Deus Necros

The forest bent before them, or so it seemed. Gnarled roots pulled back like wary limbs, and even the birds had learned to quiet down when Titania passed. The sky was choked in thick canopy, but what slivers of moonlight broke through scattered across her cloak like oil over steel.

She moved with the assured pace of someone who had never been caught off-guard in her life and wouldn’t tolerate the idea if she ever were. Her boots sank slightly into the damp earth, but she didn’t so much as glance at the trail. The sword at her hip clinked against her armor with every step, not for balance, but punctuation. Like the forest ought to listen.

Behind her, Misty staggered under the bulk of Titania’s traveling case. The reinforced suitcase, easily the size of a coffin, rocked with every uneven patch of dirt, its brass buckles groaning in protest. Misty huffed, struggling to keep her grip as the heel of her boot skidded on a moss-slick stone.

“God damned goblins,” Titania muttered. “Can’t go ten paces in this forest without one of those walking bags of mucus leaping out like it thinks it’s clever.”

Misty gasped for breath, readjusting the case against her shoulder. “You did reduce them to, um… sludge, my lady.”

“They deserved to be sludge,” Titania snapped, with zero remorse. “Little green shits tried to ambush me from the trees. One of them actually threw a boot. A boot, Misty.”

“I thought that one tripped and just flung it by accident…”

“Intentional or not, it struck my back, and it smelled of three-month unwashed feet! So I turned him into soup. Problem solved.”

Misty had no reply for that. She staggered forward with a small grunt, knees shaking. “Still… better than being back at the Sacrosanctum.”

Titania scoffed. “Obviously. At least the monsters out here scream when you hit them. Not like those robed pricks who nod and smile and pray you’re too pious to call their bluff.”

“Preach,” Misty wheezed.

They pushed deeper into the woods, ducking under low branches and stepping over tangled vines. The air grew cooler, thicker, damp with the cloying smell of sap and wet bark. Crickets sang somewhere in the distance, but nothing dared draw too close.

Titania barely broke stride.

“What really gets me,” she said after a moment, “is the gall of that idiot blob they’re calling the ‘Hero.’”

“Hiro?”

“No, the other useless meat sack covered in golden drapes and ego, of course Hiro!” Titania growled. “He can’t lift his own ass out of a chair without whining about it. And they want me to play nursemaid. He’s not even trained. Can’t swing a sword, can’t channel magic. Hell, he thinks a blessing is just squinting real hard while yelling ‘Holy Power.’”

Misty gave a breathless snort-laugh, too tired to stifle it. “He did bless his bread yesterday. Twice.”

“Bread? He blessed bread?”

“He said it looked… suspicious.”

Titania stopped walking. She turned fully, placing a gloved hand on her hip, expression like thunder behind that gleaming half-smile. “He should be suspicious of me. I’m this close to carving a sermon into his forehead.”

They resumed walking. Misty gritted her teeth, dragging the case with sheer spite now.

“And then there’s Mot,” Titania went on. “Now that one actually has power. Real, terrifying, silence-the-room kind of power. And what does he do with it? Nothing. Just stands around looking twelve and…creepy. Gives me goosebumps that kid…”

“He says he won’t act unless ordered by his god,” Misty offered.

“His god is Azathoth, Its not even one of OUR GODS” Titania snapped. “That walking brain aneurysm he calls divine authority hasn’t said a coherent sentence in three eons. And apparently only Mot hears him… Dreams he says,” she sook her head.

Her tone grew grim, “If Mot sneezes hard enough, he could level a citadel. But nooo. He’s waiting for permission. One with too much power and too afraid to use, and the other with nothing and thinks he got the world under his palm… such tribulations… oh how is my faith being tested so…”

Misty dared a whisper, “Maybe Mot’s afraid. To use it…”

Titania didn’t answer immediately. She just smiled, eyes gleaming under the shadow of her hood. “He should be. That’s too much power to have and not be afraid to use. The only thing that I’m glad about is that the little brat isn’t our enemy. I’d need nine lives just to subdue him myself.”

“Surely you jest, my lady, you’re Titania, the Holy Maiden, undefeated so far. And even forced away that Lustful woman back to the sand before.”

“Tsk, I don’t like to talk about that Misty… those were dark days…”

“Lady Titania… question.” Misty said.

“You haven’t stopped asking since morning, why stop now? What’s going on…”

“Why did we,” she heaved as she pulled the suitcase over a large tree root, “Have to go to Lamar, instead of heading directly to Tulmud? I mean, we could have used the gate directly there…”

“And waste my two weeks stuck in the cities?”

“True… but Tulmud also has…well forests like these…”

“No, here, it’s different, Tulmud is a Knight Country, it has too many brawn over muscle type of people, they literally drove the monster habitation to extinction but for a few places. It’s no fun adventuring like this in Tulmud. Here on the other hand we get to enjoy a bit of… well killing, to be more frank.”

“Aha.. ha…ha” Misty forced a laugh, “I guess you’re right…”

The forest path twisted again, rising slightly, and Titania tilted her head.

The wind shifted. Smoke. Not burning trees, campfire. Cooked fat. Horse musk. And faint mana traces.

She stopped.

“What is it?” Misty asked, panting hard now, sweat running down her temple.

“A carriage,” Titania murmured, squinting toward a dip between the trees. “Several men. A woman. And… something odd. Familiar, but… newer.”

She stared longer.

Then her smile widened. But this time it was sharper. Wilder. Like someone who’d just spotted a surprise appetizer at the end of a long hunt.

“Well,” she said, hand resting gently on her sword’s pommel. “Looks like we’ve found some travelers.”

Misty dropped the case with a thud and groaned. “Please… no more goblins.”

“Not goblins.” Titania stepped forward, her pace already shifting into a casual saunter. “Let’s see what kind of travelers these guys are…”