Debris collapsed from the ceiling after Axion’s roar as he climaxed. Dink crawled free from under the pile of beautiful naked women piled atop him. He looked around himself, the staircase was strewn with exhausted sisters of Mercy. Axion sat nearby on a step preening himself. There was a gorgeous Beastfolk woman with a mixture of Human and minotaur features resting with her head in his lap. Drool pooled from her mouth beside his spent manhood as she lightly snored.

Even I’m impressed we managed to service more than fifty virgins between us. Mercy’s avatar will be looking for blood. Take what’s mine, will you? I don’t think so. It’s strange though, why did the spores not transform me this time? I was completely immune to their effect. I can’t decide if that’s a bad thing or not.

His gaze travelled up the steps to the altar with Estra tossing and turning. The true sisters of Mercy stood immobile in front of the bronze statuesque avatar. Their divine power continued to blanket Estra in golden light as she visibly recovered. Dink felt something bump against his foot.

Glancing down, he discovered the Myconid free from its cage affectionately nudging its head against his leg. He crouched down to pick up the mushroom creature and placed it on his shoulder.

“Well done, big guy. For this, I think you’ve earned a name. How about… Wart? I like it. What about you?” Dink asked. Wart chirped in satisfaction as Dink scratched under his cap. “Good. Then it’s settled. Wart it is.”

Corrupted sisters of mercy milled around in exhaustion like they were recovering from a hangover. He noticed the Half Wood-Elf sister from earlier, Eos, sitting on a step rubbing her temples with both hands.

A cry of rage reverberated through the inner sanctum, drawing Dink’s attention to the statue of Mercy atop the dais. Bronze crumbled away as the statue stood from its throne, revealing flesh underneath. The avatar hissed in pain while shrinking away from the divine power wielded by the true sisters of Mercy.

At full height, he was more than twElve feet tall with a heroic physique. He possessed golden-hued skin with a tightly curled beard and short cropped hair of a matching colour. His eyes were filled with charred orbs that still smouldered. He was pockmarked with burning patterns that shifted and healed over the surface of his skin, which didn’t seem to pain him in the least.

“You lowly creatures dare to defile this one’s women? Trespassers, your souls shall be flayed from your flesh and chained to this one’s throne for all eternity. Harlots, for your betrayal this one strips you of all your divine power. No more shall you be welcome within these halls. Be gone!” the avatar declared.

The corrupted sisters all collapsed to their knees in unison, simultaneously wailing in despair at the loss of their divine connection. Dink heartlessly ignored their screams. He could feel the pleasant surprise coming from the true Mercy at the edge of his consciousness at his actions.

“It’ll take more than words to scare me, imposter. Let me show you the true might of Mercy, not your little mockery. What did you hope to achieve by severing your connection to the thing giving you life? Without Mercy, you don’t exist. You’re less real than this sword,” Dink mocked, holding his open hand to his side.

A golden sword grew from his shadow to slam into his waiting palm. It had an ornamental hilt capped with the chalice symbol of Mercy on the pommel. The slender blade was etched with divine patterns glowing with golden light.

“How? Mercy has no influence on the mortal plane, this is this one’s domain!” the avatar screamed in disbelief.

“Ah, you see, that’s where I come in. I’m good at breaking the rules. Goblins are born to fuck shit up. It’s the one thing we’re good at and I’m about to fuck you up. You should never made designs on my woman. Especially while she’s so vulnerable. I can’t believe you’ve forgotten this, fake Mercy. It hasn’t been so long for you since we last met,” Dink sneered.

The corrupt avatar’s expression twisted in confusion at his words. He leaned closer to truely look at Dink, peering through the layers of his body. His eyes widened in surprise while forming a smile of amusement.

“Sword Saint, it seems you are not much different from this one. You’ve fallen on unfortunate times. If it was you from the height of your power, this one would be concerned. But your soul essence is less intact than this one’s own, limited to the Expert realm. Not even a Master. This fallen one stands firmly within the Grand realm even broken. That’s a gap of two realms between us. You will not survive this encounter,” the corrupted avatar retorted.

His cursed title caused all the mortals within the room to involuntarily spit on the floor before looking to Dink in disbelief. Axion was especially taken aback by the revelation, staring at Dink with mouth agape. Dink waved away any questions he may have before returning his attention to the god avatar.

“Haha, that’s where we differ. I’m not a lowly coward biting the hand that feeds me. An avatar cannot exist separate from its god despite cultivating independently. Your mortal power would fester away to be claimed by any opportunist enough to take it. Who do you think that would be? There’s a reason an avatar can’t ascend to the Divine realm. You’ve been deceived,” Dink replied while ascending the steps, the divine sword gouging a rut behind him. In response to his words Jiltia appeared in a puff of indigo smoke atop the dais.

“This one is not so easily swayed by mere words. It will take more than that for this one to distrust this one’s my devout adherent,” the corrupt Mercy firmly stated.

He stepped down from the dais and reached behind the throne, drawing an enormous sword from behind the backrest. The sword was identical to the one held by Dink.

Dink casually lift it to rest on his shoulder as he turned to confront the avatar at the top of the stairs.