WIEDERGEBURT Act III: Chapter 32

I did not stay in the Endless Desert for long. Stopping briefly in cities to stock up on supplies and oasises to replenish my water, I made an almost straight shot for Nevaria.

I did run into some trouble with the Malik Family, who learned that I had killed their heir. The guards I let live probably told them. I should have killed them, but hindsight was always 20-20.

They sent dozens of assassins after me. They even hired several mercenary companies, but the mercenaries eventually gave up after I slaughtered six of the larger companies. Even the assassins eventually began to lose interest after the first five dozen were killed.

I had briefly thought of paying the Malik Family a visit, but I honestly didn’t care enough to wipe out their family, so I kept traversing the Endless Desert, until at last I arrived at Nevaria…

***

A few days had passed since I spoke with Stelys and learned that Gudmund wanted to marry Fay. I didn’t do anything about it, choosing to ignore the problem for now in favor of focusing on other pursuits. That said, I knew I couldn’t put it off indefinitely. I just figured that since I had no idea what Gudmund planned on doing, I would let him make the first move and counter it. I already had the advantage of being the man Fay loved. In all honesty, I didn’t think Gudmund could actually do anything.

At present, I was sitting in the office of the Nevarian Spiritualist’s northern barracks. I had received a letter this morning from Mykkel requesting my presence there. The person who had made the request was, naturally, Dante and Rainer.

When I appeared at the barracks, I was immediately directed toward their office.

Dante Astralia was a white-haired man with a boyish face that I could only describe as roguishly charming. He wasn’t wearing armor today. The blue pants and long-sleeved blue shirt he wore stretched across his muscular legs and torso. Epaulettes decorated his shoulders. Despite having a crisp and neat uniform, the laziness his very presence exuded had not diminished.

Being the older and more serious of the two, Rainer did not have the lackadaisical bearing that Dante possessed. His princely face had the well-defined features of an aristocrat from a good family. His body, thin but strong, was adorned with the same uniform as Dante, making me think this might be something they wore when they didn’t need their armor. Short hair had been swept back, but two small bangs trailed down the center of his forehead, bringing attention to his eyes.

“Hey there, Eryk! How ya doing?” asked Dante as he sat in a chair behind the desk, his feet propped up on the surface. He looked like he had been sleeping.

“Eryk,” Rainer greeted with a polite smile. “We’re glad to see you. Thank you for taking the time to visit.”

“It’s no trouble,” I said as I eyed Dante and his lazy posture. Shaking my head, I closed the door behind me and walked further into the room.

Rainer brought out a second pair of chairs from a corner of the room. The table that I remember seeing in here the last time wasn’t around. I guess they only brought that out for emergency meetings and war councils. After placing one chair next to Dante and another chair in front of the desk, Rainer sat in the chair beside his brother and gestured for me to take a seat as well.

I did.

“I hear things have been going well for your sect,” Rainer said.

I nodded. “The sect has been doing a lot better than I imagined. Even though only a little over one month has passed, we’ve already increased from our numbers to 245 Spiritualists, and that number is growing daily. We’re also getting so many requests that we’re have trouble keeping up with them.” I crossed my arms and frowned. “The only real problem we’ve run into is training all of these Spiritualists who joined us so they are up to snuff. We’re doing our best, but there are so many that we can’t train them all and continue our work. I’ve left most of the training right now to Geirolf, Earland, Mykkel, Bjark, and Catalyna.”

Dante and Rainer’s chest swelled as I spoke of how their sons were currently in charge of training our members.

“We’re glad to hear our sons have been proving useful,” Rainer said with a relieved sigh. “They have always been very strong, but they appeared directionless until just recently. Joining your sect was a very good thing for them, I think.”

“I have to agree,” Dante added. “Especially Geirolf. It seems he’s really coming into his own.”

A long time ago, Mykkel had told me that Geirolf was so arrogant and pushy because he was constantly trying to live up to his talented brothers. He worked two or even three times harder than they did.

At the time, I had only vaguely recognized his hard work, but now that he was working for me, I realized what Mykkel meant. Out of all the people who worked for me, Geirolf was the hardest worker. He was also the one who had improved the most in the least amount of time.

I continued speaking with Dante and Rainer for a little while. These niceties were an important part of socializing, according to Kari. The goal was to keep up a light-hearted banter in which we didn’t speak of anything too important, which allowed us to get a feel for the other person or persons… something like that. I still wasn’t one for politics. I’d much rather leave this to Kari.

However, we eventually got to the reason Dante and Rainer requested that I pay them a visit.

“Do you know what this is?” asked Rainer as he placed an object on the desk. About the size of my palm, the object looked like a tooth or maybe some kind of claw. Strange markings covered the surface. They looked similar to Runes, but I already knew they were not Runes.

“I do not entirely know what it is,” I said with a shrug. “However, I have seen a similar object before. The Basilisk that I killed had an object just like this planted into its head. While that isn’t enough to fully tell me what it is, I believe this is some kind of runic device that the Sekbeists have created to let them control Demon Beasts.”

I had one of these in my possession and had even tried studying it to uncover its secrets, but alas, I wasn’t able to figure out anything beyond what I just said. The device was currently in the possession of Kari. She had expressed an interest in studying it, and she was much better than me when it came to research, so I let her have a crack at it.

Dante and Rainer glanced at each other. From their expressions, I was almost certain they had reached the same conclusion as me.

They turned back to me after sharing a long, silent conversation.

“A while ago, we went with a team to Bucharest,” Rainer began. “We wanted to see if we could find that Sekbeist or, barring that, we wanted to find out what he was doing there. During our time there, we searched through the sewers and discovered what appeared to be some kind of laboratory. There were over a dozen of these claw-like objects, but there were also several leather bound books that are written in a language we’ve never seen before.”

Humanity’s language had permeated the entire world. Almost everyone spoke it with only a few exceptions like the Dragons, who knew the language but felt speaking it was beneath them. Even the Lamia of the Endless Desert spoke the human tongue. However, while they spoke our language, their writing was vastly different from our own.

It did not surprise me that the Sekbeists had their own form of writing.

“May I see one of the books?” I asked.

“Let me get it,” Rainer said as he stood up and wandered over to a bookshelf. He soon came back with a large book that was old, worn, and had yellowed pages. After placing it in front of me, he sat back down. “This is one of them. There are some diagrams in the book that shows the anatomy of various Demon Beasts. From this, we can guess that the Sekbeist Shaman you fought was studying the Demon Beast, perhaps to learn of ways to control them. However, without being able to read the contents, we really can’t say for sure.”

Nodding at his words, I placed my fingers on the pages. The feeling of old parchment crinkling against my fingers was honestly pleasant. It reminded me of my days when I worked at the Nadine Library, which felt like a really long time ago despite only one year having passed since I returned to the past.

I flipped through the pages. Just like Rainer had said, there were numerous diagrams of Demon Beasts, many of which I recognized from having fought them in my previous life. There was the A-ranked Demon Beast Cockatrice, a creature that looked like a small two-legged dragon with the head of a chicken and the body of a serpent. It was a sub-species of the Chimera Demon Beast, which was classified as a B-rank.

Not only were there A-rank Demon Beasts listed on this, but there were even a few S-ranks. There was the Giant Horned Lightning Eagle, a legendary creature with absolute control over lightning. I had fought this creature in my previous life. It had been one of my toughest battles, but I had needed it to create the Yin-Yang Spiritual Enhancement Pill of Lightning. This book even had a diagram of Leviathan, the S-rank Demon Beast I fought to create a Yin-Yang Spiritual Enhancement Pill of Water.

I couldn’t read the language, which looked like nothing more than squiggles to me, but from studying the diagrams, I could tell that whoever wrote this had been studying the Demon Beasts in depth. Each page likely contained information about the Demon Beasts shown on the diagrams. If I could somehow decipher this language, I wondered if I could discover where some of these Demon Beasts were located. There were a few I had tried to find in my previous life but couldn’t like the Frost Ape and the Fire Salamandar. That would help me when I went to gather ingredients to refine pills for Kari, Fay, and Lin.

“I believe you are right,” I said to Dante and Rainer at last, shutting the book and looking at them. “Given what I saw when I fought the Sekbeist and his Basilisk, I can say with certainty that the Shaman was studying ways to control Demon Beasts.” I picked up the claw-like object, which was a little heavier than it looked, and stared at it. “More than likely, this device is some kind of collar that subdues Demon Beasts and bends their minds to the will of whoever created it.”

While Dante and Rainer looked grave after hearing my words, they didn’t seem surprised. Instead, they looked resigned.

“We’re doing our best to locate the Sekbeist Shaman,” Dante said after a moment of silence. “We’ve had the Nevarian Spiritualists scouring all of the mapped out parts of the Demon Beast Mountain Range and even some of the parts we haven’t mapped out yet, but he appears to have long since vanished. We haven’t found a single trace of him since your battle in Bucharest.”

“I would be surprised if you did find him,” I admitted with a wan smile. “Basilisks are located far deeper into the Demon Beast Mountain Range than anyone from Nevaria has gone in a thousand years. That Sekbeist Shaman likely came from deep within the mountain range and only traveled closer because of what happened with the Sekbeist Shaman known as Skygge. I wouldn’t be surprised if these two Sekbeists were working together. There is probably a group of them out there somewhere.”

The plot the destroy Nevaria through the use of Dyr’s power had been thwarted, but that didn’t mean the danger had passed. Now that Skygge was gone, more Sekbeists would begin coming to try and do what he could not, which meant we needed to strengthen our defenses, increase the power of our Spiritualists, and be prepared for any eventuality.

“Anyway, I believe I should head back to my sect.” I stood up from my chair. “Will you two let me know if you discover that Sekbeist Shaman or anything else regarding this subject?”

“We already planned on doing that.” Dante shrugged. “Truth be told, you’re the only one we can turn to for this. You are surprisingly knowledgeable about matters regarding the Sekbeists.”

“It is only natural that I know about them.” I smiled, but it was the kind of smile that caused Rainer and Dante to shiver. “After all, the Sekbeists are one of my most hated enemies.”

***

Kari did not have to attend the academy today, so she was currently spending time in an empty room she had purloined for herself. It had bookshelves lining two of the four walls, a table in the center, and several racks filled with a variety of fabrics and metals. The room wasn’t very big. However, all she was using this room for were experiments with Runes.

At present, what sat on her table was not one of her usual Runes, but the claw-shaped object that Eryk had discovered lodged inside of the head of the Basilisk. He had given it to her awhile back. Although she hadn’t really possessed the time needed to devote herself to studying it, she figured she would do so now.

Unfortunately, she was at a loss.

Running her finger over the surface, she marveled at the strange smoothness of this claw. She didn’t know if it had been sanded and polished or if it was naturally smooth. Regardless, the texture reminded her of those pebbles at the bottom of streams that had been smoothed out thanks to the constantly flowing waters. The only areas that were not smooth was where the symbols had been etched into it.

The symbols were something she had never seen before. They did not match any of the Runes she knew of, nor did they resemble any of the languages that existed before the Catastrophe. They were completely alien to her.

“I wonder what would happen if I ran my Spiritual Power through them,” she muttered, picking the object up.

As of now, she had yet to actually experiment with the object out of wariness. However, if she didn’t do something, she would never figure out what this thing was.

Taking a deep breath, she began channeling raw Spiritual Power into the object. The energy flowed from her hand and into the object… and then it stopped. She frowned as she sensed something blocking her Spiritual Power. It felt similar but different to her Spiritual Power. It was like Spiritual Power but not at the same time, which greatly confused her. Regardless of what this energy was, she could sense the inherent darkness in it.

With a glare, Kari channeled more Spiritual Power into the object, pushing against the dark energy in an attempt to overpower it. Sweat formed on her brow and her hand shook. Whatever this energy was, it had an incredible strength. Even so, she pushed and pushed and pushed, and eventually, the strange power blocking her Spiritual Power gave way.

Kari’s eyes widened as the symbols began glowing. The object heated up in her hands. She waited to see if something would happen, but much to her disappointment, nothing happened. The glow died back down after she stopped channeling her Spiritual Power.

With a sigh, she set the object back down and bit her thumbnail in thought. It seemed this object could be activated through her Spiritual Power, but now she was wondering about that strange power that was already inside of the object. It was clearly powerful. It had only been the residual power leftover from when the Sekbeist Shaman had inserted it into the Basilisk, but it had taken a monumental amount of effort to overpower it.

While she was lost in thought, the door to her study suddenly opened and Eryk walked in. He was carrying a large book in his hands.

“I figured this is where you’d be,” he said with a smile.

“Eryk.” Kari smiled back. “How was your talk with my fathers?”

“Informative but ultimately inconclusive.” Eryk shook her head, a wan smile on his face as he walked over to her. “They currently have their forces scouring the Demon Beast Mountain Range for that Sekbeist Shaman, but he’s likely long gone by now.” He looked down at the claw-shaped object. “That said, they did find over a dozen of these claws and several books that look like the research material from our enemy.”

He set the book down and flipped it open to a random page, which showed the diagram of a Chimera on one side and several squiggles on the other. These squiggles were the made of same symbols that had been etched into the claw.

Kari placed a hand against the book, feeling its aged parchment. “This writing is…”

“It’s the same as the writing on the claw,” Eryk confirmed. “I figured this is the Sekbeist language. It probably acts similarly to our Runes. It might take awhile, but I was thinking we could begin decoding the language. If we do, we might learn a bit more about the Sekbeists.”

“That’s a good idea,” Kari confirmed. “However, this is going to be a huge undertaking. I don’t know how many years it will take to decode an entire language when we don’t even have a frame of reference.”

“We might not have a complete frame of reference, but we do have this.” Eryk pointed to the diagram of the Chimera, which had several lines pointing at specific parts of the body. Squiggles were written outside of the diagram and referred to these body parts. “These each seem to talk about specific information within the Demon Beast’s body. I figured if we can dissect some Demon Beasts, we could create our own diagrams and try to use those to create a frame of reference for us.”

“That could work…”

Since she now had a clearer idea of how to go about decoding the Sekbeist language, she and Eryk began creating a list of all the Demon Beasts cataloged in the book. There were well over a thousand. However, they started with the ones more common to the regions near Nevaria. They would begin with those.

As they continued working, someone knocked on the door several times.

“Who is it?” asked Kari.

“It’s Fay,” came the voice. “Can I come in?”

“Oh! Yes. Come on in, Fay!”

The door opened and Fay walked into the room. She was dressed in a light training outfit. Her stomach and a good deal of her breasts were exposed because she was only wearing a single leather wrap around her chest. It looked like a thick and sturdy fabric that was being used to replace her breast bindings. She was also only wearing shorts that were so short they just barely covered her entire butt.

Sweat caused her body to glisten, with several small droplets trailing down her neck, arms, stomach, and thighs. As she entered the room, a slightly sweet and slightly salty scent followed her.

In her hand was an envelope. It was already opened.

“Training hard?” asked Kari.

Fay shrugged. “I’m doing my best. I can now use the Flame Dragon Fist well enough that it’s combat ready, but I haven’t mastered it yet.”

“Is that a letter from your father?” asked Eryk.

Fay shook her head and became pensive. “No. It is a letter from Gudmund. He is inviting me to have dinner with him at his family’s mansion.”

Kari felt an ugly expression cross her face.

She had, of course, heard about how Gudmund wanted Fay’s father to annul the marriage agreement between Fay and Eryk, so that he could marry Fay instead. Unfortunately, while their engagement had been publicly announced, it wasn’t like that meant they were guaranteed to marry. Anyone who wanted to was allowed to contest the marriage until the ceremony. Only after the ceremony had concluded would they not be able to do anything about it.

She looked at Eryk, who looked calm to anyone who did not know him. However, when Kari looked down at his hands, she saw how they had been clenched into fists.

“We already knew this would happen eventually,” he said with a sigh. “The only thing we can do now is decide what to do about his invitation. Fay, what would you like to do?”

Kari said nothing as she looked at Fay, who was biting her lip with uncertainty. This had to be hard on her friend. However, she also knew that Fay was not the kind of girl who’d shy away from something like this.

“I think… I should go and meet with him, if only to turn him down,” Fay said. “Still, I do not believe it is appropriate for a taken woman to meet with an unmarried man who has expressed an interest in her. I also do not know much about the Drage Family outside of what Father told us during dinner.” She took a deep breath. “I remember what happened with Grant Leucht. He caught me when I was alone, kidnapped me, and tried to rape me. I’d rather not see history repeat itself. I might be stronger now, but I’ll be inside of the Drage Family mansion.” She looked at Eryk, took a deep breath, and squared her shoulders. “That being the case, I was hoping you would come with me.”

Kari looked back at Eryk to find his expression unreadable. While his face hadn’t really changed, his eyes were filled with a determined light.

“I think that’s a good idea,” he said. “Not only will this allow us to avoid the potential dangers that come from meeting with a powerful family on your own, it can also be taken as a symbol of our unity.”

Nodding her head in approval, Kari shut the book she and Eryk had been studying, then placed her hands on the table. The hard wood was smooth, having been sanded and painted with a lacquered finish. Even so, she felt the grains beneath her palms and fingers as she looked between Eryk and Fay.

“I imagine the Drage Family already knows you won’t be going alone,” she said to them. “They are aware that Fay is getting engaged to Eryk, and they probably have a lot of information on both of you, so they’ll know how you are likely to respond to their invitation. I don’t think I need to tell you two this, but be very careful when dealing with the Drage Family. The entire family is wrapped in mystery. Outside of what’s considered common knowledge, nobody knows anything of true value about them.”

Eryk and Fay nodded to show they understood her words and caution.

Since they were going to meet with the Drage Family, Kari did what she could to prepare them, teaching them what little she knew about the family. It wasn’t much. However, her mother did have dealings with them. Being the Empress of Nevaria, the Drage Family could not just ignore a summons from her, so she knew more about them than anyone else in Nevaria—though that wasn’t saying much.

“I do not know much about Gudmund outside of what Lord Stelys already told you,” Kari admitted. “However, I can confidently say he’s probably the strongest Spiritualist among the generation that Catalyna belongs to.”

“If that’s the case, then why did he not participate in the Spiritualist Grand Tournament?” asked Eryk, his brow furrowing.

“Because they’re a very insular family.” Kari shrugged. “They never participate in any of the competitions hosted in Nevaria. Even their exploits are masked in mystery. We don’t know how they can do what they do, but their family is well-known for killing many rare and powerful Demon Beasts.”

After telling them everything she could think of, the three of them traveled up to their living quarters, where they met with Lin who had been diligently working on some papers regarding the sect’s latest budget report. There was already a large stack of finished papers on one side of the desk. Upon seeing them, the Lamia stopped working and joined them for a quick lunch.

It was just another day at the Nevarian Braves’s headquarters.