Chapter 273: To the North (1)

A roar like a furnace blast rolled across the sky as a gate to Hell yawned open.

Maws split, and something that should never have had a mouth stretched it wider, carving a passage toward the Mortal Realm. Demons hurled themselves through with howls that scraped bone.

“Haha—hahaha!”

“So this is the air of the world above. Ah, yes, I remember this smell very well.”

Demons that once needed rites and anchors to descend now appeared as if the rules had been erased. Veterans who had survived since the Divine–Demonic War lifted their faces and cried out with raw joy.

“Our home,” someone screamed. “Our longed-for home!”

Once, this land had been theirs. The gods had driven them out and slammed the door, and uncounted demons had perished without ever setting eyes on the Mortal Realm again. Now they crossed the threshold and stood upon ground they still called their own.

Many were moved to tears.

“Thank you,” they whispered, looking into the dark as if it could hear. “Thank you, my king.”

It was the Demon King’s grace that had opened the way, and they would repay it the way they knew best. They would crush the world underfoot.

Demons fanned out, and the Mortal Realm stained where they walked. Cities fell to screaming. Capitals shuddered under siege. Holy lands that had shone for centuries were ringed by shadow and claw. The continent lurched into panic.

News reached Elia's holy land as the bells of celebration fell silent.

“

Aah!

” the Saint cried, raking both hands through his hair until it stood up in frightened tufts. His face had gone the color of paper. Disorder spread through the halls like smoke. The festival mood that had painted the streets only hours ago vanished. In its place came the whispers of fear, lingering around mouths and eyes, refusing to leave.

Ketal chewed a skewer in the sunlight and watched. He had remained in the holy land to deal with the aftermath of the broken blade. Now he studied the frightened people and the messengers sprinting up and down the steps.

“Lively,” he said, not unkindly.

“It cannot be helped,” the Holy Sword replied in his hand. “The barrier is broken.”

“You mean the wave of power a few days ago?” Ketal said.

Ketal was talking about the Demon King’s strike. It had shaken the world like a gong, and every sensitive thing had felt it.

It had been tremendous. The power had made Materia look like an insect. It had not been a question of quantity but of distance, a difference so vast that the comparison barely deserved the name. Ketal had felt it and taken in the fact of it with a strange, private relief. A world that could still produce something so far beyond him was a world worth walking.

“Yes,” the Holy Sword said. “The demons did something clever and tore the barrier.”

“What exactly

is

this barrier?”

“It's a ward that defends the world,” the sword said. “It blocks Hell and prevents interference with the Mortal Realm. It declares this land divine territory and gives form to that protection.”

However, that very protection was now in pieces. The Mortal Realm no longer counted as the gods’ domain. The Holy Sword’s tone did not change, but its words fell colder for being plain.

“This was expected,” it said. “My descent meant the fissures had grown too large to ignore. Even if the gods could not act directly, they judged that they needed to send power down. That is what I was for.”

Ketal considered that, then let out a breath through his nose. “I managed to make that worse.”

“Well, I wouldn't say you made it better,” the sword said.

He folded his arms. The Holy Sword gave a tiny flinch, then hurried to soften the words. “Should I have said it is not your fault? I may be poor at reading the room.”

“It is fine,” he said. The facts did not change because they were uncomfortable. He had broken the mechanism that would have created a Champion, and now there would be no such figure to rally behind. His mouth tightened, deep in thought.

I should have cooled off instead of yanking on it like a fool,

he thought. He had drawn the sword, broken it, and gained responsibility in place of spectacle.

“Well, what is done is done,” he said aloud.

If there would be no Champion, then he would take a share of the work that would have been theirs. He popped the last cubes of meat into his mouth and went to find the Saint.

“You look busy,” he said.

“K-Ketal, forgive me,” the Saint blurted, snapping back to himself as if jerked by a string. “I have neglected you.”

He had been the one to keep Ketal at the holy land while they sorted out the sword. When the news broke, he had left everything to chase papers and dispatches. Ketal shook his head.

“The world is in confusion. I will help.”

“You will?” The Saint blinked, then straightened as if the air had grown lighter. “Truly?”

“I drew the sword. I can pay for that,” Ketal said simply.

“Thank you,” the Saint said, and the gratitude carried no polish. It landed like water on dry ground.

Ketal was strong. His power had reached the Hero level, and he had proven it by fighting demon after demon and walking away victorious. He had met Materia, the Mother of All Demons, and sent her back where she had come from. Broken blade or not, his presence would matter.

“The demons are striking across the whole continent,” Ketal said. “What is the state of the Mortal Realm?”

“Give me a moment,” the Saint said. “I will show you what I know.”

He returned with a map so large it needed both arms and a cleared table.

“It will be easier to explain with this,” he said, spreading it flat. Mountains stood up in neat creases; rivers flowed in ink; borders traced their old arguments. The shape of the world looked wrong to anyone who had grown up on another planet, and Ketal always felt a moment of vertigo when he saw it.

Where Earth wore its continents like wide-set islands across an ocean, this world gathered its lands together in a single massive body. Several plates had married into something that approached a supercontinent, a knot of lands too stubborn to drift apart.

At its center sprawled a wide, pale emptiness—the White Snowfield.

It was as ugly in scale as the stories said, a white wound laid across almost half the continent. Places that could house creatures the size of the White Serpent did not come small.

“The demons are descending into each region and pressing the attack,” the Saint said. “To speak plainly, the situation is unfavorable.”

Demons were strong, and the gods could not interfere. That combination tilted every contest the wrong way. Kingdoms toppled, and holy lands shuddered under siege. Transcendent fighters fell, and the names on the lists were hard to read without stopping.

The Saint closed his eyes for a breath, then shook his head briskly and went on. “Let us divide the land into the four great quarters, West, East, South, and North. First, the West, where we are. Here, the situation is the least dire.”

The West held the Sun God's Church and the Earth Goddess's Church. Of course, the balance of the world had fallen, and the Mortal Realm no longer counted as divine ground. Holy power no longer carried its old supremacy against demonic power.

However, that was only true if one measured holy power as raw energy. If one could wield the holy scripture, if one could set a verse and a law into the bones of a spell, one could still hold an advantage against demons. The clerics of the West were doing exactly that, and the lines were holding better here than elsewhere.

“In the East,” the Saint went on, “we have the Mage Tower and the Mercenary Guild.”

The Tower Master led the mages; the guild rallied their blades; together they met the surge from Hell.

“Still, the situation of the East is not good,” the Saint admitted.

The Tower Master was a tremendous force, but he could not be everywhere at once. The Tower housed many powerful mages, yet their strengths were specialized. Magic could do anything until it met the one thing it could not: too many fronts, too many angles, too many bodies at once. Mercenaries stood around them where they could, but muscle had its limits against numbers and surprises.

“So the East tilts toward worse,” the Saint said. “It may be fair to call it bad.”

“And the South?” Ketal asked him.

“That is beyond our hands,” the Saint said. “Humans do not hold the line there.”

Elves, dwarves, the fairies, and dragons—the nonhuman races together met the push of Hell in the southern lands.

“Dragons are terribly strong,” the Saint said, “and the demons are attacking them with the same intensity. I believe the fighting there is severe.”

“I see,” Ketal murmured. He listened with interest, then paused as another piece clicked in his head. “And the Empire? Where are they moving?”

The North remained unmentioned, and that was the barbarians’ territory. The Empire had no business there, which left East and West or the choice not to move at all.

The Saint bit his lip. “The Empire lies to the southeast. If they wished, they could intervene in the East and turn the tide. They have not stirred.”

“Not at all?” Ketal asked him. “Why?”

“I do not know,” the Saint said, and his composure finally cracked. “The demons are invading the Mortal Realm. The whole continent is in danger, and they do nothing. If they moved, the picture would look far better than it does.”

The Saint gritted his teeth at the thought.

The Empire was strong, in ways that public stories only half revealed. What the world knew was enough to name them one of the great powers. What they had not shown could shake the map if they chose to open their hands. Yet they had done nothing, as if something more important than the outer skin of the world occupied every one of their thoughts.

“Why,” the Saint said again, quieter and sharper. “Why. Why...”

It made no sense to him. No nation could afford to pretend the demons were someone else’s problem. The Empire acted as if they were set apart, a separate piece on a separate board.

“It is odd,” Ketal agreed. Curiosity flickered through him and then shut its eyes again. He had a practical choice to make.

Where do I go?

he wondered.

The West could hold for now. That left the East or the South. He could go East, find the Mage Tower, and study magic at the source. He could go South, track down the dragons, and learn more about the Dragon Tongue. He had grown skilled enough with Myst that both paths were possible.

The North did not present itself as a choice in his head. That was natural, since the North belonged to barbarians, and Ketal despised barbarians. In a world full of wonders, the northern lands were the one place that did not interest him at all.

Even so, he asked the Saint the question he should. “What of the North?”

“Ah... who can say?” the Saint admitted. “They are probably holding. We have very little information.”

The North did not keep many doors open. Its people lived closely with their own and did not send letters to solicit sympathy or help. The Saint glanced at Ketal and chose his words with care.

“They are fierce and do not fear to stand in front,” he said. “With bodies built for war, they will hold the demons at bay.”

If Ketal had not been a barbarian, the Saint might have called them brutes and been done with it. In his youth, he had dealt with northern raiders who did not bother with greetings, and his opinion had taken its shape then. Now he polished the words and offered them carefully.

Ketal did not react the way the Saint expected. Ketal's expression changed, and he went very still. He looked at the Saint with a strange light in his eyes, and the Saint felt his stomach dip.

Did I offend him?

the Saint wondered.

“Barbarians are very strong,” the Saint blurted, deciding to smooth the mood before it could wrinkle. “They are the very image of rugged manhood. When I was young, I admired them. I wanted a body like theirs.”

Ketal’s look had nothing to do with the compliment or its lack. It was aimed at something the Saint could not see.

What is this?

Ketal thought.

A translucent pane had unfolded before his eyes. Letters settled into place with the calm of fate.

[Quest No. 789]

[Respond to the Anomaly in the North.]

So there was something in the northern Demon Realm after all,

Ketal thought.

That was not what made his face change. If it had been only a Quest, he would have taken it as one more tile falling into the mosaic. Of course, the board would tilt that way eventually. Of course, it would ask him to go where he least wanted to go. That was how stories worked.

His gaze dropped to the line below the description. There was a warning, printed in a hand that did not know how to exaggerate.

[Warning]

[If you do not respond quickly, the danger may escalate.]