Prologue

The farming village of Chartreuse Town was a peaceful place, named for the distinctive color of the local trees, and the way the light reflects off of them. The people were kind and lived honest lives as they toiled the land.

But today was a day of celebration for the normally quiet town. A festival, in honor of the Goddess of Light, celebrating the gift of light she bestowed upon them. The crown princess of the kingdom, and Chosen Champion of the Goddess, Princess Aurelia, would be there to lead the festivities, as part of a month-long tour of the countryside to bless each and every farming town with bountiful sunlight.

She arrived with the sunrise, a vision of golden beauty garbed in traditional silver and purple armor. The village greeted her warmly, flocking around her as she passed out her own heart-felt greetings.

“How kind, the princess is.” They would say, as she took the time to speak with each and every villager who approached her.

“What a radiant soul, the princess is.” Parents would swoon as they see the princess participate in childish games with the local youths, a smile on everyone’s face.

“Truly blessed by the Goddess, the princess is.” All would repeat as the princess leads the start of the festival with a prayer.

A festival, which the town spent weeks preparing for. Tables spread throughout the village, loaded with delicious treats grown in the fields of Chartreuse. Places for dancing, and drinking, and chatting, and games, and just enjoying the peaceful, idyllic countryside.

Yet, the festival was ruined when they came in pillars of bloody fire and shadow.

At the entrance of town, an army appeared, walking through writhing flames and billowing shadows.

Murderers wearing blood-dyed clothing.

Bandits wearing clothes as if woven from darkness.

Scoundrels with masks of silenced mouths wielding metal staves tipped with no focusing crystals.

And alongside the people, were monsters. Orcs, goblins, devils, and other villainous races. Large golems made of stone stomped forward behind them, ready for dismantling the village.

The biggest threat, however, was the towering demon, larger than even the local church, fat as a ball, with wings too small to properly carry his weight, as he gripped his giant mace with glee.

Yet no one attacked, even as the villagers began to flee.

The invaders stood there, antsy, eager to dig into this feast of innocents, waiting for the sign.

And there it was. A cloaked man walked forward, and raised a grand staff made of a dark lilac gemstone, yet with no focusing gem at the tip. When he pointed the staff to the sky for a moment, a magic circle of purple appeared, spinning around the top of the staff, and flew into the sky, hovering over the town, slowly rotating as it covered the whole town in its effect.

With the final piece in play, the gathered army surged forward, seeking blood and death this day.

But the brief wait before the attack was not to the invaders’ advantage, as it gave the princess and her personal guards time to move. The civilians were led to the church, under escort of the soldiers. The soldiers did what they could before the attack started, and when the soldiers were called to the front line, the remaining civilians rushed for whatever safety they could.

Many still fled for the church, trusting in the Goddess of Light and the local priest to protect them.

Those who could not reach the church safely sought safety within the forest, or within cellars and under floorboards and in cupboards and dressers.

Truthfully, such places were not truly safe, but as long as the princess and her knights lived, they would ensure the safety of as many as they could.

Six knights, each wearing bulky silver armor with purple cloth underneath, and wielding both sword and shields, charged into battle. A golden magic rune floated behind each of them, blessing them with power from the Goddess of Light. Their steel swords transformed into blades of light, slicing through the horde with blinding strikes. Golden glow shined through the cracks in their armor and through their visors.

Every movement of the knights left a trail of light, flashing with every strike whether through blade or fist against the hordes of evil.

Many of the villains here were caught off guard by this display of power. They expected the knights to be easy pickings, yet here they were, slaughtering their number with ease, as if their magic wasn’t sealed at all.

As long as the mark of the God of Silence hung above the town, chants and rituals to call the power of a god were supposedly impossible. The raiders planned for this, and had magic stored on them for use. Except for the followers of Silence, who could still cast magic without interference.

Since magic is not a power one is born with, but only given to mortals by the gods, one must either be blessed or possess divine blood to call upon the magic of the gods. The raiders were the former.

The princess was the latter.

She had the blood of the Goddess of Light flowing through her. It flowed in her veins so strongly she was said to resemble the Goddess herself. And thus was appointed the Champion of Light.

So she shared her blessings with her knights, and now each one carried a halo of light behind their backs.

They would not be able to give prayer to the goddess for the casting of spells as long as the village was Silenced, but they could channel their magic into their own strengths, each fighting as if they were worth a hundred men.

Not quite leading, but still shining the brightest amongst all the defenders, was the princess, charging through hordes like a golden comet. Two halos floated behind her, shining on the silver armor she wore. She moved and fought twice as fast as her knights, the twin halos showing their worth and then some.

A single whack from her white staff, wrapped in purple, was enough to send foes flying away, either killed with the first strike, or turned into a pile of flesh and clothes when they struck a wall.

Only the strongest of the invaders dared to challenge her, and only the strongest of those were able to even besmirch her armor for more than a few moments.

Which is why the strongest decided to leave the princess to their ultimate weapon, the titanic demon, currently crushing houses with its mace. Every step it took caused the ground to shake, and even buildings further away threatened to topple from the vibrations.

The princess ran towards it as it brought its mace down on another home, a cozy house that belonged to an elderly couple that treated her to cookies.

She just barely arrived in time to jump at the mace and strike it with her own staff. The princess could feel the resonation of her strike shake her arms, but it didn’t divert the mace enough to avoid smashing the house.

When she landed back on her feet she tightened her grip on her staff, and bit the inside of her cheek. The upper half of her face was hidden behind her silver visor, but her golden glare could be felt.

She would make everyone here pay for ruining this festival.

So she returned to striking at the demon, trying to find a weakness in the steel-like flab.

And while the princess was distracted, the cloaked man who Silenced the town struck.

The knights had incredible reaction time, as not even thieves were able to sneak up on them. But when one was suddenly sliced from behind by the cloaked man, the knight barely had time to observe the man disappear before the knight was crushed into the ground by a golem, the golden glow of the armor having disappeared the moment he was sliced. A new, bloodier glow appeared as the armor crushed the knight’s body with every smash of a golem.

With the first knight dead, the tide began to change. Yet the knights, too split up and distracted, didn’t realize until the second one fell to the ground, her severed leg falling with her. Spears followed shortly after piercing through the armor like paper.

The third knight saw his sister-in-arms die, and just barely spun around in time to block the first strike of the cloaked villain. His sudden change in the battle allowed attacks from the thieves he was slaughtering to begin stabbing into the joints of his armor, and he found himself dying a slower death than his comrades.

With half the knights dead, the flood of raiders took to the streets and homes, raiding tables of food and killing whoever they could.

The fourth knight cleared a space around him with a spin of his blade, forcing the cloaked man to take a step back. Only for the villain to strike again immediately after, without so much as a tell of his upcoming attack.

Panicking, the fifth knight rapidly disposes of all enemies around him, and dashes back to a sturdy stone wall, keeping up a flurry of attacks too fast and unpredictable for the cloaked man to move through. Except he attacked from above, a single whack from his blade made the exhaustion quickly catch up to the knight and left him at the mercy of the approaching army.

The sixth knight, the most experienced of them all, and a longtime friend of the princess, watched her comrades die, and knew she was one of the last line of defenses against this cloaked threat.

So when the time came for her to be attacked, she smashed the ground instead, sending countless shredded rocks up in the air, neutralizing the cloaked man’s stealth. As he struggled against the debris, the knight took her chance and sliced at his neck.

The cloaked man only barely got his sword up in time, blocking the strike, though his stance was weak, and would be easily broken. Or, it would have been if the knight didn’t watch her blessing be dispelled simply through contact with the villain’s sword.

She lost her enhanced powers, but she wasn’t the strongest of the six for nothing. The knight pursued the cloaked man before he could attempt to escape, overpowering his blade and digging her own into his shoulder moments before he could disappear.

She was greeted with his scream of pain being cut off as his unknown method of disappearing took effect. Leaving her with just the remaining army surging through the town, as many surrounding her as those who ignored her for the prospect of pillaging the village.

Even without her powers, she was a talented warrior, quickly working to clear a path through the horde, even as her armor became more and more scratched from the sheer numbers around her. As soon as she could, she moved so that all her opponents were in her line of sight as she slowly moved backwards, closer to the princess.

The knight couldn’t kill the scoundrels in one hit anymore, but even a strong slash was enough to incapacitate one for at least a few moments, buying herself more time.

One by one, the invaders went down before her, even as her shield was gouged to shreds and her sword began to chip. Her armor was slick with blood, and the purple cloth turned a deep shade of red. Every slash, every cut, every gouge spewed an incredible amount of blood everywhere, covering her completely.

And that’s where she failed.

Spikes of blood suddenly shot out from within her, tearing through her armor as she collapsed to her knees. The sickening sounds of flesh ripping and metal shredding echoed from her body as she turned into a bloody pin-cushion.

Arianell, the silver knight, fell, chipped sword still clenched in hand.

The princess, focused completely on the towering devil, could not see when her companions died, but she felt the connections snap, one by one.

The invading hordes seemed to think this would make her weak, a loss of her power. Instead, for every knight that died, the holy halos returned to her back, quickly forming a pair of wings behind her, three halos on each side.

And with each halo returned, so too did her power return.

Where she could barely nudge the demon’s mace with a strike, with three halos returned, she could deflect it completely. With four halos, she could force the demon on the backfoot with a strike to the mace, sending it nearly flying out of his hands. With five, the mace shattered as it was wrenched from his hands. And with six, she could fly, delivering a bone crushing strike to the center of his chest, powerful enough to part the fat on his body like water in a river as she caved in his chest cavity.

The princess crushed the skull next, with none of the splattered blood sticking to her armor, glowing so bright it might as well have been made of gold.

With the largest threat dead, she floated above the battlefield, taking everything into account. Her allies destroyed the vast majority of the enemy forces, and the rest were either scattered around, running away, or trying to attack the church, where the priest she gave her ninth halo to was holding back the dwindling hordes.

The moment the demon died, the mark of Silence above the town faded away, and the princess took a breath, before raising her staff to the sky.

“Goddess above, let your light shine upon this town, and let your providence root out all traces of evil upon this good soil! Grant me your might so that I may bring justice to those lost today, and bring swift mercy to those foolish enough to sour your skies with their profane images!”

As she prayed, the dark clouds above parted violently, as rays of sunshine appeared, each lighting up one of the invaders, dispelling the darkness and the flames and the blood that hid their presence.

Divine reckoning would be delivered by Her Highness, Princess Aurelia of the Holy Kingdom of Aureaton.