“I see… You can go meet Tubrock now. Be sure to let me know if either of you need anything.” As soon as I said that, Ryone gave an eager nod, vanishing into a black mist that dispersed into the air. The mist was a new touch to her transportation…
* * *
In the plains surrounding Try’s Hold, a large herd of centaurs were gathering. Among them, there were only the normal breed, not a single variant. This was not unusual, as the variants were still much less common than a normal centaur. This particular herd was composed of nearly fifty, all of whom were armed with stone spears or wooden bows.
One among the crowd seemed to be arguing with the rest. A young centaur who had just turned of age a few moons ago. “Please, there must be another way.” He begged, looking to the older members of the herd for assistance. “This can’t be the answer.”
“This is the only answer.” The eldest says, his hair starting to gray. He walked unsteadily on his four legs, clearly showing his age. A scar crossed the right side of his chest, a wound from an earlier battle. “They are an abomination to our people and our god.”
“Greymane.” The youngling pleaded, looking to the elder that spoke. Greymane was not the man’s name, but a title he earned for living as long as he had. “How can they be an abomination to our god? You’ve heard the stories! Tryval once stood with the ‘cursed’, sheltering them.”
“Silence, boy!” The elder snarled out, reaching for his bow. “You don’t know what you’re talking about. Those are just stories made up by them to buy acceptance.” As he spoke, he grabbed a single arrow from the quiver on his back. “They preach of following Tryval’s teachings, to accept one another, yet they hide in their walls to disguise their shame.”
The boy wanted to continue talking, but he saw that the greymane was nocking the arrow on the bow, clearly intent on attacking him if he did not stand down. “I can’t agree to this.” He said simply, turning his body away. “I will follow the teachings. The plains are my home, and its people are my people.” As he spoke, he began to trot away. Not in the direction of the nearby city, but out into the open plains. He refused to look back, to choose either side in the coming battle.
“At least one knows.” A quiet voice seemed to be carried on the wind. The remaining centaurs all quickly turned to find a new person standing only a dozen meters from them. His blonde hair flowed down his back, his muscular body untainted by scar or dirt.
“Who are you?” The greymane asked, his hands still holding the bow and arrow. He had come too far and prepared too much for this attack to let it be ruined by an outsider.
“Nobody important.” The man spoke in a solemn voice, his steps slowly advancing. In his eyes could be found a trace of sorrow, and reluctance.
Seeing that the newcomer had no intention of identifying themselves or leaving, the greymane pulled his bowstring back, aiming at the man’s human heart. “Forgive me, Tryval, for what I must do for your people.” As he finished his prayer, he let the arrow loose from the bow, watching as it flew straight towards its target.
However, it was doomed to never hit. Just before the arrow arrived, he seemed to disappear, crossing the entire distance in a moment. “No.” He looked to the greymane, his hands covered in blood. Suddenly, two of the closest centaurs fell sideways to the ground, their heavy bodies crashing down. Each of them had two gaping wounds in their bodies. One was located at the left side of their human torso, while the other was at the front of their horse underbelly. The locations of the two hearts of a centaur.
“Kill him!” The greymane shouted, causing the others to all rush towards him. Men, women, even some smaller ones like the centaur that left earlier charged to the man. Arrows flew, spears were thrust, but the man simply stood there.
“I’m sorry.” He said in a small voice, his figure once again vanishing to appear in front of the greymane. This time, the blood covered all the way to his shoulders, and one of his hands were sticking through the greymane’s chest. “I can’t let you start a war. If they did it, I would do the same.”
As his voice fell, nothing answered him but the crashing of bodies. Every centaur that had gathered for this raid, regardless of age or gender, now littered the field. Like before, each had a pair of identical wounds on their bodies. For a centaur, losing one heart was crippling, but not lethal. They still had a chance to maintain their bodily functions to a degree. Losing both hearts or the head guaranteed an instant death. Instant, and painless.
Faint tears trickled down the man’s face as he released the greymane, who similarly crashed into the ground. For seemingly no reason, he turned his head to look at the sky. “I guess I have to leave for a while, now.”
Without removing the gore from his arms, he turned to walk off into the distance, nobody left to see his departure. Some hours later, a herd would pass over the area, concerned by the bloodstains littering the ground. By then, the bodies would have long since been lost, moved to a place where they could not cause trouble for either side. But, this was not a true solution. Whether it was the variants in Tryval’s Hold, or the centaurs that wandered the plains, tensions were rising.
* * *
“Hey Dale.” I turned and saw Terra greeting me as I sat on the couch in the living room of the Admin Room, not feeling the desire to do… well, anything really.
“Hey. Finally got Udona settled in?” I asked, only to see a trace of guilt crossing her face.
“Not… quite. I had to tell her a harsh truth, and she’ll probably need a couple days before she is ready to see anyone. But, Bihena said you were looking for me?” She smiled sadly, moving to sit next to me on the couch, leaning her body against me and holding me close.
“Yeah… Is there something you need to talk about?” Right now, she looked like someone desperate for a friend. My curiosity could wait until that was taken care of.
“It’s… The system can be a real jerk at times, you know?” She looked up to me, her eyes slightly watering. “You wanted her to be our sister, so that’s what it gave her. Memories of me, her, Keliope, and Accalia growing up together. Always alone, depending on each other. She had never known anyone besides the three of us, and in her mind the other two were already awoken.”
Terra gave a slight sniff, bringing a hand up to wipe her eyes. “And I had to tell her that none of that was real. That it was just something the system gave her to set a personality. That I had never spoken with her before today, and that her other two sisters had never said a word to anyone since their birth.”
I reached up, gently rubbing her back as I listened to her. “I’m sorry… I didn’t know that it would do something like that when I asked your permission. I thought it’d end up like any of the other gods.”
Terra nodded her head slightly. “I know, Dale. I don’t blame you. If I knew, I wouldn’t have agreed to it. But… I had to tell her. Otherwise, she would have hated all of us once she found the truth out herself. At least this way, there’s something left to salvage.”
I gave another nod, still rubbing her back. “Do you need to talk about it more?” It was obvious that doing this hurt her, and the fact that she might have to do the same thing two more times didn’t make it better.
“Just… let me stay like this for now.” She buried her head in my shoulder, speaking with a weaker voice than I had ever heard from her. In this kind of circumstance, I really couldn’t deny her this, so I let her silently cry against me for as long as she wanted. My questions could wait a little while longer.
Chapter 60
Terra and I stayed like that for over an hour, before she calmed down enough to talk to me. From there, she was happy to answer my questions about divine energy. She had just needed some time to get over what had happened with Udona.
Apparently, divine energy such that I can feel is not the same divine energy that the gods and goddesses wield. Rather, it is the raw power from which they draw strength. Likewise, divine energy can’t be obtained from worshipping any single god. From w
hat she said, it is only possible to unlock the Cleric class, which uses this energy, by equally praying to and drawing energy from multiple gods.
To no surprise to anyone, it was actually a beastkin that earned this class first. Though, not a felyn like I had been expecting, but a kitsune. According to Terra’s search, only two clerics had been born into the world, and of those only one was still alive.
As for the other energy, which I had no clue about at all, Terra identified it as Karma. When I bought the karma system to help Irena before, I had caused the world to begin creating karmic energies. But, this was a rather strange energy, from what she said.
“For a mortal, karma is not something that can be controlled. Even for those that feel it, it is simply an omnipresent force at work in the background of the world. Even for gods, it is difficult to directly affect karma. I might be able to do it with my Fate domain, but none of our others would.”
After saying it like that, Terra seemed to sink into thought. “For this game system… think of karma as an invisible multiplier to luck. Someone with terrible karma, such as a mass murdering villain, will eventually have terrible things happen to them even if they have a high luck stat. On the other hand, someone who goes out of their way to help anyone in need, at no regard for their own safety, might be incredibly fortunate even without a high luck stat.”
Before I could ask what I wanted to, she gave me a small smile, nodding her head knowingly. “Yes, as the Keeper you are able to directly change a person’s karma through the system. But why would you? What could one tiny mortal do that would merit that attention?”
“True…” I nodded in response. “Still, it’s good to know exactly what these energies are. Though, I have to ask. If divine energy is gained by drawing power from multiple gods, then why don’t I have the cleric job already? I mean, I did quests to become a priest for all of you.”
Terra’s smile faded slightly, shaking her head. “Because you’ve never actually drawn power from us. You never had to. With your own power, you have never been in a really difficult situation that made you ask us for help. Thanks to that… it’s unlikely if you would have ever gotten that job without someone else appearing to show you how.”
She did seem to have a point, and I had to agree. The most difficult situation I’ve been in was my fight against the pride of lions. And even then, I had massively outclassed them in levels. Had it not been for the fact that my Keeper levels are all over the place, I would have been able to take care of them all without getting injured at all.
“I see…” I was just about to continue asking when I heard slow steps approaching the room. Turning out of curiosity I saw Udona, still holding her arms close to her chest as if to protect them.
When she saw who had entered the room, Terra immediately jumped up off the couch with a worried expression. “Udona, are you alright?” She had already said that she did not expect the kitsune goddess to come out of her room for a while, yet here she was in front of her.
Udona gave a bitter smile to Terra, but did not shy away from her when she approached. “I’m… okay. No, I’m not, but still. I wanted to ask for something, if that’s alright.”
The catgirl goddess nodded her head quickly. “Of course, anything you need. Just ask.”
Udona giggled slightly, her face relaxing momentarily. “No, sis… Terra. Not from you.” Then, she turned her head to look at me, her body tensing up slightly. “Him. I want to ask him for something.”
This surprised both myself and Terra, but the catgirl quickly looked to me with pleading eyes, so I nodded my head. “What do you want?” I asked, honestly curious what could get her out of her room so quickly.
“Uhm… I want, I want you to awaken Accalia and Keliope. You should be able to do that, right?” As she asked, she saw Terra’s worried expression, smiling slightly to her. Bringing one arm away from herself, she pulled Terra in for a gentle hug. “I know that we’re not really sisters. Still, I can’t help but be sad if I know that the two of them are standing there like mindless puppets. Besides, this is all I really know. So, for now at least, can I keep treating you as my big sister?”
Terra looked at her in surprise, her eyes watering slightly. However, she soon gave a brief nod, smiling happily. “Of course you can. I’d love to have you as my sister, Udona. But… we need to be careful with the other two. I don’t want to have to make them go through what you did… I don’t want to go through having to explain it all again like that.”
Udona seemed to understand this, pulling Terra in for a closer hug. “I know, sis. I wouldn’t want that either. Do you know how to make it so that it won’t be a problem?”
Terra thought about it for a long moment. “There might be a way. They won’t have any memories of a past together like you do, but they’d still see the two of us as family.”
Her words made Udona’s expression falter, though she quickly recovered. “I see. It’s probably for the best, isn’t it?” I couldn’t imagine just what she was going through in her mind right now. But, I could at least agree to this request.
The only reason that I had been awakening one god or goddess at a time was to give each a chance to adjust to the situation before bringing in another. With Keliope and Accalia being the only two remaining, and their setting being that of sisters, it made sense to awaken them together. Though, seeing how Udona had initially reacted, I was glad that I did not awaken them all at the same time.
Terra squirmed her way out of Udona’s arm, albeit reluctantly, and moved over to me again. “Okay… I’m going to write down some instructions to use as a personality framework. In order to not give the system any chance of implanting false memories to create the personality we want, we have to be as specific as possible, and not leave any room for interpretation.”
Compared to when she was talking to Udona, or even me before she showed up, Terra’s voice right now was serious. A clipboard appeared in her hands, on which she began rapidly writing with a pen she materialized. Only when she was finished did she hand it to me to read.
Going through what she had written, I honestly did not understand most of it. If I had to compare it to anything, it would be the notes of a psychiatrist regarding a detailed study on their patient. Rather than an outline for a personality to create, this read more like a description of someone that had already been interacted with. Though, strangely any reference to a past was cut off. Their physical age was listed as ‘one month’, while their mental and emotional ages were twenty years for Accalia, and eighteen for Keliope.
Still, I continued to do my best to read through it, wanting to at least partly understand what I would be putting into the system. There were repeated references in both of their ‘reviews’ that mentioned a strong familial connection to both Udona and Terra, as well as each other, yet no mention of memories or past experiences with them. Perhaps, most surprising to me, each one also had an entry where they held a high degree of trust towards myself.
Glancing up to Terra, I saw that she nodded with a confident smile. “The system decides things too randomly to be a hundred percent sure, but this should eliminate the options for it to add in troublesome memories. I included basic information into each one that they would need in order to manage their domains.”
I had noticed that, and it seemed well written. “Okay… go call everyone here. This is the last time we’ll awaken a god for the foreseeable future, so it’s a special occasion.” Meanwhile, I closed my eyes to focus on the world menu, so that I could pause the world as a whole. That way, Irena would be able to attend as well.
Once that was done, I began expanding the living room, so that I could accommodate everyone easily. This would be the first time that everyone was truly in the same place at the same time, after all. The closest until now would be when we had our meeting the other day, but now we had even more gods, some of whom wouldn’t even have met each other.
I created a small, wooden stage in the center of the room, watching it rise f
rom the floor. Around it were several sets of stairs leading up, with plenty of illumination both on the stage and around it. I thought about making chairs, but given Tryval’s appearance I decided against it. Having only one person unable to sit down would seem a tad unfair, in my mind.
As I finished setting the stage, the ‘guests’ began arriving. To my surprise, the first to appear was Tryval, though his hair had changed from black to blonde, going down the middle of his back. His eyes seemed to cast a dark shadow over his face, showing that something had happened to him while he was descended. I’d have to look into that later, see if there was anything major. He didn’t say anything to me as he silently moved to stand next to the stage.
Next was Aurivy, no real surprise there. She came skipping in with a smile on her face, and practically tackled Terra with a hug. “Hey, sis! How’s it--oh, sorry!” She quickly backed away with her hands over her mouth when she noticed Udona standing next to her, the kitsune having flinched from the halfling’s sudden approach. “Uhm… are you feeling better, miss?”
Udona did her best to relax after Aurivy calmed down and addressed her, nodding her head somewhat. “A bit… I just want my sisters to be together.”
When she heard that, Aurivy had a rather sad look on her face, glancing between Terra and Udona. Then, she approached Udona with her hands held together in front of her legs. “Uhm… Udona? If you’d like… would you let me be your sister too?”
World Keeper: Birth of a World Page 45
