ROD - Chapter 119

Chapter One-Hundred-Nineteen – Acolyte – Part Three

The difference between a want and a need is often subjective.

-UWO Staff Sergeant Mwangi-

“Goddamn cultist witches are the worst, Acolytes of utter bullshit. This one time, I burned down a coven full of…” Carl pauses seeing my expression, “Right, send your message and then the war chest.” I move forward to go past the hedges, “Don’t go past the gnomes, that’s the secondary boundary line, you’ll end up in a field in Kansas if you do that.”

As I pass the hedges completely I see a line that shimmers on the ground, evenly spaced are garden gnomes, each looks unique and hand painted like it was someone’s hobby for a few years. Though based on the paint outside the lines, I don’t think they ever really mastered it.

The mana in the air shifts ever so slightly as I step into the outer bounds of the wards. Pings from my notifications interface draw my attention. Messages, hundreds of them from almost all of the team members that I exchanged contacts with. I scroll through and find Cortez’s.

[ Cortez: Jimmy, where the fuck are you? ]

The messages go on for another forty, all of them sentimental and worried. Until I see something that stands out as strange.

[ Cortez: They’ve ordered us to rendezvous in New York. We’re all to meet up there. I sent you the rally coordinates. Mother’s orders.

Please be okay… I love you. ]

Her mom’s orders. I don’t think her mother would send her directly into danger, but if what Karen said is true and the Marauders own the UWO, and those orders came from someone above her, I don’t know if I trust it. At the same time, I can assume that her boss isn’t, or wasn’t a Marauder agent, since they didn’t tell them I was the candidate. At least there’s that. No telling now, too many things at play to risk trusting an unknown entity.

I send a reply to her.

[ Novak: Get Gilroy and go somewhere else, somewhere far away from wherever your mom tells you. Tell no one where you are going. I’ll come for you after this is all over. Ajax is a Marauder, and your mom might be giving orders from them unknowingly. UWO is compromised. Enact Tenny’s quarantine protocol. ]

I wait for five minutes, there’s no reply, she might be sleeping though. Me and Clayton haven’t slept since the Respec quest ended. Hopefully she’s just sleeping.

Fucking hell. I send Tenny a message too, telling her the gist of the situation. She actually already had worked on a plan with Fisban, in case our chain of command became compromised.

I wait another three minutes, passing through messages, until I get a response from someone.

[ Gilroy: We’re on a flight to New York right now for the rendezvous, Cortez is asleep.

Do you want me to wake her up? ]

Fuck…

[ Novak: How long until you land? ]

Worry threads.

[ Gilroy: We just took off an hour ago, so maybe six and a half hours. Did you hear they attacked the WSA too? It’s fucking chaos. ]

Just like Karen said. They attacked both.

[ Novak: Don’t wake her up. Get some sleep, there isn’t anything you can do until you land. I’ll meet you at the airport. An hour before you land, brief Cortez, don’t tell anyone else. The less that know, the better. Especially do not tell a suit. The UWO may be compromised. ]

Less than a minute later I get a ping.

[ Gilroy: How compromised? ]

My brow furrows.

[ Novak: Very. Also, don’t trust Ajax, he’s one of them. Use your discretion on who to tell. We don’t want to tip our hand yet and let them know. If you see him, be very wary, you and Cortez are his targets. ]

After a few more exchanges with worried people and Greymore I close my interface and kneel. My hands move in the way that are required to activate my skill.

“Goddess of Fate, Seraphine, I call upon thy blessing and ask for your runic pacts so that I may do your will.”

[ Skill Runic Pact Activated ]

The wind stirs and she appears in a flowing dress that sparkles in the rising sun’s light. Sera peers at me as I kneel, her face placid like an ocean without a current. What is she thinking? Why did she help me? What is her game?

It doesn’t matter. I need shit from her. That’s what my focus turns to.

“You were the first I called this time,” I breathe, staying on my knees.

She traces around me slowly, examining me, then her eyes shift toward the warded zone. She speaks out loud as she says, “Your world practices peculiar magics it would seem.”

Peculiar? Interesting that she noted that.

“Why have you called?” she asks, moving her finger to my chin and tipping my head up to look into her bright red eyes.

“I need your help.”

She releases my chin, turning she says, “I gathered that much.”

A silence hangs for a moment.

“Look, I don’t know exactly why you’re helping me now when you used to fuck me over religiously, honestly I don’t even care. If you’re going to help me, then give me what I need.”

She looks at me curiously, there’s a certain graceful placidness in her face, just like Ulana.

“I need that intelligence buff that Ulana gave me. I’d wager you can do the same thing.”

She muses it for a few seconds before saying, “She did not give you a normal intelligence boost.”

“Meaning?”

Sera looks towards the sun directly, her white hair gleaming in it, “She increased your base natural intelligence. A forbidden technique to give to mortals. Lest they rise to conquer the heavens. Even gods are not meant to pass a certain threshold. Lest we destroy ourselves, or so it is written.” She smiles a strange smile, “Curiously, the ones who wrote the warning are all dead.”

There’s silence for a few moments again before I break it.

“So, you’re not going to give it to me?”

“No, I am not.”

“Unsurprising.”

She turns and looks at me sideways for a moment before returning to the sun, “Because you still think me your enemy?”

“No,” I sigh, stretching my neck and standing up, “It was a long shot, I figured Ulana was stronger than you. Which means anything she did is probably too much juice for you to replicate. She’s certainly braver as well. If I had to guess, given your white hair and similar blunted elflike ears, you’re sisters, or at least cousins… maybe even fraternal twins or something. A goddess of death and a goddess of fate. Seem pretty connected to me. Everyone’s fated to die after all.”

Light blooms in her crimson eyes yet she says nothing. Guess I was right.

My stride is swift as I move back toward the estate, “I guess she got the better genes.”

“Marauder…” she says with an even tone, yet on the edge of it, I feel the sharpness.

My feet pause but I don’t look back at her.

“You’re quite the specimen, aren’t you?” she muses, she moves to be next to my ear, soft as a whisper she says, “I think I understand why she chose you.”

“Oh?”

The air gusts and a notification appears in my vision. Red text wrapped in gold energy.

[ Major Blessing Status Effect Gained ]

[ Tier: Error… 11 ]

[ +110% Intelligence Boost ]

Error, as in she broke the ten-tier limit per stage of blessing by making it 10% more than the one Ulana gave me. A power flex to let me know the system bends to her will if she requires it. Existence pauses and I feel a pulse rushing up my spine. There’s a sensation that tingles in my mind. Everything feels… clear…

The familiar feeling of extreme clarity threads into the weave that is my existence. All of my problems become smaller in my mind, and all of my questions become larger… much larger.

A symphony of extasy in the form of tangible thoughts and ideas becoming one flood my mind. One rises above the others.

“Sera, how would you like to become Earth’s prime Goddess?” I ask, turning an eye toward her.

She studies me with a strange expression, like for once she isn’t quite sure what I’m thinking… and she’s right.

“I need a rather large, rule breaking favor, if you don’t mind.” I bend down and examine one of the gnomes, “In exchange, I’ll grant you joint custody of Earth’s fate.”

“Joint?” she asks, tilting her head.

“With Ulana.”

“Why would you think that I want the Earth?”

“Remember that deal you made with me to fix Fisban, among other things. Your building requirements were rather specific, so specific in fact that it isn’t a leap to understand you want me to build an altar for you here.”

She doesn’t speak, she looks at me closer, as though I’m no longer an insect.

“Gods pay more on worlds they don’t own. You’re rich, but when you gave me those runes, your eye bled, I’m guessing that’s a sign of strain? Based on your surprise, I don’t think you realized it would cost that much, you’re used to just swiping your proverbial god card and not feeling the fees. Earth’s strange though, isn’t it? You said so yourself.”

Her eyes travel across my face like they are studying it before she says, “This version of you, I wonder if it comes with a mute button.”

“I didn’t mean to offend, I simply wanted to avoid the long and drawn out why I know you want it beating around the bush talk.”

“If you are right, why would I want to share with her?”

“Because, I think that you don’t actually hate her. I think you want her to acknowledge you. Respect you even. Maybe you strayed from the path that she walked, I don’t know your history, but you want her approval, even if you won’t admit it.”

She squints at me then begins to laugh for a moment before her brow furrows and her face straightens.

“Are you trying to find out my motivations by incorrectly guessing them to get a rise from me?”

“No, I really believe that.”

“Why?” she muses, her eyes almost seem softer than before.

“It’s the little things,” I say walking closer to her, less than a pace from her, “You care even though you pretend to be evil. You came and helped me save Barlow, you could have asked for anything, but you didn’t. I’d wager you wanted me to save Niva back then, not because she’s a calamity reborn, but some other, softer reason.”

“And you’re sure that was my only motivation?”

“No, one can never be completely sure of anything. But if I had to guess, I think that someone you actually hate or despise or consider a rival is playing the game now. Someone who isn’t Ulana, maybe someone who’s a threat to her? Or to this game you’re playing back and forth with her?”

Her mouth opens, but she pauses, as though worried I’ll see between the words… I will and I already have.

I continue, now circling her as she circled me, “You want to be helpful now, because another entity has entered the fray. You’re not the type to become obsessed with a mortal like me. I’m your pawn and you like to win. I saw as much when you battled Ulana during the proceeding.” I lean down and examine another garden gnome, they are strangely detailed in certain ways I didn’t realize before.

“What is your point?”

“My point is that you’re bad, but not completely so. I don’t think you were always the one messaging me with red text before. I think your underlings were for the most part. You’re more pragmatic than they are…” I smile, “Or in the case of some, like Azeroc and Kodah… were.”

“You think that I’m not all bad. Why is this relevant?”

“Well, because I wouldn’t give the keys to Earth to a truly evil goddess.”

She laughs again, though it’s not as hearty as before, “You act like you’re in a position to give me a world. I could have sworn I gave you an intelligence buff, not a delusional debuff.”

“You’re right of course, I don’t know how to give you Earth right now, but I know that you know how I can. It starts with an altar and worship. I know that much from Sage.”

“It is one thing to help you, another to break rules when you ask. Why should I entertain your whims, mortal?”

I move directly in front of her again, moving to her ear like she always does to me, I ask softly, “Aren’t you curious what I’ll do?”

A small smile creeps on the edge of her lips as she turns from me, “What is it that you’re begging me for?”

I smile as I feel the hook pulling tight.