Paladin 4: Chapter 12

Darren and his forces spent the next week scouting the area, securing their supply lines, and generally preparing Neverhorn to serve as the citadel it once was.

Sasha made deals with merchants in Yellowcrest to send over anything that wasn’t already on the way by ship. Soon, the ports of Salsroth would be repaired enough for the Silver Sword Merchant company’s transport fleet to start docking there. That would make ferrying supplies easier and do a lot to help revitalize the destroyed city simultaneously.

But Darren was growing increasingly anxious as he saw no signs of Kalaziel. Only his prudence and the desire to ensure his people were protected and ready kept him from charting into Eastwood himself. Kalaziel might be hoping he’d do just that and might have set a trap in Eastwood accordingly.

If the Prime Saint thought he could get rid of Darren just like that, he had another thing coming for him.

Darren had Sasha send his subordinates out in all directions, scouring the land as they advanced slowly eastward. There were definite signs of demonic activity, but nothing as powerful as the Demon Lord he’d killed to save that small village Lady Gwen and her people lived in.

These little sources of Demonic Aura confused Darren all the more. If the seraphim were present in large numbers, they would drive all the Demonic Aura away. Kalaziel might have had a deal with the Circle of Archdemons to secure the Sinful Servants for the Order of the Rod, but he had no such deal with the rogue minor demons springing up in the area.

Everything Darren knew said these demons should be attacking any divine presence with all their might or fleeing for their lives. There were only two possibilities. Either Kalaziel and his forces weren’t in Eastwood at all, or they had something like Darren’s cloak to hide their presence.

After cutting the demonic population in the territory, they scouted down to nothing, their forces encroached ever closer to the one official remaining settlement of the Eastwood Kingdom, Castingwatch. It was the capital and the only bastion of civilization in this ruined wilderness land. Here, the last surviving daughter of the Eastwood royal family served as a puppet of Whiteguard.

While Kalaziel might be able to afford a few cloaks like Darren’s for his subordinates of the seraphim, surely he wouldn’t be able to do the same for members of the Order of the Rod in the city. The map and information Darren had gotten from Gwen told him they had their own quarters within the new palace and were a frequent sight in the city, as they made their rule known.

Like in the Blackwind Empire, they’d completely replaced the Eastwood royal family’s military and personal guard with men and women from their order, so there was no way they could be in hiding.

“The city of Castingwatch doesn’t appear to have as large an Order of the Rod contingent as we believed...” Sasha picked up a few miniature wooden swordsmen from the city meant to represent the Order of the Rod and moved them off the map.

“So it would seem.” Darren stroked his chin. “We need to infiltrate the city.”

Sasha’s eyes lit up. “Good idea. I will ask for volunteers among the holy adepts. We can get a team of five furnished with fake merchant goods, and they can pretend to be a small wandering caravan looking to trade goods. It will be a good excuse to get them into the city. Then, the moment they’re in there, you can look through their eyes and look for any signs of divine or demonic presence yourself.”

Darren had initially intended to put his cloak on and check the place out himself, but he was still getting used to having subordinates who could do that kind of work themselves. Reluctantly, he decided Sasha’s idea was better. If this was a trap, Kalaziel wouldn’t waste it on a couple of holy adepts, giving Darren that much more time to get the lay of the land.

Sasha found six men and women eager to volunteer. They’d served as a team on several scouting missions already. With a small cargo ship and a few goods, they appeared to be exactly what a band of traveling merchants might look like. Sure, they were armed, and a few carried their sigils openly, but this was a dangerous land, and nobody without that kind of power would dare make this kind of journey, even by ship.

After that, Darren merely had to wait and see. With Morgana, Sasha, and Asuriel all lingering close at hand, the days passed far quicker than they should have. He also spent time upgrading his Lifewell.

Limitless Evolution: Item Evolution

Lifewell (Epic) has evolved to Fountain of Youth (Mythic)

• This fountain generates a large amount of water that heals and repairs living tissue to its most unblemished state. Drinking the liquid it creates rapidly restores lost limbs and organs, temporarily blessing them with healing powers that can pour over and grant them a minor healing ability to aid those around them. The water can restore youth and vitality indefinitely and grants biological immortality through frequent use.

Darren nodded in approval. The healing effect and the amount of water the item could produce had been dramatically enhanced, which were the two main things he was hoping for. Keeping him and his favorite women spry and youthful enough to keep breaking bed frames every night was just a bonus, though the Blackwind Emperor would certainly have been desperate to get his hands on an item like this.

If Darren had this a year ago, he might have even been able to get the Blackwind Emperor to kick out Whiteguard and side with him instead, though that would require getting to the Emperor back when he was still thinking for himself.

But unlike the Blackwind Emperor, Darren wasn’t astonished by biological immortality. Darren knew that if he was going to die, it would probably be in battle long before his lifespan ran out. For his purposes, the healing effects were more important.

The only thing troublesome was that the Lifewell had gotten quite big after its evolution. It was a fountain now, and its appearance had changed accordingly. It was as wide as a dining table, with water pouring out a spout in the top. The water trickled down carvings of old women that slowly turned younger and younger as the water reached the basin at the bottom.

The pool was large enough to fill a hundred of his old Lifewells, which would be good for healing a mob of exhausted prisoners. But it would be difficult to whip this thing out in the middle of a battle to take a sip, which was what Darren was most concerned about.

Restore Fountain of Youth to flask form?

Fortunately, the item was powerful enough to have that feature built-in as well. When he selected that option on his sigil, the fountain vanished in a shimmering blast of light and then shrank down into the familiar form of his Lifewell. Darren worried it had lost its new abilities in its condensed form, but a quick taste told him otherwise.

Darren called in a few older men and women from the citadel staff to help him test his fountain of youth, since he wanted to be sure it didn’t turn people into babies. He could imagine standing on the battlefield guarding a band of a hundred mewling infants from a hoard of demons because he hadn’t tested the fountain ahead of time.

Fortunately, some settings let him adjust that sort of thing from his sigil. It looked like twelve years old or so was the youngest he could set the water to go, though Darren wanted something closer to his early twenties. A couple of the older women had other ideas.

“Wait! I need to be to fit into one of those sexy maid uniforms that all the girls in the citadel are prancing around in. Set it a bit on the younger side,” a gray-haired woman pleaded.

“Me as well! I’ve seen the way those dashing young holy adepts are eying those maids!”

One of the older men coughed. “Say, how old would you say is the average holy adept recruit? You know, the guys just starting out. I see the way those maids are eying those holy adepts...”

The fountain of youth became surprisingly popular with everyone in the citadel, and just about, everyone wanted to be part of Darren’s tests with it. He used it on everyone, from ordinary humans to a fourth-order archpriestess. By the time news finally came in that their spies had finally reached Castingwatch, just about everyone in the citadel had drunk their fill. Darren had to put it away. Otherwise, it would be hard to convince next week’s arrivals that these were their commanding officers.

***

The following night was extremely noisy, with many moans and creaking beds echoing through the citadel halls. Darren used the time to look through the eyes of the holy adepts in Castingwatch.

The city had a rustic wilderness feel to it. Everything was made of wood, some of it sawn and cut to size, while many others were simply enormous logs laid atop one another. The sturdy wall around the city was little more than a bunch of tree trunks buried in the dirt to form a palisade.

Saws echoed up and down the streets, most pulled by hand, but a few of the bigger ones ran off water wheels lining the stream along the city’s northern side. Castingwatch sprawled as wide as Limedeep, though people weren’t as densely packed. There was enough room for small gardens scattered around the various houses.

Darren had heard that Castingwatch was entirely dependent on food from Whiteguard in exchange for their lumber to survive, but it looked like a few of the locals had at least tried their hands at growing their food locally. Unfortunately, the number of paths to the Seven Hells north of the city and the number of minor demons already roaming the surface would have made regular farming both extremely risky and extremely dangerous, which meant their gardens would help vary their diets, but they were still very much dependent on trade for staples like grains.

There was a stark contrast in housing in the city as well. Most houses had a crude and rustic log cabin look, usually with the bark still on their sides. But north of the river, the houses grew many times larger. The houses had four or five stories, smooth painted walls, and an air of craftsmanship the others lacked. Many of the houses were hanging banners from Whiteguard, clearly displaying their allegiance.

“No demons. No seraph...” Darren muttered as he flicked through the eyes of each of the holy adepts. They’d separated into three pairs of two as they scoured the city. Ostensibly, they were trying to contact local merchants to set up trade deals, but in truth, they were looking for information.

Three of them had sensory enhancement skills, and with Darren’s skill, he could push what they saw to a new level. But even then, he saw no sign of his enemies. Eventually, one of the holy adepts he was observing through struck up a conversation with one of the locals, a matronly woman trawling through the modest garden in front of her bakery, with her ovens cold and empty behind her.

“Aye, things are a bit rough now.” She tore a carrot from the ground, scowling at its modest size. “Whiteguard tripled the price of grain overnight, and I can’t bake bread for a price people are willing to pay.”

“Why would they do that to you?” the holy adept Darren was looking through asked.

The woman shrugged. “People started getting a little rowdy last week when half the garrison from Whiteguard went home with the last grain shipment. After her majesty the queen died in the last demon attack, a few fools said it was time to rise up and let Eastwood rule itself again. Those fools didn’t realize one paladin in armor with a sword can chop the heads off a hundred regular men armed with frying pans and pitchforks without even breaking a sweat. Their little rebellion failed miserably the first time, and then they went and did it again. They should have known this was going to happen...”

“Thank you. Perhaps the Silver Sword Merchant Company can start selling grain here. We’ll have to tell the chain of command how high the prices are here.”

The woman scoffed. “As if Whiteguard would let your ship dock.”

“Farewell, good lady.”

“I ain’t no lady! And you take care now! Many people in the city have been falling ill with some new sickness. We’ve been calling it blight touched! Turns your skin cold and dead looking. Nasty stuff.”

“I will be careful.”

Darren heard similar stories from the other holy adepts talking to the locals. Everywhere, people were hungry and somewhere between frightened and angry. But the most interesting part of the story to him was that they all mentioned similar details about the warriors from Whiteguard. Many of them had left the city just a week prior, leaving nothing more than a skeleton force behind to keep order.

Everyone wondered what could have happened to draw them home in such a hurry. Darren was wondering the same thing.

***

Darren relayed what he saw to Sasha the following morning and shared his frustrations with her.

“We’re being smart about this, remember?” Sasha wrapped a hand around his side while they lay together in bed, head resting against his shoulder. “Be patient.”

“You’re right...” Darren muttered. He just didn’t like the idea that he didn’t understand what his enemies were up to. When were they going to fight?

Morgana nuzzled against Darren’s other shoulder. “I know this is terrible for you. You like to be all knowledgeable and in control and stuff. But I’m excited about the mystery. What’s going to happen? Are they going to attack Limedeep while we’re away? The Blackwind Empire? The fear is making my heart race...”

At Morgana’s words, Darren hastily checked in on some of the sigil wielders in Limedeep and the Blackwind Empire. But there was no sign of Kalaziel or his agents there.

“You should smack her in the rear for making you worry, Darren!” Asuriel said from where she sat on top of stomach.

“If we start again this early, I’ll get nothing done all day,” Darren replied. As much fun as his women were, they had a way of keeping him from his duties.

So Darren forced himself out of bed. He and Callum were meeting up for a few minor quests again. None of them really should have warranted Darren’s attention, but he wanted to keep tracking Callum’s progress so he would be able to elevate his friend the moment he was ready for the fourth order.

But the moment he got out of bed, a new quest flashed before his eyes.

Quest Available!

Cleanse the undead outbreak in Castingwatch! (Hard)

He turned to his women, each of whom sat upright at the same moment he had.

“Did you all get a new quest?” Sasha asked.

Darren nodded.

“Yep.”

“The one about undead?”

Darren hadn’t been the only one looking through the eyes of those holy adepts. He sometimes felt his mother’s presence somewhere in the sigil network, though he’d never been able to truly communicate with her. But he felt her hand in this new quest. And the fact that she sent it out to everyone could only mean that she was trying to get his attention.

Darren closed his eyes and focused on his sigil again, bringing his attention back to the senses of the holy adepts he’d been looking through just a moment before.

The first thing he heard was screaming. He flicked through the vision of each of the six holy adepts until he found someone going to investigate. People were running in all directions. Some grabbed whatever they could use as makeshift weapons, while others simply fled as fast as they could.

“Form a circle! Don’t let them out into the rest of the city!” A man said as he tore free one of the tent poles to his fruit stand and wielded it like a spear.

“Where are those damn paladins from Whiteguard when you need them? Someone run to the palace and tell them there’s undead in the city!” A woman shouted as she tore her frying pan off the fire, dumped out the food she was cooking, and then wielded it like a weapon.

Next to her stood a man with a felling axe, ready to chop the zombies shambling toward them like cutting down trees.

The makeshift militia held the line when a zombie lunged toward the woman with a frying pan. The rotting corpse’s exposed teeth went for the woman’s neck, but she blocked with her skillet, giving the man beside her a chance he needed to split the zombie’s skull open with his axe.

Nearby, the man with the tent pole jammed his stick right through a zombie’s eye socket. With the undead firmly stuck on his stick, he forced it over to the nearby fire pit and jammed the undead into the blaze. He held it there while its skin turned crisp and only fell back when his pole started burning.

But there were more zombies wherever these came from, and while they could handle two, they couldn’t handle ten. That was when the holy adept Darren was watching the scene through made his presence known.

“Stick behind me!” he shouted, finger pointed at one of the zombies. The people standing around turned their gazes toward him as he unleashed a fist-sized ball of white fire.

The white fire leaped from his outstretched finger to the zombie’s skull, instantly engulfing the entire undead in a brilliant white blaze. When the fire faded, the zombie collapsed to the ground, and laid to rest at last.

The holy adept fired three more bursts of power in quick succession, felling a zombie with each blow. Sensing they had someone with real power among them, the locals grouped around the holy adept.

“Are you with Whiteguard?” the woman with the frying pan asked.

“No, I’m from Limedeep.”

“I don’t care where you’re from, but if you can get these undead bastards off us, lead the way!” the man with the burned pole said. They all looked at him with bright and hopeful eyes.

But Darren sensed something the holy adept didn’t. There was something deadly and powerful coming their way, and it wasn’t something this holy adept could face. The clouds overhead darkened to herald its arrival, and the shadows stretched longer, and the black within them deepened. Miasma filled the air, giving it all the rich evil aura of the Sixth Layer of Hell.

The people didn’t even have the chance to see what killed them. Only the holy adept lived long enough for that. A towering skeleton of the size and wearing the armor of a paladin emerged from the ruins of a nearby building. He wielded a massive sword, and with one swing, he slaughtered the entire group of humans. The holy adept Darren was watching through summoned a shield to ward off the fatal blow, but it was only barely enough to save his own life, and he lost his left arm in the process.

“Back!” the holy adept yelled, blood dripping down the sides of his lips. He fired his white flame again, but Darren knew it was no use. The hulking undead ran him through with his sword.

Darren opened his eyes and deactivated the feed from his sigil. That had been a Death Knight, created from a former paladin. And from the look of its armor, it had been a paladin of Whiteguard. Odds were, whoever this was had once been part of the local garrison.

Darren issued an addendum to the quest his mother sent out and gave the five remaining holy adepts the quest to regroup and find shelter while saving as many of the locals as they could.

“Tell everyone I’m headed to Castingwatch.”

“Nope. You’ll have to find somebody else to tell everyone because we’re headed with you!” Sasha declared.

“Yeah! Let’s go kick some undead ass!” Asuriel pumped a fist.