A World With/Out Home

Chapter 18: Echoes (Part 4)

"You should be proud of yourself Human God," Karen stood above the collapsed body of the supposed God. Her hair was matted with sweat and clothes torn but her eyes shone in victory. "The last time ten of us fought together seriously was during the war of devils."

"N-no please! I am a God! A God!" the large man whimpered in defiance. "You cannot harm me."

"You're not a God. Just a man who's tasted too much power." With those words she plunged her staff down into the man's chest breaking apart the black orb. A haunting shriek echoed from his lips as his body rapidly began to shrivel until finally all that remained was an emancipated husk. "It's over."

For a moment the Mercenaries took stock of their surroundings. The large chamber had been broken apart and if not for the spells holding the space together the building would have collapsed long ago. The few knights who had been in the room had been taken as sacrifices during the battle and the demons spawned, destroyed again and again. At first the Human God held his advantage but as the fight waged on, even joining the fray himself couldn't save the outcome. Despite his seemingly unlimited power, experience was against him and step by step, minute by minute, his life was undone.

"Phew," Sephie leaned against a block of rubble trying to neaten her orange hair. "That was quite the work out."

"I haven't fought seriously in a long time," Kyle agreed. "Took me a while to work out the kinks."

"Right?" Arvel nodded and rubbed his injured side. "It was pretty close there a few times. Though I guess we can tick off killing a God on the list."

Estile however frowned and shook her head, "No... that was too easy."

"Easy?" Sephie looked at her like she was crazy. "We almost died there."

"That's the thing. We didn't die." Her eyes focused on the remains of the dark orb. "When we fought against the Archdevils we sacrificed so much more. Shouldn't a God be stronger than that?"

"Well we are much stronger than back then," Trent suggested. "And like Karen said before, he wasn't really a God."

"But did that feel like the strength of someone who could summon armies of demons from halfway across the world?"

Karen who was closest to the destroyed orb grew suspicious as well. She picked up a fragment, "This was the source of his power but where do you think he got it? Arvel what can you get from it?"

The tired man was barely able to catch the black crystal in time. He did as asked regardless of his state and began to analyse the piece, "I can definitely feel that it's similar to the demons. Hmm, strange. I can feel something else... this thing. It's barely there but it's linked to something else."

"Of course it is," Karen sighed. "I'm dropping the barrier. Lav can you get a contact to Mori and see how the state of things are on her end?"

"On it," the purple haired girl gave the thumbs up and as the barrier fell she immediately began to concentrate. "I can't get through. It might be the temple but-."

A sudden ripple of pain crossed all their hearts echoing a sadness they hadn't felt in near a hundred years. Not one of them was unaffected as they became unsteady.

Sephie reacted first, a tear in her eye, "W-was that Orpheus?"

"That's impossible," Edgar who had remained quite till then shouted. "He couldn't- he wouldn't just die like that."