Slayers - Volume 14 - Chapter 3

3: The Priests’ Blood Flows in the Darkness of Night

The setting sun painted the temple of Vrabazard the color of blood. We could see roughnecks loitering out front, just like the last time we visited.

Guess the trouble hasn’t kicked off yet...

Gourry and I made a beeline for the entrance.

“Hey, hold it! Oh, it’s you council guys. Whaddya want— Hey! Wait!” One of the ruffians started yelling when we failed to slow down or respond.

I cast a glance back at the lot of them. “Head Priest Francis is in danger. We need to see him,” I said.

“Huh?”

My words stunned the hired mob into silence, so we left them behind and entered the temple. We already knew the layout of the place, so we strode right toward the head priest’s room and—Wham!—threw the door open with a bang. Inside we found Priest Francis and four mercenaries.

“You...” He stood up as the mercenaries began whispering to each other. “What in the world are you—”

“Zord and Zychael are dead,” I said bluntly before anyone else could speak. That was enough to make Francis freeze up. “I think you know what I’m talking about, right?”

“Ah...” he whispered hoarsely, then sank into his seat. The mercenaries, who knew nothing of the situation, kept their hands on their sword hilts and shared inquisitive glances. “I...” Francis’s face contorted with shame as he shook his head slowly. “It’s not... my fault.”

“Cut the crap!” Gourry barked.

That sent a tremble through Francis, and the mercenaries gripped their swords a little tighter. But...

“How many people are dead?! How many lives lost at the hands of your assassins?!”

His words caught the mercenaries off guard. Understandably, of course. Francis surely hadn’t told them he’d hired hit men.

“Did you also kill High Priest Joshua and make it look like an accident?” I asked.

“No... no, please... please hear me out...” Francis said weakly, clutching his head as he shook it back and forth. “I received... a revelation.”

“Huh?” I asked, furrowing my brow. A revelation? Where’s this coming from?

“When High Priest Joshua died in that fire, I lost a major source of support in my life. I kept asking myself... how could such a fine man just perish like that? I prayed to the gods I believe in... to Lord Ceifeed... to Lord Vrabazard. And then that night... I heard a voice.”

“A voice?”

“It spoke in my ear as I prayed... Yes, I’m sure it was the voice of God. It revealed to me that the death of the high priest was no accident... That it was assassination perpetrated by the wicked. That the same evildoer sought to cast the city into chaos. That I might be next, and that to protect myself, I needed power... ‘Gather power,’ it said... That’s what the voice of God told me!”

“That’s the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard!” I hissed, but he didn’t seem to hear me. He just kept rambling on.

“And so... I hired people. If one of the other three head priests was the killer, I wanted to send them a message: ‘I know what you did. I won’t let you do the same to me. One day, I will expose you.’ At first I just hired hot-headed amateurs, but then the other head priests began hiring people too... So I had to escalate to professional mercenaries. I couldn’t afford to let them overpower me if one of them was the killer, after all. Then they all followed suit. And then... before I knew it... I was hiring that assassin named Zord...” Francis confessed, torment and regret etched deeply on his face.

“And you ordered him to kill Head Priest Bran of the West?” I prodded.

“No!” Francis shouted frantically, looking up at me again. “I didn’t ask for that! All I ordered him to do was keep the other priests in check—lean on the mercenaries they’d hired a little and get them to back off! That’s all! That man... Zord killed Bran all on his own!”

“You really expect me to buy that?”

“It’s true!” His voice cracked. “A few days before the Bran incident, he came by to give me his nightly report. He seemed in unusually high spirits. I asked him why... and he said that he’d run into some familiar faces. That he was about to start ‘really enjoying this.’ I didn’t think... he meant...”

Familiar faces...? Wait a minute!

A few days before the Bran incident would have been the day we arrived in town. The day we’d stumbled on an assassin and mercenary in the slums. If that assassin was Zord, then...

“I heard several assassins attacked Bran... But I only hired Zord! I’d assumed someone else was responsible for the deed, but that night... Zord came to me laughing, saying ‘This is what you wanted, isn’t it? I brought my colleagues by to help.’ But that’s not what I wanted! This... None of this is what I wanted! I just...!” He buried his face in his hands.

Aha... I get it now.

Zord must have recognized us that night, realized that two-against-one was dicey odds for him, and withdrawn. But that didn’t mean he’d given up on his desire for revenge. So he’d called up his old comrades and started a bloodbath, all in defiance of Francis’s orders. His aim was to drag us into this fight. And in the end... it was Mileena who...

“I didn’t... ask for this,” Francis moaned softly, his face hidden by his hands, as if he was trying to convince himself. “I didn’t... I didn’t want Bran to die. It’s not... my fault...”

“You can think that if you want,” came a voice out of nowhere. It was Luke.

Then, suddenly—Fwssh!—darkness wreathed Francis’s body! Nobody knew exactly what had happened at first. And as we stood there, paralyzed in our shock—Crash!—an incredible roar sounded out, and...

“Graaaaah!” Francis’s wail echoed throughout the room.

All I could do was stand there dumbly. I couldn’t even begin to imagine what was unfolding. Luke had ambushed Francis; I knew that much, but why shroud him in darkness? And what was that crash—

Of course!

“Luke!” I shouted as I took off running, vaulting the priest’s desk in a dash toward the darkness.

“Lina!” Gourry cried, hot on my heels.

I plunged into the patch of darkness... and came out the other side into a world of orange. There were nicely trimmed garden trees, a long flagstone path, small fountains, and statues all dyed the color of sunset.

“Lina! Where are we?” Gourry whispered as he emerged from the same hole in the wall behind me.

“The courtyard, I think,” I said. The head priest’s room was right next to it, after all.

The ground around us was littered with collapsed bodyguards and priests. Were they unconscious? Were they dead? Hell if I knew.

It had taken me a second to process what we’d just witnessed. Luke had used a spell called Dark Mist, which conjured a sort of black fog that cut visibility to zero within a given area. He’d cast it from the other side of the wall to shroud Francis. Then, while Gourry and I were still too flummoxed to react, he’d cast a second spell to break through the wall and drag Francis outside.

And now I caught sight of them, silhouetted by the setting sun, standing on the roof of the breezeway.

“Yeah... figured you’d follow me. Knowing you... Yeah. I figured you would,” Luke said, a wry tone in his voice. It was hard to see his face, covered in shadow as it was, but Francis was already dangling limp in his arms.

“Enough, Luke! All he did was hire Zord! He didn’t tell him to do this!” I cried.

“Yeah... I know. I was listenin’ in from outside, so I know the whole situation. That’s why... unlike with that Zord asshole, I made it painless.”

What?!

Fffft... thud. Francis’s body fell from Luke’s arms, struck the edge of the roof, then tumbled to the ground below.

“A long time ago...” Luke continued, his voice distant. “I did that kinda thing too. Killin’ people for money an’ all. Meetin’ Mileena made a new man outta me. But now... these assholes went and made me remember. Dammit.”

“It’s... It’s okay now, Luke,” I said.

“No... it ain’t. Not yet,” he quietly rebuffed me.

“Luke!”

“I’d appreciate it if you’d keep out of this. But I know sayin’ that ain’t gonna do any good, you guys bein’ big busybodies an’ all...”

“This isn’t right!”

“I ain’t gonna argue with you there. I don’t think it woulda made Mileena happy either. But... if I don’t do this...” There, Luke trailed off. Silence fell, punctuated only by the dusky wind blowing. And then...

“Wh-What’s going on?!”

“There he is! Over there!”

I could hear the mercenaries finally emerging through the hole in the wall. Their arrival was Luke’s cue to leave.

“Luke!” I cried as he turned to go.

He looked back over his shoulder at me. “I’m almost done. Don’t try to stop me. Next up... the south,” he said, then took off running along the rooftop.

“Hey! Get him!”

“Wait, you bastard!”

The mercenaries were quick to pursue. Meanwhile, I... I just stood there.

“Lina! We’ve got to go after him!” Gourry urged me, but I didn’t move. “Lina!”

“He said not to,” I replied, hushed. “Luke... doesn’t want us to stop him.”

“Lina?” Gourry got around in front of me, seizing my shoulders in his hands. “This isn’t like you. What do you think Luke meant just now? It sounded like ‘please stop me’ to me.”

Ahh... My breath momentarily caught in my throat. He was right. Luke had said where he was headed next. Would he have mentioned that if he really didn’t want us to stop him? If he’d wanted to throw us off his trail, he would have pretended to stand down and then gone and done it anyway. There would’ve been no way for us to stop him then. Yet for seemingly no reason, he’d given us his itinerary...

“You’re right,” I nodded quietly.

Luke must have been torn between two contradictory feelings: a desire to stay true to the peace Mileena had afforded him and his seething hatred for those who’d taken her from him. Neither had fully won out—not yet.

“Let’s go, Gourry.”

“Sure.”

I chanted an amplified Lei Wing, then took off into the sky at top speed with Gourry in tow. Our destination? Head Priest Ryan at the southern temple.

Stars twinkled in the twilight sky. The sun had already dipped below the horizon, and the dying rays of red on the city’s west side offered little resistance against the encroaching darkness. Night was falling.

Such was the hour that Gourry and I touched down at the southern temple. Your typical tourist trap temples closed their doors at night when business died down, and indeed, the southern temple was locked shut by the time we arrived. One city guard and one mercenary stood posted at its front entrance.

“Lina Inverse and Gourry Gabriev from the sorcerers’ council,” I announced as we approached, before they could even ask.

“What do you want?” the soldier inquired, his expression cautious.

“We have information that someone is coming to kill Head Priest Ryan. We need to see him,” I said.

“What?!” the soldier and mercenary shouted in unison.

The mercenary’s face drained of color. “A-All right. I’ll show you the way...”

“Wait!” The soldier stopped him. “Give us the details.”

“There’s no time!” I insisted.

“If you need to talk, we can do that just fine here! Why do you need to get inside so badly?!”

“To protect him, of course!”

“The head priest has more than enough bodyguards already!”

I understood why the soldier was wary. He thought we might be assassins who’d come for Head Priest Ryan and we were just making excuses to try to get close to him. I couldn’t blame him for thinking that, given the situation. But I also couldn’t just back down. Luke was getting closer by the minute.

I looked around for a while before laying eyes on a gate lamp by the entrance. It was a little taller than me, with a post as thick as my wrist, and atop it sat a statue of a young woman holding a chalice. A magical light hung over the chalice.

I pointed to it. “Gourry, cut that.”

Gourry immediately sliced his sword through the air! Swish! Crrreak... Crash! He cleaved the bronze pillar on the diagonal, causing the lamp to crash into the garden. It was an undeniably spectacular feat of swordsmanship.

I looked at the soldier again. “If we were assassins, we wouldn’t bother talking. We’d just kill you and get our way. That’d be faster, right? Consider that we’re not taking that route. Look, the guy on his way is really tough... If the soldiers guarding the priest can all do what my buddy here just did, maybe you don’t need us after all. But if not, Head Priest Ryan is dead—no ifs, ands, or buts. So? What’s your call?”

“V-Very well...” I wasn’t sure if it was Gourry’s skill or my argument that persuaded him, but the soldier acquiesced. “B-But... I’m coming with you.”

“Suit yourself. Let’s go,” I said.

Gourry and I left the mercenary behind and followed the soldier into the temple. Inside was full of mercenaries, but there was no sign of the priests that were usually in the mix.

“No holy men at this hour?” I whispered to myself.

The soldier must have overheard. “It’s dinnertime,” he explained. “Head Priest Ryan should be eating in his private room, and the other priests take their meals in the dining hall.”

That’s right, it is about that time. In which case...

“Hurry!” I shouted.

“Huh? All right...”

At my prompting, the group sped up, and we soon arrived at the head priest’s quarters. Bang! We kicked the door in to find a group of five soldiers and mercenaries standing around Head Priest Ryan, who was just bringing a forkful of food to his mouth.

“Who...?” he stammered. “Wait, you’re the ones from the sorcerers’ council—”

“Head Priest Ryan, someone’s coming to kill you!” I declared.

“Wh-What?!” Ryan and the mercenaries rose to their feet with a clatter.

“Have you eaten any of that food yet?”

“No, I was just about to start. Don’t tell me...!” His eyes widened and he tossed the fork away. “It’s poisoned?!”

He looked fearfully at the dishes on the tray. A warm vegetable salad, fried whitefish, bread, and soup. His fork had only just speared his first mouthful of the fish.

“Let’s test it,” I said, picking up the tray and taking a scowling bite from each dish. “Try some, Gourry,” I urged him as I handed the food over.

“Right.” He took a bite out of each dish as well.

Head Priest Ryan continued watching us with dread.

“Hmm...” I said, considering. “I think, fortunately, the food’s okay.”

Of course it was. Luke hadn’t had time to get ahead of us and poison the man’s meal. I’d just made that up so we could get a bite to eat.

Hey, don’t judge me! Undernourishment compromises both brain and muscle power. There was no way we could fight or argue down Luke on empty stomachs.

“Still, this room isn’t safe. It abuts the courtyard, and he could blast you with a spell from outside. Let’s move to a bigger chamber, preferably an interior one with no windows—and a shortage of hiding places,” I suggested.

Ryan immediately rose to his feet. “U-Understood! To the dining hall, then!”

“Aren’t the other priests there eating?”

“I’ll kick them out!” he declared without hesitation. “Come on! Follow us, all of you!”

Leaving his dinner behind, the head priest strode out of the room, surrounded by his soldiers and mercenaries. Gourry and I followed after them.

We soon came to a vast room with a large table at its center. Ryan commanded the priests dining there to vacate, then ordered his mercenaries to clear the table. The priests, unaware of the situation, looked unhappy about this, but Ryan clearly didn’t give a damn. I mean, I’m sure it’s hard to be considerate when your life is hanging in the balance, but still...

After we cleared the place out and sat down at the central table, Head Priest Ryan let out a sigh. “Now, all this about someone trying to kill me... Why? What’s going on here? Is one of the other head priests behind it? Is it the same person who killed the high priest and Bran? Are there lots of assassins? Shouldn’t we be on the run instead of holing up here? No, maybe what I need is more soldiers to protect me! Speaking of which... I heard that there was a fire in the city. Is this connected?!”

“Calm down. One question at a time, okay?” I said, trying to soothe the snippy priest.

To be honest, I wasn’t entirely sure what to tell him... I didn’t know if I should reveal that Luke was the one after him. If I spilled the beans, he might start to think that Ceres, Luke’s employer, was the ringleader. On the other hand, if I kept my mouth shut, Ryan might never realize what his selfishness had wrought...

“This isn’t the guy who killed the high priest and Bran,” I said. “It’s someone with... a more personal grudge against you.”

“A... A personal grudge?! Don’t be absurd! I’ve never offended anyone!” he insisted brazenly, without any self-reflection.

With a sudden swell of internal rage, I found myself raising my hand, and... Wham!

“Guh!” Ryan took a fist to the face and fell to the floor.

“Your Holiness!”

“What are you doing?!”

The mercenaries looked at us accusingly, but...

“I could’ve done much worse than that. And you’d have deserved it.”

It was Gourry who spoke up, not me. That old priest’s words must’ve really gotten his goat.

“What? What are you talking about?!” Ryan demanded as he cradled his cheek.

I looked down at him. “A few days ago, a couple visited this place. The woman had been poisoned, and you refused to treat her out of spite just because she was in the employ of Ceres of the North. She’s dead now. The man she was with cared deeply for her, so he wants to make you pay. The only way to make it right would be to bring her back to life. And since you seem kinda slow on the uptake, I’ll say it outright—you basically killed her.” My statement had the mercenaries and the soldiers glaring angrily at Head Priest Ryan.

“Wait, you... You’re accusing me of murder?! H-How dare you! Absurd! I... I don’t know what you’re talking about!”

“The mercenary who turned us away at the door told us he was acting on your orders.”

“That... That’s... It’s some kind of mistake! And I... I never... It’s not like I poisoned the girl myself! He should go after whoever did!”

“Already did,” I said casually. Ryan then froze and fell silent. “You said you heard there was a fire nearby, right? That’s where he killed the guy. Tore him apart piece by piece while he was still alive. Then he threw him in the inferno to finish the job.”

Ryan’s knees began to knock. Seemed like he was finally catching on.

“B-But...” He looked at me pleadingly. “He’s just one man! That means it’s not the group who killed Bran! So... with all this security, I have nothing to fear!”

“I’m telling you he killed Bran’s assassins in that fire. Who do you think is the bigger threat?”

“Yeek!” The old priest gasped. “But you... You’ll protect me, won’t you?! G-God entrusted this city’s guardianship to me! I can’t... I can’t die yet! Please, protect me!”

“I don’t know what stupid thing ‘God’ entrusted you with, and I don’t care,” I informed him. “I’m under no obligation to protect a jackass like you.”

“Please!”

“I just wanna stop the guy on the rampage, from the bottom of my heart... And it just so happens that means keeping you free from harm.”

“I-I’ll give you anything! Just save me! P-Please! I’m begging you!”

“Then sit down and shut up.”

“Y-Yes! Of course!” Ryan said and quickly took his seat.

It’d be nice if the old bastard would just pipe down and stay put, but...

The layout of the southern temple was probably the same as the other branches. Luke had been a bodyguard at the northern one, so it would be safe to assume he knew the basic ins and outs of the place. Meanwhile, Gourry and I didn’t have a great handle on what was where... meaning moving Ryan around too much would only play to Luke’s strengths.

The question, then, was how Luke would approach us if we bunkered down. There were no windows in the dining hall and only two doors, which were some distance away from where Ryan was sitting. Luke couldn’t use the same strategy he had at the eastern temple now that we’d changed rooms. Ryan was too far from any outside walls.

We’d been slow to react last time because it was all so sudden, but now that we knew the trick, he wouldn’t catch us off guard with a Dark Mist again. In other words, if Luke was going to spring a surprise attack on us, there were only two ways he could do it—either from above or below.

“Is there a basement under this room?” I asked.

“Eh? No... only the annexes have basements. Should we move to one of those?” Ryan asked in turn.

“What’s above here?” I asked, ignoring him.

“What? That’d be the priests’ dormitories... Of course! He’ll come from overhead! That’s it! Yes! Send all the guards to the floor above us! You there! Get five or six guards in the courtyard with nothing better to do and take them upstairs! Around rooms five through seven of the priests’ dormitories! Understood?!” One of the mercenaries left the room on Ryan’s command.

After that, the hall was silent for quite a while. We had nothing to do but anticipate Luke’s arrival.

The wait was interminable. What was taking so long? Not that I was eager for Luke to show up in a murderous rage, but when we’d parted ways, he’d made it sound like he was coming directly here. An awful lot of time had passed for that to be the case. Maybe he was already inside the building, biding his time.

“Is... Is he really coming after me?” Ryan finally asked in terror, unable to bear the silence. “You’re sure there wasn’t some mistake? Perhaps he made you think he was after me while he went after Francis in the east.”

“If that’s what you think, we can leave right now.”

“N-No! Please don’t!” Ryan yelped, frantically waving his hands.

“Besides,” I started to say, but just then... I heard footsteps approaching from down the hall.

“Is... Is that him?!” Ryan clamored fearfully.

The mercenaries sprang to life, yet the arrival at the door was an out-of-breath priest.

“Head Priest Ryan!” he called.

“What’s wrong?!” Ryan leaped to his feet in response.

“E-Emergency!” the priest cried as he fell to his knees before Ryan. “A messenger just came from the eastern temple! Head Priest Francis was killed by an intruder!”

“What?!” Ryan exclaimed in shock.

“We know,” I said. The entire room froze. “We saw him kill Head Priest Francis right before our eyes. And after the fact, he said he was headed south next. That’s why we’re here.”

“No... No! That means...”

Before Ryan could say whatever he was gonna—Fwoom!—we heard a distant rumble and several screaming voices.

“Wh-What was that?!” the priest gasped.

“Something’s happening in the courtyard!” one of the mercenaries in the hallway announced.

“Ah... fine! Send all the guards to—”

“Stop!” I interrupted Ryan swiftly.

“What?”

“It’s probably a diversion! He’s causing a ruckus in the courtyard to draw attention there! Then when your guards scatter, he’ll strike!”

“B-But there’s just one of him, isn’t there?!”

“Yeah, but he has his ways! He could have summoned a rock golem to raise havoc for him! So stay put, would you?!”

“Good call, right down to the rock golem... You know me pretty well.”

I flinched when I heard his voice. Need I even say who?

“Who’s th— Ghhk!” Down the hall, I could hear the bark of a mercenary cut off by a groan.

Then he appeared at one of the doors, his naked blade at his side. Luke...

“Hey. You’re Head Priest Ryan, right? I’m here to kill the shit outta ya.”

Immediately, a figure tore across the room. Gourry!

In a split second, he’d closed the distance to Luke, drawn his sword, taken a stance, and blocked the path! Nice one! Luke had only just appeared in the doorway, but the big lug wasn’t going to let him through!

“That’s enough!” Gourry shouted.

“Yeah, figured you’d come. Really, really wish you hadn’t. Didn’t wanna mix you guys up in this...” Luke muttered as he readied his sword and squared off with Gourry. “Since I know I can’t beat you in a straight-up swordfight.” A self-recriminating smile appeared on his face.

“Eeeeek!” Ryan screamed, and I moved to cover him.

“I’m not gonna feed you some platitude like ‘I understand how you feel’!” I shouted. “But I can’t sit by and let you continue this rampage!”

“Yeah... Sorry about all the trouble I’m makin’. But I just can’t stop myself,” Luke said, his gaze locked on Gourry.

Luke knew that he couldn’t best Gourry in terms of fencing skill, but there was more to it than that. There was a decisive difference in their weapons of choice. Luke had a magical sword with a pretty good edge and an interesting property that let him temporarily store a spell in it. Meanwhile, Gourry had the legendary Blast Sword, which was so unbelievably sharp that we’d had to put a protective spell on it just to keep it under control. Luke’s sword would be toast on the first clash. He had to know that... yet he showed no sign of backing down. Did he intend to fight to the finish, even if the outcome was already evident? Or did he have a plan in mind?

“Let’s go!” Luke howled as he swung his sword.

Gourry’s blade flashed in response. And the instant the two streaks of light neared each other... Whoosh! A gust knocked Gourry’s blade off course! Had Luke charged his sword with a wind spell?!

Normally Gourry could slice through a whirlwind, but despite his determination to stop Luke, his swordplay was lacking its usual ferocity.

“Grk!” Nevertheless, he channeled the momentum of his deflected blade into another strike. His target? The sword in Luke’s hand! He was going to slice it in half to neuter his attack power.

But... Whoosh! Another blast of wind knocked Gourry’s blade off course again! This time, Luke stepped in. Gourry backed up to keep his distance.

I was wrong... I suddenly realized, stunned. Gourry wasn’t holding back in the slightest; it only looked that way because the wind wreathing Luke’s blade was just that incredible. That was the only way to explain it deflecting Gourry’s strike not once, but twice! Luke had known Gourry would be here, so he’d decided to play up his defense rather than offense. Which meant...

In anticipation of Luke’s next play, I began chanting a spell under my breath. Gourry couldn’t risk moving back any farther. He dealt out a third and then a fourth slice, but Luke’s sword knocked those away too. Against an ordinary opponent, Gourry would’ve had the foresight to predict the path of the wind and cut through it. But though he wasn’t as good as Gourry, Luke was leagues better than “ordinary.” By focusing on defense, he could continue to use his wind barrier to throw Gourry off. Looking at it that way... it was pretty impressive!

As Luke thus deflected the umpteenth strike, he bellowed, “Gust!”

With that—Vwoosh!—the wind stored in the sword was unleashed, rushing forth in a howl!

Caught by surprise, Gourry couldn’t keep his balance. He was forced to leap back with the wind rather than fight it, and when he did, Luke took off! He darted at Ryan the instant Gourry was out of the way!

Fortunately, I’d predicted this. I immediately unleashed the spell I’d chanted. “Diem Wind!”

Vwoosh! My own gust pushed Gourry back in the direction he’d come, closing the distance between him and Luke again!

“What?!” Luke cried in surprise.

“Graaaah!” Then Gourry raised a war cry, and through it, I heard Luke’s sword hit the floor.

Gourry hadn’t knocked it out of his hand, however. Realizing that a hit from Gourry’s Blast Sword would be the end of his blade, Luke had dropped it the moment they made contact. The improvised nature of Gourry’s attack had failed to cut through Luke’s weapon instantly.

“Rrk!” Luke drew back into the hall, realizing he was now at a disadvantage.

But we couldn’t let him get away! If he escaped, he would just come after Ryan some other way! If that happened, what would be the point of any of this? We needed Luke to let go of his hatred and back down for good. I didn’t know how we were going to do that, but the only way to try was to open a dialogue.

“Gourry! After him!” I shouted, giving chase.

Gourry followed after me, and when we hit the hall... Bwsh!

Where Luke had just retreated was shrouded in darkness—another Dark Mist spell! Gourry stopped instinctively. Then suddenly...

Fwoosh! Flames began to lick out of the darkness along the ceiling!

“Waaaaagh!” the mercenaries shouted in surprise.

The flames stuck to the ceiling, suggesting Luke had cast a fire spell upward from beyond the Dark Mist to keep us in check. Except I wasn’t gonna let that stop me! I ran headlong into the blackness!

Within a few steps, I was out on the other side... and I came to a halt. There were magical lights in sconces lighting the corridor, but just down the hall was another patch of Dark Mist.

“Lina!” Gourry quickly caught up with me. We shared a glance, nodded, and took off running again. We passed through the second dark cloud only to find a third lying beyond it.

Argh! Give it up already, man! Without even slowing down this time, Gourry and I plunged in. We came out at an intersection. The hallway just beyond was obscured by yet another patch of darkness.

Doubt clouded my mind. “Stop!” I shouted, doing so myself.

The Dark Mist diversion... The first try made sense. Even the second. But a third? Luke had to have known that wouldn’t work. So what was with the fourth? It looked to me like he’d intentionally put it past the intersection in an attempt to convince us he’d gone that way. But if he really wanted to give us the slip, the obvious move would have been to cast Dark Mist at the intersection itself and then pick a side.

Doing it like this suggested... Was he trying to mislead us, or make us think he was misleading us when he truly had gone that way? Or was it possible...

“Let’s head back, Gourry!” I said, whipping around and running back into the darkness we’d just come out of.

“Right!” Gourry responded, following suit.

We backtracked until...

“Waaagh!” the mercenaries cried out, surprised by our sudden reappearance.

“Calm down!” I scolded them while getting a look around the room. There was no longer anyone in the central chair. “Where’s the priest?!”

“H-He took his guards and ran out of the other door!” one of the mercenaries responded.

Damn! I’d belatedly realized Luke’s plan. The purpose of the fire on the ceiling wasn’t to stave off me and Gourry. It was to smoke the already terrified Ryan out of the dining hall. Meanwhile, Luke had pretended to flee in order to lure us down the hall, all while using his superior knowledge of the building’s layout to get around to the other side of the dining room and head Ryan off.

That strategy potentially explained why he’d taken his time getting here from the east temple. He wanted us to explain the situation to Ryan and let his fear metastasize.

Gourry and I dashed across the room toward the other door. Just then...

Krr-crash! Further down the corridor, the ceiling caved in with a roar!

“P-Please! Stop!” I could hear Ryan screaming beyond the reverberations of destruction.

Not good! We kept running regardless. The dust hadn’t settled yet, but this was no time to worry about that. We climbed over the fresh mountain of rubble on the floor. Like the guard in the dining hall had said, the priest must have had his security detail with him. There was a handful of mercenaries collapsed nearby, but no sign of Luke and Ryan.

Where are they?! I reached out with my senses and picked up the sound of combat in the distance. Is that them?! No, it’s the golem in the courtyard...

“Aaagh!” Over the distant din, I could hear Head Priest Ryan!

“This way!” Gourry shouted and took off running. I did the same.

We came out of the corridor, turned a corner, and... Given our general heading, I was pretty sure we were en route to the backyard. Normally there would be guards all around, but there wasn’t a single one in sight now. They must have all rallied to the courtyard earlier.

Gourry and I continued down the hall and—Wham!—slammed open a door that had been left ajar! We exited the building into the quiet night.

Here and there, lamps cast a faint magical light. The lawn was neatly trimmed and the trees were well tended. Shadowy silhouettes of bronze statues stood around us. I could still hear the melee from the courtyard, which seemed to have drawn the majority of the temple guard. There were only a few here out back—all collapsed on the ground.

Standing silently among them... was Luke.

“I just don’t get it,” he said softly.

There was a black mass at his feet... I looked down to see it was the body of Head Priest Ryan. Dammit!

“Humans... Sometimes it feels like they can survive anything, but then... the littlest thing kills ’em.”

I failed to stop him. I clenched my teeth hard.

“Fightin’ those demons... Again and again, I thought, ‘Man, we’re so dead.’ But we managed to pull through every time an’ win. But after all that... Seein’ Mileena get ganked by a second-rate asshole like Zord... It just don’t seem real. It just... It ain’t right.”

“Luke...”

“Even this guy... He died just like that. I didn’t wanna listen to him raisin’ hell, so I thought I’d cut his vocal cords. Even made sure to miss the artery so he wouldn’t die too quick, but... Guess it was the shock, because he just went... flop. Sucks, ’cause I really, really wanted to make this guy suffer...”

“Luke...”

“It ain’t enough. It still ain’t enough...”

“What?” His words sent a chill down my spine. The hatred inside of him hadn’t been quelled. I could still feel it emanating from him.

“I thought killin’ this guy would be the end of it. That it’d be enough. That afterward, they could just arrest me or kill me or whatever. Mileena ain’t comin’ back either way, so what do I care? That’s what I thought. But I guess not, ’cause that awful voice... just keeps risin’ up in me... sayin’ to keep goin’... That it still ain’t enough. If only Ceres and his people had better magic... If they could’ve used Resurrection, they could’ve saved Mileena!”

“Luke!” I cried out.

It was true that Head Priest Ceres and his magical doctors had failed to neutralize the poison and that none of them were capable of casting Resurrection. Yet Zord’s poison wasn’t just designed to be incurable by typical antidote spells. By the time we’d reached the northern temple that night, it had already circulated throughout Mileena’s entire body and exhausted her stamina.

I mean, yeah, she might have made a comeback if we’d been able to fully excise the poison. And a spell like Resurrection, which borrowed life force from the surrounding area to transfer to the patient, could have recouped enough stamina to allow her to fight off the last of the poison herself. But to blame what happened on Ceres just seemed so...

“I know! I’m just makin’ excuses and takin’ it out on other people! That’s what my head tells me! But... But my heart... My heart’s tellin’ me it still ain’t had enough!”

“Snap out of it, Luke!” Gourry shouted. But his words couldn’t reach Luke’s heart either.

“Next up... the north.”

“Don’t do this, Luke!” I took over. “You’re just feeding the hatred in your heart! If you kill Head Priest Ceres, next thing you know, you’ll be turning your rage on us! And if you manage to kill us, then it’ll be someone else next! In the end, you’ll have no one left to turn on but yourself! If you surrender yourself to hatred, you could destroy the whole city and still never be satisfied!”

“Okay, fine. What would you guys do? It’s easy to tell a guy to just stop... But what if the same thing happened to you? What if some asshole killed your partner an’ someone told you to put your hatred aside? Could you do it? If someone said it wouldn’t help, could you just say ‘oh, right’ and let it go?”

“I...” I didn’t know what to say.

Slowly, Luke turned around. “This is it... This has gotta be the end of it!”

“Luke!” I called...

But my cry was drowned out by the sound of Luke unleashing his spell. He took flight to the north.

To the temple of Head Priest Ceres.