Cultists?
The Guard Captain wasted no more time.
“Jelkia, immediately report to the mayor. Ferena, the Adventurer’s Guild. As for the rest of you,” The man swept his gaze over all of us here. Normal people and Adventurers that had come running to the scream of someone finding the body.
“Civilians, go home! The Guard will handle this. Adventurers, the details will be up on the board within an hour. More details will come within a day. Now go!”
I walked over to my partial teammates, who each had very complicated looks in their eyes. As they turned towards me, that look only got more complicated. I blinked. I expected there might be some bad blood after my rejection and honest reasons why but the look on their faces felt like I was looking at something far more… serious?
Well, I suppose the dead body would do that to people.
“Cultists, apparently.” I spoke up. “It’s horrifying they managed to do this in nearly broad daylight. This isn’t a busy street but still. The sun is still up.”
They looked between each other and I realized that something was probably more up than I knew.
“Derek, we need to talk.” Konohora said, steel in her voice.
Again? We just talked yesterday. I suppose they might have their own grievances they wanted to work out. It was too arrogant of me to think I could get the last word and walk off I suppose. Riary alone would probably find me to yell at me over nothing.
But what really drew my eye was Tyler. Tyler looked… heartbroken but also angry. His face read hatred on a level that surprised me. Especially as Riary didn’t look angry. Actually… it looked like she had been crying…
Alarm bells began to go off in my head. They barely glanced at the body. Danger signals began to flood. Uh-oh.
“Sure.” I said. I’d just have to deal with whatever, whatever this was.
“What about the body?” Tyler said and his voice! I nearly ran away right there, his voice was raw with emotion. This wasn’t me. Something had happened.
“We’ll deal with it after. We aren’t leaving any time soon.” Konohora’s voice was sharp.
I followed The Heroes back, mind whirring. The most obvious thing, given Riary’s muted nature, was that she had fucked up. I don’t know how but I wasn’t blind to the looks both of the others were giving her. I just had no idea what had happened.
That confusion lasted all the way to inn, and heightened when we didn’t go to a table to drink and eat, but instead headed up to the rooms. We entered one of them, probably Tyler’s judging by the massive shield on the floor.
The second the door closed, they rounded on me. I nearly reached for my weapon. Tyler’s face, I could finally identify it. That was the look of betrayal. He was practically huffing and puffing with emotion, while Riary’s own emotions seemed to be drowning. I could feel goosebumps beginning to prickle my skin.
Konohora took a step forward, staring at me. Hard.
“Derek.” She said. “I am going to ask you some questions. I need you to answer honestly.” Her voice was sharp and hard. No kindness in them at all.
“What do you know about the Gems?”
My mind whirred as my heart rate skyrocketed.
********
“He….” Tyler sounded like a broken man. And truthfully, he was. He thought they were getting along! They, they had fought life and death together!
“Tyler, you barely think of me as a person.”
That, that wasn’t true! Of course Tyler knew Derek was a person! He was their friend, their ally, their companion! But… but…. But…
“You never talk to me.”
“You have never, once, sat down and really talked with me.”
Tyler tried to think, tried to remember when he had talked to Derek. When they had shared words. When they had really bonded. He remembered… talking to Riary, to Konohora, about different things. Small things. Conversations he couldn’t remember, about the weather or complaints about the tent or the food, normal everyday conversation.
But none with Derek.
The more he thought the more horror filled him. Had he… ever talked to him? He remembered when they had first met, when Riary had attacked him. Tyler had stood by and even after feeling moved by his actions, after saving that villager and nearly dying for it… had Tyler ever talked to him about it? About how he respected him? About his origins or wants or desires? They had interrogated him and… that was it. That was the end of the memories.
The next time… was weeks later. When they had first started sparring.
And then nothing.
Horror filled Tyler and different words came back to him.
“Is it so surprising? As he said, I neither knew his favorite instrument was the drums nor his favorite color. Despite traveling with Derek for some time, there is a lot we still do not know about each other.”
Tyler felt his heart clench.
“I’m an asshole.” He said.
“Well, Derek may think along the same lines.” Konohora said.
He looked up at his friends, both giving him complicated looks. Konohora seemed to be smiling… with pity.
“Do I, did I really… not treat him like a…”
“Person? Tyler, you made no effort to get to know him in any way at any point.” Konohora’s words were like daggers to Tyler’s heart. “You had fewer conversations with him than Riary. And although you had less negative conversations overall, Riary had more positive conversations, if we include her apologizing to him after our near-death experience.”
Tyler felt like he was being rolled over, his face was a grimace at his own actions and Konohora did not go easy. She said the final nail in his coffin.
“Tyler. We have been traveling for nearly a month with him.”
Tyler’s face was a rictus of pain. He had to find Derek and apologize. Make this right. Even if he didn’t want to travel with them… he couldn’t leave things like this!
Riary had stayed silent. But now, she spoke up.
“I…. I….” She grit her teeth, both her teammates looking over in surprise. “I… have to tell you something.”
As she talked, as she began to say more and more, Konohora quickly moved them to their room. By the time Riary was done… Tyler was like stone and glass. Even Konohora was gaping at her. She had said it all, said the reasons, said what she had done, said what had expected.
Tyler was… tears began to fall.
“You…” His voice was scratchy. His way home! She, she had his way home! She had kept it from them! Kept it, kept it for over a week. And now, and now?!
“You betrayed me. He betrayed me.”
Tyler’s heart felt like it was going to explode. He turned around, ready to find Derek and tear him apart-
“Tyler! Wait!” Konohora’s shout stopped him in his tracks. Her voice sounded panicked, afraid.
“Tyler, listen to me. Listen. We have no evidence it was Derek. Yes, he said a small lie about his future goals. Yes, he had access to the Gem. But we have no proof it was him! He could be innocent!”
Tyler let out a shaky breath. It had been too much. Horror filled him for the second time that day, his emotions an utter mess. Derek’s refusal, Tyler’s assholery, Riary’s betrayal and the loss of his way home, his anger nearly blinding him to the point of murder and his horror from that. He collapsed, falling onto the floor on his knees.
“Tyler!” Riary called out and moved forward, only for Konohora to hold her back.
“Tyler. You’ve experienced a lot, too much, in too short a time. Listen to my voice. The Gem is here. The Gem will be found. We will get you home. Repeat those words to me.”
“Riary, Derek.”
“Repeat. The. Words.”
Tyler breathed in and out, his mind a mess.
“T-The Gem is here. The, The Gem… will be found. We-”
He looked up at Konohora’s stern face, looking her entire age for once. Riary looked full of guilt, making Tyler’s heart clench again with betrayal and pain.
“We will get you home.” He finally said, staring into Riary’s eyes. She nodded.
******
“What do you know about the Gems?” Konohora said.
And I knew I was fucked. I hadn’t forgotten, how, how on earth could I forget? I had a Gem inside my body.
The Hell Gem.
The Gem that had summoned me here, the Gem that had transported me to hell, worse than anyone’s imagination. Such an awful place that I genuinely thought the destruction of the universe and all life in it, would be better than anyone getting their hands on it. Oblivion is far better than eternal torture to the level a human can’t even imagine, can’t even normally perceive.
It had never mattered and I’d try to put it out of my mind. I danced away from conversation with Gems and ignored them entirely. There may be others out there, that led to their own afterlives. I truly didn’t know. But I was already doing more than enough, keeping this one Gem hidden and locked away.
It wasn’t even hard. The only worry had been that it might pop out of my dead corpse if I die, so my death had to be avoided at all costs, but I was doing that already. I knew the Heroes were searching for Gems but I didn’t know why. It didn’t matter. I would never give them the one I had.
Not for anything.
“Cube ish like shape, have some link to other worlds possibly? You are on a mission to find them, there’s probably a green one maybe? Oh, you have a parchment with a Gem on it.”
No lies. Just not the truth either.
Konohora frowned and my heart skipped a beat.
“Is that everything?” She pressed.
“Well, I guess not? They’re probably pretty important, it’s possible the Gaun Empire you’ve mentioned has one, they might come in other shapes or sizes but I don’t really know that I suppose-”
“Derek.” Konohora was done playing. Her eyes bore into me.
“Do you have a Gem?”
Internally I was screaming. Outwardly, I put on a confused expression.
“Why? What is this, anyway? Why are you asking-”
“Answer the question.”
“No.”
Konohora frowned immediately, blinking in surprise. I held my intent, I held my answer. As her expression began to suddenly morph, I knew my attempt had failed. I hadn’t lied. I said No, to answering the question. But that was too much of a gamble. I didn’t know how her power worked fully. Would it let that go? Maybe, but if I was doing it on purpose, attempting to deceive her? Too risky.
“Let me be clear. No, I am not going to answer the question. Not until you assholes tell me why I’m being interrogated.” I crossed my arms, my eyes going hard.
“Derek-”
“You did it.” Riary suddenly spoke, anger and hatred and shock fueling her to a level I’d only seen once before. After she had been raped. “You stole it.”
Fires sparked around her and the heat suddenly became immense. The fires in her eyes grew and grew, going so hot as to become blue. Tyler himself looked like he was shattering into a million pieces and Konohora seemed to be turning towards her to try and calm her down.
The palpable relief I felt was immense.
“I didn’t steal any of your shit or stuff or anything like that.” I said calmly.
Riary had, unknowingly, just saved me.
Konohora froze, which was enough to freeze everyone else. She blinked, and relief palpably spread through her.
“Truth.”
Tyler looked like he was utterly shocked and lost. But Riary… it took a while to reach her. She still looked angry, still looked ready to burn me to the ground, as flames swirled around her. But the flames mirrored her, were her in a way. She was anger and wrath and her flames were beautiful and intense… but now? Now they were muddy, practically brown in some places, sloppy. That said more about Riary’s mental state than anything else ever could.
I took a step forward, staring her down.
“I. Did not steal. Anything.”
For a moment, a brief flash, I thought she was going to attack, to let all of that pent up rage and horrible emotions collapse onto me, and burn this whole inn to the ground.
Instead, she fell to her knees, flames sputtering out as a look of absolute guilt and pain wracked her face.
“Then who has it?!”
*****
“Is it ready?”
“Of course Master.”
Down deep, there were over a dozen men and women, standing around an altar. On it?
A black Gem.
A pleasant humming could be heard.
Cultists?
The Guard Captain wasted no more time.
“Jelkia, immediately report to the mayor. Ferena, the Adventurer’s Guild. As for the rest of you,” The man swept his gaze over all of us here. Normal people and Adventurers that had come running to the scream of someone finding the body.
“Civilians, go home! The Guard will handle this. Adventurers, the details will be up on the board within an hour. More details will come within a day. Now go!”
I walked over to my partial teammates, who each had very complicated looks in their eyes. As they turned towards me, that look only got more complicated. I blinked. I expected there might be some bad blood after my rejection and honest reasons why but the look on their faces felt like I was looking at something far more… serious?
Well, I suppose the dead body would do that to people.
“Cultists, apparently.” I spoke up. “It’s horrifying they managed to do this in nearly broad daylight. This isn’t a busy street but still. The sun is still up.”
They looked between each other and I realized that something was probably more up than I knew.
“Derek, we need to talk.” Konohora said, steel in her voice.
Again? We just talked yesterday. I suppose they might have their own grievances they wanted to work out. It was too arrogant of me to think I could get the last word and walk off I suppose. Riary alone would probably find me to yell at me over nothing.
But what really drew my eye was Tyler. Tyler looked… heartbroken but also angry. His face read hatred on a level that surprised me. Especially as Riary didn’t look angry. Actually… it looked like she had been crying…
Alarm bells began to go off in my head. They barely glanced at the body. Danger signals began to flood. Uh-oh.
“Sure.” I said. I’d just have to deal with whatever, whatever this was.
“What about the body?” Tyler said and his voice! I nearly ran away right there, his voice was raw with emotion. This wasn’t me. Something had happened.
“We’ll deal with it after. We aren’t leaving any time soon.” Konohora’s voice was sharp.
I followed The Heroes back, mind whirring. The most obvious thing, given Riary’s muted nature, was that she had fucked up. I don’t know how but I wasn’t blind to the looks both of the others were giving her. I just had no idea what had happened.
That confusion lasted all the way to inn, and heightened when we didn’t go to a table to drink and eat, but instead headed up to the rooms. We entered one of them, probably Tyler’s judging by the massive shield on the floor.
The second the door closed, they rounded on me. I nearly reached for my weapon. Tyler’s face, I could finally identify it. That was the look of betrayal. He was practically huffing and puffing with emotion, while Riary’s own emotions seemed to be drowning. I could feel goosebumps beginning to prickle my skin.
Konohora took a step forward, staring at me. Hard.
“Derek.” She said. “I am going to ask you some questions. I need you to answer honestly.” Her voice was sharp and hard. No kindness in them at all.
“What do you know about the Gems?”
My mind whirred as my heart rate skyrocketed.
********
“He….” Tyler sounded like a broken man. And truthfully, he was. He thought they were getting along! They, they had fought life and death together!
“Tyler, you barely think of me as a person.”
That, that wasn’t true! Of course Tyler knew Derek was a person! He was their friend, their ally, their companion! But… but…. But…
“You never talk to me.”
“You have never, once, sat down and really talked with me.”
Tyler tried to think, tried to remember when he had talked to Derek. When they had shared words. When they had really bonded. He remembered… talking to Riary, to Konohora, about different things. Small things. Conversations he couldn’t remember, about the weather or complaints about the tent or the food, normal everyday conversation.
But none with Derek.
The more he thought the more horror filled him. Had he… ever talked to him? He remembered when they had first met, when Riary had attacked him. Tyler had stood by and even after feeling moved by his actions, after saving that villager and nearly dying for it… had Tyler ever talked to him about it? About how he respected him? About his origins or wants or desires? They had interrogated him and… that was it. That was the end of the memories.
The next time… was weeks later. When they had first started sparring.
And then nothing.
Horror filled Tyler and different words came back to him.
“Is it so surprising? As he said, I neither knew his favorite instrument was the drums nor his favorite color. Despite traveling with Derek for some time, there is a lot we still do not know about each other.”
Tyler felt his heart clench.
“I’m an asshole.” He said.
“Well, Derek may think along the same lines.” Konohora said.
He looked up at his friends, both giving him complicated looks. Konohora seemed to be smiling… with pity.
“Do I, did I really… not treat him like a…”
“Person? Tyler, you made no effort to get to know him in any way at any point.” Konohora’s words were like daggers to Tyler’s heart. “You had fewer conversations with him than Riary. And although you had less negative conversations overall, Riary had more positive conversations, if we include her apologizing to him after our near-death experience.”
Tyler felt like he was being rolled over, his face was a grimace at his own actions and Konohora did not go easy. She said the final nail in his coffin.
“Tyler. We have been traveling for nearly a month with him.”
Tyler’s face was a rictus of pain. He had to find Derek and apologize. Make this right. Even if he didn’t want to travel with them… he couldn’t leave things like this!
Riary had stayed silent. But now, she spoke up.
“I…. I….” She grit her teeth, both her teammates looking over in surprise. “I… have to tell you something.”
As she talked, as she began to say more and more, Konohora quickly moved them to their room. By the time Riary was done… Tyler was like stone and glass. Even Konohora was gaping at her. She had said it all, said the reasons, said what she had done, said what had expected.
Tyler was… tears began to fall.
“You…” His voice was scratchy. His way home! She, she had his way home! She had kept it from them! Kept it, kept it for over a week. And now, and now?!
“You betrayed me. He betrayed me.”
Tyler’s heart felt like it was going to explode. He turned around, ready to find Derek and tear him apart-
“Tyler! Wait!” Konohora’s shout stopped him in his tracks. Her voice sounded panicked, afraid.
“Tyler, listen to me. Listen. We have no evidence it was Derek. Yes, he said a small lie about his future goals. Yes, he had access to the Gem. But we have no proof it was him! He could be innocent!”
Tyler let out a shaky breath. It had been too much. Horror filled him for the second time that day, his emotions an utter mess. Derek’s refusal, Tyler’s assholery, Riary’s betrayal and the loss of his way home, his anger nearly blinding him to the point of murder and his horror from that. He collapsed, falling onto the floor on his knees.
“Tyler!” Riary called out and moved forward, only for Konohora to hold her back.
“Tyler. You’ve experienced a lot, too much, in too short a time. Listen to my voice. The Gem is here. The Gem will be found. We will get you home. Repeat those words to me.”
“Riary, Derek.”
“Repeat. The. Words.”
Tyler breathed in and out, his mind a mess.
“T-The Gem is here. The, The Gem… will be found. We-”
He looked up at Konohora’s stern face, looking her entire age for once. Riary looked full of guilt, making Tyler’s heart clench again with betrayal and pain.
“We will get you home.” He finally said, staring into Riary’s eyes. She nodded.
******
“What do you know about the Gems?” Konohora said.
And I knew I was fucked. I hadn’t forgotten, how, how on earth could I forget? I had a Gem inside my body.
The Hell Gem.
The Gem that had summoned me here, the Gem that had transported me to hell, worse than anyone’s imagination. Such an awful place that I genuinely thought the destruction of the universe and all life in it, would be better than anyone getting their hands on it. Oblivion is far better than eternal torture to the level a human can’t even imagine, can’t even normally perceive.
It had never mattered and I’d try to put it out of my mind. I danced away from conversation with Gems and ignored them entirely. There may be others out there, that led to their own afterlives. I truly didn’t know. But I was already doing more than enough, keeping this one Gem hidden and locked away.
It wasn’t even hard. The only worry had been that it might pop out of my dead corpse if I die, so my death had to be avoided at all costs, but I was doing that already. I knew the Heroes were searching for Gems but I didn’t know why. It didn’t matter. I would never give them the one I had.
Not for anything.
“Cube ish like shape, have some link to other worlds possibly? You are on a mission to find them, there’s probably a green one maybe? Oh, you have a parchment with a Gem on it.”
No lies. Just not the truth either.
Konohora frowned and my heart skipped a beat.
“Is that everything?” She pressed.
“Well, I guess not? They’re probably pretty important, it’s possible the Gaun Empire you’ve mentioned has one, they might come in other shapes or sizes but I don’t really know that I suppose-”
“Derek.” Konohora was done playing. Her eyes bore into me.
“Do you have a Gem?”
Internally I was screaming. Outwardly, I put on a confused expression.
“Why? What is this, anyway? Why are you asking-”
“Answer the question.”
“No.”
Konohora frowned immediately, blinking in surprise. I held my intent, I held my answer. As her expression began to suddenly morph, I knew my attempt had failed. I hadn’t lied. I said No, to answering the question. But that was too much of a gamble. I didn’t know how her power worked fully. Would it let that go? Maybe, but if I was doing it on purpose, attempting to deceive her? Too risky.
“Let me be clear. No, I am not going to answer the question. Not until you assholes tell me why I’m being interrogated.” I crossed my arms, my eyes going hard.
“Derek-”
“You did it.” Riary suddenly spoke, anger and hatred and shock fueling her to a level I’d only seen once before. After she had been raped. “You stole it.”
Fires sparked around her and the heat suddenly became immense. The fires in her eyes grew and grew, going so hot as to become blue. Tyler himself looked like he was shattering into a million pieces and Konohora seemed to be turning towards her to try and calm her down.
The palpable relief I felt was immense.
“I didn’t steal any of your shit or stuff or anything like that.” I said calmly.
Riary had, unknowingly, just saved me.
Konohora froze, which was enough to freeze everyone else. She blinked, and relief palpably spread through her.
“Truth.”
Tyler looked like he was utterly shocked and lost. But Riary… it took a while to reach her. She still looked angry, still looked ready to burn me to the ground, as flames swirled around her. But the flames mirrored her, were her in a way. She was anger and wrath and her flames were beautiful and intense… but now? Now they were muddy, practically brown in some places, sloppy. That said more about Riary’s mental state than anything else ever could.
I took a step forward, staring her down.
“I. Did not steal. Anything.”
For a moment, a brief flash, I thought she was going to attack, to let all of that pent up rage and horrible emotions collapse onto me, and burn this whole inn to the ground.
Instead, she fell to her knees, flames sputtering out as a look of absolute guilt and pain wracked her face.
“Then who has it?!”
*****
“Is it ready?”
“Of course Master.”
Down deep, there were over a dozen men and women, standing around an altar. On it?
A black Gem.
A pleasant humming could be heard.
