The approach to the Cathedral took them across the Plaza of the Kneeling Saints, where the cobblestones were uneven because, legend said, they were carved from the petrified skulls of the First Heretics.
Probably just bad masonry, but the white Enmagic-Mist rolling off the church steps tasted metallic like pennies and judgment.
The Kynoboros Cathedral wasn't a building. It was an insult to darkness.
Everything in this wretched city was black stone, shadows, and damp gloom. But the Cathedral? It was white. Blindingly, aggressively white marble, glowing with its own inner Enmagic. It sat there like a polished tooth in a rotten mouth, daring the rain to touch it.
Baldur's army stopped just outside the perimeter. The line of black steel looked pathetic next to the divine glare.
"They're unready," Wilhelm noted, squinting against the light. "Gates are open. Guards are napping or praying or whatever Holy Knights do on Tuesday nights. We hit them now. Blitz. In and out. I grab the incense, you grab the Bishops."
"You will approach," Baldur commanded, his voice as immovable as a mountain, "and deliver the terms of engagement. One hour. To prepare their souls and their swords."
Wilhelm turned slowly. He looked at Baldur.
"One hour," Wilhelm repeated blankly. "You want me to walk up to the fortified hornet's nest, knock on the door, and tell the hornets, 'Heads up, we're bringing the fly swatter in sixty minutes'?"
"I expect the laws of war to be respected," Baldur said flatly. His hand drifted to his sword hilt. "Do not test my definition of treason, bastard. You are an envoy now. Go."
Wilhelm groaned. He looked at Gutrum, hoping for sanity. Gutrum just looked at the sky. Useless.
"Right," Wilhelm muttered, starting the long walk towards the glowing white nightmare. "Envoy. Sacrificial lamb. Potato, potahto."
The walk was miserable. He felt like an ant marching into a supernova. He passed under the colossal arches, expecting arrows. Expecting lightning. Expecting instant vaporization.
Instead, he found chaos.
Priests were running in circles. Monks were hauling relics. A frantic looking Bishop was trying to stuff a golden candlestick into his robes.
"They're here! The Storms are here!" someone shrieked, tripping over their own cassock.
Wilhelm stepped over a dropped censer. Clonk. He kept walking. Into the nave.
And there, chaos ended.
The center of the cathedral was vast. A sea of pews leading to a High Altar that stretched so far up it might have tickled the Concrete Sky.
But sitting on the stairs leading to the altar... there was him.
Ser Alexander Shadowgrove. The Violet Eye.
[ ENTITY SCAN: HOSTILE GOD ]
(User: Wilhelm Storm)
Target: Ser Alexander Shadowgrove
Alias: "The Pontifex Slayer" | "Violet Eye"
Class: Archangel (Perfection Incarnate)
[ POWER LEVEL ANALYSIS ]
Spirit Power (Current): 1,205,000 SP
Spirit Power (Projected Max): Uncalculable
Threat Tier: X-Rank (Cataclysmic)
[ TACTICAL ASSESSMENT ]
You (Level 16): 38.000 Spirit
Target (Level 100+): 1.2 Million Spirit
Win Probability: 0.000%
Conclusion: Baldur's "Honor" just granted a Demon one hour to reload.
Conclusion:Baldur's "Honor" just granted a Demon one hour to reload.
He sat on the marble steps like he was at a picnic. He wore no helmet. His silver armor was polished so brightly Wilhelm could see his own reflection swaying in it from fifty paces away.
His hair was perfect how do they keep it perfect in this humidity? dark, falling just so over his forehead.
He held a red apple. He was rubbing it with a silk handkerchief. Rub, rub, inspect.
A priest sprinted past him, sweat flying. "Ser Alexander! By the Gods! The army! They are at the portcullis!"
Alexander didn't look up. He sighed, a tragic little sound. "Then let them wait, Father. You don't rush to the dance floor before the music starts. It's gauche."
Wilhelm cleared his throat. It echoed like a gunshot in the vaulted space.
Alexander stopped rubbing the apple. He looked up. Those Shadowgrove eyes... violet, mocking, bored.
"Ah," Alexander said. "The help has arrived."
Wilhelm spread his arms, flashing a strained grin. "Wilhelm Storm. At your service. Though, mostly at the service of my stiff-necked brother outside."
"The Bastard of Kaledon," Alexander mused, standing up. He moved... Gods, he moved like oil. Smooth. Fluid. Lethal. He tossed the handkerchief aside. "And what does the Bastard want? A confession? I'm afraid the booths are closed."
"A warning, actually," Wilhelm said, stepping closer. He felt absurdly underdressed in his damp coat next to this shining demigod.
"Lord Baldur Stormsong, in his infinite wisdom and by wisdom, I mean maddening obsession with rules has sent me to tell you... well... you have an hour."
Alexander froze. He blinked once. Then twice.
A slow, delighted smile spread across his handsome face. It wasn't an evil grin. It was the grin of a man who just found money in an old coat.
"An hour?" Alexander chuckled softly. He walked down the steps, closing the distance between them. He ignored the sword at Wilhelm's hip like it was made of cardboard. "How... utterly charming."
He stopped inches from Wilhelm. He smelled of expensive cologne and ozone.
"We have five hundred men here, Wilhelm," Alexander whispered, intimate as a lover. "Half are asleep. The other half are panicking. If you had breached the gates five minutes ago? We'd be meat. Every single one of us."
Wilhelm shrugged, helpless. "I suggested the breach. I was overruled by the concept of 'Honor'."
"Honor," Alexander rolled the word around his mouth like wine. "Baldur... that dear, stubborn fool. He gives me an hour?" He laughed again, shaking his head.
"In an hour, I can armor five hundred knights. I can have a prayer said for our souls. And I can place five hundred elite Shadowgrove archers on the gargoyles and rooftops."
He leaned in, his violet eyes locking onto Wilhelm's.
"His honor just cost you the war, little bastard. It just cost you everything."
Wilhelm looked back at him. For a second, the enemy lines vanished. They were just two men acknowledging a universal truth: Baldur was an idiot.
"I tried to tell him," Wilhelm sighed. "He has a stick... well, you know where."
"Indeed." Alexander stepped back. He tossed the apple in his hand. Up, down. "You should run along then. Tell your brother I accept his generous gift of time. And tell him..."
Alexander's expression shifted. The amusement didn't leave, but something sharp edged into it.
Something moved in the rafters. High up. A squeak. A rat, scuttling along a beam in the shadows.
Alexander didn't look. He barely moved. His wrist flicked.
Thwip.
The apple left his hand. It was a blur of red.
Fifty feet up and twenty feet back, in the gloom of the ceiling...
SPLAT.
A squeak cut short. A small, furry body dropped from the dark, landing on the marble floor with a wet thud. The apple was pulverized, embedded in the rat.
Wilhelm jumped. He stared at the dead rat. He stared at Alexander.
That throw... blind... backward...
Alexander smiled. That charming, terrifying smile.
"Tell him I will kill him slowly," Alexander said pleasantly. "Out of respect for his stupidity. Now run along, Storm. before I mistake you for vermin."
Wilhelm didn't need telling twice. He nodded, backed away keeping his eyes on the Smiling Serpent and turned.
"Enjoy the apple," Wilhelm called out, his voice shaking just a little as he hurried toward the exit. "Lots of fiber!"
He needed to tell Baldur. Not about the hour. About the fact that they were completely, utterly screwed.
Leaving the sterile light of the nave, Wilhelm headed for the flicker of the campfires set up in the Ruins of the Old Market.
The soldiers were burning Gloom-Wood crates for warmth, the smoke rising in thick, blue spirals that smelled sweet and suffocating a side effect of the wood absorbing the ambient despair of the city for fifty years.
Wilhelm's walk back across the bridge felt longer.
Probably because every step towards his brothers felt like walking into a graveyard he had personally dug. The wind howled through the gothic arches, a lonely, whistling sound that got under your skin. He kept picturing the apple. Splat.
By the time he reached the makeshift camp at the end of the span, the smell of roasted meat hit him. Not burning king-flesh this time. Actual food.
Baldur's "camp" was precise. Tents aligned to the millimeter. Fires contained in iron braziers. No mess.
But at the biggest fire... chaos.
Brandan sat on a crate that groaned under his armored bulk. He had a leg of something boar? Mutated rat? in one hand and a wineskin in the other. He was loud. Booming. The blood was still drying on his face, but now it was cracking with laughter.
"And then! Then!" Brandan roared, spraying crumbs. "The idiot tries to parry! With a dagger! Against a warhammer!" He slammed his fist into his palm. "Like swatting a fly with a needle! HA!"
Wilhelm drifted into the light, shivering.
"Brother!" Brandan spotted him. He waved the meat bone like a scepter. "You live! Baldur said you probably tripped into the abyss. Come! Eat! You look like a wet cat."
Wilhelm grabbed a stool and dragged it near the fire. The heat felt good against his damp clothes.
He ignored Baldur, who stood nearby, reading a map like it held the secrets of the universe, refusing to join the "fun."
"I delivered the message," Wilhelm said, snatching a piece of bread from a platter. He didn't mention the archers. Or the dead rat. Why ruin the mood? "They accepted. Very polite. Considering I told them they're all going to die in... forty minutes."
Brandan clapped Wilhelm on the back. It nearly dislocated his spine. "Good! Good lad! Polite wars are the best wars. Makes the smashing more satisfying."
He passed the wineskin to Wilhelm. It was heavy. Warm.
"To victories!" Brandan bellowed, raising an invisible toast to the black sky. "To Lisa! May she see us burn this holy hypocrisy to the ground!"
Wilhelm took a long pull. The wine was sour, sharp, horrible. It tasted perfect. He wiped his mouth with his sleeve.
"You remember that time," Wilhelm started, feeling the warmth spread in his belly, the fear retreating just a step, "when we were kids? In the cellars of Kaledon? And you got your head stuck in the barrel of pickled herring?"
Brandan froze. Then he exploded into laughter. A deep, belly-shaking roar that echoed off the gargantuan walls. "It smelled for weeks! Father was furious!"
"You smelled like fish for a month," Wilhelm grinned, leaning back, kicking his boots toward the fire. "Every time you walked into the hall, the cats followed you. An army of cats! Marching behind the heir of House Stormsong!"
Brandan wiped tears from his eyes, gasping. "And Baldur... Baldur tried to calculate the volume of the barrel to see if we could grease me out!"
Baldur didn't turn around, but Wilhelm saw his shoulders stiffen.
"It was a valid geometrical solution," Baldur said to the map. Flat. Serious. Which made it funnier.
"Valid!" Brandan howled, slapping his knee. "He greased my ears with lard! I slid out like a birth! Pop!"
For a moment, in the flickering orange light of the brazier, the war didn't exist. The towering spires, the ancient magic, the impending slaughter... it all faded. Just three brothers. One drunk, one haunted, one stiff as a board.
Wilhelm looked at Brandan. The big man was smiling, really smiling. The grief for Lisa was still there, lurking behind his eyes, but right now... he was just Brandan. Just the Storm. Alive. Vibrant.
"I love you, you big oaf," Wilhelm mumbled into his bread, so quiet nobody could hear.
"What?" Brandan leaned in, ear cocked.
"I said pass the meat," Wilhelm said loudly, snatching the bone. "You're hogging the protein. Need my strength for the... heroics."
[ RESOURCE RECOVERY LOG: WILHELM STORM ]
Status: Depleted ➔ Recovering
-- INTAKE ANALYSIS --
🍖 Boar/Rat-Leg (Proteins): ~1.500 kcal
🥖 Ration Bread (Carbs): ~800 kcal
🍷 Soldier's Wine (Sugar/Ethanol): ~600 kcal
Total Caloric Input: 2.900 / 6.000 kcal (50% Cap)
-- VITALITY SYNTHESIS --
Starting Blood Volume: 3.212 ml ⚠️
Synthesized from Caloric Surplus: +1.788 ml (Rapid Process)
Current Blood Volume: 5.000 / 5.000 ml (MAX)
[ COMBAT READINESS: OPTIMAL ]
-- INVENTORY CHECK (Belt Pouch) --
🧪 [ Crimson Vial (Blood Refill) ] x2 (Unused)
Capacity: +500ml Instant-Heal per vial.
🥄 Stolen Silver Spoon (Junk Item / Sentimental Value)
Brandan laughed again, watching Wilhelm gnaw on the bone. "Heroics! The Bastard Knight! We'll make songs about you, Wil. 'The Rat that Roared'!"
"Better than 'The Fish-Head Duke'," Wilhelm shot back, mouth full.
They ate. They drank. They insulted each other with the easy, rough affection of men who grew up fighting over toys and are now fighting over kingdoms.
The fire crackled.
The rain hissed.
And then... a bell tolled.
Deep. Resonant. Coming from the White Cathedral.
DOOOONG.
The laughter died instantly.
Brandan stopped chewing. The smile slid off his face like wet paint. The haunted look returned, heavier than before. He dropped the bone. It hit the wet stone with a dull thud.
Baldur rolled up his map. Precise. Snap.
"The hour," Baldur stated. "It is time."
Wilhelm felt the wine turn to acid in his stomach. The warmth of the fire seemed to vanish, replaced by the crushing cold of the city.
Brandan stood up. He grabbed his hammer. He looked like a statue coming to life something ancient and dangerous.
"Right," Brandan grunted. He cracked his neck. "Playtime's over."
Wilhelm stood too, swaying slightly. He adjusted his belt. Checked his sword. Checked his stolen spoon.
"Here we go," Wilhelm whispered, looking at the glowing white cathedral in the distance. It looked like a tombstone now. "Into the grinder."
Brandan looked at his brothers. For one second, he looked terrified. Just a flash. Then the mask of the Warrior King slammed down.
"Stormsongs!" Brandan roared to the waiting soldiers. "WITH ME!"
And they marched into the dark.