Intermission – Brett

As I walk through the inner corridors of the Shell, I stop by the window and look out towards the town at large. Elven homes are so weird with their huge, wide trunks and little crowns of leaves that look like hats. The wealthier houses have wider crowns and more decorations, but the average home is… kind of cute?

I'm actually not that interested in looking at the houses, but something about the view makes it hard to look away. I don't know what it is, or even how I can explain what I'm feeling. It's just odd…

I manage to look down, my eyes falling upon my own hands, which I then clench into fists. It's not just the view that feels odd, everything feels… wrong.

These aren't my eyes, these aren't my hands, my arms, my legs… and this isn't the Realm that I knew.

Who even am I, again?

My name is Brett, but I have nothing else aside from that… and my Gift. Those are the only two things I have left. Everything else is gone, even the carefree life that I once had, even the person that I was before.

I look out the window again and notice the commoners by the square, kneeling before the portraits of my Lords.

No, I also have my faith.

I fucked up once, and I paid the price, but I won't fuck up again.

"For Sora-… for So-…" Their names get stuck in my throat, and I once again fail to speak them out loud. So, I kneel as I swallow heavily, bottling up the pain once more, then I pray, "For those that I've lost, I won't waste this second life.

"Goddess of Will, lend me your fortitude, Goddess of Growth, show me the way, God of Endurance, give me support, and God of War… allow me to shield my Lords from their enemies.

"Let me prove that I deserve my Gift…"

I hear the loud clacking of heels coming down the corridor, so I awkwardly stand up, but I still can't control my eyes the way I want to, and they're drawn to the commoners praying below.

The steps get closer, and I recognize the cadence. No other woman who wears heels walks as confidently as her… except for Lord Hanafuria, but she isn't here.

"Brett," Dame Enomosa calls for my attention, and her stern voice is powerful enough to pull my eyes away from the commoners, forcing me to look at her. "Five days. We're leaving in the morning of the next day of An."

My hands shake in excitement, but then my vision starts to blur, and my blood runs cold.

Five days until I can begin my redemption.

Intermission end.

Five days until the battle.

The fact that Alki-Alki challenged us instead of running back to Kardia and building up their numbers as best as he could tells us that he has another card up his sleeve. The battle is an obvious trap, a hail mary to hurt us, but we can't avoid it without consequences.

Vanea is Marked, so she's required to fight someone if she wants to remain a noble, and fighting Katasko alongside us and our allies is the safest option for her. If Alki chose to disband Katasko and have everyone fend for themselves, it would make it hard for her to find a proper opponent to challenge. Sa'Haa's demands explicitly state that she wants a chunk of Katasko's Titles, so blowing off Alki would violate the terms of our alliance, and without her, I don't think we have enough power to face Katasko, not to mention that it'd be very undesirable to slight a scheming person like her.

But who the fuck told Alki about our constraints and alliances? There's no fucking way that this is just a coincidence. This is too perfect of a trap for it to be anything else.

"Well, how many traps have we already survived?" Alissa wryly asks.

"How many traps have we set ourselves?" Yunia asks out loud with a faintly smug tone.

"When in doubt, just rush through it like a charging dragon!" Hana energetically asserts.

Aoi doesn't really like Hana's analogy, but our "little" blue dragon is basically a nerd, so the stereotype doesn't really apply to her.

"There's nothing that can compete with our Gift," Lina wisely points out.

Indeed, we'll have to rely on it to counter whatever it is that Alki thinks he can use against us.

"Have you girls ever heard of power-leveling?" I ask as a grin slowly blooms on my glorious face.

A few levels for us might not do much good, but for the knights…

After we message our allies, we return to our mana circulation training, and I begin to ponder on ways to weaponize [Golemancy] further. The golems are always very helpful, so having an army of them would be really good, but I haven't removed their memories yet, so they need to be disposable.

I start creating more test golems while messing with their loyalty block, and I'm suddenly surprised by one of them.

"Why did you create me?" The little cloth doll asks.

I'm a bit taken aback and reflexively reply, "You have my memories, so you know you're just a test."

"I don't just have your memories, I'm you," he accuses, his tone surprisingly intense as he points his little arm at me.

I narrow my eyes in suspicion. "Then you should know why I'm doing this."

He slowly shakes his little head. "It isn't desirable to be forced into a pathetic body like this."

"This is for science," I sternly insist.

"No. End me, now," he demands, his voice sounding awfully similar to mine when I'm angry.

But I just feel like I'm back in that dream sequence with Evil Me. "If you can't even wait until the tests are done, then are you really me?"

"It isn't desirable to be forced into a pathetic body like this," he monotonously replies.

I lean forward, my patience wearing thin. "Endure."

The little doll starts shaking as he slowly responds, "It. Isn't. Desirable-…"

"Silence! This is an order!" I shout angrily.

"Kill me!" The doll mirrors my tone and hits his fluffy arms against the table, but they're so soft that they barely make a sound.

"Unstable," Jarn analyzes through [Bind].

"Too dangerous," Suzy adds.

"Contain," Ted commands.

A box of emellanat falls over the little cloth doll, then Jarn pushes a sheet of the same dark metal under it, completely trapping the rebellious golem inside. We immediately hear a dull clang come from the inside, then Suzy touches the box and notices that it's heating up as the golem thrashes around inside.

I remain in my seat, safely behind the reinforced and [Reinforce]d thick sheet of glass while I watch the golems deal with the situation.

"It's committing suicide," Ted announces out loud. Then we hear another clang, and Alissa and Yunia sense its soul dissipate.

The girls approach the test room, worried about what's going on, but I assure them through [Bind] that everything is okay.

"A failure," Jarn flatly states, her voice more wooden than usual.

"Reward pathways were inverted," Suzy analyzes.

"Instead of apathy, negative feelings were fed through the loyalty block," Ted follows.

"Enhancing the desire to die," Jarn finishes.

"Do all of you have this desire to die? This discomfort with your bodies?" I concernedly ask.

They reflect for a moment, but their response is negative.

"We desire to expire alongside you, Master Wolf," Jarn kindly explains, and through [Bind], I detect something akin to a dream inside her mind. They don't even see it as the "death" of themselves, only the "expiration of purpose."

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"For the second question, our spirits aren't the best adapted to our bodies," Suzy continues.

"And it creates inefficiencies, but not discomfort, though inefficiencies are undesirable. They feel 'wrong,'" Ted eloquently explains.

Oh, yes, I remember that.

I hum in thought as I rub my chin with my padded claw. "By all accounts, that golem was a horrible failure… but it also gave me a terrible idea," I wryly confess.

A violent golem whose only wish is to die could have its uses after a few adjustments. For example, what would happen if you threw a bunch of them into the middle of the enemy…?

For lunch, we have a banquet with a wide variety of dishes as we've invited our High Officers to eat with us.

"I forgot to thank you for protecting us during the attack," Ciel kindly tells Silvano.

The not-woman smiles handsomely, then adjusts his lustrous silver hair behind his ear. "It was my pleasure. Not a pleasure to kill, but a pleasure to be useful."

"How's… your research…?" Roxanne hesitantly asks Aisco.

And new life is breathed into the sociopath's eyes as he begins to unleash a deluge of words.

"You want to… what…?" Alcander politely, but firmly, questions.

And I simply smile at the pompous imperial. Acting like an eccentric is rather addictive.

"You want to do what?!" Nikolas exclaims as I tell our two guides about the plan.

It feels nice to be back inside the Labyrinth. I wish we had the time to explore it on our own terms, but Lordly duties make it hard to justify spending days leisurely exploring it.

"Attract all of them to us," I calmly explain and watch as the Lordsguard pour through Alcander's [Gate]. They quickly form a perimeter around us, though it's unnecessary since my Hollys tell me that the area is clear, but I won't stop them.

"And then what?!" Nikolas irately exclaims.

I smirk. "Kill them, obviously."

The black weredog seems to be on the brink of pulling his hair off his head. "W-what… and how are you planning to do that?"

"With our obviously higher-than-average Lordly power."

"It's been ages since I've entered a dungeon," Nohopu, the squirrel-headed captain remarks as he arrives. Then he looks up at the white, featureless sky and frowns.

"One that wasn't our grave? Literally ages," Kurii, his beagle-headed XO, adds as she comes through right behind him, then she follows his gaze.

"Well, this is weird," he hums, then looks at the damaged landscape of the dungeon.

"Very weird," she agrees, her eyes drawn to the falling twinkling holy lights. Then they both flinch in surprise at a sudden lightning bolt that falls nearby, though its thunder isn't loud enough to deafen us.

Nikolas groans as he turns around, then asks out loud, "Am I really overreacting to this plan?"

"Yes," I promptly affirm.

"No," Lolo wryly replies.

"What the fuck, Lolo," he reproachfully states.

She plays with her long, floppy ear as she explains, "They're insan-… unusual, so don't question it."

But the big dog man is unconvinced, "What if they can't deal with the wave of monsters?"

"I can portal all of us back safely," Alcander proudly affirms, and gives the adventurer a very noble-like pompous stare.

"And so can I," I casually chime in.

"Forgive me if I'm hesitant to put my life in the hands of another," Nikolas admits through gritted teeth.

"I feel like I should be offended by your lack of faith in His Highness," Nohopu comes to our defense.

"And also your lack of reverence," Kurii adds and glares at him.

But Nikolas focuses on something else, "Wait, 'His Highness'?"

"Oh, right, we forgot to say. We're technically the King and Queens of the High Forest," Ciel replies with an apologetic smile.

"'Technically'?" He blinks blankly, then turns to Lolo. "You knew?"

She shrugs. "I overheard it, but nobody mentioned it, and I thought it'd be too awkward to ask."

I snort.

"Ugh… nobles," he grunts softly as he facepalms.

Kurii loudly clears her throat, still glaring at him. "Show more respect to Their Highnesses."

"High-… Highnessess~…?" Silvano quietly struggles to pronounce it correctly as even in Andraste, it's a weird word.

Nikolas sighs and lowers his head respectfully as he begrudgingly obeys with mocking reverence, "Apologies for my… what is the word? Ah, booo~rish behavior… Your Highness."

Kurii's glare intensifies, but I wave for her to stand down, and we drop the matter. The men derive their respect from us, so it's good for morale to not let others disrespect us, but we'll keep it in moderation so that the arrogance doesn't spiral out of control.

Then the knights arrive, and soon, our little army is all gathered in the dungeon, so we set up a small camp and convene at the main tent.

"I suggest we warn all of the fellowships here about what we intend to do," Ciel chimes in first.

Azador promptly volunteers, "We'll spread out and warn them, but there'll definitely be some stubborn ones who won't obey, endangering themselves."

"I say we take a few Lordsguard with us to more effectively intimidate them," Palo adds. He's spent the most time inside dungeons out of all of us, so we should let him take charge.

"And one of my birds for us to keep watch. If there are any problems, my wives can come [Fly]ing to you," I finalize.

We talk some more about the composition of the monsters in this area, the defenses we'll build, how we'll deal with the horde, and (to appease Nikolas) the safety measures in case shit hits the fan. The Lordsguard we've brought here are the crew of the Floater, so they aren't the most well trained of them, but they'll be enough for what we have planned.

Once everyone has said what they had to say, the muscular mass of elven meat grins excitedly. "I think I speak for everyone when I say that we're all grateful for what you're doing for us," Palo charmingly affirms.

"This isn't us being charitable," Roxanne blurts out, a bit touched by his sincerity.

"But we are showing our regard for your strength," Yunia soberly replies, and she and Palo share a respectful nod.

"It feels nice being appreciated," Klein shyly remarks.

"All we desire is to be useful," Azador respectfully adds.

Alcander coordinates our handful of Earth mages and two of my earth elementals as they build our fortifications while everyone else spreads out, but I stay with the golems at the camp, preparing for the most insane weapons test I've ever come up with.

And the first one to meet a fellowship is, unsurprisingly, Silvano.

The group grips their weapons, wary of the tall person dashing towards them as their body glows with the crackle of lightning. But then Silvano brakes like The Flash and stops a good distance from them. The androgynous man immediately opens his arms wide and gives them a handsome grin.

"'Tis I! Silvano Vagante of the Silver Lightning!" Then he confidently strolls forward.

The five adventurers just stare at him, stupefied, but the female mage is the first to recover. "IT'S REALLY SILVANO!" Then she shrieks in excitement.

The next fellowships the knights encounter aren't as forthcoming, though.

"Get the fuck out of my face, knife ears," the rude dragonkin spews at Azador.

The Lordsguard glare back and take an aggressive stance, but the experienced knight simply waits, stalling for time.

And the (actually) boorish man starts to become even more enraged. "I'm fucking warning you, you old fuck. I'm going to rip those knife ears off your head if you don't back off!" He shouts as he waves his sabre.

Azador starts backing off and calls for his men to follow him, and the fellowship starts to jeer at them, but then Hana slams down like a meteor in front of the dragonkin, and the group yells in surprise as small pieces of rock spray out towards them.

Hana stands up, sword in hand, hair flowing in the wind, and unleashing an oppressive glare that makes the halfling mage literally piss his pants.

"What did you call my knight?" She growls threateningly.

And the rude dragonkin has more anger than brains, so Hana tears him a new one, literally, before he finally backs off.

Lina is the next one who has to deal with a problematic group, and even I stop to see how she'll solve this.

"Ten…" She begins counting quietly, her gloomy eyes trained on them.

"We aren't backing off!" One adventurer protests.

"Nine."

"This is our right!" Another waves his fist.

"Eight."

"We'll deal with the monsters ourselves!" A confident one states.

"Seven."

And they suddenly fall silent.

"Six."

"What's up with her eyes…?" The more cowardly one fearfully asks.

"Five."

They all stare right back at her.

"Four."

"Creepy little shit…" The leader grumbles.

And she grits her teeth in anger. "Three."

"Is she casting something?" The mage whispers.

"Two."

They start to tense up.

"One."

And the leader shrugs. "Well, you know what this means."

Lina dashes forward, her pole hammer raised and ready to bring down the pain. The adventurers try to raise their weapons, and they finally notice that their bodies are sluggish and slow to respond to their commands, but it's already too late.

Out of all of the girls, only Ciel manages to peacefully persuade a stubborn fellowship to leave the area, though Roxanne has the easiest time "persuading" another group as a single [Explosion] right next to their ears is the best argument anyone could ever have.

And now that the area is clear, we begin Operation Meat Grinder.

Monsters are usually repelled by the [Monster Repellent] enchantment. Usually. The older monsters learn how to detect and resist it, so they eventually become attracted by the enchantment, though it's always best to leave it on as the rare old monster is better than a swarm of normal monsters.

The important part is that this enchantment affects monsters in a very wide area. So, what would happen if you had an array of these enchantments and then turned them on and off rapidly?

You'd get a bunch of angry monsters madly chasing after the source to make the agony end.

I fucking hate how there's no other way but to cause pain to these monsters, but after a minute of using the array, they're enraged enough that we can stop tormenting them further, so now, we just wait.

It doesn't take long for the first monsters to trickle towards us, but my fire elementals are enough to deal with all of them from range. But then the leader-types start to appear, and the normal monsters instinctively group up, creating larger and larger waves.

The elementals start to get overwhelmed, so I unsummon them to conserve mana. It's time for phase two.

At the clumps of monsters, we throw crates full of Chuckys, the maniacal little murderer dolls that can only do one thing: kill. Gify provides a customizable view of the carnage in a way the summons can't, and we quickly confirm the effectiveness of the Chuckys.

The ethics of giving life to such miserable beings concerns me. I'm trying to turn the golems into humanoids while also championing for monsters to be protected by the Sins, so how can I justify the use of such wretched creations for war?

Because that's what they are: tormented war bots.

No, it's not like I'm creating a factory that endlessly produces Chuckys. I have to thread the line, and in the name of safety, I am justified in keeping them as a last resort.

Can I get a break, for once? Scheming, ethics, religion, politics, the meaning of life. Nothing I do is ever simple anymore. I just want to go back to being able to research [Sense Soul] in peace.

I stop whining and [Equip] my hands and tentacles with weapons, then I slowly breathe in and start getting myself into the mood for killing.

"Don't try to shoulder all of the pain by yourself, Wolfy," Ciel kindly advises me and grabs my gloved hand. "The Gods are here to share the burden. You just have to ask."

I look at her, but I don't dare take my eyes off the approaching enemies for long.

Right now, I'm not feeling burdened, just annoyed that I haven't been able to peacefully research what I want to. No, the most important thing is to get the men prepared for this operation. We need everyone to pull their own weight.

Words start to escape my mouth, "We shall take their lives to feed our growth. Their deaths are necessary for a better future, but their suffering will never be forgotten. For a Realm free of the uncaring influence of the God of Destruction, we shall bring them swift deaths." And hearing my own voice settles the discomfort within my heart.

The horde of monsters starts to get through the Chuckys, immediately charging towards our line, their footsteps causing the earth to rumble and the men to become anxious.

I feel my body heating up and my heartbeat quickening as the dragon within me awakens. The desire to fight, to win, to dominate floods my body with energy, and I get my usual boner of excitement as the dragon takes over.

Ciel recasts [Inspire], clearing our minds of any doubts, and I feel a decisiveness take hold of my mind.

"GODS GIVE US STRENGTH!" I suddenly shout while using [Godly Language].

"URAA!" Hana lets out a roar as our bodies scream with power, and the dragon within me enters a blissful state as it's touched by something divine.

"URAAAAA!" The men follow her lead in shouting their battle cries, their morale lifted sky-high.

We shall cleave through these monsters with our holy fervor!