Chapter 82: Church of Thanatos DLC: Pay-to-Win Souls Edition
As they walked, Karl’s mind whirred with questions. "Can’t you order your men to stop fighting, so we can end this charade?" he asked the Dullahan.
"No, my lord," the Dullahan replied, his voice a low, hollow resonance. "If my memory serves me well, we have something in our minds that is controlling us individually. My men are no exception. As you may have observed, they lack organization and fight savagely, like rabid dogs. My knight subordinates, however, retained only some of the instinctive combat techniques from years of training, but they can’t follow orders anymore, nor do they listen to reason. There is an endless scream in their minds, a hateful, chaotic voice that only knows violence."
"So what’s different with you?" Leo asked, his brow furrowed in thought. "You can speak, you can reason."
"Yes, I can," the Dullahan said, a hint of weariness in its voice. "But only for short moments. Maintaining my sense of self, my consciousness, without succumbing to the voices, takes a toll of energy far greater than a normal fight. It’s a constant mental battle, a silent struggle against madness."
Rook, ever the pragmatist, immediately put the pieces together. "So the last time we fought you, was it that you didn’t even use your full power because you were constantly using your energy to maintain your sense of self?"
"I’m afraid so," the Dullahan admitted. "Not necessarily bragging, but I only used half of my strength and half of my energy was to fend of the corruption that’s been eating my mind."
Leo and Rook were slightly surprised, but Rook, intrigued by their new subordinate’s strength and training, pressed further. "What made you so strong like that? Did you do a lot of technique refining?"
The Dullahan smiled, a dry, cracking sound. "Some, but mostly dark mana training."
"How exactly do you do that?" Rook asked.
"We knights of the underworld have gone through not only physical training but also we were exposed to the dark mages’ training," the Dullahan explained. "Dark mana training takes a lot of time and meditation to form one’s mana flow as you see fit."
Karl was surprised, but he didn’t show it. The Dullahan’s description of mana flow training sounded exactly like a game he had played on the system, one that asked him to untangle a ball of threads and reform the mana flow. Completing it granted him a small number of Necro Points (NP), and for him, it was a form of entertainment, a relaxing puzzle.
He was also playing a dark mana flow challenge by the system that gave him NP, which literally asked him to catch a bunch of dark clouds and compress them. He shook his head, remembering the challenge. He didn’t know how many retries he had to take—it must have been thousands. Every time the dark mana compressed to a certain point, it would turn into a nuclear bomb.
"So, about that dark mana training," Karl asked, feigning casual interest. "How do you guys train yours? I’m just interested in how others train theirs." That was a lie; he knew nothing about dark mana, having only played games that took him to a dark space and asked him to suffer. He was probing for a clue, hoping it would help with the challenge.
The Dullahan, oblivious to Karl’s hidden agenda, continued. "Most dark mages have only 30% dark mana. Most of their mana is natural mana, which they convert through time and patience, collecting dark mana from the air and mixing it with their natural mana. But without expert handling, they get corrupted and turn into mindless monsters. Others go through forced conversion, mixing their own natural mana and dark mana, compressing them to a certain point. There’s a high chance that unstable mana conversion occurs, resulting in an explosion."
Karl’s curiosity was piqued by the mention of compression. Did the challenge given by the system somehow not a game at all but a training?
The Dullahan continued, "When a dark mage succeeds at 30%, they get employed by numerous factions in the underworld. But basically, 30% is a standard for a dark mage. Most don’t go through 40%. Only kings and emperors have reached past 40% dark mana purity, and a few percentage of Arch-Dukes."Karl then asked, "So hierarchy ranks are based on dark mana purity?"
"No, my lord," the Dullahan said. "Mostly the capacity of the mana within them. The dark mana only goes to show how powerful your spells or techniques are." He then looked at him with an unsettling, servile intensity. "But if ranks were based on dark mana purity, which is a standard for the Ecclesiarchy of Lord Thanatos, you, my lord, would be a high emissary."
Karl, still confused, asked, "So, what does the emissary rank belong to?"
The Dullahan continued, "The Church of Lord Thanatos has 12 ranks based on their dark mana purity.
Supplicant: The lowest entry, kneeling at the gates of the temple. They prove devotion through silence, fasting, and service before being allowed into the priesthood.
Acolyte: Students of ritual and doctrine. They light incense, clean shrines, and assist in ceremonies, learning sacred chants and the handling of relics.
Liturgist: Priests who conduct daily prayers, chant litanies, and maintain the spiritual rhythm of the temple. They are the voice of devotion for the common folk.
Confessor: Spiritual guides who hear the sins of the faithful, assign penance, and administer blessings. Known for their stern but compassionate authority.
Cantor: Keepers of sacred songs and words. Cantors lead choirs, preserve oral tradition, and guard the purity of scripture against corruption or heresy.
Sacristan: Guardians of holy places and treasures. They oversee temples, relics, and shrines, ensuring both their physical safety and spiritual sanctity.
Preceptor:
Teachers of doctrine and mentors to acolytes. They serve as instructors in seminaries and defenders of orthodoxy in debates of faith.Arch-Confessor: Influential priests who command wide flocks, often entire provinces or armies. Their sermons can spark pilgrimages, reformations, or even holy wars.
Prelate: Regional overseers with both spiritual and administrative authority. They appoint priests, control temple finances, and mediate between faith and crown.
High Sacristan: Entrusted with the greatest relics of the faith. They preside over the grand cathedrals and ceremonial processions, embodying the splendor of the religion.
Cardinal: The senior rulers of the faith’s vast territories. Cardinals speak with near-sovereign authority and often influence kings and rulers.
Hierophant Supreme: The pinnacle of the priesthood, the living embodiment of divine will on earth. Believed to be chosen by prophecy or celestial sign, their word defines truth itself.
The Dullahan explained, "Dark mages could enter the church at the lowest rank of Supplicant with 30% dark mana purity. Their rank would go up as their dark mana purity increased. At 35%, they would rise to the 6th rank as a Sacristan, and at 40%, they would have the right to challenge a Cardinal. They would fight with their souls on the line. Even the Hierophant Supreme has only 45% purity."
"However, emissaries usually have at least 50%. Emissaries are living envoys of Lord god Thanatos. Someone with a high purity like 40% has the destructiveness of their spells and techniques amplified by four times," the Dullahan explained. "But the dark mana purity at 50% goes way beyond that. Even though emissaries are extremely rare to find and encounter, we the knights of the church, usually witness them every year when Lord Thanatos ascends from the 90th layer of the underworld and speaks to the people. Lord Thanatos usually makes each emissary fight in the festival event and have a single region for themselves as an arena. Emissaries fight with the destructiveness level of a disaster; their powers go beyond a normal high dark mage; even a Hierophant would cower at the sight of it. And you, my lord, if I had to guess, have the purest dark mana that belongs to a few emissaries, high emissaries."
Karl absorbed the information, he didn’t care about ranks, but instead were interested in the information of the lower floors. So this Thanatos fellow resides at the -90th floor. If I were to guess, then the floors below are a world of their own, and the underworld must be above the 90th floor, and emissaries are the messengers of this Thanatos fellow. I never thought the entire dungeon was this big.
He then said, "So that’s how powerful emissaries are, huh?"
"Yes, my lord," the Dullahan said. "Emissaries are the direct voice of Lord Thanatos that rules the faith of the underworld. They are above Hierophants, kings, and emperors. They can achieve dark mana compression the size of their fist."
This surprised Karl a lot. Fist? Fist?! he thought. The system even automatically failed me if I didn’t reach and stabilize the compression of an atom. Even THAT, is the minimum size to complete the challenge, and it only gave 35 NP. I went through a lot just to get the size of a grain! I had to constantly spin my containment field, and every time I compressed the size of an atom, I was so close to stabilizing it, then everything just went nuclear. Karl gritted his teeth, thinking, The size of a fist is not one to be proud of.