Your eyes open and a groan emerges from your mouth. It could have been from the bullet still in your shoulder or the intense grip of your mother as she holds you tight against her prominent bosom. But no, this pain is in anticipation of the upcoming day. It's the day things change. As for how much you really do not know. Things could change very little or you could be called out immediately and dragged away to face who knoes what kind of dubious fate. Today the Church will begin their inspection of the school and you really don't actually know what to expect.
In truth, you don't even know who to expect. Your immediate assumption is is that it will be one of the Apostles that comes. They were, after all, the ones who called for this investigation in the first place. But as far as you remember their influence in this part of the city is limited. There are two other factions, the Traditionalists and the Sisters of Salvation. You aren't entirely sure which group you would prefer to deal with. Each one would pose a unique threat. But Aria has promised to give you some assistance once you know who you are dealing with, so long as you can just survive the day she should be here tonight to speak to.
For now you can only rest, recover from your injury and maybe see how Sherry is getting on. You give her a quick ring and start asking her questions about Ami. You can feel her reluctance to answer your probing but she still miserably answers your questions, even giving you Ami's phone number, not that you would be able to explain to the girl how you got it if you did want to use it. Maybe a trump card for later.
As for Ami herself, her family situation is fairly complicated. Her mother married into the DeLacey family, a fairly upmarket family with a strong tradition. Her father is a fairly prominant politician, though not part of the governing party he has a reasonable amount of influence across the city and has the ear of certain people close to those in charge. Her older sister is from her father's first marriage and as such is not related to her by blood. A graduated university student, Sierra DeLacey apparently opted to remain working for said university as a researcher. Sherry unfortunately does not know which university it was or what Sierra was studying.
You get the impression then, that Ami is a very studious girl who feels a great deal of pressure to live up to the high standards her new father and sister have set, while likely not entirely considering herself part of their family. Is she insecure, does she have self worth issues? Does she resent her high achieving father or does she resent her mother for dragging her into this family? Is her real father still alive and could he be used to create a rift in the family? All these would be interesting issues to explore if you wanted to.
Of course, right now you don't have the time for any of it. Perhaps once this church business has been cleared up. And as for Ami's father, an influential political figure wouldn't make a bad possession target. And he'd be suitably close to all your current works in progress that it wouldn't be difficult to just continue where you left off, with a bit of tweaking. So many possibilities, so little time. You thank Sherry for the assistance and hang up quickly before she starts sobbing into the phone. Maintaining control over her emotions must have been difficult for the poor girl, you'll take them all away from her soon enough.
Obtained another 40 Malice for tormenting an unclosed emotional wound!
You have recovered from your injury! The bullet is still there but it shouldn't cause too many problems!
With a sinking feeling in the pit of your stomach like you are heading to your own execution you head to school. The same walls, the same gates, the same buildings, the same gourmless kids, blissfully ignorant of the darkness lurking in their midst. You make sure to arrive a little earlier than usual, hoping to spot the investigators as they arrive. As it turns out, they had a similar idea. In fact, they've arrived before you.
You sense her before you see her and you get the distinct feeling she gets the same impression about you. She's standing before the entrance to the main school building, hands clasped together, mouth moving in silent prayer.
Your first impression of this girl is that she is dangerous! But not dangerous in the same way as that crazy High Priestess was. No, in comparison to her the impression you get from this newcomer is much gentler and purer. And sweet, sickeningly sweet. So sickeningly sweet in fact it's already making your toes curl. Just being around this person for any amount of time is going to eat into your malice reserves, you can already feel your darkened soul recoiling from the brightness she's emitting!
Definitley not an Apostle then, if you had to guess this one has to be a member of the Sisters of Salvation, the ones who were in charge of that homeless shelter you stayed at that one time. The ones that spend their time doing good deeds and trying to be the best that they can be. Difficult to deal with in a completely different way than the Apostles. You aren't even sure which group you would have preferred. At least the chances are she's not going to try and kill you. She's already moving towards you, her eyes still firmly closed yet her gait unwavering.
'My child,' she greets you, her tone full of genuine disgusting concern, 'how tragic, but I can feel the taint on you. One of the devil's minions have lain their cursed hands on you. How cruel for them to target our youngest and most pure!' You are actually worried she might start crying, though at the moment you are too busy trying not to recoil from her. Fuck, she's too warm and pure! And bright! Damn it!
'Do not worry,' she's assuring you, 'soon the curse upon this sacred place of learning will be purified and the vile one will be chased away! I give you my word that I will see it done!' You gape up at her, fortunately you are allowed to be bewildered by this so your expression doesn't give you away. A hand lands on the girl's shoulder, drawing your attention to another figure you hadn't noticed before now, focused as you have been on the girl.
'Excuse me,' he apologises, 'we are sorry to disturb you, young man. Please continue on your way.' You are all too happy to comply with his instruction. As you scuttle away you hear him speak to the girl.
'What did I say before? Do a full sweep of the premises before we start to address individual problems. We don't know hoe bad the situation is right now!'
'But that poor child,' protests the girl. As much as you'd like to listen further to this conversation you are far too eager to get out of range of her. It isn't good for you in the slightest.
Yikes! Stranger danger! Lost 20 Malice! Might be best to try and stay away from her, she's far too pure for our blackened soul to handle right now!
Your mind reeling from your encounter you quickly hurry to class. That girl, she had sensed the corruption on you, that was not good! You had made absolutely sure that not a trace of Aria's scent remained on you. So whatever she had picked up can't be anything but the corruption in your own soul. Perhaps it had been a bit premature to upgrade your Soul. Would she have noticed you otherwise? Hard to say. But you can't really regret it, Soul is still your best chance to help you defend yourself from your tormentor.
The good news is, she doesn't at the moment suspect that you are the culprit here, right now she suspects you are just a victim having been unknowingly contaminated by some dastardly servant of darkness. This means she won't be trying to kill you, or hand you over to someone who will. However, she will likely soon attempt to 'rescue' you from your plight. And when that happens you are really not sure what will happen. Worst case scenario she ends up dealing major damage to your soul while realising that you aren't just another victim. No matter what happens, she can't be allowed to examine you in any further detail.
The question then becomes how best to throw her off the scent. She's already sensed the darkness on you, and unless you can suddenly learn in an hour how to fox her insight she'll continue to seek you out. So you either continue to avoid her until the end of school or you try and throw her a bone to distract her away from you.
You contemplate the jewel Aria gave you, safely stored away inside your bracelet. It's probably the best chance you have to bait the priestess away from you. But you really aren't sure how best to use it. Should you just have it on your person and pretend you found it or were given it by someone? Or would it be better to plant it on someone else, that way you aren't the only one under investigation. Maybe you should bury it somewhere on school grounds?
Aria is the one who got you into this mess, she should be the one to get you out of it. That's what a major part of you is saying. If you pocket the jewel she gave you, let them find it and point them towards her maybe that would be enough? Surely someone experienced like her has dealt with this sort of stuff before? Then again maybe you'd be better off just stalling for time, for now. If you just slip it into someone else's pocket hopefully that will buy you enough time to stay out of their radar.
Even as you are thinking that there is a polite knock on the door to your classroom and look who shows up. The young man enters first, flashing a badge at your teacher. After him is the woman. Hopefully she won't get any closer than that. The officer gives some half baked story about a matter of public safety and declares that everyone is going to need to vacate the classroom for an inspection. Either they are doing this in every room or they are focusing on this one due to your Aura. Either way there isn't much you can do right now. The young woman's eyes are still closed, but you can't help but feel as though her sightless gaze follows you as you leave via the other door, doing your best to look like you aren't deliberately avoiding getting close to her.
As you leave you palm the jewel from out of your bracelet. You just need to decide which sucker is going to be your distraction.
Without a classroom with which to use for studies, Ms Erikson leads your class outside, deciding to let everyone get a bit of free time while she makes some calls and works out where we are going to be situated going forwards. You take the opportunity to ask her if you can 'pop to the bathroom' and quickly head off, seeing if you can find someone suitable to act as a decoy for you. There can't be many targets available, most of the self respecting students would be in class right now. The only ones who wouldn't would be...
You find them in the same place as before, this time just hanging out and talking. You haven't really had time for them as of late, your vague plans for them having somehow fallen by the way side in favour of other schemes. There really just is not enough time in the day to get everything done you want to. Stupid classtime. And now you have to waste more time dealing with this. Still you have at least a barest mimimum rapport with these guys so they shouldn't give you any hassle as you approach.
You start up a brief bit of conversation as though you are following up on the advice you gave them from last time. As you do you slip the jewel into the leader's pocket and give him a Suggestion to become defensive and obstinate if asked about it. That should keep them busy for a bit. They'll likely suspect that his memory has been tampered with so he doesn't remember how he got it. They might even be able to recognise Aria's scent on it. If so that will be entirely her own fault for planting the damn thing on you in the first place. You haven't forgotten that this whole mess is her fault.
You spend the rest of the free period experimenting with your influence over the class. Unsurprisingly it's rock solid. You are easily able to gather every single member over to where you are in order to arrange some 'group activities' which effectively boils down to you giving them a number of instructions and watching them all carry them out for you. It's pretty empowering actually, you've essentially got your own private little army. Not a single one seems even remotely concerned about why they are subjecting themselves to this. And Roger, of course, is beaming at you with undisguised pride!
You've been cultivating this level of obedience and affection for a while, after all. You could even say it's been the biggest use of your time. Of course you shouldn't let those investigators know the extent of your control over your class, but surely you must be able to use this influence to your advantage in some way, even if that isn't especially related to the current matter. Though this is something you'll have to consider at a later date. Lunch time has arrived and you've decided to keep your head down and spend it with the three girls. Now you just need to decide on how to play this.
You decide to play it safe at lunch. No abilities, just a peaceful lunch with your 'friends'. Roger is with you, of course, he's practically glued himself to your side at this point, and Ami and Maria are in their usual good spirits. Sherry is a different issue entirely. Unable to meet you in the eyes, unable to meet her friends in the eyes she sits at the table in silence, fending off everyone's concern without giving away whatever it is that is bothering her. You, of course, know what is bothering her, but you'll not be revealling that information yourself.
Instead you distract the girls with discussion about the Church's activities in your class, probing Ami and Maria for information on their end. You learn that the investigators did indeed examine their classroom, as it seemed they were checking all the classrooms, but only yours was actually emptied. That could cause issues later. But for now you indulge in some idle gossip and conversation with the girls before switching the topic back to studies. You know more about Ami now and you should be able to utilise your extra study sessions with your teacher in order to tempt her into spending more time with you. You just need to decide how to do it.
Your ploy works pretty well. Ami seems impressed that you are receving extra sessions and agrees to pop round for a visit to study together on the weekend. For a moment it seems as though she's going to try and turn it into a group occasion but Maria is quick to bow out, claiming that she most certainly will not be using her days off studying. Sherry, perhaps understanding your intention, also declines to attend.
You wouldn't actually mind if the two of them do turn up, you'll be able to work on Ami just as easily with them there as without them. It just means that Maria will once again escape any tampering. Perhaps she'll escape you entirely, it is rapidly seeming to be the case. That's fine, you have little use for these girls anyway. Even Ami will likely just be a stepping stone into her family and the potential it offers. The girl herself isn't any more valuable to you than Sherry is.
Speaking of which, you discreetly send a text to Sherry instructing her to make arrangements for you to spend the evening at her house tomorrow evening. The excuse should be obvious, you want to 'strategise' with her before your 'date' with Ami. But in fact your stay at her house will be a massive step forward in your plans with her. You doubt you'll get it all finished in one day. But you should get pretty close. Especially considering her mental state. You've done a good job twisting the blade. It will be over soon and her suffering along with it. Your arrangements made you and Roger bid your farewells to the girls and head back to class.
Ms Erikson has apparently managed to find a spare room for your class to use and you get back to some semblance of normalcy across the rest of the afternoon. It's difficult for you to relax, of course, not when you expecting the people from the church to be bursting in through the door at any minute to call you away. Somehow, however, you survive the entire afternoon without anything happening. Your decoy strategy may have worked. Either that or they just didn't intend to bother with you today, too busy checking the rest of the building. Whatever the reason you were happy to conclude your day undisturbed.
Except of course that it isn't the conclusion of your day if you don't want it to be. It is Thursday, after all and your next private session is today. Though now might be the one day you decide to play it safe and skip it. You aren't sure how much progress you'd want to make with your teacher today anyway, considering the threat looming over your head.
You rather doubt the Church people will do anything while you are attending the session, after all Ms Erikson chased off the High Priestess herself! Hopefully they will be gone by the time you are finished. You don't see why they would hang around after the students are all gone, unless they are still checking the building itself. Regardless, you bravely, or foolishly, decide to stick to your guns. You won't let them trip you up and make you panic! Also you want more time with your teacher. No Aura, that just gives you a single Suggestion to implant. Fortunately you are pretty sure which one would be good right now.
Oddly, Ms Erikson is late to your session. She's never been late before to any of her classes so her tardiness confuses you. When she does arrive, a full half an hour later she's fuming.
'Sorry about that, Zachary,' she says as she enters, 'there was a situation earlier. Those investigators from the Church got into a disagreement with some of the older boys. It got rather nasty. I was called into a meeting after classes ended. A good thing it didn't last any longer or I would have had to cancel your session.' You nod, trying your best to hide your relief. No doubt the leader of the bullies resisted being questioned or searched, leading to a scuffle. Your teacher's expression would imply that it didn't go well for the kids. Boo hoo for them! But you didn't feel any large surge of malice so it's doubtful there was much of a scuffle. That man in the suit must be pretty good.
Still it's an excellent opportunity.
'Why are those people here?' you ask her, 'is it about what that scary lady was saying last week?' Ms Erikson's face creases with irritation.
'Indeed,' she confirms, 'some nonsense about safety assessments. But those of us in the know understand why they are here.' Seeing an opportunity you push forwards. You'd already planned to make your teacher your accomplice so turning her more against the Church would go a good way towards that. Perhaps not so much here at school, but if you want her to be more useful outside it, having her help you against your worst enemy would help. Then again, it might just be useful if she protects you from them here at school.
'Those Church people are really irritating, there's clearly nothing going on here and they are traumatising poor Zachary, for no reason!' You slip into her head as you pretend to be worried.
'I don't like that lady from before,' you say, 'she was mean! Do these people work for her? Are they going to take me away?' Her eyes flash for a moment, likely processing your Suggestion. Then she shakes her head and looks down at you.
'Don't you worry about them,' she reassures you, 'they won't do anything to you. Us teachers have a duty to keep our students safe!' You nod, eagerly and pretend to be reassured. In truth you don't actually think that is true. A teacher has a duty to teach their student, keeping them safe is a different matter entirely. You doubt many teachers would be prepared to take a bullet for their pain in the behind students but that's not the point.
The point is you've managed to push Ms Erikson further into being your ally without much effort on your own part. And the best thing is, this won't even be considered a change in personality as your teacher has already clashed with the Church in your defence. Her attitude, while partly genuine, won't be seen as suspicious at all. You can use this to garner some free attention from her and get her more and more used to taking your side. Maybe this investigation has a good side to it after all. After what is left of your session you even manage to convince Ms Erikson to escort you to your mother's car to make sure noone bothers you.
You are somewhat relieved to find that Aria isn't already at your place when you arrive home. Likely she plans to show up a bit later. This gives you a chance to decide how to handle her. You have a few decisions to make here. Firstly, whether or not to confront her over what she was trying to do to your mother. Secondly, whether you are prepared to hand the soul fragment back to Aria, or if you would rather try to stall and let it carry on working on Elisa's mind. In order to help you make this decision you decide to test your mother over the course of the evening.
You spend every available moment you can glued to your mother's side, holding her hand when not outright embracing her, using the contact to start experimenting with your grip, touching her in places no normal mother would appreciate being touched by her son. When she sits down to watch television you plant yourself down on her lap, Lucy quickly sitting next to you and resting her head on your lap. Over the course of the evening you watch Elisa get more and more flustered, clearly she's grown to enjoy this attention, and her eyes reflect a small amount of torment as she currently is aware that this attention isn't normal and isn't something she's supposed to be enjoying. Still, she makes no attempt to stop you.
But it's still fairly early. It might earn you a little bit of malice as she dwells on this, but nothing substantial. Aria's soul fragment will likely need more time to work on her if you want better results. Still, having her see you in a sexual light doesn't really help you in any significant way. It's not like you can take advantage of it in this child's body anyway. So handing the soul fragment back to Aria wouldn't be a significant loss in that regard and would allow your potential alteration of the much juicier target to begin sooner.
Another potential issue will be the jewel. The Church must have it at this point, whether they can identify it and it's owner you aren't sure, nor do you really care. The High Priestess was likely only moments away from finding that stone on your person the day you met and you would have been completely innocent. If Aria ends up taking flack from her enemies as a result of this she has only herself to blame. It will still need to be decided whether you actually warn her about them finding the jewel or not when she arrives.
Finally the reason why she's coming in the first place. The Investigation. You were able to escape them today with just a bit of loss to your malice. That sucks but is not life threatening. However, you'd be a fool to assume they are done with you. The pair will certainly be focusing on you once they realise there isn't much else at school to concern them. And this is why you need Aria's assistance. She'll need to help you fend off the priestess at the very least. Perhaps you could even push for more, though you are fairly certain that trying to corrupt that girl with your current abilities would be like trying to swim up a waterfall. Still, Aria might be able to help you tip the scale, assuming you trust her not to throw you to the wolves just for her own entertainment. You give it 50/50 right now. Not odds you'd like to gamble your life on.
As it turns out, she's making you sweat it out. Perhaps she thinks you'll grow more desperate if she drags her heels and makes you wait. It isn't a terrible assumption, in all honesty. You were pretty frantic the last time the two of you spoke so maybe she's thinking it will be easier to exploit you if she makes you think she isn't going to show up. And she doesn't believe you are anything other than a scared newbie without any real power so she's probably expecting you to really be crapping yourself right now.
And you really would be if weren't sure she'll show up and help you fix this, just to get a chance to hold this over your head. But you might be able to use this against her as well. They have her jewel now, a slight nudge should put them on Aria's trail. And a clash between the two could only be of benefit to you. For now you need to draw attention away from you and handle the other few issues with Aria. You have decided exactly how you are going to handle the various issues at hand. You just need to wait for her to show up.
Dramatic as always, Aria has the temerity to actually ring the doorbell. Your mother answers and lets her in. Of course she's fully in 'big sister' mode.
She's really milking this! She'll be moving in next! You have to go through the whole sister shtick again, though you still enjoy giving her a good squeeze and feel. She takes even more liberties with Lucy than she did last time. But this time you don't mind. Your little sister's heart and soul belong to you now so it doesn't matter what Aria tries to pull, she won't be able to take Lucy away from you. She'll have to convince you to sell her and, considering you know how badly Aria wants her you won't be selling for cheap, if you even sell at all.
Once you've gotten the nonsense out of the way you get down to business.
'So,' she begins, opting to remain in her human form this time, 'how have you been?' You grimace.
'Not great,' you admit, 'the Church investigator nailed me the moment she arrived.' You describe the priestess to Aria, who actually scowls.
'Uck,' she gags, 'so they sent her, did they? I didn't think the Apostles would bother sending one of their own people for something low priority like this, that's why I wasn't worried before. But the Sisters clearly weren't messing around. Sister Cassandra is one of their heavy hitters. You probably felt it. Bitch is like a massive wall of purity and faith. Not a drop of malice or sin in her body. It's revoltingly unnatural!
'I'm not the only one who wants nothing more than to watch those clothes of hers get torn off and watch her get filled in all holes at once! She's way above my strike zone but I'd still pay good money to see that! You may have noticed her eyes? Bitch apparently gave them to the Church in exchange for a divine blessing. Her sensory perception is among the best around so I'm not surprised she picked you out. Not a problem, though. The Sisters are easy enough to fox.'
She plunges a hand into her cleavage, makes an exagerrated show of rummaging around inside then pulls out what appears to be a bag of sweets, throwing it at you. You pretend to struggle to catch it, no reason revealling your Enhanced Reflexes if you don't need to.
'Here's the plan,' she instructs you. 'What I've given you is a suppressant. It'll temporarily put pressure on your demonic soul, preventing you from using your powers but also preventing you from being detected. You'll basically be mortal for an hour. The Sister has marked you now, so she'll most certainly attempt to 'purify' you the first chance she gets. She'll bring you into a room, perform a ritual and banish all the corruption inside you. Of course, that will only work if you are a victim and not the culprit. So you just need to hold one of those in your mouth and swallow it as she reaches the end of the ritual. She'll believe she has saved you, you'll take some damage but be ok and you both walk away happy. Alright?'
You digest her words. She makes it sound easy and if these little gum balls she's given you work as she claims they do then it really would be that easy. Surely the ritual will eat into your malice but that's probably a price you'll have to pay. You can always point the Church towards Aria afterwards just by mentioning the bracelet. Aria probably won't be happy if she finds out you pushed them towards her, but you can feign ignorance. You'll admit that they have the jewel so that could just as easily be the smoking gun that leads them to her. She can't prove that you gave them the nod, even if she might suspect it.
'And how much are these suppressants going to cost me?' you ask. You want her to believe you are weak, not stupid. She giggles.
'I don't know if you actually have anything here of value to me, do you?' she taunts, her gaze flitting towards your sister, who has been clinging to your side the entire time. You doubt Lucy completely understands what is going on, but it doesn't bother her, your work on her soul guarantees that. You understand Aria's implication, though.
'If you think for a moment that I'll be giving you Lucy for this bag of sweets...' you say, trying to sound as much as possible like cornered prey trying to sound tough. You don't think a bold approach will upset her. Aria has responded well to confidence before and it works again here. She laughs and shakes her head.
'No need for that right now,' she says, leaving the threat hanging in the air, 'for now I'll just settle with permission to come round here whenever I like. I am your big sister after all! I should spend time with my darling younger siblings, shouldn't I?' You don't really know what she plans to achieve by showing up here more often, but you can't see how it can hurt. She will most likely try to toy with you some more, but if she's actually here when the Church arrive to check the braclet that could be ideal. So you simply nod.
'That seems suspiciously fair of you,' you say, 'I don't suppose you wanting to stay here has anything to do with that weird braclet my mother is suddenly wearing and refuses to take off, right?' Her voice remains playful, though you feel more like she's taunting you.
'You don't like it?' she asks, 'I thought you'd appreciate a more relaxed attitude. And the view must surely have improved!' You shrug.
'There's relaxed,' you reply, 'and then there's streaking. I'm worried that my mother's reluctance to wear clothes will one day start to extend beyond the confines of the house. And then the shit will really hit the proverbial fan!' She laughs again.
'Don't worry about that!' she tries to assure you, 'I made sure to put some safeguards in place. There won't be any danger of it getting anyone in trouble.' You wouldn't really believe her if you hadn't obtained the truth directly from her soul fragment before now. But that isn't something you mention. You lean back, try to make it look as though you are toying with whether or not to ask Aria to take the thing off, before sighing and relenting.
'There is one other thing I should probably tell you,' you mention. Aria's eyebrows raise, her eyes sparkling with intrigue.
'Oh?' she says, 'and what would that be?' You sense the challenge in her voice. Yes, she's enjoying this! Perhaps this is actually what she's wanted all along. She's played with so many lives for so long, was she really just waiting for someone to play with her?
'They have the jewel you gave me,' you inform her, straight up, meeting her in the eyes and gauging her reaction, 'I didn't know how to get them off of me. Like I said, they were on me right out of the gate. So I fobbed the jewel off on someone else to distract them.' Aria's eyes don't express much surprise. In fact she looks positively eager!
'Oh?' she practically hisses, her tounge running out to moisten her lips, 'that was bold of you! You didn't think I might be upset by something like that?' You shrug, gaining confidence in her reaction. Yes, she's played single player for so long she's actually been looking forward to some multiplayer action, even if that isn't necessarily co-op.
'You gave it to me without explaining what it was or what you did to it,' you tell her, 'it's a miracle it wasn't found on me the day that High Priestess nailed me. I figured you couldn't have been that concerned about it getting found if you would use it to set me up like that.' She laughs again.
'Very good,' she exclaims, 'things promise to be much more interesting now! This tiresome stalemate has always frustrated me, it might really be time to let loose a little bit!' Perhaps she's more unstable than you had originally suspected. You knew she was bored and looking for entertainment, but who knew that she'd seek that entertainment from anyone, even people who very much wanted her dead. And she'd drag you down with her if you weren't careful.
'I'm happy that you are excited by this,' you tell her, 'but I'm still focusing on trying to survive past tomorrow. As such, can I borrow a soul off of you? I'll return it the first chance I get!' Aria rolls her eyes playfully at you.
'Oh for fuck's sake, seriously?' she moans, 'you really need to stop being this pathetic if you are going to be taking on the Church with me. Alright, fine just take the damn soul! But you'd better start getting ready to pull your weight! Don't flake out on me or you'll be in big trouble when all the excitement starts!' She again reaches down the front of her top, why does she keep everything there, and hands you a single soul. Lowest grade, of course, but you don't need anything higher.
You realise she's just revealed more than perhaps she intended just now. Does she actually expect you to help her fight against the church? Is that because she suspects that you are stronger than you are letting on or does she just plan on using you as a sacrificial lamb when the time comes? Either way it seems to have put her in a good mood so you don't dare to question it, not when she didn't even ask for anything in return. Not that she might not still do that at a later date. No doubt she'll call in this favour when you least want her too. But that can be Future You's problem. Present You can simply celebrate meeting your quota for the second time and being able to survive your next encounter with your terrifying but oh so hot demon mistress!