Catacombs

His delight at finding the Golden Seed was matched by his frustration upon leaving. The Tarnished had barely finished celebrating when he noticed the sky growing dark, and with the night came a member of the Night's Cavalry, blocking his path.

The rider looked menacing. Both he and his mount wore pitch-black cloaks, like a grim reaper come to harvest lives.

"What the hell are you? A Tree Sentinel wannabe?" The Tarnished hoisted the Golden Halberd and walked straight toward the black-cloaked rider.

"?" Sensing movement, the rider turned to look.

"A Tarnished..." The rider drew the bloodstained black Flail at his waist. A vicious glare shone through the narrow slit in his helmet.

"Fine, another lunatic. All right, if you want a fight, I'll oblige." Without another word, the Tarnished swung the Golden Halberd. The sudden attack nearly knocked the unprepared rider off his horse.

"Underhanded Tarnished! A sneak attack!" the rider cursed with a grunt.

"Oh, you can talk. How was that a sneak attack? You drew your weapon, but I'm not allowed to fight back?" the Tarnished said casually, resting the Golden Halberd on his shoulder.

"Hmph... Very well. Our mission is to bury all who would approach the Erdtree. The Tarnished are among our quarry..." With that, the rider wasted no more breath. He spurred his mount onward, combining his speed with the Flail's unpredictable attacks to give the Tarnished quite a headache.

The rider was far more agile than the Tree Sentinel. His kind were not heavily armored soldiers like the Tree Sentinels. Clearly, they were undertakers who traveled by night, and living up to that title required speed, precision, and ruthlessness.

The Tarnished fended off the attacks while watching for an opening. At last, he found one: to preserve its speed, the rider's horse wore very flimsy armor. It was far less resilient than the Tree Sentinel's Golden Warhorse.

He pulled a large ruin fragment he had picked up beside the road from his bag, lined up the angle, and hurled it at the black funeral horse's leg. The horse let out a mournful cry. With one leg broken by the stone, it lost its balance mid-gallop and crashed to the ground, flinging its rider from the saddle.

"You think you're so clever, Tarnished!" The rider staggered to his feet, his voice full of fury.

"Still talking tough." The Tarnished advanced on him.

"You think knocking me off my horse means I've lost? Ridiculous!" The rider brought a hand to his mouth and whistled. The shape of a Spectral Steed began to materialize beneath him.

"A spirit horse?" The Tarnished rushed to his side and kicked him away before the Spectral Steed could fully appear.

"You think I'd give you that chance? I've seen plenty of riders with Spectral Steeds."

"Impossible...!" The rider had barely raised his head when he saw the Tarnished holding the Golden Halberd high. The halberd came down, killing him in a single blow.

"What a pain. Why does night come with a whole new kind of soldier?" The Tarnished examined the wounds the rider's Flail had left on him, then took a sip of spirit elixir. His minor injuries healed almost completely at once.

He took out the map again and noticed a tower symbol to his right. "What's this place?" According to the map, the tower stood on a plateau. For now, the only way up seemed to be climbing it barehanded.

"Climbing it is."

After loosening up his limbs, the Tarnished relied on his rigorously trained body to scale the plateau by sheer strength. Walking onward, he found a tower over ten meters tall standing among the trees.

A blue magical barrier sealed the tower's entrance, preventing him from entering.

"A sorcerer's tower? There should be a way to break the seal." The Tarnished searched the surroundings and finally found a stone Imp statue holding a book among the bushes. Written in the book was:

Oridys's Rise. If you seek its treasure, seek three Wise Beasts!

"Wise Beasts?" There were plenty of possibilities. Many beasts in the Lands Between possessed intelligence that rivaled or even surpassed that of humans. The wolf shadowbound beasts and Godfrey's lion regent were prime examples of highly intelligent creatures.

Which of them did this sorcerer's tower mean by Wise Beasts?

"No, it shouldn't be anything that far removed. The answer's probably nearby." This tower lacked the energy to extend its reach very far, so the three so-called Wise Beasts had to be somewhere close.

A rustling came from the grass. The Tarnished parted it and found a spirit turtle. Realizing it had been discovered, the large turtle gazed at him with clear eyes.

"Ha... So it's turtles." There were indeed highly intelligent turtles, and their lifespans far exceeded those of other creatures. Naturally, they knew more. A gleam of wisdom shone in the spirit turtle's eyes as well.

"All right, that's one." The Tarnished gently poked its head with a finger. The spirit turtle dissolved into motes of light that flew into the tower's seal.

"Two left... Hopefully there's something good inside."

The Tarnished then found the remaining two turtles near the tower. Once he had gathered all three wise turtles, the seal broke. He strode inside, grumbling as he went. One had actually been hidden underwater. Whoever had come up with this puzzle was a crafty one.

He climbed the ladder to the top floor and opened the treasure chest displayed in the room. Inside lay a black stone with a mysterious hue.

"I remember this... A Memory Stone, right? Sorcerers seem to consider these treasures. I think you can use them to cast more spells." Though he had no use for it yet, he understood its value.

"Heh, at least the trip wasn't wasted." Leaning back in a chair in the room, he looked out the window and spotted an unactivated Site of Grace directly ahead.

After reaching the Site of Grace, the Tarnished wandered around the plateau. On a distant cliff, he found a chair. A dead human sat in it, clutching a Stonesword Key.

"Why would this be here?" Curious, yet wary as though guarding against someone, the Tarnished kept an eye on the movement behind him while lying at the cliff's edge to look down. At first, nothing seemed amiss. Just as he was about to leave, however, the presence of souls drifted up from below, inevitably piquing his interest.

The drop was far too great. Jumping would surely smash him to pieces, so the Tarnished had to find a lower point from which he could easily reach the bottom.

The closer he came to the bottom, the stronger the presence of souls grew. Following it, the Tarnished found a tightly shut wooden door. He approached and opened the long-unused entrance. Dust blew into his face, but he paid it no mind. This was no ordinary place. It was-

"A catacomb..."

A catacomb, as the name suggested, was a place where the dead were buried. Commoners were different from Demigods. Although the Golden Order forbade death, commoners still had finite lifespans. Unlike ordinary life and death, however, deceased commoners were taken to catacombs built near the Erdtree roots, allowing their souls to return to the great tree and eventually be reborn.

This process was called [Return to the Erdtree].

Heroes even received lavish catacombs of their own. The one before him, however, was not a hero's tomb. It was dilapidated, its decorations haphazard, and his initial assessment suggested it was not particularly large.

"A place like this has pretty much nothing to do with me." Had Marika not personally exiled the Tarnished, there would surely have been a place for them in these catacombs too.

And what sort of treatment would he receive, being half of the Golden Lineage himself? That was a question with no answer, and one that was meaningless to consider now.

"Forget it. That grave outside the Lands Between is pretty nice too. Next time I die, I'll get someone to embed it in the Erdtree." The Tarnished broke into a grin.

He had not walked far before another Site of Grace appeared ahead.

"I remember that Sites of Grace inside catacombs can't connect to the outside." That was to avoid disturbing the dead. As for why they had Sites of Grace at all, those were probably intended for the gravekeepers.

As he ventured deeper, the Erdtree's enormous roots wound through the catacomb overhead. To his left lay a bottomless abyss. If he slipped and fell, he would probably return straight to the Erdtree.

"What were they even thinking with this design?" Sometimes, the Tarnished felt these people had truly bizarre minds.

The catacomb was not dimly lit, thanks to the white candles placed throughout it. Around a right turn stood a huge stone door, apparently controlled by some mechanism. Brute force alone would hardly get him through. On the other side of the doorway stood a small stone statue of Marika.

Unlike the enormous stone statue in the chapel, this depiction of Marika looked more like a sinner being displayed before the world for an unforgivable crime. In this statue, Marika was imprisoned within an arc.

"Public humiliation, huh... Have you lost your patience too, Greater Will?" Thinking of the shattered Golden Order, the Tarnished sneered aloud. He was no devout believer in gold. In fact, he could not get along at all with those excessively zealous worshippers.

"Still, I was one of those deceived by the Erdtree at first too." With a self-mocking smile, he resumed searching for the mechanism that would open the door.

Partway through his search, a small figure lunged out to ambush the Tarnished. It was a verdigris-colored creature.

"An Imp Golem." The enemy before him was short, wielded a tiny dagger, and had a cat's head. It was the same kind of Imp he had seen many times outside.

They were a kind of Golem, with much the same duty: primarily eliminating intruders. The enormous bodies of ordinary Golems were clearly unsuitable for guarding the interiors of buildings, however, and so Imps had been created.

"All that jumping around is really annoying." He kicked the darting Imp, then grabbed its head and slammed it hard against the wall. Once cracks appeared in its head, the Tarnished crushed it beneath his foot.

Golems were puppet-like mechanical weapons driven by magic, and Imps were no exception. They had no consciousness and merely carried out specific orders.

"After the Elden Ring shattered, the people outside became just like these Imps." Rubbing his chin, he looked at the Golden Halberd beside him. This place was too cramped for such a long weapon, so he decided to return to the Site of Grace and equip the Golden Straight Sword instead.

After resting and reorganizing his equipment, the Tarnished returned to the spot where he had defeated the Imp. Ahead was a dead end, while what seemed to be a lift stood to his right.

"..." Without a word, the Tarnished took a stone from his bag and tossed it onto the lift.

The stone pressed down on the mechanism, setting the enormous lift in motion. The Tarnished, however, kept his eyes on the space below. He had discovered a vast area beneath the lift, while from overhead came the sound of the stone being crushed.

"Good thing I kept my wits about me. Whoever built this catacomb must've been a psychopath." He repeated the trick, using a stone to trigger the lift while immediately jumping down below. Along the way, he picked a grayish-white flower.

The flower was called Grave Glovewort, a flower of souls that grew near burial grounds. People called it a silent bell capable of summoning spirits.

He had heard tales about glovewort before. Apparently, the people known as Spirit Tuners were very fond of these flowers, which seemed capable of strengthening souls.

As always, he might not need it, but he should still have it. Besides, he did have two boxes of ashes, even if they were not much use... Still, he might meet a Spirit Tuner someday. This counted as planning ahead.

"Ha, a new area begins." He stuffed the glovewort into his pocket and gazed straight ahead at the ground covered in filthy water.