Chess Mage of Faerûn

Chapter 445 The Holy War of the Traitors
When the city gate catches fire, the fish in the moat suffer as well; the neighboring Gaoya Territory may not necessarily fare well in the end.

After much deliberation, I made the decision to sell Akachi!
Who is Akachi?

As a pastor named Milcor, he was highly favored by Death, but he couldn't bear to see his unbelievable lover being used as wallpaper after death, so he rebelled against the will of the god he believed in.

This is the legendary Holy War of the Traitors, which affected many planes and involved various forces. It is also the origin of all the suffering, struggle and resistance behind the mask of the Traitors.

Akachi's impulsive act of fighting for love did not end with the happy ending of a legendary novel. His soul was torn out and used as wallpaper, and what remained after his soul was drained was not his body, but his more primal essence, which became the Soul Eater, wandering the world.

Even after Melkor's fall and Kranvor's rise to power during a turbulent year, Akachi's heinous crime of deceiving the heavens could not be absolved, and the terrifying legend of the Soul Eater still lingered over Rosieman and Thane.

Akachi's struggle as a "traitor" is certainly moving and inspiring, and his love for the red-robed woman is genuinely sincere, however...

What does that have to do with Master Zhang?
Zhang Yuan has always been very clear about such matters. If we really want to investigate, the source of the tragedy in the Betrayer Mask is neither Melkor nor Akachi, but ultimately the religious system of faith established by Aio.

The holy war that broke out in the underworld involved many people and lasted a long time. In the end, it was a mess and there was no promising progress in the foreseeable future.

If the lack of faith itself is the original sin, then even without the Wall of the Believers, something like the Wooden Ass of the Believers or the Iron Maiden of the Believers might emerge, and tearing down the wall would solve the problem.
To trace the origins of this case, we need to take it all the way to the Pantheon. As for the defendant and judge, Prince Aio?

Even if you reach the Pantheon, what then? Who are you standing here, and why are you accusing me?

Furthermore, since Io is the root of the problem and should bear leadership responsibility, then of course he has no responsibility. So what role did the Red Robe play in all of this?

He strips the soul of another from their body and consciousness, stuffs it into the remnants of Akachi's hunger, and attempts to use this to retrieve the soul of his beloved and escape the tragic fate of slowly sinking into the wall of the faithless.

In the end, it only sends more unfortunate people to the underworld to contribute to the construction of the wall.

The unfortunate captain of Crossroads Fortress was one of those victims. What seemed like a struggle against fate and the instinct of hunger was all part of a script that had been arranged behind the scenes by the Red Lady.

Since the other party could be so unscrupulous, Master Zhang naturally felt no qualms about revealing this mess. As for the consequences and what would become of the ill-fated couple, that was not his concern.

It can't get any worse than this, can it?

Most importantly, the epicenter of this incident is thousands of miles away from Sword Bay, so it won't affect our own region at all.

As Viconia's prayers of thanksgiving gradually rose in tone, they stirred the monk's thoughts from his swimming, and the ritual ceremony quietly ended in the stillness and darkness.

Looking up at the altar statue again, all the strange phenomena and lights disappeared, and even the inscriptions and diagrams on the altar were gone, as if they had been wiped away by an invisible hand. The shadow gap behind it changed from the original vertical pupil shape to a circular black hole with a diameter of about three meters.

This scene, somewhat unexpected, left the mage bewildered. He turned to look at the female drow, his eyes filled with inquiry.

"The ceremony was a success. Our lord is quite satisfied with the intelligence we presented, but there is one small regret."

Viconia's expression was quite amusing, a mixture of delight and a touch of regret.

"What is that?" Upon hearing this, Master Zhang's face immediately darkened. He didn't want to make a mistake at this crucial step.

"Actually, it's nothing. The lady probably thought the magic circles you drew were too unappealing and looked down on your silly tricks, so she erased all the decorations on the altar."

At this point, the female drow's face broke into a wide smile and a playful tone:

"However, the Shadow Magic Network obeyed the will of the great Lost Lady and directly accomplished the goal that a certain male mage had worked hard for half a day to achieve."

"Once the goal is achieved, you can try to close the Shadow Gate. I'll have Nevinmore come over to assist you."

At this moment, the Shadow Demon was still waiting in the main hall of High Cliff Fortress outside the dungeon. Out of caution, the mage dared not let him watch the ritual ceremony, in case Lady Shar became curious and took a fancy to such a big toy and insisted on taking it back to her own home...

That would be a huge loss, and Zhang Yuan could only watch helplessly as he did nothing about it.

"No need for that!"

Vicania looked confident and once again adopted a praying posture, her tone full of smugness:

"This is the manifestation of the Night Lady's power and the accomplishment of her will. As a follower of the shadows, I do not believe that any other cumbersome or unnecessary steps or external intervention are needed."

After Viconia finished speaking, he prostrated himself at the feet of the statue of Shar, and as he murmured his prayers, a deep purple aura and an invisible power emanated from the statue.

After several flashes of light, they converged on a black wheel-shaped weapon held in the hand of the statue of Shar. A beam of light shot out from the central hole of this replica of the Shadow Moon Wheel, the weapon favored by the Lady of the Night, and struck the center of the Shadow Gate.

Behind the altar, the shadow gate, resembling a black moon, was enveloped in a black mist that created a maze around the gate. As the purple beams struck the shadow gate, the ripples they created also surged in sync with the tides.

The black mist receded and contracted towards the center of the Shadow Gate, like a receding tide, compressing the originally perfectly round gate into an ellipse, then, like a closing vertical pupil, it seemed about to shut down, and then…

Then I froze.

"I'm telling you, if you can't do it, just say so."

Now it was the female drow's turn to sit on the wax, while the mage who had been watching from the sidelines leisurely leaned forward and asked a question, seemingly out of kindness.

"Whoosh, whoosh."

Just minutes ago, Pastor Zhuoer was full of vigor, but now he was panting heavily, his face was flushed, and beads of sweat the size of beans were sliding down his forehead. He looked just like Shin-chan's mother, Miya, who had been constipated for days and was sitting on the toilet struggling to survive.

Hearing the monk's sarcastic remarks, she gritted her teeth in anger and rolled her eyes at him with her last bit of strength, only to be met with an indifferent smile in return.

You can't blame gravity for not being able to poop.

(End of this chapter)