EXTERMINATORS

It was a weird day, it has been a long time since I went to school and going to a new one with
different people made me anxious, it’s not that i care what the people there will think of me, it’s
more that i want to feel familiarity, something that i haven’t felt in a while.
I was in a big SUV on the way to my new school, sitting next to me was my brother, with a fake
smile trying to convince me that everything was going tol be alright. With us, there were three
other kids, two identical twins, a girl and a boy. Oscar, one of the twins was a little taller than
me, he had dark red hair and clear blue eyes, his hair was long and ended on his shoulders.
Elisa, the girl, was like Oscar, dark red hair and light blue eyes, the only difference between
them were their clothes and her hair was longer than his, reaching the middle of her back. The
other boy was sitting in the front seat, Jacob Jr, he was the oldest and the most responsible
one. Jacob was so tall that he could be a pro basketball player, different from his brothers he
had blond hair and clear blue eyes, just like his father. The twins were my age, fifteen years old,
and Jacob was the same age as my brother, sixteen years old.
On our way to the school the twins didn’t stop fighting with each other. He was pulling her hair
and she was punching his arm, they continued for 10 minutes until their dad took an attitude.
“Would you stop whatever it is that you two are doing back there?” As soon as he stopped
saying it the twins froze in their seats. “I’m only driving you guys to school because it’s their first
day, could you at least behave?” He said in a cold way, not raising his voice but commanding
respect.
“Sorry dad.” The twins said in unison.
Even though the twins were annoying they did help with the anxiety, so for the rest of the drive I
kept thinking of stupid stuff to try not feel so anxious. But it didn’t work, it has been two months
since our parents died in combat and that would not leave my mind for a second. Our parents
were from the Demon Extermination Forces, they were the country's best soldiers and we were
very proud of them. When they died my world fell apart and if it wasn’t for my brother I don’t
know what would have happened.
Since our parents were orphans themselves we didn’t have any family to go to, so on their will it
was said that in the occurrence of their death, our tutors will be their friends Jacob and Melissa
Alva, which was a weird decision for us, since we rarely spent time with them. Jacob is the
youngest minister of defense our country ever had and Melissa is the teacher of demonology at
a prestigious university.
When we arrived at their house they gave us a warm reception, but since we never knew them
well enough me and my brother just kept quiet and in our rooms most of the time, only leaving
for lunch and dinner. Their house was huge, it was nothing like the two bedroom apartment we
lived in. Even though they had separate rooms for us, my brother decided to live in the same
bedroom as me. Although I wished for a little privacy in this delicate moment, I couldn't say no.
In the past two months we kept it to ourselves not creating any problem and just leaving the
house when necessary, or when they kinda forced it on us, like a dinner out or a trip to the local
mall.
“Hey Lucas, I’m talking to you.” Said Oscar.
“Sorry, my head was in the clouds.” I replied to him.
“Are you excited for school?” He excitedly asked
“Yeah… Sure.” I replied with a fake smile.
“Wow, what a bummer.” Elisa made fun of me.
“Hey, stop it! Let him be!” Oscar started protecting me.
“What are you now, his best friend?” She replied
And so the twins started to fight again and I let out a sigh of relief, something that I haven't done
in a while. The rest of the drive to school was normal, the twins fought until their dad gave them
another scolding and they stood still in their seats. When we arrived at the school the dad gave
us his goodbyes and we got out of the car, Jacob Jr. came to me and my brother and said:
“Come with me, I will show you the principal’s office.” He said with his headphones still in his
ears.
“Sure, but why do we need to go there?” My brother asked him.
“You need to get your class schedule and your locker combination, and there is gonna be
someone to show you the school individually.” He answered with a cold face.
“Oh, it’s just that in our old school we didn’t have any of that.” My brother said to him.
“I imagined.” He said, looking down on us. “Come, I don't want to be late to class.” He started to
walk.
“What an asshole.” My brother whispered to me, and I let out a brief laugh.

As we walk through the school I notice that some people keep looking at Jacob, it’s like he is a
respectable and popular figure here. But there are some people who look at us too, and most of
them whisper to their friends after, I can imagine what they’re saying.
The school is very big, it has more than just one building, but the main building has this archaic
baroque architecture, while the gymnasium and the other one have a more modern build. As we
enter the main building I see a lot of people greeting Jacob and he just ignores them. We make
a couple of turns and then he opens a door and we’re in the school office, there is a huge
counter with a large fat woman sitting behind it. Jacob the takes one of his headphones of a ear
and say to the secretary:
“I brought the new students to the principal.” He said in a monotone voice.
“Thank you very much Jake, you are the pride of this school.” The secretary flattered him.
“No problem.” He replied with his cold voice. “I will go now, you two wait here until the principal
call’s you.” He said it and left.
“So you two are the new students?” She asked us. “You’re very lucky to end up living with
Jake's family. You know, there are people who would die for that.” She suddenly changed her
tone to a more aggressive one.
“Yeah, I would still prefer that my parents were alive than to live with his stupid family.” I lashed
out.
“Lucas!” My brother scolded me. “I’m sorry miss, it’s just that the loss is recent, don’t be
offended.”
“I can see that you are the smart one in this family.” She said to my brother.
“C’mon Linda, let the boys be, they’ve gone through enough.” An old man came out and said to
the secretary in a light tone.
“I’m sorry Mr. Principal.” She retracted herself.
“Come on in boys, sorry to make you wait.” The principal was at the door of his office.
The principal was a middle aged man with a huge white mustache and a bowler hat, he was
approximately 1,70cm tall and was very skinny. As we enter his office he closes the door and
sits on his chair.
“I am so sorry that I couldn’t be present at your parent’s funeral, that was a very big loss for me,
but not as big for you I'm afraid.” He said with a genuinely sad face.
“You knew our parents?” My brother hurried to ask.
“Yes of course, they studied in this very own school, but at the time I was only a professor of
demonology.”
“They teach demonology in this school?” My brother asked excitedly.
“Not anymore, back then we needed any help we could get, so it was common to teach
demonology in some schools.”
“More importantly, how could our parents afford this school? I thought that they were orphans.” I
asked desperately for an answer.
“Well, at that time the military looked for orphans to volunteer for the Demon Extermination
Forces project, and your parents were one of them. And as a volunteer the military thought it
was a good idea to let them enroll in the most prestigious schools of the country, to create the
perfect soldiers. It was in this place that they met.” He answered me.
“Why didn’t mom or dad ever tell us this?” I said to myself.
“I don’t know why, but your parents were the most brilliant students I ever had the pleasure to
teach, your mom was an expert in demonology at a very young age and your dad could be a pro
in any sport if he wanted to.” He was overexcited to tell us about our parents. “Well, I could
spend years talking about how great they were, but we need to proceed with formalities.” He
handed us our class schedule and our locker combination. “Here is what you’ll need to start this
school year. Inside your lockers will be all the books you need for your classes, and just outside
this door there will be two of your class presidents waiting to show you around the school. Once
again I'm very sorry for everything that happened to you two and know that you can come to me
if you have any problem outside and inside the school.” He said sincerely to us. “Now go,
otherwise you’ll be late.”
“Thank you sir!” My brother got up from the chair and nodded at him
“Thank you!” I followed my brother’s move.

We left the room and saw two people a boy a and a girl, the boy had was a little shorter than my
brother around 1,70 cm tall, he had black short and messy hair with the top part dyed candy
floss blue color, he weared the boys uniform, a white shirt with a tie behind a navy blue blazer
with the school emblem and navy blue pants. She was just as tall as me, probably 1,64cm tall,
had long blond hair with black roots, she too was wearing the school uniform, a white shirt with
a tie and a navy blue checkered skirt.

“I guess that you are the younger one, am i right?” She said pointing at me with an attitude.
“Yes.” I speaked in a low voice.
“Follow me.” She said that and left the school office.
“See you at lunch.” My brother said it to me while waving his hand.
I follow her for a while and she says nothing so I try to create a conversation.

“So… What’s your name.” I asked the girl in front of me.

“My name’s Jessica, but everybody ‘round here calls me Jazz.” She replied without looking
back.
“Cool… Nice meeting you Jazz” I said nervously.
“Yeah yeah, nice meeting you too.” She said it with a misdemeanor tone to it. “So what makes
you exchange schools in the middle of the semester?”
“Well, um… Actually.” I wasn’t capable of saying the words.
“C’mon man hurry up.” She rushed me.
“See, my mom and dad died.” I said it quietly, but she heard it anyway.
“Wait!” She stopped walking and looked back at me. “So the rumors are true, you are the son of
Martha and Jonathan.” She said surprisedly. “No fucking way! I thought that you were gonna be
stronger and tall like them, but look at you.”
“Thank you for the compliment.” I faked a smile.
“C’mon I’m the biggest fan of your parents, I have all their covers on papers and magazines, I
dream of being a demon exterminator as good as them, when they died I cried like there was no
tomorrow.” She didn’t stop talking
“Know how you feel.” I said it to myself.
“When I heard the rumors that their sons were gonna study in this school I thought that was a
lie, but here I am with one of their offspring and you are nothing but a wimp.”
“Ok, now you are offending me, would you stop it already.” It was like saying to a wall, she didn’t
stop talking.
“I’m so disappointed, you don’t deserve to be their son.”
“SHUT UP!” I yelled. “Would you just shut the fuck up!” She stopped and looked surprised. “
You don’t need to show me around the school, just bring me to my fucking locker, I can find my
way.” I diminished my voice seeing that everyone around us was looking at me.
“Okay, sorry I think I went too far.” She apologized.
“Just show me the way.”

We walked a bit in silence, we went up a pair of stairs and took a right turn. After a while we
stopped in front of what I assumed was my locker. She apologized to me once more before
leaving. I looked at the note with my locker combination and opened it. Seeing that I was going
to have history class I grabbed the history book and left to find my classroom.
I kept looking for it, but the school was too big and I was lost. As I thought of asking someone
for directions the school bell rang and everybody hurried to their classes and I was left in the
hall alone. I kept walking looking for it but I couldn't find it. It was like the whole building was a
maze, just as I was losing hope walking in circles until I saw someone opening a locker and I
went to them for help.

“Excuse me.” I said to them

“Oh, hi.” They said back
As the locker door closed, I could see that it was a boy, he looked my age, he had medium
black hair and was a little taller than me, instead of the blazer he was wearing just a shirt with a
tie, just like the girl before.

“I’m sorry, I’m new here and I need to get to my history class, I think it is room 108.” I said it
while reading the note.
“So you’re the new guy, people been talking about you guys for ages.” He said while closing his
locker door. “Sorry about what happened, it really sucks losing a loved one.”
“Thanks, but how did you know about us?”
“The twins been talking about you since you moved in with them.”
“I see, i gotta have a nice talk with them later.”
“Be easy on them, it’s hard to keep such news to themselves. But if you mind me asking, isn’t
Jazz supposed to show you to your classes?”
“She was a big nuisance, so I sent her off.” I got angry, remembering that stupid girl.
“I know how she can be, but you know, when…” He paused. “When that happened she didn’t
come to school for a while, ‘cause of how depressed she was. She’s kind of a difficult person to
deal with at first, but when you actually meet her you’ll see that she’s fine.”
“I don’t know if I can handle it.”
“Haha!” He laughed. “I know what you mean, come I have the same class as you.” We started
walking.
“What’s your name by the way?”I asked him.
“Oh, I’m Thomas.” He smiled.
“Nice to meet you Thomas, I’m Lu-” He interrupted me.
“Lucas right?” He said it with a smug face.
“How do you know?” I was surprised.
“Well I think it is the duty of the class president to know the name of every student in his class.”
He kept the smug face.
“But isn’t Jessica the class president?”
“She is, the name is class president, but we’re in charge of all the first year students and in the
school to share the work we have a guy and a girl to be class president.” He said proudly.
“But how can you two take care of all the students alone? Isn’t there like almost a thousand
students?”
“Right now in this school we have 365 students in the first year, 366 counting with you. And
answering your question, yes it’s hard to manage all those students, but we have help from the
student council, and they’re very competent.”
“This school is very complicated, we have different rooms for different classes without needing
it, you have student councils and the class president has to handle the whole first years.”
“Your other school wasn’t like this?” He asked, confused.
“No! We only changed classes for computer lab or science lab and that was it. We had
something like a student council but nobody cared.”
“Where did you study?”
“In a public school downtown.”
“You studied in a public school.” He said almost like he was afraid of the idea. “I heard that
people get in knife fights and use drugs in these schools.”
“You have lots to learn.” I sighed.

We kept walking toward the classroom and got there in no time, the door was closed so he
knocked on it. Ten seconds later a young man in his early thirties opened the door.

“Look what the cat dragged in.” He said with a smiley face.
“Good morning professor Eduardo.” Thomas said entering the room.
“I see that you found our lost student.” The professor gestured for me to enter the classroom
and I entered..
“Yeah, it seems that Jazz didn’t fulfill her duties, but luckily I was there to guide him.” He went to
his seat which was in the front row.
“Oh, how merciful of you to help a lost student in his needs.” He made fun of Thomas. “Nice to
meet you, my name is Eduardo Conti and I’m gonna be your history teacher for the year.” He
closed the door behind me. “Why don’t you introduce yourself to the class.”
“Do I really need to?” I asked hunching my body and scratching my neck.
“Come on, it’s gonna be fun.” He insisted.
“Okay.” I sighed and moved to the front of the class. “Hm, my name is Lucas Holmes.” As I
finish telling my name the whole class starts whispering until professor Conti clears his throat
out loud and the people stop. “I’m fifteen years old, I don’t have a lot of hobbies other than
playing video games and watching TV, I think that’s it.” I said and looked at the professor.
“Well, wasn't that exciting, I hope that you make lots of friends here.” He came to my side. “It
seems that we don't have any other seats than the one in the back of the room, I hope that you
have great vision and hearing.” He let out a laugh.

As I moved to my seat in the back of the class I could hear the people whispering and seeing
them pointing fingers at me. I sit in my seat, take out the necessary material for class and hang
my backpack on the hook next to the table.
The class was boring because the subject that we were studying I had already learned in my old
school, so I pretended that I was studying and kept reading comics on my phone. At some point
I think the teacher caught on to what I was doing and asked me a question about the french
revolution, it was an easy question so I answered it. The rest of the class continued and I kept
reading on my phone until the bell rang and class was finished. As I was going through the door
the teacher called me and so I went to his table.

“I noticed that you were distracted, was my class that boring?” He asked me with sincerity.
“I’m sorry, the class wasn’t boring, it’s just that I already learned that subject in my other school
so it is fresh in my mind.”
“I hope that it's still fresh in your mind when the midterms come.” He smiled at me. “Now go and
don’t be late to your next class.”

As I exited the classroom I saw Thomas waiting for me.

“Hey, what did you think about the class?” He asked me.
“It was alright, I had already studied French revolution in my old school so it was kinda boring.”
“It must have been horrible for you, it was for me, history is my worst subject.” He started
walking. “ Come, let’s go to your locker, I'll show you to your next class.”

On the way there he explained to me that all the first years lockers and classes were based on
the second floor, only some other classes were on other floors like the music room and the
laboratories. The second years were in the third floor and the third years were in the fourth floor
and in the fifth floor there were the advanced classes that only the prestigious students went to.
When we arrived at my locker I looked at the note and I had English class. So I stored my
history book in it, pulled the english book and put it in my backpack.
“So you have English class with Mr. Morris, good luck, he’s a horrible teacher, don’t get
distracted for a second or he will lecture you in front of the class, oh and never arrive late, he
won’t let you enter.” He gave me some advice.
“So we better hurry.”

The classroom was very close to my locker, so I said goodbye to Thomas in front of the door,
sat in the middle row and waited until the bell rang. When it happened I was surprised by the
person who entered the room, it was Jessica, the other class president. She sat next to me, it
looked like she was about to say something but the teacher entered the room. Unlike Mr.
Eduardo, he looked like he was in his late fifties, he was wearing a gray suit and tie and had
some white hair invading his black short hair.

“Good morning everyone.” The whole class said good morning back to him. “So today we have
a new student in our school, but since I bet that y’all know him, why don’t we skip introductions
and get on with class.” I thanked him in my head for this.

The class was normal, it wasn’t anything out of the ordinary, but it did keep my interest so
different from the history class. This one I paid attention to until the period ended. The bell rang
once more and I got up to get out of the room and I saw the teacher make a hand sign calling
me to his table and so I went there.

“Look…” He said, trying to find the words. “I’m sorry for what happened to you, see, your
parents saved my daughter from demons once, I don't know what would’ve happened if they
didn’t do that, so if you have any problems or just need someone to talk to, know that I’m here.”
He offered his sincere help.
“I’m glad that my parents helped you, everytime i meet someone they saved I get happy and my
endless respect for them grows even more.” I start to feel sad. “Thank you for your support, if i
need help i’ll come to you.” I faked a smile trying to swallow my tears.
I say my goodbye to the teacher and start to move for the door while trying to hold down my
emotions, even though I like hearing heroic tales about my parents, for now the last thing I
wanted to hear is about them, the pain that I feel every time their name is said is too big for me
to handle. As I exit the classroom waiting for me right next to the door is Jessica.

“Hey.” She says with hesitation.

“What do you want?” I asked while wiping my teary eyes with the back of my hands.
“I just wanted to say sorry to you again.” She said while holding her right pulse with her left
hand.
“You can keep your apologies to yourself.” I started to walk away from there.
“Wait!” She grabbed my hand. “Please listen to me, I promise that if you do, I'll never bother you
again.”
“Okay.” I freed my hand from her. “But let’s do it on the way to my locker, I don’t want to be late
to class again.” I started walking.
“I’m really sorry for what I've done, I really crossed the line.” She said while following me. “You
see, I have this bad habit of not thinking before I talk, and sometimes I say things that I don’t
believe it myself. Most of the times I do this, I end up hurting someone.” I could hear by her
voice that she was really sad about that.
“So?” I break my silence.
“I’m sorry man, I don’t know what more I can say.” She finishes saying it and we arrive at my
locker and I open it. “You see, I really admire your parents, especially your mom, they are my
heroes. The only reason I became class president was because of them, I always want to help
others like they did.” As she keeps speaking I get sadder and angrier, I just wanted to forget all
about it.
“Why do you admire them so much?” I lash out at her again. “Why can’t you just think for
yourself and stop following what some dead people said on TV!” I slammed the locker door and
everyone around us started looking in our direction.
“When…” She holds her tears. “When I was a kid, I was sick all the time. I spent most of my
childhood in hospitals. Life sucked, all my friends could go to school, parks and have fun, but I
had to be in a hospital bed.” She let some tears out. “One of those days, when I was only nine,
a patient inside the hospital was possessed by the demon of death himself. If it wasn’t for your
mom I would be dead right now.” She wipes her tears off with her forearm. “That day, other than
saving me, she gave me the motivation to move on and be the person that I am today, sure I
may be flawed, but I will never give up my dreams and help others.” She breaks down crying.
“I’m sorry.” I panic and start patting her on the back. “I’m really sorry, I should've been more
considerate of your feelings.”
“Iz ogay.” She said while crying. “Do you forgibe be now?”
“Yes! I forgive you.” I get desperate trying to make her stop crying. “I forgive you, so now stop
crying, everybody is looking at us.”
“Zank you.” She continues crying.
“Hey, how about you show me my math class? I still don’t know school very well, would that
make you happy?”
“Yez.” She wipes all of her tears. “Iz right this way.” She composed herself.
“Hey I’m really sorry about what I said.” I said on our way to the classroom. “It’s just that it’s
been very confusing these last few months, every time I hear something about them on the TV
or on the internet, I get sad and after that I get mad. I just wish I could forget about that, if only
for a day.”
“I know how it feels, I lost my mother to the demons when I was still a baby, but the feeling is
the same.”
“I’m sorry I didn’t know about that.”
“Of course you didn’t, you just met me today.” She smiled. “Don’t worry about it, it’s been
fourteen years.”
“But still, it must suck.”
“It does, but with time you get used to living with it, but the pain never leaves.” She says
seriously. “Here is your classroom, I hope I can see you at lunch and show you the rest of the
school.”
“Sure, thank you by the way.”
“For what?”
“For showing me to my class.”
“You don’t need to thank me, that’s just my job as class president.”
“You know, Thomas wasn’t that wrong about you.” I started entering the classroom.
“Wait! What did Thomas say about me?”
“See you later!” I closed the door and sat in the front seat.

It was math class, my worst subject. Not only that, it was the last period before lunch, so I was
hungry and desperate to leave class. The teacher was Miss. Valdez, she was a little older than
Mr. Eduardo, probably in her mid thirties. She had long brown hair, brown eyes and was likely
1,70cm tall.
I was completely lost the whole lesson, don’t get me wrong, she wasn’t a bad teacher. It’s just
that being away from school for two months, entering a new one and being my worst subject, I
just tried my best to understand and take note of everything. At the end of the class, just like the
other teachers, she called me to her table.

“Excuse me for asking this, but do you have any difficulties with math?” She asked while
checking some papers on her table.
“Yes, math is my worst subject, I just can't get it.” I said, frustrated.
“I imagined, the way that you were looking at the black board like the numbers were
hieroglyphs, it was easy to notice that you had problems with learning.”
“Weren’t they hieroglyphs?” I made a joke.
“Since you were out of school for a while, I understand that you need a little bit of time to catch
up.” She ignored me and kept on checking her papers. “So I arranged for you to have private
lessons with our best student after class. I can’t have you dragging down the whole class.”
“Okay. When will it start?”
“Today.” As she said, she ripped a piece of paper from her notebook and wrote something in it.
“Meet him at this study room after your last period, he will be waiting for you there.”
“Do I need anything else?”
“No, that’s just it, you’re dismissed.”

I left the room mad, knowing that I’ll have to stay at school because of private lessons. I went to
my locker to leave some stuff there and left for the cafeteria, the only place I knew where it was
because of the signs all over the school. As I was going down the stairs I saw Thomas and
decided to talk to him.

“Hey Thomas.” I called him.

“Oh, hi lucas.” He looked at me. “Are you finished with your math class?” I thought of asking him
how he knew that, but it wasn’t worth it.
“Yeah, that Ms. Valdez is weird, she had a whole conversation with me without looking at me
once.”
“I heard some rumors that she can be a little bit impersonal, but she’s one of the best faculty
members we have in this school.”
“Wait, you don’t have classes with her?”
“Nope, I have advanced math classes. It's preparatory for college admission exams and college
classes in general.”
“Wow, that must be very hard, I suck at math.”
“I know, Ms. Valdez asked me to give you some private lessons.”
“Oh, so you are “the best student in this school”?”
“I see that my reputation precedes me.”
“But how did she tell you that fast?” I was impressed by the speed that the information got to
him.
“The teachers, the class presidents and the student council have a tool where they can see the
students schedules and book appointments with them, so as soon as she booked the private
lesson i got a notification on my phone.”
“This school is so technological.” I said impressed by the school's ways.
“I imagine that your school wasn’t like this.”
“The most technological thing we had was an app that we could see our grades, and one time a
friend of mine hacked it and changed his grades.”
“What happened to him?”
“Nothing, nobody found out.”

We walked the whole way to the cafeteria talking and laughing until we reached the lunch line
so i asked him how it worked in this school. He said there was three ways of getting lunch here,
you could bring lunch from home, you could go out of school grounds and buy lunch from a
restaurant or at a dinner and the last one was a prepaid monthly meal plan, were the parents
together with the school dietitian, make a meal plan for the whole month, having in mind the
student’s taste and allergies. After he said that, I remembered that Amelie, the house assistant,
asked me for my food preferences when she was handling our school enrollment.
Me and Thomas get in the lunch line and while waiting I decide to have a look around the
cafeteria. It had this modern design with big windows and glass doors leading to the outside
area where there were some tables with students eating in it. Inside it was huge, there could
possibly handle more than five thousand people, and in different tables you could clearly see
the different groups and clicks sitting together. In one of those I see my brother having fun with
a lively group of people.
“Hey Thomas, do you know who those people are?” I asked him and pointed to the table that
my brother was at.
“Oh, those are the popular kids from the second year, some of them are from the student
council, some are from the varsity basketball team and I probably shouldn’t tell you that but that
person over there.” He pointed to a boy sitting next to my brother. “He is from the Demon
Extermination Forces.”
“I thought only people eighteen and over could apply to the D.E.F.” I asked him.
“I heard this by accident one time…” He came close to me. “Apparently there is a squad formed
by high schoolers that are battle geniuses and he is a part of it. But don’t tell anyone, it is a
secret for a reason.” He whispered to me.
“If it is a secret, why are you telling me this?”
“For one, I think that you are a trustworthy person and for two I believe that is the information
that you wanted to hear.
“What do you mean by I want to hear that?”
“You want revenge don’t you? If that happened to me I would want revenge, and getting on that
squad is the fastest way.” He said it in a different tone, a tone that he hadn’t used with me the
whole time we talked.
“I-I…” I was speechless, didn’t know what to say
“The line is moving.” he said while pointing to the space between me and the person in front of
me.

I kept quiet until the lunch lady asked for my school ID card, I gave it to her and she asked
someone behind her to grab my lunch, she gave me back my card and a minute later she
handed me a tray with the food.
I waited for Thomas to get his and we looked for a place to sit. For a second I thought of sitting
with my brother, but all the seats were filled and he looked like he was having fun with his new
friends, so I didn’t want to bother him.
We ended up sitting at a table outside with Jazz, a girl with short black hair and skin white as
snow, a boy with brown skin, short black hair and looked smaller than me and a girl with purple
dyed long hair and probably 1,60 cm.

“Yo Tom, who is this dude you're bringing?” The only boy at the table spoke.
“This is Lucas, he’s the new student.” Thomas said, putting his tray on the table and sitting.
“So he’s-” The purple haired girl was interrupted.
“Don’t say anything rude, Indie.” Jazz interrupted her.
“Sorry.” She retracted herself.
“Nice meeting you all.” I sat at the table.
“Nice meeting you too Lucas.” The black haired girl said to me with a smile on her face.
“Introductions.” Thomas said. “This guy right here is Abed, he’s going to be the next Stephen
Hawking, he’s the best at everything science.”
“Not Hawking, but Neil deGrasse Tyson, this way I’ll make more money.” He said while
repeatedly rubbing his thumb over the tip of his middle and index finger.
“This is Sarah, but we call her Snow white because she looks just like her. She's gonna be the
first woman president of this country.” He continued.
“I would prefer if you call me Sarah.”
“And last but not least, Indigo, but we call her indie. She’s gonna be the next Picasso, just wait
and see.”
“Yo.” Indie raised her hand greeting me.
“What about Jazz?” Abed asked.
“Well…” Thomas said while pulling his shirt collar.
“We’ve already met.” Jazz said.
“That’s right, you were the one that showed him the school right?” Sarah said.
“Yes.” She put her head down.
“It seems that you are all geniuses at something, what is your guys' thing, Jazz and Thomas?” I
asked them and took a bite of my succulent steak.
“I’m an all rounder, other than math, my best thing, I’m good at everything that doesn’t involve
physical activities or history.”
“Me too, I’m good at everything other than English, my worst subject.” Jazz said after she
finished chewing.
“It must be fun being a genius.” I thought out loud.
“Other than being at the AP classes, we’re not really geniuses.” Abed said, kind of mad. “I’m
sure that there is a guy in India younger and with less resources than me that is making new
discoveries in astrophysics. And that’s what motivates me to be better, I need to beat this Indian
kid.” He clenched his fists.
“That seemed personal.” Indigo said. “But he’s not wrong, we all have personal things that
motivate us to be the best in our field. Don’t you have something like that?” she pointed her fork
at me.

There was something that motivated me, the only thing that makes me leave the bed in the
morning, the thing that makes me flee the house every night to train in secret: Revenge!
I want to exterminate the demon race. I need to kill the demon that murdered my parents. If I
don’t do that, I don’t know how I will live with myself.

“He clearly needs time to think.” Thomas said. “Why don’t we change this talk to a more
interesting one, did you guys know that Jacob fired the P.E. teacher for robbing school
property?” Thomas came closer to us, almost resting his body on the table. “Apparently he was
robbing expensive sports gear and selling it to a store in the mall.”
“That’s our student council president for you, always cracking the corruption in this school.”
Indigo said.
“Is this the Jacob that I’m thinking of?” I asked Thomas.
“Yes, the one that you’re sharing a house with.”
“You’re sharing a house with jacob?” Abed said in a judgy way.
“It’s more complicated than it seems.” I am almost stuttering with nervousness.
“I wish I could share a room with Jacob, he’s so dreamy.” Indigo said.
“Now it makes sense why the secretary was sucking up to him.” I said to myself.
“What did you say?” Thomas, who was sitting right next to me, asked.
“Nothing.”
“So because of that, on the period that we would have P.E. will have the time to use as we like.
Such a dream has come true.” He said tying his both hands fingers together, as if he was
praying.
“P.E. is my last period on friday, do you think they would let me go home early?” Indigo said
hoping they would allow it.
“Don’t you have art club responsibilities after class?” Sarah said.
“You’re right.” She was bummed. “Maybe I could do them early to leave early.” Now she was
more cheerful and Sarah shook her head in disappointment.
“There you are.” A masculine voice said behind me. “I was looking for you.” I turn back and see
my brother.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t want to disturb you.”
“You must be William, right? I heard that you are a killer basket player.” Thomas said.
“Yeah, how do you know that?” My brother was suspicious.
“Well, it’s my job to know. My name is Thomas, I'm the first year class president, nice to meet
you.” He got up and extended his hand to my brother.
“Nice to meet you.” My brother shook his hand slowly, still suspicious of Thomas. “I’m gonna
steal my brother for a minute, I need to have a nice convo with him.” My brother put his hands
on my shoulders.
“I'll see you guys later.” I got up and grabbed my food tray from the table.
“Later.” Everyone said.

We started to walk to find a place with no one, on the way I left my tray on top of a table with
other food trays in it. We found a place with no one far from the lunch tables.

“Bro I was looking for you.” My brother said angrily.

“I know, it’s just that I saw you with the popular kids and didn’t want to bother you.” I was holding
my left pulse with my right arm nervously.
“You know that I don’t care about that, you’re my brother, you would never bother me.” He
almost yelled at me. “We’re not at our old school anymore, things are different, I will never leave
you alone.” He was emotional. “So, how was school?” He changed subjects.
“It was fine, I fought with my class president.” I was interrupted.
“That weird Thomas guy?” He said out loud.
“No, he’s fine. It was the girl, but it’s alright we made up.” I explained to him. “Other than that,
history class was boring, english was interesting and I fucking suck at math. How about you?”
“The classes were fine, my class president is cool, he begged me to do the tryout for the
basketball team, apparently they know all our school history.”
“Yeah, it’s weird. But are you doing it?”
“Why not? If he begged me to do it, it’s because they need help.” He threw his hands in the air.
“I heard an interesting rumor today, one of the guys that you were having lunch with is part of
the D.E.F.” I said seriously.
“I know.” He made a serious face. “He asked me to go there with him.”
“What?!” I screamed. “Bring me with you, please!” I held his shoulder.
“I’m not going!” He put his hand above mine and moved it.
“Why?! We would be a step closer to getting our revenge.”
“I told you to forget about that. Revenge will only consume us.” He finished saying and the bell
rang. “We’ll talk about this later.” He came close to me and put his hand on my head. “I’ll see
you at the school entrance after class?” He gave a smile.
“I guess so.” I took his hand out and started walking.
On our way back he kept talking about the friends he met to try and distract me from the topic
we were talking about earlier. When I got to my locker and said goodbye to my brother I realized
that I didn’t know where the next class was going to be. It was biology class in the science lab,
so after some thinking I remembered that Thomas told me that all the labs were on the first
floor.
I started walking to the first floor to look for the lab and the bell rang once again indicating that
the classes were going to start.
For my luck there was a janitor heading for the cafeteria and I asked him where the science lab
was, and he gave me directions, in no time I got there. As I open the door I see the teacher, it
was a man in his early forties, he had a big red afro and was wearing a lab coat.

“I see that the new student has arrived, since you're already here, why don’t you introduce
yourself to the class?” He asked me with a cynical smile.

Knowing there was no way out of this I go to the front of the class and start:
“Hi, my name is Lucas, I'm fifteen like most of you.” I see a familiar face in the room, it’s indigo.
“I like playing video games and reading books, I hate fruits, my favorite food is lasagna and
that’s it, Nice meeting you all.” I said more lively than the other time.
“Isn’t that lovely.” The teacher said, “Since everyone of her partners gave up on her, why don’t
you sit with Indigo and be her lab partner.” He moved his hand pointing at the empty seat.

I walk to her direction, put my stuff on the table and leave my backpack on the floor in front of
my seat.

“So this is your worst subject.” I said to Indigo.

“What?” She asked me in confusion.
“Everyone of you guys has a subject that they’re bad at, Thomas is history, Jazz is English and
yours is Science.”
“Oh. Yes i suck at it.” She said without shame.

Since it’s the middle of the semester, the teacher used this class for us to work on our project.
And because Jazz is bad in science that meant that I had to make the project almost alone.

“So… What are we doing for the project?” I asked her, hoping that she would at least engage in
conversation.
“I don’t know, why don’t you choose and make it yourself?” She said while drawing on her
notebook.
“I thought of doing something that you would take interest in, because then making it won’t be
so bad for you.”

She ignored me.

“What do you like?” I lost my short patience.

“What do you mean?” She looked at me while drawing.
“I mean what I said, what are your favorite things?”
“I like drawing and painting.”
“Well I tried to think about something related to this but I can't figure something out, other than
you making the arts for the project. Tell me what else you like.”
“Other than that, I don’t think I like anything else.” She stopped drawing to think. “Oh, I like
eating.” She said excitedly.
“Agh.” I let out a noise of disappointment.

I kept thinking about what we were going to do for the project while she continued to draw and
when I was thinking of doing something all on my own I heard someone drop their pen case.
That made me think of a fun experiment that involves food.

“Hey.” I said to her. “Why don’t we make an experiment testing the five second rule?”
“What? That’s dumb.” She dismissed my idea.
“No, it isn’t, it involves biology and food, something you like, other than that, is fun since it’s
almost a joke.”
“I don’t think the teacher would allow that.” She continues to draw.
“I think he would, why don’t we ask him.” I get up and go to the biology teacher. “Hey, I had a
doubt about the project.”
“You want to change your partner right?”
“No, nothing like that. I was just wondering if we could make our project about the five second
rule.”
“I have no problem with that, just deliver me a project that involves biology and it’s interesting.”
“Sure.” I went back to where I was sitting. “He said yes.”
“What?” She was so surprised that she stopped drawing.
“He said yes, now what do you think about it?” I instigated her.
“Well, it’s a rule that I follow and it might be good to know if I'm right or wrong on this.” She
weighted the work with its worth.
“To make it better, you can make amazing art for our project.”
“Only if you say more lines than me in the presentation.” She pointed her pencil at me.
“Deal!”

After that we started to work on how exactly we were going to make the project until the bell
rang signaling the end of the class.
“So tomorrow after school we start the research.” I said to her,
“Yeah, we can use the school floor for the tests.” She was engaged in the project.
“Sure, it’s a good idea.”

We kept talking until we parted ways since her locker was far from mine. Again I look at the note
showing what my next class was. The last two periods were going to be elective classes, the
next one being Computer science and the last one french.
I hurried to the computer lab. I already knew where it was since it was next to the science lab
that I just had my biology class. As I was walking through the school hall I saw Abed.
“Yo Abed.” I approached him.
“Lucas, right?” He looked at me.
“Yes, so what’s your next class?” I tried to strike up a conversation.
“It's computer science.” He was walking by my side now.
“No way! I too am going to have this class.” I was happy to have someone I know in the room.
“Not to be an asshole, but mine is an advanced class.” He said while scratching his neck.
“I get it, it’s for you geniuses.” I was bummed.
“Actually it is not, if you feel like you’re way advanced in the regular classes you can ask the
school supervisor to put you in the advanced program, but you need the grades to prove it.” He
said it like he didn’t like that. I called him a genius.
“Okay, I’ll ask Thomas about that.”
“Yes, he’s the right person for you to ask that. This is where I’ll stay, see ya!” Abed pressed a
button on the wall next to the elevator, probably going to the fifth floor, where the AP classes
were.
“Later!” I said and continued my way.

I went down the stairs to the computer lab and waited until the class started. The class was very
boring, it was almost like the teacher didn’t know what he was teaching. It was so boring that I
decided to check my social media, something that I haven't checked since my parents death.
When I tried to open the browser, the computer had a program that didn’t allow the student to
open it, but it was very simple. I just opened the task manager and I closed that program and
the monitoring one, since the teacher was lost I imagined that he wouldn’t bother checking in on
me.
Other than piles of notifications, my twintter didn’t have much, other than some people of demon
sightings, the most “interesting” one being a demon that allegedly has been attacking school
girls in their uniforms after they leave school. I clicked a link to a news report about it. In it they
said that more than five girls were missing. It also said that apparently it was a possession by
the demon of Lust, Asmodeus. Right when I was about to read more about where he was
sighted, the teacher caught on to what I was doing and scolded me in front of the class.
The rest of the class was boring as hell, and time moved slowly until the bell rang and I left class
as fast as I could. On the way to my locker I saw Jazz talking to a student. I thought of saying hi,
but decided to not bother her. I open my locker to get my french book and when I close it i see a
familiar face on the locker to the right of me.

“You’re Sarah, right?” I asked her in doubt if that was her name.
“Lucas, I didn’t know that they placed you next to me, what a nice surprise.” She had a beautiful
smile on her face. “What’s your next class?”
“Oh, hm.” I didn’t notice it back then, but Sarah was gorgeous, and I got a little nervous just
saying hi to her. “It’s french.” I scratched the back of my head.
“That’s nice, my next class is French too.” She closed her locker.
“I bet it’s an advanced class.” I was bummed to not have class with her.
“How did you know?” She was surprised.
“It’s just that all of you are part of the Advanced program.”
“That’s right, but not all of my classes are advanced.”
“I know, there is probably one subject that you’re bad at, and you take that regular class
because of it.”
“How did you know that?” She was curious.
“It seems there is a pattern amongst your friend group.”
“I didn’t notice that until now.” She brought her hand to her chin and started to think about it.
“I gotta go to my class, see you later.” I said to her.
“Later lockermate.” She smiled and waved at me.

I didn’t know where the room that I was going to have my French class was, but luckily the room
was one number smaller than the one I had in my English class, so I remembered the way and
found my classroom.
I sat in the front and waited, the bell rang and some more time passed, in the meantime i was
on my cell phone reading comics. When the teacher arrived twenty minutes late, she gave us an
explanation as to why she was late, basically she had problems with her sick son. The teacher
was clearly French, she was short, had long black and glossy curly hair, olive skin and hazel
eyes and spoke in an almost stereotypical french accent.
The class was fine, I wasn’t dragging it since my mother had me doing private French lessons
since I was 10, but it wasn’t all easy, it was fun and a little challenging, I loved the French
language since it was one of the only things that my mother and I shared alone. The class even
had me emotional at some point, when I remembered my mom helping with the subject that we
studied today. The bell rings and the teacher calls me to her table.

“Nice meeting you, my name is Louise Dubois.” She said in her french accent.
“Nice to meet you too Ms. Dubois.”
“I called you here to tell you that the students are already working on their project for this
semester. The project is to make a rendition of an English work in French, it can be a song, a
play or even a movie scene, the length of the presentation may not surpass the five minute
mark, if it does you will lose points by the second. I suggest that you be fast on choosing your
work, when you do it come to me, I’ll see if anybody else has picked the same as you.”
“Okay, I'll do it.”
“That’s all.” She excused me.

I left the classroom and went in my locker to pick my stuff for the private lesson with Thomas,
while I was there I sent a text message to my brother telling him that I would be late because of
it. He texted me back saying that it was no problem since he was going to do the tryout for the
basketball team. In the time of me grabbing my stuff and texting my brother, Thomas appeared
behind me.

“Are you ready for your class?” He gave me a Jump Scare.

“FUCK!” I yelled, scared and went for a punch as a reflex, but when I saw who it was I stopped.
“Don’t you ever do this again Thomas, I almost punched you.”
“Sorry.” He said, scared. “I didn’t mean to scare you.”
“Is fine now.” I was out of breath. “Let’s go to the study room.”
We went up the stairs for the third floor and down the hall, when I noticed that we were getting
out of the main building through a walkway connecting both buildings. The walkway had big
windows to the sides showing the outside of the school, while we were passing through i asked
him:

“Why are we leaving the main building?”

“The study room is inside the library and the library is not in the main building, on the contrary,
the library has a building of its own.”
“Oh, then why didn’t we go through the first floor?”
“Because if we did, we had to exit through the main entrance and then go to the library. It’s a
shortcut coming through the third floor.”
“I got it.” I said. “You really know your way around this school huh.”
“Of course, I’m the class president, it is my job to know such things.” He said it, proud of himself.
“Sure, sure.” I waved my hand up and down.

We passed through the walkway and got to the library. The building had four floors, the first
three consisting of the library and private and public study places, and the last one was where
the student council resided. I asked Thomas, why did they need so much space and he said
that they do more work than in a normal school.
The library itself was enormous, it was three floors filled to the brim with modern white
bookshelves; the middle of the second and third floor was open so you could see what the
people were doing down there. I was shocked by the magnanimity of the place and stood there
with my mouth open.

“Are you going to stay there?” Thomas said while walking ahead of me.
“I’m going.” I followed him.

We took a path to the right and started to get up on the stairs leading to the fourth floor.

“Weren’t we going to the study room?” I asked him out of fear of going to the wrong place.
“That’s where we’re going.” He said without looking behind.
“But doesn’t the fourth floor belong to the student council?”
“You’re right, but at this time all the private study rooms are filled and I can’t teach you properly
with all that distraction.” He said looking forward as he walked up the pair of stairs. “Don’t worry,
they lent me a vacant room, so I go there to study and do my work from time to time, so we
won’t get in trouble.”

As we got to the fourth floor I saw that seemingly there was no one there yet. The floor has one
singular hall that leads to a wall with a window, the place is filled with rooms, all of those have
glass double doors. We walk through the entire hall until he opens the last door to the right,
different from all the other rooms, this one had an old wooden door without any glass in it.

“Welcome to my office.” He said while gesturing for me to enter the room. “But don’t tell anyone,
otherwise I'll lose it.” He said while covering his mouth with his hands.
“But didn’t you say that they let you use it?” I enter the room.
“Oh yes, but they asked me to not tell anyone, because then the other class presidents would
want the same, but there aren’t enough rooms for everyone.” He sat in his chair that was in front
of a table.

In comparison with the other rooms from this floor, this one was small, almost the same size as
the bedroom that I shared with my brother in our old house. Inside it had a Table on the
opposite side of the door, the table had a computer monitor, keyboard and mouse, behind the
table there was the chair that he was sitting on and a window in the wall. On the wall to the right
side of the table there was a shelf with books, comics and DVDs, on the left part of the room
there was a small table with two plastic chairs and against the left wall there was an old and
small blue sofa.

“So this is where we’ll study, thank god that you came to show me the way here.” I threw my
backpack to the side of the couch and sat on it. “Nice place.” I lay down on the sofa.
“This is not a place to “Chill”” He used air quotes. “I’ll just finish checking my emails real quick
and we’ll begin the private lesson.” He started to work on the computer.
“You know, I was thinking, you said that Sarah was going to be the first woman president of this
country, but why isn’t she a class president? I thought that would be great for her curriculum.”
“Class president is too small for her, she’s aiming to be the student council president.”
“But isn’t being class president a good way to enter the council?”
“You got it wrong, she’s already part of the Student Council.”
“Wow. From the way that you speak of the council, this must be a big thing.”
“It is, the only other person I know who was on the student council during the first year was
Jacob.”
“So the little prince isn’t all just talk.”
“Yes, he basically runs this school, he has more power than some teachers here.”
“What about the principal?”
“What about the principal?” He repeated my question
“Does he have more power than him?”
“No! The principal has more authority than even the rich donors of this school, one of the prides
of this place is that it is incorruptible.”
“But wasn’t a teacher selling school property?”
“That’s why we have the council, they take care of matters like this.”
“But isn’t this a grown up’s problem?”
“In this school we are considered grown up’s”
“That’s weird, but I guess every school has its ways.”
“I finished, let’s study now.” He got up and sat on one of the plastic chairs next to the small
table.
“Okay.” I got up and did the same.

We studied for about an hour until he had some school problems to deal with, on the way out of
the floor I saw Jacob through a glass door, i stopped to look at him, he was in sort of a meeting
were he was the only one standing, through the glass door i couldn’t see if Sarah was there, but
i guessed that she was. I stood there for ten seconds until Jacob looked at me and I left the
place.
I went back to my locker to leave my math book and some other stuff that I wouldn't need to
bring home. Since I was still in the main building I decided to send a message to my brother
asking if he had finished with the tryouts. I waited for a while but he didn’t text me back so I
decided to go where we had agreed before.
I went to the main entrance of the school, there were still a couple of people there, in front of it
there were some carts selling food and candy. I waited there for what looked like an hour, but it
was really thirty minutes. In the meantime I read some comic books and said goodbye to Indie,
Abed and Jazz who all passed through the main entrance at different times. Some time had
passed and I heard someone saying “He’s here.”I think that the person wasn’t talking to me so I
ignored it. But then I hear my brother saying my name. I look back and see him in a basketball
uniform and the D.E.F. guy.
He was as tall as my brother, had short red dyed hair, but you could see his black roots clearly,
blue eyes and just like my brother he was soaking wet with sweat.

“Oh my god, I was looking for you in the other entrance.” My brother said out of breath.
“But you said the main entrance.”
“I know…” He stopped to breathe. “I thought that the other one was the main one.”
“Hahaha.” I laugh.
“This is Nick, he’s in the basket team, he helped to guide me here.”
“Nice to meet you Nick.”
“It’s my pleasure.” He had a weird smile, different from my brother he was not out of breath.
“I’m sorry Luke, but I won’t come home with you today, we are training until the school closes.”
“So you passed the tryout, but why are you guys training ‘till so late.”
“We’re close to the nationals and we don’t want to lose because of poor training.” Nick said.
“Ok then, see you at home.”
“Are you really fine? Won’t you get lost?”
“Of course not, the internet has everything I need.”
“Are you sure?” He started to come close to me. “Don’t you need your older brother to guide
you?” He came in for a hug.
“Get away from me.” I pushed him away. “You’re full of sweat.”
“Come on, give your bro a hug.” He persists and Nick starts laughing.
“Get out!” I push him again.
“Ok, see ya at home.” He left with Nick.

Immediately I started to look on the internet for the closest bus stop that will have the right bus
to get me home. I follow the map to a bus stop close to the school and I see Jazz there standing
up and sitting on a bench next to her, there is a strange guy pale like a corpse, he was wearing
a suit and tie, since it’s still three pm, he must be feeling bad and is going home early. I came
close to her and decided to greet her.

“Hi.” I gestured to her.

“Hi, Lucas.” She took one of her headphones from her ear.
“Is the bus late?” I asked her since it’s been a while since we said goodbyes at the school
entrance.
“Yes, I looked at the app and it said that the bus should’ve been here already but nothing
passed through here, it must be a bug.”
“That sucks.”
“So, how was the first day of school?” She took her other earphone out.
“It was fine, I got into a fight with this girl in the first ten minutes, but it was alright.” I joked.
“Haha, very funny.” She laughed sarcastically.
“Nghh.” The seated moaned.
“Is he fine?” I asked her.
“I don’t know, he got here five minutes before you.” She stood there thinking.
“Are you thinking of talking to him?”
“I’m not thinking, I’m doing.” She approached the man. “Are you alright sir.”
“Nghh.” The man moaned again and looked at her. “RUN AWAY!” He screamed.

The man got out of control, his body was moving in an unnatural way while seated, it was
almost like his muscles and bones were growing more than the body could handle. Jazz stood
there in shock at what she was seeing, knowing that something is wrong I ran to her and pulled
her away from there. I looked to our sides to ask for help, but the street was empty and a
sinister fog surrounded the place.

“I could see his eyes.” She said in panic. “They were red, he’s a demon!”
“We need to get out of here as quickly as possible.” While still grabbing her we ran away from
him.

While we were running I felt this sinister feeling that there was no way out. We make a couple of
turns, but still no sign of people. When we make another turn I see the same bus stop with the
man still “transforming”, but from the perspective of the sidewalk in front of it. Knowing there
was no way out of it, I continued running to a place far from there and tried to open a door to a
building, but it was locked. I try to break in, but it doesn’t budge. I even tried to break the glass
window of a coffee shop next to me but it didn’t break. I try to find an alley next us so I can hide
Sarah until help comes.

“You stay here, I’ll distract him until help arrives.”

“Don’t leave me here, I will not survive alone.” She was in a total state of panic.
“Hey, weren’t you going to be the best demon exterminator?” I tried to calm her. “If you don’t
survive here, you won’t be able to make your mother proud of you.”
“I-I.” She tries to speak, but she has tachycardia and cannot speak.
“Hey look at me.” I hold her face close to mine. “Everything will be alright and tomorrow we’ll be
laughing with our friends, but for that to happen I need you to be calm.”
“O-Okay, I-I’ll b-be c-calm.” She tried to shake herself back.
“I’ll go now, but stay here until help arrives, you must not try to flee, stay here can you promise
me?”
“Y-Yes” She was shaking.
“Pinky promise?” I hold out my pinky finger.
“P-Pinky promise.” He tries to intertwine her pinky with mine, but she is shaking too much, so I
hold her hand and do it for her.

I left, and while walking I looked in my backpack for something that could hurt him, so I gathered
a box cutter and a bunch of pens and pencils to stab him. When I get to the bus stop I see what
was once an office worker sitting on the bench with his right leg on top of his left.
He was huge, like 2,50 meters huge, his skin was light red because of the changes, he was now
all muscles and bones, his muscles grew so big that his body was shaped by them, they were
so hard that they looked like bones, even his face was like that, in his hands were once was
fingers and nails now there were claws double the size of a tiger. The clothes that he was
wearing were all teared up hanging by a thread on his hips. He was sitting there like he knew
there was no escape for us, as he saw me approaching he laughed and started talking.

“Where is the girl? The mere faint smell of her is enough to make me lose my mind.” His voice
was distorted, hoarse but at the same time it was clear, I could understand every single word
that he was saying.
“She left this place.” I yelled to the man across the street. “I’m the only one here.”
“You can’t lie to me boy.You are not powerful enough to break my domain” He moved his head
like he was smelling something. “I can still smell her.”
“I know who you are, Asmodeus.” I said his name knowing that saying the demon's name
makes him weaker. “I already called for help, they will arrive in no time.”
“HAHAHAHAHAHA!” The demon starts to laugh uncontrollably, even falling on the floor. “Do
you really think that lord Asmodeus would waste his time in this horrid place?” He continued to
laugh. “You made me laugh like never before boy, and for that your death will be quick.” He got
up from the floor and started to walk in my direction.
“Don’t come near me Demon, or I'll kill you!” I pull out my box cutter.
“Laugh time is over boy, now is time for the hunt.” He continues to walk in my direction.

I started to run to a direction far away from where Jazz was, since he could sense her. I looked
behind to see where he was, and he was far from me slowly walking in my direction. In the time
that I was running I was thinking of what I could do, maybe I could make an ambush and stab
him, but what if it didn’t work, then I would be dead. What if I talked to him and tried to waste
time for help to arrive. For a millisecond I even thought of help not arriving, but I chased that
thought away because it would lead to nothing.
I went with the option of ambushing him, maybe with my training I can defeat him. So I ran far
away until I couldn't see him anymore and waited in a corner, for the right opportunity to stab
him in the heart.
I wait in the corner nervously, ten seconds passes and nothing, twenty seconds and still
nothing, thirty seconds, forty seconds, fifty seconds, one minute and:

“What are you doing there?” The sinister voice said behind me.
“Agh.” I screamed and stabbed him in the heart with my pen.
But it was useless. The pen broke in my hand before penetrating the hardened muscle wall.

“You indeed are funny, did you think that a punny pencil would hurt me? A demon!” He got
angry.

He tried to attack me with his claws, but my reflexes were quicker and I was able to dodge, only
leaving a tear of the shape of his claws on my shirt.

“You have good reflexes for a boy.” The demon mocked me.
Knowing that the pencil won’t work, I pulled out the box cutter and tried to slash him on his
achilles heel. He lets me do that, but again it doesn’t work because of his muscles and some
blades break on the contact.

“What are you, the demon of muscles?” I make a joke while taking some steps away from him.
“You make me laugh, boy.”
“If you like me so much, why don’t you let me live?”
“It’s not that easy boy, the smell that you humans have, make us demons lose control.” He
comes close and starts to smell me. “But you…” He wears a concerned face. “Your smell is
different, I can still smell the human inside you, but it is so faint that I can barely feel it, maybe
that’s why you make me laugh so much. Maybe I can bring you to Duke Astaroth, I’m sure he
would reward me with riches beyond imagination.”

While the demon was talking to himself I decided to take action and stab him in the only place
where his hardened muscles couldn’t protect him, his red eyes. When the demon finishes
saying “imagination” I jump and attack him as fast as I ever did in my life, i stab his left eye and
now he’s bleeding severely.

“ARGH!” He yelled while putting his hands in his stabbed eye. “Stupid boy, you were going to
live in the majesty of the duke.” He continued yelling.

I saw that he was stunned in place with his hands on his left eye and as soon as I landed on the
floor I went for another attack on the right eye. Again I pull the forces from my training and as
quick as the wind I jump to his head and stab him in his other eye with the box cutter.

“PUNY HUMAN, YOU DARE TO HURT THE VESSEL OF THE MIGHTY PRESIDENT OF
HELL, THE DEMON GLASYA LABOLAS!” The demon revealed his name in a fit of madness.
“Glaysa Labolas, now that I know your name your powers will diminish.”
“Puny human, do you really think knowing my name will help you?” He took his hands of his
bleeding stabbed eyes with the box cutter blades still attached to it. “I don’t even need this
vessel’s eyes to kill you.”

Glasya Labolas moved in my direction so quickly that my eyes and brain couldn't process it.
When I knew it, he had already stabbed me with his claws. I look down and see his hand inside
my stomach, I don't feel anything, just a faint sensation that this is my last moment on earth and
I begin to close my eyes and see my life flash just before my eyes, the beautiful moments that i
spent with my parents and even the futile fights that i had with my brother, all came to me at
once.
But then I remember about Jazz, that she has a full life to live and that by me dying right here is
also a death sentence to her. And suddenly by the sheer sense of duty I feel something strange
inside me like my body is reacting and when the feeling gets stronger and stronger I lose my
consciousness.
I open my eyes and I see the sky and some buildings, somehow this sight calms me and makes
me at ease, but i remembered what happened, i quickly touched my torso, and saw through the
ripped shirt, there was no wound from the demon. I got up and started running to where Jazz
was, I was so worried that I didn't even think of anything else but her safety. As I get close to the
place I hear the sinister voice of the demon.

“Scream!” He yelled. “That will make things tastier for us.”

“SOMEBODY HELP ME! LUCAS!” Jazz screamed.
“Yes, keep going.”

As I get in the alley I see the demon getting closer and closer to Jazz, she’s trapped at a dead
end and the monster it’s taking his time savoring the moment. The demon keeps talking and
Jazz keeps screaming for her life, and with every word and every scream I get angrier and
angrier.

“Scream darling, scream! No one is coming to save you, there is no more Holmes, lord Gluttony
made sure of that.”

“ARGH!” I lose control of myself.

“Lucas!” Jazz yells.
“How are you still alive boy?”

Suddenly out of control my right arm is in flames, but I don't feel the heat nor am I feeling the
burns, it’s different, I feel the power. And so I ran to the demon and punched his heart.

“You know this won’t work boy.” The demon underestimates me.

The punch stops at his thick muscular hide, but i don’t stop, i continue pulling strength out of
nowhere and keep pushing. I feel like every single bone in my hand is breaking, but I don’t stop,
I need to save her. And so I start to feel cracks coming from his skin, like something is breaking.

“Stop boy, I'm ordering you.” I feel fear in the demon's words.
“ARGH!” I continue pushing.

The demon now, afraid of what would happen to him, starts attacking me, he uses his claws to
tear my stomach open, but I don’t stop. I punch him again stronger than before, I feel my insides
leaving me, but I don't stop. He tries to cut my head off, but when he was going to do so Jazz
comes and holds his arm stopping him, he throws her away with a single wave of his arm and
she flies to the wall leaving her unconscious.
Seeing her lying on the floor made me even angrier, and suddenly the flames were covering my
entire body. I felt my hand healing, I took it away from his chest and with a single stroke, pulling
all my strength I punched one more time.
This time was different, I felt my hand going through him and catching his pulsing heart and
pulling it away from him. As I do it, the demon falls to the floor and with his last strength he says
his last words.

“This will not be the last time that you see me, Lucas.” He said my name with disdain. “I will
come from the depths of hell and end everything you hold dear.” He said slowly until he left his
vessel.

With his heart in my hand, I felt the temptation to eat it. There was a voice echoing in my head
saying “Eat it, if you want power then eat it.” and “If you want to protect your brother, then eat it.”
“If you want revenge, then eat it.”
I can’t hold it in anymore, the voice is right, as I am right now I will never get my revenge, today
proved that my training was worthless, it was child’s play. In my hand, right now I have the
power to change, to hunt demons to fulfill my revenge, I'll eat it, nobody needs to know.
The voice consumed me to the point that I was about to take a bite of the demon vessel’s heart.
As I approach my two hands holding the bleeding organ to my open mouth, something stops
me, I feel my hand being touched by something I look to my side and as i get out of the transe
for one moment I see a familiar face and as the hand that held me throw the heart away from
me, I lose my consciousness.

CHAPTER TWO

I open my eyes and see a beige ceiling, it took me a second to realize that I was in a hospital
bed. I take a look around and see that in front of me there is a TV on the up on the wall with
cartoons playing on it, right next to it there’s an open door that leads to a bathroom, on my left
next to me there are the medical apparatus and a door by the end of the room and to my right
there is a wall with some big windows, showing the vast night of the city and leaning on it there
is a sofa where my brother is sleeping.
I try to move my body, but the pain is so much that I let out a moan out loud waking my brother
up.
“Lucas, is that you?” He says while cleaning his eyes with the back of his hands and sitting on
the sofa.
“Hrmpf.” I can’t properly speak, it’s like my vocal cords are damaged.
“Oh my god, you really are awake.” He said getting up and rushing to my side. “I’m gonna call
the nurse.” He presses a button next to my bed.
“Uugh.” The words can’t come out of my mouth.
“Wait a second, the nurse will come and t-then s-she will help you.” He said with teary eyes. “I’m
so happy that you’re finally awake.” He starts to cry. “I couldn’t bear the thought of losing you.”

My brother keeps crying next to me and after a minute the nurse comes, she asks me some
questions but since I can’t talk she tells me to answer by blinking, one blink is a yes and two is a
no. She asks me about some symptoms, she asks if I’m feeling throat pain, I blink twice saying
no, she asks if I feel nausea, I blink twice again, she asks if I’m bothered by light or noise and I
say yes. She keeps asking me questions and when she finishes, she does some tests to see if i
can move or feel certain parts of my body. I can feel them all, but can’t move because of the
pain. After that she leaves the room to get some medication for me.

“You know, your friend, the one that you saved.” My brother said to me while holding my hand.
“She came to visit you every single day, unfortunately she couldn’t see you, since only family is
allowed to visit, but still, she came.” He was more calm now, but still with teary eyes.

Some time later the nurse came back and gave me the medication, not a minute later I was
already sleeping in the bed. That night I had a strange dream. I was in a totally white room,
everything was so white that I couldn't know when the room began or when it ended. The only
thing there was a round wooden table with seven wooden chairs surrounding it. Unfortunately i
couldn’t see very well because i was with a different perspective, it was almost like I was a baby
crawling on the floor. I could hear three different voices speaking, since I couldn't hear them
very well I moved in closer. One of the voices was a soft and sophisticated masculine voice.
The other one was more clear and feminine but they had a lisp on their speech pattern. The last
one barely talked, but when they did, his voice was the same as a teen boy, but they spoke very
slowly.

“I still don’t understand why we are having this secret meeting, brothers.” The teen voice spoke
enunciating every word as slowly as the other.
“How can you not understand?” The beautiful masculine voice said in anger. “He is the key to
free our brother, imagine the rewards we would receive from the morning star.”
“What I don’t undersstand iss why we sshould keep quiet.” The feminine voice spoke with a
heavy lisp.
“If we call all our brothers then we will share the spoils with them.” The masculine voice insisted.
“I don’t know brother.” They said with the lisp. “How can you be so sure that he is the key to
freeing the lord of the flies?”
“Haven’t you felt his power? It’s too much for him to handle, he will be tempted by us!” You
could hear by their voice that they had a smile on their face.
“You can count me out brothers.” The teen voice slowly spoke. “I don’t wanna be a part of your
stupid plans to impress our older brother.” I heard the noise of the chair moving and someone
moving closer and closer to me. “It seems that there was someone listening to us all this time.”
“Do you think is him?” The masculine voice asked in fear.
“No.” The teen voice said. “It’s much more powerless.” He caught me in his arms. “Haven’t your
mom taught you that listening to other people’s conversations is rude?"

Now I could clearly see their face. It had these feminine traces to it, their eyes were fiery red
with a black pupil, their short hair was silk white, every single thing in their body was perfect, in
my whole life I've never seen someone as beautiful, that was until they opened their mouth. It
was a nightmare, their mouth was akin to a shark, with hundreds of sharp teeths, their jaw
opened much wider than a human could manage. As they moved me closer to his mouth I could
see the inside much better, it was like an endless pit of sharp teeths until it reached a point that
no light could get to. And in less than a second I was engulfed by it.
I woke up scared, the dream was so real that it affected me in ways I couldn’t describe. I look to
my sides to find my brother, but he’s not there. I tried to get out of the bed but I couldn't,
although the pain had almost disappeared, my body was still hurt from all the stress. Because I
can't leave the bed I panic and breathing gets harder and harder to do, to the point where I can’t
find the air and starts to feel dizzy and in a moment of panic a memory with my father resurges.
I was a kid with respiratory problems, we were at my bed in the old house, he was teaching me
how to breathe properly, in case he wasn't with me when I had an asthma crisis.

“Son.” He said. “It’s simple, just remain calm, sit straight, close your eyes, pull your arms up and
keep it there.” He was doing it to show me. “And now slowly breathe in with your nose.” He
inhaled. “And slowly breathe out with your mouth.”

After remembering my father's advice I did as he said, I sat straight, pulled my arms up, closed
my eyes, slowly Inhaled with my nose and slowly exhaled with my mouth. After doing this for a
minute or so I hear a voice.

“Are you alright?” A masculine voice asked me.

“Yes.” I said with my eyes still closed.
“Are you sure?” He insisted. “You’re soaking wet.”
“What?” I say in surprise.

I opened my eyes and looked at me, he was right, the hospital clothes that I was wearing were
all wet, so was my hair and the bed. It was as if someone had thrown a bucket of water at me. I
looked at where the voice was coming from, it was the door. Standing there was Nick, he was
wearing the school uniform and holding his courier style bag.

“What are you doing here?” I asked him in a rude way.

“I came to check in on you while your brother went home to grab a change of clothes.” He
walked to the sofa and sat there.
“I thought that only family could do visits.”
“Being in the D.E.F. has its perks.” He wore a sly grin.
“Why did my brother choose you to stay here?” I was frustrated.
“You speak very well for someone who couldn't say a word yesterday.” He let out a cynical
smile.
“You’re.” I tested my voice. “Right.” I was perplexed. “How?”
“If you ask me, the more interesting question is how a fifteen year old boy without training was
able to defeat a demon by himself.” He moved to the couch next to me and sat in it.
“How do you know?” I was taken aback by the question.
“I arrived at the scene and saw two people lying unconscious on the floor and the dead corpse
of a man used by a demon.” He grabbed a pack of chips from his bag. “After I talked with the
other victim it was clear who did that to the demon.” He grabbed a bunch of chips and put them
all in his mouth at once.
“What will happen to me now?” I was afraid.
“I don’t know.” He said while chewing. “I don’t have enough authority to decide your future, but
my boss is coming later today to have a talk with you.” His voice was muffled by the chips in his
mouth.
“Can I ask you a question?”
“Sure, I don't know if I can answer it though.” He was lifting the pack of chips up to his mouth to
eat the crumbles.
“When we saw that the man was being possessed, we tried to flee, but no matter how far we
got, we always ended up at the bus stop. What was that?”
“That is called domain. It’s something that some demons are able to create.” He smashed the
pack of chips with his hands. ”You see, demons aren’t from here, they are born in a realm that
we call hell.” He threw the pack of chips like a basketball in the trash. “And when they possess
someone or travel here, some of them are able to create their domain, a place between hell and
here. Basically an area where they are more powerful and that normal people can’t leave or
enter.” He got up and started to walk to the exit door. “If you couldn’t go far, that means the
demon wasn’t that powerful.” He started to leave the room.
“His name was Glasya Labolas.” As I finished talking, the man stopped and came back to me.
“What did you say it was his name?” He rushed back to where I was.
“Glasya Labolas.”
“No.” He had a worried face. “It can’t be. How can a low level demon be able to open a domain
through possession?” He said it to himself. “Are you sure that was his name?”
“Yes, he told me himself.”
“What? How could a demon let his name out?”
“When I stabbed him in his eyes he said his name in a fit of rage.” I explained to him what
happened.
“Huh.” He was perplexed. “I need to call my boss, I’ll be back in a minute.”

As he rushed out of the room he bumped into someone, it was my brother.

“Be careful man.” William said to a running Nick. “Luke! You’re awake.” He said in awe.
“Yeah.” I said while adjusting my position on the bed.
“You can talk now!” He noticed.
“I don’t know what these doctors are giving me, but it's working.” I let out a forced smile.
“Are you alright? Are you feeling any pain? Do you want me to call the nurse?” He said while
getting closer to me.
“I'm fine, thank you for worrying.”
“Luke, you’re soaking wet, are you sure you are okay?” He asked worriedly and then put the
back of his hand on my forehead.
“I'm alright, I just had a nightmare.” I pulled his hand out of my head.
“So your nightmares are back.” He said with a worried face.
“C’mon man, the last thing I want right now is you finding one more thing to be worried about.”
“Okay, I'm going to tell the nurse that you woke up.” He got up and walked to the door and
stopped. “Do you know why Nick was running when I came?”
“I don’t know.” I lied. “I think he got a text message before leaving.”
“Ok.” He got out.

For a moment I thought of telling the truth, but I didn’t want to drag my brother into this, I was
naive and underestimated demons. Nick said that Glasya Labolas was a low level demon. If he
could do that to me imagine a higher ranked demon. Just the thought of it makes me shiver.

After the nurse came she checked up on how i was, she was surprised by the rate that I was
recovering and called the doctor. He asked me a couple of questions that now I was able to
properly answer and he too was puzzled by the quick recovery, but he just disregarded that and
prescribed me some medicine for pain and again as soon as the drugs got into my organism I
fell asleep.
I had a weird dream, in it I was a pig on the sty happily rolling in the mud with other pigs,
suddenly a kid appeared and the other pigs disappeared out of thin air, as I took a better look at
him I could see that it was my brother, just like when he was a child. He is holding an apple and
a knife, he sits on the pigsty fence, starts singing a song and peels the apple. The song goes:

“Sleep sleep sleep Don’t lie too close to the edge of the bed Or little grey wolf will come And
grab you by the back, Drag you into the woods Underneath the willow root.”

He keeps repeating that and after finishing peeling the apple he throws it at me and i eat it in a
hurry, like i starved for a hundred years, when i finish eating the apple i noticed that everything
around me disappeared and now all that was left was a vast white infinitude and I was lying
there on the ground in all fours naked in my normal human form.
I wake up almost jumping out of the hospital bed, but this time I don’t panic and pull myself
together. I look to the sides to see if my brother is next to me, but instead of him there is a
woman with a black eye patch on her left eye, looking at me as if she knew I was going to wake
up at that time.

“Good morning sunshine.” She said with a smile on her face.

“Ah, g-good…” I see the window showing that it was night. “...Night.”
I finish saying and she gets up from the sofa, moves my legs and sits on the bed.

“You had a nightmare?” She asks me with a soft voice while leaning close to me.
“No, just a weird dream.” I was freaked out by what was happening.
“Why don’t you tell me about it, little piggy.” She was now lying on top of my body with her head
close to my heart.
“Uh, do you mind?” I try to move my body away from her but I can't.
“Sorry, is this too much contact?” She looked at me from my chest with a timid face.
“Hm, y-yes.” She stood there with her head on top of my chest, almost as if she was hearing my
heartbeat.
“Ok!” She completely changed her tone, yelled and got up. “Hey little piggy, why don’t you tell
me exactly what happened four days ago?” She was now standing up in front of the bed with
her arms crossed.

Now I could see her clearly, she was a woman in her early thirties wearing a black jeans jacket
on top of a white shirt with “Cool” stamped on it and black jeans pants. She had upper-back
length black hair with a low loose ponytail with bangs thrown on the left covering a part of her
eye patch. The only eye that was showing had an intense black color.

“Come on little piggy, spit it out, I don’t have all day.” She wore a mad face holding herself to not
kick the bed.
“What do you wanna know?” I was confused about what happened four days ago.
“Ah.” She threw her head up in frustration. “Tell me how you killed that demon.”
“Oh, I don't even know it myself.”
“Do you want me to remember it for you?” She rested her left leg on top of the bed frame
aggressively.
“All I know is that, I got in the bus stop and talked to my friend and all of sudden the dude there
went berserk and started to act weird, so she went to ask if he was alright, it was then that she
saw his eyes, they were red as fire.” She looked at me with an intense stare. “So I grabbed her
and tried to flee, but no matter how far we went we ended up coming back to the same bus
stop, so I hid her and tried to buy time. I tried to stab and cut him with pens and a box cutter but
it didn’t do anything.” She accidentally lets out a laugh. “So I started to talk to him, ask him
questions and try to get his name out, but it didn’t matter. In a moment when he was distracted I
grabbed the box cutter and stabbed his eye, he got mad, and I stabbed his other eye, in a fit of
rage he told me his name, Glasya Labolas and so…” I took a moment.
“So…? What happened?” She hurried me.
“He… He took his claw and pierced through my torso.” My hands started to shake remembering
this moment.
“Hm…” She scratched her head. “So you didn’t kill the demon?”
“I don’t know.” My memory was fuzzy. “I think I did, but… Argh!” My head started to hurt a lot.
“That makes things harder.” She said and jumped on the bed. “Stay still.”
She who was standing up in the bed kneeled and leaned close to me. I tried to go back on the
bed as far as I could, but got stopped by the bed frame. She got so close to me that I couldn’t
feel my headache and started to get flustered. She took her right hand and gently pulled up the
hair off my eyes and touched her forehead with mine.
I froze, I didn't know what to do, so I sat waiting for what was to come. She was so close to me
that I could see her glossy lips and the imperfections of her face. Because I was so flustered I
decided to close my eyes. As my eyes close the memories of that day start to, painlessly,
coming back one by one.

“Ok!” She yelled again and got out of the bed to my right side. “I know what happened now.”
She said to herself. “Well that explains the rate of recovery, but that wasn’t supposed to happen,
a low rank demon opening a domain by possession.” She scratched her head and out of a
sudden her nose started to bleed. “That means that they started to move.” She continued
rambling to herself. “By now they must know of him,”
“Excuse me, but your nose is bleeding.” I said to her.
“Oh, this?” She cleaned the blood with the back of her hand. “It's just a side effect.” She stopped
for a moment. “Do you happen to have a change of clothes with you?”
“I don’t think so.”
“This oughta work.”

As she finishes saying she starts to pull out everything that was connected to my body, like the
catheter and the EKG plugs.

“What are you doing?” I get nervous by her sudden change of attitude.
“We need to get out of here, this whole hospital could be in danger.” She continued
“Why?” I asked
“I think that’s it.” She ignored me as she finished doing what she was doing.
“Can you fucking explain it to me? Don’t hospitals have protection against demons?” I sit in the
bed with my legs off of it.
“This isn’t enough for what could come.” She says as she opens the window full.
“What are you thinking of doing? You know that we’re at least on the eighth floor.” I start to
panic.
“Don’t worry, I will be gentle.” She said with a sinister smile.

She hurried to me and grabbed me with her left arm like a dog, holding me by the belly, making
me lie on her arm as the only support.

“Hold tight.” She screamed.

Not knowing what to hold, I hug her left leg, and so she jumps out the window. As we leave the
building she grabs me with more strength and ends up hurting a little. “She’s crazy” I think as we
fall and she starts laughing like an insane person.
We were plunging so fast that I couldn't even keep my eyes open. My hospital gown, barely
hanging on, felt like it was going to fly right off me, holding on for dear life. Panic set in as I
thought we were about to slam into the concrete at warp speed, and I let out a scream, pure
fear coursing through me. Then, out of nowhere, the freefall came to a jarring stop, and it felt
like my skeleton wanted to get out of my skin but was stuck. I couldn't help but scream in pain
as I cracked my eyes open. What I saw is something I'll remember forever.It was stunning, so
stunning that it made me forget the pain, the fear, everything I'd just been through. It was the
city below, all lit up like a dream, with stars winking in the night sky. I glanced back and realized
the hospital was on a hill, and we were gliding down, almost like we were floating. I looked at
her, and she was holding what looked like an umbrella, just as captivated by the sight
As we float through the night, the woman holds into the umbrella-like device, controlling our
descent. Feeling the wind passing through my face, I couldn’t hold on and let out another
scream, part fear, part excitement. Despite the fear, I felt a sense of freedom that I've never felt
before in my life.
We continued our controlled descent, with the hospital growing smaller at the back of us and the
streets getting closer. I looked at the mysterious woman and couldn’t help but ask:

“Who are you?”

“The name’s Ann, I’m a member of the D.E.F.” She replied without looking at me.
“The Demon Extermination Forces? So you’re Nick’s boss.”
“That’s right!” She looked at me with a big smile, like she was proud of him.
“Why?” I was confused about everything that happened.
“Why what?” She asked me back while concentrating on the umbrella-like device as if she was
driving a car.
“Why would we need to leave the hospital? Why did we jump out of the window?” I was
frustrated by the lack of information.
“You see.” She said while looking at the horizon. “A regular high school boy can’t kill a
possessed person easily like you did, especially if they opened a domain.”
“I don’t even know what really happened.” I try to recollect my memory, it was painful but I
remembered something. “All I know is that I punched him.”
“I can assure you that a regular high school boy can’t kill a possessed person by punching
them, especially if they opened a domain.” She smiled. “I know what happened boy, you don’t
need to try and explain it to me.”
“But how?”
“How what?”
“How do you know?” I lost my patience and yelled.
“It's. A. Secret!” She said it with a certain rhythm that only made me madder.
“I give up!”

As I finish saying she starts laughing like it's pleasuring her, but i cannot lie she was gorgeous
even with this sinister laugh of hers. If I wasn’t that mad at her I probably wouldn’t be as
comfortable talking to her.
We continue our descent for a few minutes as we get on the ground. She picks up her cellphone
and makes a call, since she distanced herself from me I couldn't properly hear the conversation
she was having on the phone.
The street that we were in was completely empty, the building surrounding us was like they
were destroyed, we were encompassed by rubble and debris, but somehow it seemed like they
didn’t invade the sidewalk. The poorly lit street combined with the cold wind, made the
surroundings just more creepy. I hugged myself since the hospital gown wasn’t enough to keep
me warm, so I started shivering and clicking my teeth until something hit my head. It’s the
woman’s jeans jacket.

“Put it on.” She said while walking towards me. “I can’t have you freeze to death.”
“T-Thank y-you.” I put on the Jacket. “W-What are w-we waiting-for.” It started to warm me up.
“We’re waiting for my son to come pick us up” She sat on the edge of the sidewalk.
“Y-You have a son?” I was so shocked that I accidentally shouted.
“Not just one, I have three children. Do you wanna see their pictures?” She looked up at me with
a happy smile.
“I’m fine.” I sat next to her.
“Ah.” She let out a sigh of relief and grabbed a pack of cigarettes out of her pocket. “Want one?”
She moved the hand holding the pack next to me.
“I’m a minor.” I reminded her
“Want one?” She insisted and moved the hand closer to me.
“Ah.” I let out a sigh of frustration. “Sure.”

I picked up a cigarette and so did she. She grabs a box of matches from the same pocket and
lights the match out of her shoe, with it she lights the cigarette and the match goes out.

“Here.” She says with the smoke on her lips and leans her head next to mine suggesting that
she was going to light mine cigarette with hers. “You know how to do it?” Her voice is muffled by
the smoke.
“I saw it in a movie once.” She smiles.

I placed my cigarette between my lips and leaned in close to her. Our cigarettes practically
brushed against each other. I couldn't help but sneak another peek at her gorgeous face. It was
mesmerizing, enough to make my heart skip a beat. Our cigarette tips met, and I inhaled
deeply. The glow of the cigarette intensified as I exhaled a plume of smoke, making it come truly
alive. When she noticed the brighter ember, she pulled away and took a satisfying drag on her
own cigarette.

“How do you know how to smoke?” She asked me just after exhaling the smoke.
“My dad was a huge smoker, I think it was his way to cope with all the demon hunting.” I took a
drag of my cigarette. “So one day when I was fourteen I found his pack and tried to smoke one
myself.”
“What happened?” She asked with enthusiasm.
“Well I started coughing like there was no tomorrow.” I wore a sad smile and she laughed. “So
of course when he arrived from work that day he went for his pack and saw one missing, so he
asked me and my brother who did it and my brother ratted me out.”
“What a snitch.”
“Right?” I took another drag. “So instead of my father making a big fuss about it.” I said with a
muffled voice and let the smoke away. “He brought me to his room and said “Whenever you are
feeling so stressed, anxious or sad that you need to smoke, come to me and we will smoke a
ciggy together.”” Tears started to fall from my eyes. “So from that day on, we smoked a couple
of times, but when my mom discovered we made a vow to stop smoking.” I couldn’t hold on the
tears any longer. “But he couldn’t stop and I knew that he was smoking in secret.” I started to
break down crying. “He was so bad at hiding it, but anytime I said that he was smoking he
denied it to eternity. He was that type of guy.” Even with the non stop tears coming out of my
eyes I take another drag of the cigarette.

I keep crying there on the sidewalk for a moment, the woman does nothing other than stare at
me and smoke her cigarette, after a couple of minutes a black sedan car stops in front of us.
The widow goes down and a male voice says:

“Is everything alright?”

“Yup!” The woman gets up at once and walks towards the driver. “Shoosh.” She makes a hand
sign for him to get out and the door opens.
“Are you sure everything is alright?” Nick gets out of the car, moves close to me and offers his
hand.
“Yeah.” I take one last drag and throw the cigarette on the gutter. “Everything is alright.” I take
his hand and he helps me get up.
“C’mon!” She honks the horn. “We don’t have all the time in the world.” She honks again.
“Shotgun!” Nicks says.
“Okay.” I accept this distorted reality I’m living in.

As I sit in the middle of the back seat, the woman accelerates even before Nick buckles his seat
belt.

“No smoking in the car!” He said to the woman with a cigarette in her mouth.
“Shut up!” She continues to drive faster than before.
“You know the rules Ann.” he said stressed, while trying to take it out of her mouth.
“Let me drive!” She dodges his attempts, consequently throwing the car to the right on the
empty street.
“Ann.” I said to myself quietly.

All this time and I didn’t even know her name. I started to think, while those two don’t stop
bickering at each other. And Nick is her son? How? She doesn’t look that old.

“Ann, you know that the car will start to smell.” Nick says to her while continuing to grab the cig
out of her mouth.
“LET ME SMOKE!” She yells like a kid back at him.
“SHUT THE FUCK UP!” I scream and the car stops. “Nick for the love of god, let her smoke.” I
assert myself.
“But it’s against the rules.” He looks back at me from the passenger seat.
“Fuck the rules!” I say with such intensity that some drool flies out of my mouth. “It’s against the
rules to jump out of a fucking hospital window, but we did it anyway.”
“You guys jumped out of a window?” He looked at her and she gave him an “oops” face.
“It’s against the rules for a fifteen year old boy to smoke, but I did it anyway. And it may be
against the rules to smoke in the car, but goddamnit man let me have a moment of peace.” I let
off steam.
“Okay.” He sits normally in his seat. “But just this time.”
“Hehe.” She smiles and goes back to driving the car at high speed.
“Why did you jump off the window?” Nick asked her, perplexed.
“It was faster this way.” She answered him like it was the most normal thing.

Those two kept talking and fighting the whole ride, but I was so exhausted that I slept in the car.
Fortunately I didn’t have any weird dreams that I could remember so I could finally rest.
I woke up with Nick calling my name and pushing me, as I opened my eyes I saw that we were
in an underground garage. This floor of the garage was big and filled with black cars and
imported cars, it was so big that you could probably fit two basketball courts side by side here.
In the middle there was a mini hall with two elevators on each side.

“Where are we?” I said with a deep voice from sleep.

“Where else but the D.E.F.” He answered me as I got out of the car.
“I didn’t think the D.E.F. was that small.”
“Dude, this is just the garage.” He said honestly
“I was joking, man.” I wiped the sleep off my eyes. “Wait! What about my brother?” I
remembered about him. “He must be worried about me.”
“Don’t worry, I already called him.” Nick closed the car door.
“What did you say to him?”
“I said that we moved you to HQ for better treatment, he wanted to come, but I said that they
didn't allow it.”
“Okay.” I calmed down. “Ever since we lost our parents he’s been worrying too much about me.”
“I get it man, you are the only family he has left.”
“I know, it's just suffocating.”
“Will you two ladies stop the tea time and hurry up?” Ann said in front of the elevator holding the
door.
“Let’s go.” Nick said as we rushed to where Ann was.
“What are we doing here?” I asked them.
“It’s safer here.” Ann said.
“This is the second time you say something about this, what is happening?” I started to get
worried.
“From now on a couple of demons are gonna start coming for you, and this is the safest place in
the whole country.”
“Why? Just because I killed a low ranked demon by accident?”
“It wasn’t by accident.” Nick said with a troubled face.
“What do you mean by it wasn’t an accident?” I get more worried.
“You are what we call, bad blood.” Ann said it like it was nothing.
“Are you sure?” Nick hurried to ask her.
“Yeah, I saw it myself.”
“What do you mean by bad blood? What’s going on?” I start to feel anxious and my breathing
gets heavier.
“Relax man, I’ll explain it to you but you gotta relax.” He said, trying to calm me down.
“I…” My breathing gets heavier and heavier to the point that I can’t breathe properly. “I…”
“Come on man, breathe in, breathe out.”
“We’re here.” Ann says and the elevator door opens.

The elevator doors opened to reveal a long, eerie corridor. The walls were painted blood-red,
and there were strange paintings hanging all along both sides. The floor was this dark wood,
and a faded brown carpet that extended to the end of it, only covered only a section of floor. The
corridor seemed to stretch on forever and was just a tad wider than the elevator itself.I squinted
to see what was at the end, and there was definitely something like a desk near a big window. It
was hard to tell if it was far away or if I was just struggling to see clearly, maybe because of the
sudden breathing trouble.
Ann was the first one to get out of the elevator, disregarding my asthma crisis. Nick, trying to
help me, stayed by my side until he made sure that I was okay. It didn’t take much time for me
to get better, maybe this almost macabre view “Woke” me up.
While we were following behind Ann, I couldn't help but fixate on those mesmerizing paintings
on the walls. They were so intricately detailed, and every single one boasted this classy golden
frame that just oozes sophistication. But what really caught my eye was the subject matter.
Each painting depicted this epic battle between angels and demons. It was like looking into a
celestial battlefield, with the angels radiating this ethereal grace and the demons exuding this
menacing aura. You could see every feather on the angels' wings, and the demons' fiery eyes
seemed to burn right through the canvas. It was like being transported into a cosmic struggle of
epic proportions.
As we approached the end of the corridor, I couldn't contain my curiosity. What lay ahead was
truly remarkable. A generously sized light wood desk, reminiscent of a relic from the late 1800s,
awaited us. Its craftsmanship was impeccable, adorned with intricate carvings that hinted at a
story.
At the very center of the desk's front, a captivating carving drew me in. An angel, wearing armor
and brandishing a sword, subdued a demon-like figure beneath its foot. The carving exuded a
level of detail that transported you to the scene, capturing the angel's grace and the demon's
turmoil.
Beyond the desk, a dark wooden chair with plush dark brown padding provided an elegant
contrast, adding a touch of sophistication to the ensemble. In front of the desk there were two
dark wood chairs that, although they were sophisticated, didn't come close to the other one.
The final touch was a magnificent stained glass window, bathed in soft, colorful light. It
portrayed the timeless battle between angels and demons, as if recounting an ancient tale. This
wasn't just a piece of history; it was a work of art that transcended time.
Sitting in the chair there was an old man in his sixties, his skin was brown and rugged showing
his age. He had large curly brown hair and wore a big white beard, although the beard was big,
it looked like he took very good care of it.
I recognized this man, he had been to my house before, when I was a kid, but I couldn’t
remember his name. As Ann got closer to him, she sat in one of the chairs almost like she was
lying in it.

“So you really brought him here, Anselma.” He said with this soft but respite voice carrying his
age.
“I didn’t have any choice.” She said, throwing her hands in the air.
“We always have a choice Anselma.” He looked at me as me and Nick got closer to him. “It’s
been a while Lucas, the last time I saw you, you were just a little kid.” He got up from the chair
and came to hug me.
“Yes, it has been.” I awkwardly accepted the hug.
“So!” He released me. “What takes you here to my office?”
“I don’t know.” I said.
“He’s a bad blood.” She said quickly and the man in front of me made a disappointed face. “And
by your reaction I’m guessing you already knew about it.” I thought of saying something, but the
moment didn’t allow it.
“Yes.” He said with a heavy weight to his word and went back to the chair. “I already knew about
it.”
“How could you not do anything?” Ann spoke seriously for the first time, it was almost like she
was mad.
“His parents were handling it.” He sat down.
“His parents are dead.” She slammed her hand on the beautiful desk.
“I know, and that’s why he’s with the Alva’s, they have enough security to protect the president.”
“Mammon already has a plan to capture the boy! He should stay here.”
“That is new information.” He put his index finger on his mouth thinking. “Was it the…”
“I saw it in his dream.” She interrupted him. “Somehow he’s connected to them.”
“That does changes everything.” He kept thinking for a while.
“Excuse me.” I timidly enter the conversation. “I know that I asked this a lot today, but what is
going on?”
“Of course, you should be confused with everything.” He was considerate of my feelings. “Nick,
why don’t you take him to the cafeteria and explain everything to him, he must be hungry.” He
signed to the elevator.
“Yes, sir.” Nick said and started to walk in the direction of the elevator like a robot.
“Go boy, I will see you later.” She looked back at me.
“Okay, it was nice seeing you again sir.” I said to the old man.
“It was nice seeing you too, but for what it looks, we’ll be seeing each other more times.” He
gave me a comforting smile.

On the way back to the elevator I kept thinking about what they were talking about, what was
bad blood, who is mammon, what the hell were they talking about. All these crippling doubts
were getting me nervous and as soon as we entered the elevator and the doors closed I asked
him.

“What the fuck is going on?” I asked, almost pushing him into the wall.
“Where should I start?” He gave me a fake smile.
“What is bad blood?”
“People who are born with demon blood.” He said like he threw a bomb out and expected a bad
reaction from me.

As he finishes saying my world once again fell. I share the same blood with those horrid
creatures that killed my parents, that kills dozens of people every day. Me? I was supposed to
kill them, not be one of them.

“I know that you are thinking a lot of things right now. But calm down, just because you have
bad blood it doesn’t mean that you are going to turn into a demon.”
“Having bad blood is common?” Maybe it is a common thing and I'm worrying about nothing.
“Actually.” He wore a troubled face. “Being a true bad blood is actually very rare.”
“FUCK!” I scream with anger and hit the wall of the elevator.
“But hey, look at the bright side, you could easily kill demons with it.” He faked smile
“Nick! I tried to eat a human heart!” I started to cry.
“What?” He leaned in closer.
“The possessed dude that I killed. I tried to eat his heart, if it wasn’t for someone I would
probably have done it.” I put both my hands to my face.
“Hey, we had Bad bloods in the D.E.F. before, we know how to handle them.”
“Nick.” I pull both of my hands from my face. “You’re not helping.”
“I’m sorry man.” I put my hands on the wall separately. “I don’t know what to say.” as he finishes
I headbut the wall with all my strength. “What the fuck?” He screamed.
“Ok.” I say as the blood starts to fall from my forehead. “We’re not going to the cafeteria.”
“Where are we going then?”
“There must be a library in this building, right?” I ask him while not wiping the blood that now is
running through my face.
“Yes, but only D.E.F. members can use it.”
“I’m lucky that I have one here.”
“Could you at least wipe the blood off your face.”
“Oh fuck, you’re right.” I went to wipe the blood with the jacket.
“Just don’t do it with Ann’s jacket, she’ll kill for that.”
“Oh, okay.” So I wiped it with the hospital gown.

Nick presses another button and for some time we stay there without saying a single thing. I
keep wiping the blood out of my head, but it proves troublesome so I just let it go. As we arrive
on the right floor I follow him through a series of halls until we get to a place where there are
metal double doors.

“Don’t say anything, just follow my lead.”

As he turned the doorknob and let the door swing open, I was greeted by the sight of a truly
amazing library. While it might not have been quite like my school's library, it possessed its own
unique beauty. The space was big, with seemingly endless corridors created by imposing metal
bookshelves. These shelves held a diverse collection of books, ranging from brand-new
publications to old ones that had the marks of their age and wear. It was a captivating literary
haven.
To the right of the entrance there was a medium sized counter where sitting behind it there was
a woman who was sleeping, in front of the counter there was a turnstile that could only be
released with the permission of said person.

“Excuse me.” Nick said, but she didn’t wake up. “Excuse me!” He said a little louder.
“Oh my saintess.” She said jumpscared by him. “I’m so sorry, it’s just that it gets quiet here at
this time.” She gave an excuse.
“No problem, you see Commander Ann sent me here with this new recruit to do some research
on a demon that we will face soon.” He created a nice story.
“Sure no…” She stopped. “Is he in a hospital gown?” she leaned forward on the counter.
“Oh yes, he just left the medical ward, the commander treated him pretty rough on the training.”
He approached the counter.
“I heard that she torture her squad.” She covered her mouth with her hand.
“Oh it’s nothing like that, she is just hard on us.”
“Okay, I'm gonna need your guys ID Card.”
“Here’s mine.” He handed her his card. “Lucas, give me yours.” I patt on my thighs showing that
the gowns have no pocket. “Tch, I forgot, Commander rushed us out of the ward, he doesn’t
have his ID with him.”
“Well I’m afraid that without his ID he cannot enter.” She crossed her arms.
“Are you sure there’s no way?” He insisted. “If he gets late on the research, I can’t even imagine
what the commander will do to him.” He persuaded her. “Take a look at his state.” He pointed at
me with his hands and I made a sad face. “Are you sure there is no way?”
“Okay, just do it quickly.” She gave in.
“Thank you so much, we owe you one.”
“I will cash in a favor in the future then.”

She released the turnstile and we went through it, we walked a bit until we turned right to a
corridor.

“If I’m right, there are some books and archives about bad blood here.” We started to look for
books on the shelf. “Here! The creation of demi demons by the archbishop Francis the eighth.”
He pulled a book from it.
“Demi demons?” I panicked.
“It’s what the Vatican calls Bad blood, but is an old-fashioned term that was disproved to have
any base on demonology, being a bad blood doesn’t make you a demi demon.” He started to
walk. “Let’s go to a table.”

I followed him to a place better lit that had a bunch of tables. We sat down and I started to read
the book. It started with an introduction to who the Archbishop was, telling how he was one of
the pioneers of demonology and that his specialty was Demi Demons and cited a couple of his
other studies about it.
The book starts with a theory on how to infuse demon blood or parts to create a mixture of a
human with a demon. He gets on extended details, but he uses some words that neither I nor
Nick understanded. In a nutshell to create a Demi Demon you need a captured demon and a
suitable subject, they will start with the blood transfusion. After the body accepts the blood they
start with transplant. And if the subject doesn't die they will possess the power of the limb of the
demon, but that is all theory and was never tested.
The second part of the book tells how Demi Demons are Naturally born, in the book there are
only two manners of how a demi Demon is born, the first one is if a Demon reproduces with a
human, there is a possibility that the child of said sin is a demi demon. The other possibility is if
the child is born from a weak Wish, but since there is only one case of this in the dark ages, this
is not very credible information.
The third part of the book tells of how a Demi Demon lives and is based on the studies made
from actual Demi Demons. The Demi Demon has special power that is based on the demon that
the blood is from. The strength is based on the rank of the demon and the power is based on
the wish that created the demon. If the Demi Demon keeps using his power without any restraint
he will be consumed by it and will lose his humanity. If the Demi Demon doesn’t have enough
will while using his powers he can become consumed by it. It’s important to notice that the Demi
Demon can live a normal life if he doesn’t use his powers, but someday his powers will appear
and if he doesn’t have support he will be consumed by it.

“What are you two doing here?” A feminine voice almost shouted.
“Ann.” Nick said scared.
“Answer me. Weren’t you two bozos supposed to be in the cafeteria?” She approached us.
“H-Hm, Lucas had some doubts about Bad Blood so I brought him here.” He was afraid.
“You brought a non member of the D.E.F. to where all the important archives are? What if he’s
being controlled by a Demon?”
“H-He didn’t seem like he was being controlled by a Demon.”
“He didn’t seem to. Who are you now? Specialist in possessions?.” She started to scream at
him. “Would you stop reading this fucking book.” She closed the book. “What is this shit.” She
grabbed it and read it. “The Creation of Demi Demons by the Archbishop Francis the Eighth.
This book is full of shit.” She threw it to the wall. “Don’t believe in a single word that’s in this
book.”
“Well you guys won’t explain anything to me so i had to take measures with my own hands.” I
got up from the chair.
“This idiot over here.” She pointed to Nick. “Was supposed to explain everything to you.”
“He had a panic attack, so I tried to help.”
“Could you guys keep it quiet.” The librarian spoke from where she was.
“SHUT THE FUCK UP! NOBODY TALKED TO YOU!” She yelled at her. “If Moses hadn’t
monitored you guys, it would’ve taken me ages to find you.”
“Wait, Moses monitored us?” Nick asked disappointed.
“Do you think he would trust him to a moron like you? Argh!” She screamed angrily. “Let’s get
the fuck outta here, I’m starving.”
She walked out and we followed her with our heads down. The whole way to the cafeteria she
kept complaining about everything, about how the elevator was slow, how this place was too
big, about Moses.
When we arrived at the cafeteria, it was a normal place, a little big with sets of round tables and
chairs everywhere, even though it was in the middle of the night there was still someone
cooking food for the night shift agents seated at the tables. We kept quiet the whole time, that
was until she had the first sip of the beer that she bought from a vending machine.

“Will you two be quiet forever?” She asked while cleaning some beer off her lips.
“Tell me what’s happening, I’m just so confused.” I spoke truly.
“You are a Bad Blood, that doesn’t mean that is a bad thing, but it will put you in danger,
especially if you use your power, like you did with that possessed guy.”
“The book said that if I used my powers willy-nilly I would be consumed by it and lose my
humanity.” I was afraid.
“That is not all true, if you use it without a care you can be consumed, but if you train it and learn
to live with it you will not be consumed.” I sensed a preoccupation with her words.
“The book said that the only way that a bad Blood is born is by the Sinned relationship between
a demon and a human, was I…”
“No!” She interrupted me. “At least I don’t think so, I know that there is more to it, and I will
discover it.”
“Why are you so invested? You just met me.”
“I owe it to your parents, when everything that I held dear to me died, they helped me a lot so
this is my way of thanking them.” She took a long sip of her beer and I kept quiet.
“So what about Mammon?” Nick asked to break the silence.
“Who is Mammon?” I Asked back.
“He is a king of hell, the demon of Greed, one of the seven deadly sins.” Nick said with a low
voice.
“Why is he after me?” I was getting confused
“You know the demon you expunged? He went back to hell and told his superior and his
superior told his superior until word got to Mammon, so now he is planning an attack to free
Beelzebub, so that his older brother can praise him.” Ann laid it out.
“Older brother?” I asked
“Lucifer, the morning star, the demon of pride.” Nick filled in.
“But what does that have to do with me?”
“I still don’t know, but somehow the power you displayed that day caught their attention, that’s
why I can’t have you running around without proper security, and that’s why we fled the hospital,
that could’ve turned into a blood bath with all those bad wishes.” She finished the beer and
smashed it with her hands.
“Wishes!” I said out loud.
“What about wishes?” Nick said.
“The book. The book said something about wishes a couple of times, what are wishes?”
“Wait, you don’t know?” Nick made a confused face.
“Don’t know about what?”
“Makes sense.” Ann threw her beer can on the garbage bin from the chair. “If they were keeping
a secret that you were a bad blood, I imagined that you didn’t know about it.”
“I read some stuff about demons on the internet, but it never said anything about wishes.”
“Of course it wouldn’t say, if that information was available to the public, terrorists would have a
day at the park.”
“What do you mean?” I was more confused than before.
“Lucas, do you know where demons come from?” Nick asked me.
“They are born in hell, no?”
“No Lucas, they are born from collective wishes.” He answered
“What?” I was surprised by the information.
“Do you think all demons are bad?” Ann asked me.
“Yes, otherwise they wouldn’t be called demons.”
“No Lucas, the only reason they were called demons is because the first reports of them were
from the middle ages, where the Catholic church ruled almost the whole western world, in
Japan, demons are called Yokai, China is Youkai, in most of the countries of the orient they call
demons a different thing, to make a comparison in India they are called Gods.” The lady who
handled the food came and brought it to our table. “It doesn’t matter what you call them, they
are the same. Creatures that are born from collective wishes, and the most powerful demons
are born from the most wishes.” She started to eat her stake and french fries. “Have you ever
heard of the massacre of ‘87?”
“Yes.” I took a bite of my spaghetti and meatballs. “When the death demon destroyed the most
populated city of our country in less than ten minutes.”
“Exactly, do you know why he’s so powerful?”
“Because a lot of people wish for death?” I cut a meatball in half with my fork and ate it.
“It’s almost like that. Has someone ever done something that you hated so much that for a
moment you wished that person would just die?” She cuts down the steak with a knife, it bleeds
out and she dips the stake on the blood.
“Yes, but just for a brief moment.”
“It doesn’t matter.” Nick butted in. “Even if it is a small wish it will power the death demon, and
that works with other demons as well. That’s why the seven deadly sins are so powerful.” He cut
a piece of his apple pie with his small fork and ate it.
“If they are created by collective wishes, how do we stop them?”
“We can’t. Because it doesn’t matter if we kill them, as long as the wish still exists they will come
back.” She grabs the rest of the stake with the fork and starts biting it from there.
“Can’t we capture them?” I took another bite.
“Eventually we do capture one of the big mean ones, but the cost is too big.” Nick said after
finishing eating his apple pie.
“You must wonder how your parents died.” She took another bite of her stake with the fork close
to her mouth.
“H-how?” I stopped eating.
“There was an attack from gluttony himself, for some reason from all of the places in the world
he chose this country to attack.” She took a bite. “And so.” She spoke with her mouth full of
meat. “The D.E.F. thought that was a good chance to capture him, so in accord with your
parents they plotted a plan to capture him.” She swallowed it. “But killing a demon is a thousand
times easier than capturing, and so the plan went through hell when your mom got attacked by
him and lost an arm.” She took a bite. “Your dad got too emotional and tried to save her.” She
chewed it. “But it only got worse and he got hit too.” She swallowed. “Beelzebub perforated his
torso, much like what happened to you.” She took the last bite. “But your parents are strong,
and even in the brink of death, together with the other agents they were able to pull it off, they
beat the demon to a pulp, but unfortunately.” She chewed it. “They died, the injuries were too
much, they lost a lot of blood and couldn’t hang on.” She swallowed.
“Where is the demon being stored now?” I said with my voice trembling and the tears falling
from my eyes.
“He is being stored in this exact building.” she swallowed. “If you want I can take you there right
now.”
“Ann.” Nick interrupted.
“This is none of your business.” She shut him up. “If you want we could go there and you could
kill him right now. What is your choice?”

I was torn apart in a way I could kill him and avenge my parents, but if I do that more people will
die and the sacrifice they made will be in vain. I miss them so much, why would demons exist,
why do we have to wish all the time?

“Ann.” I said, holding up the tears that were coming down my eyes. “Why won’t people wish for
a world without demons?”
“They do.” She took another long sip of her beer. “But unfortunately in this world negative
wishes are more powerful than positive ones.”
“Ann, you said that if I trained my powers I could control it, right?” I said it with a serious face
“Yes.” She wiped some of the beer that was on her upper lip with her hand.
“Nick, you said that Bad Bloods can kill demons easily, right?”
“I don’t like where this is going.” Ann smiled with the beer can in her hand.
“Am i right?” I imposed myself.
“Y-yes.”
“An-” I was interrupted.
“Lucas.” Ann looked at me with her sinister grin. “Would you like to be my son?” Knowing what
she meant I answered.
“Yes!”
 CHAPTER THREE

It had been two months since I accepted Ann’s offer and started to live in the D.E.F. and my
once quiet life, now was very agitated. Because of the impending danger to my life, I wasn’t
permitted to leave the D.E.F. HQ, so everyday after school my brother would come and visit me,
sometimes he would bring letters from the twins or friends from school, since I wasn’t allowed to
have a phone.
My daily schedule was busy. I would wake up around five in the morning and go out for a run,
after that I would shower and go to martial arts training at seven am, where Vanessa, a buff
huge veteran, would teach me everything about hand to hand combat against demons. At nine it
was Demonology class with Mr. Franco, he was one of the leading specialists in demonology of
our country, there I learned about the demon ranks, Kings was the highest, Princes, Dukes and
the Counts were the lowest. After his class at eleven it was lunch, when all the soldiers would
gatter and eat lunch in the cafeteria. Unfortunately I hadn’t made friends, but thankfully the
chefs in the D.E.F. were no joke, so we had a wide variety of delicious food to choose.
After lunch at one pm we had conjoined training with all the recruits, where we would study
tactics, run out scenarios and formations, since I didn’t have an official squad I would just train
with the new recruits that were older than me. We usually ended this training at six thirty pm and
we would shower and eat dinner, it was at this time when my brother would come and visit me
so we had dinner together.
After that was the hard part where I had training with Ann from eight pm to eleven and
sometimes till dawn. There she would teach me how to use my powers the hard way, since I
had a high recovery rate, she didn’t hesitate in hurting me. At the end of the day I would just
shower and pass out on my bed in the barracks with the other recruits.
That was my schedule, although sometimes instead of Demonology class or Combat class I had
Weapon training or Suit testing. Weapons and suits were the technology created to combat
these supernatural creatures, so most times when the D.E.F. would capture a demon they used
every single part of their body to create these defense gears.
Suits are a type of full body armor created to protect and enhance the user capabilities, suits are
made from the essence of demons so the higher ranked the demon, the higher was the power
of it. For them to work well you need to have an at least average synchronization rate of fifty five
percent. Just like demons are created by powerful wishes the suits need a high power of will to
have a bigger synch percentage, if you have a low rate they will just weigh you down, because
they are surprisingly heavy with such a slim appearance.
When I was testing one for the first time the teacher insisted that we needed a good reason to
make the rate go up, because if in the future we see ourselves in a tough situation and our will
weakens the rate will go down making combat harder. A lot of the recruits had lost loved ones
so most of their reason for high will was vengeance. In the beginning was hard for me, because
I couldn’t find a good reason, so I expressed this to Ann and she told me to use the anger that I
have pent up inside me, because even if I'm in a bad spot it will never go away. After the advice,
I didn’t have a hard time anymore.
Weapon training was easy, since most of the weapons available to us recruits were low level,
but even so, some of the weaker recruits fainted while trying to wield a weapon. Similar to suits,
it was also made from demons, the difference was that you didn’t have a synch rate and some
weapons you didn’t need any effort at all, so we just had to choose the type of weapon suited us
and train with it. For me it was easy to choose a weapon, since Ann used a double daggers, I
picked it up as my weapon, but even so I still had artillery training, which I was horrible at.
Our teacher in Weapon training was Vanessa, she was tough but a nice person, in the first class
she showed us her Duke ranked Weapon, a greatsword named after its demon, Valefar the
Thievery wish. The weapon had the ability to steal the power of a demon of the same rank or
below. She told us that she had to conquer her greatsword, which was a common thing with
higher level weapons. To conquer it, she had to have a talk with the Demon. She reported that
they reached common ground after what seemed hours to her, but in the real world was a week.
Conquering a weapon was extremely dangerous, if you tried to conquer a high leveled weapon
and fail, you could end up being possessed or even in a vegetative state. Luckily the ones given
to us were low level and didn’t need conquering.
And so two months of my life passed by without me noticing, I only realized because it was
finally the day of the exam, if I pass the exam I’ll become a full member of the D.E.F. and use all
the advantages that come with it, and if I don’t I’ll spent more time training. Normally a recruit
trains for at least six months, but since I was a Bad Blood and had special training from Ann
they let me do the exam earlier.
The test was simple, they would randomly form a squad containing four people and a
commander, who is a real commander of a squad, to help them with strategies, but not enter in
combat. The squad would have to defeat and capture alive a Duke ranked demon, held by the
D.E.F., without killing him. If a member of the squad doesn’t think they’re capable, they can quit
and do it again another time, but a squad member cannot quit while the exam is happening,
otherwise they will be prohibited from participating in the D.E.F.. The prerequisite of participating
in the exam is to have an average sync rate of the suit, since they’ll use it. And to be able to
wield a low ranked weapon.
It was the morning of a Wednesday, it was raining and cold, all the candidates were waiting
outside in the pouring rain in front of a building with three stories. It looked like there were a
hundred of us in a five line formation. The building didn’t have windows and it seemed like the
gray walls were reinforced with something, because they looked sturdy.
We waited for what seemed like an eternity when all of a sudden a man came out of the building
by the automatic double doors. He was big, perhaps bigger than teacher Vanessa, but not as
buff as her. He was wearing a black fuzzy military coat with the symbol of the D.E.F. in it, a crest
with in it an angel, wearing armor and brandishing a sword, subduing a demon-like figure
beneath its foot. Behind the coat he was wearing what seemed to be the gray D.E.F. uniform.
He was wearing a military cap with the D.E.F. symbol and because he was distant from me I
couldn’t see his face.

“Good morning Candidates.” He screamed for all of us to hear.

“GOOD MORNING CAPTAIN!” All of us screamed back.
“If anyone wishes to give up, now is the last chance.” He said and silence filled the place, no
one gave up. “I will call four names, when your name is called proceed to the building behind
me and wait there with your commander until all of your squad is there, understood?” He now
spoke in a lower tone, but still loud enough that everybody could hear.
“YES SIR!” We yelled in unison.
“I will now call the names.” He cleared his throat. “Eric Foreman.” A man far from me started to
walk. “James Light. Desiré Gonzales. Sam Jones.” As people would get out, the lines were
moving forward filling the gap left by them.

All of the people he called went in there and everybody else stood there in silence, but what
impressed me more was the fact that he knew all the squads without the help of a paper sheet
with the names.

“I will now call another squad.”

He proceeded to call names one by one until a squad was formed. While my name wasn’t called
I waited there in the cold rain. Because I wasn’t in the front I had the advantage of looking
around everyone without being scolded. I look to my sides discreetly and see all the candidates,
some of them I've seen around the HQ, but most of them I didn’t know, since I wasn’t training
with ‘em. There was a common face all those people wore, some were so nervous that with one
fast look, some had a very serious face but their hands were trembling and some were just
focused. But everyone there was freezing since the clothes that we were wearing were paper
thin.
Some time passed and I was moving up the line, until my name got called and I started to walk
towards the building, as I passed next to the Captain he gave me a look that made me nervous.
His face had a Huge diagonal scar coming from the top left part of his eye and ending in the
right part of his chin. Even though I only looked at him for a second I could see that he had a
glass eye on where his left eye was supposed to be. But what frightened me wasn’t his scary
face, but the fact that of all the people that passed next to him he didn’t look at anybody, but me.
As I got close to the door something came through my mind. Everybody was entering through
there, but no one was coming out, either it had another exit or they were hospitalized.
I passed the automatic glass double doors and entered the building. My first thought was
happiness since in here it was way warmer than outside. But on a second look I could see that
the reception area was rather small. Close to the upper left corner of the room there was a
counter with a person sitting behind it, in front of the counter a little further from it there was a
small wooden door on the left wall. Right in front of the entrance on the other side of the room
there were double doors, like the one you see in hospitals. On my Right there was another
wooden door diametrically opposed to the one in the left wall. To my left side where the
automatic doors ended and the wall began there was a couch and seated on it was a man, who
looked like he was in his late twenties with long messy black hair. He was reading a newspaper
seriously. In front of him standing up, there were three other people, my squad for the exam.
The person on the left was a little taller than me, probably 1,70 cm and looked like he was in his
early twenties. He was tanned and his uniform didn’t show his muscles properly, but he had a
strong build. He had short tapered fade blond hair carefully combed. Next to him there was a girl
as tall as me, her tanned face was complemented by freckles dispersed across her cheeks and
nose, just like the man next to her she too looked like in her early twenties. She had medium
wavy chestnut hair that ended on her neck. The person on the right was enormous, he had dark
skin, was about 1,80 meters tall and different from the person on the left his muscles were
showing through his uniform so much that it looked like the clothes would rip at any effort made
from him. He had a black short military haircut and different from the other ones that their
postures were slacking, he was standing straight.

“So you finally arrived.” Said the man seated on the couch while reading the newspaper. “Would
you all do me a favor and enter the door on the right?” He said, licked his index, thumb and
turned the page. “Inside the room there will be lockers, find the one with your name in it, put on
the suit and grab your weapon inside.” As he finished saying he chuckled. “Come back once
you’re finished.” He chuckled again.

We follow his orders and as we are close to leaving the area I can hear him saying “This cat, he
really hates Mondays.” and laughs to himself. As we pass through the right door I see a corridor
stretching to an intersection to the left. We all walked in a line, with the big guy in the front, the
woman behind him, with me in the back and the other man in front of me. Nobody made a
sound as we walked. One of the Bad blood skills that I learned from Ann was the ability to
enhance my senses, so to know how they were I decided to hear their breathing pattern, since I
was not powerful enough to hear their heartbeat. From what I could hear, the most calm person
in there was the woman, the most agitated one was the man in the front, although he did not
show his nervousness, I could clearly hear by his breathing pattern that he was anxious. The
man in front of me was a mix of both, he was nervous, but he was controlling himself.
I thought I was going to be more anxious, normally when I had a trip or some activity I would
never sleep on the day before and I would get very anxious. But now I was calm and collected, I
think all those meditation sessions I did with Ann before our training helped me control my
emotions.
As we turned left we reached a dead end, close to it in the right wall there was a door with a
men sign on top of it. On the left wall there was a door with a woman sign on top of it. While
everybody stopped and looked I continued walking and opened the door with the gentleman
sign.
It was a big room with three lines of tall lockers and in between them there were benches.
Behind it when the lockers ended there was what looked like shower cubbies divided by small
doorless walls. In the middle of it there was a wall that divided the shower cubbies and the
stalls.
I entered it and started to look for my name written in one of the red lockers, the other guys
followed me and did the same. I found it next to the left wall and opened it. In it there was a Suit,
just like the ones that I tested before, tactical boots and double daggers in its sheath. The Suit
was slick and mostly matte-black with shoulder and knee pads made of some type of metal,
both of the pads were a gunmetal-gray color. In the suit there were no pockets, but it did have
enough holsters for us to store anything we needed for a mission, without hindering our
movements. The suit was in a hanger inside the locker. As I took it out, the suit almost fell from
my hands because of its weight. It had been a while since I trained with one, so I forgot how
heavy they were when they’re not activated.
I grabbed it properly and went to a stall to get in it. Since I had done it a couple of times it wasn’t
too hard, but what proved difficult was the fact that once I was in it, the suit was bigger than my
body. Thankfully they had put an auto adjust feature, so with a press of a button on my wrist the
suit changed and became like a second skin, tight to my body.
I went back to the locker and put the clothes that I was wearing in it and grabbed my daggers
and the boots. I sit on the bench in front of my locker and put on my boots, after getting up I
store the daggers in the two holsters on my waist, one on the right side and the other on the left.
Ready and geared up I left the room and bumped into the girl. She seemed a little shy in her
suit, different from before, since she was more confident. I let her lead the way and follow her
back to where the commander was.
As soon as we entered the reception room, we saw the man, who was now on his cellphone,
laughing out loud at something on his screen. When he notices our presence he quickly drops
the phone to his right side on the couch and grabs the newspaper and pretends to read it.
Since we were the first ones to arrive, we waited a couple of minutes standing there in front of
the man who was trying to contain his laughter. When the other members finally came the
seated man threw the paper to the side, got up and cleared his throat.

“We will now proceed to the exam area, where you will face a Duke level demon as a squad.”
He scratched his peach fuzz chin with discontent on his face. “Before, in there, you will have ten
minutes to deliberate between each other and form a strategy.”
“Sir! Can I ask a question, sir?” The girl said to him.
“No!” He replied instantly.
“Okay sir!”
“Let’s go recruits.”

He said and started to lead the way through the double doors. After it, there was a long corridor
with some lengthy pitch black windows on the left wall and next to them there were doors. We
could hear some grueling noises coming from them, but since we could not see what was
inside, all of us decided to ignore it.
I did the same thing I did before and decided to hear their breathing patterns. This time there
wasn’t one person that wasn’t calm, everybody was nervous, but the most collected one of the
bunch was again the girl. If she passes the test, I’m sure that she would be a great Demon
Exterminator.
After two minutes of walking I could see at the end of the corridor another pair of doors. Even
though we were walking for minutes I was too distracted to see what type of weapons my peers
were going to use. The person in front of me, the bulky short guy, had a spear on his right hand.
The person next to him was the girl and she was carrying a rifle, that reminded me how bad I
was with firearms. The one in front of those two was the buff men and he had a great ax on his
back. The commander didn’t seem to carry anything.
We pass through the doors and see this arena-like structure. It was a huge place and the
reinforced walls went so high that could fit at least five elephants stacked up on each other. On
the left wall of this huge room, way up, there was a big window with a few people looking at us.
Using the ability to enhance my vision I saw that one of the people there was Ann, the other
ones I never saw in the whole time I lived in the D.E.F.. I look at her, she looks back at me,
waves her hand and with a happy face she mouths the words “Remember the promise.”. I stop
looking at her and move next to the squad.
The promise she is talking about is the one condition she imposed for me to take the exam this
early. I could not use any of the Bad Blood powers that I learnt with her. She said that with this
much training, it was enough for me to pass the exam without any powers. I think that the
motive behind this is to limit the amount of people that know that I’m a Bad Blood.

“Now that you’re all here, I will start the ten minute timer…” He paused. “Now!”
“Who will command the squad?” The short guy asked us.
“I can do it.” I said.
“I’m sorry but I won’t trust my future to a kid.” The girl said.
“Me too.” The buffed guy asserted.
“Ok then, I’ll do it.” She took charge. “First let’s name each other. I’ll be Alpha.” She pointed at
her chest. “You’ll be Bravo.” She pointed at the tall man. “You’ll be Charlie” She pointed to the
Other man. “And you’ll be Delta.” She pointed at me. “From now on we’ll call each other like
this, understood?”
“Yes, sir!” We screamed.
“Right now we have two close combat soldiers, one medium and I'm long.” She stopped to
think. “Since you are big and buff Bravo, you will be close with the demon and distract him,
while me and Delta deal damage to him. Charlie, since you have a somewhat long range, if you
see that Delta or Bravo are in danger you interfere and call the attention to you, I will give you
cover from back here.” She laid out her plan. “Do you have any doubts?”
“I don’t think that bravo should be our front line.” I said.
“Why?” She was bothered by my comment.
“Since we don’t know what form the devil will have, I think it is more safe for us to have either
me or Charlie in the front line and have Bravo help us with cover.”
“I understand Charlie, but why you?” Bravo said, confused.
“No matter what form the devil will have, I can guarantee you that I can handle it alone.” I said
confidently.
“Don’t be arrogant, Delta.” Alpha said mad. “We will follow my plan. Does everyone agree?” She
dismissed my words.
“Yes, Sir!” Bravo and Charlie said in unison.
“Delta?” Alpha looked at me.
“Yes, Sir!” I gave in.
“Now I will tell you about plan B, for if this formation doesn’t work.”

Basically the plan B is Alpha, Bravo and Charlie will make a triangle formation with Bravo on the
right side of the Demon and Charlie on the left and Alpha shooting it from behind. I thought of
saying what I thought of it, but it would be ignored again.
She talked about another plan if everything went to shit, she would throw her rifle to the side
and enter close combat so the squad cam recompose. After that she told each squad member
how to act in combat. I pretended to listen, but I ignored the advice she was giving to the other
members. I was focused on another thing.
You see demons have a very strong bittersweet sulfur scent to them. And the stronger the scent
the stronger the Demon. I knew that the creature was a Duke level, but I wanted to know how
strong it was. So I concentrated and enhanced my sense of smell. In the beginning it was bad
since the suits had a similar scent to demons, but then I started to sense the Human smell that
Glaysa-Labolas told me, it was really sweet like something I never sensed before. Since it was
not my first rodeo I controlled myself quite well, but the first time it was a disaster. After that I
could sense a small demon scent coming from the corridor behind us, but it was so weak that I
discarded the possibility that it was a Duke level one. And all of a sudden I sensed this awful
smell, it was stronger than I ever sensed before, it was similar to the scent of Ann’s daggers. It
was coming from below us, way below. So I dismissed it, figuring it was an experiment they
were doing.

“Delta! Delta!” Alpha was yelling in front of me. “Delta!”

“I’m sorry, I was concentrating.”
“I could see.” She snared at me. “Your job will be seizing openings the enemy will leave, if you
see an opening, attack.” She started to explain to me. “Other than that, just stay put, I don’t trust
you to help cover the others. Do you copy?”
“Yes sir!” I said to her.

And then suddenly a loud horn sound covered the entire room.

“Your time for strategizing is over. In a minute I will release the Demon and you will have to
defeat him.” He said in a monotone way. “If at any moment you feel that your life is in danger
you can say Help and I will assess the situation. If you really are in danger I will help you, if not
you will have to handle it with your squad. Understood?”
“Yes Sir!” We all screamed.
“Release the demon!” He yelled with his hand up and moved it in a circle with his index finger
pointing up.

When he finished a hole in the floor a couple meters in front of us started to open, it was like a
lid was slowly sliding to the right. After the hole was completely open we started to hear a noise
like an elevator going up. As the noise was getting louder I could sense the putrid smell I
sensed before, something wasn’t right.

“Commander!” I approached the man that was now leaning on a wall behind us. “Something is
wrong, I don’t think this demon is what it says.”
“Recruit, if you want to give up, you should’ve done it before when you had the chance.” He
ignored my warnings.
“I’m not talking about this, lives are in danger here!” I tried to heed his attention one more time.
“Of course it is, we’re dealing with a demon, this is no school trip.” Again he didn’t care.

Knowing that talking with him wouldn’t work, I looked up to see if Ann was there, but at a closer
look enhancing my vision I could see that she was no longer visible, in her place there were
other people. So I moved closer to Alpha.
“Alpha, this is more dangerous than you think, this is not a Duke level Demon.” I tried to convey
the danger to her.
“What are you talking about?” She said, angry. “Of course this is dangerous, you should’ve
stayed at school.”
“You stupid people, this is at least a prince level Demon.” I said frustrated.
“Are you gonna start with insubordination?” She looked back at me fuming.
“Okay, then commander.” I said to Alpha. “Just brace yourselves.”

It finally came, the demon was in a cage the size of a wardrobe, now I could sense him without
the enhancement. But it was different from what I expected. Instead of a monster, inside the
cage there was a naked woman with voluptuous breasts and slim body. Its hair was long and
golden like an angel and its eyes were fiery red with a slit black pupil. When the cage opened I
took my position behind Alpha, with my daggers in hand I started to slowly move around it from
far away.

“Okay squad, remember the plan.” Alpha said.

The demon that was laying down in the cage now was seated down and started to stretch his
body and let out a loud yawn.

“It has been a while since I've been sleeping.” Its voice was simple but beautiful. “I was getting
bored waiting for you.” The cage’s door opened and the demon got up and started to walk.

Seeing it out of its cage I could now see it better, the body was completely dirty like it hadn’t
showered for ages, but the surface smell was sweet. If I didn’t have an ability like that, I would
never know the threat that this Demon imposes.

“Now, Attack!” Alpha screamed

At her command Bravo ran to the Demon with his Great Ax in hand and tried to do a diagonal
slash. Behind him was Charlie ready to help him if he was in danger and Alpha started to fire
against it.
With its left hand the Demon deflected Bravo’s attack to the floor where the Ax pierced the floor.
With the right hand palm, it deflected every single bullet that was coming out of Alpha’s rifle.
Bravo trying to pull his Ax that was stuck in the floor became vulnerable and the Demon took
advantage and went to grab him by the neck, it was then that Charlie moved in fast and tried to
attack the hand impeding the demon. But something clashed against his spear, there was a tail
coming out of the demon’s back, it was bright yellow with black spots. The incredible tail was as
hard as Charlie’s spear, so the demon easily grabbed Bravo by his neck. Although Charlie was
rapidly attacking the demon’s arm, its tail was following the movement of the spear naturally,
with seemingly no effort.
With the Demon strangling Bravo, I could easily see from afar that he was panicking, fearing the
worst I moved fast as I could, and as quick as the wind I slashed through the Demon’s left arm
freeing Bravo from the claws of the creature and making him fall on the floor.
“Ah.” It said disappointedly. “I really liked that hand.” The demon mocked us.

Bravo that now was free moved back, letting his Ax stuck on the floor.

“Bravo, I will create an opening for you to retrieve your weapon.” I said when I saw him moving.

The demon that was deflecting both attacks from Alpha and Charlie, now was looking at its
forearm, oozing something akin to black blood, like it wasn’t in combat. And with little effort its
arm started to regenerate slowly, cell by cell.

“Reloading!” Alpha said from the back.

Knowing that Bravo was at disadvantage I charged on, until Alpha could get back at firing. With
its left hand it effortlessly blocked every single one of the multiple blows that I threw. In a
moment I looked to my side and saw Charlie, that before was attacking, now was defending the
quick whips from its tail. And it was at this same moment that his movements started to become
slow and not accompany those of the Demon. When I saw that an attack, that he was not able
to deflect, was aimed for where his pancreas was, I attacked the demon’s hand in a way that
made it go up from the recoil and kicked Charlie out of the attack. Unfortunately I couldn’t
control my force so he went flying a little bit, but he was saved from the piercing blow.

“T-Thank you man.” He said scared.

Now I was in defense mode, defending from the attacks of the hand and the tail. The blows
were quick, but thanks to my training I was able to deflect them.

“Back on target!” Alpha yelled and started to fire.

Now that Alpha went back to shooting, I went back to attacking and I aimed at the almost
reconstructed hand. Knowing that the tail would come for the save, I attacked it with extra force
on my right hand, so when it entered contact with the tail it would shove it down, making an
opening for me to attack the healing hand with the dagger on my left hand. But when I was
about to make contact the Demon blocked the blow with its elbow.

“No, no, no!” The demon looked at me and shook his head.
“Now Bravo!” I sent the signal to him.

He started to run and went to grab his Ax. The tail went to attack him, with my right dagger busy
with the elbow I threw my left dagger pinning the tail on the ground and enabling Bravo to get
his Great Ax. And this time Charlie got up and came close to the group.

“Aren’t you ingenious.” The demon said to me. “This must be why the boss wants you.”
“So you’re a servant of Mammon.” I said with a grin on my face while dodging its moves.
“Me, serving Greed?” The demon laughed. “My master is better than that charlatan.”
“Then who is your boss?” I said as I tried to attack its arm.
“Do you think I’m a buffoon like Glasya-Labolas?” The creature blocked my blow with its elbow
again.

Knowing that it doesn’t serve Mammon it leaves me with one King of hell, Leviathan, the envy.
Later that fatidic day two months ago, Ann told me that from what she saw in my dream, the
other demons were Leviathan and Belphegor. Since Belphegor didn’t want in this plot created
by Mammon, the only one is Leviathan. What servant of Envy has a tail and is of Prince level,
who else but jealousy itself?

“All demons are fucking buffoon, Sitri!”

When I finish saying the demon’s name, the creature freezes, seeing a window of opportunity I
slash its throat with the only dagger left.

“The name of the demon is Sitri, now is the time to attack!” I yelled.

Alpha hit some body shots, Bravo slashes it creating a huge wound from its right shoulder to the
center of its chest, Charlie pierce its ribs with his spear. I go for the tail and cut through it,
getting my dagger back from the floor. And as I go for another attack, an astonishing force
pushes everyone that was close to it to the back wall. Suddenly the room fills with a thick mist
especially where the demon was, not allowing us to see it.

“What is this?” Alpha said in shock

“Domain.” I answer her while getting up from the floor.
“But. But it wasn’t supposed to open a domain.” Bravo said with his hands shaking.
“I told you all that it wasn’t a regular demon.” I got ready for what was coming.
“You said its name was Sitri, but…” Charlie started to realize.
“Sitri is a prince level demon.” Alpha finished what he was saying.

Suddenly I started to hear a considerably loud noise coming from Bravo’s suit, it was like an
alarm. And then I hear the same from Charlie. It meant that their Suit’s sync rate was lowering
more than the average, this meant that if it continues to go down the suit will stop functioning.

“Bravo, Charlie, get it together!” I tried to put sense into their heads.
“Commander!” Bravo fell to the floor. “Hel-”

In a second Bravo’s face was severed from the bottom of the nose up. The alarm noise from
Bravo’s suit stopped but Charlie's suit was now going crazy, meaning it was going to stop
working at any second, the weight made him fall to the floor like Bravo.

“Help!” Charlie yelled.

It was for milliseconds, but I could see the almost invisible attack of the demon coming at
Charlie’s direction. I tried to move, but it was faster than me, so as it gets close to his body
something appears in its way and deflects it.

“Squad leader, give me the status report now!” The commander was in front of Charlie with his
Chokuto sword unsheathed.
“I-I…” Alpha panicked.
“The demon in front of us is Sitri sir, it just opened its domain after we dealt fatal blows.”
“How can you be sure?”
“It has a leopard tail and serves Envy.”
“Nice job recruit.” He said. “Charlie you either get your shit together or get the fuck out of here.”
He said to a crying charlie.
“I don’t wanna die.” He said while crawling out of the room.
“Alpha and Delta, the demon is in the process of transforming to its true form, we don’t have a
lot of time.” He moved next to us. “I wish I could tell both of you to leave, but I cannot face this
alone, let’s make some time until help arrives.”
“Yes sir!” We yelled.
“Alpha you will stay behind and give us cover, Delta you come with me to the front, I saw what
you’re capable of.” As he finishes saying another invisible attack comes. “Look out, Alpha!”

He tries to run close to her but the attack is quicker, thankfully after the second attack I
enhanced my hearing and moved quickly to deflect it. Since I saw the commander doing it I
thought it was going to be easy, but it took more effort than I had imagined, the blow was so
strong that it left cracks on my daggers.

“Be careful Alpha, the attack is as quick as is stealth.” Now the suit from Alpha started to make
the alarm noise. “Be calm, breathe slowly and remember why you’re here.”
“Ok.” She started to breathe slowly.

Out of nowhere, the mist shrouding the demon lifted, revealing its true essence. Where the
injured, enchanting woman once stood, now emerged in its genuine form a colossal
anthropomorphic leopard with wings that could put any griffin to shame. This majestic beast now
stood before us, like it owned the place.

“I really didn’t want to do this.” The beautiful feminine voice was gone and a more deep and
hoarse voice took place. “After you discovered my name, you left me with no choice.”

The creature flapped its wings and hiding in the gust were wind blades sharp enough to cut
through a cranium. The attack was going into Alpha’s direction, knowing that if I deflected the
attack again my daggers could break, I ran and pushed Alpha out of the way and we fell to the
floor dodging the attack. As I get up I see the commander engaging in combat with the demon.

“C’mon.” I offer my hand for her to get up. “Quick, you need to give us cover.” She took my hand
and I helped her get up.
I ran to aid the commander in battle. He was slashing the beast at an impressive speed, but the
demon was accompanying his every move deflecting and blocking with its two hands. I circled
behind it and went for a backstab with my right hand dagger, but to my misfortune the damn tail
had regenerated and blocked my attack so with my left hand dagger I slashed a small part of
the leopard beast’s back.

“Argh.” The creature screamed in pain. “You Fiend! Master never said anything about bringing
you injured.”

The creature went to attack me with its wings and I moved back fast enough to dodge it, but I
was cornered to the back wall. The demon sees an opening and attacks me with its tail on my
right calf. I let out a scream of pain as the tail pierced through it and as it went out, the attack left
an enormous open wound on my leg.
I immediately fell to the floor and my calm disappeared, knowing that the next attack was
coming I tried to get up but my right leg gave up and I fell once more. Trying to seek solace
somewhere I look up to where Ann once was and even from afar all I can see in that glass
window is blood, someone attacked up there.
Knowing that reinforcements weren't going to arrive I tried to at least crawl from there, but as I
moved the tail came to attack me once again, but this time on my chest. I easily deflect it, but
the attacks don’t stop coming, so I see myself sitting on the floor giving my all to stay alive and
block all the quick attacks from the tail while the main body is busy with the commander.
The more the tail attacks me, the more I get tired and as a consequence my reflexes get slower,
thankfully when one of the attacks is about to hit me the tail goes flying as a bullet from Alpha’s
gun hits it. I saw that she had circled the beast and was a few meters away from me. Knowing
that there was not much that I could do in that situation I remember a scene from one of the first
days of training with Ann.
It was night I had just showered and I was extremely tired due to not being used to that routine.
Knowing that I had to train with her that night made my will completely disappear. Since I was in
the recruit barracks I had to walk quite a while until I got to the training center. We recruits didn't
sleep in the main building, to be honest we weren't allowed to get inside it without permission
from a superior. The training facility that we used was a few floors down in the underground, she
said it was so that nobody could hear us. The place we used to train was just like the exam
location, the difference was that it was way smaller and it didn’t have a window.
That night she was hard on me like always, not hesitating in cutting me or breaking a bone or
two, even though I could regenerate it didn’t mean that the pain didn’t go away. And I had
enough of it, this wasn’t training it was torture. She had just sliced through my achilles heel
making my left foot almost totally open and dangling by the few muscles and nerves that hadn’t
been cut.

“IT’S OVER!” I screamed partially in pain and partially angry while sitting on the floor. “I’m not
doing this bullshit anymore.”
“What do you mean?” She lighted a cig.
“This is torture, all the we’ve done is you attack me and I try to dodge it.” I said it frustratedly.
“You didn’t teach me how to control my powers, you’re not teaching me how to fight. All you do
is hurt me and wait for it to regenerate.”
“Well.” She let out the smoke gathered in her mouth. “I was going easy on you.”
“EASY?!” I let out a scream. “This is easy?” I point to my bleeding feet.
“Yep.” She takes a drag and lets the smoke out after a couple of seconds. “Son, you don't
wanna know how Hard I can go on you.” She moves next to me and crouches. “This is hard.”

She takes her dagger and slowly forces the blade through my leg, penetrating it and creating
more pain than if she did it quickly.

“Argh, what the fuck?” I Yell in pain.

“Regenerate.” She says it with a cold face.
“Stop!” She presses the knife further.
“Regenerate.” She continues to say it.

She continues to do it until the blade ends and the handle starts, then she does it again next to
it. She keeps doing it, even with me crying and screaming in pain telling her that I didn’t know
how to do it. But she didn’t care about it, all she had to say was “Regenerate.”. After a half hour
of this I try to attack her, but when I start to move my arm she slaps my face and says
“Regenerate.”. At this point I’m so tired that tears stopped falling from my eyes and I didn’t even
have any voice left to scream.

“Focus on this wound.” She says pointing to one of the wounds of my leg that she had just
done.
“What do you want from me?” I said it with the little amount of voice that my vocal chords still
had.
“Focus!” She slaps me hard on the face. “Focus on this wound, feel the pain and gather all the
anger you have against me on it.” I do as she says, but nothing happens. “Maybe I have to stab
you one more time for you to get it.”
“No! No! No! Please no!” I begged her.
“Then focus on the wound and regenerate it.” She says it with her cold voice.
“Okay!” I said while a few of the tears left fell from my eyes.

I do as she says and concentrate on the wound, in the surface level all I can feel from it is pain,
but if really focus on it, I can start to feel the flow of the blood veins interrupted by wound, I can
feel the individual cells being dilacerated as the air flows through it. I can feel all those little
things I hadn’t felt before in my life, it was like I was in control of my entire body.

“Regenerate.” She said it one last time.

And with all the focus I could gather, I forgot about the pain of the multiple wounds and focused
on how the body worked and I could feel the cells regenerating the specific area that she had
pointed out.
“That’s how you do it.” She dropped her tough person act. “In the beginning it will take some
time, but it’s just like a muscle, the more that you train it the better you will become.” She sat on
the floor. “I had three objectives with the type of training you were having. The first is to make
you used to pain, when you are a Bad Blood, pain is unnecessary it will only slow you down, the
more you get used to it, the better. The second one was to make you adjust to the speed of my
blows, this will be extremely necessary for fighting against Demons. The third one was to make
you regenerate unconsciously so that you would get used to it and it becomes like muscle
memory.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I said, disgruntled.
“Because if you became conscious of it, you were going to try harder and it could be detrimental
to your training.”
“But…” She started to cry.
“I’m sorry son.” She hugged me. “I promise that I will never do this to you again.” She starts
sobbing. “But you need to understand that the demons you will face from now on will not go
easy on you, they will use everything they have to make sure you get killed, or worse captured.”
“I understand.”

I sat there still, seeing something that I never had seen before, this affected her way more than I
had imagined. We kept sitting there for another ten minutes until she recomposed herself and
dismissed me.

“Go to the cafeteria and grab something to eat.” She said while standing on the exit door. “When
you regenerate your metabolism needs more fuel to keep working, so make sure to eat lots.
And use this.” She threw me her D.E.F. ID card. “If anybody says something, tell them that I
sent you.” She was wearing a more comforting face now. “Goodnight son.” She blew a kiss to
me.
“Goodnight.” I said goodbye to her.

I did as she told me and went to the same cafeteria that I went to on the fateful day, different
from before, no one was there other than the chefs. I used her card and ate a ton of spaghetti,
since I’m more hungry than I’ve ever been in my life. After that I took a shower at the recruit
barracks and on bed I tried to regenerate the other wounds, but ended up sleeping from
exhaustion. On the next day, all of my injuries were healed.

That warning that she gave me never left my head while fighting against Sitri, but since I had
grown a lot since then, I thought that I could take the Demon on my own without any help, my
hubris screwed me.

“Alpha!” I screamed. “How many bullets left on the mag?”

“Twenty seven!” She answered me.
“Change to single fire mode and give me cover, I need to heal my leg.” I said while sat down on
the floor with the impending threat of the Demon’s tail.
“Yes Sir!” She moved close to me.
“I will close my eyes and concentrate, don’t talk to me unless it is necessary, do you copy?”
“Yes sir.” She fired her gun against the tail deflecting the attack.
I close my eyes and start to concentrate on the wound, just I had trained every single day of all
these months that I spent here. Since the calf was almost all muscles it was easier to
reconstruct than if it were more nerves, but there was one thing that the tail cut through: The
tendon of plantaris, it is a tendon that goes from a part of the knees to the end of the leg and
beginning of the feet. Reconstructing a tendon is much more difficult than a muscle, so
something that would take me five minutes, now it was going to take fifteen.
After regenerating my calf muscles I open my eyes and see that Alpha is firing rounds against
the demon’s tail. I look at her and with military hand signs I say to her that I will try to move
away from the beast. I got up with my left leg and started to walk with my right, the pain was
insane, since the tendon wasn’t there to protect the muscles. But thanks to the time that I spent
with Ann I could take it on and walk out of the reach of the demon’s tail, behind where Alpha
stood. Through the trail of walking there I didn’t look behind me once, but I could see that she
had fired some bullets in the beast’s direction.

“How many rounds left?” I ask her once more.

“There are eight left sir.”
“Drop the sir, I have the same rank as you.” I said bluntly
“Okay si-” She was going to say it.
“How many mags left?”
“Other than this, I only have one more left.”
“I will buy you time to reload, then you will give me ten more minutes, if the Commander is in
danger forget about me.”
“Okay!” She complied.
“After the ten minutes, you will run to the locker room and search for more mags and anything
useful. I think I can buy you twenty minutes, more than that I can’t say for sure. Do you copy?”
“Yes sir.”

She used the rest of her eight bullets and I moved into the back of the Demon, so that I could
take the tail’s attention making it easier for the commander to fight. Reloading these guns are
complicated since they are made from a different method from normal guns, after reloading the
magazine into the weapon it takes some time for the weapon to recharge, to be more specific it
takes thirty seconds, and in a battle against a demon of this level thirty seconds can change
everything.
I move close to the tail and I start attacking it with my left foot in the front, making me put less
force on the right one, but that changes how I attack. Other than that there was another factor,
there were cracks on the blade, so I couldn’t put much strength on it, making me only deflect its
blows in a way that wouldn’t damage the daggers more. Because of that I couldn’t follow the
speed of the attacks and ended up giving me superficial cuts on my body, nothing that I had to
worry about, the only thing that mattered was getting Alpha to successfully reload her rifle.
It was impressive of how much effort we were putting into the tail of the demon considering that
the commander was facing the beast head to head. It made me thought that Prince level
demons are really impressive and must not be underestimated, but even though, something
inside me kept thinking that something was strange in all of this, but maybe the commander is
strong enough.
“Back on target!”

Alpha says and I start to look for an opening, but the blows are really quick and even with her
help it would be difficult for me to get out of that situation, so I decided to bait an attack on my
feet. I start to deflect its attacks and look for a specific blow that would corner me to the wall.
Since I know that the demon is not targeting my life I know that it won’t give me a killing blow.
And so it comes a strong attack coming from above, I use both of my daggers in an “X” to
deflect the attack downwards and I move back as a consequence of it, when the tail sense that
I’m cornered it goes for my left leg, but before it reaches me, I jump high to the wall behind me
and use it as a platform to jump again over the demon and using the opportunity to slash it in its
eyes.