Chapter 11 - Scam

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In the Vallethan Palace, Malta, there stood Reina, under a collapsed glass ceiling, in the center of devastation, her feet standing upon a now cracked marble floor, surrounded by pools of gore and the mangled remains of armor.

Reina looked up into the night sky, admiring the perfectly straight cut through the otherwise overcast clouds as the light of the full moon shone brightly into the now open-plan hall, shards of glass littered on the floor reflecting its pure white light.

The dull silenced thud of what seemed to be the last standing artisanal column could be faintly heard as the telltale squelch of human remains followed.


Assuming there even were survivors, if they ignored the now discolored soaked clothing, and the freshly spilt blood trickling down her hands, they’d see a gorgeous girl standing completely still, the odd tattoo on her face now stained with a distinct dark red.

Piles of dead bodies litter the floor, the room completely silent if not for the dripping of a particular red viscous liquid on the white marble floor.

 

She breathed in, taking up her first amounts of fresh air, not rushing it as she wanted to savour every moment.

It was not far from an exaggeration, and in fact would be a vast understatement, to say that it has been a very long time since she breathed in her first gasp of fresh, undiluted, and clean air.

Or, at least it would be clean and undiluted, if it weren’t for the iron in the air from all the blood she spilled and the dust from all the debris she caused.

Feeling herself about to sneeze, she waved her hand around to get rid of the creeping dust cloud, ridding her breathing palette of unwanted components, then picking up a random arm she found just lying on the ground.

‘I … lost my cool for a bit there …’ She shook her head at the thought, withdrawing her Aether back inside her body as she looked at her surroundings, grabbing bites of the arm that she was holding into.

 

Of course, the fact that the stone roof was basically torn into nothingness aside, there were still other, finer and minor details.

Such as the fact that the walls collapsed too, and it looked even like that the entire section of the palace she was in collapsed as well.

‘I used more Aether than I expected …’ Reina looked upon her … or Rei’s hands technically.

She couldn’t help but see that it was unexpectedly a body much like her own, aside from a few minor details as she looked upon a reflective pool of blood.

‘Damn a tattoo on the face is a bit peculiar however, was she an idiot or something …?’ Reina thought, somewhat criticizing what she thought was a major part of her host’s body.

“No …” Reina rejected the thought.

‘This is my body now, I ought to learn to start getting used to this …’

Her ears twitched, as she had picked up on something just near her.

‘Breathing ...?’ She thought, closely picking up on the details on what kind of sound it was.

‘It’s faint, but still present …’ Reina walked for a fair bit, coming closer to the source of the faint breathing, finding a slowly-expanding puddle of blood, with Sebastian as the source next to some rubble.


‘He’s still alive …?’ Reina questioned, even herself, obviously surprised at the sight.


Sure his arm was blown off, one of the sides of his body completely screwed over, making him a mere former shadow of what he used to be just a few minutes earlier, but he was still alive nonetheless.


“How unsightly …” Reina said, raising her hand for a sure-kill strike that would put him out of his misery.


She didn’t like beating half-dead dogs, nor did she like looking at them for more than she actually needed to ….

‘Besides …’ And judging from the smell that her nose picked up from the first time when she sniffed the weird  worm for the first time, it was highly likely that Sebastian had as well …


‘So I ought to make sure, lest I suffer the same mistakes that led to my downfall …’ She thought, thinking about some of the people that led to her death, or more specifically, the heroes.


People who kept going back up even after being fatally wounded, again and again just barely escaping her grasp even as she wins every battle, growing stronger with every defeat, and every comrade lost to her carnage …


‘They were sons of bitches among sons of bitches …’ She thought, a clear spark of annoyance seen on the expression on her face, as she thought ‘goodbye’, looking at Sebastian for once last time …


[Cease.]

However, all of a sudden, Reina’s ears perk up, as if she heard something faint, but too faint for her to hear even with her vastly enhanced senses.

She looked behind her to see if there was anyone sneaking up on her, to which she found nothing at all …


Smelling the air, feeling the vibrations in the ground, listening for even a heartbeat …


…


‘Nothing …’ She didn’t notice a thing.

‘It must have been my imagination …’ She arrives at the conclusion, before looking back towards Sebastian’s dying form, still breathing.

“The dust in this place is getting to me, how unsightly …” She laughed for a bit as she was experiencing what seemed to be delusions now.

‘How the mighty have fallen …’ She raises her hand, readying for a blow that would deliver an efficient, and fast mercy-killing out of her generosity, but then stopped short when she heard something yet again …

This time, more concrete, the sound of a droplet of liquid making contact with the ground was heard beneath her …

“Blood …?” She looked down to see a drop of blood on the floor, just beneath her body.

She rubbed a hand underneath her nose, and sure enough, it was her own blood, dripping down from her nose …

And it wasn’t even just the nose, as she noticed her eyesight getting a bit … redder.


‘Poison …? No, that couldn’t be the case …’ Reina thought back, during her fight with Sebastian’s goons …


All of their weapons just so happened to be coated in either sure-kill or sure-weakening concoctions, as she had notices the impurities trying to flow among the Aether in her body, however such substances considered toxic would barely be a problem to demons of Gluttony, much less to the Demon Lord of Gluttony herself, a being whose blood was expected to just instantly dissolve any impurity within her body …


‘Right, it’s not that …, this is probably just the effects of having used too much Aether …’ Reina gathered her rationality and came to the most valid conclusion she could think of.

It was a reasonable deduction, considering that she hadn’t really eaten much, and had just only gotten her physical form, even Reina herself didn’t know the complete extent of what she was capable of, and what her defined limits were at the moment …


‘That’s right, breathe …’ Reina calmed herself down, collecting her thoughts, breathing in deeply to help with all of this and to stabilize herself.

Or, at least she tried to, but there was an issue …

‘!?’ She couldn’t breathe at all, it was as if her lungs were refusing to move, and what was supposed to be her new body just refusing to listen to her will in general.


‘This is–!?’

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“Mmmpghh ...” Rei slowly sat upright, rubbing her head and then neck, feeling a bit sore in those areas. But it was nothing major. Absurd. Just moments ago, she had been fatally battered in a battle against what might as well be an entire army, and stabbed straight through her brain.

The floor she was currently sitting on had a woodlike roughness to it, a stark contrast to the grainy, rubbled stone floor of the room she used to be in.

Not only did her relatively minor wounds heal, the hole left behind by the man’s sword piercing into her brain disappeared without a sign it even existed in the first place.


Rei opened her eyes to see a man draped in magelike attire, sitting upon a velvet couch, patched crudely together using mismatched colors of fabric on the other side of the room.

In fact, the entire room somehow felt chaotic, something that only left Rei in even greater confusion.

 

“Hey, you.” A soothing, but somewhat … anarchic-feeling male voice suddenly called out to Rei.

“You’re finally awake!” Yuitherceus continued, closing the book he was reading and stood straight up, leaving the comfort of his chair.

“You were trying to beat that guy right? You walked right into his trap!” He then went on to have a hearty laugh on his own, much to Rei’s annoyance of having her suspected-fatal defeat being rubbed just straight in her face …

‘Fatal defeat …?’ Rei thinks for a bit, before her mind refreshed by itself, making her remember the utter humiliation of having being killed so slyly, outclassed in every way.

‘That’s right … that did happen …’ Reina shook her head, before finally talking to the person she thought strange.

“Am I ... dead?” She asked simply, not really bothering to have tact despite the current situation’s complexity.

“Oh heaven’s no!” Yuitherceus said, making Rei nod in understanding.

“Then … where am I?” Rei asked once more, not really being able to hold herself back with such curiosity and confusion just fueling her thought process.

“Well …” Yuitherceus removes his glasses, then magicks a cloth out of what seemed to be nothing in order to clean them, then putting them back on.


‘Is that … magic …?’ Rei thought, her mind drifting off to think of other practical applications for such a type of magic, before her mind was taken back to ‘reality’ with Yuitherceus speaking yet again.

“We’re in your head, and before you ask, the name’s Yuitherceus.” He said, taking Rei’s hand and shaking it briefly.

“Wh–” Rei was about to ask another question, but then was cut off by Yuitherceus clapping his hands together to silence her.

“You, are almost dead, but not quite.” Yuitherceus emphasized the word ‘almost’ making Rei nod in understanding.

“What you saw back then in that little teeny-tiny flashback was a great figure back then, who I have decided to bring back to the present times.”

“But why–”

“As for what reason? That doesn’t matter, what does matter, is you! My good friend.” Yuitherceus said enthusiastically, pointing towards Rei.

Rei didn’t really bother asking questions until she was sure that the bastard wouldn’t cut her off again, and sure enough Yuitherceus still had plans as he brought up his next words after seemingly waiting for Rei to speak just to get on her nerves.

“Right, so let me get straight to the point.” He said, not really bothering to entertain what was basically a dead mortal’s curiosity.

“I like you, be my servant.” He said boldly, in a commanding tone which nothing short of infuriated Rei deep inside her psyche.

‘This bastard …’ Rei was about to get up and try to wring the life out of the figure in front of her, but eventually decided against it as she calmed herself down, prioritizing rationality.

“What …?” She asked instead, not being really able to help but to ask for clarification anyways.

Seeing Rei had come along with his ‘smooth’ topic change, he gave a smirk, thinking that it would be easy to convert such a person.


‘Though …’ Yuitherceus wanted a fun conversation, not really letting such a chance pass.

This was the girl that managed to withstand Reina’s attempts at mind control up until her brain was stabbed through by a sword, it’d just be rushing it if he, the asshole that he was, didn’t try to play mind games on her first, testing just how much he could actually mess with her.

“It means what it means.” The God of Chaos said, not really bothering to elaborate more.

…

‘Is he retarded …?’ Rei thought, thinking about it as she looked upon what was supposed to be a divine deity.

Though, she really didn’t know that, however she did have suspicions of other things …

She rubbed her chin, thinking about it really hard, about the situation she was in, and about how she would go about approaching it.

“Sure, why not.” Rei surprisingly said so, seemingly not thinking about it all too much.

…

Silence followed straight after, which made even the God of Chaos confused.

“Wait, really?” Yuitherceus asked, wondering if he heard correctly.

“Yes, that is correct.” She confirmed.

‘Is she retarded …?’ He thought upon hearing her answer.

“Well then, uhh … just sign here I guess …?” He awkwardly said, magicking a contract paper and pen out of nowhere, floating just over his hand.

“I scammed you with that cheeky system notice you saw earlier, but out of respect for a second contract with you, I’ve decided to let you see for yourself the terms and conditions that you would fully be subject to …” He made the paper and pen levitate towards Rei’s direction, to which she replied …

“But before that, I have a request …” She cut in, waving the pen and contract paper away, not even bothering to look at them, staring into Yuitherceus’ eyes.

‘This brat … she’s a bit brave isn’t she …?’ Yuitherceus thought, at least relieved to see that the girl he had taken an interest in at least wasn’t completely retarded.


“Very well, what might that be?” Yuitherceus put aside the floating pen and paper for now, instead tending to what Rei’s request could have possibly been.

‘Money? Power? Or maybe something like food?’ Yuitherceus thought.

“I can grant you anything you wish if you sign the contract, but for now I’ll entertain you with a sliver of what is to come upon hearing your request, so name your desires mortal.” He said, looking at Rei with expectant eyes.


“I want to take a look at my body one last time, and when I do, I’ll sign it.”


Yuitherceus couldn’t even laugh at this, instead making a look that went like ‘are you for real?’, to which Rei replied with her own look of resolution, basically a solid reply that said ‘yes, I’m for real.’.

Seeing such stubbornness, Yuitherceus could only facepalm as if he was tired, and snapped his fingers, revealing another scene.

It was the ruins of the battlefield that took place with Reina possessing Rei’s body against Sebastian and his goons …

Reina was there, deformed bodies and a wrecked perimeter packed the surroundings, though for some reason it seemed weird, it was as if …

‘She can’t see us …’ Rei thought, quickly coming to the realization, making her click her tongue internally.

“Currently, I’m only a projection of myself hidden away perfectly enough just for Reina not to sense me as she’s busy with your consciousness, and as for now, you’re merely a projection as well, hence you need not worry about any reaction.” He said, reassuring Rei.

“Right …”

Rei then thinks for a bit, as she looked at Reina, looking like she was imprinting on her mind just what a Demon Lord was capable of.

However, despite how hard she tried to hide her emotions, and to look stoic, the feelings of such strong disgust and killing intent could not get past Yuitherceus’ sharp senses.

‘Yikes, maybe it was the wrong decision to bring her here?’

“So, we should get going then?” Yuitherceus suggested, but was only met with silence as he kept staring at Rei’s unresponsive, thinking figure.

“This looks manageable.” Rei said to herself softly, just before going towards Reina’s direction, and looking close upon it, then putting a hand on it, as if trying to check something out.

Anger was slowly boiling up inside of Rei, and as the moments passed while she looked straight at Reina’s … or rather, her own face, it became more apparent.

‘Now she’s gonna be even more attached … how annoying …’ Yuitherceus thought, just seeing Rei glare daggers at Reina at that moment.

“Look, just move on, there’s n–”

“I see, so its like that …” Rei said, as if she came to a conclusion, a bit of insanity present on her face as she delved into a twisted grin that even the God of Chaos felt a little bit of uneasiness from.

“Tsk …” Yuitherceus slowly felt his patience blowing over seeing this unresponsiveness, and once again spoke.

“Alright, I’ve entertained your little request, now we shall go and you will submit to my will–”

“No, I’ll stay here.” Rei cut him off, looking at Yuitherceus as if he was a fool.

‘What the hell are you talking about …?’ Her face seemed to be saying, straight up making a fool out of a deity.

Seeing this, he sighed and proceeded to say his words …


“Hey, you still don’t get it do you!? There’s no way you’re gonna be able to wring control of your body back from a–”

“Cease.” Rei said quietly as she whispered into Reina’s ear.

And then suddenly …

Reina, the all-powerful figure dropped to her knees, looking as if she couldn’t breathe, blood uncontrollably leaking from her eyes and nose.

‘What in God’s nam–’ Yuitherceus didn’t even have a chance to speak, his mouth open agape in surprise, confusion, denial, as well as a large number of different other emotions at the same time.

“Yuitherceus … was it?” Rei started talking to the God of Chaos.

For the first time in a while, he had felt uneasiness, a will overwhelming.

“Thank you for everything you’ve done up until now.” She said, directing her twisted smile at him.

“Oh, and I’ll be sure to murder every single one of your believers.” Rei said, offering up the most fake smile she had ever produced in a while now, much to the annoyance of Yuitherceus.

“What the hell did you do–!?”

But then stopped when he suddenly saw that he was back in the previous place where he waited earlier …

With Rei nowhere in sight …

“... did she just scam me?”

The realization slowly dawned on him ...

'That fucking bitch--!?' Yuitherceus couldn't help but bare-handedly wrecking everything in the room.