Ekological Chimera
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Chapter 8 - Talking Star
🕑 Added 2024-09-18 19:16:56 +0000 UTCThe Custodian stood in one of the Temple’s courtyards, watching the thirty-seven silent knights in front of her. She wore her customary white robe and held an intricate silver pendant in her hand. The silver formed an eye, with an embedded blue sapphire serving as a pupil, glimmering in the sun. Her eyes shined with a gentle silver glow as she monitored not only the courtyard, but the entirety of the temple and beyond.
The courtyard itself stood right next to the First Temple, north of Serana’s tower. The debris from the explosion had long been cleared, though the damage on the walls caused by the falling rubble wouldn’t let anyone present forget for a long time.
She watched as Knight Commander Aisac Ferrier moved through the lined-up knights, distributing pendants identical to the one she held. Each knight accepted the jewellery with reverence.
The Custodian had ordered them assembled for this very reason. They were the best and most loyal members of the church, gathered from around the continent in the past weeks.
She had to significantly reassess the situation after the assassination attempt. In hindsight, it all seemed rather obvious. It would hardly be the first time she saw new technology spread across the world. Yet it still took an assassin for her to truly understand what that meant, this time.
The entire debacle brought some disquieting truths to the surface. The knights would no longer be enough. The Terran weapons were simply too powerful.
That was unacceptable. It threatened the entire system.
The Custodian could never enforce the entirety of the Eternal Laws alone. Too many people lived on Eigos. Never mind the continent, even just a single kingdom had too many criminals for her to personally handle. One could always count on humanity to produce more rapists, child molesters and other scum.
Even the support of the church wasn’t enough. The kingdoms had to cooperate as well, enforcing the Laws in their respective territories. The church made sure they did their duty diligently, while also making sure the general populace knew the Laws were just and proper.
Needlessly complicated, perhaps. She could have seized control of everything and forced her will on them all. Eternity knew that no one could have stopped her. She had done so in the past, after all. Her first attempt to systematically enforce the Laws.
It worked well, for a time. Eventually, the people forgot the tyrants their ancestors laboured under and started blaming her for their problems.
A ruler could never make everyone happy. It had been an important lesson to learn. Be it natural disasters or man-made ones, they blamed her for it all. As she was nearly synonymous with the Eternal Laws, the people slowly grew contemptuous of them too.
So she had stepped down. Soon the people grumbled about the good old days when she used to rule, but Serana no longer cared, seeing the entire venture as a failure. She had adopted a lighter touch, afterwards.
The current system only arose after much trial and error. It had worked almost perfectly for a long time. Still did. The people blamed the kings for their troubles and praised her and the church for upholding the Laws.
Yet all of it worked only because of the respect and fear the royals and nobles held towards the church. The Terran weapons were guaranteed to destroy that status quo.
Her knights needed to not only equal the best soldiers on the continent but surpass them, lest those far away from her think themselves safe. Even acquiring Terran weapons would not be enough for that, as long as others possessed them too.
Unless she intervened.
Therefore, the pendants. They would allow the thirty-seven knights and Aisac to channel Eternity’s power, in a roundabout way.
Serana had no better alternative.
Soon, the last knight received his pendant and Aisac moved back to her side. The Knight Commander’s face was grim, yet Serana could see the excitement in his eyes.
She turned to face the arrayed knights, towering over even the tallest ones.
“The world is changing, my loyal knights,” Serana’s soft voice spoke, spreading throughout the silent courtyard.
“You will change along with it, to better serve Eternity,” Serana continued, raising the silver pendant she held.
All the knights and even the usually stoic Aisac stared at the trinket, enraptured.
The men that died searching the city below for the assassin’s accomplices weighed heavily on the Knight Commander’s mind, she knew. Less so their demise, for he was no stranger to death, and more their helplessness in front of the novel weapons.
He would have died just like them, unable to do his duty properly, and was well aware of the fact.
“This pendant shall allow you to make use of Eternity’s power,” She said.
The small amount their bodies could handle, anyway.
“You are the first ones to be granted this honour in centuries.”
The next moment the radiance in her eyes intensified and all the pendants started to shine with a silver glow. Many of the knights lost their composure, gasping, as they felt the power coursing through their bodies.
A rather crude method of teaching, yet an effective one. The Temple Knights only needed to learn to channel the power through the pendant, a simple task. Finer control would come later.
Actually supplying the power depended on her. She served as a conduit between the artifacts and Eternity every time any of the pendants were used.
As such, much of the process rested on her shoulders, hence the limited number of pendants. Compared to the knights, her capacity could only be described as massive, yet even she had limits.
The source itself was functionally inexhaustible, however. The power of the Goddess defied comprehension.
When it came to using it, her body and control were the only limits. The same would apply to the knights.
The amount they could handle would not be large, but such things are relative. It would be enough to deal with the new weaponry.
“Feel Her divine power, memorize the sensation of its flow,” Serana lectured.
A minute later, the glow disappeared. The knights stood frozen and many of them held their hands over the pendants.
Aisac was the first to recover, his eyes quickly settling on her once again.
Soon the rest followed, and the Custodian continued, “Now, draw it out on your own, concentrate.”
The Custodian watched as the knights struggled to replicate the technique. They could not compare to true blessed, but that could not be helped. They would need to learn the old-fashioned way.
There were a few positives to that. Unlike someone blessed, all of their power would have to go through her. This meant that she’d have absolute control over their use of it while also shouldering much of the burden. Fortunately, she had had a lot of practice. Unless they all acted in concert, she would barely feel the strain.
Even if all of them utilised their pendants to the maximum, she would still be able to handle more than enough power for anything she could imagine.
Though perhaps she’d find her imagination lacking. The stars above were vast and terrible, now more so than ever.
Time passed and more and more pendants lit up, the glow of Serana’s eyes increasing minutely with each success.
After an hour, the last of the knights managed the feat.
Next, Serana planned to teach them some of the basic ways to utilize Eternity’s gift. In a few days, they would be capable of not only augmenting their own strength, but also shielding themselves and others.
Greatly mitigating the advantage of Terran weapons.
Yet before she could continue, the Custodian noticed an intruder. A woman in the clothes of a pilgrim approached the temple, however, her gait hinted at martial training and her features were foreign.
Serana’s eyes flashed as she investigated the suspicious pilgrim.
“Commander Ferrier,” Serana turned to Aisac, “A woman in brown robes is approaching the Temple. Take four men and bring her to my guest room, politely.”
Aisac moved to comply while casting a few glances at her.
Serana rolled her eyes and spoke to the gathered knights, “We will continue this later. For now, continue to practice using the pendants. This takes precedence over all your other duties.”
The knights saluted and started dispersing, silent.
Serana herself strode towards the tower, her focus never once wavering as she kept watch over her surroundings, paying special attention to the intruder. She would not be caught unaware again.
At least not until the current situation was dealt with and her focus wavered once again over the following decades.
She chuckled quietly at the thought. Long ago she had thought Eternity’s gifts to be too much. Would a little bit of vigilance not suffice for most dangers? Only centuries later she had understood the true threat of immortality, quite impressed by her patron’s foresight.
The path to her guest rooms offered no surprises and so she soon sat at the room’s table, watching the pilgrim’s progress. The woman had not offered any resistance when Aisac reached her and was currently being escorted to the tower, giving Serana time to study her.
Not that she could tell much, at this distance. Yet even the little she saw was rather suspicious. She would be able to tell more once she could see the pilgrim up close.
Before long, a knock resounded and Aisac entered the marble room.
The woman entered after him, allowing the Custodian examine her in detail.
She stood barely to Aisac’s shoulders, nearly half the Custodian’s own height, but her steps resounded with surprising strength, as if belonging to someone both larger and heavier. She wore her chestnut hair cut short and her eyes were brown, matching her brown robes.
Her plain appearance did not draw Serana’s attention, unlike the many strange incongruences. The woman blinked at the exact same intervals, her heartbeat similarly regular. Her eyes were vacant, yet she walked with confidence and precision. The supposedly cheap pilgrim robes were both clean and perfectly symmetrical, a near impossibility for a sewn garment.
While Serana scrutinized her, the brown-robed woman responded in kind, unashamedly looking the Custodian over.
The Custodian motioned for her to sit, while she shooed Aisac and the guards away with a head gesture. Just in case the woman proved explosive. Serana could have likely protected them in such a scenario, but felt no need to tempt fate.
After the woman sat, she continued staring for a few more minutes. Though she needed to crane her head quite a bit upwards, lest she stare at the Custodian’s chest.
Serana let her, content with the silence.
Finally, the false pilgrim spoke,
“You aren’t human, are you?”
