2.4

Victor the Heretic

The conversation with the Herald had invigorated Willow in a way she had ever known before. Something that she was still clueless about. The girl gulped down the rest of her drinks, slammed the cup on the table and says.

“Let’s go, Hiro, to see the other Heralds!”

“Other Heralds? There is only one other person, right?”

“What do you mean, He… Hiro?”

“Only me and the knight came here, to this world”

“Hmm, that’s strange…”

“Are there supposed to be more of us?”

“Well yes. Although my companion told me that there was a problem with the summoning rituals so not all Heralds arrived here near this town”

“So is everyone else scattered all over the land then?”

“No, the rest will arrive at one other location. But still…” Willow seemed to be deep in thought “According to Victor, four Heralds were summoned here”

“Wait, what! Four! How did you know about that?”

“I don’t really know the detail, this was told to me by my… companion” The girl was rather reluctant to say that word “Victor the Heretic”

The moment that name was mentioned the entire bar is up in surprise. So they were listening in after all. While none of them could understand what the two are saying, that name was what they have heard of.

‘That white coat, so it was him!’ ‘See, I told you!’ ‘That Victor is here?’

The townsfolks presented here all look worried, an unusual sight for Hiro. He couldn’t help but wonder.

“What with this Victor?”

Willow bit her lips slightly in frustration, even saying the name made her feels uncomfortable. She would rather not talk about that man. Nevertheless, it was a question from her Herald, so she answered with great disdain.

“Hiro, that man is a traitor, a despicable being. His betrayal is compiled in a great tome but I shall give you the short version… A long time ago, before Eden existed. The God gave the Divines great power to unite the people. Most people back then, blinded by their own ignorance and stupidity, didn’t accept the Divines’ love. But among the few who did was Victor”

The girl stopped to take a sip from her cup which the tavern owner had refilled.

“But it was a ruse. After the Divines had proven themselves by forming Eden, the God granted them all of his power in the form of powerful artefacts. His Tongue, His Eye, His Flesh, His Blood, four items for four Divines. Or at least it was supposed to be that way. That was when their most trusted apostle, Victor, betrayed their trusted. The man, hungry for power, had consumed the Eye of God which was in form of an apple. Since he wasn’t a Divine, Victor couldn’t truly absorb that great power, nevertheless, it granted him a great wealth of knowledge. There was no way to take back the artefact so he was allowed to continue to serve!”

As she muttered those final words, Willow crushed the cup in her palm. The girl was filled with rage and the sentiment was shared by everyone else here but Hiro of course. The story ended there but Willow is too emotional to stop.

“Without that bastard, the world would have been different. Eden would truly be unified so much sooner. With the Eye, the Divine could see all of the world. They would be able to see where are all these monsters, these Fallens. Then we wouldn’t have to fear that one day our fields would be ravaged, fear for our people our citizens our friends our neighbours our loved ones our fellow men! That bastard had corrupted that power and with it, he committed such atrocity, such affronts to nature! With all of his ghastly experiments, his horrible monstrosities! With it, he granted himself immortality and so, that man continue to be a blight to our utopia!”

Willow hung her head low, her outburst finally over, she turned to Hiro.

“I’m sorry that was uncalled for. I wasn’t supposed to vent to you like that. It’s just that… That heretic committed such a sin, but we could do nothing but tolerate him, humour him. Here I am, having to accompany that man here”

Such an outburst, how long had Willow held that frustration. It was as if something snapped in her, overflowing like a volcano. And Hiro didn’t know what to say, all he could do is sit there silently.

___

The brief struggle ended with an axe to the neck. Conrad once again emerged victorious. He looked down at his unmoving opponent with caution. The wound was definitely fatal, but he couldn’t help but be on edge.

As a vagabond, a soldier without a master, Conrad was always on the move, always drifting. And now, he had found himself in a strange place indeed. He had seen a ghastly wound reverted with just an injection of mystical blood. Who to say his opponent wouldn’t spring right back up as he checked for pulse. No, he couldn’t take any chances.

With a decisive strike, he cut off the corpse head.

The severed part rolled to his legs, its face pointing up. Conrad looked down at the empty white mask next to his feet. This is the fourth he had killed so far.

One was when he first arrived in this strange world. His opponent was skilled and deadly but was no match for the vagabond. Conrad had taken this axe from him and. Not his weapon of choice but his sword was too damaged and eventually broken from the battle with a monster.

This was a strange weapon, however, the craftmanship looked rather common. And yet, the thing was practically unbreakable. Conrad had been using this too help the townsfolks, whom had taken him in, at the timber yard. After all that work and the edge was still razor sharp.

Such a plain looking item but its value unparalleled, at least by his standard.

Perhaps that was why his next three opponents didn’t have any weapon. They roles weren’t to attack, however, but to spy. They had been shadowing a young man who arrived to this world with Conrad. But even then, these masked people were still incredible martial artists and with their enhanced strength, crushing a man head with bare hand was child’s play.

Conrad left the first spy alone, he intended to follow it later. But then that guy managed to poison the young man, giving him a horrible fever. Lucky for him, the house he was in had quite a miraculous medic.

That particular spy was easy kill, he was near dead anyway, mortally wounded by a woman with cracked mask. After that, Conrad had sought out and killed every spy after immediately. Even though he was never trained in the way of espionage, life had made him quite a competent tracker.

Curiously, all three spies looked the same. After killing the second one, Conrad had unearthed the first to compare. They were one person, not twins because their scars were the same. No, they were one person. And now there was the third one.

Conrad checked the body to find it no different. He then buried it. As he was digging a hole, however, the vagabond could hear the sound of someone sneaking up.

He turned around in an instant, axe ready in hand.

Behind him was a bald man in his fifties. He wore a long white coat with a pair of glasses in his front pocket. The old man was holding his hands up, showing no sign of hostility.

“There is no need for the weapon, I am just someone who wants to say hi. Hi”

“Hi”

Conrad replied, curious about the man words. Not their meaning but the fact that he could understand it. There was also something about this old man, he didn’t look like a local. Was he someone new to this world too? The vagabond had many questions but he remained silent. Nevertheless, he lowered his weapon but still gripped it tightly.

“Well, you must be wondering what is an old man like me doing in the wood like this. I can see it on your face, ‘Who is this intriguing person?’, ‘Why doesn’t this mysterious man not surprised to see me burying a headless corpse?’, ‘What is in his head?’, ‘Why is he so devilishly handsome for a person his age’, etcetera etcetera…”

“…”

“Well, I was messing with you there. I mean, you have that helmet on and all, how could I even see your face. Or maybe I could?”

“…”

“Oh and nice job dealing with that guy. That was a clean cut there, with an axe no less. I mean, I never really chop someone head off, living one at least. So I can’t really tell how hard it is to do that but I figure it is pretty hard”

“…”

“You see what I did there, I put the ‘living one at least’ part in deliberately. To build intrigue you know. The truth isn’t anything interesting though, I am just a researcher slash surgeon slash evil genius. Oh, one useful tip here, guys like this, their halos will fall off when they are completely dead”

“…”

I have a story about that actually. One time, one of my assistant Frank, Divine blessed him, he is a bit slow and all but genuinely nice and dedicated guy. He makes amazing sweats, that’s actually why I still keep him around. Actually, ever since I hired him, my waistline had been tighter. Maybe I should go on a diet or something”

“…”

“Anyway, one day I was called to help clean up an attack from these guys, messy stuffs. Frank approached a corpse, but the halo is still on. So I yelled ‘Frank, watch out, that guy is still alive’. Technically not that words for words but you know, kind of like that, in the same vein. Poor guy didn’t realise it in time, however, he got stabbed straight through the chest. Ghastly stuff but lucky for him I was there. So being amazing as usual, I patched poor Frank up, no scar even”

“…”

“I can’t really think of anything to ramble about. The starting joke was a bit too painful to work on. So… you know”

“…”

“You really a quite fella”

“Sorry”

“After wasting your time with all those verbal diarrhoea, I should be one saying that. What are you even apologising about even?”

“Not interjecting”

“It’s… fine”

“…”

“…”

“…”

“I’m Victor”

“Conrad”

“Need a hand with that?”

“No”

The old man then proceeded to wait until Conrad was finished with disposing the body. When the corpse was deep underground to be worms food, it was already time for lunch. The two returned to town in silent.