Halochassis

Chapter 59 - Hall of the Dead

Saint Elwyn Logress was a renowned saint, a woman whose name had become almost synonymous with miracles. She was a grand healer capable of curing terrible illnesses, mending broken bodies, and restoring the strength of those who were moments away from death. More than that, she was also a reviver. There were countless stories of people who had already crossed the threshold of death, only to open their eyes again beneath her holy light. Because of that, the desperate often came to her with tears in their eyes and prayers on their lips, believing that even death itself could be overturned in her presence.

Most of the time, a patient or the grieving relative of a dead person would visit Saint Elwyn in the Cathedral Exa, seeking one of her miracles. Today, however, the saint was far too busy to receive them.

The wide halls of the inner cathedral had been transformed into something that looked less like a place of worship and more like a temporary morgue. Several rows of body bags were spread across the polished floor, their dark material stark against the pale marble. Clerics and nuns hurried between them, carrying more bodies from the surrounding chambers and arranging them into neat rows and columns. The sharp smell of blood, dirt, and sweat lingered heavily in the air, mixing unpleasantly with the incense that usually made the cathedral smell holy and serene. Every few moments, the metallic clatter of equipment or the soft dragging of a body bag echoed through the vast chamber.

Saint Elwyn sat comfortably on her holy chair near the center of the hall, watching the procession with a strange sense of amusement. Her eyes wandered from one body bag to another, counting the potential resources gathered from the raid on the slums. There had been a tremendous number of casualties, far more than she normally had access to at one time, and every dead body brought her closer to completing something she had been working on in secret.

“How’s the body count?” Saint Elwyn asked, her voice calm despite the disturbing scene surrounding her.

“Three hundred fifty-seven, Your Holiness.” One of the clerics bowed deeply as he delivered the report.

“Hmmm...” Elwyn twirled a strand of her long silver hair around her finger. Her expression remained thoughtful, almost bored, as she looked over the rows of bodies. “Not enough. I thought it would go for a thousand by now.”

“There were reports that Lireina is confronting Qinglong, which leaves only Alexander to lead the massacre, Your Holiness,” the nun reported. Her voice carried a slight nervousness as she spoke, as though even she understood how disturbing the saint's expectations were.

“Those two idiots.” Elwyn gritted her teeth, tightening her grip around the strand of silver hair. She tugged at it absentmindedly while glaring toward nothing in particular. “Well, whatever those two are fighting for, it’s none of my concern. As long as I can get to six hundred sixty-six, I can still fuel my special project.”

A faint smile returned to her face, though there was something unsettling behind it. She glanced at the bodies again and sighed.

“Makes me feel bad for lying to them about going.”

Elwyn finally relaxed her hand and let go of her hair. She lowered her arm toward her lap, only to suddenly notice that several long silver strands had come away with her fingers. She froze.

For a moment, she stared at the hair in her hand with wide-eyed horror.

“What...?”

She slowly turned the strands between her fingers, checking them as though hoping they were someone else's. Her expression twisted into genuine distress when she realized they were unmistakably hers. With a nervous motion, Elwyn quickly adjusted her white hat, pulling it farther down over her head to cover the thinning patch of scalp.

“No, no, no...” she muttered beneath her breath.

Then, all of a sudden, the massive doors leading into the wide hall exploded inward.

The deafening crash echoed throughout the cathedral as fragments of wood and metal flew across the polished floor. Several clerics screamed and stumbled backward, while others dropped whatever they were carrying. The nuns froze in place, their faces turning pale as the heavy sound of mechanical footsteps shook the chamber.

Standing beyond the broken doorway were two enormous power armors.

Halochassis.

The first was Azazel, a terrifying black and gold machine whose crimson-purple eyes burned through the dim cathedral like twin embers. Its massive wings spread behind its back, casting an intimidating silhouette across the floor. Every movement of its armored body produced the deep metallic sound of machinery shifting under immense power.

Beside it stood Samael, clad in white, black, and blue armor. Metallic, spiky wings extended from its back, their edges catching the cathedral's light as the Halochassis stepped forward. The sheer size of the two machines made the surrounding clerics look like children standing before giants.

Saint Elwyn immediately rose from her holy chair and reached for her staff. The amusement vanished from her expression, replaced by shock and anger.

“Iron Bandits!?”

“Saint Elwyn!” Samael roared. The voice thundered through the cathedral, loud enough to make the walls seem to tremble. “I have returned! And I bring your destruction!”

Elwyn's eyes widened as she tightened her grip around her staff.

“How!?” she cried. “How did you escape Alexander? You’re supposed to be fighting and losing to him!”

Inside Azazel, Shin remained silent as he surveyed the cathedral. His attention immediately shifted away from Saint Elwyn and toward the rows of body bags scattered throughout the hall.

There were hundreds of them.

The sight made his stomach tighten.

From what he could see through Azazel's enhanced vision, many of the bodies still had dirt covering their clothes and faces. Some of the garments were torn and stained with blood. Others looked like the clothes of ordinary civilians who had never belonged anywhere near a battlefield.

They came from the slums.

Shin's eyes narrowed behind the Halochassis's glowing crimson-purple gaze. He slowly looked across the hall, noticing the sheer number of bodies that had been gathered here.

Then he saw them.

Two large portals shimmered behind Saint Elwyn, their surfaces swirling with unnatural light. Clerics were moving through them in groups, carrying more body bags into the cathedral and adding them to the growing collection on the floor.

Shin's expression hardened. So that was where all the dead had gone.

The slums had not simply been a battlefield. Their people had been gathered afterward and brought here, one body at a time.

And Saint Elwyn had been waiting for them.

As the clerics and nuns caught sight of the two Halochassis standing inside the cathedral, terror immediately seized the entire hall. Some dropped their books and holy relics as they stumbled backward, while others turned and ran without even bothering to look where they were going. The sound of hurried footsteps and panicked shouting echoed through the wide stone corridors. Their white robes and black habits flapped wildly behind them as they scattered like rats desperately fleeing a burning building, their faces pale with fear.

Azazel stood motionless amid the chaos, the crimson glow of his armor cutting through the dim cathedral light. He slowly looked toward Saint Elwyn, his voice dripping with disgust.

“I thought you were a saint. You’re a sick fuck.”

Elwyn froze. Her fingers tightened around her staff until her knuckles turned white, and beads of sweat began sliding down her forehead. The confident expression she had worn only moments ago was gone, replaced by naked panic. She glanced at the body bags surrounding her, then back at the two towering Halochassis.

“I…” Elwyn swallowed hard before forcing herself to speak. “I brought them here to revive. That’s right. I’m going to revive them.”

The words sounded weak even to her own ears. They trembled as they left her mouth, doing little to convince anyone.

“Lies!”

Aether's furious voice erupted from inside Samael, amplified through the armor until it thundered across the cathedral. The sound reverberated against the walls and caused several remaining clerics to flinch.

“That silver-haired woman is a big fat liar!” Aether shouted. “They say that she can revive the dead, but it’s something completely different from what you think.”

Elwyn immediately raised her staff. The silver ornament at its tip flashed brightly, releasing a sharp burst of holy light that illuminated the cathedral like a miniature sun. Pillars of pale radiance descended from the ceiling and struck the rows of body bags scattered across the marble floor.

For a moment, everything became still.

Then the bodies moved.

The bags twitched violently as fingers pressed against their insides. Limbs jerked. Bones creaked. Some of the corpses suddenly sat upright with unnatural movements, their chests heaving as they dragged air into lungs that should have been lifeless. The wounds covering their bodies sealed before everyone's eyes. Torn flesh knitted together, broken bones snapped back into place, and dried blood vanished beneath fresh skin.

It looked like a miracle.

But only at first glance.

As the revived corpses lifted their heads, their true nature became impossible to ignore. Small, twisted horns protruded from their foreheads, while their eyes glowed with an eerie crimson light surrounded by completely black sclera. Their expressions were empty, devoid of recognition or human emotion. Whatever had once inhabited those bodies was no longer there.

Then they moved.

With sudden, violent speed, the revived dead threw themselves toward the two Halochassis. Their bare feet slapped against the cold marble as dozens of bodies charged forward, mouths hanging open as guttural growls escaped their throats.

Samael did not give them a chance to get close.

Both of his rifles snapped upward, their mechanisms humming as mana gathered inside the weapons. Aether pulled the triggers, and brilliant beams of condensed energy tore through the cathedral. The first shot punched through a revived man's forehead, blasting apart bone and flesh in a spray of blood. Another beam followed, then another, each one striking with deadly precision.

“Kill them all, Azazel!” Samael roared. “Those are not people anymore!”

“I know.”

Azazel stepped forward and drew both of his magnums, the weapons unfolding into his hands with mechanical clicks. Their muzzles flashed as he fired, thunderous gunshots exploding through the cathedral and filling the air with the sharp smell of smoke and scorched mana.

The first bullets shattered a corpse's chest. Another shot tore through a horned head. Azazel moved with brutal efficiency, weaving between the charging bodies while firing from both hands. When one of the revived managed to get close, he drove a reinforced boot into its stomach and sent it crashing into another corpse.

He followed with a spinning kick, then fired both magnums at point-blank range.

The cathedral became a slaughterhouse.

Bodies collapsed across the marble floor while blood splattered over the once-pristine walls. Mana beams sliced through the darkness, bullets rang against stone, and the metallic clatter of shell casings scattered across the ground beneath the Halochassis' feet. The smell of blood, gunpowder, and burning flesh gradually overwhelmed the lingering scent of incense.

Yet Samael continued firing.

Every time another horned corpse rushed forward, his rifles answered with another burst of light.

As another head exploded beneath a mana beam, a distant memory suddenly surfaced in Aether's mind.

For a brief moment, the cathedral disappeared.

The screams faded.

The gunfire became nothing more than a distant echo.

He remembered another place, another day, and another tragedy that had carved itself so deeply into his heart that no amount of time could erase it. It was the memory that had shaped his hatred, hardened his resolve, and set him on the long path toward revenge.

And as Samael raised his rifle toward the next approaching corpse, Aether remembered exactly why he had chosen to keep fighting.

<><><><><>

Aether Nox was a proud young father. At the remarkably young age of eighteen, he had already become a magical engineer for Empyrea, a position that required both exceptional intelligence and a deep understanding of magic. His hands were often stained with oil, metal dust, and traces of magical residue from the machines he worked on.

He had spent much of his youth surrounded by tools, blueprints, glowing crystals, and half-finished inventions, constantly pushing himself to create something new. Because of his achievements as an engineering genius, Aether's name quickly gained recognition among Empyrean nobles and scholars. His talent eventually allowed him to marry a young duchess named Kyra Elvira. Their marriage brought together two very different worlds, but neither of them cared much about that. They were young, successful, and deeply in love, and for a time, Aether believed he had everything he could ever want.

Aether and Kyra were eventually gifted with a son named Red. The boy became the center of their small family. Aether, despite his busy work, always tried to make time for him. He would come home from the workshop smelling of metal and burnt mana, only to find Red waiting for him with a bright smile. The child would cling to his father's clothes and excitedly tell him about whatever had happened during the day. Aether treasured those moments, believing they would last for many years.

Unfortunately, Red was born with a terminal illness. At first, Aether and Kyra desperately searched for doctors and magical healers who could treat him. They spent their wealth on medicines, enchanted devices, and experimental treatments, hoping that one of them would succeed. But nothing worked. Red's condition continued to worsen, and the cheerful child gradually became weaker. His laughter became quieter, his steps slower, and his body thinner. Eventually, after only four years of life, Red died.

The silence that followed his death was unbearable. The house that had once been filled with the sound of a child's laughter suddenly felt empty. Red's toys remained where he had left them, collecting dust in corners that nobody had the heart to clean. His small bed was still made, as though his parents were expecting him to return at any moment.

Aether could barely bring himself to enter his son's room. Every familiar object seemed to remind him of what he had lost. Kyra spent hours crying beside Red's lifeless body, holding his cold hand between hers and refusing to accept that the warmth had completely left him. Aether had spent his life believing that every problem could be solved through knowledge, engineering, and determination. But this was one problem he could not fix. No machine he could build could restart his son's heart. No spell he knew could undo death.

Then Aether heard about the legend of Saint Elwyn.

Stories about Saint Elwyn had spread throughout Empyrea for years. She was said to be more than an ordinary healer. According to the stories, she could cure even the most hopeless illnesses, mend wounds that should have been fatal, and perform miracles that ordinary magic could never accomplish. Most importantly, people claimed that Saint Elwyn could even bring the dead back to life. There was supposedly no price for her miracles. No sacrifice. No payment. No hidden contract. She simply saved those who came to her. Aether desperately wanted to believe those stories were true. For the first time since Red's death, a small spark of hope appeared inside him.

So Aether went to the Cathedral Exa while carrying the dead body of his son.

The journey felt like a nightmare. Red's body was wrapped carefully in cloth, but Aether could still feel the terrible weight of him in his arms. His son's body was cold and completely still. Every step toward the cathedral felt heavier than the last. The grand halls of Cathedral Exa were filled with the scent of incense and the faint ringing of distant bells, but Aether barely noticed any of it. He had only one thought in his mind.

Bring Red back.

Saint Elwyn performed her miracle.

Light filled the room, bright enough to force Aether to shield his eyes. Divine energy spread across Red's lifeless body, washing over his pale skin like warm sunlight. For a moment, Aether heard nothing except the pounding of his own heart. Then Red's chest moved.

He breathed.

Aether froze.

Red's fingers twitched. His chest rose again, followed by a weak cough. Color slowly returned to his face, and the sound of his heartbeat eventually became audible. Aether's knees nearly gave out from relief. Tears streamed down his face as he embraced his son, feeling the warmth of a living body against his chest once again. Kyra wept beside him, laughing through her tears as she repeatedly whispered Red's name. They had their son back.

Or at least, they thought they did.

Days passed.

At first, everything seemed perfect. Red was alive, and the terminal illness that had once consumed his body was completely gone. He could walk without difficulty. He could eat normally. His breathing was steady, and there was no longer any weakness in his limbs. Aether initially believed that Saint Elwyn had truly performed a miracle.

Then he began noticing the differences.

Red's personality had changed.

It was subtle at first. The gentle child Aether remembered was no longer as affectionate. Red became easily irritated and reacted violently to things that had never bothered him before. His voice grew sharper whenever he spoke to his parents, and he began snapping at Aether over small disagreements. Sometimes, he would suddenly become emotional for no obvious reason. Other times, his anger seemed almost unnatural. Aether tried to convince himself that his son was simply adjusting after death. Perhaps being resurrected had affected his mind. Perhaps Red needed time.

But deep inside, Aether knew something was wrong.

One night, he and Kyra finally saw the truth.

The first thing they noticed were the horns.

Small black horns had emerged from Red's head, curling upward from his hair. His eyes had changed as well. The whites of his eyes had become completely black, surrounding crimson irises that seemed to glow faintly in the darkness. The sight alone made Kyra stumble backward in horror.

Then something tore through the skin on Red's back.

A pair of small, bat-like wings sprouted from his shoulders. Blood stained his clothes as the wings unfolded and twitched, their leathery surfaces stretching in the cold night air. Red's right hand changed next. His fingers elongated, his skin darkened until it became almost black, and his nails transformed into long, razor-sharp claws.

Kyra screamed.

Aether could only stare.

The child standing before them still possessed Red's face and body, but whatever had returned from death was no longer their son.

It was a demon.

The creature suddenly lunged.

Their home erupted into chaos. Furniture crashed against the walls as Red tore through the house, roaring with an inhuman voice. The smell of blood and splintered wood filled the air. Kyra screamed her son's name, desperately begging him to stop, but the demon did not recognize her. It attacked everything around it with terrifying strength, its claws gouging deep marks into the walls.

Aether tried to restrain it.

For a brief moment, he hesitated.

He was looking at the face of his son.

That hesitation nearly cost him his life.

Aether finally reached for his weapon. His hands shook as he pulled out his gun, the familiar weight of the weapon grounding him amid the chaos. He raised it with trembling arms and fired at the creature that had once been his child.

The gunshot echoed through the house.

The demon collapsed.

Silence followed.

Aether stood frozen, his ears ringing from the shot. Smoke drifted from the barrel of his gun while the sharp smell of gunpowder lingered in the air. Red lay motionless on the floor once again.

His son had died.

For the second time.

Kyra could not accept it.

The first time Red died, she had been devastated. But she had still possessed the hope that perhaps something could be done. The resurrection had given her that hope, only for it to be brutally ripped away again. Watching Red die a second time broke something inside her that could not be repaired.

After that night, Kyra stopped taking care of herself.

She barely slept. Whenever she closed her eyes, she saw Red's face. She remembered his laughter, his small hands, and the warmth of his body when he was still alive. Then those memories would twist into images of horns, black eyes, claws, and blood. She would wake in the middle of the night gasping for breath, convinced she had heard her son's voice somewhere in the house.

She refused to eat.

She refused to drink.

She refused to sleep.

Aether tried everything he could think of. He brought doctors to their home and prepared medicines for her. He begged her to eat even a few bites. He held cups of water to her lips, but she would turn her head away. Her body gradually became weaker as the days passed. Her skin grew pale, her movements became sluggish, and eventually she could no longer leave her bed.

Aether continued caring for her.

The once-famous magical engineer spent his days beside his wife's bed instead of inside his workshop. The brilliant young man who had once built magical machines capable of astonishing nobles and scholars now spent his time changing blankets, preparing medicine, and watching over Kyra's fragile breathing. The house remained painfully quiet. Red's toys were still there. His room was still untouched. Every corner carried memories of the family they had once been.

Eventually, Kyra became bedridden and brain-dead.

Aether still refused to abandon her.

He continued to care for his wife, even though she could no longer respond to him. Every morning, he checked her breathing. Every night, he adjusted her blankets and sat beside her in silence. Sometimes he spoke to her anyway, telling her about his day as though she were still listening. Perhaps he did it because he could not bear the silence.

But beneath his grief was something else.

Hatred.

Aether hated Saint Elwyn.

He hated the cathedral.

He hated the miracle that had given him hope only to turn his dead son into a monster. He hated the divine power that had brought Red back without truly bringing him back at all.

Saint Elwyn had not saved his family. She had destroyed what remained of it. And Aether Nox would never forgive her for fucking his family's life.