Side Story: 6 months - Cadet Corrine

The estate of Lord Sinclair Boyd was a sprawling, ugly thing. More gold-leaf than stone, more glass than sense. On a clear day, its reflective pillars shimmered like vanity knives above the dry plains near Gomorrah's border, the holy land for demons. But today, the air shimmered with heat for a different reason.

Smoke.

Dark, angry plumes roiled in the distance, curling above burning watchtowers and scattered ranks of retreating guards. The sky boiled amber as alarms rang like broken chimes from the lower wards. Lord Sinclair, clad in an ostentatious purple suit with gold-trim trim and the pigeon crest of House Boyd stitched across his broad chest, pressed his face to the reinforced window of his study. His nostrils flared. Sweat rolled down his bald scalp. His jowls trembled.

“This is absurd,” he hissed, licking his lips nervously. “Those damn roons... They wouldn’t dare.”

He turned away from the window, snatching up the long-range crystal communicator sitting atop his polished wood desk. He twisted its base with thick fingers, muttering the emergency call code as his voice cracked.

“Temple Hub, Priority Boyd-Alpha, repeat, Boyd-Alpha! I demand contact with the Central Hero Dispatch!”

The crystal flickered. Then fizzled.

Static. Not even the whining tone of a blocked call, just dead silence.

“No, no, no...!” He twisted it again harder. “You listen here, I am a registered delegate of the Central Capital Temple! I pay your salaries, damn you!”

The crystal cracked in his palm. Thin, glittering shards rained down like broken dreams. His breath came in ragged gasps as he backed toward his office door, face white with dread beneath his dark skin.

That’s when the screams started echoing from the floor below. Not the yelps of commoners, the death-shrieks of his trained guards.

Boots stomped. Wood splintered.

The double doors burst open before he could flee. A dozen soldiers surged in, armor gleaming with violet inscriptions, sabatons echoing across the marble. Their faces were sealed behind blackened masks carved with angular demon runes. Their movements were precise, military, efficient. Sinclair tried to bark a protest, but his voice caught in his throat when he saw the one who followed them.

A young woman stepped in last, 15 by the looks of it.

Not just a young woman. A devil-touched warrior in high-command regalia.

Corrine Baphomet.

She no longer resembled the timid noble girl who once visited Boyd’s estate with her father, lowering her head and speaking only when spoken to. That version had vanished. What stood in her place was a warlock radiating dread, her spear affixed to her back like a flag of conquest.

Her eyes glowed violet, the whites stained grey. Her black tongue, visible as she smiled faintly, bore golden runes that pulsed like an engine of forbidden script. She wore House Baphomet’s crest, a golden goat head, but her armor was nothing like the old knightly silver. This was sleek, dark as void, stitched with reactive runic plates that shimmered as she moved.

“Lord Boyd.” she said at last, addressing him like one might a squashed rodent on the road.

He tried to muster some pride, lifting his chin. “Y-you can’t be serious. This is… this is aggression against a Temple-sanctioned House! A-a war crime!”

Her stare didn’t even flicker.

“I remember,” Corrine said quietly, her voice like coiled steel, “how you used to speak to me. ‘Run along, little goat. Real nobles are talking.’”

She stepped closer. The soldiers flanked her silently, no need for orders.

“I remember,” she added, “how you called my mother a ‘souled roon whore’ when she tried to negotiate trade for demon settlements.”

His mouth opened in outrage, but no words came.

Now, for the first time, Sinclair noticed the symbol carved into her soldiers’ breastplates. It wasn’t the goat head. It was a new banner, a stylized fusion of a spider kneeling below a golden cage, a mark of her own army, not just her house.

“I called for the Temple!” he spat, voice ragged. “The heroes will come. You’ll see, they won’t let this stand!”

Corrine’s gaze drifted to the cracked crystal on the floor.

“Oh, I’m sure they’ll come,” she said, smiling with that eerie black tongue, golden runes flickering. “But not the ones you pray for. The real heroes don’t waste their time out here in the dust.”

She turned to walk past him, speaking over her shoulder.

“They’ll send the eager. The expendable. The weak.”

Her soldiers followed, and Sinclair felt his knees finally give out.

The air in Lord Sinclair’s manor was thick with soot and silence. After the estate’s formal surrender, most of the guards were either captured, unconscious, or dead. His noble insignias, pigeon crests on velvet banners, were already being torn down, replaced with Corrine’s dread spider sigil, stitched in deep violet silk, a twisted arachnid with eight curling legs and a dripping fang, by quiet, disciplined hands.

Corrine stood in the estate’s central hall now, where light filtered through fractured stained-glass. A merchant’s pride, the Boyd family tree etched into saints and saints into angels. Her soldiers moved like shadows around her, marking doors with runes, shuffling captives into clean lines, securing communication crystals.

Her tongue still hummed faintly with golden glyphs. Runes of command, of power, of pact.

Yet beneath the swirl of victory and efficiency, her chest ached. She touched the bridge of her nose briefly. Her head was pounding, not from fatigue, but from something quieter.

She remembered.

Years ago, this very hall had terrified her. She’d followed behind her father, Ramsus, hands folded, head bowed, afraid to speak up. Sinclair had waved her away like a fly when she’d asked to use the library. Called her “little goat.” Laughed when she blushed. No one had stopped him.

Her fist clenched at the memory, but not from anger.

From shame.

Because part of her still wanted to forgive. Still wanted to help the innocents running through alleys now, clutching children, hoping the demons wouldn’t eat them in their sleep. She didn’t hate them for their fear. She understood it. The world had made them that way.

But understanding didn’t change the facts.

Her people were dying. Always. Quietly. Softly. Under laws written in cities like this.

And she had been chosen to protect them, not to appease her conscience.

Corrine turned to a low-ranking officer, a demon boy no older than sixteen in rune-etched greaves and a dented chestplate.

“Make sure the civilians are fed,” she said, voice calmer than she felt. “House Boyd stored dried meat and wheat in their cellar. Open it.”

The boy saluted. “Yes, Commander!”

“Leave the churches untouched,” she added. “For now.”

Another soldier approached, this one an older woman, human, pale-skinned, with gray eyes and a thick scar across her eye. She held a scroll tightly in gloved hands, her posture tense.

“Report?” Corrine asked.

The woman unrolled the parchment quickly. “Scouts on the western ridge have spotted incoming movement. Fast. Flying mount confirmed. Estimated arrival: twenty-three minutes.”

Corrine’s eyes narrowed.

“Heroes?”

The woman nodded. “Yes, Commander. B-class adventuring party. Temple registered. Four members.”

Corrine exhaled slowly.

B-class. Not S. Not A. Still dangerous, but not beyond reason.

She looked up at the shattered ceiling as the wind stirred ash into pale motes.

So they were sending a team. Of course they were.

But not the elite. The capital wouldn’t waste their saints and shining blades on a city at the edge of nowhere, not when the real wars brewed closer everyday. They wouldn’t tell the common people, but the upper echelons knew.

Their borrowed time was running out.

She had counted on this.

Corrine walked toward the balcony overlooking the estate’s scorched courtyard. Her soldiers below were already forming ranks, reorganizing perimeter patrols. The burning outer ward was almost extinguished. They were well-trained. Ruthless, yes, but not cruel.

“I’ll meet them at the gate,” she said to the officer behind her. “Personally.”

“But Commander, shouldn’t we set an ambush?”

“No.” Her voice was iron. “We are not the monsters they say we are. If they draw steel, we finish them. But we speak first.”

The woman bowed low.

Corrine stood alone a moment longer.

She let her tongue slide along her teeth. The runes there pulsed again, a gift of the pact, and a reminder of the price. She felt Lady Hannya’s presence flicker at the edge of her awareness, distant but watching.

‘You can’t protect everyone.’ the pact whispered, not cruelly. Just honest. ‘But you can protect what matters, cadet. Remember that.’

She stared toward the west, where the sky brightened slightly, disturbed by fast motion, the shimmer of summoned light.

“They’ll come expecting a devil.” Corrine murmured to herself. “Let them see what a real one looks like.”

The gate to the outer courtyard creaked open beneath the shimmer of protective runes and scorched steel. A wind carried the scent of ash and sun-baked stone across the ruined estate, stirring embers from broken statues and cracked tiles. Corrine stood at the base of the wide stair, her hands behind her back, body still.

Above her, a shimmer of white-gold light broke across the sky.

The heroes had arrived.

A sleek winged beast landed in the courtyard with arrogant grace, part gryphon, part lionhawk, its feathers lined with pale mana threads and Grand Temple insignias. Four armored figures dismounted swiftly, each with distinct colors and matching pride.

The leader wore an open white coat embroidered with sunbursts, a twin saber strapped to his back. He scanned the burned manor and scoffed. “This the place?” His tone was clipped and bored.

“Looks like the report was right,” muttered a second, a shorter woman in mirror-polished half-plate. She already had her blade out, eyes flicking over the courtyard with professional disdain. “Temple node detected massive demonic energy.”

The third, a lanky archer with golden hair and a gleaming monocle, snorted. “Demons with tech now? That’s cute.”

The last member, a woman in bronze and white robes, trailed behind. Her eyes locked on a passing demon soldier near the gate, one with maroon skin. Her nose wrinkled.

“Ugh. Look at that roon.” she muttered with open disgust.

The soldier froze, visibly stricken, but Corrine raised one hand. He stopped himself, bowed, and kept walking.

Corrine descended the final step and stood before them in full view. The sun caught the black-violet runes on her armor, and her purple dread spider crest seemed to shimmer on her chest plate. Her tongue, when she spoke, moved oddly, coated in runic glyphs that hummed with pact-power.

“I am Evangelist Corrine, Warlock and Enforcer of the Court of Gilded Woe’s will,” she said, her voice clean and clear. “You stand within a territory claimed for restructuring by demonic authority under sanctioned precepts of pact-bound neutrality.”

There was a long silence.

Then laughter.

The leader chuckled. “You hear that? ‘Court of Gilded Woe.’ What is that, a new cult?”

The archer adjusted his monocle. “Never heard of them. Must be some backwater sect.”

The woman in robes raised a hand, gathering a bit of holy light in her palm. “Evangelist of what? You’re just a devil-worshiper with a title no one recognizes.”

Corrine remained still.

“We’re here on orders from the Central Temple to investigate the destruction of House Boyd’s estate and secure the safety of all human citizens in the region,” the leader continued. “You’ve violated Temple protection laws. You and your little army of roons are going to disarm and surrender immediately, or we’ll make it quick.”

Corrine tilted her head slightly, and when she spoke again, it was with an eerie calm.

“Under the Twin Platform Concord, ratified eight hundred and thirty-one years ago by the Primordial Devil Alliance, Beast Lord Pack, World Tree council, and Grand Temple Pantheon, all reclaimed territories within twelve leagues of Hellnia’s Gate are subject to demonic restoration in the event of a projected planar reactivation.”

The heroes blinked.

“…What?” the short woman asked, narrowing her eyes. “Twin what?”

Corrine continued as if she hadn’t heard the interruption. “As acting Enforcer of the Court of Gilded Woe, and under the authority of Pact House Baphomet, I am enacting stabilization protocols for rebalancing before the Gate of Hellnia reopens.”

There was another beat of silence.

Then the archer burst out laughing.

“Oh, she’s crazy! That gate’s been sealed for over a century. We’ve had system updates confirming its collapse. Hellnia’s gone. You’re just a warlock playing tyrant with scavenged tech.”

The priestess nodded solemnly. “Your people are traumatized. That’s understandable. But spreading delusions and burning cities to justify your crusade? That’s not mercy. That’s madness.”

Corrine's gaze slowly shifted to the soldier who had been insulted earlier. He stood further down the steps now, back straight, hand gripping his spear. She saw the way his jaw was clenched.

Then she looked back to the heroes.

“You speak of mercy,” she said softly, the gold runes on her tongue pulsing brighter, “but your temple only offers it to those who resemble you.”

The leader waved a hand. “Enough of this. Lay down your weapons, or we’ll treat this as active resistance.”

Corrine did not flinch.

“Then I must ask,” she said, the dread spider on her chest gleaming, “when you report back to the Temple, if any of you survive, of course, will you tell them the truth?”

The wind howled behind her, scattering ash across the bloodied stones.

“That demons asked for peace. And heroes answered with threats.”

The swordsman drew first, unsheathing both sabers in twin flashes of light. “I’m done listening to devil-sick lies.” he snapped.

The priestess flared with white aura. “Purge formation!”

The archer moved like clockwork, vanishing behind his bowstring.

In a single coordinated surge, the B-Class hero party launched themselves forward, radiant wings of summoned light flaring from their boots as they blitzed toward Corrine. The air cracked with magic and righteous fury.

Corrine didn’t blink.

She didn’t need to.

‘Watch their footwork. The swordsman leads with his left, his follow-through will drop by half an inch.’

Hannya’s voice slid through her mind like cold smoke, coiled and soft.

‘The archer’s mana pool is overclocked, he’ll fire three shots, then falter. The cleric is bluffing. Her barrier doesn’t cover her flank. And the little one, she’s just fast. Not clever.’

Corrine had already seen it.

Before the sabers crossed halfway to her, she was gone.

She surged forward in a flicker of violet energy, a blur wrapped in black runes. Her armored foot slammed into the leader’s chest before his first saber could swing, a thunderous impact that cracked ribs and launched him backward like a ragdoll. He hit a pillar and didn’t rise.

The short woman, eyes wide, darted to intercept her, blade spinning low.

Corrine ducked under it, pivoted on one leg, and struck with her knee. The blow caught the woman in the gut with sickening force. Her armor bent inward. She folded and vomited midair before crashing to the stone.

The cleric shouted, "[Sanct-!]" but Corrine was already on her.

Runes blazed down her arms, fortifying her as she delivered a sweeping elbow to the priestess’s jaw, hard enough to twist her mid-prayer. The barrier spell fizzled as the woman collapsed in a heap, her holy staff skittering across the floor.

Three arrows launched from behind, whistling with radiant light, their speed amplified by a general boon, a temple enhancement. For most warriors, even reacting would be impossible.

Corrine twisted.

One arrow missed. Two she caught, one in each hand, the steel tips hissing as they met her runic gloves. She crushed them between her fingers, sparks crackling.

The archer’s eyes widened. “She’s…she’s not a B-Class! She’s A! She’s-”

Corrine launched herself across the courtyard like a bolt loosed from a god’s bow. The archer barely managed to scream before she was on him, slamming the flat of her spear into his chest, then twisting it and sweeping his legs from beneath him. He hit the stone and slid into a brazier, knocking it over in a burst of cinders.

He didn’t rise.

Corrine stood alone.

The battlefield fell still.

Her dread spider sigil pulsed softly on her chest as wind coiled around her, lifting the edges of her black warlock cloak.

Behind her, her demon and human soldiers stood frozen in awe. Before her, four heroes lay strewn across the courtyard like broken dolls.

She exhaled once, slowly.

No joy. No cruelty. No mercy.

The leader groaned and tried to rise, coughing blood.

“You…” he rasped, struggling to lift one blade. “You're not a warlock. You’re a monster.”

Corrine walked over. Her boots echoed across the stone.

She knelt beside him and took the saber from his fingers gently. Then she crushed it in one hand, the metal folding like wax between her fingers.

The sight horrified him.

“I told you my name,” she said calmly. “You chose not to listen.”

The introduction struck his mind, louder this time.

Hellnia. The plane that sealed monstrosities and devils. He didn’t know what a court was, but he knew she represented a being living there.

His lips trembled. “We…we were told Hellnia was gone. Sealed forever. The Temple system said…”

Corrine looked to the sky. “Then your system lied.”

He swallowed hard. “W-why attack now? Why take Boyd’s land?”

She stood and turned from him, glancing toward the western horizon. “Because the Gate breathes again.”

A long pause. She could feel it beneath the earth near her city, the pulsing energy. The rhythm of something vast and ancient stirring behind the seals. Hellnia’s Gate was not dead.

Only dreaming.

She raised a hand. Her soldiers began to move again, securing the courtyard and treating the wounded, hers and theirs. It didn’t matter.

The Court of Gilded Woe had won the battle.

She whispered under her breath as the dread spider on her armor writhed with faint light, its sigil drinking the fear in the air.

“Mercy is a gift,” she said, more to herself than anyone. “And not one I’m always strong enough to give.”

~~~

The clatter of bronze limbs echoed softly through the underground vaults of Gomorrah. Arcane torchlight bathed the rows of golems in flickering gold and obsidian, their rune-stamped chassis stacked shoulder to shoulder in silent formation. Each one bore the crest of House Baphomet.

Ramsus Baphomet stood between them, shirtless but wrapped in a heavy black cloth around his waist, his hands smeared with residual ink and copper dust. A long scar traced across his back, old but still raw near the base, a gift from a Principality.

He wiped his hands on a cloth and reached for the new tunic laid over a bench. It was reinforced with runic thread and buckled silver at the shoulders, noblewear with the purpose of a commander. As he dressed, the soft whine of lift gears spun up behind him.

A messenger, a young demon girl in gray with pale red eyes and ash-colored hair, stepped out of the ascending platform. She bowed immediately, one fist over her chest.

“Lord Baphomet,” she said. “Word from the western front.”

Ramsus didn’t turn. He fastened the last of his belts, rolled his sleeves, and reached for the blade leaning on the bench beside him.

“Speak.”

“Lady Corrine has secured the city of Sodom. Minimal losses. The hero party dispatched by the capital has been neutralized.”

Ramsus paused for only a breath. Then a slow, satisfied nod.

“She did it,” he murmured, more to himself than to her. “Of course she did.”

He looked down at his hands, as if remembering the days he used to braid her hair with those fingers, used to train her with wooden spears in the dead grass outside their estate.

She had been kind once. Soft-spoken. Still was, under all that warpaint and armour.

But Corrine had changed.

He’d seen it in her eyes the day she slew the false angel. Tongue runed, eyes glowing. She had stepped into her strength. Stepped into her name.

And as her father…he had no right to keep her caged, not when she’d finally found her own path.

Still, worry gnawed at his ribs like a rusted hook. The stronger she became, the closer she danced to that precipice of no return, the place where humanity and pact magic blurred. But he swallowed that doubt.

She was his daughter. And she carried their house better than he ever had.

Ramsus snapped his bracers into place and turned to the girl again.

“What of the final reagent?” he asked. “For the Baphomet summoning.”

She hesitated, a shadow crossing her face. Then stepped aside as another attendant approached, a broad-shouldered man with the ink-stained hands of a scribe and trader.

“Lord Ramsus,” the man said. “Due to the widening conflict, our trade routes into the central provinces have been… severed. With the eastern passes watched by Temple scouts and the northern river now blocked, obtaining the last essence, Heart Blood of a Fell Judge, will take time.”

Ramsus frowned.

But only for a moment. He knew forcing a summoning wouldn’t be easy.

“We adapt,” he said. “Do what we can. If Corrine can draw one devil’s attention, then two will solidify our stance. House Baphomet must speak with more than one voice. Preferably one we are familiar with… relatively.”

He turned away from them and began walking toward the lift platform. The golems lined the hall behind him, silent sentinels of steel and will.

…

…

The city square of Gomorrah was already filling by the time Ramsus emerged into the light.

The air shimmered with rising dust, but the people still gathered. Humans and demons, standing side by side, not in harmony, but in shared tension. Children clutched parents, warriors leaned on spears, and whispers moved like smoke between shoulders.

They looked toward the balcony above the square as the black, violet, and gold banner of House Baphomet was raised. A goat’s head beside a new symbol, the dread spider, its legs curled protectively around a cage.

Ramsus stepped forward. A hush fell.

He didn’t raise his voice.

“Six months ago,” Ramsus began, “they came in the night.”

He let that hang. The crowd listened.

“Not to negotiate. Not to warn. Not to judge. But to destroy. The Grand Temple of Neel, under the seal of the Sanctum, sent angels and templars to my home, not because we broke a law. Not because we attacked.”

He paused.

“But because we refused to kneel.”

A murmur rolled through the crowd.

“They burned our halls. They slaughtered my staff. They tried to kill my daughter. And when their Principality bled under her spear, they called it treason.”

He gripped the edge of the railing with one hand.

“We call it defense.”

The crowd murmured louder now, eyes narrowing, fists tightening.

“Today, we are small. Surrounded. Called monsters, heretics, filth. They call our children ‘roons.’ They spit when they see our banners.”

He looked across the crowd, at humans who had chosen to live in Gomorrah, at demons who had nowhere else left to go.

“We are not weak. We are outnumbered. But numbers are not strength.”

He raised a hand.

“Unity is strength.”

His voice deepened, resonating across the square.

“We do not seek endless war. But we do not beg for peace on our knees. If peace is to come, it will come by our terms. Our strength. Our will.”

He let that settle.

“We do not fight because we enjoy the blood. We fight because the world only listens to those strong enough to speak without trembling.”

He lowered his voice again.

“So if they come for us again… show them what we’ve become. We will show them our peace… Through our strength.”

He turned from the balcony, leaving the silence behind him like a sharpened blade.

In the crowd, the people stood taller. The two banners fluttering behind him, the spider woven in violet, and the goat gilded in gold, and the silk dyed in the blood of angels.