Elisium’s classes ended at exactly four o’clock in the afternoon every weekday. But unlike the usual daily routine, something had changed in the class of Aquarius. The students and teachers assigned to the class were currently frozen at their spots as they looked at a certain brown-haired child in the room. Instead of staying seated after the end of the class, 373 had decided to leave the room with them to a place only God knew.
373 changed her habit of staying behind. The thought of meeting Michael Caelum alone in her classroom made her feel an odd sensation in her chest. She didn’t want to see him. She couldn’t explain why. All that she knew was that she didn’t want to meet with the amber-haired youth just to be disappointed with his secrets and his lies.
The little girl wove through familiar hallways that the children usually flocked. When she was certain that no one was following her, she appeared under one of the kitchen’s gigantic metal tables with a quick adicio spell and slyly took a few pieces of bread before disappearing once more. Her silhouette reappeared inside Leon’s cell. And although his eyes were wide and his mouth was hanging wide open, the surprise on the blonde boy’s face wasn’t as obvious as it was the first time they met.
Her eyes found traces of moisture on the floor that was glistening against the rough surface. Even without reading Leon’s mind, 373 could already guess at what had transpired.
The female clicked her tongue as a spell gather the water on the floor. The orb of water was no longer as unsteady as before and the blue sphere traveled quickly into Leon’s cupped palms. However, the boy’s bright eyes were elsewhere. His clear blue orbs were glued to the multiple pieces of bread she had stuffed in the plastic bag which was currently resting on top of a very thick book.
Drool was dripping from the corner of his lips. There was a glimmer in his eyes while his lips formed a small frown as he stared at the bread. “I can’t eat all of that.”
“It’s not for you-,” 373 began. But when she saw the downcast expression on Leon’s face, she tossed him most of the pieces of bread while keeping a single piece in the plastic bag. “Just make sure you don’t leave crumbs on the floor.”
She picked up the book she had brought with her and turned around. An Adicio spell was already on her mouth. Leon’s bright blue eyes widened again. “You’re not staying?” He asked.
“Maybe later.” 373 waved her free hand. The energy wrapped around her and the female could feel herself being drawn to the hallway with the hidden staircase. She didn’t use Adicio to directly transport herself to the hall – or rather, she couldn’t. The double-doors and the room itself had layers of seals that prevented people from entering it. And a spell could possibly trigger the formations and defensive enchantments in the room.
Her feet landed on the corridors that went towards the secret room. The moment she entered the huge wooden doors, she headed straight for the cross at the end of the hall, set the piece of bread down on the floor and opened thick book entitled ‘Clavicula Salomonis – Simplified Edition’. Her black eyes studied the drawings on the floor and compared them with the illustrations in the book. Every so often she would pace around the room while following the twist and turns that were engraved on the ground.
“I see that a copy of the Key of Solomon is in your possession… However, you could have just asked me, pueri,” Astaroth’s voice reverberated in the huge hall as 373 scampered here and there with the thick book in her hands. There wasn’t a single crease on the demon’s eyebrows and his face was oddly calm even as the little girl kept her back facing him.
“The book says to ‘never trust demons’,” the small girl replied, her eyes still fixated on the pages of her book. She was completely oblivious to the pair of golden eyes that never left her body.
“Are you planning on ignoring me, child?” The demon asked again.
Without missing a second, the little girl said, “Yes.”
373 took out a pencil and paper from her pockets, her hands automatically writing and sketching as she thought. Numerous ideas and possibilities flooded her mind as she created an illustration of sorts on the single piece of paper. But with a single melodious laugh, the steady stream of ideas halted. 373 glared at the demon who was looking at her with eyes of pity and humor. His perfectly chiseled face smiled at her as he said in a teasing tone, “Art is not your calling. Is it, child?”
The girl’s black orbs narrowed at the statue-esque figure. Like a child who knew no fear, she flicked her hair and repeated the words the adults always said to them when the class was being noisy.
“Be quiet and behave yourself,” she chided. Her hands quickly crumpled the sheet she had used for her drawings and stuffed it back in her pockets. 373 studied a few pages inside the thick book she had brought before setting it beside a few objects and trinkets that were placed at the floor. She closed her eyes and concentrated on feeling the magical energies that flowed within the seals on the floor while visualizing how the seals were interwoven with each other. Each spell, enchantment and seal had its own ebb and flow of energy. If she wanted to break the seal on Astaroth’s soul, then she needed to find the weakest part of the seal which would allow her to disrupt the seal’s energy flow.
She felt an irregularity. It appeared so suddenly that the small female almost had no time to react. The atmosphere in the room suddenly became stale. The air became harder to breathe in. 373 could feel unfettered power emanating from that single irregularity that had appeared in front of the wooden double-doors that should have sealed off the room from the rest of the world.
373 took the plastic bag with the piece of bread and hid behind human-shaped container that had multiple spikes lined inside the cover. The space was enough for her to crouch in and as soon as she went in the casket, the shadows stirred and lightly closed the metallic container while leaving a small gap where she could see a part of the room and Astaroth’s figure hanging securely from the cross.
The room became silent. 373 tried to breathe without making a sound. The gigantic door creaked as footsteps echoed in the room. The female hiding in the iron container strained her eyes as she peeked through the container’s gap. A woman with blue hair, an odd outfit and a white coat strode in the room with her lips pursed in a thin line. The visitor’s eyes scanned the room, her eyes falling on a single object that shouldn’t be in the room.
373 held her breath. Her heart pounded in her chest. Her eyes followed the visitor’s line of sight.
The thick book entitled Clavicula Salomonis – Simplified Edition was lying haphazardly on the floor.
***
“‘Clavicula Salomonis’? What’s this doing here? Did Master come down here to check on the seals? Or did you manage to convince one of our researchers to break the seal without telling him that you were going to eat his soul?” Asha Claire asked, her high-pitched voice reverberating in the quiet hallway like the clatter of broken plates. The woman cleared her throat and stared at the book she hadn’t seen in a long time, her eyebrows shooting up and hiding behind her bangs.
It truly had been a long time since she had last visited this secret room that both she and Silas Fidi had constructed in Elisium. The last time Asha Claire had seen the demon she had trapped was some ten-odd years ago – Elisium had just been built and they had found a little girl who caught both hers and Silas Fidi’s attention.
The female child’s talent was unique. Her body, even more so. The child was born with miasma: the dark energy that was poison to anything alive and was the same energy the demons fed on. The amount of miasma flowing through her veins was quite small, almost unnoticeable. But it had sparked the curiosity in the master-disciple pair which made them want the little girl.
If they merged the child’s body with a demon’s, would she survive?
If they exchanged the girl’s blood with that of a demon’s, would the child gain eternal life?
Would it enable Asha Claire to live forever?
Starting from that day, the Great Apothecary’s successor had gone through great pains to acquire the little child’s body from under her parent’s noses. With the use of her Talent, she planned a flawless accident that couldn’t be traced back to her or her Master. She waited for a couple of years before she executed her plan. The woman even made sure that the child’s injuries were severe enough to threaten the child’s life but could be cured by either her or the Great Apothecary.
But the child disappeared. No one remembered how or why. And apparently, there was no way to track her. All that remained was a damnable demon that neither cowered at her presence nor acknowledge her existence. The demon never saw her as its captor. Astaroth always acted like a king sitting prettily on his throne. His demeanor was nothing like that of a prisoner chained to the wall.
The female researcher had collected holy artifacts: A Cross from Calvary, the chains that were used in the Holy Crusades – all to torture the Duke of Hell and put him in unbearable pain. Yet the demon didn’t flinch. Even as he weakened, he continued to treat her like an insignificant speck of dust on the floor that he could choose to ignore or blow off if he wanted to.
Asha Claire stared up at the Duke of Hell. Astaroth closed his golden eyes, his figure becoming still and oddly reminiscent of a marble sculpture. She didn’t know why, but the Duke of Hell’s attitude always rubbed her the wrong way. The blue-haired woman’s expression darkened as she bit her lips and seethed. “You...”
“You always act like you don’t care, that all beings are beneath you,” Asha began as she walked towards Astaroth’s unmoving silhouette. The more she recalled the amount of effort she had wasted on capturing the girl and the demon, the redder her face became. Her steps were heavy like the hatred behind her voice. Her frustration was apparent. “But I own you. I trapped you. You have no right to look down on me!”
The demon’s eyelids cracked by just a fraction, giving Asha Claire a glimpse of the golden orbs that lay behind them. Although the seals on the floor and the enchanted artifacts kept him chained to the room, he had not lost his cold and royal demeanor. The demon’s chin was tilted upward, almost like he had pride to spare. Even when Asha Claire kicked the book across the floor, Astaroth’s expression remained uncaring and passive. The Duke of Hell maintained his silence. His lips didn’t move by even a millimeter. His chin was tilted upward while his eyes continued to look down, just like a monarch looking at a commoner.
“You’re always looking down on me! But I’m the future Great Apothecary! I’m the legitimate successor of Silas Fidi! You don’t have the right to look down on me!” Asha Claire stomped her foot on the floor. Every time she brought her foot down, the place she stepped on formed cracks that scattered through the rest of the wide room.
She screeched. “Gah! I don’t even know why I came down here in the first place! Why did I come here? Think. Think!”
Her long thin fingers found the contours of her face. She massaged the sides of her wide forehead as she continued to pace around the room.
“Calm down. Calm down.” She chanted. “I’m here to check on the demon’s state. The bug upstairs that’s planning on stealing from Master hasn’t discovered this place. The seal is intact and no matter how many souls it feeds on, the demon won’t be able to escape.”
“Ah… The bug,” Asha Claire muttered. All traces of anger disappeared from her face and she became a stoic unfeeling creature as her eyes studied an artifact in the room. She walked towards the Iron Maiden – the metallic human-shaped casket that was lined with spikes and lightly tapped its exterior. The casket let out a hollow ding. Her lips rose up.
“Maybe I should use this monolithic antique on it once I figure out who it is?”
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