Chapter 54: The Sinister Deity - Start of Book 2
The procession shuffled along the muddy road like a funeral cortège heading to its own burial. A dozen or so village devils, dressed in their best, though threadbare and mended, clothes, were carrying gifts.
This was no joyful march, however. A heavy, dense atmosphere of fear hung in the air, mixed with the smell of damp earth and cheap spirits, which the braver ones pulled from their flasks for courage.
Their destination was a small, moss-covered clearing in the heart of the dark forest, a place that had become their local sanctuary.
There was no gold or marble here. Instead, a primitive altar stood in the center, hastily cobbled together from fieldstones blackened with age and a roughly hewn tree trunk.
On the altar rested a grotesque sculpture—a humanoid figure, its face twisted in a grimace of eternal anger. Its eyes, made of two pieces of obsidian, seemed to stare at each of them with ruthless intensity. The figure's hands were clenched into fists, and its entire posture emanated an aura of unyielding, uncompromising power.
One by one, the villagers approached the altar, placing their offerings.
A fat goat, the best of the flock, bleated pitifully before its throat was cut, and its blood streamed down the stones, soaking into the earth. Beside it, they placed baskets of last year's, already somewhat wrinkled, apples, a clay jug of honey, and several skeins of unevenly woven wool.
Finally, the two strongest devils from the village pushed a young girl forward. She was no more than eighteen, and her face, though pretty, was as pale as a sheet.
She trembled all over, her large, terrified eyes fixed on the stone figure. She was the prettiest virgin in the whole settlement—a gift meant to appease the deity for the entire year.
When all the offerings had been made, the entire village fell to its knees.
The elder, a devil with a gray beard and a face furrowed with wrinkles, began to intone the prayer. His voice trembled, but it carried across the clearing.
"Oh, great and terrible ruler of this land! Accept our humble gifts and let your anger pass us by!"
Rest of the devils repeated it after him like a mantra.
"May the plagues you send strike the fields of our neighbors across the border! May their cows give sour milk, and may their children be born with horns on their arses!"
Another devil, especially zealous chimed in soon.
"May drought destroy their crops, and hail break their windows!"
"But spare us! We beg you, spare us, your faithful servants! We are poor and insignificant, not worthy of your attention! Let us live in peace, and we will make this sacrifice to you every year!"
By the end of ritual they were each striking their foreheads against the damp earth.
The devils remained in this position for several long minutes, listening.
When nothing happened—no lightning struck from a clear sky, no tree collapsed on their heads—they concluded their prayers had been heard.
They rose with relief, brushing the mud from their clothes.
They cast one last, fearful glance at the altar, at the terrified virgin who now knelt alone before the figure, and hurriedly, almost at a run, they headed back to their village.
None of them dared to speak the name of the being they worshipped aloud. But every one of them knew it all too well.
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'Maybe it's just rumors?'
Bogna, left at the terrible altar, couldn't help glancing from time to time into the surrounding bushes.
For almost an hour since the ceremony, no one had appeared, and the young she-devil began to hope that the cruel deity might spare her after all.
She quickly shook her head, however, blushing with shame at such terrible thoughts.
This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
'What would happen to the village then?'
The deity they worshipped was utterly merciless, and if it did not accept the sacrifice, grim plagues would surely fall upon the entire region.
'Truly, our fate is terrible...'
Soon, the candles left on the altar gently dimmed.
A strong wind picked up, and the sun, present until now, hid behind the clouds, making the day suddenly gray.
The girl felt cold sweat form on her back as measured footsteps sounded nearby.
With her forehead touching the ground, she tried to see who it was, when she noticed something that made her heart pound like a bell.
'That's...'
From the nearby bushes emerged a young man, about twenty years old. He wore simple traveler's clothes, and his face was adorned with prominent cheekbones and a strong jaw.
He was now looking around at the scene with concentration.
When his gaze fell on the altar, he sighed heavily, and a look of deep irritation appeared in his eyes.
"Damn fools..." he muttered under his breath, approaching. He looked with disgust at the dried goat's blood, the wrinkled apples, and the jug sticky with honey.
His gaze soon fell on the stone statue, which he approached with grimace on his face. He tapped it with his finger in disdain, and a sinister glint appeared in his eyes.
"How many times have they rebuilt this aberration?"
His eyes scanned the remaining gifts until they stopped on a small, rolled-up piece of parchment, pressed to the altar by a stone.
He unrolled it and read the prayer written in crooked letters. His expression grew gloomier by the moment.
"'...may his wrath fall upon the heads of our neighbors...'" he read aloud, and his ears seemed to turn red with anger. It was clear he was struggling to contain his rising indignation.
The she-devil, watching in terror, felt her heart beating so hard she had no idea what to do. The stranger's aura was so overwhelming that sweat began to prickle at her hairline.
The man himself was about to crush the parchment into a ball and throw it into the woods when his gaze... fell on the girl!
The sight was so unexpected that he had to rub his eyes to make sure he was seeing correctly.
He stood motionless for a moment, processing what he saw. His face transformed from irritation, to disbelief, and finally to pure, unbridled fury.
"What in the hell is this?!" his voice, enhanced by cultivation, shook the leaves on the trees.
This man was, of course, Justinian the Just, the infamous Grim Judge, to whom the local devils regularly made offerings.
Several weeks had passed since his return to hell and the end of the Hell's Pilgrimage. Weeks during which his reputation had grown to legendary, even monstrous, proportions.
Some small nobles had officially put a price on his head, the devils from the mountains feared him, and the local devils—the villagers—left him offerings, praying fervently that he would just go away.
His name was whispered with dread, and tales of his ruthless nature and cruel strength became a regular topic in the homes of the 66th Hell's inhabitants. All of this, of course, was to his great irritation.
The girl, at the sound of his outraged voice, squeaked in terror and curled up even smaller.
"Please, don't eat me!" she sobbed, much to her own shame.
The young man's eyes widened at her words.
To the she-devil, it was clearly because he was not used to being refused.
"Have... have you lost your mind?" he asked, his brow furrowed, barely controlling his anger.
"I can clean... I also know how to do laundry!" the red-skinned woman began to list her merits.
The "deity" standing before her, however, was not known for mercy, as she well knew. Seeing his face contort further, tears began to stream from her eyes.
"I can even... cook..."
"Enough!" he cut her off and began to stride toward her with decisive, quick steps.
The woman expected the worst, seeing as he wanted to play with her first before tearing out her beating heart. From her view, smiling menacingly and barely controlling his expression, he said slowly.
"Get up. I'm taking you home."
The girl looked at him in disbelief, and then with even greater terror. She knew the legends of the local deities and guessed what he wanted to do.
'He didn't like me as an offering, so now he wants to ravage the village...'
She immediately began to sob even louder than before, which made the man standing in front of her... genuinely unsure of what to do.
Obviously, to him, this was a farce. He didn't want to eat anyone, inflict plagues, and he certainly didn't want any sacrifices.
Inwardly, he was cursing his sad fate and the fact that all the inhabitants of the area were deathly afraid of him. He had, after all, the best of intentions and had no plans to harm anyone.
But what could he do when his reputation preceded him?
"No! I can't!" the she-devil finally shouted. "If I go back, you'll put a terrible curse on our village! My whole family will die in agony!"
Justinian felt a vein pulse in his temple. Sometimes he really felt that the matter would be simpler if he just, for example, threw a few plagues here and there. But that did not align with his crystal-clear character.
"In that case, I'll just leave you here," he finally replied after a short pause.
"No way!" the she-devil shrieked with even more fear in her voice.
The girl stubbornly shook her head, a fanatical determination in her eyes. She didn't want to go back and she couldn't agree to the offering being rejected. She was afraid for her family, for the whole village.
Justinian stood over her for a moment, feeling a sense of powerlessness wash over him. Trying to smile in the most gentle way possible, he looked into her eyes and asked,
"Can you do... anything else?"
Bogna, seeing his eyes seemingly peer into the depths of her soul, froze.
Before being given as an offering, this was what she had feared the most. Her tear-wet eyes blinked sadly, and her cheeks flushed crimson as she confessed,
"I'm still a virgin... I... I don't know...." she began to shake her head, ashamed.
The young man in front of her looked at her misconception in disbelief didn't know whether to laugh or cry.
With a sigh of resignation, he thought about the whole situation for a while finally made the decision.
"All right, let's see if you actually can cook."
Then, he turned and started walking, slow enough so she could catch on. His destination the Mountain of Plague and Misfortune.
