Chương 67: The Season of the Minotaur (16)

It had been a costly victory, but a victory nonetheless. The Paladin's attack had cost Simon about two-thirds of all his troops, including nearly all of his Class-using monsters and their Crestones. The fairy ring had been permanently disabled to cut off the party's escape, and Duchar doubted they could repair it at all. The resources they had spent on Pictomancer art supplies, bombs, equipment, alchemical fire flasks, and so on wouldn't be easily recouped either.

All in all, it probably went almost as well as it could have, in spite of victory's toll. Simon walked away with a neutralized Paladin and a proper sacrifice for the Autumnal Equinox. The Darkwood's growing influx of new monsters would let them replenish his troops with reinforcements in due time, and morale was sky high among Simon's human cultists after their victory. As far as they were concerned, his triumph was now inevitable after defeating the Paladin.

Simon would take the opportunity to bless the bravest of them with new brands as rewards for their service while reminding them of observing strict operational security. He didn't want to deal with another near-disaster like this one ever again. However, victory brought its own set of problems. A princess, a duke's son, a marquise, an elven archmage, and the secret Paladin had disappeared into the Darkwood.

Satine's treachery had yet to be revealed, so as far as the War Party knew, they had been in honest negotiations over Magvolia's future. The White Unicorn needed the princess for their planned rebellion, and the Oracle would no doubt investigate the Paladin's disappearance. Expeditions into the Darkwood could last days, so Simon had some time to react and prepare for the inevitable reactions.

He had already taken measures to ensure he wouldn't have an army knocking on his doorstep, but it wouldn't hurt to gather more information.

"This would be much easier if you would just tell me more about your planned rebellion, Your Highness," Simon told his prisoner while in his demon disguise.

"I cannot guarantee the safety of your allies still in my custody if you insist on being stubborn." The princess glared at him silently. Her hands and feet were bound to a flat wheel by sturdy manacles keeping her stretched out and unable to move. Wraiths regularly drained her of mana to prevent her from casting any spells—Simon's Perks cancelled her Prayers, but it didn't hurt to be thorough in case she knew how to use other branches of magic—and gargoyle guards kept her under close watch.

The interrogation wasn't going well so far. They had already fed her a 'truth potion' Simon had brewed with Duchar's help, but Satine either had a passive Perk protecting her from the effects or had been extensively trained to resist such methods. All of Simon's attempts to coax answers out of her had been met with defiance so far.

"Your taciturn tendencies do you credit, but I require answers," Simon insisted.

"Do I have to bring one of your comrades here and execute them in front of you to untie your tongue?" The princess sneered at him.

"You have an Illusionist and shapeshifters in your employ. I trust neither my eyes nor ears in this place. Either my friends will save me…" Her expression darkened considerably.

"Or you've already killed them. Either way, I will tell you nothing."

"How about a trade then?" Simon suggested, changing his approach.

"As I told you, all my Lady wants is to be freed. She has no designs on your nation, and would be more than willing to help your White Unicorn so long as her safety is ensured. Surely you realize it would be wiser to befriend us than continue this foolish, pointless feud." The princess answered him with contemptuous silence. She's not making it easy for me. Gregory and Grimm had already suggested skipping the threats and moving straight to torturing the answers out of her, an idea which Simon had put down.

I feel the only reason she's not biting her own tongue off rather than risk betraying her allies is the hope they will come for her.

"Leave her to my tender care, beloved," the Stone Muse said.

"I can convince her to sing us sweet songs." Simon scowled behind his Fiendmask. He only had to ask Lorimor's corpse to get an idea of what the dryad's 'convincing' entailed. She would haunt the princess' mind day and night until she obtained the answers they sought. It would be a harrowing experience that might drive Satine mad. They were unfortunately running out of nonviolent alternatives, and Simon's demonic minions suggested starting a questioning session by cutting off Satine's fingers.

The Muse's whispers and nightmares were comparatively the lesser evil here, especially if their prisoner relented after a few days. Simon loathed the mere idea, but the danger was too great and their time too precious. If the White Unicorn or the monarchists had an army nearby, ready to storm the Darkwood to rescue their missing princess, he had to know it now.

"Very well, you may proceed with your 'convincing.'" Simon felt sick just uttering those words through telepathy.

"I will come visit her tomorrow, and the day after, and the day after until she gives in."

"Worry not, my love." The Stone Muse's laughter sounded like the most ominous of all requiems.

"By the end, she will sing and dance to my whims." It's just this reign, Simon told himself once more as he left the cells, fighting against the unease in his throat and gut. This is the best way to gain levels to protect those you love and knowledge of how to prevent a disaster. Power through. He had to see this foul ritual through. This couldn't have all been for nothing.

Afterwards, Simon met with Duchar in the Halls of the Minotaur's morgue, where the necromancer was busy stitching up his sleeping son's stomach. He had laid the fully restored corpses of Alphonse's allies on nearby stone slabs, their wounds healed and any damage inflicted restored… with one exception. Simon glanced at the sixth corpse. He had no idea who it belonged to, or if Duchar had crafted it from nothing, but it now looked like a perfect duplicate of Princess Satine.

The resemblance to the woman trapped in his dungeons below was uncanny.

"I take it the princess wasn't any more forthcoming today?" Duchar guessed after completing his son's stitching.

"Give her time," Simon replied before congratulating Duchar on his creation.

"Excellent work. Will this fool autopsies?"

"Yes, though probably not advanced divinations," Duchar replied.

"Planting this fake corpse among five real ones will muddy the waters somewhat, but an expert might be able to tell a counterfeit apart."

"I will see to it that the investigators do not delve too deep." Simon provided Duchar with a note.

"Here are the alterations and wounds I require." Duchar squinted as he read it off.

"Sliced throat… dagger wounds… are we making it look like an assassination?"

"Yes, indeed," Simon confirmed. The instructions came from Lady Shabram herself after they finished hashing out the cover-up.

"Their deaths will have happened in the Darkwood, but through no fault of our own." Simon had hoped to spend this reign sticking to observation when it came to the empire's political situation in order to learn how the war would go without him influencing the outcome, but he had no choice but to give fate a little nudge. His best bet to prevent the War Party or the White Unicorn from pushing into the Darkwood was to have them at each other's throats.

Odette Kano was currently conducting an official search of the princess' and the Flauros' estates on behalf of Emperor Louis, where she would either find evidence linking them to the White Unicorn movement or outright plant it. The Cobweb had happily provided them with damning documents showing that the Magvolian monarchists were in discussions with Euphemia to betray the War Party.

The official story would be that Satine and her cohorts were secretly using the Darkwood as a cover to meet with rebels without oversight. Lady Shabram would have caught on and sent agents to catch them in the act, only for things to turn sour and lead to a massacre. She would then present Louis with intel on the planned landing.

If everything went to plan and Louis acted as he had always done–with brutality –then he would react by purging the Magvolian royalists and hopefully turning his gaze westward to prevent an invasion. The Illuseans would hopefully be too busy trying to save their assets to investigate the Darkwood further, or blame the Paladin's death on the War Party. As for the Church Party, they would be too busy defending their heartland from Dassein's and Vouivre's incursions.

Their lack of influence over Magvolia was half the reason they even agreed to an alliance with the White Unicorn in the first place. There was, however, one tiny detail about that whole endeavor that bothered Simon. Something which Frea mentioned and that could throw a wrench into his plans.

"Duchar," Simon said.

"A manatree blooms when it is about to reproduce, correct?" Stolen content warning: this content belongs on Royal Road. Report any occurrences.

"Yes, of course, Your Majesty," Duchar confirmed, his eyes widening as he caught on to the issue at hand.

"Did the elf and the Paladin mention the possibility of our manatree blooming during the battle?"

"They did," Simon confirmed.

"Which puts Mardok's actions under a new light." He had read enough about manatrees in the past to gather some understanding of their lifecycle. These ancient beings devoured nutrients in the ground and produced mana, drawing in souls to recycle them in an endless cycle of growth until they accumulated more souls than their area could sustain. When overpopulation threatened the manatree's prosperity, it would accumulate the souls inside a once-in-a-millennium's fruit.

Elven caretakers would then usually take this sacred seed away to a faraway place and plant it into the ground so it might grow into a new manatree with its own dryad. This was the process that had allowed life to progressively conquer the planet since the Worldtree first bloomed in eons past. Which begged the question… What kind of fruit would a miasma-corrupted dryad produce?

"Mardok may have been trying to cultivate miasma trees by binding the Stone Muse to the Minotaur crystal," Simon guessed.

"He must have hoped to create more wellsprings of demonic life and spread them across the globe."

"Fascinating… truly fascinating…" Duchar stroked his beard, his eyes alight with morbid curiosity.

"This would explain why the elves sealed our host, too. This interrupted the tree's lifecycle and froze it in place." Simon scowled and turned his telepathic attention to the Stone Muse.

"Which you hid from me, Beloved."

"I did not, my love," the Stone Muse replied, suddenly on the defensive.

"Was it not my promise to you that we would rule together? Though my treacherous sisters have trapped me in a half-life between two ticks of the clock, unable to bring the new life I was born to unleash upon the world, my freedom shall allow me to make the world our garden!" A chill traveled down Simon's spine.

"Will you bloom as soon as you are freed?"

"Yes, for my fertile soil has grown rich in souls and miasma!" The Stone Muse seemed to sense his troubled thoughts and tried to reassure Simon.

"But worry not, Beloved, for my daughter shall be the fruit of our union, loyal unto us both! She will be the first of a great lineage that shall one day blanket this world in darkness and condemn my sisters to oblivion!" So that was her mad scheme… to create a lineage of miasma trees that would eventually supplant and destroy the Mana Goddess' children, until the Stone Muse ruled over a dark forest stretching from one end of the earth to the other. It was doomed to failure.

Neither the Oracle nor any sane ruler would allow things to go that far. Not even the likes of Louis or Euphemia had any interest in seeing new Darkwoods popping up. They would cut the Stone Muse's ambitions short. That was probably why she had kept that information to herself rather than trust Simon with it until he had already figured it out. But that must have been Mardok's objective before he ran out of reigns.

The archdemon wished to turn the entire planet into a demonic hellscape shrouded in miasma where his kind ruled absolute. Even then, a miasma tree fruit could make for a terrible weapon of mass destruction in the wrong hands. Frea and the Oracle had been right to be wary of letting Louis learn too much. He might very well want to weaponize the fruit by dropping it on Lore or Illusea. In any case, Simon wouldn't let things progress that far. Not in this cursed reign, and certainly not in the next.

"I'm looking forward to it," Simon lied easily before moving on to the next issue at hand.

"Duchar, I would like you to analyze the Paladin Crestone for me."

"Of course." Duchar coughed.

"Has Your Majesty managed to put the outfit on since yesterday?"

"I'm afraid not," Simon grunted as he summoned the Paladin Crestone and quickly placed it on a nearby workbench.

"I was struck with immense pain the moment I tried to activate the Class. It hates me." Putting on the Merchant's Class outfit had been painful but somewhat bearable. However, Simon's attempt to activate the Paladin's armor had proved a worse experience than trying to bathe in magma. Not only did it barely cover his arm before cancelling itself, but the agony had been so atrocious that Simon briefly considered amputating it then and there just to make it stop. The Overlord and Paladin simply couldn't mix.

"I tried to have some of our cultists put on the Class," Simon confessed to Duchar.

"The Crestone burned anyone trying to touch it, and refused to activate for those using protective gear."

"This does not surprise me. The Paladin Crestone is infamous for outright rejecting what it considers unworthy holders. There are reports of it smiting and abandoning users who strayed from the path of righteousness in the past." Duchar cast analysis spells on the Crestone and quickly marked what information he could gather on a small note.

"Would this match the reports Your Majesty learned from their contacts?"

"Let's see," Simon replied as he read the document. The Paladin: The noble knight in shining armor, hero of the downtrodden, defender of the weak, champion of the Light, and unyielding foe of evil in all of its forms. Strength B, Vitality A, Agility A, Perception B, Magic C, Intelligence D, Charisma S, Luck C. Innate Perk: Darksense (Passive): You gain a sixth sense to detect the presence of the Dark–like miasma, Dungeons, undead, demons, or Dark-aligned spellcasters nearby.

Innate Perk: Evil's Bane (Passive): When using weapons in which you have a proficiency or Prayer spells, your attacks against creatures or adepts of the Dark—like Undead, Demons, or their followers—always gain a Slayer Effect (x3 Supereffective Damage). Innate Perk: Holy Fortitude (Passive): You are immune to all physical ailments. Innate Perk: Sanctify (Active): You can attempt to purify an area with a radius equal to ten feet per Paladin level.

Weaker creatures of the Dark are destroyed while stronger ones are weakened, miasma is repelled or suppressed, and Dungeon crystals are destroyed. Level 1 Perk: Defender of the Weak (Passive): You gain medium proficiency with all melee weapons (x1. 5 damage). At first glance, the Paladin Class wasn't so different from its Templar Vassal Class, but Simon only had to take a glance at the details to realize otherwise. Not only did the Paladin trump its Vassal in nearly all stats, but its innate Perks were broader too.

Evil's Bane applied to followers of the Dark rather than creatures born of it, which meant the Paladin could smite the likes of Duchar with ease, and it extended to Prayer spells too rather than just weapons. Holy Fortitude outright granted immunity to half the world's ailments, and Simon had learned from experience that Sanctify could destroy his own Dungeons.

The rest of Shabram's report on the Paladin's capabilities indicated it offered access to Prayer spells, healing and buffs, and support abilities in the form of an Aura of Valor that more or less acted as the reverse of Simon's own Dreadful Aura.

"Can't your analysis spells gather more intel on its other Perks besides the innate ones?" Simon asked.

"Not with my current degree of expertise or available equipment," Duchar replied.

"I must confess that copying schematics is not the same as understanding them, at least for me. My Class focuses on spellcasting rather than analysis when compared to Librarian Vassals like the Scholar. I can only glean what secondary divination spells tell me."

"I see." Simon couldn't blame him, considering that Duchar's expertise lay in miasma spells and necromancy first and foremost, not to mention that their current laboratory couldn't compare to the Goetia facility.

"Alphonse and his allies mentioned a certain Heroic Destiny exp-boosting ability, but I don't see it among the Paladin's innate Perks nor Lady Shabram's notes on the Class…"

"Classes change with perception, and the Paladin's opposition to the Overlord is a relatively recent development in its history."

"Are you suggesting that it could be a new Perk born of people's evolving belief?" Simon inquired.

"Something Alphonse would have acquired a few levels into the Class?"

"It is a mere theory, but one we cannot exclude." Duchar stroked his beard.

"Alternatively, it could be an Oracle ability rather than a Paladin one. Any Perk with the word 'destiny' in it calls that Class to mind. If our intruders indeed followed the Oracle's instruction, she might have provided them with a blessing of some sort."

"True. Not even Shabram could glean much about the Oracle's abilities, and she plays a subtle game." She had even managed to plant agents in the empire's highest echelons without alerting a time-traveler like Balzam, which spoke volumes about the Oracle's talent for obfuscation.

"Either way, it seems unlikely I will be able to access this Heroic Destiny."

"Which begs the question of what Your Majesty wants to do with this Crestone," Duchar pointed out.

"Keeping it outside their Inventory leaves it vulnerable to enemy divinations, and it has escaped containment in the past. Destroying it might be our wisest course of action."" Inventory only releases items it contains if I summon them or perish," Simon pointed out.

"You think it could escape anyway?"

"I fear this may be an inevitable outcome. His Late Majesty Balzam and Gargauth both had Merchants working under them, but they never had them store the Crestone in an Inventory as far as I know and instead defaulted to other methods of containment. Whether that was distrust or experience, I cannot say." True. The idea would have to have crossed Balzam Magnos' mind at one point or another.

He could have tried, and Patriate might have managed to lie to him about the Crestone escaping the Inventory, but Simon found it more likely that there was a catch of some sort. Simon wondered what to do. Consuming the Crestone would both grant him a Perk and temporarily put the Paladin out of commission until it reformed.

Although Holy Fortitude was redundant with his own Unyielding Essence and Indomitable Crown, Evil's Bane and Sanctify would be especially useful against the Zodiac Fiends should Simon ever directly come to blows with them. However, consuming the Crestone presented two issues. First of all, it would unleash a powerful burst of mana that risked alerting the War Party to their location.

Leonard had already been investigating the Merchant Crestone's destruction; another happening right after the princess' disappearance would raise too many alarm bells. Second, Simon only had limited Devour Crestone spots and he was wary of wasting one. Evil's Bane and Sanctify could be situationally very good, but they lacked the constant practicality of an exp-boosting Perk or Inventory.

All Noble Classes packed immensely powerful abilities, and opportunities to gain better ones might present themselves in the future. Moreover, he had bested Alphonse twice and knew exactly where he would be at the start of the reigns and when he would land in Magvolia. Getting past Frea to lure him into a trap would be difficult, but not impossible. Simon could consume the Paladin Crestone in a future reign easily enough with his current foreknowledge. Simon decided to hold on to it for now after some thinking.

It would take a while for the Paladin Crestone to find a suitable holder should it break containment, and even longer for them to level-up enough to provide a challenge. Frea had been the real danger to Simon's operations rather than Alphonse, and neither would trouble him anymore.

"I will keep the Crestone with me for now," Simon decided after storing it back in his Inventory. Studying how the Crestone tried to escape would also provide useful insight into that Perk's limits and mechanics, and if it proved too troublesome to keep, he would deliver the Crestone to Shabram as proof of the princess' treachery.

"Move on towards copying our new Crestones' schematics and analyzing them. I'm especially curious about what the Sage can do." The third sacrifice would be upon them soon, and after that, the final stretch towards the Minotaur's binding.