Chapter 28
After figuring out the identity of the person who had given Abel the order to notify him immediately if he ever stumbled upon Shiro again, Shiro had Abel lead the way to that high priest. True, he'd originally come here for Antonein, but with Abel confirming that the man hadn't been seen since the day after Shiro's last visit to the Lazarin Temple, the priest's own uncle seemed like the next best lead on his aphrodisiac supplier.
"It's in here," Abel said, leading him to a door tucked in a particularly lavish, deep section of the temple.
"Open it. Lead the way," Shiro said. From how much the healer hesitated before ultimately complying, anyone watching would've assumed Shiro was holding a gun to his head.
He did have a gun, sure, but he wasn't threatening the man with it.
Just with the fear the high priest had already instilled in him, fear that only made Shiro more curious to actually meet the guy.
The door opened onto a large sanctuary that looked almost like an old-school, fancy cathedral. It had the whole package: towering stone pillars, rows of polished wooden pews, a vaulted ceiling covered in massive paintings of people ascending into clouds.
The air even smelled like burnt wax and old dust. Why only almost like a cathedral, then, rather than exactly like one? Because one detail shattered the illusion completely, and reminded him exactly what kind of temple this was, one belonging to the Lazarin faith.
Down the center aisle, where you'd expect a cross or anything remotely holy, sat a coffin instead.
A massive, pitch-black box carved from glossy stone, suspended above the altar by heavy iron chains, tilted just enough to feel like it was staring down at him as he approached.
A couple of priests were tending the altar, one of whom noticed him coming.
"Who are you?"
"Abel? Who is this?"
Busy with something at the altar, the gray-haired priest, dressed in the most elaborate robe of the group, turned slowly, then nearly collapsed backward at the sight of Shiro.
"High priest!" the other two exclaimed, rushing toward the man now scrambling to put distance between himself and Shiro.
"What the hell? I knew you weren't lying about him being—" Shiro said, turning toward Abel, who'd started backing away too, clearly reassessing his own feelings about the man he'd just led here. "You stay right there," Shiro warned him.
Now that he'd found the high priest, letting go of Abel would've made sense, except with the very real possibility this place had guards, paladins even, Shiro decided he needed the healer close a little longer as leverage while he interrogated the man.
"You're High Priest Ferdinand. I'm... well, you already know who I am."
Having crawled desperately under the altar during his panic, the man reappeared on the other side of it, legs apparently giving out beneath him. "Stay away from me!" he screamed.
"Don't move!" At that, the two remaining priests bravely stepped between Shiro and their retreating superior, hands raised in some kind of martial-arts pose, which made Shiro instinctively draw his Vanguard, though thankfully not fire it, or else he'd have just shot two brave, stupid men.
"What the fuck is that? Karate?" he laughed at their fancy stances. Amused but pressed for time, he simply plowed through them. One tried to grab hold of him, but Shiro shook him off easily. "Stay down," he warned both of them. "And not a sound. Don't make me quiet you myself."
The last thing he wanted was to turn this bloody, so with that established, he crossed to where the high priest cowered on the far side of the altar, begging, "Please, please don't kill me."
"Well," Shiro winced, "that depends entirely on why you think I'm here to kill you."
He'd only been to this temple once before, and sure, he'd caused a scene by getting mistaken for someone he wasn't, but that hardly explained the kind of terror this old man was showing him now. The high priest’s reaction was that of someone who genuinely believed he'd kill without hesitation.
Shiro couldn't remember giving this man any reason to think that, which meant it had to be something outside what he could actually recall, one more gap in his memory.
"Do you know who I am?"
Face streaked with tears, the high priest nodded. "You're the one she warned me about."
"She? Who's 'she'? Please don't tell me there's someone else who's got everyone terrified of me for no good reason." The high priest just looked at him, confused, so Shiro repeated, "Who is this 'she' you keep talking about?"
"...I can't tell you."
"Why not?" he asked, shifting his tone. If this man thought he was a killer, fine, Shiro decided, he'd let him keep believing that.
"She... is a guest of our temple. Speaking of her would betray my vow to Lazare."
"So you won't talk." He nodded, then cocked the Vanguard. "You know what this is?"
"Please, don't, I…I," the man stammered, confirming he understood exactly what it was.
"'I' what?"
"I'll talk."
"Good. Start talking. And you two, on the ground. Abel, sit down, you look like you're about to faint." He gave the orders, then motioned for the high priest to get on with it, and one of Shiro's theories about the woman's identity confirmed itself right there.
???
"It's ahead," the priest said, stopping halfway through the underground section reached by the grand staircase.
After the high priest gave Shiro the identity of "she," which also answered a number of other questions, including why Abel and his companions had assumed Shiro was some senior envoy from the capital, the obvious next step was finding out where she was.
Shiro had a few things to discuss with that particular person.
"Well," Shiro said, patting the man's back, "lead the way. Take me to her."
Not without hesitation, the high priest led Shiro down the long corridor, asking halfway through, "You really promise you won't kill her?"
Damn, dude.
"How many times do I have to say this? Yes, I won’t kill her. I won't fight her, unless she attacks me first, in which case I'll retaliate, same as I did before."
That answer made him stop mid-step, but with a little urging from Shiro, he got moving again. "She's a sacred guest of our order," he said, forcing steadiness into his voice. "An honor to our temple, and to the whole city. Should anything happen to her, it would be—"
"Who goes there," someone called out from ahead.
The silhouette wasn't visible in the dim light, but Shiro recognized the voice instantly. Antonein.
"Uncle? Is that you?" the priest asked, dressed a little more casually than last time. "Phew, it's just you and—"
The sight of Shiro triggered the exact same reaction in the nephew as it had in his uncle, and he fell backward onto his rear, scrambling away, further proof that whatever "brainwashing" this woman had done had claimed another victim.
"Where is she?"
"You... you!"
"Yes, it's me. Now where's that woman? She and I need to have a long talk," he said, glancing down the corridor to his left, the direction Antonein had just come from.
Shiro had come here for the priest, but clearly, the priest wasn't his priority anymore.
Not with Karen still to deal with, the psychopath who'd attacked him in the middle of the street and then gone on to convince an entire temple he was some kind of killer.
Yes, that Karen, who apparently is the very same hero the entire ducal guard was hunting for.
The corridor quickly opened onto an overlook, a balcony-like view of a circular space several meters below, reachable by a stone walkway. The floor beneath was crowded with things that immediately marked the place as a storeroom.
Burlap sacks were stacked against one wall, some fat with grain, others giving off the sharp scent of spices. Wooden crates sat beside barrels, ceramic jars sealed with wax, and bundles of rolled cloth.
Every wall was packed, except one. Down there, just to Shiro's left as he descended the stairs, stood a door, and above it, a wooden sign reading Nazim's Workshop.
“You gotta be kidding me,” Shiro exclaimed, unable to believe it. Of all places, this was genuinely the last place he expected to stumble upon it.
He descended the stairs, passing bedrolls scattered across the floor, then walked over and pushed through the door. At first, the room appeared to be empty. Then, from somewhere in the back, a fancily dressed Kobold suddenly popped up to greet him.
"Hello there. It's been a while."
"Yeah. It sure has."
"Since you finally found your way to my shop, what'll it be for you this time?"