Dungeon Overlord (OLD Version) Chapter 17 - War Valkyrie (Patreon)

Evil Gods and other unsavory entities were nothing new to Dimaria, who was blessed by Chronos and bore the [Take Over - God Soul: Chronos], and in the Earthland, there were many Gods, Evil Gods, and different entities that were using humans as their avatars ion the mortal plane.

When she observed the sacrificial ritual, she noticed that there was indeed something or someone who was gathering the Fiath and Negative Energy that was very similar to that of the Curses through the Holy Symbol of the Black Goat.

Whether it was a real God or not was up for debate.

Dimaria knew that this world was very weak, which was most evident to her because the density of Magic was really bad in this world. Coupled with the fact that everyone feared her when she used even simple Magic Spells, it meant that the Magic wasn't commonplace here like it was in the Earthland. 

Not to mention, from the Dothraki that she captured and interrogated, she managed to gather that anything "Supernatural" was considered exceedingly rare and not something usual.

Thus, Dimaria came to the strong conclusion that this world was weak as the Magic faded, even though she could sense it very clearly. Due to the [Take Over - God Soul: Chronos], as the host of the God Soul, she had partial knowledge of the Chronos, though in a very limited way.

She knew what the state of Magic in this world was because it was something that she had seen once, and the God Soul had the information stored about it.

It was the result of the Divine Apotheosis, albeit in an extremely crude and primitive manner.

Dimaria saw that the sacrificial ritual generated two things primarily. The first thing was the Faith from the followers of the Black Goat and the second thing was something darker, very reminiscent of the Cursed Energy, but more negative.

It was created from the materialization of the anguish and despair of the sacrifices, and everything was being absorbed by the Holy Symbol of the Black Goat. She just stood there and observed how the priest was sacrificing one child after another, something in front of their parents for the better effect of the ritual.

Dimaria wasn't really going to intervene because she didn't have a reason to risk an unnecessary conflict for lives of few ants. Aside from that, she wanted to observe the ritual to find out if the Black Goat was a real God or just a pretender.

Though the more she watched, the more sure she was that the Black Goat was indeed something Divine. She wasn't sure if it was a real God or an Evil God, but she could sense the divinity and Godly presence of the entity.

It was an unmistakable feeling for her.

Due to the [Take Over - God Soul: Chronos], she could recognize the Divine Presence and after the sacrificial ceremony ended, she was sure that the Black Goat was Demigod, but it was still the geniue Divine Being nevertheless.

When the last of the sacrifices were killed by the priest of the Black Goat as he was cutting their hearts when they were still alive, she even noticed that all of the sacrifices were kept conscious and alive during the entire ritual due to some sort of spell.

But it was clearly visible to her.

It seemed that the purpose was to make the ritual as painful and full of anguish and despair as possible. This would generate more spooky negative energy and even generate more faith from the fanatics who would take it as a divine intervention from their God.

'I should proceed deeper into the city and try to capture one of those Pries and extract information from him. Then I can find that man and see what this thing is entirely about... hopefully, this world won't be as boring as it seems.'

Dimaria thought as she left the square where the clergy of the Black Goat was carrying out their sacrifices, and she searched for some random priest of the Black Goat or noble that could serve his purpose.

At the same time, she thought for several moments that it would be most prudent in the end to capture some high-ranking priest. If nothing else, she would get the same information as aristocrats, but she would be able to learn more precisely about the state of Magic and Gods in this world.

She was rather intrigued by the state of the Gods in this world because after the sacrificial ritual to the Black Goat had ended, she got a mental message from the Chronos through the [Take Over - God Soul: Chronos]. 

It basically told her that the Black Goat was a mortal that reached Godhood. That was the reason why the Godly Presence of the Black Goat felt so different; apparently, it was the Mage who reached Godhood through some means. 

Not really good ones as it seemed, because Chronos was able to tell that the Godhood of the Black Goat was shaky at best which wasn't a good thing for any God. It was also the reason for the sacrifices, as he wanted not just to recuperate himself but also to stabilize his Godhood.

This was most interesting because, in the Earthland, it wasn't possible to reach Godhood. 

She knew it very well because it was, in the end, something that she aspired to until Chronos told her that it wasn't possible as the world itself granted the permission to ascend to Godhood.

But in this world, it seemed to be possible, which made her even more intrigued as she ran through the narrow streets of the Qohor and searched for the main temple of the Black Goat.

The main temple of the Black Goat was located in the center of the Qohor and was far right of the biggest building in the entire city. One could see it even from a distance, mainly the huge ornamental statutes of the humanoid Goat that were decorating the entire building and could be seen even from a far distance.

Dimaria knew that the Temple of the Black Goat was the best choice for gathering the necessary information about the state of the world and other things that she wanted or needed to know before deciding on the next steps.

At the same time, she also wanted to get out of this place as soon as possible because it was making her sick. She found the practices of the cultists very barbaric, and the farther she was from this place, the better it was for her mental health...

If she had any in the first place.

That was something that she seriously doubted in the first place, but she still found the entire thing with the sacrifices a rather barbaric practice. Even though the Evil Gods and other entities obtained a lot of power from the Sacrificial Rituals, it also typically led to highly unstable power.

Dimaria made her way to the temple and intruded on the slave guards who were all around the temple. Contrary to the other places in the building, this one was the best protected as much as she could see, which was logical as the clergy of the Black Goat has a lot of power.

'Hopefully, I will be able to leave after getting the information from those crazed cultists.'

The entire temple was giving her the creeps because the best place that was literarily screaming that it was worshipping some Evil God couldn't practically even exist. The entire place was gloomy, dark, filled with the statues of the Black Goat, and smelled of rotting flesh, blood, and decay.

It wasn't really a very nice place to visit, and aside from the creepy environment, it was a pretty uncomfortable place to be in. As soon as she stepped into the temple of the Black Goat, she felt a subtle shift in the Magic because compared to the usual emptiness that she felt outside, this time, the Magic was a bit denser inside the temple of the Black Goat.

At the same time, aside from the higher Magical density in the temple, there was another factor that she took into consideration, which she noticed as soon as she entered. It was the subtle Divine presence in this place; it seemed that the entity called Black Goat was either observing this place or it was just heavily blessed by it.

Trusting her judgment, Dimaria knew that it was primarily due to the Divine Blessings by the Black Goat on this place to ensure the power and prosperity of its followers. This was a rather steep investment for the Evil God.

It must have consumed a lot of it's power, which was even more serious when she knew that the Black Goat was something that was recovering its old power. However, as she had the honor to see, it was extremely easy to carry out the sacrifices in this place.

If this was Earthland, religion like this one would have been long ago destroyed and all members being killed. Especially in the Alvarez Empire and Ishgar, where the control from the side of the government was very strong.

Nobody would allow such an Evil Cult like the Black Goat Religion to run around and sacrifice people to their God so it could recover its power. But in this world, the religion of the Black Goat could not only run around; apparently, it even ruled the entire city-state of Qohor together with the local nobiltiy.

Really a weird world.

Deciding not to dwell in these matters anymore as she went to the center of the temple, where she found several priests of the Black Goat, even though she could easily mistake them for Warlocks or Necromancers due to the gloomy aura that they were releasing.

'Well... if they are Warlocks, it would explain a lot.'

In the Earthland, there were not many Warlocks, and in fact, they were very rare; the closest that came to the Warlock Class were the Mages like herself, with the [Take Over - God Soul] Magic, which allowed her to become a host to the Soul Fragment of God and use its power. 

At the later stages, though, she would be able to fully assimilate the power of the God into her own and become something akin to an Avatar of the God whom she was technically speaking serving.

Warlocks were a different breed of Mages.

Warlocks were Mages who obtained higher forms of power through contracts with various extradimensional entities. Warlocks often obtained a great power through these contract, though not of their power was theirs in the first place and the enetitiy that granted them power could as easily take it back.

On top of that, they also needed to pay back the entity... usually by harvesting Souls, Lifeforce, or Magic from the common population. Due to that, in the Earthland, Warlocks were usually hunted down with extreme prejudice.

Knowing that she was on the right track, she followed after Priests or Warlocks or whatever they were into the huge room that was mostly empty aside from a few enormous statues of the Black Goat and a lot of gold-coated walls and places.

She noticed that there was one of the men who appeared to be more ceremoniously clad than the rest of them. It was clear that the man was something akin to a High Priest or at least some higher status within the religion itself and it's hierarchy, thus Dimaria made him her primary target for the interrogation.

She observed the Priests of the Black Goat for a minute before she activated her Magic, [Time Magic - ÂgeSeal], and stopped time in the room. She took out the God Speed Dagger from its scabbard and canceled the illusion Magic that was concealing her as she slowly stored through the room while slitting the throats of every single priest aside from the High Priest of the Black Goat.

With the [Time Magic - Âge Seal] freezing time around her, she killed everyone in mere moments and stabbed the knees of the High Priest so he could escape as she ended the [Time Magic - Âge Seal]. The expenditure of the [Time Magic - Âge Seal] on her Magic Power Reserves was too big, considering her current recovery rate, and was very pitiful.

She didn't really care about the Black Goat itself or killing in this temple. If the Evil God was so weak that it needed to resort to living sacrifices to recuperate, then it was in very dire straits.

Any direct intervention in the material plane was out of the question. She knew that she could do what she wanted, and there was no need to fear retaliation from the side of the Black Goat.

Not to mention, there was the ultimate reason to be safe; she knew that if the Black Goat commenced a divine descent, then it would alert other entities, including the ones that put the Black Goat into that pitiful parasite-like state.

Once she canceled the [Time Magic - Âge Seal], she was almost startled by the high-pitched screaming of the High Priest of the Black Goat that sounded like the squealing of the pig that was about to be butchered.

"Shut the fuck up. It's just stabbed knees, nothing terrible."

She watched how the fat man crawled around because as she had stabbed through his knees several times with her God Speed Dagger, he couldn't even stand, much less talk about walking.

So the only thing that he could do right now was to crawl... which was rather a pathetic sight. She already regretted attempting to interrogate him the old-fashioned way, but alas, she wanted to preserve her Magic for the more problematic situation, not waste it on the Mind Extraction Spells.

She needed to do the interrogation in a more old-fashioned way to preserve her Magic, which was actually very hard to regenerate. 

"Now, we will talk for a while, and for every answered question, I promise to make your death less painful and faster, so what do you say?"

As she asked the man started screaming and shouting at her, which made her kick him in the knees that were stabbed through, causing him enormous pain as he swirled on the ground.

"You bitch! The great Black Goat will reap your soul!"

Seeing that the High Priest of the Black Goat wasn't cooperating, she decided to use Magic as she should have in the first place.

"Dammed fanatics... why you must be so problematic at every time..."

She really hated dealing with the religious fanatics because they were the most problematic to deal with because there was no means of reasoning with them. So, despite her initial reluctance to do anything, she, in the end, was forced to use Magic to extract memories from the mind of the High Priest of the Black Goat, which took rather a strong toll on her Magic Power Reserves.

Her regeneration rate was like that of the snail because of the almost non-existent magic in this world called Planetos. The memory extraction of the memories of the High Priest of the Black Goat proceeded smoothly...

This was somehow surprising because most of the Gods would at least put some sort of mental defenses on the minds of their most loyal direct subordinates so nobody could get access to the secret of the said God, but here?

There were none.

She learned a lot about the state of the world and its recent history, including a few secrets about the religion of the Black Goat, but unfortunately, she still couldn't confirm if the Black God was a true Evil God or just some other powerful entity. 

Obviously, such a thing wouldn't be known to subordinates, no matter how loyal one is.

Still, she learned a lot of the recent history and the Valyrian Freehold as the city of Qohor was one of the colonies of the Freehold, including the information about the state of Magic in this world.

Which was fading and was slowly dying. 

Since the fall of the Vaylrian Freehold, the Magicians were losing their powers, and now, many were just shallow fades of their former glory. This wasn't really good news for her because it was clear that she would have a much harder time in this world if she couldn't recover properly her Magic Power.

Even though she was generating her own Magic Power, that alone wasn't rather problematic in the world where the Magic was dying. Though even without the Magic, with just her physical condition and mastery over the sword, she would be alright. 

Still, there was one thing that caught her immediate interest.

In the other continent in this world, Westeros, something has happened in the past few months. Something that was weird even according to the weirdest standards, and one could even describe it even as Magical.

On the place called Isle of Faces on the lake, God's Eye, a structure appeared out of nowhere that was spamming out legions of monsters and creatures of untold power that seemed like they had come from the realms of Magic and legends.

When Dimaria learned of this in this from the memories that she extracted from the High Priest, it was clear that this was the thing that she was searching for. After she got what she wanted, she stabbed her God Speed Dagger into the High Priest's head and went to a hidden room in the back of the main Temple Hall where the priests of the Black Goat were storing some of their wealth.

She needed some funds for the journey because it was a very long way from Qohor to the Westeros. Even to Braavos or Pentos, which were the best choices for transportation, was rather a long journey. 

However, if she were to choose, she would go to the Braavos, just because it was home to another major religion, and there may be more clues to the Magic.