CH458

The flight to the final destination was quiet and uncomfortable, with Verbum tucked away in the back as far from the both of them as it was possible for him to get, eyeing the two with suspicion and concern the entire time until Ben forced himself to break the silence.

“So Verbum, I get you weren’t awake for most of that but good news, it was also an easy one. The gods are fully aware of who they are and the fact they’re out there so it’s nothing to worry about.”

“They’re called demidemons,” He shot back coldly. “How is that nothing to worry about?”

Hmm, I guess it was a bit too much to hope that he’d knocked himself out before he could see their status. Shame.

“It’s nothing to worry about because they’re harmless and more or less just victims of the forbidden gods. Since those guys are dead, nothing to worry about so why don’t we just not stress and focus on the last leg of this?”

“Why? So I can find out you two psychos have your fingers all over it too? How the fuck are two people involved in so much shit? Was meeting me and becoming my guards part of some sort of plan as well? Just what the hell are you going to do to me when all of this is over, huh? Silence me so I can’t tell anyone what sort of maniacs you are?”

“Well, seeing as how we haven’t actually done anything wrong in any of those three areas, what would you even tell?”

“I’d, I would…”

Verbum retreated into his skill, trying to find anything incriminating in the ocean of knowledge it left him swimming in, only to come up empty. It wasn’t like there wasn’t anything ethically dubious in either of their pasts, it was just neither played enough of a part in those three small investigations for him to come up with anything. At worst, there was the issue that the cubed trees had a mind control aspect to them that had altered them and their environment, but it wasn’t bad enough that Ben was worried about it being revealed to the world at large.

“Verbum, listen, you can be as paranoid as you want later but for now we should be getting pretty close to the final site so can you just give us the rundown already?” Ben sighed. “Then we can all go home and you never have to see either of us again unless I decide to find you for info on any skills, jobs, or titles.”

“Don’t come looking for me after this is done, I won’t help you!”

“No, you definitely will,” Ben told him with enough certainty to make the other shrink back in fear. “But focus on the task at hand. What are we looking into with you now?”

“…Another large dead zone in the forest. I can’t wait to find out how you both did it this time too,” He said sarcastically. “More training out in the woods? Maybe made some weird item to drive all of the animals away? Hell, what about another secret race on the planet clearing out the land? No, actually all of that is too stupid, why would we get a repeat of anything? The last three have all been different, why wouldn’t I get to see you both involved in something new and horrifying?”

His rambling continued on in the background as both Ben and Thera looked at each other, both of them unable to keep themselves from questioning if they might have played some part in whatever they were about to walk in on too.

The narrative has been illicitly obtained; should you discover it on Amazon, report the violation.

It would be ridiculous. But then, I said that for the last stop too and look at how that turned out. Is there anything I might have done in this region of the woods? Any experiments or something? It’s far enough from the gate that I should be in the clear, right? Myriad, can you just tell me if I’m responsible at all and if I am we can just rip the bandaid off and tell Verbum before we land?

Unfortunately, his god was still silent, likely still busy with any range of tasks from dealing with his other believers or his new priestess to helping the other gods with their war prep.