Chapter 42: The Dominion Effect

  A few moments before everything went downhill on Government Square, Lily had still been arguing with the mayor and the priest. While exchanging words, she had quietly taken the time to assess the scene in front of her. And something about it felt wrong. It was not the fact that they had come out to confront her; that part was expected. She was, after all, literally in the process of taking over their city. But the way they had done it, and the people they had brought with them, made little sense.

  Through her helmet’s visor, she scanned the two groups again. For a city this large, she had expected at least more capable adventurers. She didn’t know what exactly she had expected, but not something like this.

  The first group, the one that had come from the city castle, made at least a little sense. The mayor had probably taken every guardsman he could find inside the city castle walls. There hadn’t been much time between her appearance at the market square and her arrival here, so she could understand the rushed mobilization. Even the few mages present from the Mage Guild could just be mages working for the city anyway, which would explain their more uniform clothing. But the group from the church was different.

  Something about them felt wrong.

  The priest was standing there, pretending to be calm, yet every movement of his hands betrayed tension. The only ones in this group who looked capable, and were probably actually dangerous, were the two paladins standing behind him. The rest of the people with him were a mess. For adventurers, they were really not well equipped. Lily saw maybe one or two enchanted items among them, but the majority wore random mismatched armor pieces. Yet when she looked closer, she noticed something even stranger.

  They moved too evenly. Their steps were slightly in sync, their eyes following the priest like trained soldiers waiting for a signal. They reminded her more of puppets, than of adventurers, even the soldiers weren’t so unified. It was subtle, but they all reacted to the priest’s voice, even when he was not shouting.

  Her gaze lingered on the priest again, narrowing behind the helmet. His aura was faint, barely visible, but the moment she focused, she could see a soft shimmer surrounding him. It wasn’t divine light, nor was it mana from a protection spell. It was something deeper and more invasive, thin tendrils of faint golden light that pulsed like veins around his body, stretching faintly toward the people around him.

  A control aura, she realized. He’s using a mass compulsion. That explains the behavior. The “adventurers” aren’t here by choice.

  Her jaw tightened. She had seen that kind of thing before, back in Xantia. It had been one of the darker sides of the Church classes, usually used by the more twisted branches that founded [evil]-aligned churches, like the Church of Chtululu, because you needed certain requirements to unlock spell branches invasive enough to mess with the mind. Sure, it was possible that certain cleric types could use holy influence to bind weaker minds, turning them into temporary zealots, even in [good]-aligned churches, and Lily wasn’t by far someone who knew everything about those branches. But at least in her understanding, it was strange that a priest—even one from that fucked-up Church of Luxandra—had such control spells in his repertoire.

  Because in Lily’s understanding, the control aura should be a variation of [Aura-of-Dominion], which was, in fact, a skill you could only learn if you were [evil]-aligned. And that made it even stranger, because to unlock variations of core skills, you needed higher class evolutions. That could only mean the priest had learned the skill because someone had taught it to him. Since this priest was never anywhere near the level range required for a higher class evolution, and obviously not [evil]-aligned, it was the first truly interesting thing about skills from others that Lily had seen in this world which actually surprised her.

  But since she was also in the middle of starting a fight with the local forces and shit-talking the mayor, she didn’t really have time to think more about it. At least she realized something else while watching the skill in action. He really wants to turn this into a fucking massacre.

  And the realization changed her view of the situation again. She did not want to begin a senseless slaughter here, especially when her enemies were being forced to act against her through some mind fuckery. No, there was no real fighting force in front of her. There were just manipulated pawns and one very self-righteous priest who thought himself untouchable under his goddess’s name.

  And although something deep inside her, a small inner voice, said that it didn’t matter, that they were all worms anyway, that she should just take her sword and do it like in Xantia—kill everything until nothing was left that could resist—Lily didn’t want to cross that border. Not after she already felt she had crossed a line today that she would never have crossed as Lily Carter.

  Also, the inner drive or voice, or whatever it was that kept assuring her she was just acting normal and that nothing had changed at all, was deeply unsettling, even though it felt so subliminal she almost missed it. She knew she would need a few calm moments later to deal with that.

  Setting those thoughts aside, she sent a short mental pulse to Thirra. When we fight, try to stay low and don’t kill unnecessarily. We’re not here to slaughter them.

  Thirra’s response came back as a low growl at the back of her mind, carrying faint confusion. Lily could feel that Thirra did not understand why she had ordered it not to kill anyone. I understand, Princess… the Demonbound finally answered, its tone reluctant but obedient.

  When the priest raised his arms and started his dramatic outburst—“You heard the words of the demon! She wants to kill every man, woman, and child in this city so she can dance on your corpses and spit on your graves! Will you let her?”—Lily almost groaned.

  For real, what is his problem?

  But it was not the ridiculous words that caught her attention. It was what happened right after. The faint shimmer around his body brightened. The tendrils of light stretched outward, touching the minds of those around him like invisible threads.

  For a moment, she could feel it, a low vibration spreading through the square, not physical but emotional, seeping into the hearts of the adventures behind the priest. Fear, anger, hatred, all mixed and stirred by divine compulsion.

  And then the shouting began.

  The adventurers howled in fury, their eyes wild and unfocused, their hands gripping their weapons as if their lives depended on killing her. The magic users behind them began chanting spells, their movements stiff and mechanical, almost robotic.

  Lily sighed softly and tilted her head, her sword still pointed at the mayor. So this is what passes for faith around here, she thought. A priest hiding behind mind control and cheap words. Not that I had high expectations after Lucien…

  She could already see exactly how the situation would unfold. The mayor’s guards would follow the priest’s command, the adventurers would charge without thinking, and the mages would lose control of their spells halfway through because they were chanting under pressure. The whole thing would turn into a massacre if she did not handle it properly.

  But there was no reason to end the charade just yet.

  She glanced upward toward the church tower, where Ekkra had slipped out of a window and was already perched like a shadow. His eyes were locked onto his mission. That meant she could simply let things play out for now, and go with the flow.

  After all, as a Spellblade, she only had the bare minimum of support skills to break mind control. Technically she could overpower the priest’s spell with an even stronger domination ability, but that would defeat the purpose entirely.

  Alright, she thought, focusing her mana as the air began to vibrate around her armor. Then let’s make this quick and clean.

  She lifted her sword slightly, the [Nocturne Crownblade] humming with power. The blade’s runes began to glow, their dark crimson light reflecting against the pale stone of the square.

  Thirra shifted beside her, lowering its body, eyes locked on the charging people.

  When Lily saw the charge through her helmet, the view behind her visor was not so different from what she remembered from the game, and for a moment, a strange sense of nostalgia washed over her. It felt like being back in Xantia, like she was home again. And then it came back, that unsettling yet familiar feeling, the one whispering that this had always been her life, that she belonged here, living exactly like this.

  Stolen novel; please report.

  With a quiet breath and a faint grin, she muttered, “Ah, fuck it,” before raising her sword high and shouting to keep appearances, “Thirra—show them their place!”

  ???

  After the priest vanished into his cloak spell, he gave the now battlefield one last glance before turning away. The demon had already begun to swing that ridiculously oversized sword of hers at the charging crowd. For a moment, he almost stayed to watch. He would have loved to see her and that abomination beside her get torn apart by the faithful, but he was realistic enough to know that would not happen.

  Only half an hour earlier, he had finally received a message from Veythral through an urgent [Sanctum Courier], and the message had given every reason for concern. It warned that foul forces were moving, and that they were moving here, in Tiara. It contained a summary of several reports, mentioning the sudden reappearance of an old guild named Doomsday, which claimed to still be part of the long-forgotten and damned Empire of Xares. There was also a warning attached because the guild was still officially ranked as Ascended.

  Even though the message also confirmed that the [Holy Saint] herself was on her way with a crusade, that reassurance brought its own problems. The timing was terrible. Lucien had gone out only minutes before the message arrived, sent to meet an elf named Lysaria Greenwood. That name was explicitly mentioned in the report as an exceptionally dangerous individual affiliated with the old guild Doomsday.

  That alone had been enough to make his stomach tighten.

  The Holy Saint was departing from Veythral, which meant she would need at least a week to reach Tiara, even using the Ecclesia’s teleport network. The network was vast, yes, but not as convenient as outsiders thought. Each teleport hub could only cover a few thousand miles because of the immense energy required, and between each hub there was still distance to travel by land. From Veythral to Burm required four teleport hops, and the last hub was located in Burma, the capital of Burm, itself. From there, the Holy Saint would still have to travel the rest of the way on foot with her crusade, and that meant at least several more days.

  Only twenty minutes after receiving the message, the priest of the Ecclesia had gotten word of what had happened on Tiara’s market square. At first, he had thought it was some kind of sick joke, another false alarm stirred up by adventurers. But when confirmation came that there really was a demon attacking the town, he merely sighed at his own bad luck. The timing was unfortunate, but sometimes demon outbreaks happened, and it probably had something to do with the cultist incident from yesterday.

  He had reacted quickly. Taking the two paladins stationed in Tiara, he went straight to the Adventurers’ Guild, which stood right beside the Church of Tiara. The city guards were already being gathered by the mayor, and since this was declared a demon outbreak, the Church immediately granted the priest full command over all faithful in the area. It didn’t matter if they were farmers, soldiers, bankers, or anything else, the followers of the Goddess were to obey the clergy without question in times of crisis.

  It was not the first time he had been granted such authority. Every major church had an artifact for that purpose, passed down from one head priest to the next. The one in Tiara was known as the [Censer of Sanctified Ashes]. It was an ancient orb sealed within the altar that could project [Aura of Dominion: Word of Subjugation], a spell designed to bind the faithful together in moments of great need.

  He had used it without hesitation. The artifact’s power spread through the church like smoke, coating the air with shimmering threads of divine energy. It was not mind control—at least, not officially—but it guided hearts, unified will, and made obedience feel righteous. In a true crisis, it turned chaos into order. The faithful needed to follow the word of the Goddess, and when the Goddess was absent, only a priest of the Ecclesia could decide what was right for them.

  He had gathered everyone present, from the guild hall and the Government Square, and led them first into the church to wait for the demon, then out to confront her. He had expected the mayor’s troops to join in soon after. Together, it should have been no problem to kill that foul creature. Demon outbreaks could be bad, but since there was reportedly only one greater demon with a lesser demon at her side, he wasn’t worried at all. Not only were the two paladins at his side both over level 350, he also had a few aces up his sleeve. But first, the faithful should weaken it.

  But when he heard her speak—when that creature called herself Princess Lilithia Nocturne of the damned Empire and Guildmaster of Doomsday—he realized instantly that the message from Veythral and this event were indeed connected.

  That was the moment he understood that Tiara was already lost.

  There was no need to stay and die in a futile stand. It was far more important to preserve the Church’s sacred artifacts and ensure that the true faithful would survive to fight again. They had already lost one Inquisitor; he would not lose the paladins or the relics as well.

  Invisible beneath his cloaking spell, the priest turned his back on the chaos outside. The sounds of battle echoed faintly through the air, the roar of fire, the clash of steel, the guttural cry of something inhuman. The light from the church windows flickered red as spells detonated in the square.

  He walked through the open doors and into the dim hall, the incense still thick in the air. Every step he took echoed softly against the marble floor. His mind was calm now, cold and clear. The demoness could have her spectacle. Tiara was already finished, but the Ecclesia would endure.

  He glanced once more toward the altar, “May the Goddess guide your hand, Holy Saint,” he murmured under his breath. “When you arrive, I will have prepared the offering.”

  Then he turned, fading deeper into the church’s shadowed corridors, leaving the screams of the square behind him.

  ???

  Back on Government Square, chaos had already swallowed the city’s heart.

  Lily could have ended this faster. She could have killed them all by now, but at first, she didn’t want to. There was no reason to kill everyone present unnecessarily. Morality aside, it would only bite her in the ass later if she became known as the one who slaughtered everyone who stood in her way. It would make things far harder when it came to actually dealing with people afterward.

  She also knew she had neither the time nor the knowledge to manage a city this size completely on her own. This wasn’t a game anymore. There were no easy systems, no macros to automate the boring parts while she focused on fighting. Everything needed real people.

  And second, the other reason she didn’t want to finish too fast was the crowd behind her. Hundreds of eyes were still following her every move. They needed to see her dominance, to understand that she was in control of the city, of the soldiers, of everything from now on. That she wasn’t just another monster rampaging through their streets but something higher. If she ended this too quickly, they might come to the wrong conclusions and start doubting her superiority. It might sound irrational, but people tended to believe in a good show more than in a brief spark of power.

  So, she fought in a way that made that clear.

  She hit the soldiers’ heads with the flat of her sword, adjusting her strength here and there, knocking out everyone she struck. She even took some of the spells without dodging. Her armor was more than enough to handle it, and she doubted most of their attacks could even harm her without it. Still, she made a little show of it, stepping back slightly when hit and letting sparks scatter across her armor so it looked more dramatic.

  Thirra, on the other hand, had much more trouble controlling its strength. The Demonbound’s instincts were harder to tame, and the soldiers charging at it paid the price. An arm flew here, a gaping wound opened there, another leg was torn off. It was a brutal display, and despite her earlier order, it was clear that Thirra’s version of restraint looked very different from hers.

  When the attackers began to slow and finally stopped charging her, Lily tightened her grip on the [Nocturne Crownblade] and surged forward. The blade cut through the haze of smoke gathering across the square, rising from the scattered flames left behind by the mages’ fire spells. Its deep crimson glow spilled across the shattered stones beneath her boots as she advanced.

  The first soldier in her path barely had time to react before she swung. The flat of her sword slammed into his chest with a sharp crack, sending him flying several meters backward. He crashed into two others, knocking all three out cold in a single sweeping motion.

  Another came at her from the side, shouting something about the Goddess, but Lily didn’t even listen. She stepped into the swing of his sword and caught it with her gauntlet. Sparks flashed, metal screeched, and with a short movement she twisted his weapon out of his hands. Her knee came up, catching him in the stomach, and he collapsed, gasping.

  All around her the battle raged, but she moved through it with a strange calm. Spells streaked across the air, painting trails of light that burst against the ground or her armor. She could feel the heat and pressure, but none of it pierced her. When a fireball hit her square in the chest, she only took one slow step back and let the flames roll off her. The crowd behind her gasped, exactly as she wanted.

  She kept advancing. The soldiers broke formation the closer she came. Some tried to surround her, others hesitated, their fear growing with every second. She swung the sword again, not to kill but to crush, the flat side connecting with a man’s shoulder and sending him spinning away.

  Thirra roared somewhere to her right, the sound shaking the ground. The Demonbound’s claws struck the cobblestone, scattering sparks as it tore through another group. Lily saw a flash of armor, before Thirra’s fist smashed him into a wall.

  Hold back, Thirra, she ordered mentally. No more killing.

  She pushed forward again, and the soldiers began to retreat, dragging their wounded with them. Lily stood in the center of it all, her blade resting against her shoulder, her breathing steady as she scanned the square for the mayor, who had vanished somewhere in the chaos. Around her, at least fifty people lay unconscious. A few arms and legs were scattered among the fallen, and some of them were definitely dead.

  Since the fighting had finally begun to calm down, she sighed. Lowering her sword, she raised her voice so it carried across the square.

  “Where is Mayor Rottfeld?” she called out, her tone sharp and clear. “His little reign ends now. Since I came here only to claim back what is rightfully part of the Empire, I have held back—for the sake of the people of this beautiful city. But my patience has its limits.”

  She lifted the [Nocturne Crownblade], letting its crimson light flare once more.

  “I’ll take over the city here and now.”

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