He is sad.
He is not scared, filled with fear or anything alike.
He is just sad, maybe a little disgusted.
What would you do if no one around you believed you?
What would you do if only you knew the truth yet no one believed you?
What if the whole world hated you, blamed you for the sin of another.
It feels so nice doesn't it? Blaming others for your own sin.
Sins are decided by the society and the religion.
Even the acts of others on you can make you a sinner.
If you commit a sin the people will judge you on their scale, will the sin weight heavier than your virtues?
If you know the answer isn't no you can just blame someone.
You can kill your father and frame your brother who always made you hate him.
You can have sex with someone and frame your cousin of raping you.
One false accusation.
It doesn't take anything more to take the life of someone.
You just have to be selfish, you just have to be human.
Humans are harmful, humans are selfish.
They call themselves a species that can feel and understand the pain of others but their empathy is false.
Biased they are.
Their sins, feelings, acts and all about them is flawed and biased.
To be human is to step on others carcasses just to feel better.
Was it the weight you wanted gone or him?
Don't worry he is dead, covered in blood in a bathtub.
His parents won't even mourn, they know him as a rapist thanks to you.
Does it feel nice? Knowing people see you as a saint? A survivor?
Will you ever blame yourself? Will you ever think that if you were so scared of the consequences of your actions you and your partner could have just kept things low?
Maybe, probably not.
Was it society that killed him or you?
Doesn't matter now does it?
Humanity is to blame for all.
"Class isn't over you know."
"Really? There is more?"
Emil looked at the boy with an annoyed face, looking at him as if he wanted to choke him out every time he spoke.
"We are not done here. We will still need a whole week of this just so you won't die in a few seconds if we encounter something."
"You are worrying so much! Well story for another time but I have survived a lot. Think of me like a cockroach that just runs away after you stepped on it as if nothing happened."
"I don't care just listen! All churches that aren't commonly present in Lulush, I mean the big four are a threat in our eyes."
"Why? Aren't we supposed to on the same side?"
"No, politics aside they might try claiming what is ours. The artifacts are not like the blessed mystical items of the saints."
"Blessed items? What are those? And are artifacts that hard to get for churches? I mean I thought artifacts were just...to be honest I have no idea."
He scratched his head while whistling for a while as if trying to ignore his humiliation at the moment.
"Blessed items are items carried by a saint during their life, they hold some of their power yet as time passed their powers dwindle."
"So any saint could just carry around billion different items and leave all types of items for the next generation to use? How do these items even work?"
"For that...let's start from the beginning. Do you know what your powers are?"
"Ehhh I am guessing that I am blessed by the Lord."
"You are. We are gifted with the Lord's waves. Our heartbeat sings alongside the ocean. We are the Lord's children, not in the literal sense as you can guess."
"So our powers are what? Just an extend of their authority?"
"Yes that is the answer. However not every blessed is going to use the Lord's authority for the greater good, those threats must be taken care of as well."
And we went through another road again, hate it when it is so hard to keep talking about the same topic.
"Master we were talking about items."
"Yes...Saints have the same ability to share their authority which is how these blessed items are created. Artifacts on the other hand the remnant authority left behind after someone dies, they hold some level of consciousness and nearly all of them have lethal side effects when utilized. And example would be something like a talking clock that can stop someone's heart for ten seconds yet stops using person's heart by twenty seconds."
"We have things like those too? Man...I was hoping for an easy job but well it is not that hard to believe. If I can do all this then why can't we have magical pens or something."
"He he he so you started studying. Ohh this reminds me of the good old days!*
An old man came inside shouting, he had difficulty. He and Antares didn't talk much at the day of the ritual but he didn't seem grumpy or anything alike which put him above most others he had to deal with in his life.
Antares covered his mouth for a few seconds before speaking in an energetic tone.
"Uncle you should save him from this misery! I have sinned! I have been a bad student!"
"Can you stop shouting at him?"
Emil shut the boys mouth his hands before trying his best to apologize.
"I am really sorry sir he is a weird fellow I think he is missing a few planks in his head."
"Ohh ohhh don't worry! I used to be like that too back when I was a greenhorn! You two will get along fine you shoukd have seen my first partner!"
The old man didn't read the room or he maybe just didn't care about what they were doing. After a few narrow steps he pulled a chair and sat down. Emil pulled his hands back and then looked at the boy in disgust.
"Why is it wet?"
"You know licking used to work when I was a kid but I forgot you had gloves..."
"Disgusting."
He wiped his hand on the table as the old figure before them spoke with pride as if his words held some ancient knowledge they could never witness again.
"Back when I was a young man my dad told me to go be a man and follow his path. I became an apprentice under Sir Arnold may Lord let peace be upon his soul."
"Is that someone important?"
"How old do you even think I am?"
"I don't know your voice is all weird too I have no idea."
How the hell am I supposed to know that when you speak quieter than a mosquito waiting to suck me dry?
"He made me do simple errands and one day even take a case! Back in those days there were two groups of pests on the streets! They were the socialist and the chauvinists! They would claim whole streets for themselves and attack each other! Smoke covered the sky and the sun stopped something that was a part of our lives! Back in those days we used to fight them too! They had their own saints and paladins! It was a literal hell until army stepped in and the days of military coup began. For months we just searched for banned books and spies! We worked with the army to eradicate what was left is those pests!"
"Why are you still here?"
The was a tall figure looking inside the room with cloudy eyes. He seemed to be lost in thoughts, unable to decide on anything. With the same stern face he gave the orders and left.
"Emil, teach him how to fill out the reports. We will need every men, it is that time of the year. Estorier I need you to divine something for me, it is urgent."
"Coming Captain!"
"Yes captain."
"Yes captain."
The old man slowly left the room before waving behind with a small smile on his face. His story wasn't interesting to Antares by any means, maybe just a grim reminder of a day long past for him and nothing more. Such a tragedy his existence has become.
"Well you heard the boss Emil."
"I did."
"Wish you weren't so cold...we are going to stay in the same house yet you are acting like I stole your kidney when you were sleeping....you never know check it tomorrow morning."
His eyelids were low with his eyes looking at the boy with annoyance, how much woukd he give to change what he said back then.
"I was hoping to go over the rituals and a lot more of the mystical side...reports are easy worry not. Go get a few from the drawer I will show you how."
"Fine fine, I really was hoping an easy job you know."
*after grabbing a few random files he threw them on the table and sat down again before opening one and skimmed through them.*
"Investigators! Ae and Bertha. Time of death: unknown but there is no sign of rotting meanwhile the body is stiff so it must have been a few hours at least....reason of death: there are bruises around his body and a deep cut in his abdomen. He is missing his stomach but we are not sure which killed him."
His voice became lower and lower until silence covered the room only to be interrupted by another low voice.
"You can see that they have forgotten a few things. Name of the victim and their profile should be right under the investigators names yet...they must have forgotten about it that is why it is at the end."
"Why is it written with a typewriter? I expected it to be something done on sight."
"The original copy is. Someone from the police department creates four copies of the original before giving them to us so we can give the copies to the other churches and keep one to ourselves."
The boy spoke with a weird look on his face. Why didn't they just do it themselves? Writing three more copies of the papers can't be that hard, it is just one paper front and back. What good would come from putting some random policeman to the middle when the papers talk about things like mysticism which are things even religious people don't believe in. Most of the believers of all religions didn't even believe in the miracles of their own saints let alone knowing that there are certain people with exceptional powers or rituals that call upon the power of greater beings.
"Why have a man in the middle?"
"Wouldn't call them a man in the middle. They are just people that learned about the world of ours by accident and want to do their best for our cause. We are all trying our best to protect everyone we can."
"What if someone leaked things to the public? Pretty sure someone like that would have enough proof for this to be impossible to put under the rug."
"Church of Order handles them. They must have an artifact capable or silencing or getting rid of them. Might even be someone's power."
"What if we go to investigate a place but someone unrelated is already there and witnessed the scene?"
With a tired voice he spoke, his eyelids were low as if he was about to fall asleep.
"We will incapacitate them and call the Church of Order so they can handle them as simple as that."
Boy grabbed the papers again before turning it around to check what was written in the end.
"So we won't talk about these certain organizations?"
"Can you memorize everything in one day?"
As the mocking sound pierced him like an arrow to the head he looked at Emil with a smug and spoke like that of those doctors in radio shows.
"A person's intelligence isn't calculated through their ability to memorize information but the specimen before you lacks the ability to solve problems too which makes him painfully mediocre....is that a smile I see there young gentleman? See see I knew you would value me more as time passed."
"Fine Mr Mediocre, today's class is over. If you have something to do go ahead or you can check the reports."
"Thank you professor! Wait...you just want me to get the money don't you? What a greedy man you are but I can't get it now even if I want to. There is still something I can do."
"As long as you don't leave this building you can do whatever you want."
Really? You had me happy for a second.
"Well nothing to do in here...wanna see my ability? Can only use it once a day but still it is a fancy one."
With his fist under his chin Emil looked at him with a curious face which he didn't expect from a dead fish looking man like him.
"Sure go ahead, I was wondering what you had for a while."
"Really? Well didn't expect that...it is a weird one I am still not sure how it works. I have to state what I think for the day and then it activates."
"So an incantation basically?"
"I guess so...I get different powers based on how I feel, my body changes to some extend, same goes for my memories and personality."
"So you become a different person for a while?"
"I guess so...after I deactivate it I vomit a weird black liquid. I should go get a bucket or I will make a mess."
He stepped back before going for the door only to be stopped by a voice pulling him back.
"Worry not, I have something for that, just do it."
"Here? Now? Well sure but you better not cry once you sre forced the wipe all that off the floor."
He got to the middle of the room before spreading his arms as if welcoming the sun as it climbed up the horizon.
"Abracadabra! Today's thought is if the love for knowledge can keep a machine from crying."
His body colvulsed as his knees gave up letting him fall on the ground. He could feel his muscles moving and warping into the imagine of someone else, becoming a different being. With shaking legs he got up from the ground before looking at himself.
"I look slimmer, might be a woman or just a skinny person. So professor what do you think I got this time?"
"That was the thing in your mind?"
"You are still stuck at that? Well I have a wild imagination, thousands of things are happening in my head so your thoughts get creative after a while."
He flexed his arm as the memories piled into his head, replicated memories of a bygone person created by his imagination.
"Definitely a woman...scientist to be exact. Lived her life for the purpose of so called knowledge, leaving all behind and losing everyone that cared for her. Isolating herself from others thinking that her existence hurts them yet in the end what hurt them was her absence."
With a weird unexplainable look on his face Emil spoke, his eyes looking away.
"You wrote all that? You would have made a good author if you ask me."
"I wish that eas the case. I wanted to be a musician when I was a lot younger but gave up on it as quickly as I decided on it."
He touched on the table before pulling back his hand with shock and then pointed at the table.
"Look at this! I can change the structure of biological beings. It is a lot darker in color now...hey wanna be handsome? I can make you pretty tall and give you a two meter dingaling too. You would have to roll it up to even walk around...egghhh I should stop imagining things."
The loud sound of Emil slapping his face in frustration echoed in the room as his frustration became visible even under those strands on his face and glasses.
"That is what came to your mind!"
"Yeah of course I mean who wouldn't pay a lot for this....I might actually turn things into gold too! I can become an alchemist with this. Well too bad I won't get this again."
"Get this again? You can't use the same thing twice?"
"I don't control how I feel but I don't even know how these incantations just come up. Well I used this ability like just a few times...I had something different before."
"What are you talking about? Something different? You don't get something different, maybe you are using the blessing in a different way that's all."
"No...I am pretty sure they are both different. Suddenly one day I woke up with this, a power I wasn't familiar with."
"..."
"I have no reason to lie to you."
"I understand..."
It has been...around a minute. I can already feel the nausea coming. Around a minute is more than enough for everything, who needs more time when everything happens in an instant?
"I will turn back so do your magic trick."
Huh? Where the hell am I!
The cold wind tore him apart from inside out, it cane from the window like a primal fear and ate away what remains of his soul. Before his eyes was a scene most disgusting, a scene he would never want to witness. This was a familiar place, a familiar room yet the sweet voice of someone was missing. There was nothing to warm his soul as it was torn apart by the past of this room, she wasn't there.
No...no no no! I didn't do this, how can I even do this! Something must have happened! Why would I even hurt him!
Laying on the ground was a familiar person, brother of a person that called him her birdie. He never really talked to him, maybe their eyes met a few times. He seemed pretty normal, just a bit silent but considering the monster that was their brother he understood him.
His skull is crushed, there are a few more bruises on his body but that seems to be the killing blow. Grey brain matter mixed with blood paints a tragedy on the wooden floor of the room where she once stayed.
Where are you! Where the hell are you! Did you leave your own little brother by himself? Did you leave me so fast? What even was I to you? If you were going to leave everything behind just like that why did you say all that to me!
He slammed his hands covered in dried blood onto the wooden floor as a scream echoed in the house, tears escaped the shackles of his eyes as he heard something. A chuckle, a chuckle escaped his lips as the a weak smile formed on his lips.
"How can I be so selfish...here! I got what I wanted! For the first time in my life I saved someone!
It is the happiest day of my life!
"As for you..."
I never cared about you, you have been no more than just a titan to me. I don't feel sad or angry by looking at you especially now that she is gone. I won't cry just because I mutilated what remains of her. I don't even remember your face or what you sre supposed to be, I don't care how this even happened yet there must have been a reason.
There was a rifle next to the boy, an old type with two barrels. It was one of those hunting rifles that used birdshot. It was a crude one without the art of wood carving ever touching it.
You tried to kill me? Why! What have I done in my entire life but to do my best to save your sister from the hands of the abomination you called brother!
"They won't know it was me, if their divinations or clairvoyance or whatever they have was that good there would be no crime in the entire city. I just have to change you a little....I can't go to prison not again or ever! I am not going to leave her alone one more time and let her descend deeper into madness!"