Chapter 2: The Demon of Urs Aletri
'Fucking red…'
Atherios woke up to an unfamiliar face staring down at him from above. He soon noticed that he was lying on the ground, but it felt strangely soft. Some kind of cushion, maybe. After days of hiding and running, it had been too long since he had a proper place to sleep.
The face was eerily pale, like that of a dead person. Its red eyes seemed endless, like they were capable of devouring the entire world. It was impossible to say if it was a man or a woman.
'Beautiful.'
"A demon, huh."
Atherios' voice was weak and devoid of any resolution, and he was too tired to stand up and greet the person staring back at him.
The demon smiled.
"Correcto! And you must be that annoying little prince of Alystae!"
The boy frowned as the demon slowly retreated, sitting by his side. He was tired, yes, but annoying? Hell no! No one dared call him that!
… Actually, most people did.
'Maybe I really am annoying… Wait, no! I'm here for another reason!'
Atherios cleared his throat, then slowly stood up. Every muscle of his body was screaming in pain.
"An army should be coming in a few da-"
"No one is coming."
The demon cut through Atherios' words, seemingly oblivious of the dark face it got in response.
He did not like it in the slightest, but he also couldn't bring himself to say anything in response. Atherios' face was full of doubt.
"You are already dead to the world, Prince. The church lost your Flare."
The demon was speaking in absolute serenity, but its words hit Atherios harder than a boulder. The "Flare" it mentioned was the Holy Sign left by the Akhavella on Atherios' body since his birth, the key to letting his body accommodate the divine soul of a god. It was the very reason he was chosen as the Holy Prince.
'And now it is lost…?'
"What the fuck?"
The demon grinned.
"Ha! That is the reaction I expected from a cursed shell, not that stupid calmness! This is great!"
"Again, what the fuck?"
With a pfft, the demon began laughing out loud. In return, Atherios just stood there, bewildered.
'Wait.'
Atherios hurriedly lifted his right arm, searching for the accursed mark that had tormented his peace of mind since the dawn of his existence. It was a golden scar resembling a pair of wings, the only way to using holy magic in the Urs Aletri, the Forest of Profanity.
And yet…
"There is nothing here!"
"I said it, didn't I? You are dead, Shell of Akhavella," the demon said after finally managing to stop its laughter, still with a wide grin on its face.
Atherios' entire body was trembling, and he found himself overwhelmed by a feeling of ecstasy.
"Ye…" he muttered.
"Hm?"
"HELL YEEEEEEEEEEEEEEAH!"
Now, it was the demon's turn to be bewildered. The sudden shout from Atherios almost made it fall on its back.
"With this, I can accept the contract!"
The previously weak voice of Atherios was now filled with energy, making him seem like a whole different person.
The demon, on another hand, had a dark expression.
"You do know what this entails, right? You will lose your mind for millennia. You'll wish for the embrace of death, but will never get it."
"And?"
"Huh?"
Atherios was confident. He still had that overwhelming, unreasonable delight, but it did not seem to weigh on his decision at all.
"I already know that feeling. And I don't care what happens, I will return."
The demon's expression changed multiple times in a short amount of time, as he tried deciding what to say. In the end, however, he simply nodded.
"Let us begin, then."
"What is your name again?" Atherios said while grinning.
Then, the demon smiled back, already moving to a different room.
"Urs Aletri."
✦✦✦
The underground space of the temple was much more spacious than any church Atherios had ever seen. In fact, it was so huge that it seemed like it covered the entire Urs Aletri forest.
The black rock walls seemed so thick that Atherios doubted he would be able to break it even if he punched them with Spectra.
Actually, maybe…
"Don't," Aletri immediately cut through his line of thought.
'Another day, friend,' Atherios thought while giving a dejected glance at his fist.
After about thirty minutes of descending labyrinth-like staircases, they finally arrived at another huge room. Really, it was more of a cave than a proper room.
"So, what should I do? Give my blood? Kill a dragon?!"
"Take off your clothes."
"... Excuse me?"
No no no. This must be wrong. Normally, to become a demon, one must offer sacrifices, like a dragon's corpse or something…
"You have to be at your purest to be reborn. Besides, your clothes would be torn off anyway."
'But I really wanted to kill a dragon…'
After Atherios had taken off his clothes, Aletri pointed to a circle at the very middle of the room. There, two handcuffs laid on the ground, each tied by chains to the far walls of the room.
'First I have to get naked, now handcuffs?!'
However, Atherios was once again strangely unable to speak in protest. It was as if someone had taken the words out of his body, leaving nothing but an acceptable silence.
"What do you seek, Shell of Akhavella?" Urs Aletri asked slowly while locking in the cuffs into Atherios' wrists. "Is it glory? Power? Women?"
Atherios spoke without a hint of hesitation.
"Freedom."
"Freedom?"
For an instant, Urs Aletri was shocked. It expected something like "honor" from the Child of the Gods, but instead, it received a slightly less boring answer.
"I want freedom to live. I want freedom to act of my own volition, not to be subdued by a supposedly all-mighty being."
The demon made a cut on both of Atrerios' palms with nails that resembled claws, yet the boy did not resist. Somehow, he felt peace.
"And you expect to find freedom a thousand years later? Believe me, you won't."
Why was a demon discouraging him to accept the contract? The soul of a Holy Prince should be absurdly valuable to the Demon God, so Aletri should be trying to make him accept it at every cost.
"I don't. I expect not needing freedom a thousand years later."
However, that was not going to stop Atherios. He had sacrificed too much to give up now, and even if he did, there was nothing left for him in this world. Without the Flare, without his soul, he was worth nothing.
'No. I might not survive leaving this place if I don't accept the contract.'
Urs Aletri did not speak further. The demon made a cut on Atherios' chest, then a smaller one on his neck. Instead of red blood, however, what flowed out of Atrerios' wounds was golden blood.
"I hope you encounter what you seek, kid."
Aletri's voice was solemn, unperturbed. In that voice, Atherios found everlasting peace and care, like that of the angels he read about in the church's library.
"See you in a thousand years," Atherios replied weakly.
Urs Aletri made a myriad of hand signs, channeling the overflowing mana in the room and the entire forest that surrounded the temple, making the already monochromatic forest seem even more dead. Multiple colors took over the room, only for the mana to set in a deep black tone and flow into Atherios' body.
"See you in a thousand years."
This was the last thing Atherios heard after Aletri finished the last hand sign. His world was overtaken by darkness, a place where no life could bloom.
It was unnerving. It was as if he had fallen into a dark sea that extended into infinity, and he was unable to swim out of it.
Soon, pain arrived.
Atherios felt his entire body being torn apart by wild claws. His flesh was reborn, only to be brutally removed again and again.
He tried screaming, but no sound came out.
His bones were broken and restored in a matter of seconds, constantly warping and changing form.
He knew it would be painful.
He knew, but…
"AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARGH!"
It was too much!