Sange,

Chapter 2: The Fated

Thus, we shall no longer trouble ourselves with the life of the father and now motherless Yasha, but instead on the life of Sange. Taken by the shape shifting demon, now triumphant and laughing however much at the misery of the father, whose still sleeping infant wrapped in a black blanket no squirmed and made an unpleasant, scared sound in its sleep. Before, she had been calmed by the lasting heat of her mother and of her twin sister. Now, in the presence of the strange demon in the guise of a man, she squirmed.

The demon did, despite all the faults or his evil, did indeed care and enjoy the company of children. His master plan called for it, and over the decades, they had somehow grown on him as an idea. It still boggled him how something that started so weak and squishy and … unintelligent could become so smart, and dangerous, or savage. This demon tended to focus on the worst parts of humanity when he thought of children; this is because it was what he made them become.

"Now, its time to think of a name for you…" He began. His voice was smooth, and deep, and menacing in its own way; yet oddly calming. The baby, who had been fidgeting beforehand, stopped and quieted at the sound of his voice. He had cultivated it just for the reason that i calmed children. The eyes, which had been glowing in a menacing way beforehand, were now normal, brown eyes and, just like his voice, calmed children and made others trust him.

As he thought of the child's parents, he found the perfect name, one sure to anger or spite the father.

"Your name," He told the child "Shall be Sange."

The child slept on, but it smiled a bit at the name and made an adorable baby sound of pleasure at its newly given name.

"It means "Savage blade"" He said, his voice taking on the tone of voice one would use to explain such a thing to a child. "And it is name your father gave to a man, who just so happened to kill his parents….at my bequest."

The baby had been making happy noises up until this time, when it suddenly stopped at that sentence, as if it sensed how wrong it was.

"Shshshsh… calm …" The Demon said, causing the baby to truly drift off into a deep sleep. The demon stepped out from the gray, warped space he had been standing in, his own personal space between realms, and into a warm cushy entrance area to the grand citadel he possessed on the 5th level of hell, the final level able to...accommodate mortals.

The entire citadel was made of a gray and red stone, which had a marble like sheen to it, and It sat against a great chasm or abyss on three sides. Its front faced a tall winding path full of skeletal trees, and the great castle was in fact floating above the abyss, almost mirrored as levels below "ground level" descended in confusing and winding shapes. However, above that, it had two rising towers facing the entrance, and many tall winding buildings meant to house any guests, permanent or not.

Despite the dull and altogether blurring texture of the castle on the outside, its halls and buildings were often lavishingly decorated with fine carpets and art or such, or in some cases, a head or two. The demon even knew a man who kept his room full of nothing but ice.

The main hall which the demon had stepped into was large and spacious, with large arches holding the ceiling, which was constantly lit and had a few imps flying around the lights. The floor was a deep red, and the walls were a teal color that was very nice to look at.

Almost the instant he appeared, two of his "Caretakers" appeared from behind him, and began inquiring over the details of the child. The one doing the most talking was a blue demon, rather boney in appearance, with long winding horns of a deeper blue that appeared to resemble a corkscrew. He had trimmings of white hair, and while his hands were otherwise totally identical to a humans, you couldn't help but notice that his nails were apparently filed to be a good bit sharper than they should've been. In addition, his feet were scaly and clawed, with three appendages on the front and a single in the back. He wore absolutely nothing except for gray linens covering his waist and upper arms. He had green eyes, and on that note, they were oddly large eyes with notably smaller pupils.

The second of the demons caretakers was a female human, with brown hair cut short enough for her to be mistaken as a male and stormy gray eyes. She wore a red and black robe which was wrapped around her tightly yet non-constrictingly, managing to keep her body cool at most times. It did nothing to reveal her averagely sized breasts. She carried, concealed within her robes, a dagger and a sword, totally nondescript. She wore an odd pair of sandals barely discernable from among the folds of her robes, which surprisingly did not very much to conceal her body shape despite their other factors, which were made from a leather dyed a deep brown. They went all the way up to where the foot connected to the legbone, and all the way around. The sole of the shoe was totally normal, but their where tight leather straps between the side of her foot and between each toe. Of her personality, it is very easy to say that she's a very hard person to surprise.

"She's named Sange?" She said in surprise after the demon had finished informing them of all other things. This was one of those rare times she was indeed surprised, for she personally knew the male named sange, whose duty now consisted of little more than guarding things nowadays.

"Yes, she is. Her father and mother had no time to name the poor girl, so i took it upon myself to name her after a rather prominent figure in her fathers life." He said, emphasizing "poor girl." as he handed Sange off to the blue demon.

"A wise choice, sir." Chuckled the blue demon, as he cradled the girl in her arms. She had yet to waken.

"I think it's fairly obvious what i want her to become" The demon said to them, before vanishing in a blue puff of flame and smoke. The demon and human then took sange off, to be raised alongside a dozen other children of her age, to become what the demon desired.

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At this point in the story, near when Sanger begins developing as a hero and Person, I think I should stop to explain a few things about the hierarchy of Hell and this demons personal realm.

In hell, demons are separated into five distinctive levels. There are, during the time of Yasha, only three demons who have the fifth ranking of fire lord, and they are, of course, the three demons who established the Umbral Pact. The shapeshifting demon was the fourth. The five classes are treated by demons much the same way we do social classes; which was how the shapeshifter essentially possessed an army.

The shapeshifting demon had, for nearly 2 centuries, been planning to overthrow Lucifer the Doom Bringer. His many, varied plans for this included stealing a fragment of a spear that fell to earth alongside doom, raising an army of ogres to kill for skulls to use to create golems (that never quite worked out.), striking a deal with Nessaj the Chaos Knight to make Doom fear pigs (which still hadn't happened.). His longest running, and yet incomplete plan, was his raising an army in order to overthrow doom. This plan was intricate, and had led to many deals with mortals, in order for him to acquire the children he needed.

The majority of these children were raised as warriors from the age of 6.

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Sange was sitting with her legs crossed among a dozen other children, who she had known for her entire life. She sometimes wondered if she'd had any friends before her parents had died and she'd been taken here to be raised. Probably not, since she was apparently newly born.

Demons are particularly efficient at imparting knowledge due to their overwhelmingly long age. Because of this, and the overall effect this had on the children was that they were not just wise beyond their years, but mature beyond their years, all sadistically teen-like, yet oddly effective. This is why Sange was thinking something such as that.

The room Sange sat in was a long room, one of many build like it, with depressing gray stone bricks making its walls and the floor being a dark, polished wood. There were rows of racks, each filled with sharp glittering weapons, mostly long or curved. None of them looked like the unique weapons she had been shown that were used by a demon, which were curved or straightened with increasingly odd hilts or magical enchantments placed upon them.

Then again, she thought,that would be a bit too dangerous for us, wouldn't it? They'd been told by one of their caretakers that this would be the day when their training started. She supposed it wouldn't be as simple as that, them using weapons like those, specifically made to be large enough for demons towering above the adult humans she had previously met, like the man named Carn who had recently been made another caretaker of her age group.

Her thoughts were interrupted when Lesandre, the blue demon who was one of her caretakers, walked into the room. The lesson has begun. He started by showing them how to properly hold or wield a sword, how to swing it, and how to disarm a dummy. These were mostly demonstrated on a dummy.

"So now," He stated once he had finished demonstrating, and had placed the sword back into one of its proper place, " I want you to practice on each other."

Sange, as many of her fellow students of the art of war, were surprised to hear this. They knew their bodies to be weak and underaged; and they knew demons to be cruelly efficient; but this was surprising for the fairly obvious reason that they had not even a half hours experience watching.

Lesandre began calling each of the children up one by one. He looked at their heights, asked them to hold out their arms, felt the muscles, and then would hand them a weapon;; usually an unintimidating and particularly long dagger, built like a cutting knife.

When Sange finally stood up and was given a weapon, it was … particular. It was long ,black, and curved in an odd way. She thought it resembled a ...Scimitar? Yes, that sounded right.

"Now then, i believe it's time for you to "spar"" Lesandre said, as Sange looked her sword over. This elicited not even the barest hint of emotion from any of her fellow students; they had been expecting this the moment he'd handed them weapons.. He paired each child with another of the opposite gender, except for one whom he simply told to watch. Once the students stood facing each other, Lesandre snapped his fingers, and with a sulfurous whiff which didn't go unnoticed within the normally fresh castle air, large circles of chalk appeared around each pair. Relatively fresh, Sange reminded herself.

And so, Sange and her foe - a boy who was her elder, name Lee who had finely combed black hair and brown eyes, with pale skin like most of her peers- started circling each other to find weak points. Sange held her weapon with both hands, holding tightly enough she could feel her hands sweat. She noticed this and loosened her grip at the moment that Lee tried swinging upward to disarm her. Now, when Lesandre had made the circles appear, he had also made odd wrist guards appear in each of the children's sword hands. Thus the intent if their exercise had been made clear: Disarm your foe.

Both Sange and Lee had realized this, and thus when Sange tried defending herself against Lee's upward swing by lowering her blade so that Lee's edge hit the flat side of hers. Lee was, despite living among calculated peers and elders, in own as being rash and overconfident in his rash choices. So Sange abused his surprise when his blade bounced off of hers, slicing diagonally upward and to the right, knocking Lees weapon out of his hand. This is because while Sange had corrected her mistake in tightly gripping her weapons hilt, Lee hadn't. It went flying out if his hand, and he released his bodies stiff posture in clearly admitted defeat.

Lesandre looked over with neutrality.

Sange knew that just as Lee was known for his faults. she was known for hers; her eagerness, especially in dishing out pain. She relished it. She knew it and loved it, and this is why she didn't even stop when, with a savage expression, she held her blade up and swung down. This was at the moment when lee had relaxed, she he had barely enough time to try rolling out of the way. He failed, and the sword plunged into his shoulder ,causing his tight white shirt to be splayed red. Sange, almost grinning, pulled the sword out. Blood squirted from Lee's shoulder as he cried out in pain. All of the others had stopped their sparring and looked over at her.

Sange realized how much she had enjoyed it. She realized it was wrong that she enjoyed it, and also realized she didn't care. She started laughing, and looked at the blades forte and tezzo., which was drenched with blood. The adrenaline in her head, she started laughing.

Lesandre grinned.

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Years later, at the ripe age of 13,as Sanges body was maturing, she lay in her bed, looking up at the ceiling as she attempted to fall to sleep, she thought of her childhood experience. her bed was made of an ashen wood, with black and blue blankets with a nice interesting cubed pattern, with birch-colored wooden floors and a not-too-heartening gray brick ceiling alongside identical walls. There was a single dresser, with no personal things on top of it, next to a gray suit of armor which currently fit armor.

She drifted off to sleep, grinning at her own memories, and of how lucky she was to be in the care of the Shapeshifters caretakers, who had raised her so well, and would continue doing so until she could repay the debt she owed to the demon. Her final thought as she fell to sleep was how much she looked forward to tomorrow, when she would meet her namesake.

This chapter took a tad bit too long for me to write. I feel as if I'm rusty, or like I procrastinated too much. I know I said I'd finished but I meant "half finished". My original plans were to upload it this morning. So, in important notation – other then my morbid obsessions with horrible injuries and death- is that I developed Sanges character a bit, progressed the story a bit…. Sums it up nicely. I had to look up swords biology to see what the proper [two] sections of a blade are called which Sange hit Lee with. They're the upper and lower segments of a sword. So, that said, please review since any feedbacks (or corrections) are welcomed.