Page 85 of The Misfit Mage and His Darling Demon

Abe ripped loose from the strings holding him in place of this memory and approached me. This wasn’t right. This was an illusion.

“No one could ever love you.” His glare cut through me, almost as foul as it was on the battlefield when he encased me inside the orb so long ago. “You’re unlovable, Beelzebub.”

The symbols on the Diabolic orb glowed. No. I wouldn’t allow it.

I raced out of the room, refusing to be locked away again. Never again.

“It’s pointless, false devil,” Abe and Eligos’ voices chased me along the walls, following me at every turn. “You’re worthless.”

I’m not. I am loved. Wally loves me. He sees every flaw I possess and loves me still.

“Bez.” Wally’s beautiful voice cut through the taunting hatred. “Bez, help me!”

I flew through the empty Magus Estate, searching for Wally.

Each hall was empty, filled with haunting words from Abe and Eligos.

Finally, I caught Wally’s scent and ran along the borders of this illusion.

He lay at the bottom of the stairs, bloody, lifeless. No. I shook my head until Wally’s corpse vanished. This was a lie.

Wally screamed from afar. A sharp blade plunged into him, the sound of it gutted his insides, and he collapsed somewhere deep within the estate.

“It’s not real. It’s not real.” I covered my ears. “This is an illusion.”

Wally’s bloodcurdling wail drained all the strength in my body. I collapsed to the floor, crawling ahead, compelled to chase the screams. To find him. Save him. I had to save him. Not here. Not in this lie. Outside this illusion.

Every second, every step, a new cry followed. Another death of Wally before I reached him before I saved him. A thousand times over, he died, leaving me searching the estate only to find corpses.

“You’ll be alone forever,” Eligos and Abe shouted in unison, an echoing horror only drowned out by Wally’s dying screams.

Eligos hadn’t shared his mind with me to unravel my secrets; he’d done so in order to lock me in a Diabolic nightmare of his making, forcing me to experience Wally’s death again and again and again.

My essence was too weak to overpower this trap, my thoughts too fractured to navigate my own mind.

25

Walter

I had wriggled loose from the essence pouring free from the orbs and crawled away, but I couldn’t catch my breath. Couldn’t move anymore. I had to stand, fight, stop these newly freed demons from killing me or Kell. My eyelids drooped, heavy and exhausted. I pushed my hands off the ground, but my body collapsed, crumpling onto the floor, refusing to obey me. I closed my eyes…just for a second. All I needed was a second of rest, and then I’d figure out how to fix this problem.

Something slurped nearby.

I snapped my eyes open and shot up, panting. Essence had coiled around Kell’s leg, wrapped around her calf like a giant slug.

“No,” I shouted. Using the Demon’s Demise, I sliced the spongy black tar until it fell back and flailed about.

I grabbed Kell’s unconscious body, dragging her away from the essence before it regrouped and attacked us. It didn’t,though. As I retreated, the essence slid away in the opposite direction.

It left a trail of slime as it wiggled away, reaching the glittery arm of the Fae, whose body had been scattered across the engine room. Once the essence reached the limb, it coiled around the arm, slurping it down like it had tried with Kell.

It wasn’t the only released essence acting this way. All the pieces I saw slithered around aimlessly. There was something very off about these Diabolics who’d been released. None of them sought out me or Kell, not really. Yes, one latched onto her leg, but it should’ve attempted to possess her. Possess either of us in an effort to gain a host body and recover. Instead, all the essence did was lunge out, feeding on stray bits of magic, from the flesh of the Fae corpse to the magic of Kell’s witch hat.

I ran over and kicked a chunk of essence before it had fully crawled inside Kell’s hat. Picking it up, I chucked it farther away. Again, essence sniffed out the magic and moved at a snail’s pace to reach the hat.

There was something very odd about this. Suddenly, it made sense why Eligos hadn’t released these demons, only resurrecting the six in the orbs posted high up on the railing. Perhaps they’d been contained too long—but Bez had been locked away for nearly fifty years. How long would it take for a Diabolic to break down and lose their sense? I also had to take into account how the engine room drew upon their energy, tearing it apart and funneling it throughout the villa.

That was why Baron Novus continued collecting demons. However he’d merged them with Fae magics to break through Hell dimensions had caused the Diabolic essence to deteriorate, chiseling away at the consciousness of the demon, and probably burned the essence to nothing over time. Those six acted as the main source of transportation, and the other hundreds workedas secondary sources. Eligos sought to use a devil’s essence because it would be infinite, never diminishing.

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