Deus Necros - Chapter 666: Dukedom of Despair (666)
Chapter 666: Dukedom of Despair (666)
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He didn’t say it as prophecy. He said it as a diagnosis. The palace had been an echo chamber of power, but echoes came from somewhere real. And whatever the Holy Order is doing in Solania isn’t enough.
“You feel it… don’t you, that the waves are also affecting you…”
“You mean Wrath?” Ludwig replied.
Gale’s mental voice lowered, “It does not enjoy sharing its Vessel.”
“It’s not in control, never will be…”
Ludwig’s certainty was iron. He refused to entertain the idea of surrendering to Wrath. Even the suggestion tasted like weakness, even without the Serene Water of the Elves.
“The Death of the Wrathful Death seemed to bring some unfortunate events along with it, but are you capable of controlling your emotional imbalance? Not even Envy was able to suppress Wrath.” Gale added.
The words tightened something in Ludwig’s head, not fear, but irritation at being forced to acknowledge the truth. He could feel it more lately, a scraping presence under his thoughts, not enough to steer him, enough to make every annoyance sharper.
“It isn’t that I’m losing control,” Ludwig said, “It’s just that I’m now easily irritable; it seems that having two parts of two different Usurpers is making them compete for dominance, though they’ll never obtain it, it’s just grating and annoying to deal with for me. Two of them are scraping against each other in my skill… is…. Irritating basically”
He spoke like a man describing a malfunctioning mechanism. That was the most tolerable way to frame it. If he framed it emotionally, it became something softer, something closer to confession. Ludwig didn’t confess. He reported.
“Wrath consumed Envy once.”
“I’m not Envy…”
“No,” Gale agreed, “You’re far worse…”
Ludwig could only give him a humorless smile. “Good.”
The carriage moved while Ludwig talked with Knight King Gale.
The rhythm of the wheels and hooves became background, steady enough to keep the world from feeling still.
The city gave way to the infrastructure around it, roads designed for armies and supplies, guarded stretches where travelers learned not to linger.
Ludwig watched the passing scenery without interest. He wasn’t here to admire land. He was here to follow a compass needle to a woman who had already escaped death once.
Soon, they arrived at the teleportation gate, and Ludwig took it without hesitation to Letonia.
********
The gate’s air had the cold scent of old stone and warding metals, a place where space felt thinner, stretched by magic and reinforced by discipline.
Ludwig didn’t pause to stare at the architecture. He stepped forward and let the world fold.
The moment he arrived, the cold air immediately struck his face. Not that he cared for cold nor heat.
The sensation still registered, more as information than discomfort. The north’s cold had a different texture, sharper, drier, less forgiving.
He didn’t shiver. He didn’t flinch. His body didn’t bargain with temperature the way a living body did.
His body was far different from that of normal people, but the sudden change from the warm region of Lufondal to the colder north was quite the sight.
The sky looked heavier here. The light felt less generous, and the air carried a smell that did not belong in a functioning city.
Rot.
Decay.
He looked around.
Cracked stone. Sagging roofs. Eyes that avoided his.
The streets were the kind that absorbed footsteps instead of reflecting them, damp and worn, lined with buildings that looked tired of standing.
Plaster peeled. Wood beams bowed. People moved with their heads lowered, not in reverence, but in self-preservation, as if eye contact was an invitation for trouble. Ludwig took it in quickly, mapping alleys, angles, distances, the way you did when you expected violence.
“What’s this place?” Ludwig asked as he was surprised by the sight he was seeing.
“We’re at the Dukedom of Drak,” one of the guards said, “Shouldn’t the guy at the other side of the gate have told you?” he said.
The guard’s tone was casual in the way soldiers got when they stopped expecting things to make sense.
Ludwig turned slightly toward him, noting the insignia, the posture, the fact that the man spoke as if he’d had this conversation too many times.
“I was told it leads to Letonia…” Ludwig said as he saw nothing but rundown streets, houses that barely were able to support themselves. More beggars than normal people on the streets.
“Well it does…”
“Are we in the slums?” Ludwig said.
He asked it because his eyes insisted on the conclusion. This looked like the outer ring of a city, the part most nobles pretended didn’t exist.
“No, we’re at the Heart of the Dukedom…The capital” The guards said.
“This heart looks like it stopped beating though…” Ludwig said.
A bitter observation, but accurate. A capital was supposed to broadcast stability. This place broadcasts surrender.
“Ah, you don’t know… new guy, I suppose?” The guard asked.
“Kinda, this is my first time,” Ludwig said.
“Unlucky…” the guard said.
“That bad?” Ludwig asked.
“It’s worse…” the guards said.
“Rumors?”
“The new Duke is… well, he’s not right in the head. There are rumors that he’s cursed. People end up dying…”
“For what crimes?” Ludwig asked.
“Depends on his mood.” After a pause, like remembering something, the guard said, “Last week, a baker hanged for over-salting bread.”
The detail wasn’t meant to impress. It was meant to warn.
Ludwig’s eyes narrowed slightly, not in shock, in confirmation. Tyranny always started with small, absurd punishments, the kind that trained the population to accept anything.
“That’s not governance… that’s tyranny…” Ludwig noted.
“That’s what we call it now, though. Can’t say otherwise,e can’t go against it,” the guard shrugged.
The shrug wasn’t indifference. It was survival. Ludwig could see the guard’s restraint, the way his eyes flicked briefly around as if checking who might be listening.
He then lowered his voice, as if trying not to be heard. “They say his dead brother speaks to him.”
“Speaks?” Ludwig tilted his head. Was the Duke into necromancy and dark magic?
“At night,” he shrugged, “By morning, someone’s swinging…”
Ludwig absorbed the pattern. Night whispers, morning executions. Whether it was madness, manipulation, or something genuinely dead, it produced the same result: bodies.
“How come you’re telling me this easily then? Others would fear they’d be swinging by morning.” Ludwig asked.
The man working the gate tapped his chest, pointing at a small phoenix symbol.
The guard tapped the phoenix insignia on his chest.
“Imperial Gate Division. Touch one of us, it’s treason against the Emperor himself.”
“Convenient protection.”
“Hard-earned protection,” the guard corrected. “We guard the roads armies use.”
Ludwig’s eyes lingered on the symbol.
“So you’re untouchable.”
The guard smiled faintly.
“Untouchable enough.”
A beat.
“If you’re smart, you’ll finish your business and leave. This place is rotting from the top down.”
“And if I’m not smart?”
The guard’s smile disappeared.
“Then don’t look up at the palace too long. They’ve started noticing who does.”
Ludwig didn’t need to ask anymore. The whole city was corrupted and collapsing. The Nobles were killing civilians, the Holy Order wasn’t caring for someone who might be using Dark Arts, and the smell of burnt flesh from the high peaks of Solania could reach all the way here, where he stood.
Something’s rotten in here…
