Chapter 20: Chapter 19: The City of Sterling IV

Chapter 19: The City of Sterling IV

---

[THE SILVER SEAT - Lifeweaver’s Ward]

The Lifeweaver’s Ward was a temple and hospital both. Located in one of the earth districts of the Silver Seat, it was one of the most well-regarded locations for medical care on the continent.

Muse walked through its halls, Webby on her shoulder. Acolytes bowed to the little divine beast as they passed. As a chosen of the Windmother, her status was rather high in this place, even if the Windmother Chose considerably more often than some of the other Divinities.

There were Divinities that did not Choose, and some that only Chose a few. The Windmother liked to adopt, however, and so her godchildren at this point numbered over fifty.

She moved past the rooms of people being nursed, and finally found herself in the worship hall. Most worship halls contained statues of the most popular Divinities in the region, but not this one. There was no need to swap out the statue of Aerachnid, not when only her faithfuls used this room.

Muse breathed in.

She had already had a talk with her father about her decision.

Poemer Aberra had been as supportive of his daughter’s decisions as he ever was, cheerfully putting on a brave face despite his obvious decline. It broke Muse’s heart to see him like that, leaning back in bed, unable to do much more than simply talk.

Her father had raised her by himself after her mother had passed, working hard and long hours in order to put her into the Heraldic Academy and hopefully get herself a better position in life. The cost of tuition had been high, and for the longest time she did not see her father eat much.

She remembered the expression on his face when she had asked about it. A bittersweet happiness that she hadn’t understood back then, but now she did.

“Don’t worry about your father. An adult’s stomach shrinks as we get older. You just eat your food and grow up big and strong now.”

A naive child she had been, she had just assumed what he said had been true. Now she knew better.

The tolls of that sacrifice would finally come home to roost after Muse graduated and joined the Iron Bars. A nutritional deficiency that had persisted for far too long.

With her squire salary, she had been able to make sure that he was taken care of, but it only slowed his decline. This was despite all the favours she was able to beg out of the Ward, even using her connections as a Chosen. No matter what she tried, it just wasn’t enough.

She needed money for medicine and supplements, money that had been beyond her grasp. Until now.

But the Grandmaster had promised. If she transferred...

“Godmother,” said Muse, closing her eyes as she kneeled in front of the statue. Webby dropped from her shoulder, going to rest on one of the pews. “Your daughter is here.”

Immediately, she was stripped of her physical body.

Her soul drifted away.

---

[THE DIVINITIES’ REALM - Windmother’s Web]

She felt herself coalesce, the pieces of her soul coming together to form a whole again. Muse opened her eyes. Her astral body gently touched the ground.

The world around her was hard to describe. Massive structures of webs suspended in the air and a brilliant azure sky. Fluffy clouds cruised gently along the horizon. She could not see the ground if there even was any, that was how far high up they were.

All around her milled Webby’s siblings, other white plush-like spiders of various sizes. Some of them were not so cute, being as large as horses, sharp and long instead of soft and stubby, but she knew they bore no malice.

Only simple curiosity, as it wasn’t often people wandered into the Windmother’s Web.

Muse crouched down and gently gave a few of the spiders pats on their heads. They squeaked, a few of them unused to the touch of a hand. Then, after the appropriate greetings had been given, Muse looked for Aerachnid’s presence.

A breeze began to blow.

It was a gentle, welcoming breeze. Filled with affection and warmth, and as she felt it on her skin she let out the tension she had been holding within.

“Hello, godmother.”

Another wind blew, this one of gentle curiosity.

“I’ve been good! I’ve been good,” said Muse. “Webby’s been doing well. I think he’s grown an inch or two! He saved a whole lot of lives in our last mission, you should’ve seen him.”

A gust of pride.

This was how Aerachnid communicated. None knew her form, and so even her worship statues were simply of a hooded vaguely feminine figure. There were debates on why this was the case - some theologians suspected that she had no form, others posited that perhaps she simply didn’t want to terrify her believers with her true visage.

It wasn’t difficult to infer what she truly looked like. Her divine beast children were relatively common. Still, none pried too deeply out of respect. Aerachnid had always been one of the Divinities that truly took the sentient races under her wing, and she was beloved in kind.

The wind rose. Inquisitiveness made the webs move, shuffling some of the smaller spiders about. One of them fell, and a larger one shot a length of silk at it, catching it before it fell out of range.

Apologeticness directed at the little one. Then inquisitiveness once more.

“Right, I... I’m thinking of leaving the Iron Bars,” said Muse.

She explained it all, saying it out into the open air, letting the streams of airflow accept the sounds she made. Gusts rose once again, then a brief storm. Through all of this Muse kept her cool, it wasn’t anything she wasn’t used to.

“...And that’s why I’m planning on joining the Order of the Black Lamps,” finished Muse.

Silence. The wind was still.

Then, a blast of acceptance and support.

Muse smiled.

“Thank you for your blessing, godmother,” she said, bowing her head.

She spent some time there, regaling Aerachnid with stories about her adventures since the last time she had been here. Some of the food that she had eaten, sights that she had seen. The Windmother always appreciated hearing her children’s experiences.

Then, it was time to go.

“Goodbye, godmother,” said Muse. “I’ll try and get Webby to come next time too. You know how he is. In a bit of a rebellious phase right now.”

Muse left the astral plane the way she had done so many times before, vanishing into the aether as her consciousness split apart. Her soul, guided by invisible winds, was kept safe and directed toward her physical body.

As she departed, the spiders watched her go.

Then, footsteps.

The spiderlings turned around, greeting their mother.

A pale woman with white hair approached where her goddaughter had been, her paces measured. She wore a long black cloak decorated with gold filigree which depicted spiralling webs in geometric shapes. Her eyes were milky white, although she could clearly see.

She sent a gust into the aether, unsure of whether or not it would reach its recipient. How appropriate, as she had been unsure whether or not to send the message in the first place.

A vision of black eyes and fire and death.

Then she turned once more, and vanished into nothingness.

---

[THE SILVER SEAT - Lamplight Dormitories]

It was morning. The three moons had faded below the horizon and fresh dew had gathered on the Lamplight Island grass.

Cain trained diligently in the courtyard - he had started picking up the habit after the sparring sessions on the road. The robed attendants of the Lamplight Abbey had provided him with a barrel of wooden training weapons, and he was going through forms with Control Scheme off.

You are reading story Dirty Avatars: An Isekai Gone Wrong at novel35.com

It was as if he had access to a group of masters teaching him how to fight. He would simply set up a situation, engage Control Scheme, and then try to mimic what he himself had been doing only moments ago. Almost like a replay ghost in those driving games.

There was nothing that Control Scheme did that his body wasn’t capable of, and he noticed as he got stronger and more flexible Control Scheme started taking advantage of his increased capabilities.

Cain looked up at a large tree he stood in front of.

Engage.

He charged forward, bouncing off a small rock in front of it to gain a little extra height. Then two steps up the trunk before gravity could take hold, and a backflip onto the branch.

Back in Corbin Village, before the levelling spree, he estimated it would’ve taken him another step or two. Would he be able to jump from building to building in the future?

How much did his stats factor into this?

Strength was his general physical strength, he assumed, though he had yet to give it a true test. He had certainly seemed to carry his weapons around easier. Now that he thought of it, Rey’s bow was denser than the one Bron had given him, but it still felt pretty similar in his hands.

Dexterity seemed useless in the face of his Control Scheme. He did notice his athletic sense improve, but it felt like his System Mechanic invalidated the stat somewhat.

Constitution he couldn’t tell. He hadn’t felt physically under the weather since he had arrived in this world. It might’ve possibly been a pure numbers stat, something like decreasing the HP damage he took from attacks.

As for Intelligence and Wisdom, they were complete blanks. He didn’t feel any smarter or wiser after his level ups, but in games often it was these stats that would affect magic strength...

“Thundara!” yelled Cain, tossing out his hands. “Agidyne! Soul Blur! Mega Star! Thoron!”

Nope, that didn’t work. If he didn’t have access to magic, it seemed like they were also pretty useless stats.

Speed, though, was obvious. The more it increased, the more he could feel time slow and the quicker his motions were. It had been the stat that let him charge McDougal in time and prevent his last victim from being Muse. Definitely something worth allocating more points into.

Strength and Speed, he decided. That was his ‘build’.

“Heeeey, bonehead!”

Speak of the devil. Cain smiled.

“Bonehead?” he asked, hopping out of the tree.

Standing in front of the dormitory was the green-skinned girl he had just been thinking of, surrounded by a good bit of luggage. Cain noticed in the distance a carriage driving off.

He walked over to her, putting the training weapons back into the barrel as he did so.

“If you’re here, does that mean...”

Muse grinned, raising her right hand. A Corpse Candle, the same as the one he was wearing.

“Squire no more, now you must address me as Knight Aberra!” said Muse. She could not possibly be more delighted. “The Grandmaster told me about this place, and I’ve been meaning to cut down on expenses and rent in the city are sky-high right now. So I thought, why not stick around and make sure you ate?”

Cain shook his head.

“C’mon, I’m not that bad,” said Cain. “I went to the Night Market yesterday. You should’ve warned me about that place.”

“Oh, great! What kind of food did you try? I really like some of the fusion cuisine they’ve got over there. The soup stall in the southeast corner has some of the best potato chowder you’ve ever seen! It’s my dad’s favourite!”

Cain helped Muse carry her luggage into the dorms as they chatted away.

“Oh yeah, you look different. Did you do something with your hair?”

“...Y-you really didn’t notice that my eyes are a completely different colour...?”

---

[THE SILVER SEAT - Lamplight Abbey]

The Grandmaster and his manservant watched the two newest members of their order disappear into the building.

“Are you sure about this, Grandmaster?” asked Ronove.

Usually, Black Lamp cells consisted of a senior member and a junior member, in order for the experienced one to teach the newer one their ways. This idea of two new members forming their own cell...

“Indeed, it’s clear they work well together,” said Baal. “And since one of the new members is a Player, it is a good idea to reexamine our methods. Having a friendly face around will help anchor him to us.”

“I see,” said Ronove. “This is quite irregular.”

“A Player is involved. It was never going to go as usual,” agreed Baal. “You will be their contact and their superior. Make sure you watch over them. Answer any questions and ensure even if they don’t do things our exact way, it’s within our spirit of not causing more waves than necessary.”

Ronove looked over at the building where their two newest recruits now lived.

“Is this not... too lenient, Grandmaster? There is a Player in our hands, and we’re simply letting him wander the city to do as he pleases.”

“His Corpse Candle has a tracker embedded within it. We’ll know where he is at all times.”

“Is that enough?”

Baal sighed.

The morning light shined through the blinds, leaving fascinating patterns of light across the floor and walls. Erioch wished he had more time to simply ponder and enjoy these little things, but alas in his position time was often in short supply.

“What would you rather do, Ronove? Bind him in chains?”

“...As you have said before, he is a Player, and Players are threats. It is my opinion that he should be kept under lock and key.”

Baal was silent for a moment.

“Not as a person but as a weapon, then,” said Baal, divining his butler’s intentions.

Ronove shifted under his gaze.

“Ronove, when I asked him whether he was friend or foe,” said Baal. “He answered friend. That had been his whole-hearted and truthful answer. We currently have a Player as an ally. If this were to get out there, we would be the envy of other nations. They would fear us.”

Memories of scouring the archives as a young man, when he had first acquired a high enough position in the order to do so. Excitement, dread, and fear at the things he read. Apocryphal tales of apocalyptic scenarios - terror at realizing the world out there was infinitely larger and more fragile than he thought.

“Alliances, friendships, relationships in general... They are two-way streets,” said Baal. “We have done our due diligence, at the very least making sure we are constantly updated on his status. Any more than that and we would be overstepping our bounds, and possibly ridding Goethia itself of a great opportunity.”

Ronove bowed his head.

“My apologies, Grandmaster. I did not mean to question you.”

“Questioning is a chance for us to get on the same page,” said Baal. “I know that your upbringing colours your present mindset, and that there are certain softer emotions and drives you do not understand.”

Ronove nodded.

“But attempt to do so anyway,” said Baal, his eyes glinting. “For when you do understand them... That’s when you’ll also come to understand our new Avatar of Beelzebub.”

You can find story with these keywords: Dirty Avatars: An Isekai Gone Wrong, Read Dirty Avatars: An Isekai Gone Wrong, Dirty Avatars: An Isekai Gone Wrong novel, Dirty Avatars: An Isekai Gone Wrong book, Dirty Avatars: An Isekai Gone Wrong story, Dirty Avatars: An Isekai Gone Wrong full, Dirty Avatars: An Isekai Gone Wrong Latest Chapter