Girl Who Killed a God Remake - Chapter Eleven

“What the hell was that, Grace?” Max shouted at her as soon as she neared the boarding house. He leapt up from his chair faster than she thought the man capable of. He turned to his retinue of thugs and started barking orders. “Go spread the word that Grace is back and is okay. And go and fetch Levi—he’s been worried sick.”

Twitch took off, his head ticking even as he ran. One of the men nodded and ran inside, banging the door as he did and bringing a few curses from Max.

“I can’t believe they let you live!” he exclaimed, turning on his heel and kneeling to look at her eyes.

Feigning terror, she gulped and nodded. “I thought for sure they would kill me afterward, but they just let me go—even gave me some coin for my help if you can believe it.”

“What by all the gods were you thinking risking yourself like that?”

She took a slow breath and let it out, not having to feign anything this time. “They were going to hurt all those people—including me and Levi. I did what I had to, to keep them safe. I had to protect them.”

At the very least, it wasn’t a lie—though it wasn’t exactly the truth either.

Grace had protected them because there was something in it for her. But she would have had to protect Levi no matter what, and she wasn’t displeased that she’d helped the others at the same time. That she was rewarded for it was just a bonus.

Maybe I’m not a complete monster yet… That I still care about others is a good sign at least. I’ve given away so much of my humanity already—I shouldn’t be in a hurry to carve away any more pieces unless I absolutely have to.

“Still,” Max said, with a shake of his head. “It was a damned foolish thing for you to do.” He cracked a small smile. “But damned brave too.”

She was about to respond when her brother’s voice rose from inside the boarding house.

“Grace!” he shouted, running out the door and down the steps before throwing himself at her.

Max immediately moved to peel him off her, likely thinking she’d taken a beating at the hands of the guards, but Grace waved him off. She didn’t hurt, and the role she needed to play was easy. Besides, what loving sister wouldn’t endure the pain of her brother's hug, even with bruised ribs?

“I’m okay… you’re okay… now please let me breathe,” she whispered.

Levi jumped back, tears forming as he realized he was hurting her. “I’m sorry, sister! I couldn’t help. I couldn’t do any—”

“It’s okay. Now, stop crying and smile. I’ll be okay.”

He nodded his head, wiping his wet cheeks, and sniffed half a dozen times. “You sure? You’re going to be okay?”

“I am… now just stand here and let me catch my breath.”

A few minutes later, most of the residents of the building were all outside, offering her praise and thanks for her bravery in keeping them safe.

Mrs. Grayden waddled up to her and patted her cheeks, offering her a very rare smile from the otherwise taciturn old woman. “Thank you, dear. My boys were there, and if you hadn’t…” She sniffed, her words trailing off as she blinked away tears.

“I’m happy they’re ok,” Grace replied.

She nodded and motioned for her two grandsons, who came forward, giving a slight bow. Todd and Jesup were eight and eleven and they played a lot with Levi when they could. They were rowdy boys raised rough in Lowtown, but they were nice enough to Levi—when they weren’t getting him into trouble at least.

“Grace,” Max said, snapping to get everyone's attention.

She turned as he gave her one of the warmest smiles she’d ever seen on the man. “You were brave today, and you certainly saved more than one life today including those I’m supposed to protect. So, from today forward, your debt to the Bottle Gang has been settled. You’re free from any obligation to pay dues or rent—though your protection will still stand—we won’t let anything happen to you or Levi, you have my word on that. It may not seem like much for what you’ve done, but it’s the best I can offer you.”

Grace nodded as a flicker of warmth spread throughout her chest and before she knew it, she found herself smiling back at the man—and it was one of the first genuine smiles she’d given since coming to this city. “Thank you, Max. It’s more than enough.”

“On top of that, I have a gift for you—something I was going to keep for myself, but now, I can think of no one more deserving.”

He snapped again, and one of the gang members brought a small wooden crate to Max. He took it and handed it to Grace. She peeked inside the box and couldn’t help but let her jaw fall.

Inside was a bushel of fresh Malkin apples.

 “I don’t need to tell you how rare these are anymore. It was a lucky find from one of my men at the docks. Swiped them clean. That’s more than a gold in fruit you have in your hands, so enjoy them. And know that everyone in Lowtown is singing your praises right now.”

They weren’t the greatest looking apples she’d ever seen, but they were Malkin green apples. In a world where Malkin no longer really existed, this might be the last taste of home that she would ever experience.

It had been so long since she had eaten one.

And for Max to give this meant more than words could convey.

Emotions warred in her chest—the warmth and affection that had shriveled to nothing since coming to Toran, as well as the cold, ruthless side of herself she’d kept under lock and key for too many years.

In that one moment, two sides of herself clashed, and her coldness won out as she knew it would. Even as the heat and once familiar emotions started fading, Grace realized she didn’t want to let them go so easily.

So, she fought to hold onto them as tears welled in her eyes and a sob rose in her throat as she stared down at the apples and remembered her family. And how she tried so hard to be the daughter they deserved.

It was for them—and herself—that she let the tears fall.

It was the closest to a funeral any of them would get.

Taking only a single apple from the box, Grace closed the crate and took a bite, savoring the salty sweet tang of the sour apple as she sobbed quietly to herself. Though it didn’t last, and by the time she’d finished the apple, her tears had run dry, and she’d gotten herself under control.

She took a deep breath and wiped her eyes, grateful for the chill that helped numb the pain away. Looking back at the grate of apples only brought those feelings to the surface, and she couldn’t afford to be so weak again.

It churned her stomach, and she fought down her disgust before she vomited.

So she did the only thing she could and handed them back to Max and said, “Can you make sure everyone here gets one?”

Max’s eyes widened, as he dumbly took the box and cradled it to his chest. “You would really give them up? For us?”

She nodded and the lie slid past her lips as if greased. “You’re the only family we have left, why wouldn’t I share?”

Max sniffed, taking his sausage of a thumb and rubbing at the corner of his eye. “Yeah…” he smiled at her. “I can do that.”

“Thank you.”

Now I have a parade of bodies between Levi and the guards… all for the low low cost of some apples. Bottom of the barrel prices for bodyguards. So cheap it should be illegal.

The thought brought a smile to her lips that Max seemed to misconstrue as comradery. He wasn’t a bad man, but that didn’t mean Grace wouldn’t use him for everything he was worth.

In the span of just a few days, everything she’d ever known had shattered—even immortality itself was no longer out of her reach. Azaroth had promised her the world, and she was going to claim it with her own two hands.

It was time to let loose and stop playing by the old rules.

She would do this her way and no one was going to stop her.

I’ll damn my soul to the Endless Abyss if that’s what it takes. They can have it… I’ll just claw my way into hell itself to recover it after this is all over with.

***

Grace didn’t expect the gifts that came from the other gangs over the next few days. It almost turned into a competition as word spread about everyone wanting to show their gratitude for protecting the residents of Lowtown.

She even received a gift from the Branded Crew, which surprised her. They were usually very reclusive, but they still felt it was honorable, and she appreciated the hand-woven blanket they gave her and Levi.

One of the tenants of the boarding house even took the seeds from the Malkin apples and planted them. She even used a bit of herbalism and alchemy to ensure they took root and were healthy. Grace and the boarding house received the lion’s share of seeds, but several were shared and planted in a few different pots near their home, and people took turns making sure they were watered and nurtured.

It was as if that one spark of her bravery reminded everyone that the world hadn’t always been like this. People remembered that everyone had gotten along for generations and worked together to thrive before the gods interfered in their lives. The people they hated were the servants of Grimdon on the other side of town.

The ones who had burned her entire world to cinders.

Only for her to rise from the ashes.

Perhaps she should’ve been grateful—after all, if she was successful, she’d recover everything that was taken from her and more.

She would be a god.

And perhaps in the deepest parts of her soul, she wagered that her aguish and despair were an acceptable price to pay for immortality.

Though, she only had to look at Levi for that opinion to shatter. Even if she was willing to bear the heartache—she wanted nothing more than to take away Levi’s pain. And she couldn’t quite reconcile the two conflicting thoughts within her.

So, she simply ignored them as she basked in the first rays of summer as she leaned back on a bench and let the sun soak into her skin.

Laughter filled the garden as at least twenty children, including Levi, ran around playing. People were playing cards or dice—coppers won and lost over and over again. People were chatting, laughing, and simply relaxing. It was something she hadn’t seen in a long time and something akin to peace settled across her shoulders like a cloak.

And in this heat, the fabric was stifling.

Suddenly a presence settled next to her as if it had been there all along and she just hadn’t noticed. “Fantastic work with the guards.”

Grace sighed and sat up, turning to face a man she hadn’t expected to see anytime soon. “Azaroth.”

The god smirked and casually leaned back on the bench. His raven black hair was pulled back into such an intricate braid that Grace instinctively knew no mortal hand could’ve managed it. He wore fine silk robes trimmed in spun gold that glittered in the sunshine. Yet his eyes were so dark they drowned out even the sun itself as he cast his eyes in her direction.

“You’ve impressed me, and that isn’t something that’s easy to do. Well done, my Agent.”

“What are you doing here?” she hissed, glancing around to see if anyone else was watching them.

“Relax, only you can see me like this,” Azaroth said and chuckled. “Now I know you don’t take praise well, but I’m feeling the need to reward your efforts. The way you handled those guards was nothing short of masterful. You’re a natural born killer.” He smiled, flashing his gleaming white teeth. “Not to mention a near perfect psychopath.” He laughed and glanced up at the cloudless sky. “Honestly, the only thing keeping you from being the perfect monster is your brother.”

Grace frowned at that. “What do you mean by that?”

Azaroth merely grinned at her. “I’m saying without something to ground you, you’d likely give over to your desires and become nothing more than a mindless killer. Someone that dangerous and out of control would be absolutely worthless to me, so it’s a good thing you have a measure of restraint… and cleverness. It gives you far more value than you know.”

Grace matched his smile, though inside she was nothing but ice. “Which is why you’re here. To claim some measure of value from me.”

The god quirked a smile at her and gave a small nod as he closed his eyes and turned his face to the sun. “Exactly right, my dear. Exactly right. I have work for you.” His voice had changed. It took on a harsh edge like a file shaving away at a tin roof. It made her wince from how it reverberated within her head and chest. “Something is coming faster than I expected. My actions set off a bigger ripple than anticipated, and though my presence has been kept hidden for now, the flickers of divinity I’ve left in my wake have not. The other gods have taken notice and have their eyes on Elora. There are stirrings of power once more in this country. Champions who’ve long served their purpose are being recalled into service. They are coming, it’s only a matter of time, and you are not yet strong enough.”

Grace scoffed as a sudden chill banished the warmth from her skin. “I’m strong enough to take down four armed guards by myself.”

Azaroth barely spared her a single glance before laughing. He waved his hand at her. “Nothing more than a mere child playing with dolls in comparison to the champions of the gods. A nascent chosen with a few skills is nothing compared to the Godblessed chosen of old. They’ll shatter right through your rank two Juggernaut and tear you apart with their bare hands. And they won’t break a sweat doing it.”

His words embedded a sliver of ice in her heart, as she recalled the might of the Godblessed champions of Grimdon and Balethem who swept through Cressida like a natural disaster. Entire swaths of the city crumbled to dust as they unleashed their abilities. Power that could destroy hundreds or thousands with a single swing of the sword.

Compared to that kind of strength, Azaroth was right, she was nothing but a girl with a few parlor tricks up her sleeves.

And that wasn’t what he’d promised her.

He promised her power. That she would be a god.

Grace was going to hold him to that promise.

“What do I need to do?” She asked, her voice steady and resolute.

He cracked a smile as he turned a single pitch-black eye in her direction. “You need to get stronger. The only way to grow in power is to ascend to higher tiers and the only way that happens is by completing the quests I give you. So far, you’ve been doing well, but it’s not nearly enough to combat the forces that are sweeping the country as we speak.”

“So, give me more,” she said. “You said you have work for me, then give it to me. Give me as much as you can, and I’ll see them all completed.”

Azaroth threw back his head and laughed, stretching out on the bench as he grinned at the sun, and amazingly enough, the sun dimmed in response. “Oh, I chose well, indeed. You’ve got a fire inside you worthy of a god.” His laughter cut off as swiftly as it began. “But you get ahead of yourself. You overestimate your capabilities. If I gave you them all right now, your mind would be overloaded with stimulus and even your rather tenacious sanity would be likely to snap like frayed twine. So, we’re going to work them one at a time until your soul can bear more of my divinity.”

She didn’t much like his tone. Not at all.

Grace folded her arms across her chest. “I can handle it.”

He chuckled as his lips curled up into a vicious smile. “Are you quite sure about that?”

She nodded. “I am.”

All traces of humor and light fled from the god as he turned to face her. His face while before might have rivaled the pinnacle of human perfection, now lost all traces of humanity and the darkness in his eyes opened to a yawning abyss that drew her in before she could blink.

In an instant, the shadows cast by the sunlight came alive and slithered over her like snakes. Darkness washed over her as they swallowed her whole and the world went black.

For an eternity, there was nothing but an endless darkness, and then in a flash of light, Grace blinked her eyes open. As her vision came back into blurred focus, tears stung her eyes and she coughed as smoke settled into her lungs. It was hot and acrid like coal ash as she dropped to her knees as a stench she knew all too well wrapped around her in a terrible embrace.

Death came to greet her like an old friend.

As her vision cleared, Grace just knelt there in horror as everywhere around her, buildings were wreathed in flames that were so hot they devoured wood and brick with equal abandon. Corpses clogged the streets by the dozens, dead to swords and arrows, or charred to briquettes by the flames licking at their flesh. Fresh screams stretched over the roar of the fire as the city burned in front of her.

And at the end of the street was the boarding house.

A giant inferno engulfed the building, flames rising like fingers from the earth as they gripped the timbers and crushed them to ash. As the old building creaked and splintered apart, it crumpled open to reveal a single horrifying sight.

In the center of the conflagration, lay her brother.

Levi’s chest was pinned to the floor by a massive greatsword, while the rest of his body was in pieces, scattered around him in a macabre tableau. The flames boiled in a circle around his corpse, yet none of the embers even came close to scorching his flesh as if the flames were being controlled.

Someone had wanted her to see this.

They turned her brother into a work of terrible art.

And from somewhere else in the city, laughter reached her ears. It echoed louder than the flames and crack of burning wood.

“Is this what you wanted, Grace Akem?” A twisted, sibilant voice whispered in her ear. “Was immortality worth the price of your ambition?”

Then the flames vanished and the city grew as still and lifeless as the corpses now decorating it.

“You humans and your hunger for power. Your greed is a terror to behold. Your gluttony. Nothing is ever enough. It will never cease to be enough. You’ll damn yourself to hell with a smile on your face for the slightest taste of true power. And once the hunger sets in, you’ll never stop, you’ll tear the world to pieces around to in the pursuit of more. More power. More wealth. More, more, more. Never once considering the cost that must be paid or the debt you’ve accrued in the wake of your ambitions.”

As she took in the horror of what was all around her, she couldn’t deny the utter truth in the words being spoken to her. Grace fell on all fours, her hands gripping deep into the cold ashes of Toran as blood ran in rivers through the cobblestone streets.

“I didn’t know,” she said, the words spilling from her mouth before she could stop them. “I didn’t realize.”

“No one ever does.”

This was the price of her greed.

Her ambition.

Death came to greet her like an old friend, and she spat in its face.

So, it took her brother instead.

If she continued, then her path to immortality would be painted in her brother’s blood.

The weight of her actions clamped down on her psyche like a vice. The consequences of what she’d done and lost were too much for her mind to bear. It was so much that her sanity almost rejected it outright. Bile rose in her throat, and she fought down the urge to throw up.

She just wanted it to be over. She wanted to go home and crawl into bed with her parents. She wanted an end to this pain. She wanted her family to be whole again. And yet, all she’d done was lose them all.

And damned another city to fall because of the arrogance of the gods and the gluttonous ambitions of mortals.

She’d wanted an end to the cycle, and yet, all she did was kept it spinning.

And Grace wasn’t strong enough to bear the agony pressing down on her.

It was too much for her to bear, but just as she was about to beg Azaroth to make it stop, to take away her pain and release her from her Oath, a flash of his smug smile stopped her cold.

No.

“No.”

With a deep breath, Grace rose to her feet and steeled herself and her resolve. Before she could think about what she was doing, Grace steeped herself in the cold expanse of her soul. It was a barren tundra—a cold, lifeless place.

A logical wasteland that encompassed her entire being.

It was a part of her she’d tried for so long to bury, but now she welcomed the sensation. She welcomed Azaroth to test her. She could withstand the visions. For that was all they were. Her path was her own to carve. Azaroth couldn’t write the future for her. The very nature of being a god was to defy the natural order, and she wasn’t about to let anything or anyone dictate her future, or the future of her family.

As Azaroth’s visions pressed against her mind, she recalled the truth behind what he had told her.

That she couldn’t bear the weight of his divinity.

Yet now, not only was she withstanding his power, but she also grasped at the fundamental truth behind it—or a fragment of it at least. If the god was opening himself up to her, then he wasn’t knocking on a door, so much as he was building a bridge.

He was letting her in, allowing a fragment of his divinity to enter her soul.

In his superiority and smugness, he’d opened himself up to her and left himself vulnerable.

Before she could tell herself how skivving reckless she was being, Grace erupted forward and latched onto the god’s Essence like a viper. With a vicious grin, her soul bit down on the ocean of power in front of her and swallowed a chunk whole.

In an instant, Grace stole a fragment of divinity right out from underneath the Sovereign of the Endless Abyss.

Suddenly Azaroth’s eyes widened in shock and the pressure bearing down on her vanished and the connection between them shattered in an instant. Grace blinked as she fled the dreamscape and found herself back in the courtyard near the well once more. She turned to Azaroth just as the as the god bodily shoved himself away from her and scooted as far back on the bench as it would allow.

“What did you just d—”

Unbidden, a notification appeared in the corner of her vision.

[You have consumed a portion of divinity from the Sovereign of the Endless Abyss. Your Attributes have been increased! Partial Evolution in Process!]

Grace offered the god next to her a wicked grin and licked her lips. “Careful who you look down upon, Azaroth. Or else you’ll find I might just devour you as well.”