Chapter 5: Catherine's Promise

“That man is a murderer,” the drow says, voice tight now but still keeping an even tone. “The woman at the door, Ungula, she watched him do it.”

The orc snorts. “If you’re not gonna fight, leave me out of this.”

“I am not a citizen of your malignant Covenant,” the elf sneers, “and I do not permit you to judge me for the death of a lowly goblin.”

Gobbet yawns. Her demonic tail flicks lazily back and forth. “Adama, do you want to take this one?”

Adama steps forward with a nod, then directs a slight bow at each of the two men glaring daggers at each other. “Hello there, gentlemen. I am Adama, and that was Gobbet. May I have your names, and the context to this crime you speak of? I suspect I know the circumstances, but clarity is important in matters such as these.”

“Why do we care?” Clara asks. “Let them kill each other.”

The drow directs his furious gaze in her direction for a moment, then sweeps it across the lot of us. “Do none of you care for the injustice that has been done?” the drow demands. “One of our number is dead and his murderer stands before you. Justice demands he answer.”

Sapphire titters, one hand not quite covering her mouth. “Justice!” she cries, positively giddy. “Oh, how wonderful. Are you a knight, good sir? I’ve always wanted a knight.”

Adama clears his throat. “I am afraid, my nameless friend, that you will find few of strong moral character in the ranks of your new peers. We are warlocks; we have all—yourself included—signed our souls away for power. Those who make that choice for a righteous cause rarely hold to that cause for long.”

Seventh Crest raises a hand. “I vote for killing the elf! He seems rude!”

The elf curls his lip at the goblin. “I am Feidanor Gelthurian, and you will respect me.”

“You’re really not making a good case for yourself,” I say wryly. “I’m also in favor of killing the murderous racist, by the way. Sword boy, be nice and answer Adama’s questions, then we can get to killing your target.”

The swordsman shoots a glance at me, but it’s more annoyed than angry. “Fine. I am Xaren veis Tashirel, if that pleases you. This man was initially grouped with Ungula and a goblin whose name neither learned. He interrupted the goblin’s reading of the trial to violently sacrifice him, ignoring screams of protest that it would not open the door.”

Gobbet cackles and jabs her elbow at Adama. “And you thought one of them would read it carelessly. The moron was told the right answer and still fucked it up!”

Feidanor slams his staff on the ground and spits, “What evidence do you have? You accuse me, completely without foundation, when the far more obvious conclusion from the sight of that creature’s corpse is that it called up something it couldn’t control.”

“His name was Third Breath,” Xaren says, leaning fearlessly closer to the flames surrounding him. “I accuse you on the word of his lingering spirit, and I have sworn to pursue justice on his behalf.”

Wraith knight, then, with a talent for binding ghosts. This one’s worth looking into. Xaren veis Tashirel… he’s not any specific character from the MMO, but I recognize most of that name; “veis Tashirel” means he’s in the service of House Tashirel, one of the more important drow families in the wake of their empire’s collapse. Their soldiers patrol the capital.

“Here’s an idea,” Gobbet offers before the bristling elf can talk again. “Let’s kill the elf after we get through the next trial. We’re already under count, and we might need every living body for the next challenge. Xaren, buddy, you have my word, he’ll be dead before he’s made it a sprint from the exit.”

Xaren’s scowl deepens, but he slowly nods. “Very well.” He lowers his sword with one final stare at Feidanor, who is protesting loudly but still doesn’t quite seem convinced of his own imminent mortality. With a snap of her fingers, Gobbet dismisses the flame.

Ungula—the beefy orc lady—sighs. “Boring. Hey, you two, get the fuck in here!” She hollers back into the chamber she and the other two came out of.

“You don’t need to yell!” shouts back a wizened voice. “It’s not my hearing that’s gone, you wicked harpy!”

“I don’t understand why everyone we’ve met is so rude,” huffs a second, higher-pitched voice. “Is the whole Covenant like this?”

Two new figures shuffle in. The one who spoke first is an old orc, face lined, with a hunch to his back and a single strand of gray in his otherwise black hair. The woman beside him is a kobold, short and lizard-like, with turquoise scales and inquisitive orange eyes.

The Telvarian Union calls humans, elves, dwarves, and kobolds its signature peoples, while the Covenant of Thorns claims the undead, drow, orcs, and goblins. Cheshires and demonbloods like myself and Gobbet can appear anywhere, so to a certain extent we could be considered outcasts everywhere, but we’ll still be a much more natural sight than a kobold or an elf in Covenant territory.

Despite that, it was possible to play any race as part of either faction in the MMO, though you’d face some unique prejudices in the story for playing outside your faction’s norms. The in-universe logic was that adventurers were too important to turn away, no matter their origin; on the Doylist level, it enabled more roleplaying options.

Of course, it also enabled a bunch of players to pick the cool, outcast monster faction while still playing a conventionally attractive “human enough” character, but, well, that was going to be the case as soon as the devs locked in the catgirl option.

The old orc harrumphs. “Oh, back in my day, we had proper manners, but it’s this new generation that’s so uppity. Well, don’t you worry, the librarians tend to have better attitudes.”

The kobold’s eyes sparkle. “Gosh, I’m so excited to see all those wonderful books. And nothing is forbidden, really?”

“Hello!” I greet the new people with a wave. “I’m Cat. Gobbet, Adama, Sapphire, Clara, Seventh Crest, and you know the rest. Who are you lot?”

The orc blinks at me and barks a laugh. “Ha! So you are. You may address me as Melroy the Gray, the last and greatest of the orcish wizards!”

The others are mostly dispersing now that the fight has been defused. Xaren found a belt and scabbard for his sword and is now fending off Sapphire’s interest. Clara’s stuck herself in a corner and is watching everyone suspiciously. Feidanor and Seventh Crest are basically doing the same as Clara. Ungula, deprived of violence, grabbed a sword of her own and now swings it around clumsily.

“By definition,” Adama points out, “to be here, you are a warlock. To my knowledge, the Lady’s gift is incompatible with the Sage’s insight.”

“And yet I’m still the greatest!” Melroy insists loudly.

“I’m Skalla,” the kobold says. “This appears to be an armory. Melroy, there are books! No, what are warlocks meant to call them? Grimoires?”

“A wizard has no need for books!” Melroy says, which is laughably untrue. “I see a walking stick with my name on it, and if it doesn’t have my name on it, then I’ll put it there!”

Well, shit, there goes my last chance to keep stalling for time.

I need a weapon, and it needs to be a good, appropriate weapon that I won’t regret picking. Which means, on some level, deciding who I want to be.

A grimoire? Scholarly Catherine locked away in her tower? Professor Bird teaching a generation of new necromancers? No. I like stories, not studying. A focus on preparation might serve me well with my time loop advantage, but I’m just as likely to get trapped in a loop where I don’t have the luxury to prepare before being thrown into the next challenge.

A sword? Rosie the Barbarian in a chainmail bikini, carving through hordes of fodder? Catherine the soldier queen, the conquering hero astride her skeleton horse? No. I’m not a fighter, I’m a coward. This body has better muscles, better reflexes, better instincts, but it would be delusion to think that those details bridge the gap between me and someone who’s spent their life training to kill. With Momo wielding that scythe, I’d just get in the way trying to swing a sword around.

A staff? Rosemary the Red, secretive and all-knowing? Cat the court mage, the mad prophet whispering glimpses of the future? No. It’ll invite challenges that I’m not prepared to face, and I doubt I have the presence to pull off carrying around a staff. A staff can be broken.

Sneaky Cat with a knife has most of the same problems as brave Cat with a sword. I could be the charming Cat with a talisman around her neck, but there’s no symbol I believe in enough to wear it and have it mean something. Still, maybe jewelry is the right direction…

There’s one implement in this room that’s been pulling at me since I first saw it. Actually, I was toying with the wand mostly to keep from toying with what I really wanted, because I wasn’t sure that I should want it. But I’ve eliminated all my other options.

It’s a ring—a ring of gold, beautiful and unadorned. It’s not the only ring in the armory, but all the others—be they silver, gold, bone, or brass—are decorated in some way. Gemstones, carvings, etcetera. Only one is blank and pure.

I know, of course, why that ring calls to me; it reminds me of another—of a singular, precious treasure. The tool of the Necromancer. The signature weapon of the iconic Dark Lord.

My sense of sensibility rebels at the very thought. What higher sin of arrogance could I commit than to claw at Sauron’s cape and drape it about my shoulders?

But it tempts me. All my life, I’ve been a nobody. I died a bookstore cashier after a dozen other empty, meaningless jobs. I had no family. Barely any friends. Will anyone but my boss even notice I’m gone? Will anyone mourn me?

All I ever did with my life was roleplay and write fanfiction. I was the kind of person that the world has no trouble forgetting. I don’t want to be that kind of person again. Even if Nyara let me, I wouldn’t be content finding a corner of Telvaria to settle down in. I can’t be just another passing face. I must force this world to learn my name. I have to become the kind of person that the world can never forget.

A ring, yes, with all the associations it carries for me, specifically. A tool of great subtlety and greater power. Something to ground me in the world. A means to dominate and endure. A promise that I will not waste this life I have been given.

A sword, a staff, a book, anything else, I could content myself with the treasonous viper “enough.” I could cut my way through one last enemy and say, “I have fought enough.” Bled enough. Suffered enough. Tried hard enough. But that isn’t eternity.

Eternity is greed. Eternity is ambition. Eternity is an endless, ceaseless, bottomless hunger for more, more, more. The appetite of a Lord. So I will climb, and climb, and climb, until I have earned the symbol that I now steal. One Cat to rule them all.

You could be a legend, Catherine. A hero, or villain, as takes your interest.

I whisper, “This ring is a promise that one day I will be worthy,” and I put on the ring.

“Shall I start calling you ‘my lord?’” Momo asks impishly, knowing exactly why I chose this of all rings.

Immediately, everything feels… sharper, somehow. Like I’d been dozing off without noticing, but now I’m wide awake. Like someone turned on the lights. Like my ears were clogged and now they’re clear. Like I’m more me than I was a second ago.

“Oh, good,” Gobbet says, appearing suddenly beside me. “I was running out of ways to keep those guffins distracted. A very admirable choice, picking the ring. Wasn’t sure you would.”

I turn around to see the rest of the group clustered around the trial door, once again engaged in heated argument, when the last ruby lights up and stone creaks as the lock is released. Ungula and Xaren are first to the doors, these ones heavy enough that both have to put their backs into pushing. Adama and Melroy quickly join.

Bodies tumble through the gap and fall limp. Corpses that must have been leaning against the double doors. Lifeless, dessicated. Mummified, though probably not embalmed.

There are dozens of them in the next chamber, lying still in various states of completeness. Slumped against walls, face down on the stone floor, or torn apart and scattered. Some stripped to bone.

This room is a pyramid, its four walls slanted and coming together at a single point. Opposite the doors, a set of stairs leads up. Sand has swept in from above, blown by distant winds to clutter that edge of the chamber. The floor is one giant summoning circle, lines etched in glowing amber crystal, orders of magnitude more intricate than what Adama threw together.

No bugs. Lots of corpses, but no bugs. Guess they know better.

We cluster in the opening. Even the fools in our group aren’t eager to get closer to that summoning circle. Well, Feidanor looks antsy.

“Perhaps we’re looking at our failed predecessors,” Adama muses. “No, I only see a handful of black robes.”

“They were trying to get in,” Melroy says, squinting. “Clawing at the door. Tomb raiders.”

Gobbet laughs. “The morons! They’re lucky they died out here; if they actually stole something from the armory, they’d have one nightmare of an afterlife waiting for them.”

Seventh Crest crouches by one of the corpses and raises its arm to his mouth. The sound of nibbling follows, quickly replaced by spitting and disgust. “Oh, that is rancid.”

“Don’t eat them,” Clara snaps. “What did you expect?”

Xaren draws his blade and takes half a step forward, assuming a ready stance. “No, I feel it too. Death is sick in this place.”

I flicker on my anima sight and get the same impression; the bodies all lack for anima, but they’re strangely discolored instead of grayscale. Bruise-colored, and rotten on my tongue.

“We should spread out,” Adama says. “We are not experienced in fighting together; we would get in each other’s way staying clustered.”

“Enough talk,” Ungula barks. The orc strides forward, sword out, and roars into the room, “Come and fuckin’ get me, you ugly shits!”

The circle flashes and we all scatter. Adama goes for the near left corner and I follow at a distance, keeping my attention focused on everyone else. Ungula goes right for the middle of the room and starts hacking crudely at the circle. Feidanor sprints past her, eyes on the stairs. Skalla cowers just to the right of the doors, tripping in her haste to get away, and Xaren steps over her protectively, sword raised. Melroy joins them, also huddling behind the drow with the sword. The other drow, Sapphire, glides to a free corner, while Clara and Seventh Crest jostle each other to reach the last empty quadrant of the pyramid. Gobbet stays in front of the doors, which slam shut as the rest of us flee.

The trial at the end of the warlock starting experience is supposed to be a tutorial boss. Something slow and flashy but not particularly dangerous, so you can ease into the game with minimal friction. A big, dumb brute.

The ear-bleeding shriek that echoes through the trial chamber dashes those notions on the rocks; there’s only one enemy in the game that makes a noise like that. Shadows swirl in the center of the chamber, knocking Ungula back, and an indistinct figure moves in the darkness. It screams again, hateful and ruinous, and the corpses on the ground begin to pick themselves up, animated by living shadow.

In the blink of an eye, the thing in the center vanishes from its cocoon of shadow and reappears right in front of me—face contorted in anguish, clawed hands reaching for me, emaciated limbs twitching and flickering as its whole body is trapped out of phase with reality. Hungry for souls.

I fling entropy at the banshee and the boss fight begins.