Archive of Our Own

Chapter Text

I.

They first meet unexpectedly— but rather catastrophically— on his day off. She barrels right into him, looking frantic and rather out of place. He lets her, even though his abilities allowed him to read her movements long before she crashed into him physically. Stopping her has the chance of perhaps injuring her with his strength, in which case the alternative of her falling onto him is much preferred. Her clothes are odd, her features are foreign. She insists there’s trouble in the slums; a notorious serial killer dubbed the ‘Guthunter’ has made an appearance.

He’ll never know it, but this is hardly the first time she’s intentionally upturned his life in such a manner. It’s not even the first time on this ‘run’. 

At any rate, Elsa slinks off to live another day, and not one but two royal selection candidates are found and saved. He owes the mysterious dark-haired girl quite a debt in light of that, despite her assurances to the contrary. 

At the time, nothing about her struck him as evil, or even remotely diabolical. She seemed strange, but relatively normal. She also would not meet his eyes, but that was also normal. Few people ever did, and he cannot blame them. Most days he’d rather not look at himself in the mirror either. 

Lady Emilia insists on repaying her own debt of gratitude by having the girl return with her to the Mathers domain as recompense. Apparently the young woman had disclosed earlier that she arrived here just today with nothing but the clothes on her back from a land so distant it would not appear on any map. Therefore Lady Emilia’s offer was just, and well-timed. However, the girl declined immediately. She had actually come here for a reason, she said, although she did not elaborate on the subject. Whatever that reason may be, it was also why she declined Reinhard’s offer as well. With nothing else to be done for it, both he and Lady Emilia wished her safe travels on her journey, wherever it may take her. She returns this with a surprisingly fond farewell of her own; it’s the first time she looks him in the eye, and he cannot quite put words to the peculiar feeling that overwhelms him in that moment. 

He feels like he’s lost something unfathomable, although he cannot imagine what. 

II.

It pains him to hear of the accounts of victorious battles long after the fact, but it could not be helped. Though he bears duties to the realm, first and foremost he is now Lady Felt’s sword and shield. Protecting her is of the utmost importance. 

He’s never considered himself particularly vainglorious, or even remotely the sort of person who finds any kind of satisfaction in fighting. Protecting innocents from those who wish to harm them? Yes. But fighting just for its own sake? He’s monstrous enough without such things. Still, to hear the tales of the slaying of the great and terrible White Whale does instill within him a distantly wistful feeling. He’s relieved and overjoyed beyond words to hear of its demise of course, after what it’s done to his country and to his family in particular, but he does wish he could have taken part in the battle. A far flung dream, of course; he has duties here, and more importantly, Lady Crusch currently has his grandfather under her employ for this very reason. If anyone deserves to deliver the death knell to such a beast, it was certainly the Sword Devil. And Reinhard doubted the man would want him there to ruin his well-deserved peace. 

News trickles into the capital from travelers and merchants who happened to come across the aftermath— the massive whale hacked up and assembled onto carriages for a triumphant return to the capital. There are reports of a great battle, of a magnificent victory; there are also whispers of a dark and terrible power emerging in the chaos. Of the whale being dragged out of the sky by the darkness itself. 

He awaits the opportunity to ask Felix or Julius about the matter personally when they return, but the true return of the party is hardly one of triumph.

Anastasia and Crusch’s camps both received accolades for the defeat of the White Whale, it is true, and further still they both are receiving credit for the subsequent defeat of the infamous Sin Archbishop Sloth, but the casualties were too great to even consider it a victory. 

Felix is utterly distraught at the state of his master. Dozens of lives were lost during the fight with the great mabeast as well as with the Sloth cultists, and many more were wiped from collective memory. Julius is in terrible condition after his colossal battle with the Archbishop and his cultists— and the emergence of three other Archbishops leaves much to be desired. The news is, in fact, quite terrible. This is perhaps not even a victory at all in the grand scheme of things, but a mere consolation prize. To make matters worse, when Julius has finally recovered enough to speak with him, he frankly reveals the true horror of it all; the camps and the people involved are hardly even the reason for any of the victories. 

They owe a debt to a mysterious traveler for dragging the white whale down to the surface, and for holding it in place long enough for the rest of the army to execute her master plan; dropping the great Flugel tree atop it. 

And again, this same traveler was the one who warned them of the cultists gathering in the forests of the Mathers domain. Julius readily admits he would have never stood a chance against the Archbishop Sloth had he not had the girl with him to reveal to him the Sin’s secrets. Sloth had the ability to revive himself into the bodies of any of his ten commanders, called Fingers. She’d directed divided groups of soldiers to hit the camps of the various Fingers spread about the forest simultaneously, providing them detailed descriptions of where to find them. She and Julius afterwards faced down the Archbishop himself; Julius used his Nect technique to gain her unique ability to see Sloth’s most powerful weapon— his Unseen Hands. Otherwise, he likely would not have stood a chance, Julius confessed. 

His current injuries were also sustained by a last-minute save using her knowledge. A cultist had hidden within the caravan of refugees, and had she not mentioned him, it is very likely Lady Emilia and all the villagers of Irlam would have lost their lives regardless of their successful flight from the Witch Cult. As it stands, Julius managed to catch up to the caravan in the nick of time, riding out as a final stand to rid the caravan of the magic crystals lurking in one of the carts. Had Julius been even a minute, perhaps even a second later, the entire caravan would have gone up in flames. His injuries, even with his spirits shielding him from the worst of it, are grave indeed but in light of the alternative he vehemently swears he got off easy. Better a few days under Felix’s care than dozens dead. It was this very integrity that Reinhard so cherished in his friend. 

Still, such impeccable timing was truly anomalous. 

And if this mysterious girl’s knowledge and timing sounded suspicious— it was because they were.

After Sloth was dead and the worst of the battle was believed to be over, Julius of course confronted her on her intimate knowledge of the Witch Cult, as was properly befitting his station as a Kingdom Knight. To his disbelief and horror, she didn’t deny her involvement in the Cult. In fact, she admitted to being an Archbishop herself.

The Archbishop of Pride.

Her description matched the girl who saved Lady Felt and Lady Emilia exactly. Julius described her as a girl of medium stature with uncommonly dark black hair and foreign features. 

Reinhard was not entirely sure how to feel about this revelation.

On the one hand, she had done so many great services to the Kingdom. She saved the lives of two royal candidates, and found the fifth candidate on top of that. She’s credited as being the key reason for both victories against her fellow Archbishop Sloth and the White Whale. When they had briefly met in person, she had been a bit distant, but still courteous. Not at all like the raving lunatics eyewitnesses describe both the Archbishop Sloth and the Archbishops Gluttony and Greed as. Julius swears the two could not have been any more unalike; Sloth had been nearly incoherent for the most part according to his fellow Knight, prone to rambling monologues on slothfulness and love, exalting diatribes to the witch, and fits of unproportionate rage. In other words; he was utterly out of his mind. In contrast, Pride appeared to be level-headed and eloquent. Apparently his grandfather had been quite impressed with the young woman, until he’d heard of just exactly who she was. 

Nonetheless, she was still a Witch Cultist. There was no telling what sort of evil deeds she had committed in the name of the Witch of Envy. 

However, his Divine Protection had assured him she wasn’t lying when she’d said she was new to the capital, and even the country at large that fateful day. There was no way to know where she came from, but he could at least know her record here in Lugnica could not be very long. 

Still, he could not reconcile such a venomous evil to the girl he had so briefly met. Perhaps if they had an opportunity to meet again, he might be able to come to terms with it. As it is, he feels as if he is desperately missing something. Something miserable, frantic, seizing at his heart. For a woman he met so briefly it could be considered naught but a moment, she had made such an indelible, immutable impression upon him. With a heavy chest full of regret and guilt, he leaves the Karsten mansion with his heart in turmoil, feet laden with impotence. 

He doesn’t have the presence of mind to summon up a Divine Protection, but he has no other explanation for such a serendipitous meeting as the one he encounters immediately after leaving the noble district. 

There, beneath a pastel parasol across the street is the very girl in question.

The tableau is idyllic; city streets alight with the midday rush, restaurants and cafes of all manner crowded with the advent of lunch. A serving girl bustles by her table, sparing a quick smile and question to the woman alone at her table beneath the parasol. The woman with illustrious dark hair briefly meets the serving girl’s gaze, and with a fleeting smile returns the words. Another nod, and the girl takes the presumably empty pot of tea off the table, before she’s off twisting through the full patio back towards the establishment doors. The dark-haired young lady takes a sedate sip of her cup, leaning back in her chair. He wouldn’t say she looks quite at peace, but there is a solemn sense of composure that lingers over her, like a blight of darkness against a glorious summer day. He feels a sense of camaraderie to it, somehow; a warm nostalgia tinged with regret. 

Before he knows what he’s doing, he’s crossing the street and making her way towards her. 

His shadow casts an interminable darkness over her form, blotting out the sun. 

Pride looks up. “Sir Reinhard,” she intones, and it’s impossible to read anything from her voice, but he thinks— something— flickers in her unfathomably dark eyes. 

He inclines his head. “Archbishop,” he returns; it seems only polite, as she had so cordially addressed him as well. He puts a hand over his heart, dipping his head; “Might I join you?”

Pride blinks at him, the endless abyss in her eyes glittering like the midnight sky. “If you like,” she replies, indifferently. 

He takes that as the only acquiescence he’s likely to get, and sits in the chair across from her.

After that… well. He’s never been very good at these things. He wishes quite suddenly for Julius to suddenly appear before him, in spirit if not in person. His fellow knight always knows what to say, with eloquence worthy of his title as knight. Reinhard, on the other hand, very rarely understands enough about human interaction (and humanity at large, if he wants to be honest) to approach even a fraction of Julius’s nuance. 

Pride, if she senses the uncertain atmosphere overcoming him, makes no move to alleviate it nor remark on it. She merely continues to enjoy her tea, gazing listlessly out into the capital streets.

He wonders what she’s seeing. What she’s thinking. Her features are so impossible to read— he wonders if even his Divine Protection of Empathy would be enough to enlighten him. He’s never encountered an Archbishop before, perhaps they have some way of nullifying such abilities. And this Archbishop in particular is even more inexplicable than the rest, he thinks. 

The waitress returns, and he finds his breath catching in anticipation as the young woman meets gazes with Pride. Is this the moment she hatches her dastardly plans for the capital? Has he set something in motion he cannot undo? 

But Pride merely smiles politely as the server returns with a fresh pot of tea— and a second cup and saucer, for himself. 

“Tea?” Pride gestures to the pot as she picks it up.

It’s unlikely to be poisoned— not that such methods would work on him— as it’s fresh from the restaurant, so he sees no reason to deny her. “Yes, thank you.”

Pride rather unceremoniously dumps the scalding hot water into his cup, before summarily doing the same to her own. Likely not from a noble family then, he thinks. Any aristocratic lady would have gone through enough etiquette classes to make pouring tea as graceful as a dance. Somehow, he could never even imagine Pride as a noble lady. Even as she sits before him in fine, well-tailored clothes usually indicative of a high social class. The black suits her, he thinks, inanely. 

“So?” Finally, it appears Pride has grown tired of this charade. “I can’t imagine the Sword Saint himself has taken time out of his busy schedule for an afternoon break for tea without reason. Why are you here?”

He finds he’s not sure how to answer that question.

He frowns slightly into the murky contents of his tea. 

“It would be terribly remiss of me to leave an Archbishop unattended and left to their own devices in the capital, no?” Even as he says this, it rings false to him. 

Rather, it’s not entirely true. 

If that was the case, he could have alerted his fellow knights and rounded up a force worthy of battling a Sin Archbishop. But then, perhaps it was better this way. He would hate to ever admit it aloud, but in a battle between himself and an Archbishop, he can only imagine that most other knights would only get in the way. A nuisance at best, dead at worst. He frowns deeper at his own thoughts, sudden self-loathing welling within him. Who is he to belittle their honor and sacrifices in such a manner? 

“And so you’ll attend to me yourself?” She raises a brow. “How admirable.”

“To do otherwise would neglect my duty and responsibility as a knight.” 

“You and your damned duty,” Pride sighs, offhand. 

It draws a furrow to his brow. She speaks of him so casually— as if they are old friends. 

“Forgive me, but have we met before?” He asks, genuine in his query. “Aside from the incident with Lady Felt,” he amends, quickly.

It appears as if he’s said the exactly wrong thing. He hadn’t realized how expressive she was being until her face shuddered off, leaving something cold and unyielding in its wake. 

“If you’ve come for a fight, I suggest you reconsider.” She advises coldly, without answering him at all. “Unless you’d like all of the capital to get caught in the crossfire.”

An invisible pressure catches around his throat, a darkness naked to the eye sprawling off of her in waves. It does nothing of course, his Divine Protections see to that, but he understands the threat for what it is. Pride is no longer interested in indulging him. She sets her teacup down, unfinished as it is, and stands. She leaves a generous helping of gold coins in her wake, which strikes him as an oddly sincere gesture for an Archbishop of Sin, and then waltzes off without a second glance in his direction.

He scrambles out of his seat after her. “Wait— !”

Her heels click against the cobblestone as she effortlessly blends into the crowd. He tears after her, unwilling to let her out of his sights. She doesn’t appear to be currently interested in wreaking havoc and spreading chaos, but there’s no telling what else she might be up to here. 

“Pride— wait, please.” He calls as he catches up to her, grasping her arm with as gentle a grip as possible. She wrestles out of his grip as if he’s burned her, and he considers it a battle not worth fighting over and leaves her be. She at least has paused long enough for him to match her stride without having to push his way through the crowds, which is concession enough. “I didn’t mean to offend you.” He apologizes, sincerely. 

“Whether you’ve offended me or not shouldn’t really be much concern of a knight of the kingdom, should it?” She retorts airily, not looking at him. 

He frowns. Well, she’s right. But at the same time— “You’ve treated me with courtesy.” He points out. “I would hate to return the favor so poorly.”

Pride’s stoic expression never wavers. However, she does sigh. “Must you always be so gallant? Honestly, if I didn’t know better I’d swear you get off on it or something.” She mutters to herself.

He has no idea what she means, but she doesn’t sound angry or insulted, so he considers it an apology accepted. 

She comes to a halt before an innocuous market stand bathed in the relaxing shade of a muted peach awning above. It appears as normal as any other stand in the market district. Nonetheless she walks up and holds out yet another generous helping of gold coins. He can’t help but vaguely wonder where she procured such wealth. 

“Do you want the whole stand?” The ringa seller asks, apprehensively, when he peers down at the amount she dropped into his hand. 

“No, just this one.” Pride says, coolly, retrieving a single ringa from the stand. 

“But this is— !” The merchant gasps, incredulous. 

With narry a warning, Pride tosses the ringa up in the air a few times, before suddenly throwing it right at Reinhard’s face with a strength he wouldn't have expected from her frame. 

Blinking in surprise, Reinhard catches it without much effort. It wasn’t the throw that surprised him— his protections allowing him to see the movement in a near omniscient manner— but rather the intent behind it. Was she still mad at him then? 

As if in answer, an explosion above them sends the street into chaos. Bystanders cry out in alarm as a plume of smoke erupts from the second-storey of the building above the stand. The merchant yelps in terror as debris begins to fall onto his stall, breaking it irreparably. Reinhard is quick to grasp him by the waist and haul him away from the dangerous explosion, barking orders to the harried guards nearby. 

In the interim, Pride slips away. 

Later, he’ll learn the explosion was caused by a faulty magic crystal. The investigation into the origins of such a crystal leads to a full legal affair as the knights discover an illegal enchanting operation based out of Cramlin involving strange runes from Gusteko. There’s no way for Pride to have known that, he doesn’t think. At the very least, no way for her to have known those illegal crystals would not only end up in the hands of the innocent ringa merchant, but also that they would explode at that exact moment. Perhaps she had been part of the illicit affair, in which case that would explain how she knew the whereabouts of the crystals, and also how she had amassed such wealth as to callously toss out gold to miscellaneous capital denizens. But that still wouldn’t explain the timing. 

Reinhard could likely ponder on the matter as much as he liked, without ever shoring up an answer. 

III.

Things come to a head in Priestella. 

The great water gate city has devolved into chaos. 

Four of Pride’s constituents have seized the infamous city and wreak havoc across its splendid canals. All five royal candidates have had the terrible misfortune of being in the city at the time, and all their assembled knights and attendants are likely scrambling to defend their masters as well as the innocents caught in the crossfire. Reinhard himself would like to join them in the latter, but as it is the life of his Lady is at the forefront of his mind. Reinhard tries to be a filial child, at least nominally if not in practice; he has never spoken ill of any of his family members, never raised his voice to them, always deferred to their orders. The situation with his grandfather, he will admit, pains him endlessly. He doesn’t even know where to start in mending that bridge, even with the White Whale defeated. 

As for his father…

Well, Reinhard pities him most of all. His descent from former glory has been a terrible sight to see, but with his mother remaining in her condition, he sees no recourse for the Deputy Commander. 

But right now, all he can feel is anger at the man. For falling to such lows, for daring to raise a blade against a royal candidate— for keeping Reinhard from his duty to the rest of the realm, merely for his own selfish desire to live. 

For all that this situation is terrible, there is a small part of him that finds relief. 

The assembled sins, he’s heard from the broadcasts, are Lust, Gluttony, Wrath and Greed. Having taken over the towers, they’ve revealed their demands to the seized city without further ado. They all appear to be as equally insane and outlandish characters as Sloth. Not a single voice of reason among them. Pride, he imagines, would not have concocted such an absurd scheme. It feels sacreligious to even consider an Archbishop in anything approaching a positive light, but after the reports of her many mysterious deeds have added up over the year since he’s seen her, he cannot help but think it anyway. 

It was nearly a year ago that he’d heard whispers of the Great Rabbit falling to her might. After her triumph over the White Whale— ostensibly a title given to his honored grandfather, although the man himself has already insisted it would have been impossible without her— as well as Sloth— in which Julius too insisted the glory was hardly even his, despite wielding the blade that felled him— he had no reason to dismiss it as hearsay. The court mage had been rather tight-lipped over the entire affair, which happened upon his lands, but even he insisted he had not defeated it alone. 

Reinhard, tied to his duty to Lady Felt, could not chase down the enigmatic Archbishop with the insistence he would have preferred. He has done his best to balance his responsibilities to both the Kingdom and his Lady appropriately, but when he has a moment to spare, he’s not ashamed to admit he uses the time to track down leads. Not that anything has come to fruition. The Archbishop of Pride is as elusive as the others had been until now.

For them all to appear, suddenly and all at once, after so many years shrouded in mystery… 

It’s no wonder everyone is panicking.

And Reinhard can do nothing to alleviate their concerns, trapped by his father’s hand as he is. 

“I’d hate to break up such a touching reunion,” a voice remarks casually from behind his father, just as a plume of shadow rises from his feet. “But I need to borrow your son for a moment.”

Without even lifting a finger, Pride has his father crumpled on the ground. The sword that had been pointed at Felt’s neck hangs limply in midair, before Pride reaches for it with her hand and grasps. Felt bolts out of the way immediately, using that clever quickness of hers to put Reinhard between herself and the newcomer. 

“Who are you?” Felt demands, from the safety behind Reinhard’s shoulder. 

“No one worth remembering,” Pride answers, blandly. She uses his father’s sword to point eastward. “Your compatriots are gathering at the central radio tower, I suggest you head that way.”

Reinhard’s brow furrows at the strange word, 'radio', but he understands the gist of what she means to say. Felt, meanwhile, stickers her tongue out at her. 

“Don’t tell me what to do, weirdo!” 

“Lady Felt!” Reinhard reprimands, and while it’s true he usually tries to instill within her a certain level of gracious decorum, he has no idea why he feels so scandalized right now. That’s hardly the worst thing she’s ever called someone, and considering the person in question proprietary seems a bit obsolete. 

Fortunately, Pride doesn’t take it as much of an insult. She just stares the girl down flatly with those dark, dark eyes of hers. 

“Whaaaat?” Felt whines at him, rolling her eyes.

He clears his throat, attempting to pull together some kind of composure. His chest feels tight, heart thundering oddly with the entrance of the woman he’s been searching for all these months. “I’m afraid I must agree with her.” Reinhard insists, turning to Felt. His divine protection confirmed the truth of Pride’s words. “Your safety is my highest priority.”

With that, he turns back to Pride. He holds a hand over his chest and dips his head slightly. “I understand you have requested my presence, but the safety of Lady Felt is my utmost priority. I must escort her to the tower.” 

Pride just shrugs, as if she’d expected as much. “Yeah, sure.”

She leads them in presumably the direction of the tower, his father’s sword still in her hand. Reinhard feels no real need to relieve her of it; he does, however, at least move his father off to the side of the street where he was less likely to be caught in the chaos of the crazed citizens. She lingers outside when Reinhard and Felt rejoin Crusch and Anastasia’s party. That’s probably for the best. Reinhard is justly reprimanded for his lack of presence during their assault on the main tower, and his general absence terribly unbefitting of a knight. That being said, everyone understands the severity of Lady Felt’s safety being threatened— by his own father, no less— and are quick to pin most of the blame on the lousy Deputy Commander. Nonetheless, a sour pit of guilt and regret opens up in his stomach, as he accepts the truth of their words. If he had only been here, they might have prevailed with their siege at the main tower; Lady Crusch might not have been in an even poorer condition than she had been prior. Felix is right to blame him. 

While Julius, Felix and his own esteemed Grandfather remain in the party guarding the camp, Reinhard still feels torn at the thought of leaving Felt so unguarded. Truly, he shouldn’t be entertaining Pride’s request at all. Assistance requested by an Archbishop could only lead to something terrible. And yet, he finds himself refusing to voice this aloud to the assembled group. At the same time, he also has no idea how to even voice such a request aloud. Currently, the remaining members are divvying up the work to take back the other towers, and unsurprisingly they have included him in this plan now that he has made an appearance. 

How is he to regretfully inform them of yet another monumental absence during an integral moment, this time at the request of a Sin Archbishop? He could bring up her assistance in securing Felt and incapacitating his father, tell them he’s honor-bound to at least listen to her request as a result, but he doubts anyone barring Julius would accept ‘honor’ as a worthy excuse at such a trying moment. Considering the state of Lady Crusch, Felix would probably attempt to claw his eyes out if he even tried to say this— and that’s to say nothing of his own grandfather’s reaction, something he’s dreading. 

He hears her before he sees her; the click of her boots against stone. He turns around first, to see her standing on the lip of an arched window. He blinks. How exactly had she managed to get up there? 

“If it’s all the same to you, leave Greed to the Sword Saint and I.” Pride announces— as prideful as her namesake. 

His companions behind him scramble into defensive positions at her entrance. Pride doesn’t spare them a glance, staring him down with her bottomless gaze. 

“And why do ya think we should listen ta ya?” Anastasia asks, folding her arms. 

“It worked well enough for you the last time didn’t it— Slayer of the Sin Archbishop of Sloth?” Pride’s gaze turns to Julius. 

His fellow knight dips his head. “A title you are well aware I do not fully deserve.” 

“But an achievement given to your name nonetheless.” Pride points out. 

“What reason do we even have to trust an Archbishop like you?” Felix counters, a venomous expression on his normally amiable face. After all that’s been done to Lady Crusch, his hatred for the Witch Cult runs deep— even extending to Pride, a once-ally in the battles against Sloth and the White Whale. 

“I intend to destroy Greed.” Pride avows. “And that should be reason enough.”

Reinhard tilts his head in Felix’s direction. “She speaks the truth.”

“And the truth is all well and good, but without a good reason how can we trust ya?” Anastasia remarks, frowning.

“Nearly everyone in this room owes a debt to this woman in one way or another,” his grandfather remarks, gravely. “Is that not reason enough to trust her on this matter?”

“Do not trust me.” Pride snaps, with an aggression that takes his grandfather by surprise. 

“I have my own reasons to destroy Greed, but don’t mistake them for altruism.” She continues, sternly. “It merely appears that in this matter, our goals align.”

“Like they did with Sloth and the White Whale?” Julius retorts, archly. 

“Something like that,” she hedges off, fiery expression returning to that flat, impenetrable look of hers. Her dark gaze turns back to Reinhard. “I’ll be waiting for your answer, Sword Saint.”

And with that, she drops off the side of the window, evidently done with the conversation. 

//

In the end, their decision was already made since the start. 

From what Garfiel— one of Lady Emilia’s attendants— said about the fight he witnessed between Greed and Wrath, Greed is all but invulnerable. Everything Wrath, Emilia, and Garfiel himself attempted on him was met with an invincibility that even Reinhard finds hard to wrap his head around. However, things being as they are, Reinhard is obviously the only choice. The other Sins are at least capable of taking damage, giving everyone else at least a fighting chance to take them down. Greed, the Archbishop who single-handedly conquered an entire city, is well beyond the means of everyone else but him. 

Nonetheless, he can privately admit to some apprehension. He has no lack of faith in his own abilities— or rather, his own Divine Protections— but he has no idea how to even approach a battle with someone as invincible as himself. No, even more so. 

It turns out there’s no real reason for his despair. 

He had briefly forgotten that this is a fight he’s not engaging in alone.

The thought is—bewildering. Distressing. Relieving. 

The relief is quite an odd thing. With it is an even stranger gratitude. Reinhard always fights alone. To have anyone fight at his side is merely a liability. The idea of going into battle with someone else should concern him, yet he feels no worries at all. For some inexplicable reason, he’s dead certain Pride will be an asset. That Pride will have the strength that he himself does not possess. He wonders where such security could possibly come from. It feels as encompassing and immutable as a Divine Protection, some unwavering truth of the universe he can barely understand. 

Pride is, indeed, waiting for him at the edge of the tower square. When she sees him leap out the window, she immediately sets off in what he assumes is Greed’s direction. Can she sense the other Archbishops? 

“What’s with that face?” Pride’s deep gaze flickers towards him as they walk side by side across the ruined streets. “You’re not scared of an Archbishop, are you?”

Reinhard ducks his head. “Not as such, no. However, I must admit to a certain apprehension at the thought of fighting an invulnerable enemy I do not know much about.”

“So even you worry about these things, huh?” Pride comments idly. Then she shakes her head. “Don’t worry your pretty little head about it. All you have to do is just tank for me— the rest will work itself out.”

Reinhard blinks rapidly. His brain stutters on ‘pretty’ in a weird way, before he forcibly drags it off to think about the rest of her sentence. He has no idea what ‘tank’ means, but her assured tone does indeed assuage his worries, which is what he thinks she meant to do. 

“I see.” He closes his eyes, smiling slightly. “So you do have a plan. That’s good to hear.”

And it is a plan indeed. 

He’s humbled by the mere idea of attempting this without her. It would end in failure, undoubtedly. He wonders if this is how Felix, Crusch and his grandfather felt when they defeated the White Whale together. How Julius felt as she guided his hand to deliver the final blow to the Archbishop Sloth. The sharp, painful acknowledgment that your life and the lives of so many others dangled upon a precipice you had never even been aware of. How easily things would have gone to ruin, without Pride there to illuminate the path forward. 

They near a church at the far end of the city, the surrounding streets deathly silent with the absence of the prowling, crazed crowds. 

Pride tosses him the sword she’s been carrying this whole time, gesturing to the front of the church. “You’ll go in first,” she tells him. “Get Greed out of there any way you can. Distract him and keep him out of ear and eyeshot of the church, but not too far, okay?”

“Understood.” He nods, hands curling around the new blade. 

“It’s best if he doesn’t see me until the last possible moment,” Pride offers, when he turns to give her a confused look when she doesn’t move to follow him at all. 

Perhaps he should wonder about that, but as it is he has more to worry about currently. 

As suspected, Greed is truly invulnerable. 

After rescuing Lady Emilia at the last second from what would have been a most unfortunate (and unwanted) marriage, he stays true to Pride’s plan and launches Greed out the window behind him. Unsurprisingly, being bodily tossed out a window and into a nearby building does literally nothing to Greed’s constitution. Reinhard spends most of the ensuing fight slowly but surely whittling away various theories the others had come up with to explain his invincibility after Garfiel had revealed it. Nothing works; not gravity, not drowning, not fire or even lightning. Pure physical force is meaningless to him. It’s as if he doesn’t even really exist, the matter of the world around him obsolete. And yet, he's clearly corporeal, as things don’t just pass through him.

Had Reinhard been left to face the man alone, he would have been at his wits end. Frustration might have even got the better of him. But he is not alone, and so he’s merely quietly humbled— and perhaps a bit apprehensive— at his first encounter with a Sin Archbishop. They truly are as fearsome and horrific as they have always been made out to be; adorned with such accursed, incomprehensible powers, it is no real wonder they’ve wandered the world unchecked and unhampered, despite the Kingdom’s best efforts. 

He cannot speak for Julius, but he can readily admit that in his case, any victory he might find over the Sin Archbishop of Greed would have to be given over to Pride. Even if it may be his own hand that slays the Archbishop, it would not have been possible without Pride. 

Greed is very obviously not a fighter. He displays no finesse or talent for the craft, merely using whatever’s around as makeshift attacks— to what would have been great success, if his opponent was anyone but Reinhard. As it is, he makes good on his word to distract the Archbishop, but otherwise does not find the fight particularly engaging. He doesn’t go out of his way to fight him in earnest, knowing full well that his efforts will be futile until Pride finishes up her own plans. And so, he finds his mind wandering to the girl in question. What sort of Authority does she possess, as the Sin Archbishop of Pride? Whatever it is, was that how she rendered his father unconscious without even lifting a finger? Without knowing the manner in which she managed it, he would have no way of defending against it. Truly, what a frightful thing these Authorities are. 

Will there come a day, one day, when he and his compatriots will have to find a way to combat her own terrifying powers? He hopes not, and yet he can see no other foreseeable future. But such an event is not worth worrying over now, in the present, when Pride is currently his greatest ally against the threat of the Witch Cult. 

“What’s this?” A cheery, amused voice calls down across the destroyed street. “You’re looking a bit peaky there, Greed. Are you perhaps getting a bit frustrated, facing an opponent as annoyingly invincible as you are?” 

Greed whirls around at the sound of the new voice— so assured in his own invulnerability that he would turn his back to the greatest swordsmen of the land— watching as a figure bathed in black walks toward them. 

“Do you need one of your wives to fetch you a glass of water? A wet towel?” A low, wicked grin gleams on her face. “You really can’t do anything without them, huh?”

“How disgusting, how terrible, to interrupt a fight between two men, don’t you think that’s really just so rude?” Greed blathers on, unbothered. “I’m so generous, you know, but even someone as wonderful as me needs to have their limits. I try to be so understanding, you know, but there’s just no helping some people.”

“Is that how you see it?” Pride raises a brow. “There’s really no helping you people, I guess.” She turns his words back at him.

“Good job, Reinhard!” She calls over Greed, to him. “Looks like you sufficiently occupied him— sorry you had to deal with his rambling. You can go ahead and end him now.”

“What is this? What is this?” Greed gasps, becoming incensed. “To speak over me? To deny me such an integral right as speech? I, the most magnanimous, the most upstanding, the most— 

“Any day now, Reinhard.” Pride interrupts his rambling with a bored drawl. 

He nods. “Yes.” 

He strikes the ground beneath Greed, and feels the mundane sword in his hand shake with the impact. The street collapses, a monstrous hole dropping into its center. Greed dodges, looking still as unimpressed as he has been with Reinhard’s efforts the whole fight— when suddenly his entire composition changes.

He gasps, shudders, then nearly falls to his knees, grasping at his chest. He whirls around, towards Pride, eyes wide and furious. 

“You! You disgusting wench!” He cries, pointing at her. “What have you done to my precious wives?”

“Oh, and now you decide to care about them?” Pride laughs, high and chilling. “What a time to have a heart, no?”

She continues laughing, so hard she’s nearly in tears, as if she’s said something truly hilarious. Greed’s face contorts into a look of pure, unadulterated fury. He takes a breath, ready to shout his anger to the heavens and back, when Reinhard interrupts him. He’s surprised to find the resistance he’d felt earlier still in place when he attempts to slash the man in half. The force of his sword does nothing but slam Greed into a nearby building. He’s unscathed as the dust clears— or rather, physically unscathed.

He drops to his knees after the fact, gasping in a wretched, wheezing breath.

Pride watches him with bored eyes. “He can hold that invincibility now for up to five seconds, but it will cost him.”

“But still, five seconds without limit?” Reinhard confirms, frowning. ”Why five seconds?” 

Pride crosses her arms. “Because that’s how long he can stop his heart for without dying in the process.” She explains.

Reinhard frowns further. It’s an explanation, true, but it still doesn’t make much sense to him. What does his heart have to do with it? Was that why Pride had found her joke earlier so funny?

“So, yeah, he has no limit to how many times he can stop his heart like that, but it can never be for more than five seconds.” She continues, offhandedly. “In which case, just dropping him into that hole should be good, no?” 

“You… you, you, you!!!” Greed screeches in rage, as he picks himself up back to his feet. “How do you know this? How could you possibly know this? This is the esteemed virtue handed to me by Her, what do you even have to do with it? How absurd! How ridiculous! How dare you!”

Pride rolls her eyes. “Don’t think you’re so special now. You’re not the only one with an Authority around here— and yours is just pathetic, in comparison to mine, just to let you know.”

Greed’s eyes widen, then narrow. “But is it… could you be? No… are you— is this—...” He pauses in his insensible ramblings. “...Pride?”

Pride smiles. “Very good.”

“No!!!” Greed howls, stalking towards them thunderously. “How can this be?! The gospel said— there was nothing— but Her wisdom could never be wrong…?!”

His words make no sense to Reinhard, but his actions speak enough. He raises his sword and steps between the two Archbishops, making his intent clear. Greed’s bulging eyes turn to him, then back to Pride. 

“You… you are working with them?” He hisses, voice shrill. “You have betrayed her in such a grotesque, such a terrible, such a worthless manner?! You, bathed in her love as you are?!”

“To call yourself an Archbishop, yet besmirch Her name in such a manner. Her grace, upon which she has blessed you. Her words, given only to her most faithful,” Greed gasps out, sneering. “How… positively greedy of you.”

“I’m more of an Archbishop than a selfish, worthless lump like you will ever be.” Pride retorts, eyes flashing. “You don’t understand anything about Her. You could never understand her suffering. Only I, and I alone, can save Satella from her wretched half-state. The rest of you are just wasted garbage.” 

Greed howls in rage, and just as he lifts his foot to send a deadly cloud of particles her way, Reinhard intervenes and delivers a well-timed jab to knock him right off of his feet and into the nearby hole. He might not have been able to execute such a seamless attack without her words to distract Greed, but nonetheless he finds himself equally as taken aback by them as the Archbishop had been. 

He can still hear the horrendous, pitiable man as he shrieks from the bottom of the deep hole Reinhard had carved out earlier, but it's impossible to tell what he’s howling about. Or maybe Reinhard is merely deaf to it, as immersed in his own thoughts as he is. Slowly but surely, the hole is being filled with water by the nearby canals. Pride raises a hand aloft, and he feels a strange pressure in the air as a boulder is lifted out of the way, allowing a torrent of water to rush into the pit. Her Authority at work, he supposes, as yet another piece of debris is cleared, and a tidal rush ensues. 

He stares down at the hole, the sounds of crashing water drowning out the poor, wretched soul below.

It is a victory indeed, but a hollow one. 

“So it’s true then,” he says, woodenly. “You do intend to resurrect the Witch of Envy.”

“I don’t understand why that would surprise you,” Pride retorts, breezily, peering down into the watery grave of her fellow Archbishop without a hint of regret in her abyssal eyes. “I am the Sin Archbishop of Pride.” 

His hand curls at his side, the other almost instinctively reaching for the sword forever silent at his waist. 

What hurts the most is that— Pride is right. 

He should never have been under any other delusion of her character. She has never made it a secret, always brutally honest with her existence as a dreaded enemy of the Kingdom. It’s Reinhard’s own fault for ever even slightly thinking otherwise. He feels… it’s so absurd. So outrageous. So stupid. He’s so stupid. He’s supposed to be the knight of knights, isn’t he? The revered Sword Saint, protector of the realm? How pathetic. What would the kingdom think, to hear their venerated hero is such an utter fool.

He’s actually shocked to feel his nose stinging, his eyes burning.

“Don’t you dare give me that look!” Pride hisses out, with such fury it actually stuns him into a stupor. The look in her eyes is one he's never seen before, expressionless mask breaking, shattering irreparably. Her face contorts into something terrible, embittered, full of emotions he can’t identify. Or perhaps, just merely wishes he could not. 

Maybe he’s imagining it. That sorrow buried beneath the rage. The regret, the hatred, the bitterness. 

He wonders what his own face looks like, to draw all that out of her. 

“You knew this all along!” She spits, without an ounce of pity. “I have never denied who I am— what I am. What I must do. I am the Sin Archbishop of Pride and you’ve known that all along, whatever else you thought is no fault of mine.”

“No, of course not.” He manages to get out, voice level enough to perhaps pass for unmoved to an unsuspecting bystander. “Nonetheless, despite what you have done for the realm, I am bound by duty and honor to put a stop to your plans, by any means necessary.”

Pride takes a step back, face returning to stone. “So be it, then.” 

He applies pressure to the Dragon Sword Reid, as he always does at the start of any battle. Never once has he imagined the seal upon its sheath actually breaking, so the graceful glide of metal against the scabbard is enough to take his breath away. 

Reinhard stares down in disbelief at the bright light in his hands. The sword of infamous renown, that prickly, finicky creature that refuses him so concretely that Reinhard cannot help but second guess his own title as Sword Saint— has finally revealed itself once more. It’s as illustrious and incredible as he always remembered it to be, so glorious as to be blinding. 

Pride, it appears, is a worthy enough opponent for his sword. 

Nonetheless, he grits his teeth and sheathes the sword once more.

Not because of any consideration for Pride, he tells himself. But they are still within the confines of the once grand water city of Priestella. And while his fight with Greed had done a great deal of damage to their surroundings, a single swing of the Dragon Sword would be even more calamitous. He’s only acting out of due consideration for the city proper, that’s all. 

Pride watches this all with hooded eyes, expression unreadable. 

He’s still in possession of his father’s sword, and while somehow, the idea of wielding it against her seems distasteful, it’s all he has on hand. 

“So stubborn, as always,” she remarks, under her breath. Again, it seems too familiar a comment for their relationship; it makes something unknowable writhe in his heart. 

Pride attacks first. 

//

In hindsight, he has gravely miscalculated. 

Or perhaps it was no miscalculation on his part; perhaps Pride had known all along that the area around the church was deserted. Perhaps she had done something to keep it that way. If that was the case though, then that meant this current situation was intentional on her part— which does not seem to be the case. 

It was apparent from the start that Pride had no real intention of fighting him. No matter how incredible her mysterious Authority might have been, he was still the Sword Saint. The greatest knight in the Kingdom, by no small stretch. For anyone to draw arms against him was considered a folly on their own part. Just his presence at any border could incite war. So it was no surprise Pride spent most of the time deflecting him with either various objects, clever maneuvers, the environment around them, or just plain ingenuity. He grew tired of such tricks quite quickly. He had no desire to fight her to begin with— to draw it out like this was just painful. 

With that in mind, he’d cornered her at the edge of the city, ready to strike a catastrophic blow from high above. 

And then— he miscalculated.

Pride was there, in the empty square, too far from any of the nearby buildings to evade his attack. She stared up at him with something indefinable in her midnight eyes— not anger, not hate, though he would be deserving of both. Something else entirely. 

A watery cry draws his gaze away from hers. 

With horror he sees the form of a person he hadn’t sensed; a little girl crawling out of the rubble a ways off, across from Pride, at the mouth of a collapsed building. She’s scuffed up with dirt and dust, hair in disarray; her face is streaked with tears. He can see it all with such clarity with his superior sight, despite the distance between them. He can hear it all with his superior hearing— her heaving sobs, the crack in her voice as she calls out for her brother. He can see it when Pride notices her too; her head whips to the sound of the girl’s cries. At first, he sees the way her expression hardens, knowing that she will dismiss the poor child as an unfortunate casualty, as he has resigned himself to do. 

For all his superior abilities and divine protections, he has no way of stopping this strike now that he has committed to it. 

But then the child stumbles into Pride’s sight, and something strange happens. Her eyes widen, brow furrowing as her mouth opens in what he thinks is a cry of alarm. The stoic expression she’s worn all fight collapses into a look of true terror— something he’s never seen on her before. 

It happens within seconds.

His blow lands true; the ground around Pride is rent asunder by the explosive force of his strike. Vicious cracks tear at the ground below her, fissures seizing jagged lines into the stone floor, all the way up into the nearby buildings. The entire square buckles under the pressure, nearly dropping into the water below. A couple of the supporting columns crumble, buildings topping soon thereafter. In the ensuing cloud of dust and dirt that kicks up in the wake of his attack, he sees that Pride has used some kind of maneuver similar to Greed’s to negate his attack, rather than attempt to dodge.

And she has somehow managed to pull the child in with her. 

A weak cry warbles out from below Pride, where the woman is collapsed beneath him. He backs away in shock as she lets out a hacking cough, her whole body shuddering with the effort. In the circle of her arms the little girl appears shell-shocked, but mostly unharmed. The look of indisputable terror that this child turns on him is almost enough to make him sick. He nearly blasted her to pieces, and it appears she’s well aware of it. He opens his mouth helplessly— to apologize, to beg for forgiveness, he doesn’t know— but Pride stirs from her stupor and pushes herself up on trembling arms. 

“Oh,” she breathes, staring down at the girl. “You’re not—” She lets out a shaky breath. “What am I saying… of course you’re not…”

The little girl finally tears her horrified eyes away from Reinhard, returning the gaze of her savior. Her eyes are big and blue, and full of tears. Pride gazes down at her, and something in her entire being seems to soften. Gently, ever so gently, she reaches up and brushes the hair off of her ruddy cheeks. It looks soft as she tucks it behind the girl’s ear, the color of sunset. 

“What are you doing here?” Pride asks then, voice nearly a whisper.

The girl’s expression creases back into tears. “I— my brother…” She hiccups. “I can’t find him.”

“It’s dangerous out here,” Pride says. “You need to get back to the shelter. When did you lose your brother?”

“W—When the lady came on with the scary voice…” The girl answers, tearfully. 

“And it was somewhere around here?” 

“Uh-huh.” The child sniffles.

“He’s probably hiding,” Pride explains gently, as she gets to her knees. She helps the little girl up as well. “This big lug behind me is a knight, believe it or not. He can find your brother for you. So let’s go back to the shelter, okay?”

The girl wipes at her eyes. “But he was hurting you.” She says, accusingly. 

Reinhard isn’t entirely sure what to say in his own defense— if there even is anything to say. He was hurting her. He was probably about to do worse to the little girl herself, however unintentionally. 

“Oh, this guy?” Pride flaps a hand toward him, then snorts. “Oh please, he couldn’t hurt me if he tried.”

A false breeze sweeps by him, but he didn’t need to feel it to know that was a lie. He knows it as the painful, indomitable truth of his entire life. He always, always hurts people. Even if he doesn’t want to.

“Really?” The girl asks, skeptically. 

“Yep. I’m suuuper strong.” Pride insists. Another breeze. “And anyway, he was just playing around.” A stronger gust of wind this time.

“He was playing around?” Her brow furrows as she blinks. “That’s not how you play. He’s dumb.”

Pride almost collapses on herself in laughter, doubling over. Reinhard feels as if he should probably be insulted somehow, but the sound of her infectious, carefree laughter is oddly endearing, and the little girl isn’t looking at him with fear anymore. 

“You said it, not me!” Pride sings cheerfully, wiping away stray tears. She holds out her hand, and the girl takes it without a single ounce of hesitation.

Pride turns back to look at him. “Well? Are you coming?”

As it turns out, her brother was waiting for her at the entrance to the shelter. They’d gotten separated in the chaos of the takeover, and he’d managed to find his way there while his sister was out looking for him. After a tearful reunion, Pride urges them both to stay safe within the shelter until a knight comes by to tell them it’s safe. 

“Don’t be so hard on yourself, it was an accident.” Pride says, breezily, as they both stare at the now closed door to the shelter. “You didn’t know she was there.”

He wonders if she has some sort of accursed powers of mind reading, or if he really is just that transparent. 

“Nonetheless, I foolishly started such a fight in a place full of innocents,” Reinhard hung his head. “The blame lies with me.”

“I started that fight, rude,” Pride sniffs. “Stop trying to steal my glory.”

“I would never do something so cavalier.” He replies, fighting off a smile. He wonders why Pride makes it so easy, how the banter is so effortless, when he normally has such difficulty conversing with others. They trade barbs like they’ve known each other their whole lives. He can’t even read Felix or Julius as well as he can her. 

“You, cavalier? Never! What blasphemy.” Pride scoffs. Reinhard blinks at the lack of telltale wind. So she really thinks that? Come to think on it, how does Pride see him? “Let’s just chalk this up to a bad idea on both our parts and call the fight a wash, how about it.”

He doesn’t really understand those phrases, but he thinks he does understand the sentiment. “I suppose the matter must be postponed, then.” 

Pride gives a hum of consideration, tapping her chin. “You probably have more important things to worry about,” she observes. 

“Indeed.” He nods. “There are still three Archbishops remaining.”

Pride raises a cool brow. 

“Four,” he amends, lamely.

“And don’t you forget it.” She nods in satisfaction. Her eyes grow distant as her gaze wanders off, towards something Reinhard can’t see, face tilted south. “Lust has already ran off, I see.”

He clenches a fist, gloves creaking in protest to sheer force in his grip. So any salvation to be found for Crusch or her other victims is unlikely. 

“Fighting her in this city would be a bad idea anyway though,” Pride adds, which only slightly mollifies him. “As I’m sure you’re already well aware, the more casualties available, the more difficult she is.”

A sound strategy, he thinks with agreement. There is indeed a reason this woman has managed to fell two Archbishops, despite her own self-doubts regarding her strength. Her assistance truly has been invaluable.

If— no, when the day comes for their postponed fight… 

Reinhard supposes he merely must steel his heart for such an ordeal, and follow through with his duty as a knight of the kingdom.

“Wrath is similar, but overall easier to deal with.” Pride continues on. “All your ridiculous protections give you decent immunity to her, so you should be the one to deal with her. Plug your ears and don’t look her in the eye though, just as a precaution. Her Authority has a radius; even if it’s big, it still has a limit. Get her somewhere entirely devoid of people, and kill her from afar. Timed magic fire crystals could work, or I guess if you’re feeling spirited you could launch a javelin at her or something.”

Pride looks amused at the thought.

Reinhard, however, is frowning. “That seems…” He hesitates to even voice his concern aloud, but does so nonetheless; “rather underhanded.”

The dark-haired woman just raises a brow at him. “I’m not sure if you noticed, but there’s no other way to defeat a Sin Archbishop. They fight dirty.”

You don’t, he thinks, intimately reminded of a young girl spared from a tragic fate near moments ago. 

“And the other two?” 

Pride shakes her head. “One step at a time, Sword Saint. You’re rushing ahead of yourself and you haven’t even dealt with this debacle yet, y’know?”

He looks away guiltily, aware of the truth in her words. How pretentious of him, to neglect the matters currently at hand, as if they are beneath him. “You are correct,” he agrees, solemn in his atonement. “But nevertheless, I do not think such an answer will appease those in Lady Crusch’s camp.”

“And yet I don’t see any of them slaying Archbishops, hmm?” Pride retorts, unmoved by the plight. “The dastardly Archbishop Pride left you without any recourse, how’s that for an answer.”

“That seems rather rhetorical.” He replies, mouth quirking.

“So it is! What subtlety you have, sir knight!” Pride affects a surprised gasp. 

He tries not to smile, truly. This is not a time for smiling, and as Pride has pointed out multiple times herself— she is his sworn enemy. Nonetheless, his heart does not feel as heavy as it had before, when he forced himself to raise a weapon against her. 

Something glitters in those endlessly dark eyes, a streak of satisfaction as her own lips seem to curl up ever so slightly as she looks at him. “Ah, there you are again. That’s much better,” she declares with a pleased nod in his direction, although he’s uncertain what she’s referring to. “Now, chop, chop. Off you go, Lassy, you’ve got damsels in distress to save.” She points off in a direction— presumably Wrath’s location. 

“I don’t know what that means, but I feel as if I should be insulted.” He muses. 

“Such subtlety! Such grace!” Pride crows, laughing. “Is there anything he can’t do?”

“He can recognize sarcasm when it is directed at him.” He ripostes back, just as teasing, even if that is, in fact, utterly untrue. Sarcasm usually goes right over his head, as all other social nuances do. 

Still, she has a good point. There are still Archbishops at large waging death and destruction upon Priestella to take care of. With one last lingering look at the sole Archbishop not currently engaged in any sort of nefarious business, he leaps into the sky. 

IV.

Hindsight, as always, reveals a full picture.

Pride did not, in fact, leave the city after he’d departed from her as he had assumed. 

She’d instead made her way towards the area where his grandfather and Garfiel were fighting against Lust’s generals. Garish, unfortunate creatures, reanimated using forbidden arts. One of which was his own grandmother, a puppet to a madwoman’s whims. His grandfather likely would have perished in the attempt to subdue her, had Pride not intervened at the last moment.

As ever, her timing was utterly impeccable. Impossible, really.

He supposes how she did it is irrelevant. She pinned the former Sword Saint down long enough for his grandfather to deliver the blow to return her to her final rest. He hasn’t spoken much with the elderly man since then, but he did seem… lighter, at the end of it. Apparently they had exchanged words, at the end. Whatever was said, it was enough to bring a small modicum of peace to a man who greatly deserved it. Another thing he’ll have to thank Pride for. Wilhelm avows himself in debt to her for both this last act of grace, as well as her actions against the White Whale. No one can outright decry him for such irreverence as swearing a promise of gratitude to an Archbishop, although he can tell people are unhappy about it. Both he and Ricardo exchange solemn glances at the announcement; they two are perhaps the only ones in the room who understand just how much they owe to the enigmatic, ever elusive Pride.

In the interim of the cleanup of Priestella, she is the subject of much debate between the royal candidates and their camps. 

Felix still bears her resentment (unduly, in Reinhard’s silent and unsolicited opinion) for both her existence as an Archbishop as well as her refusal to give any answers about Lust or Gluttony. Crusch, being in the state she is in, doesn’t have nearly as much animosity towards the dark-haired cultist, and has a rather unbiased outlook towards the whole situation. Her sense of justice is apparent as she objectively looked over the facts and decided the Archbishop’s reasoning to be correct. Trying to fight Lust in any area with a degree of population has already proven itself to be a poor idea, and trying to fight Gluttony… even Reinhard cannot suppress a shudder of concern at the thought. He is, as far as the Sword Saint can tell, the most horrific and dangerous of the lot. 

There are so many unnamed and unaccounted for, lost and alone in a city full of people who cannot remember them. The worst of the lot are the ones who have both no known collective memory, nor even consciousness. They may as well be dead, locked in slumber as they are. While the unfortunate souls transfigured by Lust are also quite pitiable, they at least have names and identities. With a bit of ice magic from Lady Emilia, their situation is salvageable for the time being. 

Pride may be an enigma, but Gluttony is a menace. 

A scourge. A dark stain on history that must be eradicated. 

A pestilence that must be blotted out of the world, just as the Witch herself must be— and yet, he can never seem to reconcile such thoughts to Pride. 

She is a Sin Archbishop, as she so angrily reminded him. She too is a scourge, an evil blemish. By her own account, even. 

If only he could find it in him to think of her so. Things would not be so difficult. 

On the subject of difficult things, Reinhard has had to weigh the balance of duty and honor and once more found himself wanting. As much as he would like to devote himself in his entirety to Lady Felt and the spreading of her goodwill across the country, his kingdom has once more called him forward. Marcus Gildark, leader of the Royal Knights, has requested him personally for a mission of the utmost importance. So important he has no choice but to leave Lady Felt in the stressed but capable hands of his only friend Felix, and to an extent his esteemed Grandfather as well. While Anastasia and Ricardo would have been a sound choice as well, the Lady Anastasia had left without a trace under mysterious circumstances. Ricardo had been tight lipped on the matter, and with so many of the Iron Fang still remaining in recovery in Priestella, it felt wrong to burden him unnecessarily. Beyond that, something about the whole situation set aflame a low burn of apprehension in his stomach; it was as if he was missing something… something impossibly integral once again…

At any rate, it was with a heart heavy with responsibility that he set off for the lower western border of the country, a place he usually would not be allowed to step foot near without fear of inciting war. 

Beyond the western borders of Agante in the Barony of Barielle, and south of Priestella lay a mountain range known in Kararagi as Zu Shi, Vollachia as The Patriarch of the Old Worlds, and Lugunica as merely The Old Mountain, a deep and terrifying landscape of sharp cliffs and calamitous weather. 

The journey into its staggering heights was not for the faint of heart. Reinhard had long since abandoned his dutiful land dragon at the base of its majestic valleys, in the hands of a stalwart wolf-man cattle farmer and his wife. The villages in this region were small and rural, with little news from the capital ever trickling through the thick forests and unyielding, treacherous mountain paths. Reinhard himself would have no trouble traversing such a dangerous road, but the same could not be said for merchant caravans, or even foot pagers. As he slowly but surely trekked up the unforgiving steppes, the quintessential villages of rural Lugunica gave way to the architecture he’d seen in Vollachia, and further still the essence of Kararagi he’d glimpsed in Priestella. Slated and thatched roofs with low angles, and robe-like outfits lined with furs to combat the mountain’s cold. The dialects grew stronger, until soon even Reinhard with his Divine Protection of Understanding was somewhat at a loss. Many kind citizens attempted to press fur-lined coats into his hand, despite his best efforts to decline them. They had evidently never encountered the Divine Protection of Temperature in this region. 

Regardless of inclement weather, language barriers, and staggering cliffs, he persevered towards his intended location. Deep within this mountain range was said to be a plateau with a lake so still it reflected a sky so pristine even sky dragons accidentally dive into its depths. Yakgoat farmers were said to traverse these barren, sky-born desert steppes in a migration that has gone unhindered for centuries. Once Reinhard could see the village, Nagqu, he would be at the base of the most majestic of the old world patriarchs. It was at the summit of that mountain where Reinhard would find his quarry— The Sin Archbishop of Lust. 

It was to his disbelief that in this old and mystical land he would find faces both new and old. 

“So you’ve decided to vacation in magic Tibet too, huh?” Pride opines, sounding more exasperated than angered.

“I— I’m so sorry!” He bursts out, scrambling backwards until his back hits a nearby boulder, and he immediately whirled around to face it, 

His meandering journey through the tangled foothills had him picking through a strangely warm and barren land in the clouds. Steam buffeted up from the very ground itself, a rich, metallic scent strong in the humid air. The warmth was comforting even for him, after such a long journey through the wintry tundra. The water too, while not potable, was of a finely heated temperature. He’d even seen local monkeys using the larger pools as bathing areas. It had seemed a good enough idea to replicate. While the weather was no great difficulty for him, he was still exposed to its elements; a bath would likely do him good before he entered into the village proper, lest he be mistaken for some sort of mountain beast beneath all these gifted furs. 

He’d scouted out the largest bath for this purpose— only to find it currently occupied with a very familiar, very naked woman.

“What are you sorry for? Are you peeping on purpose?” Pride teases. He doesn’t know how he knows she’s jesting, facing the far wall as he is; something in her voice, he thinks, even though he doesn’t know what. It still strikes him as so surreal, that he can read her so easily when such things normally elude him.

“O— Of course not!” He insists, ears turning red.

Pride laughs merrily. “Then no harm done, hm? Still, to think I’d run into you here of all places…” Her jovial tone turns a bit maudlin. “Fate really is the worst, isn’t it?”

“While I agree such a serendipitous meeting does seem rather preordained, I don’t believe it to be the worst at all.” Reinhard replies, genuinely.

He hears it, and at first doesn’t recognize the sounds. His superior hearing of course picks it up; the slucing of water, droplets against a still surface, flicks of water steaming against rock. The pitter-patter of droplets tracing down her arms and back into the pool, the ensuing splatter after she rings out her hair. His entire face flushes when he finally registers what he’s hearing; the sounds of water against her warm, naked skin. He dares not move a muscle, eyes wide as he stares unseeing at the rock wall in front of him. 

The whisper of cloth, then the vigorous rubbing against skin. He squeezes his eyes shut. By the great dragon himself, he hadn’t expected— !!

“All done,” Pride calls, cheerfully. “You can turn around now.”

He hesitates for a long moment, hoping this isn’t some sort of prank. Fortunately when he turns around Pride is fully dressed, in a truly striking layered robe in dazzling patterns. It looks rather complicated; he has no idea how she managed to fasten it so elaborately with only a single pair of hands. Her damp hair hangs limply down one shoulder, where it continues to drip onto the beautiful embroidery down her arm. Without even thinking about it, he walks towards her and retrieves the fallen towel, lifting her hair and using it to absorb the worst of the water before it ruins her outfit. Pride watches him with wide eyes as he gently places her hair over it, but makes no move to stop him. Finally he realizes what he’s done, and leaps back as if burned. Pride is still staring at him as if she’s seeing a ghost. 

“Ah— forgive me, I hadn’t meant to—” he flounders, tongue-tied.

“No it’s, it’s alright.” Pride mercifully cuts him off. She looks down at her hair, neatly wrapped up. “... Thanks.”

“I…” He truly has no idea what to say; no way of explaining his own thoughtless actions. It was terribly impolite of him. 

Before he could even think to formulate a proper apology, Pride was stepping away, tucking her arms around herself in a gesture he guiltily thought might be a bit defensive. Pride had never seemed afraid of him before, even though she rightly should have been. To see her move to put distance between them felt like a lance through his chest. Even a Sin Archbishop thought him something fearful, something monstrous. 

“Are you really just going to stand around like that all day?” Pride calls out, head turned to the side. Reinhard follows her gaze, but sees nothing but craggy scenery. “Some bodyguard you are.”

“I was under the impression you had no need of bodyguarding services,” a smooth baritone replies, and then the form of a man dressed in a knight’s uniform of all things, emerges from behind a boulder. “And you were hardly in any danger from Reinhard.”

He blinks rapidly, surprised by such a familiar form of address from someone he doesn’t recognize.

“He’s the Sword Saint, you know,” Pride retorts, crossly. “He could end me in an instant.”

“Could? Possibly. Would? Never. At least not without announcing his intent.” The man continues, and he sounds so assured of himself Reinhard has to wonder where he found such confidence in Reinhard’s abilities, considering even he himself has his own doubts on the matter. 

“How chivalrous,” Pride drolls sarcastically.

“Indeed,” the man intones, ignoring the sarcasm with dexterous aplomb. 

He looks towards Reinhard then, and something… flickers, then dies in his eyes. He looks terribly pained, even if he keeps his shoulders straight and his head held high. A remarkable man, and worthy of the knight’s uniform, even if Reinhard cannot recall him.

“So it really is true, then,” the purple-haired man stands in front of him, wearing a sorrowful expression. “I suppose I should have expected it, when even Lady Anastasia hadn’t recognized me…”

“Recognized you?” Reinhard repeats, brow furrowing. “Then, you are familiar with her?”

Out of the corner of his eye, he sees Pride turn away, as if giving them some semblance of privacy. The movement confuses him; should this be a private conversation? But he’s never met this stranger before in his life. 

“Familiar…” the man echoes. He looks so lost. “Yes, that is one way of putting it.”

His brow furrows further. There’s something about the way the man is staring at him… nothing about him is familiar, and yet, that longing in his eyes, it almost seems like— “And, have we met before?”

It seems to be perhaps the exactly wrong thing to say. The man rears back as if Reinhard had struck him at full power, eyes widening. 

“It’s incredible, really, how absolute this power is…” The man trails off with a bitter smile. “Truly, how fearsome.”

Reinhard frowns, opening his mouth to reply before Pride beats him to it.

“That’s enough of this defeatist attitude, Julius, it’s unbecoming of you.” Pride remarks, loftily. With a wince of acknowledgment, the man— Julius— lowers his head. “Sooner or later, Gluttony will fall to me, and your memories will be returned to those you treasure most.”

“Memories?” Reinhard says, looking furtively between the two. Then his eyes widen. “Then you mean to say, this man…?”

“Was a royal guard, just like you?” Pride finishes, idly. “Yes, what gave it away? That annoyingly knightly attitude? The grating chivalry? The uniform?”

The man cuts a severely unimpressed glance in Pride’s direction. In response, Pride just grins roguishly at him. 

“A royal guard… I see.” Reinhard ducks his head. “We must have been quite close, then. I apologize.”

“There’s no reason for an apology, least of all from you.” The knight— Julius— maintains, woodenly. “The one responsible will meet his retribution soon enough.”

“That’s the spirit!” Pride agrees. “Consider it a temporary adventure with yours truly. It’ll be a tale for the ages. Bards will sing tales of our valor and might— wait a second, do you guys even have bards?”

“Do you mean minstrels, by chance?” Julius sighs, sounding rather long-suffering, as if he must deal with Pride’s capriciousness on a regular basis.

“Sure, that.” She claps her hands. “Well then, looks like our boss battle party has assembled! Honestly, I was ready to go at it just the two of us, but Reinhard showing up is rather convenient…” She peers at him, squinting. “How did you end up here, anyhow? Aren’t you, like, banned from the borders or something?”

“My presence is ill-advised,” Reinhard demures. “But this trip was sanctioned by the Council of Elders; fear not.”

“I was hardly fearing,” Pride snorts. 

“Not that it isn’t good to see you, Reinhard,” Julius cuts in. “But might you elaborate on the subject more? Why would the council send you, now of all times?”

He glances briefly, but tellingly, in Pride’s direction. “Curtailing Witch Cult activities has taken precedence after the situation in Priestella.” He says, diplomatically. 

“Oh, so they’re afraid of me, are they?” Pride looks rather tickled. 

He inclined his head in affirmation. “Indeed. But curing the condition of those deformed by Lust remains the Kingdom’s highest priority. Though its origins were rather mysterious, the council received critical information that a sky dragon-like creature was sighted in these parts…” He trails off, eyes widening in realization.

Clearly Pride comes to that same realization at the exact time he does, for she narrows her dark eyes at her companion, who looks positively unrepentant. 

“While I appreciate your confidence in my abilities, I was certain a bit of backup would not have gone amiss.” Julius reveals, dutifully. 

Pride’s brow twitches. “It worked out pretty great for us with Sloth, dont’cha think?”

“And you were equally successful defeating Greed with Reinhard by your side— with significantly less damage on his end.” Julius adds, serene. “At any rate, I’m glad to hear my message was well received. WIth the situation as dire as it is, what’s the harm in additional help? Surely you agree Reinhard’s presence would only improve our chances.”

“I never leave anything to chance,” Pride dismisses him, voice low and missing its earlier teasing lilt. 

“I endeavor to assist you in this matter in any way I can.” Reinhard avows, solemnly.

“That was never in question,” Pride sighs, and despite her words sounding positively complimentary to him, he can’t help the feeling she hadn’t intended them to be that way. “Well, whatever. I’m hungry, so I’m heading back to the ryokan. Try not to drown each other or anything.”

With that evident dismissal, she turns on her heel and disappears down a grove of bamboo, likely in the direction of this ‘ryokan’. Reinhard turns to his companion, frowning quizzically. “What is a ‘ryokan’?”

Julius sighs. “Your guess is as good as mine.”

//

Apparently Pride had taken a rather relaxed approach to hunting Lust that required frequent stops at mysteriously well-appointed bed and breakfasts along the mountains. But for whatever reason Reinhard’s presence had decidedly derailed that lackadaisical pace, because Pride had unceremoniously decided they would be going after Lust tonight, no exceptions, exactly after dinner. His fellow royal guard, Julius, looked rather put upon by the sudden announcement, and had thereafter revealed his annoyance with Pride’s ambling about. Reinhard had to wonder what exactly had changed— he couldn’t think of anything but his own presence. 

Dinner was a… pointedly tense affair. 

Without Pride as a buffer, he finds it difficult to converse with the unknown knight, Julius. An unsurmountable channel of memories separates them, and it’s clear they both are well aware of it. Reinhard wishes there was some kind of Divine Protection he could use to bridge the gap between them, but these Authorities of the Sin Archbishops is painfully absolute. No matter how hard he tries, he can’t manage to recall a single thing about Julius Juukulius. And trying to ask the other knight about his life directly seems to cause him nothing but pain, so Reinhard takes great care not to bring it up. Unfortunately, that leaves them with very little in common, aside from the mysterious dark-haired Sin Archbishop. 

He tries to act nonchalant about it, focusing instead on his meal. It’s of a deeply similar Kararagi-esque style to the ones they’d had in Priestella, but that’s about all Reinhard understands of it. This one, at least, he doesn’t think is raw…

He watches Pride as she easily scoops up rice with those thin wooden sticks— chopsticks, he thinks they’re called— as if it was second nature to her. He’s at least reassured by the fact Julius appears as uncoordinated with the utensils as he is, staring down at his meal with a discomfited expression. 

“What’s with you two?” She sets her rice bowl down with a furrow set in her brows. She takes one look at their matching disgruntled expressions, the way they’re both awkwardly holding their chopsticks, and begins to laugh uproariously.

He feels a weight he hadn’t realized he’d had dissipate as he watches her face brighten with humor. “Oh my god, both of you, aren’t you supposed to be some of the finest knights in the land? This is pathetic!”

She says this, but she’s smiling so widely it’s hard to take offense.

“While this meal is familiar to the food we had in Priestella, I don’t remember these utensils being used.” Julius comments, sounding mildly aggrieved beneath that polite expression of his.

“They weren’t?” Pride pauses, looking thoughtful. “Huh. Maybe not. Well, whatever. Let me see if someone has a fork around here.”

She flags the waitress down, and after a brief conversation the woman reappears with a more familiar set of utensils. Reinhard feels faintly embarrassed as he profusely thanks the woman for her troubles, even as he secretly thrills at the way Pride watches him with unfettered amusement. 

“I’m sure with some practice I may be more adept at handling these,” he says, diplomatically. “But in the interest of expediency I think it’s best if I use the utensils more familiar to me.”

He expected a clever quip in response from the Archbishop, but when he looks back towards her, he finds her gaze distant and unapproachable, which had been the last thing he’d wanted. 

“Yes, I’m sure you would be.” She says, but she sounds very far away, even as she sits right next to him.

//

“Can’t sleep?”

He turns away from the wintry moon to see the increasingly familiar form of Pride backlit in the warm lantern light. Her hair is braided, probably for sleep, and a slightly thicker robe has been thrown over her lighter sleeping yukata. It feels oddly intimate to see her like this, something about the sight making the tips of his ears burn. He himself cannot feel the cold due to his Divine Protections; it appears even Sin Archbishops are more human than him in this manner, because Pride immediately moves to tuck herself into her robe further as she steps out into the garden properly. 

He shakes his head, speechless; his mouth feels very dry. 

Julius had eventually managed to talk her out of storming Lust’s mountain stronghold in the middle of the night, mainly by pointing out neither of them had any manner of seeing through the darkness and with the exception of Reinhard (who could in fact see in the dark) they were more liable to tumble down the cliffside than make it in one piece. Pride had grumbled over that, but had eventually, begrudgingly, acquiesced to staying one more night and departing at dawnlight. It had seemed like sound advice at the time, but now Reinhard wasn’t so sure.

His thoughts always seemed to circle back to the enigmatic Archbishop one way or another, but after this trip he had a feeling he’d no longer even have the slightest of reprieves from her. He’d seen too much, now. And he felt greedy with it. He wanted to know more. 

It felt dangerous, this feeling. In a manner nothing ever had before. 

Pride peers up at him with those unfathomably dark eyes. It feels like all the light from the stars and the moon and the world around them get sucked up into them, light and matter and energy all inexorably pulled into the center of that boundless gaze. He finds he’s no exception, even with all of his Divine Protections. 

A furrow creases her brow. “It’s not like you to be so worried over battle.” She comments idly. As always, it seems so personal and intimate a statement to come from someone who by all rights should barely know him. And yet it always seems like she sees straight into his heart. Is that what her Authority is? 

“It’s not the battle I worry over,” he confesses, quietly. 

It’s you.

It’s himself, too. He feels as if he’s standing at a crossroad, about to make a choice he can’t come back from. The urge to reach out and touch her is overwhelming, so powerful he has to clench his fists at his sides to stop his own two hands from moving without his consent. That constricted feeling in his chest that he gets whenever she’s nearby seems to compound in on itself, until even a simple breath is hard to come by. 

“Is that so?” She says archly. She takes another step into the gardens, until she’s so close he can smell the scent in her hair. “So you’re not at all concerned over fighting an Archbishop that can disfigure you with just a drop of blood?”

He blinks. Is that how Lust does it? Interesting. “I have faith in your abilities.” 

Her lips twitch upwards as she rolls her eyes, folding her arms. “Such a charmer.”

“It’s merely truth,” he protests, with humor. “You’ve succeeded against impossible odds so many times before— why should this be any different?”

Pride tilts her head, blinking those narrow, cat-like eyes at him. “Is that how you see it?” She hums, noncommittally. “Perhaps I have succeeded, but who’s to say how many times I’ve failed, that you simply haven’t seen?”

He considers this, then shrugs. “You’ve found a way to prevail nonetheless. Is that not an even greater victory?”

She appears genuinely taken aback by his logic. Her arms drop back to her side with a stunned slowness. “I…” She pauses. “I guess I never saw it that way.” 

A chilling breeze slips past them, almost like a warning. Pride grimaces, tucking herself back under her outerrobe. He frowns as he watches her, and before he can think of any ramifications  is sliding off his own cloak and slipping it over her shoulders. It dwarfs her completely, the pristine white ends falling in silken pools at her feet. 

“You’ll catch cold if you stay out here any longer,” he murmurs, gently pulling the lapels of the cloak shut against her neck.

She doesn’t push him away. She merely watches him with that unknowable look in her eyes. He wishes he knew what it meant. He wishes he knew why the sight of it always feels like a vice constricting his heart. 

“Archbishops don’t get cold,” she says, and a false wind prickles against his skin. 

“—she says, as she shivers in the cold,” he finishes, amused. 

 It pulls a reluctant smile from the secretive woman. 

He would have expected her to reject the cloak, yet she seems to accept it without much pretense. If he’s reading this right— which he can never be sure of, as he’s so pitifully inept with any and all social interactions, least of all with someone as perplexing as Pride— he might even think she was… pleased by his actions? It’s so difficult to tell. Some moments she seems to want nothing more than to be as far away from him as possible, and in others she seems so receptive to him. 

Reinhard never knows what he’s doing, when it comes to her.

He wonders if perhaps that feeling is mutual.

For a moment, he lingers near her, so close as to trace the moonspill against her cheeks, the spray of spindly lashes framing her eyes. He doesn’t know how to move forward, but to take a step back feels unforgivable. His hands drift down from the clasp at her neck, just barely ghosting over her arms. If he wanted, he could easily reach out and touch her. 

Pride takes the decision out of his hands. With a rustle of fabric she steps out of the circle of his arms, breaking their gaze as she goes. He cannot feel cold nor heat, and yet he feels a numbness as she leaves— the absence of something he couldn’t understand. 

“Don’t stay out too late,” she calls over her shoulder. “Since you’re here, I’m going to put you to work tomorrow. I’ll need you in top form.”

He dips his head, lips curving into a smile. “I’ll endeavor not to disappoint.” 

//

For all that they conversed with the effortless ease of old friends, Pride seemed to be avoiding him. 

At first he thought perhaps he was overthinking it, or merely mistaken, but Julius’ words from earlier suddenly cast it all into a certain, pointedly revealing light. Pride was avoiding him. And not just in his capacity as an extension of the Kingdom and its laws, but him, specifically. After all, she had no trouble traveling with Julius, a stalwart and upstanding knight for all that he had been erased from memory. Yet she'd fully intended to take on Lust without him; he wouldn't have even known she was attempting it had Julius not sent a coded letter to the capital. She had perhaps even been avoiding him since after their very first encounter— he could still remember how she refused to look him in the eye or even acknowledge him, despite being the one to seek him out for assistance in the first place. 

And yet, it had become increasingly obvious to him over the past year that Pride was one of the few people he felt most at ease with. 

The sentiment, evidently, was not shared. 

His cloak had been returned to his room at some point in the night before he himself had settled down for a restless sleep. He wanted to speak to her further before they departed up the mountain, but minor incidents kept getting in the way. Before he knew it, they were setting out with Julius in tow, and he couldn’t find the words he wanted to say. 

He’d liked to have asked about it— whatever it was between them that he couldn’t understand yet couldn’t ignore— but then they began the morning fighting one of the most difficult Sin Archbishop’s yet, and he had no time for such frivolities.

Villagers would tell tales of how the mountains crumbled apart and a dragon wrent the earth in two, illustrious stories of two valiant knights felling a great evil within the cloudy, solemn peaks of the world’s oldest mountains. They spun legends of the great exploits of the Sword Saint and the Finest of Knights— once he reclaimed his rightful place in the Kingdom’s memory— their daring and their valor, their triumph over evil. But they will never speak of the woman who made it all possible; the enigmatic creature who so easily orchestrated Lust’s downfall, as if it was all preordained and she was merely a puppeteer setting the stage for the final act. Reinhard had always been in awe of her, but never more so than he had been in that battle. For a woman who so obviously had no fighting capabilities to speak of to walk into a battle like that with her head held high and fearless— he’d never seen anything like it.

The capital sings his triumphant return when he finally emerges from the mountains. It rings false in his ears. He’s never felt so unworthy of all the praise and adulation they shower on him; of the title of hero.