Take Up the Cross – Chapter 36: Desecrated Chapel

“… What other rare truths have you sussed out?”

 

While the words convey surprise, the tone unsilenced by the blaring music and ravings that shake the shining Chapel also sounds impressed.

 

“fOoD!?”

 

The nearest ravings come from beneath the slug-like, grossly obese man’s puffed hat pulled low over its face. A huge, serrated kitchen knife lifts to stab downward.

Conspiratorial whispers lick at the mind of its target, with the knife boasting of how it will totally fillet the slender boy with only a single nick, before the wielder makes art from the raw meat produced that will never be consumed.

 

 

 

A flashing rainbow streaks, as the boy wielding it flies up into the air.

The transparent, shining shadow of a slug chef is fed its own face. Smeared into the altar it resides on, flashing darkness and lingering rainbow react, a lightning strike of energy coursing through it from the impact as it flails while shaking.

Crumbling remnants of the thing scream as they rejoin the parade of obscuring, revealing insanity all about.

 

 

 

“Aren’t you a little too predisposed to what you’ve chosen to… join with, if you’re this nimble only a moment after awakening?”

Sarcasm flecks the question, but the yellow-eyed questioner looks more concerned than condescending. Watching the boy flip until he lands easily on the shifting floor, his method of survival is her focus.

 

 

 

“Because it’s difficult to call you simply ‘lamb’ when you appear so falsely innocent, shall we use… [Black Lamb]?”

 

 

 

Turning to face her is an orange-skinned boy with slit, green eyes. Nubby horns poke over his glittering-rainbow, half-face mask, but it’s his dancing tails poking out the back end of leather pants and slightly pointed teeth revealed as he smiles at his “mentor” that truly convey his new, depraved nature.

 

“… EH!? The old lady didn’t hurry and run!? Shouldn’t you be hiding in your death bed, knowing that I’d be back to… play a prank on you?”

{You’re gonna get it now, lying spinster! Our pranks are pretty tasty~!}

 

Thoughts belonging to a horrible boy and manipulating impetuses of a capricious demon girl begin to mix, the two distinct entities joining hands so long as it suits them.

Malicious and mocking as he talks to his great enemy, the wavering, shadowy Chapel’s main path becomes the venue for his show. The creature which was once a boy has now become a hybrid tolerated by the darkness around him.

 

Getting up from her bench, the purple-vestmented woman’s arms rise reverently with hands clutched before her. Striding toward him slowly, the shining darkness all about her pales in comparison to the light-eating bone patterns embroidered upon her clothing.

Even if the woman appears human, her ability to stand within the uncertain horrors while unfazed proves her cataclysmic danger once and for all.

 

“Should I consider a joke about an imp wedding to have been prophetic malice, now…?”

 

 

 

Standing precociously, the boy named Adris leans over to stick his tongue out at her.

 

“The only thing ‘prophesied’ that’s about to come to pass is you meeting your God after I introduce your reverent face to the altar, you fake priestess!”

{God is dead~! Hurry up and join him~!}

Sashaying forward, the shining rainbow cross is twirled around as Adris plans a murder.

 

“To call my very nature fake, believed as such from the first moment our eyes met if I surmise correctly, would this arise from naturally recognizing yourself in others?

… Am I still so lacking in faith, after all this time?”

Though her tone is as mocking as his, this question carries a hint of self-deprecating dissatisfaction.

 

Before he has the chance to bury the knife deeper, he’s assaulted by recognition of the Chapel’s dangers when the cross’ flaring light dims.

 

 

 

Rainbow gives way to more living shadow, as the Chapel awash in eternal night is revealed to be a battleground.

 

Dozens… hundreds of black figures war with each other, the world, or themselves. Fighting on the floor, climbing walls like insects, flying while lashing about, or simply towering in the air so high they disappear into the uncertain heavens…

The only similarity between all present is the total lack of common sense. Stalking between the pews which hold statues locked in lifeless repose, the whole room teems with murderous, corruptive energy.

 

Contradictory and confusing, even the influence of Rantil coursing through him, which allows his eyes to see the aura/darkness in a way impossible before, merely grants recognition of danger when locked onto their natures.

 

 

 

The truly dangerous ones take notice of Adris, though, mostly sentient ones like the living cloak which rises from between pews to fly for him.

 

The torn, unworn manta-ray cloak rears up, the darkness inside becoming rows of vice-like teeth that glow red when poking out. Great fire arcs between them, before rays shoot for Adris. Impish eyes identify the blazes as ones that will never subside if he is struck, at least not until all present join him in a fiery fate.

 

Giving himself to a flamboyant spin that swiftly carries him sideways, all but one miss him, with the last striking a rainbow cross that angles ever so slightly.

 

The reflected ray shoots back at the cloak, catching it ablaze as if it is composed of bone-dry timbers. Screaming as it flaps about, the living torch bumps into other dark things, the fire spreading as it does so.

 

(… Friends of yours… these all are!?)

{“Friends” is kinda a stretch for some!?}

 

With his conscious mind awakening now, the Adris/Rantil hybrid’s actions come more under his control. The writhing darkness all around registers to his aura senses boosted by Rantil as the results of activated techniques, yet they resist that definition.

Behaving according to principles that he can only read and not explain, this Godless Chapel which is now spectrally ghost-like in existence has become a place where that which cannot, should not, or must not exist dares to revolt against such castaway fates.

 

 

 

Conspicuously absent from this battlefield are what he treasures the most.

 

 

 

“Where are my things, you old maid!?”

 

{… Do you really need anything more than meeee? Ehehe…}

(Shut up…!)

 

Prancing and leaping, and clobbering any darkness that wanders into his path with a rainbow doomsday weapon, he rushes back to vault over the altar.

Staring down the smiling deceiver standing before the organ that plays its own mad song while unattended, her youthful excitement accompanies a chuckling response.

 

“‘Things’ are they? How would they regard you, witnessing you acting… so natural, right now? Would they, like me, only appreciate you more? No… I doubt they could understand the appeal, yes?” Half-lidded eyes show how relaxed she is in his booming outrage, resulting in Adris only further losing focus.

 

 

 

“… HAAAAAH!? ‘Appeal’?”

{… HUH!? … You’re… getting into Rantil’s business…!? No love allowed…! But if…}

From the powerful senses available to him, Adris knows Cethran’s body better than ever. Her body shape under her clothes only the start, an imp seems capable of tasting flesh from a distance.

Something slips away, the desire to harm her morphing as he closes on the same flavor he remembers from indirectly tasting her love juices.

 

“Saying I have appeal, Cethran? My, my! Despite being this angry at the evil witch who led me astray, you’re saying you like how I look?”

Offering a twisted smile, he leans coyly forward as his twin tails swish in a sensual way.

 

“… You know, if you say I’m a handsome boy, maybe I can do something nice for you, instead? Play a little trick on you we might enjoy?”

 

(… No! Rantil! What are you doing!?)

{If she wants it so badly…♥}

 

A feeling of strangeness within his internal world has blossomed with the boy and the imp’s forms merging outside. Even if his conscious thoughts are clear on one end, id overwhelms ego on the other, leading to a great narcotic blur dictating how the whirlpool of his consciousness in the middle functions.

 

“If you were to lay yourself on that altar and pull those preciously loose vestments aside, I could let you play with again what you were so… impressed with last time?” Giggling as he closes, he puts one foot in front of the other as he sways.

“I’ll just rock inside you a bit~! No harm! Suck on your milk and make you feel wanted~! If you kiss me and moan just right, I can make sure you feel just as good as I will~?”

 

Absent any class or subtlety, Adris starts trying to goad the woman into submitting to him with raunchy words. With the woman’s eyes widening at the attempt, a brief hint of a deeper odor comes to his nose.

A realization of her suitability fires through his imp body, Adris’ orange-tinted dick hardening at the breedable nature of this hateful woman.

 

{Ehehe, she’s even at the perfect time~!}

(She’s what!? A woman as old as her? Is she… now?)

 

A depraved objective comes to the forefront.

 

“… I kind of want to see what you’d look like after I leave a bun cooking in your oven, old lady~!?” Licking his lips, this animalistic hunger leaves him hardly able to stop from racing forward to bend her over.

“Don’t think you have the right to say no, either~! You and I have a special thing, after all, right~!?”

 

(… This is not what I want, though! Stop it, Rantil!)

{Let’s punish her the way it really bothers her type~! Toting a big belly will wipe all the smug off her face~!}

 

The anger at Ave, Neesiette, Kol, and Still being missing, coupled with his hatred of Cethran’s scheme, easily perverts into a devilish revenge he’s being swayed towards. His intentions lacking any purpose larger than punishing Cethran, the imp’s instincts seek to satisfy them.

Joining with something deep inside of his subconscious mind, the idea of raping Cethran becomes impossible to not obsess over.

 

 

 

“… Hahahaha…”

 

Rather than being enraged or scared…

 

“… You know… if you truly desired it… with the thoughts of only a boy named Adris hungering for me, then I might consent to such a ‘request’?”

Revealing a toothy smile after her husky laugh, her handsome face does look somewhat willing. An older woman’s ripeness, with its unpretentious sexuality that ever does appeal to younger men, clings to her thick figure.

 

 

 

Adris catches in mid stride, jumping back.

 

 

 

“… Maybe even enjoy it?”

The modest admission unnerves him even more, her voice gaining a bit of the sultry taste she had when she’d molested him behind the pillar.

A hand brushes down to her thigh absentmindedly, focusing him on the memory of her warm insides.

 

“… Huh!?”

 

(I wouldn’t! … I swear!)

{Why does that sound like a lie!? Is Master a big gigolo!?}

 

“Is it so impossible to believe? After our mutual discussions on mystery, perhaps my unrevealed ‘truth’ is on your mind? For you to be so perverse in tastes, yet so innocent in willingness to pursue them, would you perhaps be longing for someone to nurture you?”

Gifting him a rapturous look, pure seduction carresses the backstepping youth who suddenly feels out of his element, even after joining with the hypersexual imp.

 

 

 

“Pursuing those long-avoided, novel pleasures that might satisfy and elevate you, as they also release the tension always brewing in your over-excited loins, pining for this perhaps you’ve… fallen for me?”

 

 

 

Though the words tempt his soul while hinting at affection…

 

The eyes she speaks them with are still cold and aloof, as she ever is in truth.

 

 

 

“CETHRAN! I FUCKING HATE YOUUUUU!”

{Girls like you are the worst! You make it hard for us to find easy marks!}

 

Charging the woman who dares look down on them, Adris and Rantil come to complete agreement about ending her. As he approaches the woman who opens her arms to accept him…

 

 

 

Chaotic shadows ascend the dais, taking advantage of the breaking deadlock to ambush them.

 

 

 

One in the shimmering shape of a little girl wearing pauper’s clothing and sporting pigtails shifts dementedly, traversing the floor without moving to stand before him. Her face hidden, she lifts a worn bear doll and tosses it into the air at him.

 

When it closes, the doll grows like a spreading cancer, a mass of teeth erupting from its body as it falls towards him.

A white eye in the middle, impossibly held between the razor teeth, flashes as it attempts to steal all happiness from him before ending his life as if it’s a mercy.

 

 

 

The rising stab of the cross pierces the eye, slamming through the thing’s mouth as Adris shoots up into it. Ripping out the back of the decaying, crumbling shadow, he reveals joyful fangs as he lifts his falling leg.

 

“STUUUUUUUUPID~!”

{STUUUUUUUUPID~!}

 

Slamming into the “girl’s” face, the demented ghost is splayed into the floor by his boot. Pulling off, Adris twirls like a dancer as the girl’s lifting, revealed maw for a face meets his shining cross.

Spitting out dark juices and broken teeth as it’s blasted away by a rainbow explosion, the rolling body violently returns to nothingness.

 

(NOBODY STOPS ME! GYAHAHA!)

{YOU AIN’T GETTING MY MAN! KYAHAHA!}

 

A demented agreement is reached as Adris’ psyche further deforms, with the grinning imp starting forward again. As time goes on, the distinctions between the two personalities begin to vanish.

 

Trying to take advantage of the multiple shadows attacking Cethran, a preternatural insight results in him instead jumping back in fright.

 

 

 

The two shadows that he now hopes will kill her are within reach of accomplishing this, yet her stance is open.

Opening her eyes at the last moment, red eyes uninterestedly take in her foes as her head tilts slightly.

 

 

 

A leg shoots up into the air straight from the floor, her fierce kick cracking through the face of the descending bird thing, which shreds with rainbow energy bursting through its crooked spine and splitting it in two.

Withdrawing the raised leg, she moves into a martial stance effortlessly. Bringing a left-handed hammer blow into the head of the steel-like dog creature she slides into the path of, she perfectly counters its rush.

The rainbow-charged, body-twisting impact sends what’s left of the monster spraying into the Chapel, with the screeching, distorting pieces crumbling to nothing.

 

 

 

Buffeted by the burst of air and sound of the hits, the two-strike combo ends in oblivion for her opponents before the fake priestess chillingly pulls back up into an open posture, wiping her hand on her vestments.

The strange martial art she demonstrated further cows the spectators.

Turning to face Adris with a condescending smirk while flashing her brown and gold eyes at him, the creatures milling and fighting below who refuse to acknowledge Cethran are now forgiven by the boy.

 

 

 

(Scary. There’s no chance.)

{Scary! I DON’T WANNA BE LOST!}

 

Even the part of Rantil that hasn’t fused with him is shaking, too. A priestess who doesn’t belong in this non-existent world, like Adris temporarily does, is more than capable of dominating it.

 

“… Have you changed your mind? Isn’t that disappointing…? How sad, to leave me wondering what the child of ‘two who dwell in vanity’ would look like, a question never to be answered?” Appearing genuinely depressed, Cethran adjusts her askew cap before moving to lean against the organ, its autonomous song growing ever more haunting and cruel.

His mind elevates while watching rainbow arcs continue to spark from her hand. The residual knowledge that Adris reads with his awakened eyes leaves him assured that her majesty is no less than the cross’.

 

 

 

“Yes, is it so surprising?”

Eyes which shift between colors stare him down, even as the smirk remains passably congenial.

“If you call it a ‘Drop of Creation’, a somewhat lacking name, then am I not forced to simply refer to it as ‘[Truth]’ (ABSOLUTENESS OF CONCEPT)?”

 

“Would you even recognize the truth!?” Whining and gnashing, the boy stomping on the dais has fake tears in his eyes, but real frustration in his voice. “If you know so much about all of this, then… why always fuck around with me!?”

 

“Is wisdom not something arrived at in time? My wisdom about your nature wasn’t something easily obtained either, you know? Assisting you in reaching it for yourself is quite a time-consuming venture; though, isn’t your time…?”

 

Starting forward after receiving no further aggression…

 

 

 

“Running out?”

 

 

 

Footsteps prompt the things still warring around them to flee at the change in status quo.

 

(This isn’t… going to work! Help me get away!)

{SEND ME AWAY! SEND ME AWAY! PLEEEEEEAAAAASE!}

 

The two minds once rapidly merging now diverge swiftly: Adris demands help, while Rantil begs to be freed. When they reach dissent, their shared, male imp body hops around stupidly without proper input.

 

“CETHRAN!”

 

Feeling all is lost, Adris blindly rushes her after forcing Rantil to submit, preferring to go out swinging.

 

 

 

“No, isn’t this missing the point?”

 

 

 

Adris fehl Dain, possessed by evil innocence, suddenly gasps for air.

 

 

 

A hand stronger than any he’s ever felt has him by the neck as he clutches at the arm holding him.

The woman named Cethran, if she should be called one, moved faster than even his Rantil-enhanced, aura-sensing eyes could follow.

 

The floor broke with her speed, as this all-powerful monstrosity of human-looking flesh landed in front of him, a reaper-like arm swinging to pluck him effortlessly.

 

 

 

“GYAAHK!”

Flailing meaninglessly as his eyes bulge slightly, the woman’s heartless gaze accompanies the fake smile she offers as she lifts him to her face. No muscles bulge in exertion from her actions, though his do trying to escape.

 

 

 

“HIK! D-DIEEEE! [BRAINFRY]!”

The shining rainbow tool he’s borne for days angles for her scarred face, all of the power of Xin committed to destroying his worst enemy.

 

 

 

A glorious burst of radiance consumes the dais.

 

 

 

Eyes inflame from the release, as his soul quivers at the splendor of the clash.

 

A bursting, prismatic female hand contends with the cross’ light-eating, rainbow-blazing head. Arcs of energy lash out from where the two titanic forces touch.

While his orange skin burns from the proximity, he struggles to push forward, feeling an existence within the cross aiding this drive.

 

 

 

“My, that is potent~.”

 

A factual revelation, terrible to hear, comes with a whimsical tone.

 

“But… do you really think a dispossessed tyrant like you has equal standing with the first-made of my God?”

 

 

 

The arrogant cross lashing out, ever confident and conquering, is gradually snuffed by a far greater, if more subdued, pride.

 

 

 

With the struggle ending in a room-filling burst of energies, smoke comes from the still-glowing cross that is forced to diminish.

The priestess’ now bare hand, her glove disintegrated, bears terribly burnt flesh and even a finger revealing bleached bone. Eyes that constantly fluctuate among a complete pallet of an artist’s insane colors wince at the sight of her mangled hand trembling and rolling about out of her control, before she stills it by gripping tightly.

 

“… Ouch? Pain and instability, after so long? My, isn’t this instructional? I suppose a creature such as I am is… still living, in the end?”

 

 

 

(FUCK! FUCK!)

{HIIIEEEEEEE!}

 

Pulling on her arm uselessly, Adris still refuses to relent. Brought nearer…

 

 

 

“Why are you so scared of me? Do you not recall that we are fellow seekers of truth?” A look of anguish comes to her at being “othered” by his reactions.

 

“Because you just quelled the mystical lord of another world!? Are you really this dense, Cethran!? This is why I hate you so much! Because you can ask stupid questions like that despite the answer being obvious!”

{OH!

MY!

GAWWWWD!

 

SHUT UP,

[MY IDIOTIC MASTER]!}

 

Because he is about to die, the boy decides to make sure she understands exactly why their relationship is so bad.

 

“… Hmm? Perhaps a valid point? My God believed in… ‘free range development’, so my independent perspective might make it difficult to understand a much simpler one?”

Smiling lightly, her useless explanation manages to insult him, too.

“… Or perhaps I’m teasing you, since you’re always such a good sport about it?”

 

 

 

“WHO EVEN ARE YOU, YOU MALEVOLENT WOMAN!?”

 

 

 

“You ask the kindest questions, even now!? ‘Who’ is the most attractive word anyone has ever spared for me, isn’t it!?”

Setting the terrified imp back down without releasing him…

“My, in favor to that, even should it prove troublesome later…” Tapping her chin with her burnt hand, the boy gapes while watching pieces of flesh appear from starlight to turn back time on the wounds.

 

 

 

“My God once gave me the somewhat lacking and ill-considered epithet ‘[Of Many Colors]’; yet, I was not given the knowledge to explain the importance of it, so perhaps that doesn’t answer your question?

If you ask for my personal opinion, though, I find your appellation much more romantic, for doesn’t being called a ‘Star of Ruin’ make it sound as if you may twinkle eternally, even should the world end by your efforts?”

“Just kill me now, if you’re going to sneer while delivering a shitty line like that to a man who’s already died once. I’ve got a date with a fat, dickless bastard in hell and I don’t want to be late.

Please understand, Cethran: it’s not me… it’s you.”

{SHUT UP SHUT UP SHUT UP! WE’RE GOING TO GET LOSTTTTTTT! KYAAAAAH!!}

 

 

 

With Adris totally giving up, the bratty imp desperately tries to wrench their body free in place of him.

 

“Why do you still insist that I intend to kill you? I merely wish for you to understand the truth, since you seem like you might have the chance of reaching what I have ever failed to?”

While affectionately rubbing his head, a more predatory gaze is offered when she tweaks a nubby horn.

“But to do that… don’t you need to be only a boy? While it might be amusing to watch you further degenerate into the imp you’re much alike to…?”

 

 

 

Rainbow energy surges from this hand, an eternal force coursing through into his chest, and expelling all of the dark thoughts and needs. He only becomes aware of how polluted he’s become when they rush out.

 

{MAAAAS-!}

 

A scream like Rantil’s vanishes into the pain, feelings of obsession and concern lost at the same time.

 

Deprived of Rantil…

 

 

 

“Tell me, won’t you…?”

 

 

 

… everything attacks the boy.

 

 

 

“… who is Adris fehl Dain?”

 

 

 

All of the dark things in the room, that once feared this evil force disguised as a woman, plunge into him in unison.

 

 

 

A shifting and distorting girl wearing sack-cloth puts her arm around his shoulder as the buzzing in his ears starts, whispering as she drips red onto his body, staining him forever with his crimes.

 

“dIdN’T wE aLrEaDy FiNd OuT, [     ]!? wHo/WhAt/WhErE/wHeN/AREEEE YOUUUUUU!?”

 

 

 

The stench of a dead creature is rank in [     ]’s depths.

 

With that stench assaulting him from the inside, the

 

T

H

I

N

G

S

 

from outside assault what isn’t inside.

 

Darkness cradles his body, inviting him to join and reject it. The room which was once spectrally glowing disappears, as a storm born of voices and shadows tears it to pieces before his eyes.

Both crowding orderly around him and spinning out of control, the boy at the center is ground down as the questions devour him.

 

Freed of the priestess’ grip, or perhaps gripping himself, or [     ]’s neck, or trying to die, [     ] kneels on the ground as he hangs from the wall.

 

The ravings are louder than anything [     ] has ever heard, though he’s heard many louder things.

 

And are they ravings, or his own muscles climbing up in his head, to duke it out inside of the empty space that constitutes the governance for what thought inviting darkness from beyond creation was a good idea?

 

(AHAHAHA, NOTHING WAS CERTAIN, I WAS RIGHT ABOUT THAAAAAAT!)

 

 

 

“… As I said, [     ], is it not wonderful? This presence of what you called for? This terrible sense of doubt?”

Only a shining pillar with a multitude of memories engraved on it; a headless, robed man offering a book promising an incalculable future; and a smiling, fake priestess, remain solid in this vortex of non-existence.

Cethran’s question licks his heart as it’s murdered in front of her.

 

“Can you finally see the answer to my question, [     ]? Perhaps the answer to yours?”

 

 

 

(NOT REALLY, YOU DUMB BITCH! BUT, “HOW TO TAKE MEDICINE”!? I KNOW THAT ONE! TAKE IT ALL AT ONCE, YUM, YUM! DON’T SIP IT!)

 

Instead of resisting, he lets the horrors of the night in all together, pondering every thought equally.

 

 

 

 

 

All of the questions, let in at the same time, shatter him instantly as the storm begins to emerge from him, rather than circle.

 

 

 

But a part that survives this change, “The Question”, is finally voiced.

 

“[     ], when you look at the walls that are melting…”

 

The priestess’ evil voice is full of love and hatred as it aims for the core of Truth, though what’s left of the boy doubts it is really the priestess speaking.

 

“… do you never wonder about what walls block out?”

 

 

 

He has wondered this before.

Even as the darkness is shouting and wrapping around him, he wonders at this magic place beyond the walls.

 

The cloister walls that always blocked out the torchlike sun also kept him from the true night. The walls he could never escape from, or he’d be beaten, hid the place beyond where there was a city waiting for him.

Even after escaping to the city, the walls of the city hid the rest of the world, confining him to the hell called Zon’Til (TORCH-FACING CITY). Upon realizing this, the ever-increasing, ever-enlarging walls drove him crazy each time he discovered them.

 

But, then the thought occurs to him.

 

 

 

(Aren’t the walls just hiding all of that? Isn’t it still always there? Does it ever really vanish, or is it just vanishing from sight when obscured? If I look at it that way, then obscured is the same as existing?

 

THE WALLS, WHICH WERE/ARE ALWAYS MELTING EASILY, VANISH WHEN THEY CHOOSE TO, SO ANYTHING THAT OBSTRUCTS: ISN’T IT THAT THING?)

 

When seen that way, the supplication becomes easy, filtered through the warping memories of dozens of aura rituals and aided by the ravings egging him on.

 

 

 

“Oh, Viscous Veil, thin veneer which separates real from unreal; oh, barrier between waking dream and unknown; oh, curtain drawn tight, protecting us from glancing upon all the horrors of Beyond.

Answer my question where others fail, and reveal the true nature of all!”

 

 

 

An older woman’s voice comes clearly to his ears now.

Full of emotion, it carries nostalgia mixed with disgust at what the dying boy is requesting.

 

“… Seeking quick answers for questions best resolved with wisdom hard won? Choosing that thing over me, do you find me lacking, as well…?”

 

When his chosen answerer becomes known, her despondent Question is shared in turn.

 

“As I once lamented: there are worse ways of arriving at the truth, or do you not recall?

… I hope your desires are fulfilled, if it’s fine to wish you well? Please don’t curse me if that thing that hates [truth] above all else renders me forced to intervene, okay?

Good luck, [true false god].”

 

 

 

“SHUT UP, YOU DECEIVER! LET’S GET AN EXPERT OPINION FROM THE INTERPRETER OF MYSTERIES, INSTEAD OF A MANIPULATING MONSTER LIKE YOU!”

 

His mind destroyed by the experiences, he allows the cross to drop. With the sanity of its tomb-robbing master lost, its spinning form plummets to the melting floor and plunges beneath it, as he knew it would.

The cross glows brightly when lodged within this space.

 

 

 

Always connected to it, this Veil is forced to caress a traveler from Beyond, too, whether it wants to or not.

 

 

---

 

Characters:

 

Glossary:

 

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