Red Witch (2)

"Maybe and maybe not... everything is the will of the Lord."

Valkorion had to admit that he hated these zealous types because they were the most annoying to deal with. People like Melisandre, who had blind faith in their Gods, were an absolute pain in the ass because they were able to ignore everything around them due to their faith in their God.

Not to mention, the religious fanatics were the worst kind of enemies because they would gladly disregard their very own lives in the favour of their God.

"Yeah, but that is not really the answer to my question. Do you have some securities to deal with the Undead, as you are saying? While I am aware of my debt, I would rather not risk my life, something that even Your Lord and even 'He' are aware of."

Valkorion stated as he looked at Melisandre while the red priestess looked at him with raised brown, aware of the insecurities about the mission as it was indeed a bit dangerous. Even though Melisandre had a firm faith in her Lord, if she had to say it mildly, she too had a rather strong sense of self-preservation compared to her fellow zealots.

She was one of the rare religious zealots who had a very strong sense of self-preservation; if not, then she wouldn't have survived her time as a slave within the Stygoi and Asshai in the Shadow Lands. 

That place was swarming with twisted beings, Beyonders that lost control, and various evil people with myriads of mentalities and disturbances. It was a place that was filled with unspeakable horrors that never ended, and only the strong could survive in that place. 

Those who had the courage and will to do everything to preserve their very own lives.

"You don't need to fear anything; in the worst case, I have several solutions to deal with the potential enemies and the Undead if they were too numerically superior, but the reports from the preliminary reconnaissance of the Undead Asylum Catacombs are confirming that the situation in there is manageable even for the people like us."

For some reason, Valkorion had his reservations about this, but nevertheless, there was nothing better he could do than just give her the benefit of the doubt.

He knew that this was the mission given to him by the Astral, and he needed the background of someone like the Astral because only with support from someone like 'Him' could he quickly achieve his goals.

Still, he had Excalibur, which was the deadliest poison to the Dark-Attributed beings, including that of the Undead.

That was a big advantage, hopefully not many of the Undead would be powerful or so, though hearing that the place where they were going to was one of the prime bases of powerful Beyonder Organizations he was doubting that.

"What if we encounter powerful, Extraordinary Undead? We can both degree that Low Sequence Extraordinary Undeads won't be a problem for us, but the ones in the Mid Sequence would be, less being said about the High Sequence, the better."

The red witch looked at him with something that appeared to be a grin as she said her next words, which made him more at ease.

"Not everyone can be turned into the Undead. Some pathways are somehow immune to being turned to the Undead, and even if they were forcefully turned into the Undead, their power would tremendously drop. The Red Temple is sure that there are not any High Sequence Undeads at the place, and according to the Divination, the number of the Mid Sequence Undeads should not exceed 5, and they should not be stronger than Sequence 5 Undead."

That didn't really seem that bad, actually, even though it was certainly not the ideal situation as Valkorion didn't really have the best knowledge about the Undeads and their typology and everything, but he knew that some parts of Melisandre said were true.

"You are really knowledgeable about the Undeads, Lady Melisandre."

Valkorion remarked as the woman clad in red chuckled hearing that.

"Yes... the Shadow Lands are filled with the Undeads... the Necromancers and Dark Spellcastes are practically everywhere you look, so to survive, you need to have very deep knowledge about the Undead. The Undeads that were created from the corpses of the members of Firelink Shrine, due to the contradiction of the Pathways, their strength dropped considerably to the degree, where they lost 80% of their powers, sometimes even more."

Shadow Lands was something that Valkorion knew only from the tales and from the books that were in the Tenebraenys Manor in the Cartharys. One thing he knew for sure, with his meager strength, dreaming of going to the Shadow Lands would be a decree of death.

The Shadow Lands was one of the most dangerous places in the entire Faerûn, especially the places like Stygai, the City of the Night. The Haunted Corpse City. Twisted creatures, such as demons and dragons, are said to live in its vicinity, and even shadowbinders fear it.

Little was known of Stygai, bar, and its by name comes from the fact it only sees the light of the sun for a brief period of time each day, around noon. It was said that nobody who entered the city would ever leave it, and Valkorion was rather keen to believe it.

"It is rather impressive that you managed to survive in such a place... Shadow Lands, Asshai and Stygai..."

Valkorion stated because he felt a certain degree of admiration for the woman in front of him, he was aware that she was a slave, that was something that he knew from the canon of the ASOIAF, and he predicted correctly that she was slave in this life as well.

And that she originated from the Shadow Lands and lived through the horrors of the Stygai and Asshai was indeed an almost legendary tale to tell. He knew that the slaves in the Shadow Lands had only one purpose.

To serve as a sacrifice in some twisted rituals or to serve as pleasure materials for their masters. Surviving in that place as a slave was indeed nothing short of a miracle, not to talk about the fact that she managed to rise even in such an environment, become Beyonder, and a member of the Red Temple.

If he had to guess, then Melisandre's deep faith in the future Lord of Light was mainly due to the fact that he saved her from the horrors of the Shadow Lands. Apparently, the Red Temple operated a lot in the Shadow Lands, and it was one of the more prominent Secret Organizations in the Shadow Lands.

"It's nothing just a combination of Faith and Willpower, my dear Lord... something that you, as a descendant of Vitiate Tenebraenys, should know very well. In the end, according to My Lord, you are really familiar to your ancestor."

As she said that, Valkorion froze in the moment he heard her saying that because that was supposed to be a closely guarded secret. Though thinking about it logically, it shouldn't be a surprise that if she was aware of such information, if 'They' were already aware of it.

If 'He' decided to pass this information on to his followers, then there wouldn't be anything that Valkorion could do about it at all.