The Grand Catastrophe

Chapter Eight: Back In Adamantite

“So, you created a whole new demon for me to fight, or Calvaria at the very least? Then, you attacked the Holy Kingdom to better draw my proverbial attention. After that, you led the three leaders of their nation to our lands to better gain control over them?” Momonga asked, and Demiurge nodded his head.

“Yes My lady, that is the whole of it. To think, I only managed to glean this much from your master plan. Truly, you are a genius,” he said with a smile.

“Did you even give this personality a name?” she asked.

“I knew I was forgetting something,” was all he said as he bowed in apology.

She waved it off, and leaned back in the throne. She then sighed as she looked over the plan written on the report in her hand. It was a simple thing, to try and get one of the more zealous nations to care for their own one. It would start out as Demiurge attacking said nation in the guise of a demon lord that she had fought before she had become a goddess.

She had never really had a rival player or NPC that she attached herself too, as one would with a standard rival. She never really understood the appeal of such a relationship. Because of this, she didn’t really know how to play this out.

Yet, she had been taking some acting classes with her daughter, so she would probably be fine. The plan also called for her to play as Calvaria again, which she had enjoyed to no end. That would be fun enough.

…

They soon came to the nation itself proper, the caravan that is. Neia herself was somewhat out of it. They had been riding on the road for so long that her rear end was hurting. It was a poor state affairs, all around.

It was then that she actually looked up from the road and the fields around her that were being plowed by the undead, and saw them. She then blinked again, and looked over what she and the rest of the group saw. They were huge.

They lay ahead of them. There, right by the sides of the gate, were two massive statues that couldn’t have been smaller than the city walls. They depicted a utterly gorgeous woman. The statue on the left side of the gate held a sword in left hand and had it raised above the walls. The statue on the right of the gate had a staff made of coiling snakes raised above the gate as well.

They were crossed, like an ancient immortal goddess protecting her city. Which, Neia thought, was true enough. Neia, with her eyes that she had gotten from her dad, could make out what seemed to be frost giants cleaning the things. She had seen hill giants before, so she assumed that the blue and ice themed ones were frost trolls.

“What seems to be the trouble?” Holy Queen Calca asked, breaking the quire out of her stupor.

“I was just looking at the statues. It looks like frost Giants are cleaning them,” she said simply looked at her queen.

Calca simply nodded wisely. She then looked at the statues herself. She seemed to be trying and failing to spot them, even as they got closer. It was kind of neat to see her fail at something, and Neia let out a subconscious giggle. Remedios then yelled at her again.

After about five minutes, remedios finished yelling at her for not paying attention when she was, they rode on further. Calca then sent a messenger ahead of them into the city itself to make sure that the queen of the place knew they were there. After that and he came back, they entered the city itself. Or tried to, at least.

Neia blinked as they approached the front gates, waited in line, and then finally after what felt like hours of simply sitting there, they got to the front. It was then that all of them realized that these people did things differently.

“I am Holy Queen Calca of the Roble Holy Kingdom. I come here to seek an audience with the queen of this nation, Lady Momonga,” she said briskly and professionally.

“It is country policy for all people who have never entered our home before to go through orientation. Everyone needs to do it. Last time someone refused, they caused a panic. Please don’t do that,” the extremely tired guard said as Calca looked down at him from her horse.

“Where does this orientation start, if you would be so kind?” Kelart asked, and the man looked to her.

“Of course, it’s just this way,” he said, and beckoned them all with a hand, “You’ll have to leave the horses here with the others. It’s in a building. Don’t worry, the others will make sure they aren’t taken, or anything else really.”

They all nodded, got themselves off their horses, and moved after the guard. As Neia looked around, she couldn’t help but be in awe of what she was seeing. Around her, there were many guards as the place they were walking too was connected to the barracks.

Yet, beyond that she saw demi-humans in peace with humans. Undead walking around in broad daylight as if that were normal. Dwarves and other such humanoid folk walking around. Ogres even seemed welcome. It was strange to see.

She then turned her head, and looked on at what they had then stopped at. It looked like a large room built on the side of the wall itself, with stone walls and a slanted roof. The door to said space was rather large, about three heads taller than her.

“This is the entrance for the orientation room. Please don’t draw your weapons. I don’t want to clean your entrails from the floor, the last time that happened, it took forever to clean. So please don’t attack it,” the guard that led them to the room said tiredly, and then opened the door and swung the door off to the side.

Neia flinched then. The senses that she had inherited from her father tripping out, and telling her to run. Her eyes widened, and spotted it. Now, she had just seen the undead further into the city itself. She saw how no one was afraid of the undead roaming the city.

Yet this one was larger. Its head loomed over the doorway, and it had to dip its head to make it out of the room. Its armor was full plate, with red lines tracing a path all throughout the armor. The visage under the helm was that of a dead man. Her skin crawled as it looked at each of them in turn, and walked off into the city itself.

Neia very nearly collapsed into a puddle after it left, and she tried to calm herself down. She sucked in a breath, then let out one longer than she had pulled it in. She did this a couple of times until she was fine, and then looked to the others. They didn’t do as well as her.

…