Narrator's POV.
Snow slowly falls from the endless sea of clouds that covered the sky with the sun nowhere to be seen due to those same clouds completely covering them.
The snowflakes gently fell down from the sky until they fell over the roof of a moving carriage, a driver on the front holding the reins of the 2 horses that were working on pulling said carriage, though soon enough, it stopped and the driver hopped down from his spot.
"Kid! This is as far as I'll take you" The man spoke before grabbing the door of the carriage and opening it. "You're on your own from here"
In response to the driver's words, The Messenger slowly walked out of the carriage, hopping down with his shoes landing on the snow as if he weighed nothing at all, his silver eyes looked forward, managing to see a massive castle in the distance, one that was so big that looked like multiple castles one over the other, and at the top, a single tower stretched up and through the clouds.
"Why do you even want to go to that cursed place?" The man spoke before closing the door.
"I have a letter to deliver, that's all" he answered dryly before starting to walk in direction to the castle.
The Driver just stared at The Messenger walking away, a tired scoff coming out of his mouth before he went back to his spot, and holding the reins, he commanded the horses to turn around and move on the opposite direction of the castle.
His shoes left somewhat shallow footprints on the snow as he walked towards the castle, this right hand slid underneath the sleeveless vest he wore over the white shirt, pulling out a single letter, not even sealed with wax, his eyes narrowed a little before he stuffed the letter inside of the inner pocket of the vest again and continued walking.
He reached what seemed to be the remains of s destroyed village half-buried in snow after a few minutes of walking, his silver eyes momentarily looking at the buried houses and frozen corpses laying around, but then his eyes locked on the entrance of the castle he saw at an already short distance, to which he decided to walk a little faster.
"This place reeks..."
That was the first thing he said as he walked through the front doors of the castle, looking down at the broken pair of doors laying on the floor he gave another step forward but then he perked up after hearing the sound of something falling over.
His silver eyes moved to the side and saw what seemed to be a person, if it weren't because of the disfigured face and limbs, tattered remains of a Butler uniform basically glued and mended with the grey skin, the monster let out a choked shriek, some drool and saliva coming out of the split broken mouth before running directly towards The Messenger.
"An Abomination?" The Messenger's eyes narrowed a little.
The abomination tried to attack The Messenger by slamming his head with one of its disfigured and mangled arms, but in response the silver eyed swordsman gave a step to the side dodging the weak attack without much effort, and in a quick movement, he unsheathed his sword and threw two slashed, one to slice the abomination's arm and the second one aimed directly at the neck completely decapitating the monster.
The abomination fell to the ground as soon as its head was cut off, the corpse slowly turning into silver mist before it disappeared, The Messenger stared at the place where the corpse was before he perked up as the sound and disgusting scent of more abominations approaching alerted him.
To his left a door was punched off its hinges as another abomination made its way through the doorframe, another one rolled its way down the stairs at the end of the room, the lack of legs basically forcing it to drag itself by its disfigured arms and from the railings of the second floor, another abomination basically threw himself down, its body falling and clearly breaking and bursting a little with yellow blood before it managed to stand up with a gargled growl.
The Messenger's eyes narrowed looking at the three monsters that approached him, his hand closed around the sword tighter as he gave a step forward ready to defend himself when he saw the one to his left already pouncing at him.
"Watch out!"
But before he could move to attack, a longer weapon sliced the Abomination's head clean off.
The Messenger looked at the young woman who had just entered the castle, her long and messy auburn hair was tied in a short ponytail, her red eyes already showed focus on the fight, she wore lightly, a blue shirt, a dark brown coat and brown trousers, a pair of what seemed to be hiking boots covered her feet, a pair of gloves that protected her hands a red scarf wrapped around her neck while around her waist she had 2 black belts which had small bags, though something that caught The Messenger's attention was the silver bracelet adorned with a red gem that was around her left wrist.
Her red eyes immediately locked onto the second abomination that started to erratically drag itself to her to which she just gave a step back to avoid its hands as it tried to grab her legs.
Raising her curved Greatsword, she stabbed the abomination on the back pinning it to the floor as her eyes looked at the third abomination, aiming her left hand at it the red gem on her bracelet glowed before her palm shoot out a ball of fire that exploded against the abomination letting his burning body fall back on the floor, hearing the struggling of the abomination beneath her, the young woman quickly blasted it with a burst of fire from her left hand, pulling her weapon out of it letting the fire consume the monster.
"Hey! Are you okay?" She asked still looking at the burning abomination beneath her. "Don't be scared, I'm an Adventurer, my name is-"
The Adventurer turned around to look at the Messenger right on time to see him calmly walk past her and towards the stairs, completely ignoring her...
"H-Hey! Where are you going? I was about to present myself" she raised her voice a little while glaring at his back.
"I'm going up" The Messenger answered not bothering to look back at her.
Just like how he had announced, he walked up the stairs and then moved to the left, entering one of the halls of the second floor, leaving The Adventurer stunned for a few seconds before a little huff came out of her.
"Okay...rude"
....
A few minutes later, The Messenger stopped walking and stared straight at a pair of double doors in front of him, his right hand closed around the two doorknob and twisted them to open them...but they didn't budge.
"These take me to the next floor, are they locked?"
His hand grabbed the handle of his sword and pulled it out of its sheath slashing at the door, but the blade of the weapon simply bounced on the doors, clearly too tough for him to cut down, his eyes narrowed before he tried kicking the doors down, they budged a little...but nothing more than that.
Completely defeated, The Messenger sheathed his sword and rested his forehead against the double doors, remaining there for a few seconds before a loud voice made him open his eyes.
"FUCK!!"
he gave a step back from the door and looked behind him, walking back through the hall he had walked before, he reached and intersection, he had arrived from the left, but he could now hear some sounds from the right, his hand rested on the handle of his weapon as he walked down the hall.
He was holding his guard up, ready to attack in case the sounds were from an abomination...but then he heard a small frustrated grunt before a silver cup came out flying through an open door, something that seemed to make him relax a little as he walked to the door looking at the insides of the room.
"Who keeps silverware in a goddamn chest?"
The Adventurer was apparently complaining about loot, her back turned against the door not having caught the presence of The Messenger while she eagerly inspected the insides of a wooden chest, entirely focused on the valueless things inside.
She pulled out a small fork from the chest and threw it behind her, making The Messenger tilt his head to the side to dodge the flying fork, but then his eyes opened a little as he stared at The Adventurer, the young woman had stood up and walked over to another small locked chest a few steps away and pulling out a lockpick she started to pick the lock of the chest, letting her quite quickly open it...finding nothing of worth, just silver plates stacked over each other.
She clicked her tongue. "This is not a kitchen, why is there so much of this stuff?"
The Messenger just approached her as she digged more into the chest. "Hey"
Her red eyes widened and her hand instantly moved to the curved greatsword on her back turning around ready to slash at whatever was a behind her...only for her face to express some annoyance as she looked at The Messenger.
"Oh...it's just you" she spoke putting her weapon again on her back. "Came back to ask my name?"
"There's a locked door I have to go through, I need you to open it" his dry tone of voice just made The Adventurers scoff.
"So you came because you need something from me? If you apologize for being so rude before I'll consider helping"
"I'm sorry...is that enough?" The Messenger immediately 'apologized' staring blankly at her.
"It doesn't work if you're not sincere!" She raised her voice turning around and returning to the chest filled with plates, trying to see if she could find anything else inside. "Just leave, I'm not helping you"
The Messenger looked down at the young woman as she rummaged through the silver plates holding one in her hands apparently calculating if it was worth taking, he simply turned around and started to walk to leave the room, The Adventurer's eyes looked at the pristine plate, seeing her own reflection on it alongside the reflection of the Messenger leaving, something that made her sigh heavily.
"Why does he look like a kicked puppy?" Shaking her head she looked back at him. "Hey!"
Hearing her call out to him, The Messenger stopped walking and looked behind him. "What is it?"
"I won't open that door of yours...but I guess I can teach you how to pick locks so you can do it yourself, that way you won't nag me again and again if you keep finding locked doors" she announced before standing up and dusting off her clothes.
"...Okay" he spoke immediately turning around and walking back to her.
"What? You won't even say—"
"Thank you"
The almost sincere thanks from The Messenger made her flinch a little but she quickly cleared her throat. "Y-You're welcome! Anyway, come here, it's not as hard as it looks"
.....
"See?! Not as hard!"
The Adventurer smiled...with relief as she looked at The Messenger finally force open a small lock she usually carried in one of her bags to test and maintain her lockpicking skills.
"We've been here for a whole hour!" The Adventurer thought, almost on the verge of tears as she looked down at him.
"...are you sure you're an Adventurer and not a Burglar?" He asked looked over his shoulder at the young woman.
"Shut up, you can go open that door of yours now right? Keep those lockpicks, I have a lot of spares" She quickly scoffed out of annoyance. "Now let me sulk here for a little longer, I came here to look for treasure but I'll end up leaving with silverware..."
"Okay..." The Messenger said before walking over to the exit of the room. "...if you go to the left on this hall, you'll reach another interjection, go to the right and open the second door to the right, it should be one of the servant's room, under a bed there's a locked chest, it might have something valuable..."
"Is that so? I'll go check it out in a little while then" she said not bothering to turn around. "How about we go together? If I find something nice I might share it with you"
She turned around to look at The Messenger with a little relaxed smile...only to see that he had already left the room, making the smile disappear and instead turn into an expression of annoyance.
"...I'm not helping him the next time even if he kneels and begs"
.....
The Messenger slid across the floor while slashing above him, cutting an abomination in half as it tackled above him falling to the ground dead, after opening the door, he had managed to get to the third floor, thankfully, having reached the fourth floor by now, he didn't run into any other door.
"There are more abominations here...this floor should feel heavier but...the air is getting lighter"
His silver eyes suddenly opened as he looked to the left when reaching an intersection in a hall, momentarily looking behind him to see the remains of the monster's he killed already dissapearing in silver mist.
"Now that I realize...these ones seemed to be avoiding a certain place"
Looking down the left hall of the intersection he walked across it, and on the third door to the right, he was able to see some golden inscriptions written on the wooden door which drove him to softly pass his hand on the door, his eyes narrowing as he looked at the inscriptions on the door.
"Holy symbols? Was the church here at some point?"
His hand brushed down across the door until it reached the doorknob and he twisted it which caused the inscriptions to glow dimly, opening the door he saw a rather large room, on the center of it a fireplace lay already lit, a pair of logs laid sideways on opposite sides of the fireplace like if they were resting spots while on the other side of the room a wide hole on the wall let a soft breeze enter.
Closing the door behind him he entered and ignored the fireplace and the logs, walking past them he stood out he edge of the hole in the wall, his foot almost reaching the edge of the floor, but his silver eyes widened a little staring forward, seeing the sea of clouds extending a few meters below the height of the room.
"Beyond the clouds? I was just in the fourth floor..."
He looked up...and at some better above the room he now found himself in, he saw the top of the castle, apparently the top of the tower he saw going through the clouds before entering the castle, he quickly leaned down and grabbed a small pebble throwing it up, expecting it to hit one of the outer walls of the rooms above, but the stone completely vanished as it went through what seemed to be an invisible barrier.
Soon the pebble fell right down, bouncing a little on the floor before sliding off the edge of the floor falling down out side of the castle, The Messenger stared down at the small stone seeing it dissapear as it hit another barrier, he tilted his head a little but after a second that same pebble fell from above hitting him on the back of the head.
"Spatial magic?" He drove a hand behind his head, looking down at the pebble now resting on the floor. "Was this entire room separated from the rest of the castle using spatial magic?...the church must have done it as a resting place"
He looked up at the top of the ceiling a little disappointed before he walked over to the center of the room, silently sitting down on one of the logs.
"I would've hoped to reach the top quickly...but it's a long way" he thought as he closed his eyes.
Just as he got ready to rest, the door of the room opened and The Adventurers walked through, though her face immediately turned into a deadpan as she stared at him.
"Ah...you're here too" she closed the door behind her. "This place is clearly a safe room, the Holy inscriptions of the church are a dead giveaway"
The adventure walked past the fireplace and walked to the other side of the room, smiling a little as she stared at the sight of the clouds beneath the room clearly enjoying the views...she remained there for a few seconds but then she seemed to remember something.
"Oh right...before I forget" She turned around and walked over to The Messenger. "Here, this is for you"
Her hand rummaged through one of her bags before she pulled out a small silver ring, handing it over to him, The Messenger's silver eyes stared at the ring in silence before taking it.
"... what is this?"
"It's a ring, idiot" a heavy sigh came out of her. "I checked the chest you mentioned, it was a bunch of clothes but it had some jewelry, since you told me where it was...I thought it'd be common decency if you had some of the loot as well"
"I don't need this" he said still looking at the ring.
"I'll take it back then!"
She quickly snatched the ring right out of The Messenger's hands stuffing it in one of her back glaring lightly at the Messenger who simply stared emptily at her.
Before any of them could say anything else, the door of the safe room opened and another figure walked right in.
He was an adult man, clearly in his 50s, his short dark hair mixed with gray was brushed backwards, his black eyes were a little busy staring down at himself as he dusted off his white priest robe with his free hand, though soon he looked forward and his eyes widened slightly looking at The Messenger and The Adventuer.
"Well..." The man spoke clearly impressed.
Fully entering the room and closing the door behind him, he smiled a little looking at the other two people in the room seemingly relaxing already.
"This is a surprise"
★ ★ ★
A/N: Who told me to make The Messenger's backstory so fucking long? No one! I'm just biased as fuck, so I'll give him multiple parts so properly write down the whole backstory, but I won't dump it all at once, the main plot needs to keep moving.
Anyways, hope you all enjoyed!