My calling

Author: Cornell Valentine Gainsborough

"Speech"

'Thoughts'

MAKAI! Seperates Paragraphs

Chapter 9: Nightmare come true

As the sun of this Netherworld set, Nelius found himself immersed in his dreams, this time showing him standing in front of what appeared to have been an old shrine or temple. Much of the place had taken some kind of damage, from some type of bladed weaponry, as far as he could tell.

'Why am I seeing all of this?' He wondered, but no answers seemed to come to him. He stepped into the temple, seeing the ruined walls, almost as if a battle had been waged here. Only one wall remained intact: it depicted some kind of winged being confronted by a person who wielded two spheres in each hand.

'Strange... I've never seen this place; why do I see it now?' Upon taking a closer look at the mural on the wall, he could barely make out feathers in the wings of the being. As for the sphere wielder, one sphere was black while the other was white. What did this all mean? Unfortunately, Nelius' dream was cut rather short.

In the real world, he rolled over from one side to the other, burrowing his head into his pillow, which, all of a sudden, became a lot softer to the touch. Now that he'd thought about it, it felt much warmer, too.

"Aww, I think he likes me!" A familiar voice chirped. "Cute!" That was enough for Nelius' eyes to open at an incredible speed as he looked at his "pillow". "Hi there, sleep well?" In less time than it took for the average person to blink, he was already out of bed and against the far wall.

"Okay, how in the hell did you get in here?" He pointed a finger at the Elbacky who managed to sneak into his room in the dead of night.

"Oh, you left the window open." She answered nonchalantly.

"Ah. Whoa, hold it! How'd you get in if the window was closed?"

"Did you ever lock the window? You know, that usually deters window raiders." Boy, I bet you anything he felt like an idiot now. "Anyway, how'd you audience with Brad go?"

"Aside from the exploration he had me do just a few hours ago, rather well. As of today, I'm a free man." Whatever he was about to say next was stopped right then on the spot, as he saw a mischievous glint in her eyes. Usually, whenever someone got that glint in their eyes, it would spell certain trouble for him. 'Uh oh. I think I said too much.'

"So, you're free to do as you like?" She just grinned at him, inching closer and closer.

"Uh..uh, yeah." If he pressed himself any further into the wall, he might've created a stress indent.

"Good." She let that word hang for a moment as she traced his jawbone with one of her fingers. "You know, this Netherworld's pretty big. What say that we.." She cut herself off as her right ear twitched for a minute. "Oh, darn. I have to go." She leaned over and whispered in his ear. "See you later." She winked at him before opening his window and leaping off into the night.

He slid to the ground, his heart racing so fast it nearly threatened to burst out of his chest. He let out one very shaky breath.

'I swear, she's trying to give me a heart attack.'

MAKAI!

"Never'd have guessed that Brad had a RosenQueen extension here." Nelius exited the aformentioned We carry anything and everything store. 'Though, I swear that cashier was making a pass at me.' Regardless, he had a lot of work ahead of him, and he couldn't afford to be so easily distracted if he was to defeat his former boss.

Knowing that there was more to this Netherworld than just the Felynn inhabitants, he decided to buy himself a Star Shatter for his right hand, in case he did have to fight.

Already a good distance north from the town, he was ready to begin practicing the moves that kept returning to him in his dreams, when he heard something rustling near him. Keeping his guard up, he took a quick peek through some foilage. Standing in the small clearing was the strangest Nekomata he'd seen yet. Her hair was a dark pink, nearly red in color, and her fur was a slinky black. To top it off, her eyes had the most piercing shade of red available. She looked around the area, mumbling something about incompetent hirelings before heading in the direction of town.

'Must be a new arrival.' Nelius thought. 'That Elbacky did say that Brad tends to attract Felynn classes the most... no matter. Back to work.' As he headed further north, the appearance of that Nekomata still nagged at his mind. 'Still, I could swear that I've seen that color scheme somewhere before... where, though?' A little further along, and he happened to come upon some strange creatures. They appeared to be stuffed penguins with demon wings and peg legs.

"Just what are Prinnies doing on this world?" Nelius questioned, approaching the purple birds.

"Ah, just our luck, dood." One of the Prinnies said.

"You see, we happen to be looking for someone. Can you help us out, dood?" The second one asked.

"Depends. Who are you two looking for?"

"Our boss. She has black fur and pink hair."

"Well, I suppose you're in luck, then. I just saw her go back that way a few minutes ago." Nelius jerked a thumb behind himself. "If you hurry, you should be able to catch up."

"Thanks. See you later, dood." The Prinnies thanked him before running off.

"Huh, does Brad allow Prinnies on this world?" He just watched them run off. "I'll have to ask him about that when I head back." As he turned around to continue walking... well, if you've been following along with what happens every time he turns to go somewhere without looking...

"You know, we have to stop meeting like this." Yep, the poor guy walked right into that one. "And yes, he does allow Prinnies on this world. How else does he get most of his work done?"

Nelius freed himself from her grip. "OK, what are you after this time?"

"Me? Nothing at all." She was playing the innocent act. "Why could you ever ask such a question?"

"Well, answer this: why were you in my room back there?"

"Oh, I just needed a place to crash."

"Oh, and you couldn't have used another room?"

"What, and miss seeing the look on your face to waking up to such a beauty like me?" I doubt he could come up with a response to that one.

"I'm not even going to respond to that one." See, what did I tell you? "Either way, why are you all the way out here?"

"Oh, that. Brad needs to have a few words with you. He said it was pretty urgent."

"In that case, why didn't you say so?"

"You didn't ask." Cue the facefall.

"Never mind. Let's get going."

MAKAI!

"Good to see the both of you." Brad greeted as they walked into his room.

"Ok, just what is it you wanted to see me about?" Nelius was getting straight to the point.

"Simple." He practically leaped over the desk, grabbing onto the front of Nelius' shirt, his face changing to a pleading look. "You have to help me!"

Concerned, but mostly freaked out at this sudden change in Brad's demeanor, the non-Felynn demon could barely do much except ask. "Uh, just what has you scared shitless all of a sudden?"

"Her." He finally let go of Nelius.

Nelius looked over to the Elbacky. "Granted, she freaks me out a little.." This earned him a furry fist upside the head.

"No, not the Elbacky. Her."

"Her who? Give me some details." He rubbed the area of his head that had been impacted from the Elbacky's fist.

"You see, some five hundred years ago, this girl manages to save me from becoming a BBQ'd cat."

"All right, go on."

"Well, I repayed her by giving her some of this special mineral that used to form on my home Netherworld."

"And just how does this cause a problem?"

"I'm getting to that!" Brad snapped. "Anyway, some years later, I notice that she begins following me around. At first, I'm not thinking anything of it, but later it started getting worse."

"Lemme guess, kid tries sneaking into your place?"

"Worse, she succeeded." Cue the surprised faces. "Afterwards, she even begins trying to set up marriage proposals with me!"

"All that stems from you repaying her for saving you?!" Nelius couldn't beleive it. "Damn, that kid must be persistent. What was in that stuff you gave her?"

"I did some research on the mineral I gave her, and it actually turns out to be a special type of rare gemstone that is given between people who share an emotional bond."

"Great, I see where this is going. An act of kindness gone horribly misinterpreted. Go figure. But, there's a part of the picture that's missing here. How exactly are we supposed to know who this girl is if we don't know that much about her?"

"Oh, that's easy. Here." Brad handed Nelius some kind of document with a matching picture. "That sheet has some information on her, and the picture has an estimation on her appearance."

"Let's see... travels with a band of Prinnies, dresses in black, has light red hair... hold on a minute. This sounds way too much like that Demon Lord, Etna."

"Hm?" Brad took a closer look at the sheet. "Whoops, sorry! Wrong piece." He took the sheet and picture, replacing them with the correct ones. "Here's the correct information."

"Well, I don't know wether to call this luck or unfortunate timing. According to this stuff, I just saw said person about an hour or two ago, before..." When he looked up from the sheet, Brad was gone. "What the..."

"He bolted." She pointed toward the open window, which gave a nice view of the city, and near the border sat Brad's custom ship, The Phantom Cat, Mark 2.

"Man, to think a kid like this can scare an Overlord..." He thought about that statement for half a second. "Wait, this is the Netherworld, what the hell am I saying?!"

"Either way, we better make sure he doesn't run into too much trouble."

"Meh, I'm not worried. If he can run an entire world filled to the brim with Felynn, there shouldn't be anything that can cause that much trouble for him."

MAKAI!

In the city, Brad was running for his life, especially from that crazed girl he just described.

I'll bet you're probably thinking, 'If this guy's an Overlord, why doesn't he just banish that crazy girl from his Netherworld', right? Trust me on this, when it comes to trying to banish something that can pull practically every trick in the book, plus some that haven't even been put into print yet, and has been stalking you for half an millenium in order to find out everything, and I do mean everything about you including, but not limited to: strengths, weaknesses, favorite and most despised things; even if you're an Overlord, you'll have your hands full.

"OK, there's my ship." He was dashing at least 386 Km/H toward that ship. "If I can just make it up to the deck, I can.." For those who would think that at this point he would be blindsided by the girl in question, or make it to his ship without much problem, then encounter said person, they'd be wrong.

"AAAAHHHHHH!!!"

The classic pitfall trap. Not even obnoxiously rare male cat-demons are immune to such tricks.

MAKAI!

Whew, another chapter comes to a close. Heh, once I put this chapter up, my friend, who has been constantly questioning me about when this chapter would come up, will probably try to kill me. Then again, I just had to place this cliffhanger just for him.

Until Next chapter,

Cornell Valentine Gainsborough