“The disease itself is literally the same as the Plague of Justinian. It is a microscopic organism that lives in fleas that live on rats. It congests the flea’s digestive tract, making it starve. A starving flea desperately tries to feed and attacks and infects everything, including humans. The disease then continues to spread among the humans. Low levels of hygiene contribute to the disease starting, but after it gains momentum, the epidemic essentially just burns through towns and villages, creating secondary effects of starvation, as dead and dying people can’t farm, and the societal structure collapses; children die as their parents are no longer here to provide for them and so on. Tens of millions dead within a few years. It completely overwhelmed our Judges, and I am sorry to have thought of controlling Time as to ease their burden far too late in the process, and they are now all burned out and in dire need of rest. Fortunately, as I slowed the process to a trickle, the angels are dealing with all of it now without issues”, Lady Kay nodded, obviously not very pleased with herself.
“It’s not your fault, daughter. We were all caught by surprise”, Goddess Lakshmi smiled. “It is as if Satan made a sudden decision and implemented it instantly”.
“But why?”, Augustine rubbed his forehead. “I understand why he wanted to break the inertia of Rome and Greece’s intellectual heritage and shroud Christianity in darkness before it had the time to properly find itself. Is this something similar?”
“We think so”, Lady Hypatia answered, obviously exhausted to the point of slurring words. “Christianity was reunited with the ancient libraries of Antiquity, that found their way to Europe through various trade routes. The process would have eventually produced the same results he successfully worked to prevent with the plague of Justinian and other calamities that preceded it. We had so many wonderful holy people in Europe; your Divine wife one of them”, she smiled to the blushing Lady Hildegard. “Many new wonderful angels, beautiful in ways we haven’t seen before. It was starting to be a golden age of God-awareness and piety, and it was quite balanced between men and women, which is a rare thing. And now, a terrible darkness came. People are blaming the Church for the plague, although it bears no fault. Priests have been struck disproportionately, as they have been aiding the sick and contracting the sickness themselves. People are turning to all sorts of superstition and sorcery to aid them. The older, wiser and more educated people are struck disproportionately, as they are old and their immunity can’t deal with the sickness as well, so wisdom is removed from the Earth. Again, people pray to God for help, and feel betrayed as they and their loved ones die; Satan again uses the misapprehension that is spread by the monotheistic religions such as Christianity, that God is the supreme ruler of Earth, which spiritually harms people as they see abundant evidence to the contrary. The spiritual aftermath of this calamity exceeds the physical one”, she concluded.
“First things first”, Lord Vishnu smiled and turned his sight inwards. Deep spiritual light enveloped the Judges present, and all their weariness and troubles were taken away. “I am sorry for your suffering, brothers and sisters. We missed the important developments, and you were left to suffer for our mistakes. As always, you saved the day and I thank you”, he bowed at them, and everybody else joined him.
“Now let us return to the matter at hand. This is the second time that Satan saw that things are going too well, and he reset the board. Judging by past experience, this means he already has something in preparation, that wouldn’t be as successful if it had the continued intellectual tradition of Europe to contend with. It is for us to discover what it may be, and how to counter it”, he smiled.
“I think I have a pretty good idea”, Bernard Gui whispered, more to himself.
“Please, Inquisitor; you are here because we value your insight. Tell us what you think”, Vishnu nodded in encouragement.
“I’ve seen the Cathari. It is as if their beliefs and theology were completely secondary, and the primary thing about them is satanic defiance and arrogance. They acted as if they had the holy light of truth, and the Church was an evil satanic thing merely because it was in power. They wanted to tear everything down, as if that alone will make everything better, and they lied and counterfeited history as was to their liking. I think we are going to see more of that in the future. Not of the Cathari, because they seem to be a finished story, but I have seen many examples of this revolutionary defiance and arrogance, both in the Church and outside it, and it always felt as if Satan himself was looking at me through the eyes of those people, and they looked maddened, as if under influence of some evil spirit or a drug, like sick men under a fever that influences the brain adversely. I am a newcomer here, but due to the nature of my job I faced all kinds of people accused of vile spiritual crimes, so it is likely that I am more familiar with this phenomenon than anyone else, save perhaps for the honourable Judges present”, he bowed.
“The attractors”, Azazel nodded to himself, and his wife nodded in assent. “Now we know how they manifest in practice”.
“Excuse me?”, Bernard was confused.
“Satan was buying souls of the incarnate angelic beings whom he placed in terrible situations, for instance he had their families starve, and offered to help if the angel sold him his soul. He then used those souls as sources of true spiritual light, placed in evil places within the world, so that they would attract souls like beacons, and lure them into desolate places of ruin”, Zina, now glowing with an inner light, and free from all weariness, smiled at him blissfully.
“That is absolutely vile. And yet, quite what one would expect of Satan”, Bernard shivered. “So you think he is powering all sorts of evil, starting with the Albigensian heretics, but not limited to them?”
“In a word, yes. However, it is a very general assessment, and it would be of great use if we could constrain it somewhat”, she confirmed.
“He hates women”, Azazel was scratching his chin. “He never loved, he never married, and I’ve seen his actions in the world. Whenever someone really hates women, and manifests this hatred and contempt in ways Cyril’s criminal mob manifested it against holy Lady Hypatia, or the way priests of Baal and Muslims treat women, you can always see his finger there. I think an increase in number of holy women in the Church, who were respected, admired and venerated, drove him insane and he wanted to put a stop to it”.
“Does he hate women as such, or merely the concept of male-female harmony and happiness?”, wondered Buddha.
“Hard to tell. He was always insane and hated everybody, and was full of malice. But about women, he always wanted to ‘put them in their place’, by which he meant enslavement, humiliation, rape, beatings and murder”, Azazel shivered from his recollection. “I regret not killing him then. Had I done so, many evils would have been prevented”.
“And many good things as well”, Zina smiled. “It is good that you didn’t, because had you done so, I would still have been a nasty demoness, thinking of what vile prank to pull on some innocent person, in my spiritual misery”.
“And humans seem to find it very easy to learn hatred and resentment, against any conceivable target”, Kay noted. “But oppressing the opposite gender that is meant to lead them to God by giving them the freedom and opportunity to love, that seems to be vile even for their standards”, she shrugged, as all nodded in assent.
“It can’t be just his contempt for holy women”, Hypatia noted. “It has to be a wider thing, connected with the strengthening of his attractors and his failure with the Cathari. Some evil thing against women is sure to be part of it, but it can’t be the whole plan”, she went on. “Let’s see what I would have done if I wanted to create a mechanism that will divert souls from God and towards something pointless, destructive and evil. The Church stands in the way; flawed as it is, it routinely leads souls to salvation and spiritual advancement, and as such it is his enemy on Earth. He will certainly work on weakening, sidelining and corrupting it. This is something we can take for granted. Furthermore, he will want to introduce alternatives. Dissent within the Church, of the kind similar to the split between Rome and Constantinople. Dissent always works in his favour because people work against each other instead of towards God. Prejudice, resurgence of paganism, worship of matter instead of spirit, involvement with the material things in pointless endeavours. If I were him, I’d put an attractor there, towards the matter, making it shine brightly so that people make it a false deity. Treat spiritual things as mere figments of imagination rather than the true reality that it is. Make reasons for people to hate each other; all kinds of groups for all kinds of reasons. Make them desire material things enough to hate and murder one another. Make them see each other as enemies rather than brothers and sisters. And, of course, his hatred of women and marital harmony will surely find its place in the context of all this”, she waved her head in dismay.
“I can’t find error in your thinking, beloved sister, and this troubles me greatly, for it means we are going to see an age of unprecedented darkness, where the darkest evils will be illuminated by the true light of murdered angels, to serve as beacons that will lure others into ruin”, Augustine lamented.
“I also agree with Lady Hypatia’s analysis”, Azazel nodded. “And I share Lord Augustine’s dismay, as we are sure to witness terrible things in the future”.
“I think we now know enough to plan for it”, Vishnu nodded. “I am grateful for all your contributions, for they were indeed insightful and wise. And now, we must heal the immediate wounds he inflicted, as there are tens of millions of souls who suffered and died there, and who will have all sorts of misplaced resentments that will fester unless we heal them with true knowledge and compassionate kindness”.
“All the Gods volunteering for healing and teaching sessions in the orchard until this is resolved?”, Lord Shiva raised an eyebrow.
“Indeed”, Lady Lakshmi confirmed, and all others nodded in assent. “The Judges and their angels will remain busy with the incoming, but the rest of us are on teaching and healing duty until further notice”.