NOVEL NEXT Chapter 191 - Häxprocess [Witch Trial]
A sinister deja-vu. Not a trick from a confused brain; that introduction the woman made had taken place in a past that no longer existed.
"You bitch..."
Tristessa clenched her fists and teeth to the point it hurt, consumed by a rage born of the memories she longed to erase from her mind. Flashes from the past in which that witch was the central figure. She could still feel her disgusting tongue inside her mouth; the phantom, burning pain of her severed leg, and the fractures of her sanity when Severus was executed before her eyes.
Wounds inflicted upon her spirit that would never heal. Oozing cursed pus of such sickening hatred that only the Death of that woman could stop it from pouring outside.
"It is no pleasure at all to meet you, devil… I know you," the General growled, a thirst for blood flowing from his luminous spirit. "You and your unforgivable crimes."
"What an honor! I know you too, Zephyr Malak Nostromos! And I'd like to know you much better… You, that handsome gunslinger, and that delicious girl with such a dark soul… And who is looking at me with so much hatred and fear that it's making me tremble, I might add!" Purring, Daiana caressed the sides of her own body and stuck out her tongue at them, lust-driven and drooling like the beast she was. "And you know what else I'd like? For you to tell me the whereabouts of my family… Yes, yes, yes, yes, that would be excellent! What do you say?"
"Die… Die, you damn, fucking psycho." Tristessa had to speak out to ease some of the loathing that was gnawing at her from within. Clouded with such repulsion that she didn't think at that moment about what Daiana's words meant. "Kill her, Zephyr. Please… Please kill her."
"…"
Without saying a word to the gray-eyed girl, the General took two steps forward, unable to avoid stepping on the remains of his soldiers and splattering blood around him. The corpses of men and women he had known for years, with whom he had shared more bad times than good, reduced to unrecognizable pieces of flesh and bone.
"You don't deny your evil deeds? No wonder all trace of morality is gone from you. You are guilty, witch…"
"Huh? What? Guilty of what?" she asked, feigning confusion. Bringing a finger to her chin, as if she were thinking and reflecting. "I don't remember…"
"Zephyr! What are you doing?!" Tristessa couldn't believe that the General was standing still as Daiana pondered, either for real or playing with him. He was doing nothing. "Kill her!"
"Shut your fucking trap, I can't think with all your chirping, girly!" Daiana roared in an outburst of anger, before she continued thinking, massaging her temple with her blood-stained index fingers. "Guilty of…guilty of…"
"Why…? Why aren't you…"
The reason for Zephyr's passivity, the reason he was letting time slip by, was more than obvious given what he had said when he and Auron met with her. It was just that Tristessa was too upset and furious to think clearly.
"He's still waiting for reinforcements to arrive!" she wailed inside her frozen mind. "Even if it's just one witch? Could it be...?"
There was only one reason to think that more help was needed to subdue that enemy: Zephyr knew that he couldn't defeat Daiana Mercer-Archeos, not even with Auron's support.
"OH, WAIT! I think I know!"
With that same finger Daiana pointed upwards, her hand trembling with no control at all, overcome by the emotion of her supposed reasoning. Then the other hand joined the shivering. Fingers like claws, a wild tongue, and silver eyes that shot up to the sky and beyond, where the darkness between the stars grew.
"I am guilty of being born in the Year Four Hundred and Sixty-Five After the Dawn of the Empire! I am guilty of growing up with the love of a relatively well-off family! I am guilty of having an exemplary education! I am guilty of being surrounded by friends and loved ones who loved me! I am guilty of finding a fiancé who loved me and only me! I am guilty of having an unquenchable thirst for knowledge! I am guilty of having ambition! I am guilty of getting a job at the [Research Center for Military Thaumaturgy]! I am guilty of the disaster! I am guilty of NOT BEING ENOUGH! I am guilty of being left alone! I am guilty of walking in the darkness of the Sea of Trees! I am guilty of finding a secret entrance to Merzul there! I am guilty of walking for five days and five nights across the broken plains of the Nation of Dark Thaumaturgy! I am guilty of arriving at the gates of [Xibir, Black Magicka Metropolis]! I am guilty of being welcomed by my beloved lord Moebius! I am guilty of acquiring a new family! I am guilty of bringing the Coven to Entrana! I am guilty of the Massacre of the Endless Night! I am guilty of breaking into my neighbors' houses at night! I am guilty of slaughtering them all! I am guilty of dismembering wives! I am guilty of flaying husbands! I am guilty of eating their flesh and brains! I am guilty of gorging myself until I could eat no more! I am guilty of making myself vomit so I could keep eating! I am guilty of drinking the tears of children! I am guilty of kidnapping them! I am guilty of gouging out their eyes and eating them! I am guilty of handing them over to my lord! I am guilty of kidnapping my little brother, Mellion! I am guilty of watching my lord experiment on him until he reduced him to a soulless husk! I am guilty of tearing off his head! I am guilty of eating his decaying brain! I am guilty of keeping his empty head as a memento! I am guilty of using his mangled body in a feast in honor of the Coven! I am guilty of bathing in his putrid blood while indulging in the carnal love of my sisters! I am guilty of my family being judged for the Massacre of the Endless Night! I am guilty of Aurelia Eramisaptor exiling them and leaving them to die alone! I am guilty of telling my lord everything about my family! I am guilty of my lord wanting to kidnap Lucahn and my unborn little brother! I am guilty of haunting End-World as its boogeywoman! I am guilty of being the cause of nightmares of thousands of people! I am guilty of being the reason children cry at night! I am guilty of Aurelia Eramisaptor wanting to rip my head off and impale it on a spike atop the tallest tower in the city! I am guilty of leading my sisters of the Coven alongside the other Priestesses! I am guilty of recruiting lost women! I am guilty of seducing them with the promise of fulfilling their darkest desires! I am guilty of encouraging mothers to kill their newborn children in their sleep! I am guilty of convincing young girls to crush animal heads with stones! I am guilty of whispering in a maniac's ear to commit mass murder! I am guilty of consuming men's bodies until they beg for Death! I am guilty of rewarding loyalty with books of forbidden knowledge! I am guilty of preaching Lord Moebius's teachings! I am guilty of serving Lord Moebius! I am guilty of doing his bidding! I am guilty of making his word law! I am guilty of his prophecies coming true whatever the cost! I am guilty of serving the Dark Lady because my lord serves her! I am guilty of having my loyalty rewarded with knowledge! I am guilty of craving knowledge! I am guilty of worshipping knowledge! I am guilty of having a voracious and destructive hunger for knowledge! I am guilty of wanting to know what secrets are hidden among the stars! I am guilty of wanting to know what lies in the Abyss outside of time! I am guilty of wanting to know about the worlds from which the Strangers come! I am guilty of wanting to know if those worlds hold knowledge of things beyond the collective imagination! I am guilty of wanting to know if there are more Gods out there besides those born after the creation of Nekrom! I am guilty of wanting to find the Gods! I am guilty of wanting to find their angels! I am guilty of wanting to know what it feels like to kill an angel of the Gods! I am guilty of wanting to know if it is possible to kill an angel of the Gods! I am guilty of wanting to know what it feels like to be struck down by an angel of the Gods! I am guilty of wanting to know why Nekronomika created us in her image and likeness! I am guilty of wanting to know why I was created in the image and likeness of my victims! I am guilty of wanting to know everything about my victims! I am guilty of wanting to know their joys! I am guilty of wanting to know their sorrows! I am guilty of wanting to know their pains! I am guilty of wanting to know their hatreds! I am guilty of wanting to know every sin that stains their souls! I am guilty of wanting to know every fault that weighs on their consciences as I gnaw at their brain masses in search of fulfillment! AND I AM GUILTY THAT MY CURSED DESIRE OF WANTING TO KNOW EVERYTHING THIS WORLD HAS TO OFFER WILL NEVER BE ENOUGH! IT NEVER IS, IT NEVER WILL! IT IS NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH! NOT ENOUGH…!"
Her long rant, riddled with confessions, finally concluded with a deep breath. A record that barely scratched the surface, causing Daiana to smile with teary eyes into the darkness of the Cosmos as the blood of the innocent and the damned trickled down her body.
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"To seek knowledge beyond our mundane boundaries, it's a cardinal sin… That is my lord Moebius' decree…" she moaned, weeping and her broken voice stained with deep pain and zealous love. "And I'm the worst of sinners. It will never be enough… Oh, never enough…"
Auron had completely let his guard down, his weapons aiming to the bloody floor, overwhelmed both by the inner torment he was suffering and by what he had just heard.
"She must die… She must die, for God's sake, she must die now," Tristessa, disgusted to the darkest corner of her soul, pleaded with Zephyr, the only one who had listened every single word Daiana said with absolute focus.
With consequences.
"You disgraceful waste of a human being…"
Although his main reason was to make Daiana waste time as reinforcements got closer to the Crossroads by the minute, hearing all those atrocious acts broke him. His firm stance, a living wall protecting his two companions in that mess, challenged and fractured. Failing in the end, just like Auron did from the very beginning.
The years of fighting against the darkness that sought to bring ruin to Nekrom had solidified his spirit, but it was not enough to resist such unrelenting evil. Now, brimming with the same air of indiscriminate justice that Aurelia Eramisaptor preached, he sought the destruction of his foe, by any means necessary.
"You, Daiana Mercer-Archeos, are guilty," he declared, everlasting anger imprinted in his powerful voice. "Guilty before the Gods. Guilty before the civilians you torment. Guilty before the soldiers you deceived and massacred. And you are guilty before my Lady and her Dominion, which you senselessly invade to spread your cancerous evil…"
As she listened to the sentence of that military authority, Daiana's pain transmuted into joy; her weeps into a childish, malevolent chuckle. The blood of the innocent and the wicked trickled down her cheeks like tears from tortured souls, restless in the deepest vaults of the Abyss.
"In the name of them all, I will punish you and cast you into the shadows of oblivion!" With a roar as sounding as raging thunder, Zephyr lunged at the smiling, sinister witch. "Fall into the outer darkness!"
The tip of Zephyr's spear went straight for Daiana's face, which she dodged with almost no effort applied. This prompted him to unleash a series of thrusts. Swift and at dizzying speed; so quick, so fast that Tristessa could barely see them.
"Is this how you plan to hunt me, General? Trying to poke me with your toothpick?" the witch mocked, dodging by moving from side to side and contorting her torso so that not even the edge of the weapon could graze her. "How adorable!"
"Damn, she's fast!" Tristessa cursed, and when she saw a mass of materialized shadows gather in parallel to Daiana's right arm, she screamed at the top of her lungs, "BE CAREFUL, ZEPHYR! HER DIVINITY IS A SWORD OF DARKNESS!"
The warning had its intended effect: the black-haired man raised his shield just in time to deflect the powerful, supernatural blow of Daiana's dark phantom sword, a product of her [Divinity of the Hand of the Umbral Edge].
"Tch! You nosy little bitch, mind your own business!" Daiana complained, forced to retreat as her surprise attack was ruined. Not only was she surprised by Tristessa's supposed shrewdness, but she also radiated a homicidal intent focused on her. "When I'm done with Nostromos, I'll make you squeal sweet, sweet tunes…"
"NO!" Next to Tristessa, Auron finally snapped. Hearing the dark fate that could befell Tristessa broke the veil of shadows from the past that had held him back. Making him raise his revolvers and aimed at her. "She's my only chance of salvation! You'll have to get through me first, witch!"
Zephyr was out of his firing range, allowing him to open fire. The bullets were hollow-point, intended to cause maximum damage to unarmored enemies, and each blast from the revolvers deafened Tristessa.
She had hoped to see those bullets strike the witch's head and blow her to bits. If only it were that easy…
"Two against one, that's not fair!" With her Umbral Blade and inhuman reflexes, Daiana effortlessly intercepted each shot; the phantom blade slicing the bullets to pieces and robbing them of almost all their momentum. This gave her just enough time before Zephyr's spear attempted to pierce her center of mass. "This lady can only dance with one at a time…! OR MAYBE SHE CAN WITH BOTH?! FAHREUS PLASMOS!"
The glintsone embedded in her middle fingernail glowed with the color of the surrounding landscape. Using this catalyst of thaumaturgy, the Priestess conjured magical glyphs engineered by the blood elves, taking place at Auron's feet.
And bloody spears appeared the moment those glyphs collapsed upon themselves.
"Auron!"
As Tristessa screamed his name, the gunslinger had already dodged to the side, avoiding the attack and getting drenched in the blood of the dead.
"It's not over yet! Fahreus plasmos, fahreus plasmos, fahreus plasmos! And you, General, wait your turn! Terrum!"
Zephyr was locked inside a circular prison of earth and stone, and Auron crawled as fast as he could to avoid the spears that rose from the blood-soaked ground, the deadliest trap in that place. He didn't want any more of the morbid fluid to wet his revolvers, his only hope of survival, as the earthen wall trembled under violent blows.
"Auron, I…!"
"No! Don't move from there, lady! The glyphs of that ridiculous madwoman are nothing!"
That shout, brimming with confidence, made Tristessa a little envious, besides making her believe that he—someone she had watched die in silence before—was impervious to a dark fate.
Auron used the momentum he'd gained from dodging another barrage of bloody spears and stood up. As twelve elemental blood thaumaturgy glyphs materialized around him, enclosing him in a large halo, the gunslinger emptied the cylinders and flung his revolvers into the air. He reached behind his back and, using his [Divinity of Pocket Dimension], brought them forward with two speedloaders filled with crystal-tipped bullets that emitted an otherworldly glow.
His unblinking gaze was covered by the shadow cast by his hat; unaffected by the premise of joining those broken bodies around him. Without losing an ounce of focus even though he was about to be impaled from all sides like an Alpha-Boar, he released the speedloaders into the air, the bullets getting into the revolver cylinders as they fell.
"NO, AURON!"
The cylinders spun, the bullets cocked in front of the firing pins, and Auron's fingers closed around the grips; all while Tristessa screamed his name as she saw the elemental blood glyphs glow with evil intent.
And then, the gunslinger spun gracefully, a full three-sixty degrees, firing every round from each revolver. Twelve anti-magic bullets pierced the twelve glyphs and caused mutual destruction. Twelve impacts that nullified Daiana's thaumaturgy. Twelve bursts that not only continued to echo into Tristessa's ears but left her speechless. Dumbstruck.
"Ah, marvelous! Superb, outstanding, fabulous, terrific, amazing, tremendous!" they heard Daiana exclaim, excited and salivating with ravenous hunger. "I truly want you all to myself, gunslinger!"
"And don't you want a little of me?"
The wall of earth and stone shattered into hundreds of pieces, Zephyr crashing through it, his shield taking the lead. With the smile worthy of a maniac, Daiana waited until the last second to dodge a spear thrust aimed straight for her head, then slithered with the agility of a snake beneath the General's arm.
She aimed to exploit the right side of his body, protected only by his steel breastplate, a side her Umbral Blade would undoubtedly tear to shreds.
"Not a bad offer, but you're a bit slow, General! And I'm so flexible and have such reach…!"
"Shut up and die, witch."
With years of combat experience, Zephyr not only anticipated such a tactic but knew how to counter it: he spun around and struck Daiana squarely with his shield, forcing her to cover herself with both arms. The inhuman force powered by Zephyr's [Essential Dilution] sent her flying.
"Woah! My bad!" The witch landed on her feet in the bloody pool of human remains. Whether due to stress on her mad soul or a change of strategy, she dematerialized her dark sword. "You're good, General Nostromos! And you're no slouch yourself, gunslinger! You have amused me so much that I have a very special gift for you!"
"What…?" Tristessa wondered within her own mind, watching Daiana raise her left hand and point it at the expectant General. The palm bore that scar that concealed something terrible beneath it, deceiving anyone until the truth was revealed and it was too late. "NO!"
Just as Tristessa remembered how to scream when Daiana nearly killed Zephyr with her Divinity, now her legs reacted before her brain, propelling her forward and placing herself in front of the General.
To protect him from the insane influence that manifested in the witch's palm when her scar opened, revealing that black eyeball with a crimson vertical slit.
To receive herself all that malevolent, maddening ethereal fire.