Chapter 2: Time for Hidden Secrets

Six years, six months, and five eclipses later

In King's perspective, a lot could happen in six years.

At this rate, it became a new routine of his to go up his father's skull, brew himself some coffee over fire, and watch the sunset over the Boiling Isles.

The lands had changed drastically following the defeat of Belos and the Collector. With the stolen magic restored to the land, the orange pine trees now had pinches of green in them. Wild animals were given their own reserves. The Looking-Glass ruins were renovated and turned into a regular holy site. The Palistrom forest grew in numbers and more palismans were carved. The educational system changed thoroughly. Witches chose to perform the magic they desired. Belos' old castle had been majorly vandalized and demolished, the surrounding pit filled with a new fresh-water lake. The heart of the Titan was left as it should be... Untouched and surrounded by nature, with the shifting scouts patrolling to ensure its safety.

In summary, what used to be a totalitarian dystopia turned into a utopia suffering from civil unrest.

Belos had done a neat job, causing unrest before his reign to ensure that his future followers would believe his lies in the dangers of wild magic and social imbalance. Without the Emperor who had governed them for fifty years, the witches and demons were fighting over the management. Eda and Raine had helped the former coven heads establish a Magical Alliance Generating Independence Council (M.A.G.I.C) to temporarily supervise the Isles and guide them all to use magic independently, nobody was satisfied. The population was torn in half.

The Wilders, those who supported the Council, were those that believed in independent magic. They encouraged multi-track studies at the schools, tried to establish equal-magic diversity in their communities, and offered mentorship to the lost ones. They were the ones that helped rebuild the Looking Glass Ruins and the Titan's heart as holy ground.

The Royalists, on the other hand, didn't care if M.A.G.I.C were working on being far more competent leaders than Belos. They didn't even care that Belos had tried to drain their magic out. In their perspective, the Boiling Isles needed a monarch to remind them of the hierarchy. To use magic independently was like suggesting they all had the same societal ranks, wealth, and power. The wealthy ones, the immoral ones, and those who favored one-tracked education were among the royalists. They vandalized Wilder help centers, forced old propaganda around town, and even harassed children for choosing multi-tracks. It didn't come to a surprise that Odalia Blight, the ex-wife of Alador Blight, former CEO of Blight Industries, and probably the biggest traitor in all the Isles, had sided with the Royalists and disappeared from the public eye. A large bounty was offered for her head.

As for King… he grew up.

He wasn't the small baby Titan he used to be but he wasn't tall enough to compare with his father's corpse, but he was big enough for his horns to reach the top of Eda's hair. His appearance had changed in adolescence minus the height: pointier, longer horns and fangs, a furrier tail. His claws were now sharp enough to dice a boulder. Nowadays, he got into the habit of wearing Luz's old witch cape.

He also found himself rather isolated.

Right now, besides his friends, family, and a select few within M.A.G.I.C, nobody knew that King was a Titan. The child of the Boiling Isles… The last Titan in the Demon Realm… Right now, he was primarily known as 'the guy who freed the Collector and nearly endangered us'. Because apparently, it was logical to debate on what could be worse: extermination at the hands of the emperor they once trusted or endless torture at the hands of a playful child god with no sense of limitations.

He still lived with Eda (plus Raine after they and Eda married), but nearly every day, he stayed clear from everyone…

A ringing came from his cape. He pulled out his scroll and checked his Pentstagram.

Amity had messaged him, reminding him of the small get-together at the Bonesborough Library.

"Damn it…" He sipped his coffee.

Hours later

Bonesborough had certainly changed in the span of six years.

With the night market shut down and wild magic further encouraged, more shops and businesses opened up. Old coven recruitment posters and the Emperor's Coven propaganda was removed, but now the town's walls were coated with M.A.G.I.C flyers, lottery tickets, time schedules for upcoming Grudgeby matches, and unfortunately, Royalist graffiti. Nearly everywhere King walked, his face safely hidden under his hood, he could read the words.

COVENS AND THAT'S IT!

STOP BRAINWASHING OUR CHILDREN!

YOU CAN'T COMPARE OUR MAGIC TO YOURS!

YOU DON'T KNOW WHAT THE EMPEROR PROMISED!

BAN HUMANS AND GET A REAL RULER!

Near the last graffiti, a business owner was using their magic to fix up their broken window display. King recognized it as a brand-new bakery that opened a few years ago. The owner was pro-Wilder. They probably had relatives who studied multi-track courses. Why else would somebody have shot an arrow at the bakery door, pining the paper with the words 'PUT YOUR KID IN THE RIGHT TRACK, BARBARIAN!'

King shook his head silently.

50 years under a dictatorship, give the population freedom, and they demand a new monster.

He got to the Bonesborough Library. Some of the group members got there beforehand: Eda, Raine, Gus, Eda's mother Gwendolyn, and Luz…

Luz…

Six years of blaming herself for permanently trapping her mother in the Demon Realm, without any way back, and with the Collector's curse, had done a number on her. To the point that at the age of 20, she had adopted Eda's nasty addiction of apple blood. She was even drinking a bottle as she sat on the steps. Eda snatched the bottle from her and burned it.

"I was drinking that…" Luz muttered.

"Yeah, and you could have gotten drunk!" Eda snapped. "You ain't drinking your way out of this!"

Luz muttered something in Spanish.

"Hey, King." Gus greeted. "What's up?"

King shrugged. "Oh, the usual… Walking around on a landmass that happens to be my dad's dead body… which I almost destroyed by releasing the Collector…"

Eda slipped her hand under his hood, caressing his skull. "We keep telling ya that you didn't do anything wrong…"

King wanted to snark at her. He got lucky as the library door opened and Amity stepped in. With the years passing by and steering away from her toxic influences, Amity had certainly changed for the best. Longer hair, though she kept it dyed lilac. Malphas had retired and moved to the Knee, promoting Amity to the position of Head Librarian.

"Thank you all for coming after closing time." Amity greeted them. She went ahead and kissed Luz on the cheek. Despite her sour transition, Luz was still in a solid relationship with Amity. If anything, it was a blessing that Amity still loved Luz, otherwise her depression would have given her a one-way bath in the Boiling Sea.

Amity led them inside the empty library. "So, what made you decide to invite us over, Miss Blight?" Gwendolyn asked. "New ideas to renovate the Magical Beast section?"

"No."

"Something that can help Luz and her mom get back to the Human Realm?" Gus suggested.

"I really want to, but no."

"Something to provide us with suggestions for the Wilders vs Royalists conflicts?" Raine clasped their hands. "It's really becoming a problem."

"I'm aware, but still… No. I need help with the echo mice."

King facepalmed himself. "I will kill you if you called us just for an extermination job…"

"Don't kill me just yet. I have a reason." Amity raised her hand to silence him. "You know the Bonesborough Library shelters echo mice to project the contents of the books they digest."

"Like the one that ate the diary of the human who pretended to be our emperor." Gwendolyn nodded somberly. "Do you think the echo mice are holding information we are unaware of?"

"That's what I'm worried about. Last Monday, I realized that I hadn't been in the Forbidden Stacks in months following my promotion. The echo mice ate everything."

Raine's eyes widened. "The echo mice… emptied out the Forbidden Stacks."

Amity nodded. "I called Malphas. Turns out that as an avian demon, he could keep the echo mice in check so they didn't devour all the books. Just the poorly conditioned ones that couldn't survive potential disasters. Without Malphas and my crazy workload, they ate everything! I know it sounds stupid, but I called you over to help me catch them so I can have them project what they digested. I'll have brand new copies of the old books printed out to put back on the public shelves."

"Put it that way, it makes sense." Eda cracked her knuckles. "Alright! Let's get ourselves some book-eating vermin!"

Amity nodded. She guided them towards the large doors of the Forbidden Stacks. The old process of showing a librarian's card had been replaced by an Abomination Locking System that would only unlock if the head Librarian put her hand in the knocker's mouth. The doors creaked loudly as they opened.

Besides Luz and Amity, none of them had seen the inside of the Forbidden Stacks. A cylindrical chamber with stairs leading up and down. The bookshelves were visible, but no book or scroll was present. Echo mice ran away the moment they spotted them.

"So, how does it work? How do we catch them?" Gus asked.

"No tricks. Just don't hurt them."

"How far can they go anyway?" Raine looked down at the bottom. An abyss seemed to await them.

"I'm not fully sure."

"Aren't you the Head Librarian?" King asked sarcastically.

"ONLY RECENTLY!" Amity snapped. She took a deep breath to calm down. "Aside from that ONE time I went with Luz, I've never really been in the Forbidden Stacks. All I know is that the works that used to be there were stacked based on the time periods they've been donated. We went as far as the Deadwardian Era. Anything below that goes as far as Angstiquity… or older."

"If Lily were here, she'd scoff at the idea that there were books before people could write." Eda was the first to run after a mouse.

They spent nearly an hour chasing echo mice. Gwendolyn was lucky, using her magic to lure the rodents towards her, even if all they projected were cannibal cookbook recipes and records of the Bonesborough Brawl winners. Raine lured a few towards them with his enchanted whistling, but that caused him to get all the echo mice that had devoured musical sheets and biographies of the Boiling Isles' greatest composers. Eda and Luz weren't that lucky.

Gus and Amity were the only ones effortlessly picking up echo mice without brawls or magical tricks. The Illusion Leader for M.A.G.I.C picked up one of the rodents hiding behind a skull and handed it to Amity.

"So… Have you thought about it?"

"I don't read minds, Gus. What are you talking about?"

"Well… that question you want to ask… Are you going to do it?"

"Well…" Amity looked over her shoulder for a brief moment. "I've thought about it… and I want to ask it… I just don't know when to do it. It's delicate right now, you know?"

"I know, and that's just it." Gus caught another echo mouse. "M.A.G.I.C is doing what they can, but we can't keep this thing between the Wilders and the Royalists forever. Your, I mean, Odalia is still out there. Luz isn't doing well. And our friends… Well, how much time before you don't catch up to them?"

Amity lowered her head. It was a fact and Gus was correct. Besides the civil unrest, a few witches and demons had managed to find ideal lives to pursue their ambitions. Their classmates from Hexside had long transformed. The original Emerald Entrails were now professional players. Boscha was a professional Grudgeby player. Viney had opened her own clinic, Viney's Veterinary Emporium, and even had Luz's mother helping there. Jerbo was running an organic abominations branch for Blight Industries. Barcus taught a new class at Hexside, Prophetic Liquids. Mattholomule (Amity still didn't understand after 5 years what Gus saw in him) had invented an illusionary funhouse. Even Amity's siblings had changed: Emira had created a new form of healing illusions, developing a proper hospital on the Boiling Isles. Edric was working with their father to invent abomination creations for more entertaining purposes. And Willow and Hunter…

Amity sighed.

Both had evolved so much. Endured challenging childhoods until Luz guided them to the right people. Following Belos' defeat, the Abomination Head Coven, Darius, had taken in Hunter. While allowing him to contribute to M.A.G.I.C, Darius had Hunter go to Hexside. Be a regular teenager. Hang out more with friends. Both he and Willow were professional flyer derby players and members of M.A.G.I.C.

Amity had felt happy for them when the Plant witch and the Grimwalker had married last year. And last spring, they wound up with twin girls, Fern and Rue.

And Amity was envious…

She definitely wanted that kind of happiness with Luz…

Fortunately, Amity put a halt to her worries when she realized that King hadn't been around for a while…

At the same time

King was going to make a mental note to eat the echo mouse that caused him to trip.

The stairs leading downwards were worn-down and unstable. Once he ran after the echo mouse past the Angstiquity section, one of the steps he landed on broke. His ankle dislocated at the landing, but he pulled it straight. He grunted at the self-healing. One of the disadvantages of being a Titan was feeling your own blood boil as it healed any broken bone from within.

King saw where he had landed. The very bottom of the library. Moss coated the stone walls and bones loitered the floor. The echo mouse scratched on the floor, sliding under one of the floor tiles.

King sliced the ground with his claws. The tiles shattered into a witch-sized hole. He'd expected to find dirty, rocks, and maybe holes for the echo mouse to crawl in.

The last thing on his mind was an ancient crypt.

"Guys?" He called out. "I think somebody was buried in the Forbidden Stacks!"

They ran downwards to find the Titan. Amity was baffled by the site of the hidden crypt. "Malphas never said anything about a crypt hidden under the Forbidden Stacks."

"I… don't think it's under the Forbidden Stacks." Gwendolyn sniffed the air and rubbed her fingers on the remaining floor tiles. The old witch risked it and jumped into the crypt, repeating what she had done upstairs. "This edifice is too ancient… and well-constructed. The architects who designed the library didn't know that somebody was buried here…"

"Fantastic… The library is on top of a burial ground…" Luz grumbled and jumped in.

"That's still not possible! Even for building the foundations, somebody could have noticed this!" Amity jumped into the crypt. The others followed as well.

The crypt wasn't very big, but it was well designed and preserved. The stone pillars were kept together by golden glittered cement. Artificial light came from the dome ceiling. At the very center of the crypt, just under the dome, was a golden altar with carvings of the number 666.

Resting on the altar was a mummy.

A really tall mummy that could have towered Belos in his monstrous form. Despite the possibility of having been buried long before the library was built over the crypt, some form of magic was preserving the mummy to retain its magnificence. The clothes it wore were old, but not wearing off. Its ring-bearing hands held some sort of crystal ball close to its chest.

In the crystal ball was an echo mouse fossilized within.

"Uh… who is this?" Luz pointed at the mummy.

"Not sure. He looks like he was a witch… but… I've never heard of him before." Gwendolyn frowned.

King got close to the altar and sniffed the mummy. The deceased definitely smelled like a demon, but… really unidentifiable.

It seemed too hopeful… What if this was the corpse of a Titan murdered during one of the Collector's 'games'? King touched the mummy's right horn…

He found himself surrounded by darkness again.

For the past six years, King experienced nightmares from the vision he had of the mysterious Demon King devouring humanity to extinction under the cheers of his minions. This time, it was different… He saw the mummy… Moving… Laughing as it looked over a realm before snapping his fingers. All the shadowy demons dropped everything they were doing and obeyed the mummy like ants to their queen. Without hesitation, the shadowy demons started building cities from scratch. The mummy laughed as it slouched on its golden throne, bearing the same 666 as the altar.

Thunder stroke. The mummy disappeared. It was now replaced by the mysterious Demon King from his nightmares. Both had an aura of darkness emanating from them. An aura of power.

King wanted to reach out to this hallucination. Demand what they wanted.

He stopped moving when he suddenly heard a baby cry.

"KING!" Eda's shaking woke him up. Touching the mummy had caused him to faint. "King! Are you alright?"

"No…" King grunted and sat up. "I… I think this mummy…"

"Uh, guys?" Gus' words caught their attention.

He pointed at the dome. They now noticed the intricate painting decorating the dome. It depicted some sort of family tree belonging to entities floating in clouds of stars.

The mummy's face was on the dome, next to a feminine one and under two others. Probably the mummy's parents and sister. Next to the mother was a sibling.

And under the sibling was a child they were all too familiar with.

"Looks like we got ourselves a cousin of the Collector," Luz said.

Later

They'd all gone back up in the library and went inside a conference room. Using fire bees, Gwendolyn cautiously tried to crack an opening in the crystal. They hoped that Amity could do something with the knowledge hidden in the echo mouse.

King silently drank some tea. He didn't know what to think.

My revenge will forever sing once you and your kin are devoured by the true Demon King!

The Collector must have been aware of what they were pronouncing before their execution. It couldn't have been a coincidence. For some reason, his cousin's body was buried in a regal crypt under the Bonesborough library and no one knew. Did The Collector think that his relative was still alive and would avenge them? Were they even aware that the relative was dead?

But then who's that figure haunting me for six years? King thought. And why did I hear a baby cry?

Gwendolyn finally cracked a hole in the crystal. Just big enough to touch the top of the fossilized head.

"Alright. Let's see what our little fellow has to say…"

Amity rubbed the creature's head. Visual recordings appeared and a holographic projection of black puppets took form. The mummy appeared, only alive, regal… and threatening.

"Congratulations. You found my final recorded document, which means I've long passed away. Allow me to introduce myself. I am Derkila, the first Demon King and the creator of the Netherworld, or as some plebians would call it, the Demon Realm!"

They gasped.

"The Demon King?" Eda asked.

"He created the… Netherworld? Our dimension?" Raine was shocked.

"It's hard to believe, but I was born from celestial beings with my twin. In our childhoods, we were given the tasks of creating our own realms to birth and dominate. My sibling created a pacifist realm, the Human Realm. I created a chaotic realm, the Demon Realm. Despite the separation, our realms were meant to balance each other out. One with humans and science, the other with demons and magic.

"My prototypes for demons were Titans."

Everyone looked at King. He dropped the teacup he was holding. His fur trembled as he got up to look closer at the visuals. The enchanted shadow images showed Derkila rising his arms and giants towering even him. Furred giants with skulls on their heads.

"My prototypes were too chaotic. And my magic too powerful. Their blood, which I created out of my own and the hearts of twelve dead stars, allowed them to teleport wherever they please. My sibling was angry when a dozen of my Titans went rampaging in the Human Realm. By the time we grounded them back in the Demon Realm, humans had already been traumatized by them. Nearly all the cultures came up with silly names for them. Kronos, Prometheus, Frost Giants, Yetis, and need I go on.

"I found myself with the sole option of permanently sealing my prototypes within another deception. An ocean I had created from volcanic rock, vapor, and a solar flare. A sea so boiling, getting your face too close would give you third degree burn. I had sealed away this Boiling Sea within a rock ring beforehand, and since my Titans could survive anything, I sealed them within the Boiling Sea. The rest of the Demon Realm would remain untouched from them and the Titans would be left alone to do as they please. I had created a dozen of them.

"I was finally able to create smaller, more efficient beings. To ensure that they didn't fail like the Titans, I removed the magical inter-dimensional capacities of the realm. My sibling and I reinforced the strength of the barrier separating our realms. My creations now believe that humans are nothing but superstitious myths.

"I committed the greatest mistake of my life. My cousin. An eternal child known for his destructive games and lack of common sense. Our relatives didn't bother naming him, so we called him The Collector because he destroyed 'accidentally' all the toys he collected. They begged me to let them play with my Titans. I should have known better, but I was so dedicated to my plans of creating the demonic ranks. I let the Collector play. Centuries of negligence… my prototypes perished. The Collector accidentally killed one during a game. Apparently, the Titans had enough reality magic in them for their corpses to transform into ecosystems. The first Titan corpse created a species I had never seen before. They had magic, but they weren't demons like I molded.

"These creatures went on to worship my cousin and mistook his games for a message. They thought the Collector purposely killed Titans for glory. I was so horrified when I finally checked on the Collector and the original prototypes had been massacred into islands while the youngsters' bodies were burned and their skulls turned into masks for these 'Titan Trappers'. My family was enraged. My parents provided celestial mirrors to the last Titan, giving him the capacity to banish my cousin into the limbo separating this realm from the human one. The act killed him… after he confessed that he wasn't the last one."

The visuals changed to see the shadow puppet of Derkila placing a protective seal… in the very same nursery where King's egg had been. King gasped.

The mummy… the same mummy of the Demon King that created the Titans, exiled them, and aided in the Collector's imprisonment… He was the one who had put the protective seal?

He was… the reason King was able to hatch in the first place?

"I resumed my creation of the Netherworld after preserving the last Titan's egg. In my perspective, I created the Netherworld beautifully. Ranks that determine the society's hierarchy, seats by my side for the thirteen greatest heroes, various forms of magic for all the citizens to acquire, entertainment to squash their vile phases, and of course, their education. I sponsored many, but the Babyls Demon School is my favorite. I even created a classroom all for myself, the Royal One! Out of all the demons, I preferred Sullivan, my closest companion, an aristocrat who eventually joined the Thirteen Crowns. Despite being a celestial being, I was the Demon King. The demons did anything I could fathom to say!

"Unfortunately, my powers came at a cost. For overusing them in the creation of a realm and society, my body was drained of its mana. The millenniums would catch up to me and I would perish. I could have easily eaten another demon or one of my relatives to replenish, but I can't go as far as cannibalism. My reign as the Demon King… was to come to an end."

They couldn't resist sighing in relief. If the Demon King had perished centuries ago, there was no way the Collector's posthumous curse would occur.

"Sullivan suggested that I find an heir."

They all froze.

"I told him it was impossible. I can't just find an heir! For beings like my family, powers function like bloodline magic, passed down the generations and empowered with the right nurturing. Besides, picking an heir among the barbaric, rank-obsessed demons would be like figuring out which rabid hornet will dominate the rest of the venomous hive. Sullivan suggested asking my sibling for counsel. We invited her for tea. For a long while now, she stopped governing the humans and let them go around with their lives without her dictation.

"Her suggestion was chaotic, but it rang with logic. She suggested that before I ceased my reign that I transfer some of my sentiency into the Gluttonous Feeder Ring, an apparatus that devours the mana of others and allows the user to cast stronger spells with it. That way, my sentiency within the ring will decide the finger of the one creature unselfish enough to rule after me. The bearer would be our de-facto candidate for my throne. Indirectly, that would make them my heir, but as my sibling pointed out, my true heir would not be the new Demon King but their firstborn child.

"A child with the powers of the Netherworld's strongest demons. A demon with the ring's mana transferred into their finger without the need of the apparatus. A king only the last Titan could truly respect.

"I have now 'disappeared' and left the Netherworld without a king. As we bid farewell, Sullivan promised me to find our ideal candidate. To atone for my past mistake, I chose to exile myself into the corpse of the Titan who defeated the Collector. The town I hid myself in is still in development. I thank you for reading my last document. If you meet my heir or the last Titan, tell them I'm truly sorry that I didn't get to meet them."

The echo mouse stopped the recording. They were all left speechless.

"Another Demon King…" Luz gulped. "Out there…"

"We don't know that, Luz." Amity put her hand on her shoulders.

"Let's try not to jump to conclusions…" Raine began.

A tea kettle was thrown towards the crystalized echo mouse. Gwendolyn caught in the nick of time, but the kettle shattered on the table. Tea spilled everywhere.

"King!" Eda exclaimed.

King got out of the conference room.

They kept shouting his name, but he ignored them and walked as fast as he could out of the library. He didn't bother putting his hood on. He didn't bother hearing the specific words of the witches jeering at him as he ran through the streets of Bonesborough and into the woods. He finally ran all the way to his father's skull. The night had finally settled and the stars were out.

"What am I going to do, Dad?" King sniffed. "I'm nothing more than a relic, am I? We were just stuff Derkila didn't want? What should I do?" Tears leaked from his eyes and his knees fell on the ground. "I don't know what to think anymore. I never was the King of Demons, I'm the last of our kind, I freed the Collector, and now… I got nothing. I don't even know how to deal with this whole thing about the Demon King… It's not like I can just ask them to not eat Luz and humans…" He facepalmed himself.

He stopped hitting himself.

"Ask them… not to eat Luz and humans? That could work… I mean, I did try to eat her the first time we met… What do you think, Dad?"

His dilemma was interrupted by screams coming from Latissa.