“We have located another sinner.”
In a room with plain but pristine white walls, a woman in her mid-twenties wearing simple priestly robes smiled gently, her smooth flaxen hair brushing her shoulders. She was beautiful in an understated way, and between her white outfit and soft aura, she exuded the purity one would expect of a holy maiden.
According to this continent’s lore, mythic heroes and holy maidens were chosen by spirits when evil threatened the land. One could not choose to become either thing, no matter how virtuous one might be.
But Ursula, who had been abandoned in front of a church as an infant and raised in the temple’s orphanage, had grown up a devout believer. She had joined the clergy due to her light-elemental affinity and performed countless miracles, saving many souls through divine mercy. The people believed her akin to a holy maiden and called her such.
“Today, we prepare,” she said. “Are you all ready?”
“Yes, Lady Ursula,” the four women in the room with her responded in unison, all smiling as they rose to their feet together.
They were young, ranging in age from their early teens to their early twenties, and belonged to what the church called the Holy Disciplinary Corps. They had all been saved by the church and gathered under Ursula, and now traveled with her to various places to aid the downtrodden.
“Before that, I would like to see how the children are doing,” Ursula said, smiling gently.
“Yes, my lady,” the women replied with joyous smiles of their own.
Ursula began walking, and the women, wearing similarly pure-white robes, trailed behind her. The group gracefully crossed the cathedral, attracting admiring gazes that bordered on fanaticism from the worshippers and young priests alike. A few of the priests, however, gave them tense glances—these were the ones who knew that their purity was but a mask.
When Ursula arrived at the orphanage within the temple, the young children, clad in unbleached tunics, all ran up to her, beaming.
“Lady Ursula!”
“Hello, everyone. Have you all been good?”
Here lived many unfortunate children who had lost their parents to accidents or illness. Thanks to the unconditional love from Ursula and the priests, these children, who had once cried themselves to sleep asking after their parents, could now smile innocently again.
Ursula gently patted the head of a child clinging to her robes, then picked up and soothed another.
“I’m going down,” she told her entourage. “Please take care of the others.”
She left the children with the disciplinarian maidens and proceeded alone toward the deeper part of the temple, where she unlocked an iron door guarded by priestly knights, then descended the stairs leading underground.
The stairs went so far down that as one approached the bottom, sounds from the surface could no longer be heard. The white plaster of the walls gradually grew tainted with dark smears, and from beyond came the sounds of banging and children’s sobs. Chains ending in shackles extended from the walls, and dark red stains clung to restraining platforms. Along the corridors were small iron-barred rooms fitted with rusty torture devices in which disciplinarian priests were forcing harsh training on young children.
All of the children gathered underground were those who had never known their parents’ faces. Here, they were drilled in Holy Church ideology and efficient ways to break the human body, taught that this was a just and fair practice. These children would become the next generation of disciplinarians, who would capture those that opposed the Holy Church’s teachings and “educate” the “sinners” by breaking them.
They believed that this was justice. Nevertheless, the whip had worn down their spirits. To offer them the sweet respite of compassion, Ursula embraced the children, smiling at them like a mother.
“My sweet, sweet sisters,” she cooed. “How many did you break today?”
✦ ✦ ✦
“Vivi, are you really doing it alone?”
“Yes. I’ll kill our lady’s enemy.”
Vivi, Clara’s youngest handmaiden, had volunteered to assassinate Alicia Melsis in lieu of Hilda. She, too, had been a beneficiary of Clara’s mercy. Doris and Heidi had as well, when their families had fallen into poverty, but Hilda and Vivi, whose lives had been saved directly, had pledged their full loyalty to the noblewoman.
It was only because Clara had hired skilled physicians to treat Hilda’s and Vivi’s burns that the two women bore no scars. Unlike the older Hilda, Vivi wasn’t as skilled a handmaiden, and her wounds had taken longer to fully heal. Now that she was finally whole, Vivi was eager to finally be of use, hence the fact that she’d volunteered in place of Hilda, who was a less formidable combatant.
The plan was to poison Alicia, but since she was favored by Prince Elvan and Prince Amor, and likely had her own specialized guards, Hilda had to agree Vivi was more suited for the role.
“I’m going,” Vivi said.
Wrapped in black garb covering everything but her eyes, Vivi melted into the dark of night. In her hand was a vial of illegal poison devised by a demoness and perfected by a shaman. The powder could be administered via inhalation or dissolved and mixed into food. Most strong poisons were quite pungent and rapidly lost effectiveness when exposed to air, but this one had no smell or taste and was guaranteed to kill.
It did have one flaw, however—it could only kill people without aethercrystals in their bodies.
The main ingredients for the poison were human aethercrystals. It worked by reacting with the blood of the human target—it was important that the target be the same species as the source of the crystal—and generating irregularly shaped pseudo-aethercrystals in their heart. This eventually halted blood flow entirely, resulting in certain death.
Because it required a target with no crystals in the first place, using the technique on monsters was pointless, as monsters all possessed aethercrystals. The poison was also ineffective on nobles, who almost invariably used magic. But Alicia Melsis, previously a commoner, still couldn’t use magic. It would be certain to work on her. Besides, Alicia’s poison tasters were unlikely to lack aethercrystals themselves. Not only that, Vivi, like Hilda, had Poison Resistance. Despite not having a crystal of her own, she should be able to safely administer the poison without anyone noticing.
Avoiding the watchful gaze of the patrolling knights, Vivi crept toward the area where the middle-ranked students lived. Generally, students of middle rank and below were supposed to live communally, in dormitories. But, unlike the much more numerous low-ranking nobles, middle-ranked nobles could afford to rent what amounted to one of several small mansions arranged in rows.
After the disaster of having allowed demons to infiltrate the academy grounds, the administration had tightened security significantly. Though most of it was allocated to high-ranking nobles, infiltrating the mansion of a middle-ranked noble was still dangerous, even for a former assassin like Vivi with Level 2 Stealth.
The increased security made it impossible to administer the poison through indirect means, and moving in a group with Heidi and Doris would’ve been unwise, only increasing the likelihood of detection and capture. Thus, Vivi had come alone.
According to Clara’s intel, Alicia Melsis likely had an apprentice steward from the Order of Shadows as her personal guard—but any security had gaps that could be exploited. Sneaking into the estate proper or the kitchen was dangerous, but the laundry area was less so.
Freshly collected linens could be found in the communal building just beside it. The highest quality items would undoubtedly belong to noble students. Though other middle-ranked nobles besides Alicia remained, it would not be an issue were Vivi to accidentally poison someone else’s linens, as the others would all have aethercrystals.
She crept toward the communal building and moved to unlock the door. Knights and soldiers wouldn’t be able to sense her, blended into the dark like this, except perhaps during combat.
Or rather, they shouldn’t have been able to.
The moment Vivi sensed danger, she reflexively leaped away from the door just in time to avoid a knife. The blade embedded itself into the wood with a soft thunk.
A Krus boy seeped out of the darkness, his steps silent and smooth. He directed his cold gaze and the throwing knife in his hand at Vivi.
“Who are you?” he asked.