Chapter three: Victims of theft.
Inside the Hall Villa in Backlund, three men were reunited on the Earl's private studio.
"It's good to have you back, son" said Earl Hall to his youngest, his voice aged but still firm and commanding of authority.
"It's good to be home, father" said Alfred giving a short answer before looking at his brother. "I'm sorry that I couldn't make it to your wedding… it wasn't a proper time to come back" he said extending an apologetic look.
Hibbert, now older and wiser, gave his brother a small smile. "Don't worry, now I understand that the circumstances forced you to remain at the Southern Continent… I also understand that you were putting the family first."
"Still… it's been 4 years…" said the Earl with a sigh, thinking towards the last time he had his whole family reunited.
"It didn't come without a profit" said Albert proudly before continuing "Now our family has a demigod."
"Imperative Mage" remarked the Earl in contemplation. He remembered the letters that his son had sent previously, talking about the digestion of his potion and the successful accomplishments while deployed, all concluding with him being able to advance and acquire godhood.
'Godhood…' the Earl ruminated over that one word. Over the implications of it, over the weight of the expectations that now rested over his youngest son's shoulders.
He wasn't greedy, or even happy. He was worried for his son.
Seeing his father in thought, Alfred decided to continue.
"It's the sequence 4 of the Justiciar pathway, with enough strength to be considered a powerhouse even when confronting other demigods" remarked Alfred, boasting of his achievement.
"How… how does it feel?" Asked Hibbert with expectancy in his voice.
"Heavy". The answer was short, but each of the men present could say they related to it in one way or another.
"Still, as I said, is not without its benefits" said the demigod before looking towards the door of the studio. When this happened both the Earl and Hibbert also turned their attention towards it.
Releasing a sigh the Earl asked, "since when has she been there?"
Grinning, Alfred answered by slightly raising his voice "You just got here, right Audrey?"
A small commotion was heard on the outside before being followed by a small knock on the door.
Another sigh was heard, and the Earl said holding his head on his hands "You may come in."
Then the door slowly parted and entered the Earl's only daughter, Audrey Hall. She moved gracefully in front of her father and brothers, pretending to be oblivious to the previous situation. Then she presented herself with a smile and the words "It's good to have you finally back home, dear brother."
Alfred's gaze lingered for a moment, before letting out a sigh of relief. 'She's still at sequence 7. It's on the low-mid side, and her convergence effect shouldn't put her at much risk.'
"It is indeed good to be back, so tell me, how have you been faring recently?" answered after a short moment, seeking to get some information about the recent life of his little sister.
"She does little more than work at the foundation, attend shareholder meetings and go around in her bicycle with Susie…" said Earl Hall, with an exaggerated tone of exasperation, and yet subtle pride. "Truly, our dear gem has done nothing but put on high honors for the family name" he continued laughing.
All the while Audrey was putting on a prideful grin.
"It's good to know… and about that matter?" asked Alfred, hinting more to his sister's personal life.
Earl Hall's laugh was stopped cold.
"27 rejections just this year…" sighed Hibbert.
"B-brother!?" panicked Audrey, before justifying herself "a-all of them weren't good, trust me! Have all of you forgotten my pathway?"
'They either wanted the title, my father's strength, the connections of the family, the riches, or me as a trophy… hah it's being like this for a long while' she sighed inside her mind.
"We trust you, dear" sounded a female voice entering the studio, it belonged to the countess Caitlyn Hall, that looked concerned before saying to her daughter "it's just a little worrying that you haven't found even a single prospect to be mildly acceptable."
"If one saw you, they would think loenese men are worse than those intisians. One could even say that this was a scheme of the Earl who doesn't want his little daughter marrying" said Hibbert laughing wryly.
At the comment, the Earl let out a surprised cough. Seemingly giving away a secret he wished to take to the tomb.
'Ah… father, they caught you…' lamented Audrey.
"Dear?" asked the countess, in a calm but subtly threatening tone.
"I-I promise I have been diligently searching for prospects! I even chose some of the candidates with you Caitlyn!" pleaded the Earl as he tried to, futilely, defend his innocence.
"And yet, our dear Audrey is yet to find one to her liking! Or… could it be that you've been colluding with your daughter?" said the countess, now eyeing Audrey suspiciously.
"E-eh? M-mother I haven't done anything! I'm innocent!" answered Audrey, trying to defend herself.
As this mess happened, Alfred was looking at his family with a softer than usual expression. 'Hah, it's good that this seems their lives haven't been affected, even with the rise on beyonder incidents. Audrey is the one most exposed and from what I know she hasn't encountered something too terrible.'
Noticing the sudden silence of her brother and deciding that the spotlight was way too much on her as a spectator, Audrey chimed in to deflect the attention from her poor dad.
"Alfred, now that you are back home will you be looking for a wife? I mean, it's true that while you aren't the heir, there is still a need to project a healthy family lineage." She said, spouting talking points that other nobles always considered good upbringing.
"…Eh?" was the only sound Alfred managed to blurt out.
The moment Alfred's consciousness tripped over itself, the eyes of the Hibbert, the Earl, and specially the countess shone with a dangerous glow. And so, it started a long sermon of the Earl about the need to maintain and grow the family, with the countess showing an album of potential candidates that she had gotten from who knows where.
'I'm so sorry brother, but 'She' asked me to find you a wife… and seven years of failures must really not please Miss, ehem, Madam Justice.' Though Audrey.
It was through these thoughts that deep sadness assaulted her.
She knew she was a virtual persona. Not necessarily a fake, but also not the true person.
She had been created so that the real Audrey Hall could play her role, to dutifully be the Justice.
She was a placeholder, a being born to live the way Audrey Hall couldn't.
And she didn't want that. Not for some selfish desire, but because of the same feelings that she had experienced when Madam Justice had left the villa for the last time. She wanted her to come back, to live with the family that didn't even knew how hard she was fighting.
'Even I don't know how much she is truly struggling…'she reflected in silence.
"Audrey… Audrey!" the voice of Hibbert brought her back to the surface, and as she noticed the worried faces of her family, she placated herself and gave a fast answer to calm them "hah, I'm sorry, I seem to be under the weather recently" she said fanning herself with a hand.
"You need some rest. I know the importance of your work at the foundation, but you cannot neglect your own wellbeing" said the Earl in reprimand.
"Yes, I know, I'm sorry" she said with a wry smile. After a moment, Audrey retreated from the studio accompanied by a maid, leaving her family with faces still etched with concern.
Some time passed, then the first one to break the silence was Hibbert.
"She must be pushing herself… father, hasn't she started to come later and later the last few days?" he inquired.
"Yes… she told me it was because of the incidents on more marginal regions of Loen. She took charge of coordinating supply lines to those affected by the most recent misfortunes." Answered the Earl.
"Incidents?" asked Alfred, his curiosity piqued by the mention.
"You don't know brother?" asked Hibbert, surprised that his demigod sibling wasn't up to date with the matters happening on Loen. Then, he rationalized that the situation must have been far too complicated in the Southern Continent for him to pay much attention at the less important regions in the Northern Continent.
"You must be privy to the relatively new cults that have surfaced… well, there are some that have extended themselves all the way to the more remote places of the country, inevitably causing chaos."
Alfred seemed to think for a moment before answering with a simple "I see."
'I need to know what cult is, some of them are capable of extending all the way here… there is probably more information at the office in Bellotto street. I'll pay them a visit some other day to inquire.' He thought.
"Enough with the talk about cultists and chaos. Alfred, even if you are a demigod, you must be tired." Said the Countess, interrupting the conversation.
"Ah, yes…I'll should go back to my ro-" he was getting up, a wave of spirituality interrupted him. No, it would be better to say that it hit him, as if the air itself had become far heavier. It didn't have any aura in particular, it didn't remind him of any pathway. It was just as if a massive beast had risen from the depths of the ocean.
One wouldn't see any indications, no forms, no patterns, nothing to discern the true nature of the being that had awakened. Just the aftermath in the form of waves that washed over.
It made him feel nauseous, as he stumbled his next few steps.
"Alfred… are you alright?" worried the Earl seeing his Alfred's unwell expression.
"I… I'm sorry, I must also take my leave. Let us continue with a better topic at dinner." He bowed and as such, he departed, worried for the only other beyonder of the family.
A little while later, as he moved through the villa, he found Audrey resting at a lounge near her bedroom. Seeing her in a worse state than when she left, he decided to check on her.
"How do you feel?"
"Ah! Brother, n-not that fine if I'm honest" she said trying to gather her thoughts.
"Indeed, such a wave of spirituality to even be felt by mid-grade beyonders…"
"Wave? What wave?" asked Audrey, who looked honestly confused to the mention. She hadn't been hit by no wave, but instead it felt as if she had lost something vital to her. But her thoughts were jumbled, as if something was deliberately keeping her in the dark.
Alfred looked at his sister and asked "You didn't feel it? That wave?"
'The beyonders from the Church of the Evernight Goddess or the MI9 haven't moved… it's possible that they themselves either didn't feel it, or that they have directly been affected by this… but then what could have done this…?' as his thoughts ran through his head, he extended his spiritual intuition trying to sense anything amiss inside his range.
Audrey's voice then interrupted him.
"Are we in any danger?" she asked as her thoughts wandered 'Madam Justice would have intervened if she sensed that the family was in any danger right…? Or someone else from the Tarot Club…'
Her mind immediately went to the real her, the connection that had remained between the virtual persona and its origin, left to be managed by the latter. It was now gone.
Then it hit her, all pieces starting to make view of a single picture. A single sting of pain coursed from inside her heart and through her body. Then a voice, so familiar, and yet one that she hadn't heard since the day she left.
"Please… Don't abandon us… Please look at us." It sounded distant, as if from a memory being recounted only to her.
Then, tearing through her soul, fear nested itself in her heart, tears started running down her face. Fear enveloped and her only thought was 'why?'
Why was she crying? why was she praying? ...Why no one answered?
Then she tried to get up, only to collapse. Alfred swiftly moved to catch her, his words muffled as he seemingly shouted her name and moved the servants to ask for help.
The world seemed to turn to a mute standstill.
An illusory mist started emanating from her, slowly dissipating.
The last thing Audrey Hall felt was fear, not for herself, but for Madam Justice.
***
That same day, late at night, inside the Earl's Villa, beyonders from both the MI9 and the Church of Evernight moved hastily to try and explain the disappearance from the most dazzling gem in Backlund.
Only the Earl and his son Alfred were present, as the countess was moved to another premise as she was in the process of being calmed down by Hibbert and the servants.
When the official beyonders first saw the scene, they were perplexed by the lack of clues. There was no ritual, there was no strange honorific name chanted, there wasn't a reason why Audrey Hall had disappeared.
Thinking of the worse, they tried many times to channel her spirit, only to fail each and every single one.
Some took it as a sign of hope, the young lady hadn't died! They tried to say, only to be shushed by the more experienced ones, who knew that there were fates worse than death. To calm the situation, they demanded divinations.
To do so a few beyonders from the seer pathway were brought from the church. A few of them reaching mid-grade, and one woman named Avelyn Dolowitz. She had vibrant auburn hair and pale brown eyes, she stood at the sequence 5, marionettist.
This would normally make her a powerhouse below the demigod level, but as the rest of her fellow seers, she had been an effort on the part of the Evernight Church to develop more beyonders skilled in divination, leaving her greener when it came to on field experience.
Making haste, each of the seers got engrossed into their own divinations, trying to pry open the mystery and get any clue about the disappeared noble.
'Whereabouts of Audrey Hall…'
'What happened to Audrey Hall…'
'Was Audrey Hall kidnapped…'
'Is Audrey Hall alive…'
Every attempt to seek answers ended up in the same vision, one of fog stretching far beyond into infinity, one that felt alive as if it looked back and coldly at them.
They tried many times, pressured by the Justiciar demigod, to try and find openings at the seemingly not hostile vision. Slowly but surely a sense of annoyance was felt from inside the fog, making the beyonders slowly retreat from divining further.
At the end only the marionettist Avelyn ended up trying to divine further.
"Try it only once more, then stop and don't take further risks" said the Archbishop Anthony Stevenson, who had taken up this case of major importance.
"Yes, your highness" answered the woman. After that, she once more rested her body in a corner of the hall, and after a few moments of cogitation, she fell asleep.
The vision once more showed a landscape of gray fog, thick and impenetrable. At that moment, Avelyn thought that she wouldn't gain anything more, only the same dead end as before.
Then, something moved seemed to move on the corner of her vision. 'A worm…?' she asked herself, trying to make sense of the forms in her periphery.
Then she only sound of glass breaking.
She woke up shortly after, her skin moving as if countless maggots were inside it, fighting to come out. 'I'm losing control!' she panicked. But she didn't even manage to scream.
"Silence" ordered a formless and magnificent voice.
Then she noticed a worm shrouded in small bouts of fog in front of her. It was small, only a little bit larger than her index finger.
And yet, facing it felt as if she was being subdued by a senior of her pathway.
Avelyn felt an inherent fear.
After that, the sequence 5 beyonder felt as if someone was caressing the strings that extended from her body and into infinity, as if implying that only death awaited them the moment they tried to peer into this mystery.
She knew that it was a death that no other would notice, becoming a marionette, the worm in front of her would just make them act normal and then discard them when they were out of sight.
In her desperation, she could only pray to the Goddess. Only then did the sensation stop and the worm vanished.
After that she didn't waste time and swiftly explained the experience to her superior. The archbishop's eyes narrowed to the information, seemingly in thought and worry at the mention of the gray fog and the worm no one else had noticed.
"What happened… do… do you really have no answers?!" protested Alfred Hall as he glared at the sight of the demigod saint of the church and the obviously shaken woman behind him.
"Young Alfred… there is really not much that can be done… if there is truly a hidden existence behind your sister's disappearance… as hard as it is there is not much that can be done, at least not by us."
"By you! But then there must be something that can be done by others! " Said the Earl nearly in despair.
The beyonders from the MI9 concurred with the assessment of the church, but one of them, seemingly a sergeant, interrupted. "Brigadier General, this… this might be just a dead lead, but since a few years ago a deity appeared and was recognized by the orthodox gods…"
The archbishops' eyes narrowed. "You imply that an orthodox god is behind what happened to miss Hall?" he accused, all the while knowing that it might be the case.
The beyonder from the MI9 retorted albeit nearly whispering "The mysterious ruler above the gray fog… that is part of 'His' honorific name, isn't it?"
"Still… you can't just go and knock down the door of their church here in Backlund can you? Do you not fear the gods?" the archbishop protested, trying to persuade them of the path they were taking.
To this Alfred himself countered "No, of course not… but we have other means to reach out to them…"
All the while a single name flashed through his mind.
'Xio…'
He remembered that she had been in leading the investigation that the MI9 made on the church of the Fool. If anyone knew about a lead connected to the deity surrounded by fog it had to be her.
"Tell me the whereabouts of Colonel Derecha."
All the while, the marionettist Avelyn hadn't noticed, how a small and nearly imperceptibly being had moved to nest in between the strings that extended from her body and high into infinity.
***
A few days after.
Bellotto street, inside an inconspicuous building. Xio sat on her desk while dejectedly organizing the accumulated paperwork as her thoughts wandered.
'It has been a few days already… Mr. Fool still hasn't summoned us…' her heart ached as the image of her god looking down on her friend's corpse still rebounded inside of her mind.
The battle was nearly a massacre, they had only managed to stay alive by sacrificing a lot of valuable objects and even sealed artifacts.
Even so, if Mr. Fool hadn't awakened, they would have been completely wiped out.
'It was a trap!' she concluded as she crumpled a document in her hands, anger surging from inside.
At one point they started to isolate the members of the club
A trap that managed to take away one of their members, to take away a friend.
And still, she had survived. Fors had survived. None of the minor arcana present had died, both her demonesses were still alive and well, as well as Fors' little hunter.
It felt bitter, to be thankful of her god, and to be angry at her own lack of strength.
'Praise the Fool for 'His' benevolence and mercy' she thought as she pressed a palm against her left chest, subsiding her rage.
'Still, with no reunion of the Tarot club we don't know what Mr. Fool will do about this…' she knew her god had authority over miracles, but as 'He' hadn't immediately brought her back to life it was easy to conclude that the matter was more complicated than what it seemed.
'There is also the matter of Mr. World…' as her mind moved to the member of the Tarot who she had barely seen. She remembered how he hadn't shed any tears for Justice.
The first feeling that came from this was naturally anger. 'Do you know how much she appreciated you! How much she moved for you! How much she did while you were sleeping! ungrateful bastard!' the paper on her hands started disintegrating.
Then her eyes reddened. She felt guilty, she felt as if she was being unjust. This was because at Sefirah Castle, on the single moment she had seen him, she didn't see a cold and uncaring man. She saw a man with the same guilty and pained eyes that she carried.
She sighed. 'I'm sorry Mr. World' she lamented in her mind.
As she was trying to sort out her convoluted feelings, her eyes narrowed as she looked towards the door of her office. She urgently cleaned the barely formed tears from her eyes and prepared.
Her spiritual intuition sensed someone approaching.
At the same time Alfred knocked outside of the office before opening the door. "Deputy director" he addressed her.
"Brigadier General … what can I help you with?" she answered relaxing her expression, at the same time that she started to think of possible reasons why he would come to see her, before landing on a simple answer. 'Audrey's brother… did something happened to her family?'
They had already worked together, mostly in dealing with the surging activity of the numinous episcopate in the southern continent.
"You were unreachable for the last few days…" he said moving towards a chair in front of the desk, pulling it and seating on it slowly. All the while a stern but mostly annoyed look on his face was directed at Xio.
"Personal business" she answered concisely, undeterred by the newly advanced demigod in front of her. She took a breath before continuing "Still, now I'm here so on whatever you may need…"
'If it's not related to anything too troublesome, I might even get Fors to follow us….' She added in her mind.
"My sister collapsed in a bout of gray fog" he interrupted.
'D-did he use psychic piercing on me…?' she thought as stunned as a demigod could be. After a moment her mind settled. "I will need you to explain more than just a sentence" she indicated, already sensing a possible explanation.
Ignoring the first indication, Alfred started talking as if making a report "It was a few days ago, I just had returned from the southern continent after my advancement. We just had… had been talking, no names were pronounced, nor anything in Hermes or other languages…" his eyes, although they were looking forward, trembled betraying his worry.
Seeing this Xio released her aura and confined the room before starting to talk.
"Alfred, control yourself first and then continue explaining" she said now looking severely at him.
Alfred took a deep breath and used cogitation to calm down. Then continued explaining. "That day a wave of spirituality washed through the world, later I discovered that it was sensed only by high sequence beyonders… but she, Audrey seemed to have been affected by it too… I suppose you also felt it?" he asked looking for confirmation.
"I did." She answered, continuing in her mind 'How could I not, Fors went as pale as a wraith when she felt Mr. Fool's awakening.'
"I suspect that it may have been related to my sister's case, the only incoherent part is that my sister is not on a high sequence…"
'That you know about…' added Xio on her mind.
Seeing her silence, Alfred continued "The teams of both the MI9 and the Evernight Church could only get the space filled with fog as a lead…"
'Ah… General Hall, prying into the mysteries of god…'she thought with mockery.
"I want you to help me make contact with the Church of the Fool." He ended.
'AND you want ME to pry into those same mysteries!?'thought Xio, trying desperately to keep her facade of composure, not letting her inner screams seep through.