"Millennium Tier items?" Mathew echoed, "What are those?"
Argus seemed to like explaining things to people, so Mathew was appealing to that side of him. Was his earlier hunch that Argus was some sort of tutor or instructor correct?
"Blessings are measured in terms of 'permanence', which is how long the power within them is able to last. This corresponds to how much of their own power a god imbues it with. The higher a Blessing's tier, the longer the Blessing retains its powers, and the harder it is to destroy. Usually it is more powerful as well, but not always."
Mathew tried to process all the information as Argus entered 'lecture mode' and began going through all the tiers.
"There are 5 tiers for blessings. Technically, there are 6, but the first tier is reserved for ordinary items that aren't blessings. We call this Tier 0, or Null Tier."
He grabbed a nearby twig and began to draw numerals in the ground for each tier, writing the name of each tier beside it.
"Low-level Blessings are in Tier 1, or Infirmus Tier. These are simple charms or temporary Blessings that only retain their potency for a few months at most. Tier 2 is Anum Tier, and is our intermediate tier. Blessings in this tier can last a few years. Tier 3 is Decennium, the Advanced tier. My lady's golden armor is of this tier."
Mathew remembered the feats of strength that Ophelia had performed: opening the gates of the temple and the heavy stone doors of the inner chamber.
Decennium Blessings seemed pretty formidable already. Did they really need two more tiers above that?
"Tier 4 is the Century Tier," Argus continued, "these are powerful Blessings often only seen in the hands of demigods and creatures from mythology."
"So Millennium Tier is the final tier?" Mathew guessed. Argus nodded.
"Tier 5 Blessings last thousands of years. These are the weapons of the gods themselves. My sword is one of the most powerful Blessings in history. It has been passed down in my family for generations. At one point, it was the traveler god's own personal blade."
"A god's personal blade? What does it do?" Mathew asked
"It is a little complicated, but I suppose you can simply think of it as a sword that can cut through everything." Argus then knitted his eyebrows together. "Well, almost everything. When I struck your metal skull, It did not cut through it. Only another Millennium Blessing can withstand a strike from this blade…"
"I think my skull is a powerful blessing that I fused with at some point," Mathew confessed.
"You 'think'?" Argus mused.
"Well, my memories of the matter are extremely hazy. From what my followers told me, I asked my goddess for help, and she gave it to me as a gift."
Argus seemed to ponder this for a minute or two before replying:
"If your goddess is powerful enough to grant you a Millennium Blessing, then perhaps she is a real goddess after all. I have heard of gods using false faces and false names in the past."
"You talk about the gods as if you have seen them… like they are physical beings." A few weeks ago, Mathew would have never considered that God, or even multiple gods, were real.
And whether Sequence and Alchemy were such beings… He was still trying to figure that out.
"I have not seen them myself, but it is an undeniable truth that they are real. Many centuries ago, they walked this land. No longer do they show themselves to the populace, but some still see them in visions. My lady has met Order within such a vision."
"Ophelia? She met a god?" Despite the outlandish nature of the conversation, this was still hard for Mathew to believe.
"Yes. Order granted her the Chains of Order as a Boon." Argus explained. Mathew recalled the strange invisible chains that Ophelia had used to entrap him.
"A Boon? Is that different from a blessing?" Mathew was struggling to keep all these new terms straight.
"A Boon is similar to a Blessing, but rather than a God imbuing an item with power, they are directly imbuing a person. Just like Blessings, they are ranked by the 5 tiers. The Chains of Order are of the Third Tier, Decennium."
Mathew found that interesting. He wondered if his Truesight was a Boon and what tier it would be.
Perhaps the goddess of order had gifted him the gift?
An odd thought popped into his mind. He remembered that when he was in the misty white void, Alchemy had said something about Sequence having a priest, a follower that she had fused with the Iron Mind.
Mathew now understood that she was referring to Mathias. The man had probably died while fusing with the Iron Mind… Perhaps the process had been too much for him.
What was more, if he served Sequence, and she really was the Lady of the Followers of Dread, and if she had the power to gift a Millennium Tier Blessing, as well as a Boon such as Truesight, then she really must be one of the gods of this world after all.
"Argus…" He said, trying to voice his thoughts out loud, "Is there a goddess out there named Sequence?"
"I have not heard of a goddess like that. Is that the name of the goddess you serve?"
"I think so…" he said concomitantly.
"The full title of Order is 'the goddess of order, bringer of direction, uniter of mankind'. It sounds similar, but I have never heard that name used for her." Mathew thought for a second, then asked:
"What about Alchemy? Is there a goddess called that?" Mathew felt Argus looking at him and grew uncomfortable. Had he asked something taboo?
"Alchemy the unmaker, queen of curiosity." He said, his tone serious.
"Is she… an evil goddess or something?" Mathew asked. It seemed like Argus was weighing how to answer.
"I would not say evil… There is only one truly evil god I know of. But she is very strange. Hers is the way of progress, of science, of discovery, regardless of cost or ethics. There is no single nation who revers her, but across the world, you can find weirdos and recluses who hold her in high regard. The only ones who you can consider her true followers are, of course, alchemists… but they are always dangerous to deal with."
"Dangerous how?" Mathew asked, but the voice of Ophelia interrupted their conversation.
"I have finished. Dread, you are free to turn your head." Mathew immediately jerked his head back and forth, then cracked his neck. Freedom of motion felt pretty good after being deprived of it for a time.
He and Argus stood, and Ophelia walked over to them, her auburn hair still wet. She was wearing a simple tunic, which made her look much less intimidating, but no less arrogant. She tapped the soft patch of earth with her feet and gave a satisfied nod.
"I wish to nap here." She decided. "Do not bother me until I call for you."
Argus looked at Mathew, then at the river, and then said: "Shall we go next?" Mathew shrugged in response.
…..
After they washed themselves in silence, they started a fire.
Mathew was shivering violently.
While he couldn't feel any temperature or pain in his head anymore, seeing as how it was an indestructible Blessing, the rest of him still did. It just so happened that when metal sits in cold water, it also becomes cold.
Because of this, the part of his neck that was still flesh was eternally connected to the now freezing cold metal of his skull, and it was a miserable experience.
He kept piling up the sticks and stoking the flames, but he could not keep the chill away.
"So, you mentioned that there was only one evil god. What did you mean?" Mathew asked, hugging himself tightly. His words were directed at Argus on the other side of the fire, but it was Ophelia, who was lounging to his left, who answered him.
"I assumed that you would know all about it, Dread. Are you not a monster of the night?" Her tone was equal parts teasing and accusatory.
"No… I'm nothing like that," Mathew stated, "I am just a guy with a foggy memory and a strange appearance."
"Is that so?" Ophelia asked, one corner of her mouth turning upward.
"So who is this evil god?" Mathew repeated.
"That should be obvious. Why do you think we keep the fire lit every night?" Ophelia asked, impatience bleeding into her voice.
"Because it's… cold at night?" Mathew said, confused. He felt that his answer was probably stupid.
"No," Argus cut in, "The evil god is the darkness itself. It is the night. That is why we must keep the fire lit: To ward off the darkness."
"Darkness itself?" Mathew was struggling to comprehend, "How can darkness be a god? In fact, how can it even be sentient?"
Ophelia jumped in, eager to educate him:
"The darkness hates all living things. However, it has no form, so it cannot harm us. Instead, it births abominations of darkness, called Nightspawn." Mathew nodded in understanding.
"I see! I actually fought and killed a Nightspawn a few days back. A creepy spider-looking thing. Well, calling it a spider was actually generous."
"Nightspawn." Argus echoed, standing up.
"Yeah," Mathew replied, "that's what I just said, Nightspawn.
"No." Argus said sternly, as his white breastplate phased into reality, "Nightspawn are here, right now. They are surrounding us."