FB: Chapter 48 – Dark Gods

I didn’t touch the Lesser Pendant of the Poison God and let out a sigh. The lore of this world was that humanity, and the Human Empire were protected by the Trinity. The Gods of Vigilance, Healing, and Humanity had come together to bless a Divine Saint to ensure that humans would prosper. In turn these gods who had once been weak grew in power.

The other gods grew jealous and sought to undermine the newly formed Human Empire that united all humans against the dark gods. Many of these dark gods began forming communities out beyond the Human Empire as they constantly created monsters to kill the humans and undermine their fellow gods.

Claiming this pendant would instantly make me an enemy of the Human Empire. I could turn it in for rewards instead. That last attack was most likely a curse of some kind, which would forcibly altar my alignment or give me a permanent debuff, which would make things very difficult.

Getting such a curse removed would have penalties attached to it. Since it was the poison god, that would probably mean a long-term weakness to poison, which would be very bad for my build. I looked around and found some moldy drapes over a tiny slit window. I removed the drapes and used them to wrap up the pendant before putting it in my inventory.

As I left Murk Tower and returned to Murk Town, I noted that the mist was clearing and the smell was getting less horrific. Of course, I triggered an event. It was probably using the skill Murk Barf upon Arch-Mage Blight along with all the other steps I had taken to weaken him. That was why he considered me an inheritor of his legacy. This pendant was a unique drop, which dropped from my Luck stat combined with my actions.

Events from killing bosses were incredibly rare since the prerequisites needed to be met first. If a team had just killed the boss in direct combat, he would have respawned after a period of time. A common rule of Exponential was that if you wanted to impact the lore you had to follow the lore.

From my past experience, the entire region would experience a massive shift. All the murk type monsters would probably disappear to be replaced with other monsters, with only a small group of murk monsters near the tower itself. If I wanted to get credit for killing Arch-Mage Blight and fixing the Murk Swamp I needed to hand in the pendant.

That would be enough to see my noble rank promoted from Baroness up to Viscountess. That kind of reward was really good in my mind. The problem was that the Poison God would be a huge boost to my style of combat and give me an edge that I needed. If I did quests on his behalf he would reward me.

The lesser pendant was just the appetizer in terms of potential. Becoming a secret enemy of the Human Empire would be insanely risky. When I got back to Murk Town, I had made my decision on what I was going to do. I was going to try and get another reward instead of a noble title. The starting noble title was enough for now.

I made my way to the Trinity Church present in the town. “Welcome Baroness how can the Trinity help you today?” a priest asked me.

“I have come across a dangerous item that requires the presence of a Cardinal,” I said. If I wasn’t a noble, there would have been a lot more difficulty requesting a Cardinal. If I did this on a lark, I would lose massive amounts of reputation. About ten minutes later Cardinal Pious entered the shrine where I was waiting. This was the female Cardinal who had been present when I had entered Exponential.

“Cardinal Pious,” I said and bowed my head.

“Ah, my child. You seem to be doing quite well for yourself. It brings me joy to see you flourish. I have been told you have a dangerous artifact you wish to hand over,” she said.

“Yes Cardinal. A Lesser Pendant of the Poison God after I cleared the Murk Tower and purged the corpse of Arch-Mage Blight,” I said.

“A lost lamb.” She held up a hand and a transparent glowing white sphere formed. “Please place the pendant inside.” I removed the moldy curtain with the pendant wrapped inside of it and pushed it all into the glowing sphere. The moldy curtain burned away in white flames, leaving the snake pendant behind. The glowing white sphere and the pendant then disappeared.

“You have the thanks of the Trinity Church. Such items are not destroyed but kept so as to weaken the dark gods that threaten us all,” she said with a smile.

“I trust the Trinity Church, and would ask for a small boon for returning the pendant and helping fix Murk Swamp. A holy pendant of the Trinity, to help with my Luck,” I replied. Getting anything that boosted Luck was a massive hassle. While it was tempting to focus on poison, Luck was a stat which will under the domain of the Human God.

“Oh, you wish to become an apostle of the Trinity Church. Such a path is not easy. The dark gods will target you specifically along with their followers,” she replied.

“It is a risk I am willing to bear,” I replied. She waved her hand, and another pendant appeared. Instead of a snake icon, it had a small child icon instead. She plucked it out of the air and then handed it to me.

“Take this with my blessing and thanks. If you triumph over the dark gods, you may reach out to the Trinity at that time and they will arrange for dangerous items to be disposed of,” Cardinal Pious said with a soft voice.

Minor Pendant of the Human God
A pendant used by the Apostles of the Human God to commune with their deity and receive blessings.
+Recognized as an Apostle of the Human God
+1% Luck

I put the pendant over my head. Cardinal Pious gave me a smile and teleported away, leaving behind some glittering white sparkles in the air that slowly faded away. It was nowhere as good as the lesser pendant of the poison god, but I wasn’t an enemy of humanity. Quests didn’t reward more than you handed over.

Getting one of these pendants was incredibly difficult. Since I could now accept quests directly from the Trinity and get rewarded. If I killed followers of the dark gods and handed their items over, then the pendant would improve. The real challenge was getting one of these pendants to begin with, which required a substantial contribution like I just gave.

In the future the value of such a pendant was pegged around 5,000 platinum. There were only three human supporting gods and lots of dark gods. Playing for the dark side was huge risk, huge reward. No super-guild had publicly gone against humanity. Instead, it was a lot of the smaller guilds that flirted with such things. Still getting the Trinity’s favor was like pulling teeth. My personal guess was that it was game balance, so people moved away from the Human Empire at the higher levels to get more power. The dark gods were quicker and easier, but they came with a lot of tradeoffs. This type of balancing was in line with level 120, when people would go beyond the borders of the Human Empire.

If I became a supporter of a dark god, then I would have eventually been discovered. The Human Emperor was the Divine Saint, which meant he could sense followers of the dark gods. I also had a new title available but didn’t equip it, since it wasn’t as good as my other titles.

Apostle
Awarded for becoming a follower of a god.
+Recognition as a follower of a god
+1% Stats
+1% Max Resistances

The recognition would be useful when dealing with the Trinity Church, but it would also make me a big target of the dark gods and the hordes of people who joined them. While it would have been nice to join the anti-establishment side, it would risk everything related to my guild and what I had built up outside of the game.

It was much easier getting rewarded as a follower of the dark gods than as a follower of the Trinity. But when those people were eventually found and killed by the Trinity Church and the Human Empire, they would be regretting their choices.

This was something I should bring up with the officers in my guild. It would be useful to have some hidden members who were followers of a dark god, that we could direct to cause trouble against other guilds. We needed to make sure that these people didn’t hold officer positions and that there was insulation between the top ranks and these people, but they would become useful assets. Perhaps even forming a secret dark guild of our own once we had grown a bit bigger and people had found such opportunities in game.

It was this reason why the dark guilds had flourished in the past. They secretly sheltered under the super-guilds to attack other super-guilds without starting a full-scale war. It was a valid tactic, even if it had a slight bit of risk.

The Human Empire was powerful, but there was a lot of rot under the surface. Just like how the Human Emperor appeared amazing but had a completely garbage personality. The higher up one climbed, the greater the darkness and the rot in the Human Empire.

Most of the nobles were dirtbags. But they followed the Trinity Church, which was what the Human Emperor cared about. He was the worst of them all. But the dark gods were no better, they would use humans their playthings, delighting in the weakening of the Trinity.

On the surface, the Human Empire seemed quite idealistic. But once one dug past the poor peasants and public institutions, they would find a cesspool of degeneracy. The Empire was protected by the Trinity, which were the gods that had the domains of humanity, healing, and vigilance. The gods of freedom, kindness, and benevolence were considered dark gods and they were considered incredibly weak gods as well.

That was why I didn’t like the lore of Exponential. The more one looked into it, the more depressing it was. The only good thing was that the god of humans was part of the trinity, which restrained the worst that things could occur. One would think healing would be good, but to heal you needed to be injured.

There was a reason why I had avoided anything involving other nobles wherever possible while in Exponential. I only took up the most basic title for some benefits, but I would avoid the nobility if I could.