Chapter 249: New Clearwater
The granite steps of the temple ran red.
Ryan had seen many kinds of aftermath, but this one was unlike the others. The smell of blood mixed with the sea’s fish-salt, sweet and thick, rising from the bodies that covered the steps and the street below — God’s Punishment soldiers, Church followers, Clearwater sailors, Mojin Clan Sandpeople from the allied force. They had died in every posture, by every means, but most bore burns and shattered limbs, viscera scattered across the stone. Snow powder. A weapon that did not distinguish between the body it was given to and the one standing beside it.
The Church’s fighters had not flinched. That was the thing Ryan kept returning to as he walked. They had wrapped themselves around the drug-strengthened slaves, used their own bodies as shields, tried to create the opening that would let a companion land a fatal strike. The pills granted strength and suppressed pain, but the heart and the neck and the skull still answered the same as they ever had. And still the followers had not retreated.
If they hadn’t had the snow powder, the outcome would have been genuinely unclear.
But we won. The thought came up through the exhaustion like a fire catching in wet wood. We still won.
The flag of the Queendom of Clearwater flew on top of the city walls — over the capital of the Kingdom of Endless Winter, over the Church’s most unyielding stronghold outside Hermes itself. The Black Sail Fleet had broken out of the corner it had been pressed into. The endless war of attrition that had been grinding them down was finished. They no longer had to fear that they would spend themselves to nothing before they could force a decision.
Ryan walked into the temple hall. Even here — fragments of shattered glass, streams of blood still finding the low points in the floor, the particular smell of a room that had recently been fought in. None of it mattered.
He crossed the hall to the woman standing at the far end and went down on one knee. “Your Majesty. All four gates are in our hands. The capital of the Kingdom of Endless Winter is yours.”
“Thank you for your trouble.” Garcia raised her arm toward him.
He took her hand with care, placed a formal kiss above the knuckles without quite touching, and rose to stand at her side.
“Strange ceremony.” Kabala’s voice came from somewhere to the left. “You did not even touch the back of her hand. Why perform the gesture at all?”
Ryan did not look at her immediately. The Sandstone Clan’s patriarch had proven herself during the battle — her method of command had been the difference, for the slaves carrying the snow powder, between charging into the believers’ defensive line and simply stopping at the edge of it. She had earned her place in this room. But she was not a noblewoman, and certain habits of address required effort when one was tired.
“This is a courtesy used between aristocrats,” he said. “It conveys respect. Contact would be a breach of manners. The distinction may not be immediately clear to someone from outside the mainland tradition, which is understandable.”
“Is that so.” She reached up and touched the iron collar at her throat — not nervously, but with the pointed ease of someone making a point. The ring was set with a God’s Stone of Retaliation, its key never out of Garcia’s keeping. A witch in an alliance required precautions. Kabala had accepted this without apparent resentment, which Ryan found either admirable or deeply suspicious depending on the moment. “We are co-belligerents who finished a battle together less than an hour ago,” she said, “and you still find occasion for this kind of… civility. The manners of mainland people are truly beyond me.”
There was no response that didn’t invite further conversation. He let it die.
“Don’t quarrel over small things,” Garcia said. “We haven’t forgotten why we came. Is a stone you can remove later really worth the kind of territory we’re discussing?”
Kabala shrugged. “I spoke without thinking it through. I expect the promise to be honored.”
“The alliance rests on it,” the Queen said. She turned to Ryan. “What is the Black Sail Fleet’s next task?”
“That depends on your orders, Your Majesty.”
“We’ll discuss plans shortly.” Garcia clapped her hands and spoke to the nearest guard. “Bring her in.”
Two armored guards entered with a woman between them, wrists bound behind her back. She was perhaps thirty, brown hair disordered and falling across her face, wearing a golden robe of a quality that could only belong to a Hermes Archbishop — exquisite workmanship, cloth reserved for the Church’s highest ranks. The robe had been torn in several places and was stained with blood.
“An Archbishop?”
“Yes.” Garcia lifted the corner of her mouth. “I had several local nobles confirm it. One of the Church’s three Archbishops — Her Excellency Heather.” She looked at the woman directly. “Am I correct?”
Heather did not answer. But her eyes did — contempt, clear and undiminished, the expression of someone who has decided what the people looking at her are worth and will not revisit the calculation.
Garcia saw it. “I already knew you wouldn’t surrender easily. That’s why I was thoughtful enough to bring you here — to your own house of God, so you can beg for his redemption while you beg me for mercy.” She described what would follow in a tone as level as a clerk reading a supply list. First the fingers. Then the limbs. Then the senses. One by one, methodically, so that Heather would understand at the level of her own body what the citizens of the Port of Clearwater had understood for years.
“And when you are crushed by the Church’s army?” Heather said. “What then? Do you plan to drift across the sea forever, too afraid to touch land again?”
“The Church’s army is currently attacking the walls of the Wolfsheart Kingdom,” Garcia said. “Which means Hermes is undefended right now. That should occupy your thoughts far more than my personal destiny.” She waved the guards forward. “I may not be able to set foot in the New Holy City. But I can reach the ruins of the Old Holy City at the plateau’s foot. The Styx River water from Graycastle’s southern reach — easy to ignite, hard to extinguish. I brought a full shipload.”
A guard drew his dagger and cut off two fingers from Heather’s left hand.
Heather bit down. She made no sound.
Garcia watched from the throne at the top of the steps, chin resting on one hand, with the expression of a woman who has settled in to observe something that interests her.
Three more fingers followed. Heather’s forehead was sheened with sweat. Her left hand was a closed fist that no longer had anything to close.
“Is this necessary?” Kabala said, not to anyone in particular. “If you’re not after information and you don’t need to intimidate anyone specific, this kind of pure suffering is —”
“Ask her what the Church does with witches who fall into their hands,” Garcia said, still watching Heather. “But I don’t suppose you’d want to know.”
When Heather had lost all her fingers, she began to laugh. It was not the laughter of someone trying to seem unaffected. It was something worse — genuine mirth, or something that had taken that form.
“You cannot understand the greatness of the Church,” she said. “You will never understand what the Holy City truly is. Ignorance is your lifelong companion. Even on the eve of your destruction, you will not see it coming. Hermes will show you what real power means —” Her voice cracked but did not break. “There is no end for those who move against the Church but destruction.”
“I look forward to seeing it,” Garcia said pleasantly.
Until the last moment, Heather made no plea for mercy. She did not call for God. Ryan watched her face as she lost consciousness — the expression that had been cold and detached shifted, not into fear, but into something farther away. As though she were standing at the edge of a scene she was not part of, watching a play she already knew the ending of, and the ending had nothing to do with the people in this room.
The look in her eyes — even fading, even at the end — made it difficult to breathe.
“Take her head and hang it above the church’s door.” Garcia gave the order without ceremony and turned to Ryan. “Now. The next step.”
“Yes, Your Majesty.” He forced down what was in his chest. “You intend to strike Hermes?”
“Not with the full fleet.” She unfolded a portable leather map. “The minimum sailors and Eastern Region slaves needed — the Black Sail Fleet takes the river westward to the Old Holy City. Meanwhile, we go south overland, crossing the border of the Kingdom of Endless Winter, with the Wolfsheart Kingdom’s capital as our destination.”
“Wolfsheart?” Ryan stared.
“Wolf King Woolf and I have reached an agreement. If I help him repel the Church, he gives me his hand in taking control of the whole Kingdom of Endless Winter.” She traced the route on the map. “If the Church refuses to recall their forces, the ships loaded with snow powder and Styx River water burn the Old Holy City to the ground. Unlike the New Holy City — no high walls, no prepared defense, no capacity to resist attacks from all directions at once. They will not be able to hold it.”
“And if they do recall their forces —”
“Then the Wolfsheart western border has room to breathe. The two kingdoms share a border. We can work together against the Church from that position, long-term.” She looked up. “We also gain a permanent hold on the Kingdom of Endless Winter.”
“Indeed,” Garcia said. “We will also have a firm grip on Endless Winter for ourselves.”
Chapter 249 New Clearwater
…
The granite steps of the Kingdom of Endless Winter Capital’s temple were dyed red with blood, and the sweet and strong smell of fish within the air assaulted the nostrils.
The ground was covered with corpses – there were former members of the God’s Punishment Army, followers of the Church, people from their own side and also Sandpeople of the Mojin Clan. They had died in all kind of ways, but most of them had traces of burns, their limbs had been shattered into small pieces and their viscera spread everywhere. Ryan knew that they had died under the fire and impact let out by the fierce Snow Powder.
Whenever he took another step through the city, he felt as if he was placing his feet on a mountain of sticky guts. This battle had demonstrated that the battle will of the Church’s Army of Judges and believers could only be described as madness. Even in the face of so many drugs strengthened slaves, they still had not shrunk back at all. Rather they used their own bodies as meat shields and firmly wrapped themselves around the enemy, trying to create a chance for their comrades to cause a fatal injury to their enemy – although the pills allowed people to become all powerful and unafraid of pain, their heart, neck, and head were still crucial areas like before. Her Majesty Queen Garcia simply did not have any extra armor to equip those cheap slaves with.
If they’d not had the snow powder, it would have been really hard to say how this battle might have unfolded.
But we won… Ryan’s heart felt like it was blazing, in the end, we still won!
The flag of the Queendom of Clearwater was already flying on top of the city walls, and even the Church’s most unyielding stronghold had broken under
the waves of their attacks. In this way, the Black Sail Fleet had broken apart the siege they were under and freed itself from the deadlock situation it had been in at the corner of Graycastle. Which allowed them to no longer fear that they would burn themselves out in an endless war of attrition.
Even entering the temple hall he was still able to see the picture of pure chaos, everywhere on the ground were fragments of shattered glass and streams of blood, but all of this was unimportant to him. He went directly to the woman standing at the other end of the hall and fell onto one knee before her, “Your Majesty, all four gates of the city have fallen and are now in the hands of your Black Sail Fleet, the capital of the Kingdom of Endless Winter is now yours.”
“Thank you for your trouble, you can get up.” Garcia raised her arm, holding her hand in front of him.
Ryan gently took the Queen’s hand, placed a symbolic kiss on the back of her hand, and then got up to stand on her side.
“Strange ceremony,” Kabala opened his mouth and said, “You haven’t even touched the back of her hand at all, so why then put on such a display?”
The question came so sudden, he couldn’t refrain himself from frowning, but the other side was the patriarch of the Sandstone Clan, so it wasn’t good to rudely reprimand in public, without any better option he said coldly: “This is a commonly used courtesy between aristocrats and stands for politeness and respect, to touch would show somebody’s lack of manners, but as Sandpeople you’re unable to understand this, so it’s only normal.”
“Is that so?” She raised her eyebrow, then pointed to her own neck, “We are obviously jointly allies of war, who just finished the battle a moment ago, yet you still put this kind of thing on me. The politeness and respect of your mainland people are really beyond comprehension for me.”
Kabala’s neck was enclosed by an iron ring, with a bulge in its middle, seemingly resembling an ornament, but Ryan knew that within it was a God’s Stone of Retaliation embedded. Which with the exception of a unique key was tough to undo, but this key was always in Garcia’s hands. Since the other
was a witch, it was only naturally to be careful when dealing with her, but she indeed exerted herself extremely during the fight. In case they hadn’t had her method of command, Ryan was afraid that their slaves that had been carrying the fierce Snow Powder, would have never dared to charge into their believers’ strong defensive line. In the end, even after already opening his mouth, he didn’t know how to refute her.
“Well, don’t argue about such trivial matter,” Garcia interrupted. “You mustn’t forget the purpose of our coming – compared with this vast land, is it impossible for you to tolerate the stone?”
“I simply spoke without thinking the matter through,” Kabala shrugged, “I hope you will honor your promise.”
“Of course, this is the foundation of our cooperation,” the Queen smiled.
“What is your next task for the Black Sail Fleet?” Ryan asked.
“Let’s leave the discussion about the plans concerning the next step until later, for now, we should all take a look at a good show which is about to play out.” Garcia clapped her hands, instructing her personal guard, “Bring her in.”
Not long after, two armored guards led a woman with her hands tied at her back into the temple.
She was about thirty years old, had average looks, with messy brown hair scattered over her cheeks and wore the golden robe of the Church. It was of exquisite workmanship and was made out of materials which could generally only be worn by the Hermes’ Archbishops. However, right now, this gorgeous robe had been ripped in several places, and was stained with blood.
“This woman is an… Archbishop?”
“Yes,” the Queen of Clearwater raised the corner of her lips, “I have gone to several of the local nobility and made them confirm whether she was indeed
one of the Church’s three Archbishops, Excellency Heather.” She looked at the other woman and asked, “How about it, am I telling the truth?”
“…” Heather did not answer, but Ryan could see a strong ridicule and disdain within her eyes.
Apparently, Garcia had also seen the expression within her eyes and thus chuckled twice, “I already knew that you wouldn’t surrender so easily, that’s also the reason why I was so kind and took you to the church. It was so that I could bring you back to your Kingdom of God. Here you may beg for God’s redemption as you beg me for forgiveness. First, I will slowly cut off your fingers. Then I will go on to your four limbs and then I will destroy all five of your senses. This way you will fully experience the suffering and helplessness of the citizens of the Port of Clearwater’s for yourself.”
“And afterward?” the female Archbishop suddenly asked, “What will you do when you are crushed by the Church’s army? Are you intending to drift across the sea for the rest of your life, never to come close to shore ever again?”
“It is needless for you to worry about this,” Garcia waved towards the guards. “In comparison, the Church’s Army is nowadays also attacking the walls of the Wolfsheart Kingdom, and in this way turning Hermes into an undefended city. This should be much more important for you to think about this than about my personal destiny. I might be unable to set foot on the land of the New Holy City. However, I should at least be able to reach the ruins of the Old Holy City at the foot of the plateau. You should already have heard that the water of the Styx’s River in Graycastle’s extreme south, it’s easy to light, but hard to extinguish. This time I’ve taken a whole shipload with me.”
One of the personal guards pulled out his dagger, approached the Bishop laying on the ground and cut off two of her fingers.
Heather, however, merely bite her teeth not releasing any shout.
Seeing this, the Queen of Clearwater climbed up the flight of steps, sat on the large throne, used her right hand to support her chin and showed an expression that was full of interest.
… soon three other fingers were cut off, in this way her left hand had now been turned into a bare meat palm which made beads of sweat appear over Heather’s forehead.
“Must you do this?” Kabala shook her head, “If you don’t want to intimidate the enemy or receive intelligence via torture, this kind of pure torment is unnecessary.”
“Unnecessary?” Garcia laughed coldly, “You should ask her what they do with all the witches who fall into the Church’s hands? But I guess you wouldn’t be interested in knowing this.”
“Hahaha…” At that time, Heater, having already lost all her fingers, suddenly began to laugh, “You’re simply unable to understand the greatness of the Church. And clearly, you will never understand how important the Holy City actually is. Ignorance is your lifelong companion, even on the eve of your destructing, you will still be unaware of it! , Hermes will let you see what it means to wield true power – besides destruction, there is no other end for people who go against the Church!”
“Is that so…” Garcia raised her legs and smiled. “Then I will have to wait and see, won’t I?”
Until the Archbishop had died, she never cried out any plea for mercy. However, what surprised Ryan even more, was that she had never cried for God either, or begged for his salvation. At the end, when Heather was already losing her consciousness due to the excessive loss of blood, her expression turned from cold and detached to dreadful. As if she wasn’t suffering any punishment, but was rather standing at the sideline and looking at a farce which had nothing to do with her – within her two eyes, Ryan though he could already see his own doomed future.
Feeling this kind of indescribable oppressing feeling, almost made him feel breathless.
“Chop off her head and hang it over the church’s door.” After confirming the Bishop’s death, Garcia gave an order. She then looked to Ryan, “Now, we can begin to talk about the next step.”
“Yes, His Majesty,” he forcefully suppressed the discomfort within his chest. “Do you intend to attack Hermes?”
“Yes, but we won’t dispatch our whole army.” She spread out a portable leather map, “Taking with it the least required amount of sailors and the Eastern Region’s slaves, the Black Sail Fleet will follow the River westwards, and go to the Old Holy City. However, we will instead directly go south, crossing Eternal Winter’s border, with Wolfsheart Kingdom’s capital as our destination”.
“Wolfs… heart?” Ryan got started.
“Wolf King Woolf and I have already reached an agreement,” Garcia explained, “In case I help him ward off the Church, he will give me a hand in taking over the whole Kingdom of Eternal Winter. So if the Church does not recall their troops, the ships loaded with fierce Snow Powder and Styx river-water will turn the Old Holy City into a sea of flames – unlike the New Holy City, which is surrounding by high city walls, the old city does not have any walls. Thus, without enough manpower, they won’t be able to stop the slaves’ attack from all directions.”
“However if they retreat, the western border of the Wolfsheart Kingdom will be able to receive breathing room, and with the joined border of the two countries, we will also be able to work together against the Church in the future!”
“Indeed,” the Queen of Clearwater nodded, “We will also be able to obtain a firm grip over Endless Winter for ourselves.”