Paladin 4: Chapter 24 (Patreon)

The area of the Seventh Heaven they emerged in was a wild forest teeming with a spiritual facsimile of life. The trees were thick and covered in beautiful, deep-green leaves. A canopy of green branches hung overhead, creating a natural roof that kept most of the light out and filtered it to an emerald glow.

The ground was littered with bright flowers and shiny emerald grass. The air was filled with a myriad of smells, most as lovely as the finest perfume. The beauty belied the dangerous nature of this wild place, for the Seven Heavens could be just as dangerous as the Seven Hells.

There were heavenly beasts aplenty here, but they went silent as soon as Darren and his companions stepped through the aperture. For they knew there was a new predator in their presence, and his name was Darren.

The last time he’d come here, he’d had a climactic fight with a Heavenly Water Dragon. That dragon had been quite tasty, so Darren was eager to bump into another. Sadly, a quick search turned up nothing of the sort, so they scouted the area for their true objective, finding where that staircase in Whiteguard led.

Unfortunately, locations in the mortal world didn’t match up with locations in the heavens. There was only a small chance that they would appear near the aperture at the top of that mountain.

“Let’s fly upward and look,” Asuriel suggested.

They all took to the air, soaring overhead as they searched for anything resembling the peak of a mountain from the mortal world.

“It’s probably just a small hill since we’ll only be seeing the top. Maybe they’ll be snow on it or something?” Asuriel frowned as they scanned the surrounding terrain.

“It’s not here,” Darren shook his head. He had his suspicions that Kalaziel had hidden wherever he was hiding the Order of the Rod and all the souls he’d gathered from Whiteguard. The opening they were looking for probably ended in a cave or inside a building somewhere. They’d never find it in the air.

So Darren donned his cloak once again, and Asuriel led him in the direction of the nearest settlement.

“I’ve been here before!” Asuriel said, rubbing her hands together giddily. “This is perfect! Calabor is a large enough city to get lost in, even for a pair at the fifth order like us, who might stand out here on the Seventh Layer. Ashe will have to stay in your sword since three would be a little too notable. But a pair of fifth-order lovers touring the city together should be largely unnoticeable.”

“Then that’s where we’ll go.”

They landed outside the city walls and wandered in through the open gates. Now that Darren saw a city of the seraph up close, he was reminded again of the beauty of the civilization they’d built here in the heavens. Everything seemed so clean and orderly.

If Whiteguard felt a few hundred years ahead of everywhere else in the Sacred Seas, this settlement in the lowliest of the Seven Layers of the Heavens was a hundred years further ahead.

“The walls are just to keep beasts out of the settlement, since everyone can fly,” Asuriel explained. “We’re lucky. In the more advanced cities, they scan every face on the way in, but Calabor is just a backwater on the First Layer, so security isn’t too tight. It started as an outpost for hunters gathering food and other materials from the expansive wild regions here, so strangers wander in all the time, and identifying them all would be impractical. Otherwise, your face would definitely stand out.”

“I will be depending on your for even more than I suspected then,” Darren replied.

“You won’t be disappointed,” she promised, smiling at him. “I, Asuriel, am an incredibly skilled master of clandestine operations!”

Darren waved his hands, eyes darting to the seraph wandering the city on their left and right. “Yes, you are, but keep your voice down.”

They soon found themselves surrounded by tall spires, wide streets, and well-kept buildings. Asuriel led him down a wide street, pointing out shops and homes as they went along.

“Impressive buildings,” Darren said. The structures were larger and better made than anything besides what he found in the depths of hell. They were made entirely of pure white stone that he thought was alabaster, like a lot of buildings in the Blackwind Empire. But as he flicked his finger across it, he realized this was made of something far stronger. He could cut through regular alabaster with nothing but his finger, and he suspected most powerful seraphim could do the same. It only made sense that they built their buildings a bit sturdier here in the heavens to account for such strength.

They wandered the roads a bit, getting a feel for the lay of the town. They walked past a lot of homes and stores before stopping in front of one that seemed to be some kind of tavern or bar.

“We could listen and gather information here,” Darren suggested.

“Eh... maybe...” Asuriel shrugged. “I guess we could just hang out for a while and see what we can see.”

The two of them entered, and Darren saw it was similar to a restaurant. It looked familiar enough that he reached into his Inventory and grabbed a fistful of bronze coins. She smiled and bowed. “Welcome to the Golden Rose!”

“Your finest food, please.” Darren slapped his fistful of bronze coins down on the counter.

The seraph standing behind the counter looked at the bronze coins with a confused expression.

Asuriel elbowed Darren aside. “He means to ask for a table for two.”

“Ah, okay.” The seraph motioned for them to follow as she led them through to a table. “This way!”

The two of them sat down on chairs, one built to paladin proportions and the smaller one clearly intended for Asuriel.

“Enjoy your date! I’ll be right back with drinks!” The seraph departed.

Darren looked at his fistful of bronze coins, brows furrowed in confusion.

“Sorry, Darren. I should have mentioned that they don’t take bronze here,” Asuriel said. “Don’t worry. I have an account with a bank, and I’ve got a credit line I will pay for the food with.”

“But... these are bronze coins?” Darren fingered his fistful of coins. “They buy food.”

“The heavens are a little more complicated. We have these spirit stones we use for currency, but we don’t actually carry them around. We keep them with a financial institution that extends lines of credit that we use to buy things. When we buy something, the money is subtracted from our...” Asuriel trailed off when she noticed Darren was still squinting at the bronze coins suspiciously, as though he worried they were fake.

“...You know what, just give me the bronze coins. I’ll set up an account for you later. It will be good to establish an identity here for you. The cloak is good, but we can do more.” Asuriel took the bronze coins and put them in her pocket.

Darren let out a quiet harrumph. It felt like he’d only just grown comfortable with the idea of exchanging little disks of metal for goods and services. And now Asuriel was saying that people in the heavens bought things with money they’d already given to other people. It was all incredibly strange and frustrating.

But unlike the heavens’ money, their food was much the same as mortal affairs. Only all of it came from the heavens themselves. The Divine Aura within everything from the water, to the leaves, to the plants meant that the food was incredibly succulent. Every sweet and mouth-watering flavor was amplified tenfold, and even Darren’s tremendous appetite was starting to fail him as he sampled what the heavens had to offer.

There were so many delicious flavors to choose from. He’d eaten food converted to the Divine Aspect through his purification ability plenty of times, but only now did he realize how poorly he must have been cooking it.

“This is divine,” Darren grinned.

“Stop! Don’t you start getting punny on me!” Asuriel giggled. “I’m glad you’re enjoying yourself.”

The dinner ended up helping Darren get a better feel for the heavens. Society here was even more complex and advanced than in the Blackwind Empire or the deepest layers of the Seven Hells. There were institutions and bureaucracies for managing everything from the money to the cobblestones. The whole thing seemed a little tedious and inefficient. When Cassandra helped him write the official laws of Limedeep, all of them fit on a single stone pillar they erected in the center of town.

Here, Asuriel had to warn him of hundreds of laws and regulations. Perhaps it was some sort of secret security mechanism. An intruder like him would be caught the day they arrived unless they had a local like Asuriel to guide them because there were so many rules and regulations you were bound to be violating one of them.

But eventually, the two of them went silent as Darren picked up on a conversation of interest happening nearby.

“Something seems a little fishy, is all...” a male seraph said to his companions.

“Not this again...” another male seraph groaned.

“Don’t be rude.” He was elbowed by a cheery female seraph.

“I’m just saying every time I browse my interface, I get nothing but advertisements telling me what a great guy Kalaziel is. He’s a war hero, he stands for the people, he’s going to be the next Lord of Light, and we should all bend over and let him--“ the male seraph was cut off by his friend groaning again.

“Is it really that surprising? Kalaziel is super popular. He has fans everywhere.” The second male seraph rubbed his forehead, looking quite annoyed.

But the first male seraph shook his head. “If you ask me, something’s screwed up with the ophanim controlling the interface. I don’t like the guy. There’s no way I should be getting bombarded with messages telling me I should.”

Darren turned to Asuriel. “Have you noticed that?”

Asuriel scrunched her brows. “You know, now that you mention it, I have been seeing a lot of advertisements for him. I thought it was just because I’d looked up so much stuff about him lately, but if everyone is getting them...”

She opened her interface and shared it with Darren. Sure enough, several moving pictures showed images of Kalaziel. Some had him soaring heroically through the sky with a mace in hand. Others depicted him in a battle against demons with his fist glowing with holy light. Still more had him handing out bread to human orphans while disguised as a humble priest. Darren almost crushed the glass in his hand when he recognized the streets of Limedeep in the background.

“Kalaziel is everywhere,” Darren muttered as he scrolled through the images on Asuriel’s interface. The last picture was little more than garbage. Kalaziel’s Order of the Rod had probably made killed the parents of those children. They wouldn’t be orphans if not for him.

While Darren reviewed what Asuriel sent him, she browsed for more. She was in communication with Ashe as well, who was investigating the question as well.

He pondered this new information. It was a clue, but what did it mean? There was something important he should be learning from this.

The ophanim were pushing Kalaziel as some sort of savior figure who was going to fix everything that was wrong with the heavens. Asuriel and Ashe agreed that this wasn’t the true attitude of the seraphim, but if he faked it long enough, it might start to seem that way.

Asuriel paid by waving a square thing in the air a little, which confused Darren even more, but he accepted it as seraphim magic. The two of them left the tavern, looking elsewhere to get the lay of the city of Calabor.

Kalaziel was everywhere. There were pictures of him painted on walls or on moving images built on posts. Darren tried not to flinch every time he saw his face. He kept his eyes on the path ahead of him. It wasn’t made of cobblestones like he was used to. Instead, these streets were flat and continuous strips of black and gray without any deviation in direction or elevation. The unerring flawlessness was a little eerie to someone used to natural rock formations and whatever stones the builders had on hand.

Eventually, something caught his attention. “Come one and come all to Calabor’s one and only museum!” A voice called out from across the street. “Learn the secret history of the seraph and how the humans first came to this world! We have the largest collection of artifacts from the first age on the First Layer!”

“A... museum?” Darren was unfamiliar with the word.

“It’s a place that preserves history and often displays artifacts for public view. Some are trustworthy. Others less so,” Asuriel said.

“And this one?”

Asuriel looked over the establishment being advertised. “It purports to have evidence of the theory of the distant origins. It’s not one many on the higher layers of the heavens would approve of.”

“Would Kalaziel approve of it?”

Asuriel shook her head immediately. “Definitely not. He’s claimed the theory of the distant origins is nothing but make-believe, and since he’s one of the oldest seraphim around, people believe him.”

“Then I want to hear what they have to say.” Darren locked eyes with the seraph advertising the museum, and Asuriel sighed once the two of them caught her eye.

Moments later, they were inside.

“You’re lucky I’m a reasonably wealthy lady these days,” Asuriel sighed. “I never would have spent that much money on myself one day back before I met you.”

“I will give you more bronze coins,” Darren promised.

They walked up a ramp towards a large open room filled with exhibits that had been crudely assembled on a raised platform at one end of the room. The space was filled with tables and benches, but most of it was taken up by large wooden frames with various bits of metal stuck into them with wax or glue, or both.

Darren couldn’t identify most of the bits and pieces, but there was one particular table that caught his attention. He thought he recognized some of the devices there from the time he spent with Laura. He immediately used his Absolute Analysis skill.

Absolute Analysis: Item Analysis

• Computer monitor (non-functional)
• Computer mouse (non-functional)
• Computer (damaged)

As Darren squinted at the devices, a seraph strode up to them. His eyes glazed over Darren a few times, thanks to his cloak, but he saw where Asuriel was looking, and since she was following Darren’s intense gaze, he grinned and started explaining.

“You have a good eye, my friends! These artifacts were recovered in an ancient burial site on the surface! They are far more advance than anything modern mortals make.” The seraph reached down and touched one of the devices with his finger, and it lit up. “This is an old-style computer!” He let out a deep chuckle. “This one is broken, but I hope someday to recover the data on it.”

“What’s so special about this computer?” Asuriel asked. “There are plenty like it.”

The seraph shook his head. “Ah, but you see, this computer is made of materials not found anywhere in this realm! Not in the deepest hells or the highest heavens. Not anywhere in the mortal world. Its origins are entirely extra-dimensional, therefore proving the distant origin’s theory!”

“Explain this theory.” Darren made his presence known, and the seraph blinked in surprise that he’d overlooked him. But a smile quickly returned to his face when he saw Darren’s look of interest.

“But of course! That’s what we’re here for. You see, both seraphim and demons come from the souls of mortals, reborn after death thanks to the great work of our ancestors, who wished to harness the natural power of this world for their own use. This experiment created Divine and Demonic Aura, the stuff from which we’re made!” The seraph rubbed his hands together, a grin spreading across his face as he grew giddy with excitement. “That much all the theories agree on. But where did these ancestors come from? Their arrival here predates even the most ancient of the ophanim, for they were already established when the first ophanim came into being. Perhaps there’s some feral divine aspected spirit that predates the split. Who knows for certain, but who would believe anything they said?

“The distant origin theory has an answer, though! The ancestors were ancient humans who arrived in this realm through a dimensional rift, much like the paths leading between the heavens and the mortal world! Only this rift was far more dramatic to cut a path not just between nearby dimensions, but to someplace entirely different! For we know one thing for certain: there was no magic where the ancestors came from. If there were, we certainly would see it in their technology.” He waved at the computers on display. “The scholars of the museum speculate that these devices were brought over from humanity’s true home! Isn’t that exciting!”

“Very interesting indeed...” Darren stroked his chin in thought. “And why does Kalaziel not like this theory?”

The seraph went pale, like Darren had just profaned the museum with an unholy curse. His eyes darted left and right, then he reached out and ushered Darren and Asuriel to the far corner of the room, away from the rest of the guests.

“That’s not a question you should be asking.” He whispered. “You must understand how important Kalaziel is, especially these days. But I suppose, as a scholar, I should answer your question in good faith it was asked in. The reason Kalaziel doesn’t like this theory is that it implies that humans came first and that they created the seraphim and demons. Not the other way around.”

“But you mentioned a split?” Darren frowned.

“Yes, well, prevailing theory states that the eldest of the seraphim, including Kalaziel, existed before then and merely began manifesting in human form after the creation of Divine Aura.” He shrugged.

“I see.” In other words, it contradicted part of the mythos Kalaziel was building up around himself as one of the eldest of the seraphim. “Thank you.”

“Just don’t go spreading that around!” the man chuckled. “Kalaziel shows up everywhere these days, and the ophanim are on the warpath to defend him.”

That was interesting, indeed. This was the second time someone had brought up the ophanim defending Kalaziel. Perhaps it was time he investigated the strange mechanical seraphim a little closer.

<Note>

Man, I’m trying so damn hard to stay away from any stuff that could be construed as political commentary with Kalaziel's machinations. It's harder than it looks. I might go back and edit this out later. We also have some extra worldbuilding for the history of this world. I bet a lot of you guys had it pegged as a future post-post apocalyptic earth, but that twist has been done so many times that to get the same effect you need to twist the twist! So, turns out (at least according to this seraph) humans aren't even native to this planet, though their technology wasn't all that much more advanced than our own so they didn't arrive in a spaceship...