Very long chapter for y'all today!

Chapter 22: Infiltration

-----------------------------------------------

“The hope of humanity is baseless, false and incorrect. The idea that our population will prosper, that humanity will see breakthroughs and will forever develop is the dumbest thing I’ve ever heard. The concept that the economy will have infinite growth and will never stop growing is naïve optimism. Because if you optimists are so sure of yourselves to say such a bold thing, then allow me to make one of my one; How do you reckon that the economy will grow infinitely in a finite world, a world with finite resources that will eventually run out, explain that?”

 

 

Scholar Zeldoris, The Economist

Year 645

//

--POV: Crower—

--Place: St’ Louis Church / Time:08:00—

*DING* *DING* *DING*

The bells of the church announce that it is currently 8 o’clock, and I’m currently still slacking.

*YAWN*

“Knock it off, will you?” Sophia clicks her tongue in irritation, she seems to have not slept well.

If you’re wondering who Sophia is, she is a fellow paladin in the faith, and together we were supposed to patrol Jackingham Street today….

supposed to.

“Do you have any idea how late we are?” From the 8^th bell from the church, I’d say pretty late. If you are wondering what held us up, then don’t be mistaken, it wasn’t a noble cause and we weren’t saving anyone in distress….the simple reason is….

I overslept.

But that’s ok, because I normally oversleep anyway, and Sophia (my patrol partner) normally scolds me for it, I can happily say this is a very uneventful morning.

“We won’t be able to move together, and we have to split up to cover ground quickly, don’t forget the priest wants us at 10, okay?” Bla bla bla, whatever you want Sophia. She walks in one direction, and I go in the other.

The same shops, the same street, the same people….?

A 100 metres away from where I split up with Sophia, I find a boy, a little boy no older than 8 making his way into a dark alley while leaning on the wall for support….why?

Because he is bleeding.

Fuck! I just had to come across this kid as I walk through the street, well, let’s interact with him, shall we?

Going into the dark alley the boy has just entered, I find him 20 feet away, sitting with his back leaning on the wall, blood all around him, holy fuck how much is he bleeding.

“W…who..are…yo..u” A hoarse voice, that probably hasn’t drunken or eaten anything for a while, wearing clothes that look worse than those for slaves, and to top of, it’s also covered in blood…..

It’s too pitiful of a sight, even for me.

“Don’t worry, My name is Crower and I work as a paladin for the church, do you know the church?” after getting a slow and restrained nod, the boy leans his head on the wall, and continues to stare at me.

He knows the church, so he shouldn’t be that wary, plus, the armour and clothes kinda gave away where I work.

Approaching him, I hold up my hand asking him if he could stand up.

He lifts his right hand and slowly grabs mine.

*BLURR*

My vision distorts slightly, and right after it stops, I focus my eyes only to find me holding the hand of a 20-year-old man with black hair and blue eyes…wearing butler clothes?

“You’re my hero” The man smiles innocently.

An illusion?!

“F..fuc-” The man grabs my head with his left hand and then he gr-

 

----DEAD----

 

--POV: Laurence—

--Place: Jackingham Street (Back alley)/ Time:09:31—

That went smoother than I thought, I thought I was going to have to try again, but no matter, what’s done is done.

Wearing armour and clothes of the impersonation? Check.

Mastered illusion magic which no one will be able to see through? Check.

Having no clue on the person I am impersonating other than their name? Check.

That’s three checks, I am definitely ready to infiltrate the holy land.

I make my way back out of of the back alley and into Jackingham Street, before making making my way in the direction of the closest church to the university, St’ Loius’ church.

“Hey wait, Crower!” Fuck, I already ran into someone who knows Crower and I didn’t even enter the church yet.

“Yea?” Calm tone, smooth movements, gotta put up a relaxed front for this girl on front of me wearing armour that is too big for her.

“You finished before me? That’s a first, well, it makes sense that you’d do a half-assed job” She just said something insulting to my face, but I don’t react, wanting to see how she’ll respond.

Plus, I’m not offended either.

“Aren’t going to complain and make excuses, are we?” The girl raises an eyebrow at my probably suspicious behaviour. It seems Crower was a chatterbox, let’s go with that.

“You keep nagging all the time, you expect me to have the energy to respond to all that blabbing” Even my voice has illusion magic (I’m truly the greatest), anyway I really hope this works out, because I’m in public with her after all, can’t just deal with her.

“Well, maybe if you didn’t give me any reason to nag, I won’t nag!” Ok, that’s a pretty good retort...how am I going to respond to that, how would Crower respond to that?

We start bickering as we make our way to the church.

“Well, maybe you should just stop caring, wouldn’t want you dying early due to a stressed heart, now would we?” That may have been a bit over the top, I admit.

“I-idiot, I can’t just stop c-caring!” Umm…she has a red face, stuttering….she is fidgeting….and turning her gaze away…..

It seems Crower really was the naughty boy, to invoke such a reaction from her, without even trying, good on you Crower.

We pass the gates of the church and make our way through it.

“Ahh…Crower and Sophia, you have arrived….” The head priest of this church mutters, he seems shocked…was Crower that lazy?

Looking at the prayer room of the church, it is a dimly lit room with the only light being the sunlight which penetrates the coloured gas windows, currently empty with no one but me, Sophia and the head priest (I still don’t know his name).

There is a podium on front of many chairs, and behind this podium is an old looking statue carved out of what seems like old greyish stone.

Just as I was observing it, I looked into it’s eyes and I realized something.

I can’t be sneaky anymore.

--POV: Stella—

--Place: St’ Louis Church (Underground floor) / Time:10:34—

*CLACK*

The chains on my body make a metallic sound as I move my body from the uncomfortable position I am sleeping, well…

It’s pretty difficult to sleep on cold hard floor comfortably, if I have to be honest here. Given how much control and money the church has here, I expected an old bed at least.

The only thing in this cell is me, cuffed to mana-removing chains which are connected to the wall, I can move at least 10 feet away from the wall before the chains stop me. A bowl with dirty water in it, and a window that has bars, bars that are enhanced with holy magic.

These bars are made from something I’ve never seen before, but what I do know is that if I touch it I’m going to feel a lot of pain, this is from first-hand experience.

It seems this cell is made specifically for demons. To keep demons inside, locked and chained. But I’m not any old demon, I’m a succubus.

While I may be a high-ranked demon and command a reasonable mana pool, and have strength the humans would consider supernatural, but this holy magic that the church uses is something else entirely.

It’s as if this magic exists solely to destroy demons, from my continent, this holy magic thing is not known, and the demons have prevailed. But after being exiled for a crime (that I don’t want to speak of) I ended up getting taken by the current to this continent, a continent where humans completely dominate, I have yet to see a single demon here.

Here is how I got in this cell, to enhance my abilities greatly I need to copulate, whether that being with humans or demons, so I decided to apply to work at a brothel, and I got accepted (my beauty was up to human standards), and so I was slowly gaining strength while getting paid for it by the brothel.

It was truly a good deal, but that’s when I made a mistake. I got careless, and apparently one of the clients happened to work at the church (what was he doing in a brothel?), he found out about my identity and then used that same fucking magic and I passed out.

And here I am.

It seems I’m no longer near the red-light district of this capital, but I don’t know exactly where.

*BOOM*

I hear some sounds above me….what are they doing?

“haaah….”  I sigh as I cuddle up, trying to preserve my strength and body heat, ignoring whatever those noisy bastards are doing.

Looking at the statue, that is on the other side of the weird bars, I wonder what it is, is it a deity of the humans? Is it the church’s god?

It is in the shape of a young man holding a lightning bolt in his hands, with the upper half of his body naked, and the only thing covering his junk being something similar to a towel, I can’t help but feel the faith of humans are pretty stupid.

However, what currently occupies my attention is the silence….did they finish what they were doing?

*BAM*

The door suddenly opens and a man wearing armour of the church (they are called paladins apparently) enters in here like he owns the place, and then proceeds to scan the room.

His eyes don’t stop scanning even when they pass over me, did he take me for air?

“Hmmmm…another one?” His eyes stop on the statue, and he looks it in the eyes as his right hand scratches his chin.

*CLAP* *CLAP*

The man abruptly claps with both hands as he says “Wakey, wakey!”

What the fuck?

Did this religious zealot go insane? I’m pretty sure it’s frowned upon to treat the deity like that.

The only response he gets is silence.

“Cough-” Is he trying to break the awkwardness? “I said wake the fuck up” He glares at the statue, he is really pissed.

“Ahem” He then clears his throat “Maybe I should just destroy the statue” He talks to himself as he shrugs innocently, clearly implying that he thinks this situation is out of his hands….but just then….

A deep voice sounds throughout the whole room.

“What do you want, human?”

The statue’s eyes, which were previously looking upward, turn towards the man, glowing bright yellow.

“Pretty ironic for a human to call someone else human” The man sighs….what the hell is this guy saying…isn’t this the deity? He is truly insane.

“What are you talking about, foolish one”

“You don’t know? I thought the pope was supposed to know everything?” The man raises an eyebrow, acting confused.

“Seize your stupidity at once”

An overwhelming pressure takes the room, one that’d make me fall to the floor in fear, if I wasn’t already on the floor.

A pressure that the man shrugs like it’s nothing.

“Don’t be so cold to me, Mr. Pope” Does this guy have a death wish? He is going to piss off the deity way too much.

“If you grovel and beg for mercy, I may forgive you” The deity speaks, as if proud of it’s own generosity.

The man’s joking tone stops and his face expresses a deep frown “You don’t understand how this works, pope.”

He suddenly vanishes before reappearing right next to the statue, looking directly upwards to it, before he continues to the speak.

“This isn’t your playground, old geezer.” He points an index finger to the ground as he speaks. “This is my hell, you shmuck”

His right arm then blurs, and next thing I know, the statue is in pieces on the floor.

The pieces of stone that were flown everywhere disintegrate into dust, into white powder.

*FLICK*

The man flicks his finger, and violent blue flames burn all the dust on the ground. After standing there watching the beautiful fire for a second, he turns his head my way.

His figure distorts and changes shape, and what I find greeting my eyes is a clean-shaven 20 year old man with blue eyes, as blue as the flames he just made.

With his hands now in his pockets, and knitted eyebrows on his forehead, he makes his way towards me.

As he approaches the prison bars that confine me, they…

*CREAK*

Bend to his will, the bars that I thought were indestructible, are moved out of the way without him even lifting a finger.

Fuck….

The closer he gets to me, the more I move back, crawling backwards, not daring to give him my back.

*THUD*

That is until, my back hits the wall. In which he also stops several feet away from me, just staring at me, silently.

He flicks his finger again, this time breaking the chains that were holding me.

“H-hi” My pitiful attempt to converse in such a bad situation isn’t helping. I use my last attempt, charm magic.

Now that I can properly use it, I try to give him a better opinion of me, just…

“You demons are all the same, unappreciative fools who think the world owes them something for just existing” Shit, he doesn’t have a good history with demons apparently. “Is this the way to treat your saviour? Charm them to your will?”

His neutral face turns into a frown.

“I-I’m sorry” It’s not like I was planning to harm him, I just didn’t want him to hurt me, and now he knows I’m a demon, and a succubus to boot

This isn’t going in a good direction.

“Get up” He orders me and I listen.

Now, that we are both standing, we stare at each other as an awkward silence envelopes us.

“What? Is my face entertaining?” He raises his eyebrow, his frown going deeper “Move it! Chop chop!”

*CLAP* *CLAP*

He claps his hands as I exit the cell, he clearly wants me to escape, and I am not a person that would miss the opportunity.

As I run out of the church I think about who that mysterious man was….