had their two feet and were able to move with their free will.

That was what he thought, until the last ones came out. Four of these monsters came out carrying what seemed to be a large stone coffin on their backs. The twenty others then waited for a while, at least until the stone coffin was laid down onto the ground. Then and only then did they turn to the duo with their spikes ready to fire.

All of this confused the Spartan. What exactly was the point of that stone coffin? Was that supposed to be threatening and a means to give a witty remark? Either way, this did not matter as they took on their defensive stances, ready to take on the swarm’s attacks without fail.

The Spartan expected them to give an opening remark. He expected them to shoot their spikes at them and rush into combat once more. After all, why would they change from the known pattern? They were intelligent, but they were still flawed beasts that were made in the image of the Usurper, and they should follow the same movements as the other monsters.

But that’s not what they did at all. No, the moment they laid eyes on the duos, they froze. They stood there and started to shake, their teeth gnashing and grinding together and their eyes all beginning to glow behind their metal masks. Then, they all aimed their weapons towards one person.

The Spartan.

“You!” They all roared in unison, hate and loathing tinged in their voices as they kept their aim up, “You! You vile cur! You bastard! Our soul! You have it! Our soul! Our divine blessing!”

What?

He could not help but widen his eyes at those remarks. He had their soul? What did they mean? Wait a moment, was that perhaps what that black shard was? Was that perhaps a fragment of their powers that was gifted by the Usurper?

The Spartan’s mind began to run. So engrossed was he in his thoughts that he failed to realize the Crusader had turned to him, his eyes full of suspicion and concern.

However, the duo didn’t get the chance to discuss this. Not when all the monsters opened fire at the Spartan with abject fury.