Red Bard

Liel glanced down at the gateway before her, propping herself up onto Calligan’s blade. The sky was dark and dreary in the place ahead, a land of bitterly bare trees and hills of snow as far as the eye could see.

In the reflection of the blade, Ciseus appeared. He had a grim expression on his face, and so he didn’t speak at all. Liel, aware of his presence, spoke contemplatively.

“Was there a way I could have found out the truth sooner? Or should I have ignored moral codes and acted on my suspicions even if I had chosen the wrong suspect…?”

“There was no correct answer in this scenario.” His voice was unusually sincere. There was no hint of his wit or joking demeanor in his words. “But now you have a choice. You’ve ended the plot, killing Calligan and saving the girl. Those meaningless followers of his have fled to a land where they will not survive. Even if you go along with the Red, there will be no purpose in it.”

“That man helped me, even if he is a Red… shouldn’t I see to it that he survives?”

“Perhaps.”

“Then why try and dissuade me from going?”

Ciseus sighed, placing a hand against his head. “If it were me, I might choose to go alongside him. But you’re forgetting that you’re not a free person. You’ve already spoken your vows. You promised to be an element in inevitability. This means not acting pointlessly.”

“What’s the point of vows if they ignore moral debts? Don’t I owe that man this much?”

“You do. All I’m saying is that if you choose to go help him, you will have broken your vows. My 'Will' isn't like me at all... if I could choose to do away with it, I would. But the facts remain that if you choose to follow that man and kill the Elders as an act of vengeance, you will go against my Will- that set of morals you swore an oath to. The moment you dye your blade crimson with their blood, you will have become an Oathbreaker, and not even I will be able to save you from the consequences of that. I agree with this choice, but the world certainly won’t."

“What sway should ‘the world’ have over me?” Liel chided. “The opinions of others should affect me? Forget the honour of a Paladin. If vows conflict with what should be done, if the person who they’re bound to doesn’t even agree with them, what worth do they have?”

Ciseus smiled slyly, adopting his familiar expression once more. “None at all, little Astalette.”

"If I don't make sure the Elders are killed, this gateway won't close. Horror might invade here."

"It's not that type of gateway. One can enter, but not exit. If you go through, you won't be able to return, at least not through this gateway."

Liel sighed, limping towards her blade which remained embedded in the flesh of one of the fallen Elders. She pulled it from the man’s body, wiping off the blood on his clothes before sheathing it.

“Why didn’t you help me in this matter? Was it because the Elders and Chieftain had removed their eyes, and so you couldn’t see the clues?”

“It was enough for me to tell you that something was wrong here.”

“You couldn’t have given me any other hints?”

“If I were capable of that, I would have done it. If we were capable of all things, there would be no reason for the existence of Paladins. Your people would have become farmers, and fishermen, and shepherds. There would be no need to force children to learn of the blade, of history and of self-sacrifice for the sake of the worlds…”

“What limits you from helping?”

“Time.”

“Time?”

“Why do you think there is never any talk of us helping in other worlds? Why do you think I can only ever talk with you for so long? Do you think there aren’t other important things for me to be doing?”

“More important than the lives of everyone in Estelle? More important than the life of Isabelle, and all the children and women that the town’s Chieftain murdered?”

“Measure those lives against the lives of everyone who has ever been born, still lives, and will live. If you still believe that your situation is more important, then I will concede that I was a fool and should have helped you more. Do you think you’re dealing with the only dangerous situation in the entire universe? I helped you work through the situation even though I couldn’t see it clearly for myself. That was all I could afford you. I trusted you to do the rest and you failed. You weren’t a martyr. You were a failure.”

Liel bit at her lip. “How cruel.”

“We can’t afford to be kind. You aren’t a farmer, or a fisherman, or a shepherd. You are a Paladin. At the heart of it, your life has only ever been about protecting others. That is the reason you are told to exist. And in this, you failed.” Ciseus leaned on both of his hands, bowing his head. “I thought you were an interesting person, little Astalette. Admirable, even. You chose to serve me, knowing that the morals my Will imposes abides fully by serving the greater good while seeking the death of our enemies. Still, you chose to defy the fate placed upon you by others from the very moment you were born and attempted to live an easygoing life. But in the end, you threw your desires away in order to try and save the lives of others, knowing that further investigation would lead you to danger.”

He let out a hollow chuckle, raising his head.

“You failed, but in the end, you embodied my Will more than I do. In the end, you followed me.” He pointed in the direction of the gateway, grinning. “So now, here’s your choice, little Astalette. Do the wrong thing, follow the fate prescribed to you and be my perfect servant. Or, do what your heart knows is right, and follow that man, ensuring that those Elders won’t do more harm in the future, but be despised by the world for it. Will you save no one, and be loved, or save everyone, and be hated?”

“I-”

“You will never live an easy life if you go. No one will accept you no matter where you go. You won’t be able to continue as a Wandering Crusader. The Paladin’s Templar might force you into exile if they’re not feeling kind. What will you choose?”

Liel bowed her head, her expression growing grim and contemplative. For a time, all that could be heard was her exhausted breathing, and the shaking of her legs that barely kept her standing.

“If I don’t go now, I’ll regret it forever. What is a peaceful life if my mind can’t rest?”

Ciseus smiled warmly upon hearing this response. He watched as Liel fell forward through the gateway, disappearing from the Chieftain’s home.

“Miss Lenaria would like you.”

———

She awoke in the darkness of the dreary, endless night. Snow clung to every inch of her body, its moisture having seeped into the fabric of her clothes. Liel raised her head up, glancing around her, seeing a figure standing in the distance.

He held a torch in one hand, alight with a bright crimson flame that basked the area around them in a dim glow. He glanced over at Liel as she appeared, holding long strips of meat up high. It was the Bard!

Her eyes slowly panned over to corpses that lay beside him, their expressions frozen with terror.

“Why are you cutting them apart?”

Liel had begun to suspect that she had been wrong to follow the mysterious Bard. After all, he was a Red.

“To eat.”

Her eyes widened, taking a step back. “To what…?”

He pointed to his mouth nonchalantly. “To eat. When I get hungry.”

‘No… this man might be as much of a monster as Horror!’

“All the wildlife is corrupted. They can’t be eaten. The Elders were only Vassals. They haven’t been turned, so they can be safely eaten.”

Liel relaxed her posture a bit. ‘Oh, it’s a matter of survival…’

“How do you know so much about Horror? I thought Reds were the type of people that would spend all of their time far away from Hel, or any sort of place where war would happen…”

The Bard didn’t listen to Liel’s questions, instead reaching down beside the corpse and procuring a handful of clothes. He threw them over to Liel, who, still exhausted, wearily reached out a hand to catch them. They were sets of bloodied cloaks.

“Layer these over your clothes. The cold is an enemy you must avoid.”

“What about you?”

He pulled up his collar to his cheek, letting out a huff of steam along with a heavy breath. “I’m used to this.”

‘He looks so calm now… why did he first seem so scared during that fight? Is he scared of Horror too…? Well, of course, who wouldn’t be?’

“How did you know my name? I don’t think I ever mentioned it to the carriage driver…”

“You said it out loud at the Hallflower festival.” Morrigan looked at her with a puzzled expression. “Everybody in the village likely knows your name.”

He reached out a hand in greeting, moving closer to Liel.

“My name is Morrigan. I hope our tracking will go well.”

As she stood up, she hesitantly accepted his hand, shaking it.

“Tracking?”

“Of the Elders. To kill them.”

‘Ah, he’s still talking about that…’

Liel looked out into the distance. The wind howled as snow cascaded from the sky, settling onto the hillscapes that had already been blanketed in white. The sky was dreary with storm clouds, grey and smoggy as if intermingled with poison. On either side of them, there were two giant stone walls in the distance, stretching endlessly as far as they could see.

They had appeared in the labyrinth in Hel. It was a spiraling maze that stretched across the entire world, and all of it was rife with danger, both from Horror and the environment itself. If they were experiencing frozen weather, it meant that they had appeared in the Faust quadrant, the coldest part of Hel, and those massive walls meant that they were only in a small corridor of the worldwide maze.

“Why did you pretend to be the old carriage driver? Why pretend to be a Bard? Were you following me?”

“Coincidence. I was going to find the Elders. I didn’t think the Chieftain of the town would be complicit in the ritual too…”

“You knew about the ritual?”

Morrigan nodded his head in response.

“Why do you want to find the Elders? To try and stop the ritual?”

“No, I didn’t really care about the ritual. If anything, it allowed me to get back here quicker than I planned.”

‘Get back here? So, he really does have experience in this place. Is he a former Paladin? No, if that were the case, he wouldn’t have a Red rune. It would be silver, like mine…’

“Why did you come to Estelle in the first place, then? What did you want with the Elders?”

Morrigan hesitated for a moment, turning towards the hills before his lips curved upwards slightly.

“I made a bet with the man they’re trying to find.” Morrigan responded casually in a cold tone of voice. “I’m going to ruin all of his plans.”