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Chapter 137: Church Plinths
🕑 Added 2023-11-07 20:31:12 +0000 UTC“One last thing for ya two, before ya go.” The old man had finished whaling on Matt for a while, having thoroughly proved how good the armor was by subjecting Matt to dozens of attacks that probably would have otherwise killed him without protection. By the end of the fight, he had gotten used to the old man’s speed again and got in a few hits of his own, but nothing like what he had taken. He wasn’t really injured, but he had been rattled around so much his bones now felt loose.
“Something else? Old man, this is plenty.” Despite being beat up, Matt loved the armor. It felt like part of him, which he supposed in some ways it actually was now. The old man had pointed him in the direction of a tailor who could sell him a couple of suits of underclothes he said would make the set feel even better, but more comfort was hard to imagine.
“Naw, this is important. Wait here.” The old man vanished towards the house, coming back with a few paper-wrapped packets, one long and relatively thin, and one more or less square. He tossed the longer of the two to Derek.
“This one is for ya. There were some scraps left over from the project. I thought Matt here wouldn’t mind if I put ‘em to use.” He glanced at Matt, who nodded in approval. Derek immediately ripped open the package, revealing a sheathed sword that he immediately uncovered. Where his previous sword was a pretty basic, long, and two-sided number, this new sword was bent slightly forwards, and larger at the far end than the base.
“All the weight’s at the end on that one. Ya already got a good enough sword for standard work, but ya can never go wrong having a chopper, especially if ya keep getting stronger. Good for taking off arms, or breaking armor.”
Derek’s eyes focused in on the information screen for the sword, or at least seemed to. What he saw there must have impressed him, judging by his widening eyes and gasp.
“This one’s for ya Matt. Ya were right, boy, that I can’t do anything to that shovel ya got. But that doesn’t mean I can’t do anything for it at all.”
He gently tossed the paper package at Matt, who caught it. His boots activated just in time to keep it from knocking him on his ass. Whatever was in there was heavy. Ignoring the old man’s laughter, he ripped the paper off, revealing a sheet of what looked like little weight plates sewn down to a thick layer of leather with heavy demon-tendon thread. On one side of the sheet were straps that appeared to correspond to fasteners on the other side. It looked almost like leg weights.
“What is this, old man? Need to slow me down so you don’t lose the next round?”
“It’s for the shovel, ya idiot. Now that ya took my title, weight is a friend to ya. Won’t feel any heavier in the hand with that on, but it will make ya shovel pack a punch. I couldn’t use any of that on armor. It’s just heavy, and strong. And anything that could break it would probably break ya first.”
Matt strapped it to his shovel, and gave it a few swings. The old man was right, it didn’t feel much different, despite the earlier impressions. A large stone from the wall sat in the training grounds, not yet cleaned up from the old man’s crash. Matt brought the shovel down on it, blade first.
It broke in half, like a cut diamond.
“Thanks, old man. I’ll make good use of this.”
—
“I want to see this church. The guardian plinths there, particularly. They interest me. Where is it?” Matt was trying his best to act nonchalant.
“Sure!” Derek said, not seeming to notice anything was amiss. “I don’t have anything better to do.”
“Sweet Moses, Matt. You are lucky as hell that he’s not very smart. Remind me that ‘spy’ isn’t in our skill set, if it ever comes up,” Lucy chatted from the side.
Matt ignored Lucy, even though it didn’t feel good to lie to Derek. It was their best option, and he felt sure she knew it. Derek led them towards the church, which so far Matt had only seen from a distance. It was tall, with sloping sides that cut more steeply towards a point near the top. Somehow, probably through magic, the Ra’Zorians had managed to make it look like it was carved out of one single, gigantic piece of stone.
Matt was beginning to realize, though, that the size and expense of a building wasn’t the primary way which Ra’Zorians used to relay that a building was important. Instead, they used the empty space around a building to give that impression. Given that their cities could only safely grow as big as they could build walls for them, the real estate inside was at a premium. So when the square court sat in the middle of a wide open space, it instinctively signalled power and importance. They had even built a mosaic on the ground, just so that there wouldn’t be confusion about how much of that space belonged to the court specifically. And it was a lot.
This church, which signified the headquarters of the church’s religious power and the most significant building regarding their relationship with the reincarnation, had even more space. It was surrounded not by stone, but by grass, flowers, hedges and general greenery, all separated from the outside, non-church world by a tall, white, wooden fence.
And within that fence were plinths. Dungeons weren’t a major part of the Ra’Zorian life if they existed at all. Matt, at least, hadn’t seen any. But on Gaia, he had become very familiar with them. If there was one thing he could identify, it was a system-built plinth. And these were, if not directly owned by the system, at least one of its designs.
On top of each plinth was a panel similar to what Matt was already familiar with from the dungeon plinths. Almost all of the plinths around the edges of the area were lit, but the closer the plinth was to the church itself, the more likely it was dead. The inner circle of plinths had no lights at all. Where the other plinths were almost supernaturally clean and clear of plants, the plinths near the center ranged from clean to dusty or even dirty, some even having moss or vines climbing the sides.
A middle-aged official of the church had been milling around the grounds suspiciously close to them since they had arrived, half-pretending to not watch them. Seeing Matt’s interest in the dead plinths, she abandoned any pretense of hiding his purpose and approached.
“I’d be glad to tell you the significance of the lights, if you wish,” she said. Matt looked over. He wasn’t altogether comfortable with a member of the church being present for this, but couldn’t see a good way to get rid of her. It was their house, after all. He nodded in reluctant assent.
“These plinths each represent guidance. For each reincarnator that arrives to our planet, we erect another, charging it with holy power. For the lifetime of these heroes, the plinths stand ready to offer information, advice, and direction regarding a hero’s class and choices. Those that are lit represent a hero somewhere in our world, working to protect our people from the ever encroaching tide of demons.”
“And those that are dark?” Matt asked, suspecting he already knew the answer.
“Those are the memorials of heroes that have fallen in defense of our settlements, our border, or even our capitol. They fell at the hands of the demons.”
“Never of anything else? Disease? Old age?
“Sir, I believe any disease capable of taking down a reincarnator would be part and parcel with demonic attack, in the first place. And ours is a dangerous world. If any of your kind have survived to old age here, I am unaware of it.”
Matt didn’t want to tip his hand, but as long as he had this acolyte present, he figured it couldn’t hurt to fill in the gaps of his knowledge.
“On my world, we have plinths like these. But we associate them with functions of the system.”
“Ah!” The woman’s eyes lit up, apparently glad to have found someone with any kind of knowledge with the nuts-and-bolts operation of her area of expertise. “Yes, you are correct. The plinths themselves are system-provided technology, ready to be invested with power and knowledge suitable to a variety of purposes. We use it solely for this one function, however.”
“And the power you invest them with? System-provided as well?”
The woman smiled, in a restrained, polite way. “I’m afraid the details of that are a bit beyond my position, sir. Before the arrival of each reincarnator, the leader of our church himself foresees their coming, and prepares each plinth himself.” As Matt and the woman talked, she led him further into the garden. “Alas, even our leader’s foresight isn’t infallible. He didn’t complete your plinth until after your arrival, and even now, it has failed to light.”
“My… plinth? Mine?” Matt asked.
The woman smiled pleasantly, sweeping her hand down towards a plinth mixed in with the others on the more lit-up outer side of the yard.
“Shit. Matt, we need to get away from that NOW. Right now. Something’s wrong,” Lucy said, eyes wide. “It’s pulling on me.”
Matt didn’t question it. He dashed away from the plinth, burning most of his STAM to get Spring Fighter moving.
“Is that better, Lucy?” he asked, before glancing down and realizing she wasn’t there. Somehow, despite him moving so far, she had maintained her current position.
“MATT! Get back here! I’m stuck!”
Matt ran back as quickly as possible. The church-woman looked profoundly confused.
“Is there trouble? I understand reincarnators can be a bit jumpy, but…” She suddenly glanced at the plinth, then smiled widely and clapped her hands. “Oh, would you look at that! Your plinth is coming online, after all!”
It was true. The plinth was beginning to light.
“Matt, I don’t feel good,” Lucy said. “Something’s happening.”
To Matt’s horror, Lucy was growing fainter. She wasn’t see-through yet, but the color of her face and hair was growing ever so slightly washed out. He reached for the woman reflexively, grabbing her collar and pulling her close.
“Turn it off. Now,” he snarled.
“I… I can’t!” She said. “It’s an automatic process! I don’t know how!”
“Matt, it’s pulling me in. I can… I can feel it. Do something,” Lucy said, weakly. Her eyes were unfocused, and her voice was oddly calm despite containing a note of panic.
“I’ll do it myself, then.” Matt raised his shovel overhead, and charged.
“Sir, that won’t work! It’s a system item! I don’t even know why you’d want to hurt it!”
“Bullshit it won’t. I’ll make it work.”
Matt brought the shovel down with the full force of three or four seconds worth of charge. It hit the plinth and stopped. And for a moment, it seemed not to do anything at all. Then the whole world turned to light and sound. When Matt’s head cleared, he found himself twenty feet away, flat on his back, his armor showing damage for the first time. Luckily, he had been fully kitted up because even with his armor on, the explosion shaved off a good quarter of his health.
Comments
Jake Holland
Nope. The System can't directly force Guardians into slavery, but what people do after they've become Guardians isn't considered.
DagNabItAll
He has declared war on his second planetary system, we will see who comes out ahead in this one.
Toby the couch surfer
That's got to break at least 1 system rule this instance is now f'ed
R.C. Joshua
Imagine like... leg weights. I think in my head it's basically got what amounts to demon-skin non-slip texture on the inside, and then it's basically a really tall leather belt with multiple clasps that straps on to the shaft of the shovel.
MasterMT6
Can you elaborate how the weights attach to the shovel? Cant picture it in my head
Bunny Waffles
They tried to steal Lucy! Kick their ass!
Lyncher98
I'm am so hyped for the next chapter
GoodOldChap
Yep, as predicted the church is not good.
Lyncher98
Tftc
