### Chapter 13:The Plague
His form dissolved from the frail balcony in the slums district, vanishing into oblivion. Simultaneously, he reappeared in a dark passageway, dimly lit by flickers of lamps fueled by the essence of the Relic of Radiance—a colossal Sequence 1 artifact buried deep within the stone-carved tunnels.
His footsteps echoed on the stone as his visage materialized before a heavy, malleable metal door. It responded with a squeak as he clicked it open. His figure graced the room, which was sparse: a simple chair and desk, a dark bookshelf adjacent to the chair, and a vast empty space beyond the table. There were no windows, only dim lighting. His form crashed into the chair—or rather, materialized directly onto it—a fog of exhaled breath escaping his mouth.
This was his personal workspace, hidden beneath the Vermont, the Inquisitors' watchtower—a location veiled from human eyes, save for a few.
The door behind him swung open, revealing a woman in dark trousers and a grey shirt with folded sleeves. A rosary of inverted crosses hung from her neck, almost obscured by the darkness of her hair. Her crimson eyes pierced the gloom, landing on his form.
Lyra Belmont. He was certain she was a Sequence 6 Mnemonic from the Covenant Pathway. She had social anxiety but grew bolder as conversations progressed—quite terrifying when she did.
His personal aide.
"Should I say 'blessed morning, my dear aide'?" He caressed the flag on his desk, bearing a crescent and star sigil amid stripes of white, blue, and black.
She merely fidgeted, her lips threatening to move before dying again. In the end, she slumped her shoulders.
"I see... Still battling that social anxiety of yours. I thought we were close enough by now, yet you're still anxious around me." He feigned pain, clutching his chest. "Ouch... that hurts."
Then, surprisingly, her voice chimed in, as quiet as a whisper.
"Stop the theatrics, Sir Steins."
He feigned surprise—or perhaps he truly was surprised. Maybe it was the latter.
"Oh... she finally speaks. And fluently at that. You'll need to get a fiancé around..." He winked with a sly smile. "And you know I'm always free."
His words had little effect, save for a faint blush on her ears and an adjustment of her glasses.
Was he losing his masculine charm, or did this woman have tougher barriers?
"Sorry to burst your bubble, Sir Frankenstein," she replied, her voice chirping. "Concerning your investigation today—how did it go?"
He sighed, placing his hands behind his head while propping his legs on the wooden desk. He had already removed his waistcoat.
"Come on, Lyra. You should focus on other aspects too... Love, romance, and all that. You know, if you have a change of heart, I'm always here." He sent another sly wink. He noticed the slight reddening of her ears. "But anyway, I need you to summon Leinz here. Use those psychic abilities of yours."
"He's already coming," she muttered, adjusting her glasses. "Looks like he was heading this way."
"Have you ever tried reading my mind? I mean, then you wouldn't doubt my affection for you."
Her gaze turned away from him, not before rolling her eyes—a pink shade returning to her ears.
"No... I haven't. If I tried, it probably wouldn't work. After all, you're a demigod... or maybe a Divine." She turned back to him. "If you have such Sequence abilities, why work for the Order? Why not chase dominance like beings of your level in the Endless Realms?"
He let out a sigh. This lovely assistant of his was quite spectacular.
"I've got my preferences... and my reasons. It'll probably overwhelm you." He stated, placing one leg over the other on the desk. It would overwhelm this beautiful assistant of his.
"Oh..." He watched her slight withdrawal. "If you say so."
His eyes wandered to the door. In about ten seconds or less, he was certain Leinz would burst through with panic etched in his eyes.
"Lyra," he said, retreating his gaze to lock onto her crimson eyes. "I reckon you keep whatever happens here a secret between us. You know... couple's secrets and all."
Her eyes lingered on him, searching for conviction. Sensing it, she muttered a low "yes."
He heaved a breath of relief, his brain idly registering the sounds of quickened, hastening boots against the hard, charred stone floor.
He was here. And as if confirming his thoughts, Leinz's form tore through the door. His breath hitched, his eyes constricted as if starved of oxygen. Beads of sweat poured from his pores, despite the lower temperature.
His broad-shouldered form, clad in the blue-and-gold Inquisitors' livery, crossed the distance between them.
"I offer my greetings, Supervisor Steins... and L-Lyra," he burst out in panic, surveying Lyra briefly before locking eyes on him, bearing some urgent message.
"Are you okay, Leinz?" Lyra asked, more an inquiry than concern.
Not giving an answer, Leinz simply crashed his back against the wall, gazing into the stone ceiling above.
"That petty slum thief—the one who stole from Count Viridis..." Leinz's gasping voice trailed off.
"Mephis Meredith. You can skip the basics. What happened at his home, Leinz? What did you see, and what did it tell you?" His voice carried authority as his hands caressed the crucifix he wore.
Leinz swatted his hair back with his hands.
"We went to its lair... then we saw it. It was clad in the Night itself, wielding a sword that killed all of us—me excluded. He enclosed us in a realm of ethereal darkness. Its face was a swirling vortex of nebulae... It was scary, and..." Leinz's voice trailed off.
"So, the Mnemonic suppression bullets... they didn't work on it?" This time, it was Lyra who asked.
"He made them... nothing. Then it killed us all... then made it seem like a dream." Leinz's gaze tore to him. "Steins... initially, I thought it was a high-Sequence Mnemonic, but that was no Mnemonic. No, Steins—it was the... Devil." His hands shook as they conveyed his thoughts.
So that was probably the cause of the space-time dilation. One mystery solved. And this entity—was it not a Mnemonic, as Leinz stated? Or was it an exaggeration born of fear? Was the entity truly Mephis Meredith, or some fallen god? He had never sensed any divination ritual, and letting its existence be known—killing the Inquisitors, then rewriting it—seemed like an attempt to prompt submission through fear, turning Leinz into its herald.
"Tell me, Leinz... what message did this entity leave behind?" he asked, clasping his hands.
He watched Leinz's body jolt back to reality.
"It said this: A plague—that he was bringing a plague to Valen, not a war. And that its name was Mephis, but it also was the Dream. It said the Devil had descended into Valen, and with it... it brings Ruination. Steins, I sug—"
Leinz's voice slurred as he collapsed to the ground in a sleepy heap, with Lyra behind him. Her hand had sharpened into a jab; now her figure crouched over the body.
"Sleep well, Leinz. You've done enough," she muttered, her crimson eyes gleaming.
"Was that really necessary?" he asked, raising one brow.
Her eyes met his with an empty glare.
"He'll be a distraction." She eased herself up, her tiny pale hands motioning to tie her dark hair into a bun.
In that moment, she looked... enchanting.
He couldn't help but become transfixed, tracing both the allowed and the forbidden—her collarbones, her...
"Sorry to say this, but you're creeping me out," her voice pierced his subconscious, jolting him back to reality. He saw her eyes glaring at him.
"What?!" He shrugged. "I was actually thinking... you know, formulating plans and stuff."
It wasn't fully a lie—though if you removed her gaze that screamed he was damn well lying, partially his brain was drawing conclusions. A new truth dawned in his mind: Meredith never became that entity. The entity became Meredith. And perhaps its codename was "Dream." What it had done—as the now-unconscious Leinz (thanks to the crimson-eyed beauty) described—had made them experience their deaths, then wake up to see it was merely a nightmare.
It was akin to its name: The Dream.
"So, what's it this time? We have a fallen god on our tail?" Her form was now at the shelf, casually flipping through the tomes of a book—one he remembered Lucian (for short, Ian) had given him on exorcism. Quite a nice book; he had finished its countless pages in one hour, twenty-three minutes, fifty-seven seconds, and eighty-eight nanoseconds. Let's end there for now.
"I don't think so, Lyra," he muttered. "Usually, we sense the rupture and descent of their divinities, but in this case, there was none. It just... came. Either this is a god possessing a special essence to shroud itself, or it simply exists in another plane, different and beyond our lines of thought."
The sounds of pages fluttering in the silent space filled the air.
"These pages literally have no end to them, right? How did you finish it?" Her eyes traveled to him, but before he could answer, she added, "If it possesses such power, how do you intend to stop it? This... Devil."
"It's weakened. If it wasn't, I'm not sure Valen itself would still exist, and it wouldn't need pawns. Only the weak play smart; the strong play the game of absolution." Deep within, a thought rose in his mind: Perhaps it wouldn't be struggling against a Sequence 4 Harbinger all this while. He could feel the quake of the endless land within the Great Tetragram Seal. "It's strong, but we're stronger."
He watched her place the book back on the shelf after a futile scan for the end. He really wished he'd told her it was an artifact—a Sequence 6, *The Exorcist's Requiem*.
"I see... So what of this plague the entity speaks of? The ruination it claims to bring? Perhaps an empty threat."
An empty threat. His mind spun into action. It seemed the entity was weakened enough that there was no way it could bring widespread ruination. Then what was it? His mind frantically pieced together billions of possible deductions, from instigating a revolution among the slums folk to possessing a Sequence 1 artifact. They all had a piece or two missing... except one.
The Winter Monstrosity—the corrupted Rank Harbinger with absolute control over "Stasis." Could this entity be stronger than that Harbinger, merely refraining from killing it because it wanted it as a pawn? Let's see: Its essence could fissure a divine artifact and shroud its view. It was safe to assume it surpassed the Harbinger, who had no such feats.
He sighed. Lyra's eyes were fixed on him, as if this immense detachment was his constant disposition. So she returned to scanning the dark shelves for books.
Was it planning to make the Harbinger its pawn? Then that would be the "plague." And if the entity had said it was bringing a plague to Valen—not a war—this was the most fitting piece.
His hands clutched his pocket watch, listening to the tick-tick to calm his burning nerves and hyper-intellect.
Then that entity... it was bringing a corrupted Harbinger to Valen.
That was its message. But why tell them about its plans? It was narrowing their thoughts to a chosen possibility—how brilliant. An inevitable outcome.
This entity's true horror might not lie in its attributes, but its intellect.
After all, the only thing scarier than a deity is a sketchy deity.
Perhaps he would learn more about this entity by scouring the now-unconscious Leinz's memories.
"Lyra," his voice carried with agency. Her visage turned to him, tracing the urgency in his eyes. Her face now bore inquiry.
"Issue an order of evacuation, signed by the Order, to the Congress for approval." His hands slicked his hair backward. "Tell Eva and Lancelot to issue letters of utmost urgency to the Imperial City—a permission for the upheaval of two Sequence 3 Divine Artifacts from the Grave of Anubis." His hands traced the decagram star on his crucifix. "The Sands of Time, and the Sacred Tomb of Nephthys."