Mad Hatter's Guide to Clearing The Game
Chapter 146: Ch144. [World Quest] (4) - [Holy Light]

Chapter 146: Ch144. [World Quest] (4) - [Holy Light]

The world had narrowed to screams, steel, and the stench of rot.

Sarissa’s sword split another undead down the middle, her boots skidding across a blood-slicked plaza. Vyle was down beside her, one leg torn open, but still swinging his blade with grim defiance, healing the wound only enough to allow him some movement.

Iron Roar’s line had broken, Dawnshade’s snipers had fled the rooftops, and Ethercore’s medics were nearly out of mana.

It felt like the end.

And then, light.

Not fire, not spellflare. Not an ability any of them recognized.

A golden pulse, clean, sharp, and holy in a way this world had all but forgotten, rolled over the battlefield like a second dawn.

The undead froze.

Mid-lunge, mid-scream, mid-climb. Dozens of ghouls locked in place like puppets with severed strings. One, barely a foot away from Sarissa’s face, let out a wet hiss and then went still, its eyes wide, claws trembling.

Silence crashed into the plaza, and then came the voice.

"Apologies for the delay." Someone said, smooth and amused through the comms channel. "Took a bit to break through the hordes."

Sarissa turned, her heart pounding in her ears.

A ragged breach in the west border shimmered with residual energy, the kind only teleporters left behind. From its edge, Diego stepped forward, his usually rumpled coat flaring behind him like a cape. His body still glowed with the light of his spell.

Beside him strode Mara, cloak fluttering like a storm behind her, one hand resting on a curved blade, the other holding up a flare crystal. Behind her marched enforcers from the Black Market, all masked, armored, and wielding strange weapons etched with alchemical seals.

And they did not seem to be here to bargain.

They charged with precision, cutting into the frozen undead before they could move again.

"Push them back!" Mara barked.

The guilds did not need to be told twice.

Dawnshade’s remaining snipers rained arrows again from the rooftops, Iron Roar reformed ranks with the enforcers holding their flanks, and Sarissa surged forward, her sword blazing with [Wonderland’s Inferno].

Each ghoul that twitched was met with steel and flame. The plaza became a furnace of vengeance.

The frozen ones began to move again, but slower now, sluggish, as if the light had cracked something inside them. Weakened. Shaken.

"Clear the north alley!" Someone yelled.

"Two coming from the sewer- wait, never mind. They’re down."

Mara’s blade licked fire across the edge of a ghoul’s spine, spinning into a follow-up slash that removed its head. One of the enforcers dropped a vial that shattered in golden flame, incinerating a cluster of corpses near the Ethercore lines.

And Diego... Simply walked forward, his presence radiating something the ghouls could not bear. Where he passed, they backed away. Even when they lunged, their strikes faltered, like they were recoiling from some invisible weight.

"They fear you..." Sarissa muttered, stepping beside him.

"I’d hope so." Diego said lightly, his small frame straight and composed. "I am a walking heresy to their entire system."

Together, they struck down the last of the second wave.

And then, finally, blessedly, stillness.

The kind that did not come from anticipation but completion. The kind that made warriors drop to their knees, trembling and wide-eyed, because they had survived something that should have killed them.

There was no third wave that night.

***

Smoke drifted above the city plaza, rising through broken rooftops and shattered warding lines. The fires had begun to die out, replaced by soft emberlight and the distant crackle of healing spells.

Bodies, both human and inhuman, littered the stone like grotesque offerings.

Sarissa sheathed her blade, then turned to Diego and Mara as they regrouped near the – now completely – ruined monument in the plaza’s center.

She took a breath, slow and deep. Her limbs still ached, and her armor was scorched in three places.

"What in all hells was that?" She asked.

"You tell us. We were minding our own business underground when our warning bells started screaming." Mara gave her a look that was more exhausted than amused.

"And he," she gestured to Diego, "said he had a feeling. So, we prepped a team and followed it."

"You felt that something was wrong?" Sarissa looked to Diego, brow raised.

"I’m very in touch with disturbing energies lately." Diego said. He rolled his shoulder, grimacing. "Those things... They’re not just undead. They’re tethered. Bound to a will. And it reeks of Shinji’s handiwork."

"He’s testing us." Sarissa murmured. "This was just a taste, I’m sure."

"Agreed," Mara said. She nudged one of the corpses with her boot. "These ghouls... Nothing should be able to control living dead like this..." She paused, nose wrinkling. "And they do have Shinji’s kind of flair."

"But they stopped when you arrived." Sarissa said, turning to Diego again. "That light you used... It froze them."

Diego nodded slowly.

"It’s something I discovered after Miles... saved me from Shinji." His voice dipped, quieter. "It stayed with me. The light, I mean. Like a scar that glows. It’s a skill called [Holy Light], and it can be used both to heal and to destroy [Undead] monsters. The ghouls Shinji controls, whatever dark engine powers them, they don’t like purity. Light. Hope, if you want to be poetic."

"You always do." Mara muttered.

"But here’s the problem." Diego went on. "I can’t just walk around casting that everywhere. It drains me out, and I can’t just walk by without the enforcers escorting me now. The Black Market has made me into some kind of saint."

"Wait- what?"

"You missed the fallout after your little performance, Sarissa." Mara smirked. "Word spread about Diego healing half a dozen dying scavengers while quoting dead poets and glowing like a holy relic."

"I didn’t quote anything..." Diego said, defensive.

"You literally said, ’To walk in darkness is not to be lost, but to seek the shape of dawn.’ That’s quoting."

"... Okay, maybe once. Or twice..." Diego winced.

"So now what? You can’t leave the Black Market?" Sarissa blinked.

"He needs a guard detail every time." Mara said. "He steps out alone, people try to follow him. Touch him. Preach about him. One even tried to eat part of his coat for a blessing."

"Which I did not allow." Diego added quickly. "I like that coat."

"You’re a messiah." Sarissa pinched the bridge of her nose.

"Unfortunately."

"Still. Thank you. Both of you." She exhaled.

"We came for the fight." Mara said, brushing hair from her eyes. "But also, because the balance is off. You feel it, don’t you?"

"Something’s changing." Sarissa nodded. "And I’m pretty sure Shinji’s behind it."

And then, as if the world had been waiting for that exact moment, a new sound rang out, clear and mechanical, echoing in every mind.

[The First Vault Has Been Opened.]

[The First Dungeon Is Surfacing.]

A hush fell over the plaza, and even the wounded lifted their heads.

Somewhere, deep beneath the city, there was a tremor. A distant hum, low and hungry. Like gears turning in an ancient machine that had slept too long.

"What the..." Sarissa stiffened.

"It’s gotta be Shinji. He’s making his move." Mara’s eyes narrowed.

"No. It’s related to him, but it’s not his making." Diego tilted his head, as if listening to something only he could hear.

The plaza lit up again. Not with fire or battle, but the flickering, luminous shimmer of teleportation gates opening. Other guilds, independent players, explorers, even scavenger groups from the Market, rushing to reach the source of the message.

The race had begun.

"Get the wounded stabilized, then we move. I want scouts in the field in the next hour. We find that dungeon before Shinji!" Sarissa turned to her team.

"Agreed!" Vyle said, limping over. "If Shinji wants war, he’s going to get one."

"We’ll send a detachment. Consider it a joint venture." Mara cracked her knuckles.

"And Diego?" Sarissa asked.

"I’ll do what I can. I may be stuck with a cult now, but I still like watching you swing that sword." He gave her a small, tired smile.

"You’re insufferable." Sarissa rolled her eyes.

"True." He muttered, his expression turning dark for just a moment.

They stood together, three pieces of a larger puzzle. The Black market’s shadow, the Union’s steel, and a strange, glowing hope.

The undead were gone, but the game had just begun.