Netori: Stealing The Hero's Party!

"We should have some privacy from that goddess now," she said, leaning against the tablet next to her.

"What the fuck are you two on?\' Glancing between the two, Raven has had enough of their cryptic messaging. "Just say what you mean already!"

Silence lingered for a moment following his words, but then reaching for his helmet Markus took it off revealing a dark flame with burning green eyes glaring at Raven. He wasn\'t human…And Raven had no idea. Even now as he was staring at him, he couldn\'t believe that a king\'s royal guard was an undead spirit.

"It wasn\'t a keeper that we can sense on you, it\'s a demon lord\'s war general…" Despite the lack of his helmet, his voice echoed as if it were still inside a metal box.

"We doubt Athenia knows, but even if she does, she\'ll likely keep pushing you to march to your death," Helga chimed, getting Raven\'s attention back on her.

What he\'d thought was supposed to be a discussion about zealous nobles had turned into something far more sinister. He had no doubt that what Markus had said to him before was a lie just to get him to the Lifeclover without having to explain things too much.

"I\'m still fucking confused…" Grabbing his head, he could feel his head throbbing with a headache. Yet powering through, he glanced between the two again before asking them further. "Why the theatrics then? Pushing me out of your house? Lying to me about the demon general? Why not just tell me how things are?!"

Heaving a sigh, Helga began moving closer to Raven.

"Because we didn\'t want the goddess to know that you know who you\'re facing.

Because if it comes down to it, she\'ll discard you the moment her goals have been achieved even if it means pitting you against a demon lord general," distrustful of gods and goddesses, Helga as well as Markus, neither wanted Raven to face the demon general, and not because they cared for him, but rather to ensure that Athenia doesn\'t get what she wants.

"Even if you somehow manage to get rid of his underlings, you can\'t defeat a general and the only thing you\'ll end up doing is agitate him to take even more extreme actions."

Moving his hand off of his aching head, Raven tried to process what Helga had just said. Although even when he began to understand where she was coming from, he knew that he couldn\'t just back away.

"I…" Raising his head, he looked into the barbarian\'s blue eyes. "Made a promise, and I intend to uphold it one way or the other. Besides, raw strength isn\'t the only thing you need to take down an enemy, or else, plenty of horrors would\'ve easily killed both me and the rest of my par–"

Feeling a hand on the back of his shoulder, Raven cut his words short and turned around to look. Markus said not a word and simply stared into his eyes, and for a moment, the sight of a battlefield that stretched in all directions flashed before Raven\'s eyes. Knees deep in blood and gore, the dark knight was dragging himself, and to his front was a pale-skinned giant.

Pale as a pig and just as fat, the snouted monster had screaming children tied to his limbs. In one hand he held a torch that burned the heads of humans like a torch and in the other was a spiky shield covered in viscera with at least a thousand live human faces stitched onto its surface.

The vision lasted only a moment, yet as he was pulled out of it, the mage could still taste the blood burning down his throat. Neither Helga nor Markus had to say a word about what he\'d seen, but Raven knew exactly who was responsible for that sea of blood.

"A demon lord general, alone?"

"A lesser minion of one…" Helga\'s words chilled him to the core.

His heart raced with uncertainty and his mind followed soon after. Next came his blood, running slow and cold in spite of his racing heart, and lastly the jitters in his fingers as a faint sense of fear began gripping at his heart.

"If we were to fight one, Helga and I combined, at this point in our lives, even we couldn\'t guarantee a win, so without a doubt, none of you children stand a chance," turned to an undead spirit to eternally serve Murdock, Markus didn\'t wish for another god to exploit another person, be they the party of heroes or even a commoner.

"But if you\'re gonna fight…" To the surprise of both Raven and Markus, Helga offered a third path. "And it\'s not because the goddess ordered you to, then you better kill that monster, or else it\'ll come raging to our cities."

With a brief pause, Helga turned to the door that led into Linkle\'s workshop.

"If you truly have a reason, a promise, then only will I help you fight, even if that means a certain death," grabbing the door handle, she turned to look at the men. "And don\'t think I\'m doing this because I care about whatever mission you\'re on, I just don\'t want that monster making it to Athenia to lay its foul fingers on my daughters."

"Helga! Don\'t encourage him!" Markus rebutted, his feet stomping the ground as he rushed to the barbarian.

"Shut up, Markus. I hate the gods just as much as you do, but if the kid wants to kill himself fighting against a general, then I\'d rather be there and die than watch that monster make it to my home!" Undoing the lock on the door, Helga pushed the door open.

On the other side were the monster girls as well as Linkle in a visibly foul mood.

"Now, the goddess still can\'t hear us, so I\'ll ask," shifting her attention to Raven, Helga asked but only once. "Are you doing this for yourself or because the goddess asked you to?"

\'Promise me…\' Those words by Lilith echoed in Raven\'s head, thus clenching his fist and steeling his heart, the mage raised his head with a stupid smile on his face.

"Yeah, I wanna die on this hill."

And so it was time, time for preparations, and not because the goddess had asked him to, but on pure principles.

"Ughh…You\'re both idiots," grabbing the back of Raven\'s shirt, Markus slipped his spectral hand into the mage\'s heart. "But if you\'re gonna do something stupid, then at least do it without your enemy spying on you!"

"AGHH!" Feeling as if his spine was being ripped apart, Raven gritted his teeth tight while the spectral undead pulled out the spying horror–the very same Raven had encountered smiling over his shoulder in the Arachne cave.