Chapter 2841: Dark Cult Hierarchy: Archangel Maestro Matteo, Angel Konjur

Date: Unspecified

Time: Unspecified

Location: Myriad Realms, Card World, Empire, Unknown

A young man hovered above the masses as they worshiped him. Though his strength lay within the lower mortal realm, even those who had begun to kindle their divinity—those who had forged it into form, the semi-card demigods and the true card demigods—bowed before him in reverence.

Before him, hierarchy seemed to lose all meaning. Whether card emperors, semi-card demigods, or full-fledged card demigods, all were equal in their submission.

He was clad in nothing but a simple strip of white cloth, yet before him, the poorest, draped in dirt and tattered rags, and the richest, adorned in silk and heavy jewels, fell to their knees alike—stripped of status, wealth, and pride, side by side.

He stood above all. It was as though neither strength nor wealth mattered—only devotion. One by one, they bent their knees, lowered their heads, and offered up their lives as if it were the most natural act in the world.

He looked over the masses that revered him—seeking salvation and guidance—with an impartial gaze. To them, his eyes held a profound, almost sacred light the moment they met him.

In truth, that light was nothing of the sort. It was a quiet, all-encompassing disdain for humanity. Where they saw divinity, he saw only an inexhaustible, self-renewing source of energy—their faith. Nothing more. Otherwise, he would have wiped them out, just as he had his father.

The only two who truly understood the contempt he held for his own kind stood above, hidden within the clouds, watching their handiwork unfold—one of the five Arch-Angel of the First Order Dark Cult, the Arch-Angel of the Ash Dunes, Maestro Matteo, and his disciple, Angel of Revolt Konjur.

"Master, once again, you’ve proven that no one can match your vision when it comes to recruiting fresh blood for the Faith Order. This one shows the promise of becoming a Principality in time," Konjur said, watching the boy—once forced to helplessly witness his abusive father beat his mother to death—now stand revered by masses of every background, be it strength or wealth. Before him, none of it seemed to matter.

Konjur’s expectations were clear. He already saw the boy rising high within the Dark Cult’s hierarchy—Seraphim ➔ Cherubim ➔ Thrones ➔ Virtues ➔ Powers ➔ Principalities ➔ Angels ➔ Archangels—just a step below himself. However, his master felt he was underestimating the boy’s potential.

"Konjur, I only offered you choices. You chose him," Maestro Matteo said calmly. "You were the one who helped him attain his power, the one who guided him in the ways of the Faith Order. If you wish to become the Sixth Archangel of the Faith Order, this boy—and his divine enlightenment—will be of great use to you. If that time ever comes, he will be to you what you are to me."

Hearing his master’s high regard for the boy, Konjur nodded as he watched him—someone who did not shrink from the masses’ admiration and worship, but instead seemed to hunger for more.

Though Konjur did not believe the boy could ever become his equal, he was certain that, with the right motivation, the boy would serve him well.

...

"You guys finally found me? What took you so long? I almost fell asleep waiting," the Emissary remarked, his form hovering above a golden lake some 140 miles from their earlier encampment. The lake’s radiance was so bright, so steeped in divinity, that even the blood-rule rain veered away from it. He hadn’t been hiding from them—he had been preparing to confront them. Konjur had given him a massive reserve of faith to do exactly that.

As Karl and the Field Marshal reached the bank, the lake’s golden glow intensified. It gathered, condensed, and then surged upward, piercing through the bloodstorm clouds and forming a towering pillar of light with the lake at its core.

"Is that lake filled entirely with faith?" the Field Marshal blurted, disbelief slipping into her voice as she watched the lake give birth to the pillar of light.

"Yes," Karl replied, even as his myriad ethereal spirits surged forward, pouring into the pillar while mimicking the Sandalphon’s song through soul pathway resonance.

The true strength of his ethereal spirits lay in their connection with him. Each one could access his origin card—to which they were scarified to, stripping them of their origin card, physique, and inherent traits.

Before they were his ethereal spirits they were his womb incarnations formed using his origin card, the connection between was more profound. As a result, it allowed them to draw upon any of the origin cards stored within it simultaneously. Now, they all tapped into one of his womb incarnations’ origin cards, one that granted the ability to sense the vibrations of another’s soul pathways and replicate them through resonance.

The ethereal spirits flooded the pillar like wailing wraiths, circling and weaving through it. Under the influence of the Sandalphon’s song, the faith within the lake—once shaped into a protective force around the Emissary of Light at its core—began to unwind and unravel.

There were thousands of those spirits, each echoing the Sandalphon’s song, each interpreting the faith and guiding it toward its intended purpose before it could be wielded by the Emissary for himself.

Seeing this, the Emissary of Light—who had steeled himself to face both those who had betrayed him and those who had stolen everything from him—found himself at a loss. He had known the Supreme Leader was formidable, not an opponent he could overcome even with his personal reserves of faith. But this... this was different.

His faith was no longer obeying him—it was turning against him. As it slipped from his control under the Supreme Leader’s influence, his thoughts stalled, leaving his mind blank while a slow, creeping dread took hold.

He stood frozen at the heart of the lake, helplessly watching the Supreme Leader’s myriad ethereal spirits use the Sandalphon’s song to chip away at the faith he had received from Konjur. When he tried to strike them down, they paid no heed. They would fall, only to reform in the same instant, as if death meant nothing to them. He used his divine enlightenment on them, but it was no use.

Realizing this could not continue, he finally broke from his stupor and desperately called out to Konjur for help.

...

AN: Dark Cult’s hierarchy is the reverse of the traditional angelic hierarchy. There is no god here, so devotion has no real value.

Rank is based on how much of the truth one knows. The more someone understands the ruse, the less faith and devotion they have, and the higher they rise. Those with strong faith are still clinging to illusion, so they naturally fall to the bottom.

Seraphim ➔ Cherubim ➔ Thrones ➔ Virtues ➔ Powers ➔ Principalities ➔ Angels ➔ Archangels

In this system, ascension isn’t about getting closer to the divine. It’s about outgrowing the need for it.

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