“Your sword?” It was slithering around nearby through a pile of rubble hidden from prying eyes.

“Check.” I gave Hannah the thumbs up while the twins balanced on a nearby rooftop, sending old roof tiles everywhere.

“Boots?” Why … Hannah was seriously checking everything before we entered that castle, wasn’t she?

“Two pairs.” We were prepared. We had the staff of creation, someone who could use it, we had my weapon which was capable of forcing him back to Elysium for a bit of time … now all that was left to do was …

‘I … I don’t want to see him again.’ While Lucy was quite sure about her opinion of Aska, I wasn’t. I was still loving him, that was for sure, but my hatred for him ran deeper then ever before. ‘I … I fear what he will do …’

‘If everything goes as planned he won’t know you are there.’ Her soul was safely contained within mine. We both gave our best that none of her life spilt out and ruined the show for us, but even then we couldn’t be sure Aska wouldn’t notice.

‘What if … what if he can sense me? What if he already knows?’ Still, it did get on my nerves that she was worrying so much about this possibility, maybe because she didn’t have a plan for that eventuality.

‘Then we are fucked.’ I told her bluntly. Nothing good would come out of her discovery. Nothing.

‘I don’t … I don’t want to be his toy again.’ And neither did I. If anything, this was the sole reason we were working together, why we were discarding our own existence … just so that we could escape Aska’s clutches and live in freedom.

‘Look. We are going to be fine, they I will play with you for a hundred or so years and then we are done for anyways.’ I told her whole looking beside the door we were approaching.

‘… what do you mean by I’ll play with y-‘

“Isn’t that a nice flower?” I asked loudly while pointing towards the poisonous black flower near the entrance of the castle. “It’s called Souls Despair.” Right away, the twins approached them at least until I grabbed them by their collar and yanked them backwards. “I don’t want you to turn into drooling vegetables, so do you mind not touching these?”

“Even though you drooled more than we did?” Clara asked kind of betting on any kind of reaction as I opened the doors to the dark castle.

“… stop this.” I didn’t want to think back to the time her comment originated from. I wasn’t feeling drawn towards them in any way, in fact the opposite was the case. Just thinking about the night I spent with them and their dad let my fingernails curl up.

“Sorry.” At least Clarice was somewhat apologetic and followed quietly while we strode into the entrance hall.

“Jo.” And there he was. The enemy. The person who had tortured both of his children without end. The god of death. Leaning on a railing, standing far above us.

“Jo.” I replied without showing any emotions at all.

“I see you have brought a rather special weapon with you?” He nodded towards the snake slithering inside the room without a hint of fear.

“Oh, you know Schwarz went too crazy with it so I took it away from him.” I explained and let the snake coil up my right leg until it wrapped around my arm and hissed at him. Naturally, the weapon was under absolute control from me, so whatever it did was my doing as well.

“Humans were never meant to get in touch with the divine.” Well, that could explain why Schwarz got crazy with this thing around.

“Yeah … I do have to worry he lost one or two brain cells in the process.” I had doubts he would return back to normal after my little experiment, but that didn’t really matter to me at this point.

“I see … and you? How are you faring?” Aska jumped down and landed right in front of me, startling my companions behind me while I looked at my nails.

“That pregnancy sure is taxing on the body … but I’m happy to hold Luna in my arms again sooner than later.” I told him with a beaming smile on my face, not letting any information about the real state of my soul escape. So far, it didn’t look as if he noticed Lucy’s awakening nor that anything else was going on. But I also knew how I could get him. By presenting him what he wanted – my ailing – he saw that he just needed to wait to succeed.

“Although I hate to admit it, it is nice to be proven wrong in that regard. Soon, our family will be complete.” Aska told me while caressing my cheek a little.

‘… I really hate him.’ Lucy was disgusted from his touch, that much was obvious. For the first time, I could actually feel her emotions

“She’ll be my daughter primarily. Don’t even think about being mean to her …” I pushed him away from me a bit while he smiled apologetic.

“Fine, fine. Anyways, how was your trip?” He asked with barely any interest in his voice.

“Great. I’m empress now.” I stated plainly.

“Cool … cool. Where is the demon king?” At that point I knew he wouldn’t settle with letting the matter slide, mostly because he was already glancing towards the twins from time to time.

“Is that a philosophical question? Do you want me to say that he is everywhere? I’m keeping him close to my heart? His memory will always live on?” I asked jokingly.

“He was mine. And you killed him.” Well technically it wasn’t my fault …

“Poor boy could have seen that coming.” I was rather blunt with that, without even trying to hide my involvement because it was obvious I had something to do with the demon kings untimely departure.

“… come with me. And the rest of you … do whatever, but don’t get the carpet dirty.” Without further ado, he grabbed my hand and pulled me through the corridors until we were in front of a rather heavy door which slid to the side without making any noises whatsoever. Inside the room were countless consoles with buttons blinking in different colours and … a television … showing Sofie sleeping soundly near her friends.

‘… it’s live.’ Lucy was stunned by what she saw while I already shrugged it off and faced Aska. It sucked that he knew of my plans to get rid of him, but he didn’t know all and that was more important than anything else.

“Why am I here?” I asked reluctantly. It wouldn’t make any sense to show me this room except to rub it under my nose that he knew what I was up to.

“I know what you did.” Yup … there it was.

“Oh shit … so you did find out I was the one making sure you never find a pair of fitting socks?” I held my hands in front of my mouth feigning to be utterly shocked.

“That was … no, I wasn’t talking about that. Why did you tell this girl how she could get the goddess of life onto this planet?” Well, the answer for that was rather obvious, wasn’t it?

“She claimed that she wanted to help me in the past.” I told him while going to one of the consoles.

“That was your reasoning? She is the enemy!” He told me, not exactly hysterical, but … he didn’t like that development, that was for sure. And maybe, just maybe he didn’t anticipate my move either, probably because he didn’t know what Irminsul and I had talked about so far. And honestly? That made it even better.

“Okay, first of all I do know myself. So I am aware you might not be entirely honest with me. And let’s be honest here, we both know her. She just wants the best for everyone including you and me. So I believe it is her intention to help us get rid of this surveillance, don’t you agree?” I asked innocently. Truth to be told, I perceived Irminsul as a rather simple goddess with her offspring in my head following suit. I thus didn’t believe Irminsul was okay with us being watched … although she caused Sofie to be here as well.

“… you don’t trust me at all, do you?” Aska asked while I nodded happily, pushing all the buttons I could find.

‘You went too far.’ Lucy commented.

“I could say the same about you, Aska. Why does it bother you so much I have paved the way for a friend to visit me?” I asked innocently.

“… Irminsul and I were rather close in the past.” He started to explain, but paused a little bit.

‘He is starting with the truth, but he is going to twist it so badly.’ Lucy chimed in right away.

‘I know how this works, thanks.’ I told her right away. Starting with the truth to let it slide into a lie was a rather common way to twist reality after all.

“We tried to become parents together but it didn’t work out … in the end, I was forced to use more and more extreme measures for her to get pregnant … but that only drove her away from me. Lucinda, she was against your creation from the start. She is not your friend.” Well, at least I understood that Irminsul had something against creating soul shards.

“… she may or may not be my friend. But she is the only option I have if you don’t hold your word. I don’t regret what I did … not a single second.” Sadly, my cheeky attitude made him a little angry which wasn’t working out in my favour at all.

While I was still pressing random buttons on the consoles, he walked up from behind me and grabbed my throat with one hand, only to squeeze it a little.

‘Is that your plan?’ Lucy was stirring within me, fearful of what was to come.

‘Chill. When he is angry he doesn’t think as much.’ I explained while my body was pulled backwards and I was flung through the whole room. His strength was nothing to scoff at, that was for sure as I crashed into consoles and broke several ribs along the way.

Shaking a little bit, I spewed up blood thanks to my punctured lunge and stood up giggling.

He just stood there, a bit angry at me and balled his hands into fists.

“What? Are you angry that I’m not exactly trusting you after all you did?” I asked nicely while looking at the mess behind me. Broken parts laid everywhere and my blood didn’t make the scene any better.

“We are on the same side, Lucinda. So please stop scheming against me and get back to your senses.” Ehh? Since when were we not scheming against each other?

“I’m not scheming against anyone.” I told him while tilting my head to the side a little. He must have been working really hard on getting me replaced by Lucy and didn’t want me – the original owner of this body – to fiddle around with his plans. As such, I found his attempts to place me into a passive role rather interesting.

“Really? Then please tell me, why did you push your vampire twins away for you if not because you fear retaliation?” Well … exactly because of that? I was damn sure we were still going with a tit for tat response in regards to damaging our toys …

“Because I got bored of them? It just didn’t work out between us, that’s all.” I explained, hoping he would leave them be. I doubted he would touch Hannah at this point, so the twins were the only one affected by his rage.

 “So you don’t see them as your kids? Not even remotely?” He asked with a slight smile on his face which made me think about it a second.

“That’s right.” I told him while he strolled towards me.

“We will see.” He reached around my head and pulled me into a deep aggressive kiss. And at that point, I already knew where this was going … and I cannot say I nor Lucy liked the direction.