Voltaire's Redemption

I've finished my studies and gained a Grand Magus certification degree. Let me tell you, this is better than brewing potions! I owe Voltaire my life on this!

I've hired a carriage back to the city where the Thieves' Guild is located, all because I was too tired to use the horse. It's been a day, really.

I walked around town boasting my elemental spells as tricks to impress the people, and the same guard that had hatred for me told me, "Go cast your fancy magick somewhere else!"

So, I headed into the underground. Then, a woman wearing a Victorian black dress with purple linings appeared to me before I reached the door.

"Don't let them catch you… you need to hear what they have to say about you…."

I accepted her advice, and she disappeared like thin air. I sneaked in, used my invisibility spell, and overheard their conversation through eavesdropping.

"With all the devices we stole, we're going to pawn them for more gold and just tell the pesky assassin who left us for our bastard competitor that they were hard to steal! Double the money am I right?"

"Yeah, I suppose. That bastard assassin will never know. I mean, what do they expect? We are the Thieves' Guild for Celestial's sake!"

"But hey… we can sell these devices with even more gold to the Grand Empire by the North… you know…."

"Didn't they ban such devices?"

"Well, here's the thing you don't know. Our little infiltrator Roxanne was doing her usual heists to steal the Emperor's crown. But guess what she found? It was better… she found out that the Norsemen were trying to revive on how to use these devices for their own government use. Their scholar finally knew how it all works. Everything! That very scholar can use any device! It was beyond madness, I tell ya that!"

"What? Inferno! That is madness! How does he do it?"

"The thing is… they are using it to weaponize it… told me it was a 'nuclear' bomb… imagine this, a bomb that has a radius that could potentially kill an entire region! They are using those devices for themselves, you know?"

It's worse than I thought. In fact, it can't get any more than that! IT IS THE WORST!

Then suddenly, one of the members came in through the door behind me, but I was dextrous enough to avoid getting touched. Once I get touched, the invisibility spell will expire immediately.

"Come on, lads. Let's get all the devices. We will be the richest faction in the entire continent of Arcadia!"

I went to follow them all the way to the North, ending up in the blizzard of Cantopia city. They have an enormous fortress, and the Keep itself was a castle that was fifty times bigger than the scout tower of the Academia.

I went to infiltrate into the nuclear room itself behind the museum. And there it was… it was beyond my height and size. It was enormous!

"Never should have come here!" says the court wizard, and it was the scholar himself, Fargar.

I spoke to him directly with pure intimidation to tell him everything I needed to know about their plans with the technology. This seems awfully evil.

He wasn't easily intimidated as he threatened to call the guards. Until I used my subjugation eyes on the vampire to make him do what I wanted for a short period. Then I clouded his memory after he told me everything. Replacing it with remembering that a Thieves' Guild member was intimidating him into stealing all the devices for their own personal use for more illegal acts. Sure, the Grand Empire knows about the Thieves' Guild, but you know these Norsemen are corrupt enough to use everything at their disposal just to win the war at all costs. That is until I used that information against the Emperor, appearing as the assassin who killed the previous Emperor of their dominion.

"No! Don't kill me! Guards!"

"I've already killed them… now expose everyone in all of Arcadia the truth. Or you can hand me all those devices and send them straight where they belong, the underworld."

He agreed to send the devices back where they used to be original. And I spared him just so he would live his whole life with guilt and failure. It felt good too… too good… it felt empowering… despite being an evil thing to do to spare his life living that way until the day he kills himself out of depression. I felt more amazing than having to end his misery right here and there.

So, I left, but I heard him choking behind me before I could. I looked back, and it was Voltaire himself slitting the Emperor's throat. And he took the crown and sat on the Emperor's throne, throwing the Emperor's lifeless body across the room.

"What have you done?! Are you mad?!"

"Thank you, assassin… now I can use this power to take over not just the entire continent of Arcadia, but to take over the world itself…."

"What?! Betrayal! You are a traitor! After every thing we've been through together, and the things I've done for you, this is how you treat me?!"

I entered the combat sequence between two great vampires, chaotic good and lawful evil. Between the two of us, it was none but true neutral.

It was a fight to be remembered for centuries and grand. But Voltaire lost because one thing he didn't know… is that I studied in Academia how to kill vampires. Ampiers especially, because the college has everything you need to know that isn't just on the internet itself.

His weakness? It was none but a cross representing the ancient religion they call Sethian. He is prideful, egoistic, and thinks he knows everything… but doesn't know I can outsmart him!

That is when I drove my dagger into his heart, and he spoke his final words…

"Thank you, my dear assassin… You've done all this for the goodness of heart, this was my plan all along, is for you to do good, and once you do, I can finally die in peace without having to worry about Hell, or what you… *cough* mortals call it the… Inferno…" then, he closed his eyes, and his entire body turned into a pile of ash like salt. His essence, his soul, ascended to the heavens by a dove that flew a light that took his soul. The reinforcement guards came in and accused me of assassinating the Emperor.

They told me to come with them and throw them in jail as my execution was scheduled. And it will be twice worse than a normal execution, for it will be torture beyond me. Because they finally caught the assassin of the previous Emperor, thinking I killed the new one in the act, as the war would be twice as worse than it was ever before. I will die with this guilt, by the people will never know I saved them…