Adam wandered around the bastion, lost in thought. Between his encounter with the monster, his conversation with Hannah, and the Cherubim’s diagnosis, he had a lot on his mind. He had tried to find Juhend, but the demigod seemed to be off somewhere else. The door to the tower chamber, of course, was locked at all times. Not that he was tempted to encounter the servant of the Many Winged Angel again so soon anyway. Pacing back and forth in the training field, he was startled when someone cleared their throat behind him.

  “Adam, are you ready for our mission?”

  Adam turned around to see Hellig draped in a shimmering golden armor that fit closely to his skin, as if it was an exoskeleton on his form. On his back rested a golden halberd, glittering with its own light despite the perpetual night of the Realm.

  “Yes, sorry. I’ve had a lot on my mind. I’m ready to get going.”

  “You know we’re teammates, right? If there’s any way I can help, I will. Even if it’s just to talk or be present.”

  “I know. Thanks, Hellig. You too, alright?”

  Hellig wore a smile that wasn’t able to breach his eyes.

  “Yeah, sure.”

  …

  The air stank of sulfur and rotting vegetation. Water was pooled, threatening the integrity of Adam’s pants and hiking boots. The sky was dark, with shades of dark green and violet casting an otherworldly atmosphere on the pair of Passengers. In front of them, roughly a kilometer away, lay a cluster of wooden and thatch structures, with a large bonfire in the center point. Large, mosquito-like insects the size of Adam’s palm flitted about but were warded away by the warmth and light given off by Hellig’s halberd.

  "This place has a connection to a Cherubim..?”

  Adam glanced around confused, taking in the sights of dead trees. In the distance, frogs the size of a grown human worked to catch the overly large insects in the air.

  “That’s what the intel suggests. C’mon, we’ve got three villages to scope out before we use our Anchors to Shift back. We can spend the night here if we need to, but I’d rather us get in and out of this Realm. It makes me feel unclean.”

  With effort, Adam pulled his boot from the muck beneath him and started moving forwards.

  “You and me both.”

  …

  The pair slowly made their way into the village. Thanks to Hellig’s abilities, the grotesque insects were kept at bay, and the worst of the muck and slime slid off the pair’s boots easily. A total of seven structures were present in the main town, with an eighth resting a couple hundred meters into the swampy muck.

  “Hello? Anyone here?”

  Adam looked around, but the only light came from the large bonfire in front of them. The entire area was silent.

  “Hellig, I don’t have a good feeling. If a cult really was active here, either they would have left when they were discovered, or…”

  “Yeah, I know. Stay on your guard.”

  As the pair made their way closer to the bonfire at the center of the village, they heard the sound of a dog lapping at water. Hellig gripped his halberd firmly, and Adam readied himself to use magic. While he was roughly competent with a number of weapons at this point, he preferred to travel lightly- it was easier to dodge that way.

  As the two made it to the bonfire, Adam was taken aback. What was burning wasn’t wood. The bonfire, with its flame leaping high into the sky, was kindled with corpses. The lapping sounds stopped abruptly, and a buzzing drone filled the air.

  Hellig wasted no time. Swirling his halberd, he sent a wave of light towards the bonfire, extinguishing it and scattering the corpses to the ground. Behind it was a large, half insectoid creature. It had massive mandibles and the eyes of a fly plastered onto a bulbous head. Chitinous plates extended down to its waist, but its lower half consisted of a pair of human legs whose internal bone structure was clearly missing. Dragging its legs like sheets of wet paper in the murk underneath it, the monster used its mandibles to pull itself along towards the pair of Passengers.

  Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

  “That is… quite the sight.”

  Adam nearly felt pity for the poor thing, but Hellig wasn’t so concerned. With a jab of his halberd, a ray of light shot out, striking into the monster’s chitin and causing it to shutter. In response, the drone rang out once again, causing Hellig to clutch his ears and Adam to stagger.

  This thing is dangerous! It’s way too loud!

  Attempting to concentrate, Adam conjured a small pinprick of ruby light and shot it towards the creature. Evaporating the water in its path, the light sailed forwards in a beam.

  The drone sounded again, causing Adam to stagger once more and clutch his head. The ruby light that Adam was concentrating on fizzled, only managing to leave a scorch mark as it glanced off the creature’s chitin.

  With a shake of his head, Hellig sprang forwards, stabbing his halberd straight into the head of the monster. An ear-splitting shriek was swiftly silenced by a small explosion of yellow, radiant energy from the tip of the halberd.

  “Damn thing was nearly as loud as Gusto when he sneezes. Good riddance.”

  Pulling his halberd from the monster’s body, Hellig quickly led Adam through each house in the small hamlet. Without any surprise, there were no survivors.

  …

  “The second hamlet should be just up ahead.”

  Hellig and Adam had been trudging through the muck for roughly an hour at this point. It wasn’t as if the hamlets were separated by a large amount of space, but the conditions were simply incredibly poor for travel.

  How anyone manages to live here is beyond me…

  “Hey, uh Hellig?”

  Adam’s gait slowed down significantly.

  “What’s your last name?”

  Hellig’s gait stopped.

  “Why do you ask?”

  “I uh, well with the Emperor, everyone’s last names were stated, but you were technically a guard so they never actually mentioned yours, is all.”

  “You sure that’s all? You took no less than four deeper than usual breaths before asking me that, your gait slowed, and you haven’t looked directly at my head. So, who told you?”

  Adam gulped.

  “Told me what, exactly?”

  Hellig turned around to face Adam, his face stern.

  “Well, I assume you are already aware my last name is Diell, yes?”

  With a brief nod, Adam felt as if he didn’t truly know the person standing a mere couple of meters before him. Hellig, with his blonde hair, glimmering attire and golden halberd, seemed to be closer to a divine figure than a mortal one.

  “I uh, when I was fighting the reptile monster with Gusto, I dropped the book and it flipped open. The last page mentioned your last name was Diell, and that you have some kind of Instrument, whatever that means.”

  “Instrument? That isn’t a term I’m familiar with, though I suspect it refers to my halberd. I would imagine that my sister’s weapon shares a similar title.”

  Hellig sighed deeply.

  “Long story short, Emperor Diell Aurelius originally had a different name. He took on the first name Diell after my ancestor passed away. The two of them were close friends, but my ancestor died whilst fighting the Devil that the Emperor finally managed to slay. It was the final battle that allowed the Emperor to establish Diell City on the site of the defeat of the Devil. Since then, we’ve had these two halberds passed down through our family over the generations.

  Many of us became royal guards or Passengers, even Chosen. But we’ve never been able to figure out what Realm my ancestor was harmonized with. That’s why Hrime wants my halberd so badly. It’s the family inheritance, and she thinks that uniting them is the key to finding her way to our ancestor’s Realm. She thinks that once she steps foot in that Realm, she’ll be able to ascend to a demigod.”

  Hellig shook his head.

  “But our family has tried to unite the halberds before, to no results. It's useless, they’re powerful magic items, sure, but they aren’t some mystical key. I can use mine to locate her, and vice versa, but aside from that, they are two entirely separate items, with different powers. They can’t possibly be from the same Realm.”

  Why does that feel wrong somehow…

  Feeling a slightly slimy texture overtop his thoughts, as if he was nearly remembering something he had experienced in the past, Adam followed Hellig into the next hamlet. Similar to the one before, it had a cluster of thatch and wooden buildings surrounding a large bonfire. Except this time, a figure was warming herself in front of it. A dead insectoid monster, similar to the one encountered by Hellig and Adam previously, lay on the ground at her feet.

  The figure turned, revealing her icy blue eyes and black hair. Her smile was as white as frost.

  “Hello again, brother.”