"Sociopathy, emotional numbness, dead face. Damn, you got everything for a loner girl! Hehe, this is quite amazing!!"

"Amazing?"

"Yes! It's impossible to change your personality so two-thirds of my job is lifted! Wow!"

Currently, they are in a room with only a single table. Charlotte was facing Silla directly, at least the pervert did not hold her. But...

"Why is there a..."

"A pentagram? Well, just extra protection and may or may not seal this room to prevent your escape.", Silla shrugged, glancing around the room of her own machination.

"I..."

Charlotte could not deny that, she really wanted to get away from Silla as far as possible. That is now impossible. As well as knocking the pervert out after she displayed her power. She was feeling a new emotion, annoyance.

Having no voice in the matter, Charlotte simply accepted her fate, much to her disapproval.

"Now, for our first lesson... like I said, I will be picking your brain out."

Charlotte held her hat firmly, not letting Silla do weird things to her. In response, Silla just burst out laughing.

"Hahahaha! Not literally! My, this is gonna be hard! I would need to teach you some idioms, but let's leave that for the next lesson."

"Now, we will start with simple questions. What's your name?"

"Charlotte Silvi."

"Good. How old are you?"

Charlotte did the math, the reports said she was born in 2005 and this year is 2020. That means...

"Fifteen"

"Hm, another short answer. So, what do you think about your breakfast this morning?"

"Good"

"Aw! Thank you! I was the one who cooked it for you!!"

Her heart stopped beating, her stomach churned wanting to vomit everything out. Charlotte resisted the rising feeling in her stomach. It was... made by her...

Silla frowned, "You know I can still read your emotions right? I know you are disgusted with me, everyone is, but you can't just disrespect my food that easily."

"S-Sorry...", Charlotte looked down, not wanting to face Silla.

"Hm, I guess I left a bad impression on you. Fine by me, but keep this in your mind. Always thank the person who made you your meal, no matter who they are."

"Yes... I will try to remember."

"No, there should be no 'try', you will remember it.", Silla said in a stern voice for a brief moment.

Charlotte nodded. She cannot go against Silla anyway. However, she thinks her meals will be less tasteful than before after knowing the chef.

"Well, a step is still a step! Now about how to interact with humans... heh, being here is not way enough for your growth, since everyone knows you are quite a dangerous kid. What you need is proper schooling, and you will get that in about six months. With changing you out of the window, I guess I can teach you how to cook!"

"Really?"

"Really! No suspicious motives, none at all! Cooking is the best way for you to express your emotions, even if you cannot say it with your face."

"What do you want in return?"

"Well~ I want a bit of your thing, the stuff you wanted to use to make life harder for the people at Project Darwin."

Reverie...

"You said you have no ulterior motives", Charlotte gave Silla a glare.

But the woman brushed it off, "Yes, I don't have any! Just a trade offer, besides, I can't control others' powers anyway.", she shrugged.

"Okay... Reverie."

A ball of black goo appeared on Charlotte's hands, she could feel it was weaker than normal. Must be the power of Lucifer.

Silla looked at Charlotte's hands curiously, she smirked. Then, her hand was placed on the Reverie. In return, the substance latched onto her hand and started to seep into it.

"Yes, yes. Just as I expected, it's like an invisible tumor."

Tumor? What is that?

Noticing the questioning look from Charlotte, Silla answered, "A tumor is an abnormal growth of certain tissues in the body, it's harmful and quite deadly if not treated. Your power is a type of virus that grows the gaps in the body, fueling its growth by taking on damages, and at a certain point, it takes over the tissues, causing massive bodily dysfunction. From the looks of it, it will still grow even if you get far away or even perish. Heh, this reminded me of Pandora's Box."

"Pandora's Box?"

"It's a Devil, the Gem Holder submitted his possession of it to the U.S. government. But he died in the 9/11 terrorist attack just right after his Gem awakened. The result was what's called Pandora's Sins, a catastrophic event that led to the destruction of New York State, Pennslyvania, the North East States, and a part of Canada. Unlikely as it may seem, your death might cause the same outbreak, and some researchers think the scale may overshadow Pandora's Sins, likely to consume Europe. But I find it bullshit, look just how cute you are! No one would think you are the collective knowledge of the entire human race!!"

Silla tried to hug Charlotte, but luckily with the help of the desk and the angle, the girl was able to push back the perverted researcher. 

"Personal. Space.", Charlotte sternly spoke, holding onto the woman's face as she pushed her back.

"Ow! Ow! Ow! Stop that, it hurts!!", Silla retreated back into her seat, pouting in annoyance.

Charlotte let go, still keeping her guard up against Silla. Silla just laughed.

"Seriously, you could crush my beautiful face! I'm not someone like Athen who could resurrect herself to perfect condition!"

The ability to resurrect herself... sounds amazing... but painful too...

"Athen... how can she get used to pain?", Charlotte asked, genuinely she wanted to know how her assistant could bear death, the highest form of pain to Charlotte's knowledge. Having her arm cut already brought her indescribable agony, so how can a person find death good? 

Silla's air changed again, but this time it was neither chilling nor oppressive, no hostility but enough to make Charlotte keep her guard up.

"Being in her line of work, a mercenary, she was subjected to many horrible experiences. All thrust upon her. Well, just like you she was a survivor of the Greco Civil War. She fought in the war and later joined the underworld of killers for hire, and became a mercenary for about 15 years now, mind you she's 26 this year. I don't know how many times she died and came back, but I do know she has yet to submit herself to her Devil."

"Submit to her Devil?", Charlotte's curiosity rose up.

"Why yes, being a Gem Holder isn't a cool gift or anything, if you get along well with your Devil everything is fine and dandy, but there are cases where the Devil took over the body of the Gem Holder, effectively reincarnating themselves onto this world. As I mentioned, most or all gods were killed by Remus. Some of them still have unfinished work here on Earth, some of them have hatred for humanity, and some even want to destroy the world. Though, I doubt that prince would do anything to take control of his owner."

"Prince?"

"Ah yeah, ■■■■, the prince of ■■■■. Pretty cool guy according to Luci"

What?

Charlotte could not hear the name. She suspects it might be because of the Oath of Styx. That certainly explained the tightness she briefly felt around her neck. However, when Charlotte stoked her neck, there was nothing there.

"Now, let's move on to the next subject! From what I collected, you need to change your speech pattern. In short, you are too blunt."

"Blunt?", Charlotte tilted her head.

"Yes! The way you speak is very rude, it could lead to many misunderstandings if you keep it this way. When you speak add predicate."

"Predicate?"

"Yes. For example, when someone asks your name, instead of speaking it out bluntly you should add 'My name is' before speaking your name.", Silla giggled, "Now, let us do this once again. What is your name?"

"Char— My name is Charlotte Silvi."

Silla happily clapped her hands together, beaming an unnaturally bright smile that showed her pointy teeth, "Great! Now how old are you?"

"I am... fifteen now."

"Excellent! Keep up the good work, little one! Now introduce yourself fully!"

"Intro...duce me?"

"Yeah! Tell me about yourself! You will eventually have to do it!"

"How... do I do that?"

Silla pursed her lips, thinking for a bit, "Usually, people say what their dream is or what they want to do."

Dream... what is my dream?

Charlotte thought about it. What does she want to do? Right now, she has nothing to wish for, nothing she desires without being already obtained. Her power will eventually return to her when she gets to go out of her safe haven, this place.

"I have no dream.", she simply answered.

Silla took a moment to stare at Charlotte, her cold gaze came in, accompanied by a hint of fury, "Then I will give you one.", she stood up, undoing her demonic seals in the room while at it.

Charlotte follows suit. The researcher led the girl out of the room.

 

=0=0=0=

 

The pair walked down the corridor, unlike the hallway where they entered from this place is more... creepy. Gradually, Charlotte spotted many symbols etched into the walls, all glowing different colors.

They are quite cool, in Charlotte's opinion, but she cannot help but feel ominous about them.

"Where are we going?", the girl asked.

"To where the failed subjects of Project Belial are, in other words, those who were consumed by their Devils.", Silla coldly answered.

Those that were consumed by their Devil...

"The reason is they were too... greedy, yes, greedy, Lucifer told me all of them have Greed as their greatest Sin. Man, Greed smells amazing but the more you smell it the more you are fed up with it, it makes me kinda sick. Well, since your greatest Sin is Pride the results might change."

"...What happened to them... after they were consumed?"

Silla hesitated to speak for a second, she looked up and let out a low hum, "Hm~ we cryogenically froze them, since the host is gone we technically froze the Devils. Oh, but there was one Devil who was literal ice, Boreas, God of the North Wind, so I had to put him down for good. Ah, another similarity between the previous subjects is that their Devils are all Mythical Devils, deities of the past."

"So how many are there?"

"Six in cryogen, one was put down for good.", her face darkened a bit.

So I am the eighth

They reached an intersection, and Silla led Charlotte to the left corridor. There everything changed completely, especially the air. When Charlotte breathes, she can see white puffs coming out of her nose. It was really cold in here.

Meanwhile, Silla was fine, the cold did not bother her in any way.

The more they went down the corridor, the more symbols Charlotte saw. At some point, there were more symbols than walls, some overlapping others.

It took them ten minutes to reach the end. Charlotte saw something amazing, she remembered what Athen spoke about this place, its technology was centuries ahead of the current era. There she saw six massive pods, coffins-like structures with six people in them, motionless. Four men and three women, each have their own deformities signifying the overtaking of their Devil. 

Silla went up to the pods, her crimson red eyes bearing another emotion Charlotte was not aware of. Sympathy. 

The woman began to name each of them.

"Loki, the Norse God of Trickery. His host was Alan Frejjberr"

"Surtr, the Norse Primordial Fire. His host was Kiara Vermillion"

"Izanami, the Japanese Corpse Goddess of Creation. Her host was Fujiwara Seigen."

"Marduk, the Mesopotamian God of War. His host was Haisan bin Ali."

"Quetzalcoatl, the Aztec God of Wind. His host was Jenifer Alabas."

"And Nut, the Egyptian Goddess of the Sky. Her host was Samir Azrea."

Silla stayed quiet for a bit. She looked at Charlotte every now and then.

With a cold tone, matching the air of this place, Silla looked away from Charlotte and spoke, "Charlotte Silvi, Gem Holder of the Akashic Records, the Records of Human. Your first dream is that you hope you will not become like them."