An Acolyte of Zero

Epilogue

The tombs were beautiful.

If she said so, then they truly were.

They were empty tombs, the bodies inside burned to a crisp, but still…they were beautiful tombs. She smiled, her eyes moving from the potted wilted flowers to the light refracting against the polished marble.

The tombs were beautiful.

She had to stop gazing at the tombs, she had to stop looking at the courtyard of wilted and rotten ground high above in the air, inside the Black Citadel that now hovered over the Royal Palace of Tristain.

A palace, which burned brightly in the night air, as the smell of smoke reached her nostrils. This marked the end of an era and the start of a new one, and she couldn't help but smile before whispering.

"I'm going to do great things for this country, father," she whispered. "See, big sister Eleonore? I'm not a failure," she added to another tomb. "Yes, yes big sister Cattleya, I finally blossomed just like you said I would," she smiled towards her other sister's tomb. "Now I'm a woman, a mage, a queen…"

She began to walk away from the tombs, her gaze hardening with every step she took. "And my crown is a helm of steel, just like mother would have wanted."

She stepped inside the majestic entrance of the Citadel, her gaze moving to the mighty rivers filled with the plague, past the giant abominations that roared to the ceiling. She walked beyond the rows and the lines of Ghouls snarling and walking the pavements.

The shadows filled with the glowing eyes of the Necromancers, the corners webbed by the Crypt Fiends. The dead eyes of the zombies looked morosely forward, as the Acolytes walked around with their robes of teal and light purple.

Gargoyles screeched from their perches, as she opened the double doors that led in the throne room of the Citadel. Obsidian Statues and Destroyers flocked to her side, and as her gaze went to the maps that adorned the table in front of her throne, she watched the entire of Tristain covered in a deep purple colour.

The country was hers now.

With a terrifying screech, Marianne entered the throne room trashing about.

"You monster!" she screamed, "I won't…forgive…"

"Louis," Louise said crisply. "End her suffering now."

"As you wish, my Queen," her Death Knight replied, before smoothly swinging down his Runeblade across Marianne's scarab-like body and killing her on the spot.

"Make sure her soul cannot be used for resurrection, and find another Crypt Lord —one willing and loyal to the cause."

She watched as the body of Marianne bled to death, before her entire frame disappeared in a blinding light as her soul left the clutches of the Scourge.

"Your highness," Louis said then, "We must plan our next campaign," he pointed towards the map. "The Frost Wyrms have been unlocked and are ready for their first use. We are in dire need of resources however; we will not be able to field a large enough army to counter every other country yet…not with the numbers of their own summoned units."

Louise looked at the maps, before her fingers gently pointed towards Albion with a moment of hesitation. "The Windstones dug up from Albion mines make up the majority of imports of the other countries. We can crash their navies down, but I wonder…can we use them to begin with?"

Louis turned thoughtful.

"I will check with the remains of the ships, my Queen," he bowed, "Maybe there is something we can use…like an expansion pack."

"Just…go and check," Louise sighed, watching him leave.

She brought her back to rest on the throne and closed her eyes.

It was over. Truly, she was the Queen of the Fallen. Her fingers tapped on the arms of the throne, her throat hummed a light tune.

The stench of rot became perfume as Louise lost herself to her memories. Her heart throbbed in her chest, sending painful jabs of agony through her entire body as she remembered the sweet moments, the nice bits and pieces of her life, the days of running around the lands of her family without a worry.

The days where she wasn't branded a failure. The days where…where she was 'Little Louise' and it wasn't said in spite, but in kind affection.

Those days were long gone, as tears were all that poured down her eyes.

"They will call you the crying queen if you continue like this, child."

A cold, ethereal voice rose from the corner of her mind. She widened her eyes and gripped on the arms of the throne, before she saw him. A pale-skinned man, with blond hair and kind blue eyes, stood in the corner of the throne room slightly behind a column.

The Ghouls and the Abominations that lurked in the room as her guards did not react, so maybe he was a Necromancer? However, they all looked like old men, didn't they?

"Who are you?" she asked, standing up from her throne. "Show yourself!"

The man did not reply, instead he bitterly smiled and slowly hid himself behind the column once more.

She nearly jumped down the stairs from the throne as she dashed towards the column, before stilling to a frozen halt. Behind the column was nothing and no one. There was no man, no living creature or undead. Simply thin air was all that she saw.

"I'm going mad," she muttered. "Wouldn't surprise me," she added in a low murmur, "And stop talking to yourself!" she chided the next instant. "It's not like there's anyone to hold a conversation with," she grumbled. "Maybe Henrietta was right," thoughtfully, she began to walk outside to explore the rest of the Black Citadel. "Maybe I am too weak to rule the Fallen."

She slapped her cheeks the next moment. "No, no Louise. A weak person wouldn't have burned Tristain's palace to the ground to prove the point. We are strong and we can do this."

"Wazzup!" a Ghoul said nearby, waving at her.

"The ceiling," a Necromancer replied absent-mindedly, before coughing and returning to his vials of chemicals. What were they doing with those to begin with?

Actually…from where did the water of the Black Citadel come from?

The more her mind wandered, the more she found herself doubting what she was seeing. The Ghouls moved and sometimes talked, far more than the Zombies. The Necromancers didn't eat. The Acolytes all seemed to enjoy finding creative ways of dying or becoming undead.

"There goes another one," she muttered to herself as she watched an Acolyte slip on a banana peel —one the man had placed beforehand— and then slam and crack his head apart.

A Necromancer standing nearby began to carry his body away, to resurrect him as a Zombie probably.

She groaned.

It was like being surrounded by lunatics, but the fact was that most of the time they acted 'sane' enough to overlook it. As 'sane' as an army made of undead creatures sworn to exterminate all life was, of course.

Still, everything worked. She climbed a stairway that led upwards, towards her rooms and that insufferable talking sword. It called itself Derflinger, claiming to be six thousand years old —as if it were possible for swords to last that long.

It talked of Brimir however, and as long as it spoke of things concerning the void, she couldn't just throw it away. She would have enjoyed doing that, but she didn't want to risk missing some bit of important information out of her haste to finally spend a nice and quiet night sleeping.

"Hey partner," the sword said as she entered her rooms. "I remembered something else!"

"Good for you," Louise remarked. "What is it about?"

"Brimir had four familiars!"

Louise closed her eyes and heaved a great sigh.

Then she opened them again.

"Louis?"

"Yes, master?"

"How many types of Heroes can we summon?"

"Four master. They are the Dreadlord, the Crypt Lord, the Death Knight and the Lich."

"Very well," she returned to stare at the sword. "I suppose that's right," she added, "Can you tell me more? How did they work, for example? What their special abilities really were about?"

"Sorry partner, I can't remember that bit."

"Of course not," Louise grumbled. "Well, I'll let you know we'll be marching on Albion soon. If you can remember anything by then, it would be appreciated."

"I'll try my best partner," Derflinger rattled out, before falling silent.

His best would simply be silence until the next day, where he'd spout out another short line to avoid being melted. Maybe she shouldn't have so quickly menaced to turn him into a pile of molten scraps if he revealed being useless.

Yes, maybe she shouldn't have been that hasty.

She looked out of the window to the city below, filled to the brim with her people.

Rotten flesh and bits of bones showed as the Fallen raised their hands, as if invisibly realizing she was watching them. She opened her window and walked out on the balcony, staring at the hordes that moaned and waved at her.

More were coming in from the countryside as the last few villages fell to the Plague.

Soon, it would be time to march once more.

"FALLEN!" she roared to her people, "WE. SHALL. RISE!"

Lifting her right hand up in the air, she slammed it down once more on the stone guard of the balcony.

"Tristain is OURS! Tristania has fallen! The path has been arduous and filled with many deaths, but now, finally, our glorious ascension can begin! Tomorrow, our armies shall march upon La Rochelle! Our wrath shall cast the heretics who refuse to follow us into hell, and our mercy shall bring their souls into our folds! We are the chosen of the Void and of Founder Brimir! We…will…rise."

The moment her whisper died out, the roar from the massive numbers of zombie made her windows tremble lightly, as a smile settled on her lips.

These were her people.

They would follow her not because she wore a crown, but because she commanded them.

They would be loyal and unyielding. They would obey and gladly die for her.

Because the truest victory…

Was stirring the heart of the people.

The End.

Author's notes

Epilogue done.

*raises hands to halt the onslaught*

This began as a 'Foz+W3' crossover made for laughs. How my muse derailed it into angst, death and despair I will probably never know. Point is, this is where it ends. Why? Because 'An Acolyte of Zero' worked as a title as long as Louis was an Acolyte. He's a Death Knight now, but the centre of the story was never on him, but rather on Louise (I'm sure you all noticed that, didn't you?)

So, rather than adding more chapters (and since the purpose of this was simply to write about warfare scenes, which I did to great success apparently) and diluting the story with 'filler' chapters of Louise going to X and then trashing the army Y and then so on…

I'll end it here.

Mind you, knowing my muse this is just the Heat taking its toll, and tomorrow a new story entitled 'The Death Knight of Zero' will appear magically on .

However, I always prefer to have a clear-cut conscience. So 'An Acolyte of Zero' ends here.

Hope you enjoyed the ride and the reading, even when it changed from comedy to dark angst.

Once more…

Thank you for reading.