As the alcohol wore off, the pain set in.

Lady massaged her neck with her free hand; the other gripped a particularly vicious looking 9mm "You really hurt my neck, demon." She grumbled, shooting him a poisonous look and wishing she could shoot him for real.

Dante wasn't ready to apologise "Yeah, well boo-fucking-hoo. I can't believe I can still walk after what you did to me."

Lady almost laughed, his words reminding her a little of their conversation in the morning of when the whole mess had stared, but stopped, remembering to be angry with him.

"You started it." She said childishly.

They walked down the dark passage in silence, the only sounds being their footfalls and water dripping from the damp ceiling. Though he wasn't in the best mood, Dante still remained vigilant. If he let his guard down, something would probably leap out of the shadows and try to slash his or Lady's throat.

And hers wouldn't be able to take that kind of assault.

Lady felt another bolt of irritation shoot through her as a slimy drip of water landed on her dress. It soaked into the white silk, staining a patch pale green "Do we even know where we're going?" She asked exasperatedly.

Dante stopped and turned, giving her a rather disrespectful look "It's a rule. Dark, slimy looking passageways always have something at the end of them." He said plainly.

Lady folded her arms over her chest "Oh? Like what, a brick wall?" She asked, nodding to indicate the space behind him.

Dante turned, and looked completely flabbergasted as the bare, slimy brick wall just sat there, being a wall.

Mocking him.

"That's it. I'm turning around right now, finding that damned warlock and beating him until he takes this curse off. World be damned." Lady said, but as she turned to leave, she just so happened to put her foot on a certain stone which just so happened to sink downwards, opening a passage beneath a certain hybrid's feet.

"YAARGH!" -CRASH!

"EEEK!" -WHAM!

Wanting the stars to clear from their vision, both just lay where they were for a while, not really thinking… Until Lady realized she was lying comfortably on top of someone and Dante realized he was lying almost as comfortably under someone.

In the darkness and confusion, as they struggled to get up, Dante and Lady just further entangled themselves in a mass of arms, legs and skirt.

The skirt being Lady's, of course.

"STOP TOUCHING ME, DEMON! YOUR HAND IS SQUEEZING MY… STOP IT!"

"YEAH, WELL, THAT ISN'T MY HAND, IDIOT! YOU'RE STICKING YOUR TITS IN MY FACE!"

This went on for some time, but in order to prevent boredom, let's just move it along a little bit, shall we?

Panting, gasping and making all manners of wheezing noises, the two finally managed to disentangle themselves from each other.

"Okay, where the hell are we?" Dante grumbled as he brushed dust that he wasn't even sure was there off his shirt.

"I don't know, Dante. Its pitch black." Lady replied numbly, stumbling to her feet.

"We have to be somewhere important. What kind of people would stick some random pit here if there wasn't anything to hide?" Dante replied.

If there had been any light, Dante would have seen Lady's skin go from clear alabaster, to the colour of bad milk.

"If it's a trap…" She managed to say. Her throat had suddenly gotten tight.

Dante paused and as his eyes adjusted to the dark, realisation crashed over him like a Tsunami "Oh…"

Even a "Fearless" warrior like Dante had to gulp when something tapped him on the shoulder with very, very long fingernails…

I wish I had Rebellion with me… Dante thought, as he turned to face some sort of cross troll, cross werewolf, cross… Rabbit?

Whatever, it had claws. Sharp ones. And a grin on its face too. And it wasn't an "Oh, I'm so glad to have company, I'll go put some tea on" sort of grin. It was more of a "Me hungry. You food." Kind of grin.

Dante took a step back and the thing grunted deeply, causing Dante to reach for Ebony and Ivory.

The thing stopped.

So did Dante.

Lady scratched her head, not knowing what was going on.

The creature suddenly curled up on the floor, whimpering.

Dante and Lady simultaneously raised their eyebrows.

"What. The. Hell?"

Obviously, the creature wasn't into shiny things (or maybe just guns) so the two used its apparent breakdown as an excuse to inch passed it, into the narrow passage behind it.

"That was weird. What idiots would set something like that to guard a secret passage?" Lady muttered.

"Hey, maybe they're stupid." Dante said hopefully. If they were, they would probably underestimate the pair's abilities.

"I don't think so. They study magic, Dante. You've gotta be smart to make sense of all those spells and curses." Lady said, sounding disbelieving.

"Oh? Then what's with the vault up ahead?" Dante replied with an annoyingly superior look on his face.

And indeed, there in the face of the stone was a large vault. It looked pretty old but as the two drew closer to it, they saw the thin layer of dust on it had been recently disturbed.

"Okay fine. We've found the vault. Now how do we get in to it?" Lady asked, rather unhappily. Dante looked momentarily pensive.

"Hmm. We don't know the code… How do we get into it?"

That's what he said, but Lady could already see the slightly evil look in his eyes.

She took several steps back.

Dante drew out Ebony and Ivory and aiming both at the now pitiful looking vault, open fired. Lady shielded herself as much as she could, even at the distance there was a possibility of a ricochet hitting her, but Dante himself didn't have to worry about that sort of thing.

As the smoke cleared, Lady saw that though the vault door seemed dented, it didn't look about to swing right open for them.

"I didn't think it would work Dante. Now what?" Dante just stared at her and threw a kick at the already abused door, which crumpled under the force.

Lady's eye twitched.

Dante turned to her looking smug and was about to say something when she cut him off.

"Shut up. Don't you dare say anything."

Dante didn't, he just bowed like a gentleman showing her through the door. Lady stormed through, too angry to check for traps.

As it turned out, the only thing they had to deal with were a couple of drone demons and a quick bullet to the head was all that was needed to take care of them.

At the far end of the vault on an ornate pedestal sat an unattractive pink box.

"Is that what we've been tortured for?" Lady growled, kicking a demon in the head to make it didn't get up again.

"It's probably what's in the box, babe." Dante said, placing his twin pistols back in their hidden holsters.

"Well, I want to know what we've gone through all this grief for." Lady said, picking up the box and before Dante could stop her, she flipped the lid.

"Lady! Wait!" He cried a second before a strange pink glow came from the box, hitting Lady square in the face.

She just stood there, looking at the box, puzzled.

"Babe? Hey, Lady, you okay?" Dante waved a hand in front of her unfocused eyes.

She looked at him and dropped the box.

"Heeey… Dante?" she said, her voice becoming husky as she took a step towards him.

He looked back at her, wide-eyed "What? Something the matter?"

She continued walking towards him "You know what….?"

Dante swallowed "What?"

And Lady suddenly leapt into his arms "You're really, really pwetty!" She cried, giggling like a child.

Dante would have dropped her, had she not been clinging to his neck "What the-! Lady, stop licking my cheek!"

"Aww, don't be maaaad, let's have some fun!" She giggled.

Dante felt his thoughts race as she got a mouthful of his silvery-blonde hair and started chewing it like it was grass.

"Oh my god… Lady's been infected with essence of Riko!"

Heh, not really. You'll find out next chapter. And don't freak out when Dante manages to lose Lady, despite the curse. There are answers to all questions…

Well. Most questions.