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    Father Abraham’s speech was surprisingly persuasive, even with my mist resistance. He called us all together into an informal huddle in the middle of the room, dragging tables together, and sat up on one of them smiling benevolently at everyone. “Friends, you know me, you know my mission. I seek only peace between land and sea.”


    Some of the parishioners nodded, but a few, who must have been new, looked bewildered. One of them, a lean girl with wild eyes and braided hair scoffed. “Peace? The Pale Men come from the waves to kill and eat us. How are we supposed to have peace?”


    Abraham smiled benevolently at her. “Ah, but are they the only ones who plunder? Do we not fish from their waters, killing the living things to collect their bones for their usefulness? I think you’ll find that if you look back, it was we who invaded first. The depths of the sea have done their best to keep us away, releasing the mist to drive us back, seeking only their solitude. Humans are hungry, greedy creatures, it is we who insist on stealing the bounty of the waves.”


    She bristled. “Are you saying our lives aren’t worth as much as FISH?”


    “Are the lives of all living things not valuable?” he asked benevolently. “Can one put a price on a living existence? I admit, there have been grave sins on both sides, but just as someone cast the first stone, so too must someone lay down the first sword. At the Deepchild Collective, we believe that with enough time and persistence, we can reach a common understanding with those beneath the waves, and aim to create a better world together.”


    Another man, this one tall and tan, smiled at her encouragingly. “I know it sounds odd, but the father really believes in coexistence. Don’t look at the Pale Men, who are only weapons unleashed to drive us back, many of the creatures below the ocean are wise and benevolent. The father has told us many stories, and there’s a lot we can learn from them.”


    I was disgusted. I’d heard that thing in the pool, had seen the tentacled monstrosity in the depths. The oceans were not some benevolent undersea kingdom of misunderstood creatures. They were fucking death traps full of nightmarish abominations.


    The worst part was, I UNDERSTOOD. He wasn’t selling them the ocean, he was selling them hope. They’d lived their lives in this despicable cage world, trapped on the islands and constantly assaulted. The mists undoubtedly increased misery wherever they got by the candles, even when they didn’t have a chance to convert anyone to a Pale Man.


    Not to mention the fucking bone coins. SOMEONE in the higher ups of Skartaris the Weeper’s organization had to understand what those did. There was no way they ACCIDENTALLY built their society around evil hate batteries.


    Which made me think of the cloak in the Ghost Bone Tranquility Tower. He had seemed benevolent and helpful, like he was taking our side…but was he? Going out of his way to introduce us to the coins, not to mention the NAME of the tower was incredibly suspicious when taken in the context of this cult and the coins themselves.


    These people were being kept in conditions approaching torture by their overlords, all of them pushed the point of mental and emotional exhaustion. Thinking about it, Malzareth’s Mistwardens were ostensibly protection, but Wesley had implied they mostly bullied and extorted, making things worse, and we’d seen no signs of them when the Pale Men attacked, either.


    The more I saw of this place, the angrier I got. And someone like Abraham, who had essentially abandoned humanity to side with the monsters who prayed on them, disgusted me even more. I wasn’t one to put value on a nebulous concept like ‘humanity’, mind. I turned myself into a part time fallen angel, and some of my best friends weren’t human, but there was a difference between a racial trait and becoming a toady for predatory monsters that ate people’s misery.


    I wondered how involved the vanished gods were in all this. Were they really just taking advantage of an opportunity? But I decided that line of thought wasn’t useful. Being careful was fine, but going down a rabbit hole trying to connect unrelated issues wouldn’t do anything but send me into a spiral.


    Father Abraham, meanwhile, was just getting warmed up. “It’s true, my child,” he beamed. “Beneath waves, in the deepest parts of the world, there are great cities and civilizations, wonders and treasures and knowledge for those brave enough to seek it. The shallows are where the scum of the ocean reside, and the monsters you see breaching the surface are simply criminals and villains to the wise and benevolent sea faring races.”


    I had to flare my Promethean Fire Soul Body hard as he spoke. Something in my head wouldn’t let GO of the image of that thing in the dark. Not even the one Callie saw, just that tentacled monstrosity that had tried to drag her down. It was like an infected splinter in my brain that wouldn’t go away.


    Grimacing, I made a note to spend some time in Leviathan, purifying my consciousness a bit just in case. That seemed like it might become a problem later if left unattended.


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    Abraham continued, speaking of shining underwater cities and wise unknowable creatures with knowledge of great art, science, and philosophy. He spoke of impartial justice systems and crafting masters, and advanced technology. It basically sounded like a dream come true, and I could see even the sceptical girl starting to be won over by his words.


    I was confused as he spoke, not understanding the goal here. He was giving them hope, making them feel happy and excited and all the things that weren’t useful for him. It wasn’t until he finished talking and the parishioners dispersed that I realized what he’d been doing. As they left, the spell of his stories faded. In comparison to that fantastical ideal world, the current darkness seemed even bleaker, was even more unbearable.


    With my Perception, I was able to see the hearts of these people breaking as they were yanked out of their beautiful dream and shoved back into the cold hard grasp of reality.


    Why were they DOING this? What was the Void Child gaining. Power, I assumed, but to what end? Why create this terrible place and fill it with these suffering people. Why engineer this system to purposefully torment them. Was it trying to break out? But it must have been involved with creating the void barrier around this place. Couldn’t it just go back to the void? I was missing something. Possibly a lot of somethings.


    I approached Father Abraham, putting on a look of wonder. “Father, that was so amazing. Can such a wonderful place really exist?”


    “It does exist,” he said warmly. “I’ve seen it. The cities beneath the sea are wonders of the modern age. Towering monoliths are as common as cabbage and great heroes exist on every corner. Most of my flock will never have a chance to see such sights, but you, Wayne, are a bit special. Would you be interested in joining our collective? You would need to earn your place before descending, but in a few years, you too could dive beneath the waves to receive the blessings of the Deepchild.”


    I put on a delighted face. “That sounds amazing! I wonder though, is the Deepchild really only one being? I always assumed the Collective was mentioning multiple entities.”


    “Yes and no,” he said, his expression turning genuinely fanatical. “The Deepchild is the origin and the truth. It descended from the higher world to save us all, and teach us the weakness and sin of this fragile mortal realm. To that end, it spread its love to the great beings in the depths of the sea, for only they could withstand its power. From these unions came the Abyssal Lords, its trueborn children, the Lords are the ones who created those great cities.”


    This was what I’d been looking for here. Learning more about the presence of the Void Child. It seemed like it didn’t act directly very often, preferring to allow the Abyssal Lords to do the dirty work. This meshed well with what I’d seen. That tentacled thing in the deeps that had grabbed Callie must have been an Abyssal Lord, acting on its parent’s behalf.


    If not for Callie’s connection to the Abyss I wouldn’t have even known about the Void Child, and my Perception was nothing to scoff at. I briefly wondered if the thing in the pool was the same Abyssal Lord that had tried to grab my wife, but I decided it probably wasn’t. We were a long way from where that happened, and it sounded like there were more than a few of these creepy things. Hopefully not TOO many, but enough that I didn’t think we’d run into the same one so quickly.


    “What would I need to do?” I asked hesitantly. “In the collective. I’m not good at much, I’m just ok in a fight. If you need me to do anything complicated I might not be able to help.”


    He clapped me on the shoulder. “Not at all. In fact, you’ll be perfect for what we have in mind. See, sometimes when we help the less fortunate, people take advantage of our hospitality. They steal from us, hoard supplies, and drain our resources. Most of these people are despicable liars who will never admit what they’ve done. Even in their last moments they claim to be the victims, trying to invert good and evil and frame us.”


    I had a bad feeling about this, but I gave him a ‘puzzled’ frown. “There are such people?”


    “Far too many of them,” he sighed with an air of faux melancholy. “And that’s why we need a big strong lad like you. We need you to track these villains down and take back the things they stole from us. A smart boy like you won’t be swayed by their insidious lies or their false pleas. By helping us take back what belongs to us you’ll ensure that we have enough resources to help the others in the ministry, undoing the despicable wrongs perpetrated by these heinous thieves.”


    So…he wanted me to rob a bunch of poor people. Classy. I could already see where this was going. He’s send me to ‘repossess’ some of these so called stolen goods, push me to beat these people and rob them, then soak in the suffering as I unknowingly destroyed their lives, all the while twisting my mind until I slowly came to agree with his way of doing things. I wondered if Simon had started out like this. Genuinely optimistic and wanting to do good. How many people had this monster ruined?


    But if you have to manipulate and brainwash someone, a demon is a bad choice, even if only one in spirit. I could play vicious games too.


    Pretending to be unsettled, I chewed my lip, before finally nodding slowly. “I can try. But I don’t know if I can bring myself to resist someone pleading like that, even if I know its false. Can you come with me the first time, Father? With you there to reassure me I’m on a righteous path, I’m sure I can harden my heart to do the right thing.”


    I saw the smugness in his eyes, the slight twitch at the corner of his mouth, and the excited clench of his fists. I wasn’t surprised. With the mist, he should be able to manipulate the target to basically confess, setting up a perfect first outing to begin my corruption.


    Of course, I was just as smug. Providing evidence of him actively participating in robbery and assault would be more than enough reason to evict him from the city, or worse. I would tip off Caladwen and then help her capture him. Once that was done…well, I could question him under Dantalion to learn anything else I needed to know about the Void Child. I couldn’t live with myself if I let this scum walk these streets another day.  It was finally time to act.