Simple commands.

The High Priest gave me orders until morning when he was satisfied that he knew the extent of what I could be compelled to do. All they could make me do was simple commands.

Go there. Carry this. Watch that. Bring me something. Fight that monster. Simple things like that. I had figured out that I had leeway in the orders that I was given. I also found out that anything that would endanger Tres or give them grounds to assume I was protecting Tres wouldn’t trigger the compulsion. If the compulsion was triggered and I could reason how it could endanger Tres or my secret, the urge would vanish. I’d tried to reason that helping them would eventually hurt my God, but that hadn’t worked, so there was a limit to how much I could fight back.

I wasn’t sure if Rishard had figured out what sort of leeway I had, but he had worked out that he couldn’t demand information from me.

“Can I play with him?’ Lyssa pulled out one of her knives.

“One last thing I want to check.” Rishard nodded at the prisoners. “Kill them.”

“WHAT! NO!” Lyssa stomped over to the High Priest and poked a knife in his face. “I’ve been wanting to cut on them all night and you’re going to let HIM have all the fun???”

I hadn’t felt an urge to harm anyone, but I tried to look like my inaction was because I was deciding whose orders to follow. My mind was racing with possibilities of how I was going to be able to comply. I was also curious if killing someone, earning a PK mark on my mantle, and breaking the seal hiding who I was would also break my compulsion to obey. While it was tempting to test, I like the idea of being dragged around by the murderous Nephilim a lot more than I like the prospect of being carted off to Kire so the God could see if they could take me apart.

“Who..?” I looked between them and sat down.

“You broke him!” Lyssa turned to me.and began pointing her knife between the two of us. “He can catch them, but I get to do the killing.”

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I could feel something inside me stirring and knew that if she ordered me to bring someone to her, I would have to.

“You can’t kill everything you want or you’ll earn the ire of the other Gods.” Rishard motioned at me. “He needs to be Tier Five and this is the easiest way to get there.”

“Fine!” Lyssa put away her knife somewhere in the loose tan covering that she was wrapped in. The ivory woman glared at me before she walked away.

“Now…” Rishard turned to me. “Kill them and let’s get out of here.”

I touched my CB as I got up and took out my sword. I knew that if I didn’t do it, then he would let Lyssa have them. I walked up to Nyssa. They were all gagged, which was going to make this a little easier.

Her brown eyes were pleading with me to not comply and as much as I wanted to comfort her, this was all I could do.

“HEY!” Sipher started running over to us.

I stabbed her before he could tell me not to. I knew what his plans for the golden woman were and I wasn’t going to let him have her.

I watched her eyes dim as I plunged my sword into her heart. I didn’t flash.

“WHAT ARE YOU DOING!” Sipher tried to grab my arm.

Before I could be told to stop, I stabbed Haley, then Garlin. Each time through their heart and out the back. Each time they fell over and none of the times did my experience budge.

“STOP!”

My sword was through Tyver Sands, the bandit’s mage, when Rishard gave the order. Sipher pulled me away from the carnage.

“It’s like he’s killing a Mundane!” Lyssa knelt over Nyssa, then looked at Rishard. “Do you have any idea how much experience you just wasted!?!”

“You can have the last two.” Rishard motioned to the rest of them. “Pack it up. We’re leaving.”

If Sipher hadn’t been holding me, I would have tried to kill the other two before Lyssa, but he had a grip on my arm that he wasn’t releasing.

Lyssa took her dagger back from Kise and stabbed Lace and Tera in the throat. Their blue and gold blood mixed on her blade to make a weird brown color. I looked down at my blade and saw gold, green, and red splotches. I wiped off the blade on my sleeve, then put it into my CB.

Rishard was already at the gate and was walking into the bunker. Sipher guided me away from the bodies. I looked back at them one last time. This had been a heavy price to pay for immortality.