Chapter 233
The rain fell relentlessly from an oppressive, uniform grey sky that felt less like a natural phenomenon and more like a vast shroud pulled tight over the city.
It was a chilling, mournful curtain of water, as if the heavens themselves wept for the grievous losses suffered in Orario.
The perpetual twilight cast by the unyielding clouds draped the city below in a dismal hue, blurring the lines between reality and nightmare.
For a fleeting moment, gazing upon the bleak landscape submerged beneath the downpour, one might mistake this place for Limbo – a desolate realm tethering precariously between the living and the dead.
But this somber, rain-lashed earth was, tragically, the world of the living.
Its identity was brutally confirmed by the sprawling, desolate garden of the dead that dominated the scene – a vast, sorrowful cemetery located on the city's outskirts.
Here lay not dozens, but countless graves, stretching further than the eye could clearly see.
This was no manicured final resting place.
Instead, it was a landscape of raw earth and hasty mounds.
Many markers were rudimentary, little more than broken weapons thrust into the soil, their steel or wood dull with mud and rain.
Worse still, some mounds bore only a rough wooden stake, or in the most tragic cases of those whose remains were incomplete or unrecoverable, held no identifier at all.
These were not simply graves; they were final, sorrowful acknowledgments of lives brutally cut short in a single, horrific night – the night Orario had given birth to a monstrous evil within its own walls.
Amidst this desolate expanse, a small cluster of divine figures stood, starkly outnumbered by the silent multitude beneath the soil.
A handful of gods, huddled together against the downpour, their divine presence a fragile, vibrant note against the overwhelming quietude of death.
The silence between them was heavy, thick with unspoken grief and the drumming rhythm of the rain against stone and earth.
Astraea was the first to break the stillness.
Her voice, though soft, carried a weight of sorrow that cut through the ambient sound.
"This tragedy," she began, her gaze sweeping across the mournful field of mounds, "it has claimed so many... brave adventurers, innocent civilians... lives lost in a single, horrific night." The rain plastered strands of her hair to her face, but her eyes, filled with deep, empathetic sadness, seemed barely to register the downpour.
She paused, the weight of her words hanging in the damp air.
"And still," her tone deepened, "still the count rises."
The evidence was all around them – the fresh mounds, the hastily dug trenches for new arrivals being added even now, the sight of weary gravediggers working tirelessly through the rain.
This place had swollen overnight, forcing raw extensions of turned earth into the surrounding land to accommodate its new, silent occupants.
The ceaseless cycle of burials, the unending flow of tears and unshed blood, painted a grim picture of continued suffering.
The atmosphere was beyond grim; it was a suffocating blanket of despair that pressed upon the gods gathered, many visibly struggling to maintain their composure.
Then, the heavy quiet was shattered.
Ganesha, his imposing form trembling with suppressed emotion, let out a sound ripped from the depths of his being – a raw, earth-shaking wail that momentarily drowned out the rain.
Tears, thick and hot, surged from beneath his elephant mask, streaming down his face faster than the falling water.
"My children!" he roared, his voice booming across the cemetery.
"Oh, my poor, lost children! I failed you! I failed you all!" His lamenting cry was a torrent of pain and self-loathing, a god's anguish laid bare.
"No words can express how sorry I am," he cried, his voice fracturing.
"What good is the god of the masses," he sobbed, gesturing wildly at the endless graves, "if he cannot protect even them? If all he can do is stand here and howl at the sky?"
Around him, the other gods shifted, their expressions a mix of shared pain and discomfort.
A painful silence followed his outburst, marked only by the soft sounds of their own suppressed sorrow and the continued rain.
Today, no one offered him platitudes or urged him to quiet his grief.
In fact, more than one divine gaze held a flicker of stark envy for his ability to break their rigid composure, to simply hurt aloud in the face of such overwhelming loss.
Slightly apart from the main group, near a particularly dense cluster of new graves, Hermes stood.
He wasn't speaking to the assembled gods, but murmuring softly to the muddy earth beneath his feet.
His tone was low, laced with a weary cynicism that cut sharper than Ganesha's roaring anguish. "They're gone," he whispered, the words barely audible above the rain.
"Their souls have passed beyond our reach. Who are we praying to? Who can hear our pleas and ease our regrets?"
The ways of an eternal god often seemed callous or detached to mortals, yet in this moment, thinking of the many lives tied to his own familia now reduced to anonymous mounds, something shifted within him.
He reached up, pulling the brim of his winged hat low over his eyes, a purely mortal gesture of concealment against the elements and his own burgeoning pain.
"It's just a mortal custom, isn't it?" he seemed to muse aloud, though only the nearest mounds could 'hear' his words.
“A meaningless performance... And yet..."
From the edge of the circle, Bahamut watched Hermes.
She didn't fully inhabit the searing, personal loss that gripped many here; her own familia had been spared the direct devastation of the night.
Yet, the sheer weight of the collective sorrow was a physical pressure, a chilling reminder of the fragility of mortal life.
She stepped closer, offering a quiet presence amidst the suffering.
"And yet," she finished Hermes' thought, her voice steady, a low counterpoint to his cynicism, "if we do not remember them... pray for them... who will?"
Her gaze swept across the sea of mounds, then back to the drawn faces of her fellow gods – the trembling shoulders of Ganesha, the veiled sadness of Astraea, the hidden pain of Hermes.
Bahamut felt no regret about her choice – the choice made that night, the decision not to engage Faluzure within the city, had been the correct one.
It had prevented an even vaster slaughter, saving countless lives at a terrible cost.
It was a burden of knowing, a truth she carried, aware that many mortals, perhaps even some gods unaware of the impossible calculus of that night, would never understand or forgive that terrible inaction.
………………………………………………………….
The rain had ceased at last, the heavy downpour lifting as if the very sky had wept itself dry of sorrow.
A quiet settled over Orario, but it was a silence devoid of relief.
The improved weather offered no comfort, for there was no one with the heart to appreciate it. This morning marked only the second day, and already, the sprawling metropolis known as the Labyrinth City felt broken, brought low to its knees.
A pervasive wave of fear gripped its residents, a suffocating blanket that smothered reason. People consumed by such terror were prone to rash, desperate decisions.
This primal urge for self-preservation had coalesced into a volatile mass at the city’s western entrance.
A large, desperate crowd had gathered, their faces gaunt with exhaustion and fear, their clothes stained with the grime and soot of the previous night’s destruction.
Many bore fresh injuries, crudely bandaged or simply left raw.
“Open the gate!” a strained voice shrieked from the thick of the throng, cracking with desperation.
“Why in the hell are you trapping us all in here? Let us out!”
“Let us out of this hell!” another pleaded, the cry echoing the collective anguish.
Near the front, a woman knelt amidst the press of bodies, clutching a single, small child against her chest.
Tears tracked through the grime on her cheeks as she wailed, her voice raw with grief.
“Please, hurry! The Evilus can attack at any moment! I can’t afford to lose any more family in this cursed city… not after last night…” She had already paid a horrific toll during the initial disaster, her husband and three other children claimed by the darkness and chaos.
A multitude of similar laments and demands rose from the crowd, a cacophony of fear and desperation.
They screamed, pleaded, and shoved, directing their terror and fury at the few adventurers manning the makeshift barricades that sealed off the massive city gates.
One such adventurer, a towering figure with a build that could rival a bear, stood firm despite the barrage of panic.
His name was Falgar Batros, a member of the Hermes Familia.
He ran a hand over his close-cropped hair, his expression a mix of weariness and frustration. “How many times must I repeat this?” he boomed, his voice cutting through the din, though lacking its usual authority against such overwhelming fear.
“The Evilus are waiting out there for you. They have surrounded the entire city. Leaving is walking straight into their trap!”
Despite Falgar’s intimidating presence, the terrified civilians seemed almost ready to physically assault him, their fear overriding any sense of caution or respect.
Observing the volatile situation, Falgar couldn’t suppress a heavy sigh.
The weight of their desperation was crushing, but he had a duty to uphold.
He attempted to reason with them once more, his voice softening slightly.
“If you leave the city, we won’t be able to protect you out there! Please, try to understand the danger.” he pleaded, extending a hand as if to implore them.
But his plea had the opposite effect, igniting the embers of their frustration into open rage.
“Who cares!” someone roared back, their voice dripping with bitter resentment.
“A whole lot of good your protection did for us last night!” another spat sarcastically, the words like venom.
“Yeah, let us out of here! We don’t need the likes of you adventurers!” a chorus of voices joined in, the sentiment spreading through the crowd like a virulent infection.
Men and women screamed in unison, their fear curdling into aggressive defiance.
Their children, clutched tightly or hidden behind legs, trembled, frightened more by the terrifying transformed faces and screaming voices of their parents than by the unseen enemy outside the walls.
‘Sigh. What a disaster’ Draco thought, a familiar sense of weary disappointment settling in his chest as he watched the chaotic scene unfold from his vantage point atop a nearby rooftop.
The ground far below vibrated with the collective panic of the crowd.
It was painfully obvious, even from this distance, what the evilus were trying to achieve.
This wasn't just about inflicting physical damage; it was a calculated psychological assault.
They were aiming to sow discord, to create a deep, irreparable rift between the civilians and the adventurers who were supposed to protect them.
This division was catastrophic.
The city of Orario, for all its might, relied on a delicate symbiosis: adventurers for defense, civilians for its functioning economy and infrastructure.
Both sides needed each other for the city to thrive, or even just to survive this onslaught.
But what could be done? The horrors of the previous night had been deeply traumatizing, a wound that festered and bred paranoia.
There was no simple solution, no magic words to appease an enraged mob driven by terror and loss.
Reasoning with them verbally felt like trying to extinguish a wildfire with a teacup.
Force, of course, could disperse them, but that would leave a lasting scar, a chasm of distrust between the protectors and the protected that might never heal.
Furthermore, it wasn’t just the civilians who were nearing their breaking point.
It was only a matter of time before the adventurers, exhausted, grieving their own fallen comrades, and facing relentless hostility from those they were trying to save, became fed up. That moment would spiral Orario into even deeper chaos, a city tearing itself apart from within.
“Any ideas on how to stop this… this self-destruction?” Draco asked, turning his gaze to Asfi, who sat beside him on the gritty rooftop.
Her face, usually composed, was etched with a deep, troubled expression as she watched the pandemonium below.
She sighed, the sound barely audible above the distant clamour.
“By the gods… I can’t think of anything spontaneously. This must have been part of the Evilus plan all along. What better way to sink the city into more chaos and despair than by turning its own people against each other? Killing is direct, but this… this is insidious.”
“What about you, Shakti, any idea…?” Draco began, turning slightly towards the figure of Shakti, who had remained silent.
But the question died on his lips.
His head snapped up, eyes widening as his extraordinary senses flared, picking up on something disturbingly familiar, a signature presence he hadn't felt since the night.
He shot to his feet, his previous contemplative mood vanished, replaced by urgent alarm. “Shakti! Asfi! Immediately! Get down there and start evacuating the civilians away from the gate!” he yelled, his voice sharp, cutting, and carrying the weight of immediate peril.
The sheer urgency in his tone was unmistakable, even reaching Falgar several hundred yards away at the barricade, causing the large adventurer to momentarily forget the screaming crowd and look up towards the rooftop.
Just as Asfi and Shakti reacted, moving with practiced speed, Draco spotted what his senses had warned him of.
Red, glowing stones, like malevolent embers, were falling from the sky.
Not just falling, but being hurled with immense force from atop the very city walls that were supposed to offer sanctuary.
They were inferno stones, weapons of terrifying destructive power.
Channeling torrents of wind elemental magic, Draco acted instantly.
A powerful, focused gale erupted around the first cluster of falling projectiles that were arcing directly towards the packed civilian crowd.
The wind buffeted them, altering their trajectory just enough to divert their lethal path away from the densest group.
Boom! Boom! Boom!
A series of massive explosions ripped through the ground just beyond the edges of the civilian cluster as the inferno stones impacted.
Flames roared skyward, sending shockwaves through the air and cracking the earth.
Luckily, the main force of the blasts had been diverted, sparing the core of the crowd from instant incineration.
However, scorching heat washed over them, and jagged pieces of superheated debris were flung outwards like shrapnel, tearing through the air and striking those at the periphery of the group, inflicting horrific, severe injuries.
Screams of agony mixed with the roar of the explosions.
“Aaaaaaaaaah! It’s the Evilus! They’re throwing bombs from the city walls!” someone shrieked, the terrifying declaration amplified by the echoing blasts.
The already panicked crowd fractured.
Rational thought evaporated entirely.
A fresh wave of primal terror seized them, and the civilians scattered in a mad, every-man-for-himself frenzy.
They ran blindly in all directions, trampling over each other in a desperate, brutal scramble for survival.
The scene became a horrifying tableau of mortals at their worst, bodies jostling, falling, and being crushed underfoot.
Some people, tragically, were not quick or strong enough to survive the stampede, especially small children who stood no chance against the heedless rush of panicked adults.
Their tiny bodies were simply overwhelmed and extinguished in the chaos.
Draco watched all of this from above, a cold, heavy disappointment settling in his chest.
He had gone through the effort, expended the energy to shield them from the initial, external threat, diverting the deadly stones and sparing countless lives.
And yet, here they were, killing each other through unfounded panic and raw, self-serving fear. What was the point? What was the purpose of adventurers risking their lives, spilling their blood, standing against monsters and enemies, if the very people they protected would simply behave like this when faced with terror?
The same heartbreaking sentiment echoed through the minds of many adventurers below, those who weren't caught in the direct explosions but witnessed the horrific stampede.
Doubt gnawed at them, making them question why they were even bothering, why they were willing to sacrifice everything for people who seemed determined to destroy themselves.
“Gahahahahahah!”
The cruel, mocking laughter of some evilus soldiers perched atop the city wall pulled Draco’s attention away from the tragedy unfolding below.
They were watching the civilian stampede with obvious glee, finding amusement in the self-inflicted carnage.
Even worse, they were already preparing to unleash another batch of explosives onto the fleeing masses.
Below, amidst the chaos, members of the Hermes and Ganesha familias were already attempting to organize aid, their faces grim.
“Mages! Erect barriers to the left! Healers, fall back further away from the wall!” Shakti yelled, her voice strained but commanding, desperately trying to bring some semblance of order and protection to the panicked civilians and injured.
The situation was dire.
The Evilus had seized control of the city walls, effectively turning the defensive structure into a weapon – and Orario into a cage.
Although every instinct screamed at Draco to launch a swift counter-attack, to rain down devastating spells from his aerial perch upon the laughing soldiers on the wall, he hesitated.
He could feel it in his bones, a distinct, unsettling pressure emanating from the wall.
The presence of one of the evilus champions.
He didn't know which one it was, their aura concealed or unfamiliar, and in that moment, he didn't particularly want to find out by drawing their attention.
Contemplating aerial spells, he quickly dismissed the idea.
For his magic to be potent enough to deal with potentially high-level targets on the wall, he would need to descend, making his air advantage null.
Additionally, it was broad daylight; even with his abilities, he would be a blindingly obvious target, a beacon against the clear sky.
After witnessing the sheer destructive power demonstrated by Zald during his fight against Ottar, where he cleaved the very clouds above the city with a single strike, Draco had no desire to personally discover what it felt like to be sliced in two or obliterated by such a champion’s power from below.
With few viable options for an effective offensive strike, Draco made his decision.
He dropped from the rooftop, landing lightly behind Shakti and the struggling adventurers.
He had to abandon the idea of assaulting the walls for now.
Retreat was the painful, necessary reality.
He joined the mages, lending his power to the defensive effort, focusing his will and energy on erecting sturdy magical barriers.
They had to completely retreat from the perimeter around the surrounding walls, conceding that ground to survive the storm from above.
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