Outside, the air was cool and crisp. It was late at night now and the moon was high overhead.

The forest was eerily quiet, with would have seemed ominous to anyone else, but to me it was peaceful. I loved places like graveyards and sacred lands, so this was no different. There wasn't any wildlife here, either tucked away for the night or it was just nonexistent. I didn't know which.

A wolf did howl in the distance once, followed by four more. The sound of it made me happy.

A dark mist began rolling in just then, seemingly out of nowhere. From it, emerged what I would only guess was a spirit. It's body glowed golden, and it nodded at me. It was a wolf, and eying me as if to follow it.

"You wanna take me somewhere?" No other angel can speak to the dead or than me, which I learned a long time ago. Not even Castiel knows about the ability, but he does know that ghosts exist.

The wolf huff's softly and turns, walking further down the path. I follow it as it cuts through thickets of trees and bushes, until it gets to a small lake were it then stops. This lake is U shaped, and within the center of it sits a small grave-site. Masters long dead, from the original Holy War.

"If you wish to win this war," a wind seems to whisper. "Then locate the golden chalice hidden in the Angelica chamber. Make your wish, and let your soul be known."

I was going to ask them what kind of fortune cookies they were reading, but I kept quiet about that. Instead, I nodded and agreed like a good supernatural being.

"But what if I don't want to?" I challenge it. "Maybe I'm just here for the fun of it."

The wind blows a little stronger now. "Perhaps you do, angel of death and life, but let it be known that your wish is not one that can be taken lightly. For you wish not to be a god, nor a demon. You wish to forsake your divine right to live among the unclean, the broken, and the most destructive beings known to this planet."

"I know what I'm signing up for."

"You, child, have made the same choices countless times before. Yet you never learn from them. What makes you think being mortal will solve that?"

"I don't know that it will-"

"Exactly. Your dear brother went through this already. It did not help him any."

"Says you."

If a spirit could sigh, this one would have. "You do not know what you're dealing with, child. Even God has abandoned us and so you-"

"I don't believe in him anyway, so there really isn't any comparison."

"Oh...? So, there isn't any comparison to God running away with his sister and refusing to follow their role in this universe, and you? The angel who left Heaven only to run around with evil Djinn and a corrupt Magi?"

Okay, so she had a point. I was like him, but that wasn't going to change anything.

"I'm staying."

"What is your plan then? Defeat all of the other Master's and Servants, get the grail and then what? You'll be a mortal and eventually die. And so, will that Magi. And anyone else you befriend or adopt as a family."

Wise-o-lady was right, again. Though it would never be all that bad. An ouroboros is a symbol for the infinite cycle between dying and living. Every religion in the human universe has an ideal concept of that cycle, which was very much true. Just as a Magi or Heroic Spirit can be reincarnated into other beings or back into themselves, so can host angels. The removal of my angel abilities can only remove so much. I would no longer have angel radio, nor be able to do healing the same way that I have been but being able to move my soul means dying and living still won't be an issue. It likely would wipe my general memories, since it would be a new start in a new time and essentially, an entire existence, but the general essence would remain the same.

I explain all of this to the glowing lady, which just makes her laugh. Which to me, sounds more like the hum of a strong breeze.

"I suppose you do have it all figured out, then." She materializes more and takes up my right hand in hers. "I wish there was something more that I could give you, to help you along your journey, but my wolves may be the best thing to have. They're spirits but given real forms they can be of use to you. Use them how you see fit. They are yours and will answer only to you."

From the wolf who stood in front of me emerged four wolf spirits which with a howl, materialized into actual wolf bodies, the original dissolving into nothingness.

There was a small wolf, just a she-pup, with dark brown fur and brown eyes. The one next to here was an adult, also female, had a tawny colored pelt with light green eyes.

On the opposite side there was two males. One was scrawny and withered, wrapped in bandages as if it was, in death, mummified and brought back to life. His eyes were tightly wrapped in gauze, but he wagged his tail at me despite this. Finally, there was the tallest of the wolves, a large pitch-black wolf that nuzzled my hand in greeting.

"Take good care of them and they shall do the same for you." the wisp was beginning to fade now. "Oh, and just so you know, the Knight is almost upon you."

The lady gone, it was just me and the wolves who milled close to me.

"Well, I guess we gotta go find Mordred, eh?" I pet the black wolf's head. I decided I'll name them eventually, but not now. There're other things to deal with.

Just as I'm about to step away from the graveyard, a bomb goes off nearby, causing the wolves' hackles to bristle.

"Hey, Master. Looks like I found a wanderer." the female voice came from the smoke and flames that the bomb had created, she'd stopped to look behind her whilst still engulfed in them. "What do you want me to do with 'er?"

"Leave her be," a gruff male voice said, a little further back.

I wave slightly. So, this was King Arthur's 'son', Mordred. Golden hair tied in a pony tail flowed from her silver and red metal armour. A large red blade rested on one shoulder. She looked me over with a sneer.

"I suppose you haven't been here long." she says, aloud to no one in particular, then cuts her eyes over to my hand. "Where's your Servant?"

"At home," I tell her, almost able to see a look of disappointment cross her face for a brief second.

Mordred's Master came out of the woods, brushing ashes off of his clothes. He's heavyset and looks like a biker. Shades and all. "You just say you have a house?"

I nod and tell them I'd sensed them around the area. "You two are welcome to stay if you'd like. We won't mind." Well I wouldn't, at least.

The two take a while to come up with an answer, bickering between one another. Finally, Mordred morphs out of her armour into shorts and a jacket.

"Lead the way," she said with a grin.

I obliged and lead them back to the house. The outside is even more impressive than the inside, decorated to look like a tall old temple that'd been there for years. Inside the place was slightly more modern, or at least not old and dusty. Mordred and her Master found it satisfactory.

"This wasn't here the other day," I heard the other Master grumble. I chose not to say anything about it, since having to explain everything would be more work than it was worth. So instead I direct them towards a room and tell them where the kitchen is.

After giving them a small tour, I depart from them and return to a different wing of the house, one that to them would just seem like a wall. Magic traps were nice like that.

Once through it, I reset the ward and kept walking down the hallway until I got to the room where I'd left Judar.

I knew he'd hate the fact that I'd went outside, let alone brought back a small pack of wolves and another Servant and Master. But I felt like they were needed. We weren't playing a long game for nothing. We needed something to work with, and now we had it.

I slid the door to the room open, careful not to make it too loud. I closed it back behind me after the wolves filed in.

Sadly, Judar wasn't asleep still like I thought he'd be.

"I thought I asked you not to leave," he seems mad about it, but hugs me still.

The wolves don't seem very pleased with it but also didn't growl at him either, just pad back over to the door and pile into a heap together by it, leaving the large black wolf to sit at the foot of the bed.

Apparently Judar was allergic to canines, because after he left go of me, he sneezed, making the dark wolf jump.

"Dogs?" Judar asked, finally noticing them.

"They're not dogs, wolves."

"What's the difference." He's about as thrilled about them as they are him.

I ask him how long he'd been awake before we came back, to distract him.

"Hours." was his reply, before sneezing again. "I know where you went. Didn't think you'd come back with pets."

The wolves growl slightly at that, and Judar sneezes for a third time, falling onto the bed.

"I think I have vegetable poisoning." He's being overly dramatic now, but I let him be.

"I.. don't think that's even a thing," I tell him, laughing.

He pulls me onto the bed with him. "Are you sure?"

"Yes, I'm sure."

"Nah." He got back up then, pat me on the head, and then disappeared into astral form. "I'll be back"

I had a general idea of where he was going off to, but I didn't try to stop him. Wouldn't have been of any use anyway. So instead, I took out my large spell book and flipped through it. I'd written a lot in it over the centuries. Drew a lot, too. I love drawing. Monsters, humans, random objects, anything. It was one thing of many that I had in common with mortals. The book was almost like a diary, with its countless entries of important events, wars, and other important information. If anyone would have thought better, it was I who was the scribe in Heaven. I didn't care about Angel wars, however, that was someone else's worry. In honesty, I didn't care much about this Holy War I found myself in, just simply the want of an achievement drew me to it. I was no better than the humans, and I think even God knew that. He was too, which is why he ran away. To not interfere any longer in their lives that he could not completely care for. They had to make their own mistakes and learn from them, his help just let to complacency. It was the same for the Angels, every one of them was coddled by him, other than Lucifer, who was banished for defying him. I too did the same, but Lucifer still loved God. I did not. I didn't think of him as an ultimate being, not like the Angels or the humans did.

In my mind, if there was God, there was other beings over him, other places he didn't touch, and I was right. This Holy Grail War, even though supposedly fought for God or some just cause, it was not. It was simply selfish desire and ideals that brought it on. The outcome of these wars, these dimensions or even the ideals, didn't cause any difference except to the world it was located in. Simply remove oneself from that location, the issues from it no longer exist in your sphere of life. That's why wars happened and would keep happening, because imagining they do not is easy if there isn't one to see.

To me, there was a reason to fight, however. I did have my wish to become mortal. I wanted it for many reasons. Mainly to be able to appreciate the world as they did, learn things the way they do, and perhaps change their lives for the better simply by being there. It was simple and silly, and even if it didn't work out, there was plenty of travesty that could occur. Likely because of me getting bored, but it was something I would deal with when that time came. I was indeed selfish, but if the only way to solve anything was to become mortal, I saw no harm in it. I could die at any minute even being an Angel, reincarnated back with my memories wiped, or as a mortal with the same result. Life was a funny thing, one giant circle that's full of choices and possibilities. Too many to ever count, and far too many paths to ever fully traverse. But that's what made it interesting, the journey of it all.

I knew for a fact, that Judar too once had a wish to make the world good, but distrust kept that from ever happening. Just as I would have loved to stay an Angel, keep the world safe and suffer for everyone else. But I was done with that a long time ago, never obtaining anything for my trouble. I didn't hate the other angels for it, no, nor the humans either. I distrusted God for all of it. He made many mistakes, such as Gabriel, Lucifer, and Metatron. The worse one being me. All the others were either purely bad or good. Never both. Never apathetic to fighting or not fighting. I was an experimental angel, one that he decided was fine to just treat as a human, see if that made any difference to the overall scheme of plans. I wasn't like Castiel, who could do bad things for a good cause - to protect his family from an impending war. I didn't really have a cause, no real purpose.

By that time, I had stopped being in that room. It was one bad perk of having dimensional powers. It was easy to get stuck in one's own thoughts. I was instead in one that didn't have logic. It was quiet and dark, with water for ground and sky. It was glassy but rippled with the slightest touch as if it would break free at any second. In the center was a large clock, an ouroboros circling around it. Multiple hands were ticking, all in different directions, at varying speeds, while some were just stuck motionless. Others just stuttered. A book lay open nearby, just like my book. Further in the room was shelves upon shelves of thousands of tombs. I knew what each one's epithet said. What each one pointed to. There's a room just like it for Reapers. Except for them, they're given a person's death records. For mine, it's a constant mess. Death, life, all possibilities that could lead to one or the other. Constantly changing and shifting. My given task was to deal with all of it. That's why I left Heaven. Why I pushed God and even my own brothers away. Why Castiel refused to listen to anything God told him, because being controlled was the worst way to live. We made our own choices and lived our own lives. No one could tell us what we were meant to do anymore.

I wanted to one day be rid of this clock, knowing full well that I never would be. Even if human, it'd keep ticking. Revert itself to some other time if it had to, but forever have me locked in as a chess piece for some stupid game I never wanted to play in the first place. God had a horrible idea of fun. And wasn't even around to watch it unfold. What a pity.

Hey

For a minute I was confused. No one else could usually find this room. It was hidden in my head and sometimes I couldn't even find it. It was like a black hole of a storage space, why I could never easily get out. My memories became cloudy there, too, making remembering anything in the outside world, the longer I was there, fade.

Come one, you can't stay there forever. It's boring as hell anyway.

It is boring here, but I want to stay. I tell the voice that. I can't even tell where it's coming from within the room. It's starting to become annoying. I want it to go away and leave me there.

You have people to fuck with, and a war to win. What more do you want? Other than a date with me.

I cringed at the word 'date', but thankfully that reminded me who I was talking to. And while the previous quiet of my mind was nice, I was now bored with it. There were better ways to occupy my time and I didn't need to think about all of it at once.

I realized that was always my issue all along. I always thought I had to solve all issues that came to me, even ones I had no answers to. Instead of just letting things come and go as they pleased. I let them linger and over-thought them so much that it was always impossible to get over them. I had to learn to live in just the current time, the current second. I'd be that selfish angel that I was and focus on what I want. I was done a long time ago with getting told what to do.