Chapter 244 - Scorching Embers II

It was evening by the time Claire made it back to Vel’khagan. Rather than heading straight for her final destination, she had sought Meltys for a spar and Arciel for a chat before departing. The dungeon was much closer to the city than it had been during their initial raid, but it still took Pollux’s warship a few hours to ferry the soldiers between the base and the city. Officially, he was continuing his assault, but the queen had long caught on. Perhaps that was why she had hired mercenaries from the south to begin with, for she had not the means to publicly condone him without causing an international dispute.

Despite her many detours, Claire was the first on the scene. The floating castle was still a distant speck on the horizon by the time she landed just outside the city and entered through its eastern gate. She was in her true form throughout the process. The guards had long committed her to memory, not as an individual, but rather one of the many beasts tamed by the mysterious Ms. Lia. She hated the label, especially the part that dictated her the cat’s property, but she had ultimately decided against correcting the misunderstanding. It was less of a hassle with things as they were; they never asked any questions or checked any of her belongings. It helped that some of the guards were afraid of getting too close, even though the only ones she had ever lashed out at were the chronic scale-touchers.

The qiligon flew another five-odd kilometers within the city limits before transforming in midair, donning her usual attire, and landing not too far from the city’s core. The building was on fourth street, and the only description she received was that it was impossible to miss.

“Some details would have been nice.” She muttered under her breath as she walked down the road. There were certainly a number of standouts, but none grabbed her as being any more eccentric or ridiculous than the others. “They all look equally ridiculous.”

“Really? ‘Cause I’m pretty sure it’s gotta be one of those two,” said Sylvia.

She pointed a paw at each of the buildings in question. One was made of tin and bore the shape of a large pig built atop a dozen meters of scaffolding. Its entrance doubled as the swine’s nose, and was accessible only by way of a tall ladder. Its rival, sitting just across the street, was a gingerbread path decorated on both sides with a garden of sweets. At its far end, nestled into the very back of the property, was a massive, ceramic cake. The snow sat perfectly on top of it, fitting into pre-carved notches to form a thick layer of frosting.

“Maybe,” said Claire, “but the two at the end of the road seem more appropriate.” She gestured with her tail, first towards a dreary mausoleum with skeletons adorning its exterior, and then at a glass building with all its interiors obscured by thick black drapes.

“Huh!? I mean, I guess the one with curtains is kinda suspicious, but isn’t the other one supposed to be one of Xekkur’s temples?”

Claire shrugged. “It’s the only other place that stands out. And a temple is the perfect place for a con artist to hide.”

“I dunno, that seems kinda risky.”

“It is.”

Those that abused the authority of the gods were sure to be smited for their misdeeds, but that was assuming they were caught by the deities in question. The pantheon’s members, be they supreme beings or celestials, were well known for carefully monitoring only those they marked as persons of interest. They were too busy to concern themselves with every last mortal, for it was through the continuous use of their powers that the world was maintained.

Or at least that was the tale as told by the scriptures. Having met several gods herself, Claire was less than convinced that they were as busy as they made themselves seem. Flux had watched over large swaths of her journey, and Alfred’s eyes were equally difficult to escape. He had, on a whole seven occasions, pulled her into world chat just to complain about the nonexistence of her nightlife. She was keeping a careful count over the running total; it would be the same as the number of times she stabbed him.

“Didn’t the papers have an address on them or something? What’d they say?” asked the hat.

“Just that I’d recognize it immediately.” That, of course, was a lie. She simply hadn’t been bothered to check the exact number, with the description being what it was.

“Hmmm…” Sylvia pressed a paw to her chin. “Oh, I know! You already memorized their faces and names and stuff, right?”

Claire nodded.

“Then we can just snoop around and check out each building and see if you recognize anyone.” The fuzzy passenger leapt off her mount’s head and tip-toed through the air. “We can probably just use a bubble or something to stop ourselves from getting caught.”

The longmoose paused for a moment before nodding and giving her companion a squeeze. “Okay.”

When they reached the closest building, the one shaped like a hog, Claire floated up to one of the many apertures lining its porky metal flank and cast her eyes inside. She slowly looked around it, staring carefully at each face she spotted. Of course, she wasn’t looking for a perfect match. The illustrations had been fairly liberal, to say the least, and they were heavily supplemented with descriptors in text.

Her primary protection target was a giant dog-woman, not a huskar like Natalya’s godmother, but a full-blown bipedal canine that stood at over three meters tall. Her husband and children, the other beneficiaries, were of the same race, but she saw no such people present within the diner, whose staff was made up almost entirely of pigs with chef hats. They were not monsters, but rather the domestic variety typically raised for livestock. The porkers were waddling around the restaurant, pushing trays to the tables with their noses and setting them with the tong-like grasping tools they held in their mouths.

“That’s just messed up,” said Sylvia.

“It looks sanitary enough. I doubt they have any mice this far off the ground,” said Claire.

“No, not that, dummy! Look at the menu!”

Claire briefly glanced at the text scrawled all over the floor. “What about it?”

“It’s pork! The only thing they’re serving is pork!”

“I don’t see the problem.” The lyrkress lightly clamped a hand over the canine’s jaws, holding them just loosely enough that she didn’t really impede the other halfbreed’s speech. “Now stop screaming. Everyone’s looking.”

“Mmmphhhh… How do you not get how messed up it is!?”

“It’s not big enough a deal to kick up a fuss. It’s probably just their culture.”

“I really don’t think eating your own kind is supposed to… wait a second! I almost forgot you were part lamia! You’re just as messed up!”

“You’re just narrow minded.”

She pinched the fox’s cheeks as she hovered across the street, slowly dropping to ground level as she approached the confectionery shop. Unlike the other store, where business was booming, the dessert-shaped enterprise had not a single customer hovering around outside. Peeking through the curtains told a similar story. There seemed to be someone in the kitchen, from what Claire could tell from all the humming and clattering, but the cupcake-like chairs were stacked atop the scone-shaped tables, and the front door was locked. There weren’t any signs explaining why, but it was clearly closed for business.

“I’m pretty sure it isn’t this one,” said Sylvia.

The lyrkress nodded and started down the street. “It’d be hard for anyone to take business talks seriously at a store that looks this stupid.”

“Uhmmmm, that’s not really what I meant, but I guess we can think about it that way too,” said the fox.

Claire cocked her head.

“Well, I mean like… selling sweets doesn’t really make a lot of money, right? ‘Cause you’re just selling stuff to kids? So I’m pretty sure whoever’s running the shop has gotta be like reeeeaaaally nice ‘cause they could probably do anything else even though they’re just running themselves into the ground.”

A degree was added to the tilt of the scalewarden’s skull. “What are you talking about? Children rarely come to places like this.”

“H-huh?”

“It’d be safer to send their servants to fetch expensive goods like cakes.”

“E-expensive!? But the girls that sold sweets in Al’s books were all super poor and stuff, and they always had to whore themselves out to make ends meet. It was really sad ‘cause they just wanted everyone to be happy, but then they always got mindbroken.”

“Don’t confuse fantasy with reality.” The vixen’s forehead was greeted with a flick. “Especially not if the fantasies are born of Alfred’s mind.”

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“Mmmnnnn… I dunno. Al’s whole schtick is that he makes fantasies real. I’m pretty sure us foxes only exist because he thought us up, so I’m like, pretty much a mix between fantasy and reality in the first place.”

“Not really. You exist.”

“I know I do, but it’s really not that simple,” said the fox.

“Try telling me that again when you aren’t that simple.”

“Hey! That’s super mean! I’m not simple!”

Claire buried her face into the fox’s head with a smile, but otherwise remained silent, even after a brief delay.

“Uhmmm… Claire?” Sylvia looked up, confused, only to receive a gentle headpat. “Oh, what the heck!” The angry fox puffed out her cheeks, but leaned into the accompanying chin scratch. “I hate you,” she huffed. “You’re such a meanie.”

“I know. Now shush.”

They were coming up on the curtained building, the entirety of which was perfectly covered with several layers of deep black cloth. There wasn’t a single hole in the defenses; she couldn’t find any angles to peek inside, no matter how many times she circled around the perimeter.

“Suspicious,” said Claire.

“Mhm. Totally,” agreed her pet. “They’re like, basically screaming that they’re doing something shady.” She moved her paws towards her eyes and formed knots, but Claire stopped her with a pinch of the nose. “No seeing through everything. It’s more fun if we do it the normal way.”

“Mmmnnn… okay.” Sylvia squeezed her way out of the embrace and climbed up onto her mount’s head. “Wait, where’s the door anyway?”

“Over there.” The horse pointed at the large hole situated just behind the building. It had an entrance sign hanging just outside, as well as a mailbox overflowing with letters aplenty.

“Wait a second… why’s the front door in the backyard?”

“I don’t know,” said Claire, with a shrug, “but I don’t think it’s what we’re looking for anymore.”

“Wait, really?” asked Sylvia, with a trio of blinks. “Don’t you think it’s like, super duper suspicious with all the curtains and stuff?”

“I do, but anyone visiting a place like this is sure to keep their guard up. I didn’t think about it earlier, but our instructions hardly make any sense. No successful con artist would be doing business anywhere conspicuous.”

“Mnnn, I guess you’re right. It’s a lot easier to get tricked when you aren’t expecting someone to try and trick you.”

“Exactly,” said the lyrkress.

“Wait, if you’re so convinced that this isn’t the place, then how come we’re still going inside?” The fox asked the question as her mount slowly floated down the pit. At a glance, it didn’t look all that deep, but it went a solid thirty meters into the sandy dirt before finally bending its way towards the building.

“So we can find out what it’s for.”

The underground area’s construction was just as curious. The whole tunnel was filled with curtains, and it got a little darker for each woolen wall she passed.

“Wait, why the heck do they have all these curtains underground?” said Sylvia, as she fiddled with a piece of cloth. It was soft and fluffy enough for the girl to mistake it as her own tail. “And how the heck are they so clean? There’s literally dirt everywhere.”

“I doubt they’re made of anything ordinary.”

At the end of the cloth-gated path was a long, thin ladder leading up into the building’s interior. Its rungs were slippery and worn down, and it appeared rather unsteady to begin with. They were buried not in solid ground, but wet compacted sand, the stability of which would immediately be called into question as soon as one considered the possible range of a guest’s weight.

Claire extended a hand towards the hatch at the top of the climb, but it opened before she could touch the handle. Her ears were filled with the hissing of air, while her eyes locked onto a strange-looking elf in a dark brown habit. The first thing she noticed, aside from his tiny, knife-shaped ears, was the book in his hand. It was styled like a scripture, carefully bound with pages of yellowed parchment.

“Welcome lost lamb,” he said, “to the godless church.”

For a moment, the lyrkress was frozen, her eyes locked to the priest’s fake beard and artificial bald spot. She regained her function when he extended a hand and offered to help her up the ladder, only to shirk away. The elf’s arm was still in the doorway, but she slammed the hatch shut and made for the way she came.

“Huh? We’re leaving already?” asked Sylvia, as she stared at the ownerless arm. “Weren’t we going to check it out?”

“We did,” said Claire. “And we found an elven anti-church.”

“Yeah, I know, but we didn’t even look inside!”

“You can if you want. But I’m not going to listen to another one of their rants.”

It wasn’t necessarily the contents of their sermons that annoyed her, but rather the preaching itself. She had just woken up a few hours ago, and she wasn’t exactly keen on being put right back to sleep—the knife ears’ lectures were even more boring than Allegra’s.

“Awww… I’m kinda curious but I really don’t wanna go alone.”

“You can drag the cat over later. We’ll be in the area for a while.”

“Oh! That’s a great idea! Maybe we can have Ciel tag along while we’re at it, since she’s been all busy and stressed and stuff lately.”

“Yeah. You should.” Claire fought back a mischievous grin as she imagined the moon-worshipper arguing with an angry elf. “It’d be a good way to get her mind off of everything.”

She floated her way back out of the hole and looked towards their final destination. The temple was not quite as fancy as the one located on Godsent Cliff, being a tiny branch meant for those too busy to walk to the opposite side of town, but it was unmistakably one of Xekkur’s; it was only the god of death and ascension that blended so many skeletons and skulls into his motif. The building itself was made of a dim grey stone, the very same kind so often used to mark the tombs of the dead. The evergreens residing on the temple’s grounds were bare, and so too were any branches that poked into the deity’s domain.

Around the roots rested the bodies of his followers, dried out bare bones granted peace beyond their mortal coils. It was a practice that some found questionable, and perhaps even disturbing, but it was Xekkur’s will for the dead to nourish the living. In that way, he was akin to Kael’ahruus, though the precise details of their principles differed greatly in nuance. For the lion-faced god, death was a result. It was the thrill of the hunt that mattered, and the consequences thereof were irrelevant. But for the lord of corpses, it was exactly the opposite. There was no meaning in the slaughter itself, but through death, an entity could nourish another in both body and spirit. And it was neither the killing nor its process that was relevant, only the final result.

Because their concepts were so closely adjacent, the pair was often worshipped together, viewed by the general public as close friends or rivals. But to those that studied theology with more earnesty, their relationship was seen as that of silent acceptance. Each would allow the other to step on his toes so long as it was not done intentionally or with malicious intent.

Whatever the case, Claire cared little. She wandered onto the temple grounds and bore with the pain that came with her flaring divinity.

“I don’t see any dogs,” she said, as she scanned the building. The first floor was open enough that everything could be seen. There was only a single room, used as the main hall, as well as a staircase leading down beneath the soil.

“Maybe they’re further in?” suggested Sylvia.

“Maybe.”

She stretched her ears, but caught nothing in particular. The only heartbeat she heard belonged to the receptionist dozing off at the desk. In any other temple, such a lack of staff would likely have been considered absurd, or perhaps even taken for the deity’s downfall, but the death god’s was known for its eccentric priests and priestesses, the lot of which would often head out to murder the local monsters. It didn’t help that many were retired veterans of war or adventure. The zealous fighters ate all their kills without failure and often shared it with the locals in need as well. Their penchant for indiscriminate death, however, meant that the meat was not always delicious. It was from this that their label was derived; to call a dish Xekkurian was to say that it had an equal chance of being hellish and heavenly, the truth of which could only be determined through tasting.

Claire spent a few minutes wandering around the empty underground space before making her way to the atrium and sitting in front of the altar. She wasn’t quite done with Griselda’s divine quest just yet, but saw no harm in picking up another.

“O Xekkur, great god of mysterious stir fries and wanton destruction. I thank you greatly for all the nourishment I have derived from slaughter, and greedy as it may be, beseech from you a task you would deem worthy of your blessing.”

She waited for about a minute before standing up and spinning around. It seemed that the god was unwilling to respond, but that came as no surprise. The two other temples she had visited over the past few months, belonging to the goddess of spring rains, and the goddess of barren forests respectively, had both also ignored her.

Upon leaving the room, however, she found a new message echoing through her mind.

Log Entry 37162

You have received a divine revelation.

It would be more accurate to describe wanton destruction, as well as destruction as a whole, to be more of a concept you would find within Builledracht’s domain.

That said, I do have to give credit where it’s due. I have just reviewed all the deaths that you have incited, and I must say that I am rather impressed by not only your propensity to kill, but also your ability to reflect upon your mistakes and further nourish yourself with the deaths that you have wrought. However, I have found that your reflection is shallow and lackluster, and I am not yet willing to provide you with a blessing.

I find that assigning a quest for such a task is rather meaningless, and will personally judge when you have satisfied my requirements, at which time I will reward you with a blessing. I will inspect you periodically, but you may visit any of my temples at any given point in time for an immediate review.

The conditions were extremely vague, and she failed to see the shortcoming he described, but she walked away with her feelings on the more positive side of neutral. It was effectively a promise, so long as she refrained from getting on his bad side. All she would really have to do, she figured, was fight more foes like Meltys, who were capable of pushing her to the brink and beyond.

“Hey, uhm, Claire? Sorry to ruin your good mood…” said Sylvia, as they exited the temple. “But I don’t think we found the people we’re supposed to be looking for.”

“I know,” she said. “We’ll just have to wait for everyone else.”

“That sounds kinda boring… Can’t we like, try staking out or something to see if we can find them?”

“I doubt it. If we didn’t find them after all our investigating, I doubt we’ll randomly fi—”

She froze before she could finish the sentence and turned towards the man that had just turned onto the street.

“Sometimes, I wonder which of us is the idiot.”

“Huh!? What’s that supposed to mean!?

“Nothing.”

Her eyes remained fixed on a dog, a middle-aged, bipedal dog that stood at roughly twice the height of a man, dressed from head to toe in a patissier’s gown.