Chapter 33: The Trust
The floor where Angel Dust and Indigo's rooms were located had to be patron-free for now. And Angel Dust had to bless Alastor's sound-proofing powers. The new patrons wouldn't have to hear the terrible trashing sounds.
Angel Dust kept throwing everything around his room. All six arms out, he was using his bats to break apart his vanity mirror and space. His teeth ripped the curtains. His fingers clawed out the bathroom tiles. His reflection stared back at his self-disgusted person, so he punched the bathroom mirror.
How could he do this? Angel was in self-loathing.
Why did he hit her? He didn't want harm to come to her! Why did he harm her?
Big whoop, Angel Dust! Scrunchy's just a toy! He and my fucking bugs mean nothing to me since I fell here for no valid reason!
The spider demon broke the bed in half.
Remember your fucking place, Angelcakes! My top whore, my belonging! I own you!
Angel Dust threw his nightstand out the window.
Damn it, Anthony! Why can't ya be normal like the rest of us? Ya think a faggot can do right shit for our family?
Everything darkened for him…
"Angel?"
The spider turned and hissed, all the eyes of his true demon form glowing, threatening a possible transformation to the intruder. Alastor confronted those eyes of his.
"Coming to yell at me for what I did? I already feel like crap!"
"Angel…"
"I can't believe I did this!" Angel Dust paced around his destroyed room. "I hit Indy… A kid!"
"Angel!" Alastor shouted.
"WHAT?"
Out of the blue, Alastor gave a quick slap to Angel's face before clutching his cheeks. "I cannot believe I'm doing this… Do one of those breathers Charlie recommended. Deep breath in…"
Angel Dust wasn't sure why he listened. Yet… there was something… relatable, in Alastor's voice, whenever he spoke without radio static coating it. Something that allowed Angel Dust to follow him. He inhaled, and when Alastor guided him to let it out, Angel obeyed and exhaled.
"Feeling better?"
"Surprisingly… yeah." Angel Dust cleared his throat, reverted to normal, and hugged himself. He took a look at his room's poor state. Then again, he slept in worse.
"You know…" Alastor cleared his throat. "With… your abode being… temporarily unfit, you may use my guest room…"
Angel frowned at him. "Are you… inviting me over to your tower? Who are you and what have you done with Alastor?"
"Don't get cocky! It's one-night only, your own room, and no, you won't do on me any of your services!" Alastor snapped, his radio static back.
Angel giggled quietly. "You sure it's OK? I'm not sure we can leave Indigo alone on this floor…"
"The poor thing locked herself in her bedroom. Either she's sleeping in tears or sleeping after midnight snacking on ice cream!"
At the same time
Indigo popped open her third carton of HateMen-Dazs ice cream.
Like any teenager in an angry fit, she locked herself in her room. However, she didn't feel like having red admirals flood her bedroom, especially now that the hotel had more patrons. The Ars Goetia went back home, but using the Apocatombs, Octavia snuck back to Indigo's room, a bag stuffed with ice cream cartons and a jar of Colchis Kelp. Not wanting to be bugged in her emotional eating, Indigo made the most irrational suggestion. And Octavia reluctantly agreed.
"Alright, let me get this straight." Unlike Indigo, who was eating through her ice cream slowly, Anqa had eaten through twenty cartons of ice cream. Centuries worth of starvation and a newfound love for pistachio ice cream would do that for the angel. "You built a garden using virtue symbolizing plants for a hotel created by Lucifer's daughter to redeem demons, your slave attracted an audience under your name without permission, you almost threw him in the Lethe River, and a prostitute who is overprotective of you slapped you."
"I still can't believe what Scrunchy did…" Indigo groaned through her ice cream-filled mouth. "I can't believe what I did to him! And what I said to Angel was awful! He hit me!"
"So? Adults do that to discipline misbehaving kids." Anqa shrugged.
"It's the 21st century, holy breath. Most humans consider it as assault or abuse if you hit someone, especially a kid," Octavia said.
"Old-fashioned techniques never die." Anqa licked her spoon in satisfaction. "How come we never had ice cream in Heaven? The coldness of snow, the texture of soup… and the amazing aroma of pistachios!" She took a larger scoop. "I still cannot believe that A, Lucifer and Lilith FINALLY have an offspring, and B, she wants to rebel against Hell and redeem demons! Talk about a flip in holy texts!"
"Yeah… Not a lot of demons believe in redemption."
"It's not impossible."
Octavia nearly coughed out a pellet and Indigo spit out some ice cream from the shock. Anqa just kept eating.
"Wait… You think, as an angel and former Exterminator, that redemption is possible?" Indigo gasped.
"I said it's not impossible, not possible."
"What?" Octavia pulled her beanie in frustration. "You just said redemption wasn't impossible! Why are you saying that it's not possible."
"What? It is!" Anqa protested. "It's not considered impossible because ANYONE can be redeemed, but it's considered not possible because not many souls have enough conviction in it! Take the dinosaurs. It wasn't impossible for an asteroid to wipe them out, but it's not possible that there weren't other factors in their extinction. It's not impossible that Moses opened a pathway in the Red Sea or Jesus reincarnated into Heaven, but it's also not possible that a sea wouldn't leave signs of supernatural interference and that a body can't just disappear from a cave within a day!"
The girls looked at her in confusion.
"It's like addictions!" Anqa got exasperated. "It's not impossible to get over them, but it's not possible to JUST GET OVER IT! Redemption can be done, but it's not like it can happen in a day!"
"OK! Redemption can be done!" Indigo clasped her hands together and started pacing. "Question: how do we make redemption happen to the 66 new patrons in the hotel so I can get over my guilt over what happened a few years ago?"
"Oh, I am NOT the best person to ask for that!" Anqa stacked up her empty cartons of ice cream.
"But… you're an angel. Can't you just tell mortals to get their shit together?" Octavia snarked.
"You'd be surprised by the very unethical ways Heaven came up with to set humans on the right path before the bureaucracy got intense." Anqa began. "Where do I even begin, my fowl fiend? Some angels were SO desperate, they tried brainwashing humans into Samaritans. Forced pagan tribes into monotheism. Created the prototypes of conversion therapy. Countless sackings of Jerusalem. New age music. And don't get me started with the whole shit of how we proved women to be witches! The LINES we got from innocent women waiting to get into Heaven." She grimaced. "I can already remember that annoying cervid cherub Deerie from HR! 'Yeah, sorry. Yeah, we thought you were witches. Yeah, no.' Allah, I hated her!" She groaned. "Besides. If I start cleansing demons just like that, there's an 80% chance that my presence gets exposed… Or that I might kill the demons by accident."
Indigo pulled out a piece of chalk from her hair and started writing on the stone wall.
What to do about the hotel? What to do about Scrunchy's shit idea?
"Well… what would be the LEAST obvious move? Scrunchy outright promoted as a consultant to demons if they give up on redemption" Indigo growled out some red admirals. Anqa caught one of the butterflies and inspected it. She brought it closer to her eyes. Crushing its abdomen between her fingers, she noted the glowing orange fluids coming out of it.
"Do your butterflies always vary based on their emotions?" She asked.
"Yeah, wh… What did you do?" Indigo exclaimed at the sight of the handicapped butterfly oozing orange fluids out of its abdomen. She squinted in confusion. "Wait… why is my red admiral full of Wrath?" She poked her finger in the ooze, stuck it in her mouth, and quickly gagged. "Eh! Wrath!"
"Should have known." Anqa quickly killed the butterfly. "Sin-devourers eat and digest sins. However, when sin-devourers can only digest a particular sin, they have unnecessary sins stocked in them. We had to remove the sins out of them the way you remove unnecessary fat and cholesterol out of a person on the verge of a chronic attack."
Indigo looked at the countless butterflies flying around the bunker. "I've been… secreting sins out of my hair?"
"But Indigo's butterflies only pop out of her when she gets emotional!" Octavia butted in. "And they get bigger if she bottles the emotions in!"
"And that's the problem!" Anqa took the chalk out of Indigo's hand and started sketching a series of doodles. In less than a minute, she managed to create a quick sequential art about a doodled Indigo eating, butterflies flying in her stomach, and looking relieved once they all went out. "When the Aztec sin-devourers consumed the sins of the deceased, they could only digest the lust. The sin gave them the energy boost they needed because that was the only sin their bodies could handle as metabolism fuels without corrupting their souls. However, since they couldn't digest the other sins, it would weaken them physically and morally, so most of the time, they had to be killed on the spot. When I was in Heaven, I heard that sin-devourers who ascended had to use aromatic thuribles daily to cast out the unnecessary sins using the fragrances of the flowers of the virtues clashing the vices. YOU, for some reason, can secrete the unnecessary sins when your emotions manifest as your invertebrates. For instance, when your red admirals manifest out of you, they expel the Wrath you consumed… by holding it within!"
"But what about when she gets happy or whatever gushy feeling she gets?" Octavia pointed it out. "If her bugs are connected to unnecessary sins, why would she be secreting the sins when she's feeling positive?"
"My fowl fiend… WE'RE IN HELL!" Anqa ruffled the few feathers she had left on her wings. "Some demons relish in their sins, not out of condition but out of satisfaction! She could be happy if she was eating a meal she enjoyed, and that would be enough for the butterflies to extract Gluttony out of her! Whatever goes on between you two also expels the Lust out!"
"There's nothing between us!" The girls exclaimed.
"Whatever." Anqa dismissed their denial. "She could just suck the sins out of the quitters, and it's a quick redemption!"
Indigo took the chalk back and wrote on the wall.
Can't use my sin-devouring on sinners directly. The staff will catch on. AND, I promised Alastor I wouldn't hunt demons for their envy.
"You realize that the hungrier you get, you lose control, right?" Octavia said. "I lost count of how many times you acted out and nearly tried to kill someone for their envy."
The women started sniffing, realizing just now the presence of pollen. That's when it came to be noticed that Anqa had forgotten to wipe the Wrath ooze off her hands following the crushing of the red admiral. Her steps had caused the ooze to trip onto the stone floor. Where the drops hit the stones, tansy flowers grew on the spot, their yellow petals possessing the glow of an erupting volcano. Any nearby butterfly stopped to drink the tansy nectar and dropped some nectar as they flew off, inadvertently causing more tansies to grow.
"Butterflies are pollinators…" Indigo gasped.
"And sins are harvested in Hell just to reinforce the the environments," Octavia concluded. "But the flowers you picked for the hotel represent virtues… Which means that every time your bugs drink nectar from Hell's flora, they collect sins the plants were exposed to the same way they secrete the sins you don't digest. If they get killed or if the pollen flies off, they spread the sins like a sickness!" Octavia looked above their heads to the cavern ceiling. "Lava Tansies are common flowers transported from Wrath. If this had happened upstairs, you'd make a lot of demons succumb to their wraths!"
"Wait… I got it!" Indigo doodled on the wall.
'Nice flowers' are spread around hotel. Butterflies spread pollen. Exposure to flowers makes demons nicer and they decide to be good.
Irredeemable demons get kicked out of the hotel, meet me in private, and we get some trapdoor to drop them into the Apocatombs. Anqa does torture shit, Octavia makes taxidermy, we take out the sins, and I eat the Envy.
WHAT DO WE DO ABOUT SPARE VICES?
Oh, and we give some of the flowers from upstairs to Anqa. Holy food shit.
"So, you're going to kill demons just so you can eat," Octavia frowned her conclusion.
"I'm not committing murder if you and Anqa are playing with your toys. It's more of a… not-so-fiery-pit-of-failure for the victims," Indigo defended.
"So, I get to kill demons as I please and the fowl fiend gets to stuff them?" Anqa smiled. "I love this plan!"
"You're very dark for an angel." Anqa ignored Octavia's remark.
"As for the spare sins, I know just what to do. But I'll need seven canopic jars, some of your butterflies, a whole lot of taxidermy knives, a cauldron… and a live test subject."
Meanwhile
When Alastor said 'guest room', Angel Dust didn't think it would mean Alastor locking them inside his closet and pulling the doorknob off the door.
"THIS is your idea of a guest room?" He questioned.
The doorknob darkened in Alastor's hands, taking the shape of a deer antler handle. After forcing the newly transformed handle on the door, Alastor let them out.
The sight baffled Angel Dust. Instead of the office few people at the hotel got to see in the radio tower, the demons had stepped into some sort of living room annexed to a kitchen. Everything was decorated in a rustic, late 1920s fashion from the red papyrus wallpaper to the Candlestick Telephone, a relic Angel Dust hadn't seen since his living childhood. When jazz was heard from the windows, Angel Dust rushed to open it. He gasped in awe at the vintage neighborhood he was in.
Hell's version of the French Quarter, just outside of the Cannibal Colony. Demons in old-fashioned clothing and flapper dresses were partying around, drinking at public speakeasies or going to voodoo shops. The air itself smelled of beignets, bayou, and blood. When static noises louder than the Radio Demon caught his attention, Angel Dust saw it.
Just above the building stood a tall tower.
A tower made of smaller towers sticking out and glowing in red, green, yellow, and purple lights like a Mardi Gras crown.
A radio tower made of radio towers.
"Holy shit… We're in YOUR radio tower?" Angel Dust pulled himself back in. "THE radio tower that you use to control all the radio channels in Hell?"
"Not ALL the radio channels, my dear." Perhaps because they were underneath his tower and static hummed above them, Alastor had ditched the static coating his voice. "Just my primary bloodshed channel, the independent stations in the other rings, the Cannibal Quarterly speeches, the Exterminations, the hotel promotion channel, and the weather. I don't control those silly podcasts that VOX controls… The…"
And just as his eyes could have turned into dials, Alastor summoned a knife and threw it towards a wall. Angel Dust watched the blade hit the left eye of a Vox poster.
Then again, the whole right corner was plastered with Overlord flyers, celebrity tabloid pics, and sketches of random demons. Unsurprisingly, many knives, darts, and a prybar pierced through the frequent faces of the Three Vs, Vox in particular.
"My apologies… I'll go get us some water." Alastor headed for the kitchen, leaving the spider to stare at the wall.
So many Overlords…
Paimon had a hunting knife slicing through half his face.
As for the sketched demons, they were all intricate sketches of the way Alastor brutally killed them. Red words soaked the wallpaper and stabbed papers; the spider demon didn't have to guess why Alastor wrote his victims' individual natures in blood.
Among the images of the Overlords, one caught his eye.
It was an old-fashioned poster, very much like the ones Alphonse Mucha designed when Angel Dust was still a human infant. The blue goat demon could almost be mistaken for a Baphomet demon if his mane weren't a veil of calla lilies. His white fur coat went all the way down to his black hooves. Courtesan necklaces dangled from his black fingers. His throne was a tower of naked demons, struggling to either reach him and his beautifully dressed entourage or perform an orgy before him.
That Overlord had far more knives on his face than Valentino.
Alastor came back, a tray with water-filled glasses in hand. He put it down on the nearest wood table.
"You killed Wallen?" Angel Dust pointed at the poster, which had no written text on it.
Alastor's grip tightened on the tray. "I did no such thing…"
"Really? Would have made sense if you did. He was the Overlord taking charge of Lust way before I fell in Hell."
Angel Dust didn't notice the sounds Alastor was making by bending the tray. "You never heard of me until we met… yet you heard of an Overlord deceased long before your arrival?"
"Hard not to when you work in the lust biz. I didn't hear about it directly from Val himself, but you meet people who still run the same brothels in the Lust Sector since the 1900s." Angel Dust hugged himself, looking at the poster in dread. "Some European dude who knew how to work with whores in Amsterdam. He dies somewhere around 1575 and he makes a name for himself. Wallen knew human whores, but demons say he knew human clients better. He knew what people really lusted on. What made them tick when they told him no. What to do to make them change their minds… He was the Overlord of Brothels for 3 fucking hundred years. Before he showed up, it was only street performances, naked lake swimming peeping, or the succubi going up on Earth.
"In a shitty way, Wallen caused Lust to be the empire it is. Val's business would have been a college dropout project if Wallen's legacy had left nothing behind. The Big Ozzie himself always talks around that Val is nothing like what Wallen was. Wallen really brought out the spirit of lust from demons. Some sinners say he feasted on Lust secretly since he was so good at bringing lust on the table.
"Then it's kinda weird, but they find him dead in the streets. Some Overlord shit. By the time I get in Hell, almost everyone working in Lust is either a freelancing performer or extra help at clubs. Business and money booms when Val brings porn and traps everyone in contracts." Angel Dust sighed in frustration. "I try not to think who would have been worse. Wallen had this thing where if he found someone pretty, he'd put those shitass courtesan collars of his onto their necks, regardless if they said yes or no. Once those things were on, your brain gets squashed. All memories get altered, even those suppressed in your subconscious. Apparently, if you wore one, the only thing you could focus, love, and think of was the one who gave them to you. Your whole life would be about the one who brainwashed you into a permanent plaything. And Val… he signs a contract with you, promises a career, money, and fame… but everything goes to him. We're playthings to him, but no matter how much he breaks us, we keep being fixed so that we can provide more cash."
The spider cleared his throat. "Wow. I haven't spoken that much since I bailed on my family." He saw the glass of water on the table and went for it. Alastor had turned his back to drink, pretending to look out the window.
In reality, he was hiding his scowl and gritting teeth.
Angel Dust didn't even notice the pretzeled tray under the table.
"Angel…" Alastor turned.
"Sorry I talked so much about Wallen. If how you killed him stirred some bad memories, I didn't mean to upset ya." Angel Dust took a sip.
"It's not that. I didn't…"
But the spider kept interrupting. "I don't even know why I was rambling on about it. I honestly have no idea of what things have been going on. I mean, first it's Debauchery Avenue, then we meet Indigo. I don't know why I keep running into Vox trying to do some weirdass shit on you, and you ask me about my contract with Val." His upper right arm rubbed his temple. "And I'm going back to work soon…"
"Angel…"
"Alastor, I have no idea what I'm doing!" Angel Dust finally opted to walk towards Alastor before finally sitting on the floor by the window. He inhaled. So much was coming out of him. "I don't know what's wrong with me right now and it ain't withdrawal. I don't know why I'm being so… paternal towards Indigo. I… I don't know what to make of you anymore. I'm aware that I shouldn't do the obvious with you… and it's not doing me any good when I try to not think about it."
"I'm… not sure I understand your intentions." Alastor sat down next to him.
"I don't either! I mean, what are we exactly, Al?" Angel raised his spare arms in the air.
"Well…" Alastor's fingers tapped in rhythm against the glass. "I like to think we are residential acquaintances further developing into friendship due to an unusual common bond with an emotional child."
Angel Dust snorted in amusement. "Is that the main thing we can think of that we have in common?"
Alastor pondered. "Well…" He thought out loud. "We don't think the best of most demons we encounter. We hate being vulnerable before those that really matter… We commonly hate those obnoxious Vees!"
The spider smiled a bit. "We cook a lot. We like to tease Husk and make Vaggie bonkers."
Alastor let out a chuckle. "We argue a lot."
"You haven't tried to eat me."
"You haven't…" Alastor stopped himself. Ears perked up, he got up. "What am I doing?" He exclaimed.
"You didn't say what I haven't done to you." Angel put his glass down on a safe spot. "If it's about my usual sex antics, obviously I was going to do it on you. You said no, you were pretty obvious in Charlie's group talks that you were ace, and frankly, I just can't do it with you."
"I repulse you that much?" Alastor didn't look at him.
"Ya ain't repulsive, Al!" Angel got up and started to get upset. "You're an Overlord and I'm a whore, the property of another Overlord! Unless you're a paying client, I can't be in a relationship with ya that doesn't involve you giving Val money for my performances. Stage or bed." He quickly rubbed away a tear from his face before it could be seen. "Besides… You could have anyone in Hell."
"I can't." Alastor's ears dropped. "I'm the Radio Demon. Hell's most terrifying Overlord and one of the rare few considered old-fashioned."
"So? People still dig vintage?" Angel Dust mustered up to reassure him. "I mean, it's also one of the few things we have in common. Similar time periods. You're one of the few people that talk and behave in a way that reminds me of my old life."
"Thank you." Alastor briefly looked over his shoulder. Angel Dust couldn't believe it.
Alastor's left eye… exposed a frown.
"But nostalgia has nothing to do with it. In our hierarchy, Overlords are considered nouveau riche. The oldest Overlords, those that have reigned longer… are considered old money among the nouveau riche. We are still viewed as dirt and sinners by Hellborn nobles… but we are high enough to be considered by their standards." Slowly but surely, Alastor dropped on his knees and held himself. Angel Dust took a cautious step forward.
"I never asked to be an Overlord! I do what I do because endless entertainment is my sole purpose in the afterlife!" His Transatlantic accent slipped into a more natural one. "Just because I killed several Overlords for fun, they decided to make me one! I…"
"Al…" Angel Dust reached his hand out.
"I didn't… ask to be among Hell's… repulsively rich rednecks!" Angel Dust could smell Alastor's salty tears. "If anyone's interested in me, it's because of my terrible title and ludicrous lucre!"
Angel Dust knelt down in front of him. Using his front hands, he lifted up the deer demon's chin so he could see the real tears pouring from the real, frowning Radio Demon.
He wanted to cry.
Alastor was exposing himself, his REAL self, to Angel Dust.
Angel Dust rubbed his thumbs under Alastor's eyes, rubbing off as much of the tears as he could.
"This isn't going to work, is it?" Angel Dust sighed.
"What, my statements?" Alastor coughed.
"No. The whole…" Angel sighed. "This isn't going to work… publicly. You can't be seen with me. I can't be seen with you. I don't know how I'm supposed to feel about this… And I can't believe that you're showing your vulnerable side to me. I…" He sighed. "I don't think I can go on pretending that we have this thing going on… but I'm not sure if I'm ready to trust you with myself. I don't know if you'd break my heart like everyone else has."
Alastor lowered his eyes. "And I don't think I can trust you… if all I am to you is the Radio Demon. Yet I can't hide that I worry about you."
They just sat there the whole night, unable to think of a solution to their problem.
Unaware that throughout Pentagram City, Octavia Goetia was using the Apocatombs to sneak kill some meaningless demons.
Back in the Apocatombs' bunker
Octavia sure as Hell knew how to hunt for prey for taxidermy. In less than a half hour, Anqa and Indigo were greeted by the pile of dead prey Octavia tossed before them.
Three vole demon sinners. Five rat gangsters. Three bug demons. A red cardinal demon prostitute. She'd even caught a half-eaten snake demon, an obvious leftover from the Cannibal Colony.
"You would make a fine demon slayer if you weren't a demon," Anqa insensitively commented. Octavia just scowled at her.
As Octavia used her personal taxidermy tool kit to dismember her preys, Anqa requested Indigo to have the butterflies carve out pits on the ground. Almost as if to make a burial tomb, except the holes were shaped like thirteen gingerbread man cookie cutters the size of a pro-wrestler. Anqa, on her end, used the cauldron, some Envy water from the hidden source beneath them, Indigo's spit and blood, and dozens of the butterflies to concoct brews. Indigo watched the former Exterminator smash the bugs on the stone ground, scrape the ooze of sins with a ladle, and stir the ooze into the correct brew. Like powder and water for tie dye, the ooze blended with the waters. Indigo could smell the sins as Anqa poured the brews into their respective canopic jars. Right now, she was finishing up her jar of Wrath.
"So… why did Heaven come up with this recipe to hold in the unnecessary sins of sin-devourers?" Indigo asked.
"We couldn't just toss the sins away." Anqa shrugged. "Besides, by sealing away evil forces within those simulacrums, we could ward off evil. The forces of good always come up with artificial lifeforms from organic materials to slow down the forces of evil. Adam was created out of dirt by God. Prometheus sculpted humankind out of dirt. Rabbis built golems to protect their communities. Pinocchio was crafted out of pine…"
"Wasn't Pinocchio after your time?" Octavia cautiously laid out the bones in the ground molds. According to Anqa, there had to be perfect symmetry in any mixed bones for the spell to work. Then she organized the organs. Anqa just ignored her and poured the Wrath brew into its canopic jar. The women carried the heavy jars to stand by the molds.
"Alright. Before we cast the spell, Indigo needs to pour the sins into the hearts and livers of the homunculi," Anqa explained. "If there's one thing demons and angels do have in common, it's that their vices and virtues are located in the heart and liver. Higher quantities in the heart, lesser ones in the liver. Indigo doesn't just bring life to a hive. She gives her creations personalities. The homunculi CANNOT have the same doses of sins!"
"I have just the thing." Indigo went through her hair and pulled out the one item she was looking for.
Good thing she had precautions to bring with her the Sin Sensationator 13.0.
"OK… That is NOT a good look for you!" Octavia shuddered.
"Yeah, but it has its." After putting on the glasses, Indigo adjusted the stones on them to get ratings on the canopic jars. The data on the screen was senseless!
44% Wrath+ 15% Pride + 10% Greed + 8.5% Envy + 8.5% Lust + 7.5% Gluttony + 6.5% Sloth= most likely to put others in their place.
This option stuck out to Indigo.
With the glasses' guidance, Indigo poured orange, red, and green brews on the heart and purple, blue, yellow, and pink brews on the liver of the first skeleton. The first skeleton with the majority of its limbs belonging to the half-eaten snake demon. The brews sank into the organs.
Anqa knelt on the ground and spread her wings. A halo flickered over her head.
"aldhunub almustaearat waleizam almustaearat,
li'ahjarik dakhil alhijarati.
ayqiz eabidak min tirabti."
The heart and liver glowed in rainbow hues.
"Peccata mutuata, et ossa mutuata;
Pro gemmis tuis in lapidibus.
Exsurge servos tuos de terra mea,
Sic mihi serviunt donec fervent!"
A coat of neon-colored rocks grew over the bones. The shiny soil kept rising until it properly buried the skeleton. Octavia went to take Indigo's hand.
"Daneikés amartíes kai daneiká kókala,
Gia ta nkólem sou mésa se pétres.
Xýpna tous doúlous sou apó to chóma mou,
Eména loipón ta servíroun méchri na vrásoun!"
Everything in the bunker darkened. All the butterflies began to fly in a circular formation above the glowing tomb.
"Iasad peacaidhean agus cnàmhan an iasad,
Air son do ghleus an taobh a stigh de chloich.
Dùisg do sheirbhisich as an ùir,
Mar sin dhòmhsa bidh iad a' frithealadh gus am bi iad a' goil!"
Thunder boomed. Winds swirled underneath the butterfly rings. Octavia hugged Indigo tighter out of fright. The rainbow soil grew a coat of ice. Each feather in Anqa's wings began to shine.
"Pecados prestados y huesos prestados,
Para tus golems dentro de las piedras.
Despierta a tus siervos de mi suelo,
¡Así que a mí me sirven hasta que hiervan!"
The rumbling's worsened. Several free butterflies used their small bodies to shield the girls. The ongoing earthquake HAD to be felt throughout the pride Ring. Cracks grew on the ice, outlining the form of a red admiral butterfly.
"Péchés empruntés et os empruntés,
Pour tes golems dans les pierres.
Réveille tes serviteurs de mon sol,
Alors pour moi, ils servent jusqu'à ce qu'ils bouillent!"
The internal storm got louder. In the ring of butterflies flying over the ice coat, all the red admirals fell dead. Their bodies froze, merging with the coat.
"Borrowed sins and borrowed bones,
For thy golems within stones.
Awaken thy servants from my soil,
So to me they serve til they boil!"
Anqa stood up, folding her wings in. The butterflies dispersed. The earthquake and indoor storm ceased. It almost looked like things had calmed down.
Indigo yelped and pushed Octavia so the girls could dodge the falling rock. They ran to look at the… weird tomb they had just built… and had witnessed the weirdest thing any of them had ever seen in their short lifespans.
"Uh… now what?" Indigo asked.
A hand shot upward through the ice coat.
"MOTHERFUCKING SATAN!" Octavia shrieked.
The skeletal hand had visible muscle tissues and veins glowing in neon colors of Wrath, Pride, Greed, and Envy. Another similar hand punched through the ice. Then came skeletal legs of Lust, Gluttony, and Sloth veins kicking their way out.
The skeletal being finally pushed its way out like a butterfly sprouting out of a cocoon. Gelatinous, colorful liquids dripped on the ghoul. All its limbs rotated like crazy wheels, like Exorcist crazy. Well, less Exorcist crazy and more like cotton candy machine crazy. By twisting its bones horribly, the creature had wrapped the gelatinous substance over bones and veins. Its new muscle tissues and flesh had the sickening color of over-expired sticky rice.
The creature contorted its limbs yet again. It couldn't decide if it wanted to retain its deadly form or acquire something more muscular. The upper body took an average fit, but the lower body proportions decreased. Whenever the legs were pressed against one another, the creature could have been mistaken for a Lamia. But no, it had two legs.
Anqa smiled the moment the creature shrieked as its skin ripped to create a texture. As the girls hugged one another, a large quantity of butterflies flew out of Indigo out of her newfound fear. Creation couldn't have gotten much scarier. Finally, the creature settled for snake-scaled legs, needle-thin fingers, flowing lava hair, and pale ice skin. The only thing that wasn't naked on the creature's body was the mask.
A masquerade mask with the colors of a red admiral's wings. All they could see from the face were the snarling black lips… and the magma orange glare underneath the mask's eyeholes.
"WHO… DARES… TERRIFY MY MISTRESS?" It creepily pointed at Octavia. "HOW DARE YOU HOLD MY MISTRESS… WITHOUT SETTING UP AN APPOINTMENT?"