"Sir, shouldn't we be looking for the murderer?"
"We weren't told too, it's not like the circle didn't know about them. I'm sure they have a reason, perhaps this is a way to make the humans reliant on us during the war, by weakening their weapon manufacturers and government."
"So, you think we're the ones doing the killings?"
The 13th apostle looked at the person who asked him the question. He stared at them without answering.
"I'm sorry sir, I'm asking too much from you. Please accept my apology." The man said with a bow.
The apostle looked away and shook his head, "I actually don't think we're the ones doing the killings, but I don't think the demons are either. When John visited the party, nobody came with him, I'm certain they were investigating the killings. I think it's a third party, maybe they have an agenda, maybe they just like killing people in the upper-class."
"I see… What if his squad did the killings while he attended the party?"
"None of them would do something like that, I don't think. They'd file to get another squad to do it. Anyway, let's go get some food, I'm starving. You'd think those humans would actually give us a nice place to stay."
"Cheapskates, sir. Cheapskates."
"Let's go here, they have good rev-"
The apostle was quickly shoved aside, and a black-haired kid ran by. The apostle assistant hand started glowing before the apostle hit him on the head.
"It's just a kid, calm down."
Then a familiar adult shoved the apostle aside, he was also black-haired.
"SORRY!" John yelled as he pushed aside a random pedestrian, "I just want to talk!" He shouted to the kid ahead of him.
"Milo was right about him being a rat though, good lord." John thought as he chased the kid through different shops, across the landscape, and city infrastructure.
Eventually the kid started slowing down due to exhaustion and John tackled him.
"For… fucks… sake…" John panted out as he laid on top of them. At this point John had been chasing him for nearly thirty minutes.
John sat on him and quickly whipped out his phone and typed away on it. Not long after he shoved it into his pocket and got up.
"You alright kid?" He said as he turned around to help the kid up. He extended his hand towards the kid on the ground.
But he froze when a scent entered his nose, he could only faintly mummer out, "What the hell are you?"
The kid only stared angrily at John; he gave no answer. In fact, it looked like he was ready to pounce on John even if it meant dying. John slightly took a step back when he noticed this.
"John. Mind telling me why you're chasing someone down the streets without care for your surroundings?"
"Hmm?" John turned after hearing the familiar voice, "Oh, it's just you. I just need to talk with this kid, don't worry about it."
"About what?"
John glared at the apostle, "Didn't I just say don't worry about it?"
After a moment of silence, "Well, now I'm really intrigued." The apostle said with a grin.
"You angels should really learn to mind your own business." John turned away from the kid on the floor and stared at the apostle and his party as he put his hands into his pockets.
"O-hoh. You don't need to provoke me you know? We both want to kill each other, that much is bright as day!" The apostle laughed, "So, why don't we just get it over with? We might not see each other for a while and I'd rather get it done, here and now."
"Can't, I'm a busy person. Something you apostles wouldn't know since all you do is sit on your asses all day."
The apostle's eyes went wide, and he shouted, "We are chosen from BIRTH! Chosen to kill the first prince when we find him! You better watch your mouth, John!"
"Well, why were you at a party for the mayor? Or better yet why are you outside a random coffee shop? Shouldn't you be looking for the prince?" John laughed. "You lot are so pathetic…"
The apostle was silent for a moment before he glared at John and mumbled, "I know why you're here John. Same reason as me. I know you don't give a shit about the killings."
John glared back without responding.
The apostle continued, "There are rumors that the first prince is here in Riftmoor. I bet that's something intrig-"
Then, a group of three walked out from the random coffee shop, as they did, rain started to fall from the sky. It was William, Charlie, and Milo. Seeing this John could only tilt his head in disbelief.
"Why were you guys at a coffee shop instead of heading over here?!"
"Oh, well, we saw you at the window, but Milo hadn't finished eating his bagel." Charlie said with a smirk.
"What?! Don't throw me under the bus, Miss I-Burned-My-Mouth-On-My-Coffee-So-We-Had-To-Wait-For-It-To-Cool-Down!" Milo retorted.
"I have no idea what you're talking about." Charlie shrugged.
"Guys!" John could only continue to stare at them in disbelief.
"To be fair, we were hungry, and they did have good food." William mumbled.
"Oh, fuck this." The apostle said and drew a sword laced with thorns, much like his outfit.
Charlie quickly raised her hands and a flaming ethereal bow appeared. She nocked an arrow and shot it towards the apostle. Milo drew a sword from thin air and dashed towards the party behind the apostle. William grabbed a handgun from seemingly nowhere and went in between Charlie and Milo. William aimed the gun towards the back of the apostle's party.
In the apostle's party a similar thing occurred, someone drew a sword, another a gun, and the one who tried to attack the teen's hands glowed once more.
The apostle blocked the arrow Charlie fired and charged towards John, ignoring his squad mates. John did the same and ignored the apostle's squad too. Once more the strange mist enveloped John and scales grew on him.
Quickly the street erupted into chaos. Those with swords assaulted those with guns, while those with guns assaulted those with magic, and those with magic assaulted those with swords.
But strangely, the people with swords defended the magic wielders on their team. The people with guns defended those with swords on their team and those with magic defended those with guns on their team. The battle created a well-defined loop.
It was a battle of perfection, and who could keep it up the most. Anytime a bullet was sent towards those with magic, those with swords would deflect the bullet or cut it in half.
William ran back to the café to get into a defendable position, but a swordsman chased him down. Before the swordsman caught William, William fired a couple of rounds at him. The gun's muzzle flashed illuminating the nearby surroundings, and the rounds echoed throughout the tall buildings.
The nearby cars swerved to avoid the area with fighting, and the people who were walking were now running away with screams.
But it didn't matter as the swordsman deflected the bullets with his blade and cut a few in half. William clicked his tongue and jump backwards into the café, through the window, creating a deafening crash and sending glass everywhere.
Before the swordsman could chase after William, he noticed a flaming arrow streaking towards him and he narrowly avoided it. But another was sent towards him, and it pierced into his shoulder.
It tore a significant hole in his shoulder and the arrow fizzled out of existence. As it did, the wound cauterized itself, but the swordsman found himself unable to wield his sword which was two-handed.
This was the first break in the battle and the angels quickly collapsed after that. The swordsman, stunned from the pain was almost hit in the head, but a well-placed bullet knocked Charlie's arrow off course.
The shot came from the angel wielding the gun. But another round ran out from the café and an angel fell into the wet pavement. The angel that used magic had been shot in the neck and instantly died.
Seeing this Milo charged the angel with the gun. He raised his sword and deflected all the bullets being sent at him.
When he arrived, Milo quickly moved his foot back and raised his blade up to his chest. An instant later, the gun user fired a round at Milo's feet and one at his chest, but they were quickly avoided.
Milo swiped his sword up and cut the hand of the angel off, the one which held the gun. Then he brought it down with all of his strength, embedding the sword into the gun user's collar. It went deep enough to almost sever him.
With those two dead, Charlie sought out the swordsman from earlier while William went to hide in a nearby alley after sneaking out of the café. It wasn't long until the swordsman was charred completely and riddled with scorching holes. Steam quickly rose from his body due to the rain pouring down on his corpse.
John and the apostle's fight was very different though. John was practically teleporting around the angel and sending lightning everywhere. The apostle on the other hand made the nearby plants rapidly grow while blocking John with his sword. There were even new plants raising out beneath the thick concrete. Every plant, regardless of if it had already been there or was new, was adorned with sharp thorns akin to barbed wire.
The larger plants were vine-like and would periodically shoot out to try and pierce John and his armor. They were very coordinated in their attack, pushing John back whenever he got to close to the apostle. Whenever he was far away, they tried to trap him instead.
Eventually the street was filled with the plants and Milo, William, and Charlie evacuated themselves to a safe distance. From that distance, William and Charlie fired at the apostle, splitting his concentration between them and John.
John on the other hand was relatively fine from the barbed plants. He avoided them nicely and the ones that managed to touch him couldn't penetrate the black scales covering him.
All of this happened within two minutes and the police were quick to arrive, their sirens drowned out by the gunfire from William, who had seemingly pulled a rifle out of nowhere. When the police arrived, they quickly fired upon John's squad, who, learning from the teen, retreated to hide in the sewers. They split up and ran in different directions once they reached the sewers.
John seeing that his backup was sent away by the police and that the police were supporting the apostle could only groan. Then his legs were suddenly ensnared by the plants, and he couldn't move. In fact, he fell over from the sudden stop and more plants dogpiled him.
Seeing this the apostle pounced at John and swung his sword down. John narrowly avoided it and grabbed the blade. Although he had strong scales covering him, the blade was exceptionally sharp.
It was designed to cut and pierce and not chop, hence him not once swinging towards John haphazardly. It was also why the blade was much sharper than most normal swords as it only had that one purpose.
Meaning, when John gripped the blade, it started digging into his hand, slipping between the scales. It made his hand start to bleed and caused his grip to loosen. Not soon after, the sword was ripped away from him. The apostle pulled it back and stabbed towards John's neck.
Bang! Bang! Bang!
Three shots echoed between the buildings, muffled slightly by the rain. One struck the apostle in the chin, and the other two struck his chest. The apostle slightly stumbled backwards and slowly fell to his knees. His eyes were widened, and he was bleeding rapidly.
The now jawless apostle fell over and started pulling himself towards John. As he did, his blood trailed along the concrete and plants, but was quickly being washed away by the water from the rain.
He reached John after some time and collapse on John's chest without being able to do anything. John lightly patted the apostle's head.
"It was nice to see you again, Sebastian." John said in a slightly sad voice as the plants around him started to wither away. John rested there for a moment as the police struggled to make their way towards John.
John stood up and gently placed Sebastian on the concrete where a nice little bed of moss had yet to wither. Then John disappeared from the scene entirely.
What nobody had noticed was the teen from before crawling through the thorny bushes, trying to reach the dead gunman from earlier. The teen had already made it to safety, but for some reason decided to help John. After reaching the gun, his body was covered in small cuts, but he crawled back through. After reaching his previous safe spot, he fired the three shots with expert decision and left through the sewers.
After leaving the scene, John called the other three and they met up at the warehouse. They needed a place to lie low and this place seemed perfect. The other three were just as confused as John had been when they arrived.
The locals stayed away from the party like before, but they didn't shoo them away this time. Probably because they noticed them bleeding and being completely wet from the rain. They rested and cleaned their wounds in a secluded corner of the strange warehouse. After a while it was night and they decided to get some rest. John on the other hand rarely slept, for some reason he didn't need to sleep that much.
But this caused him to usually sleep during the day, so he was nearly as pale as the teen from before, he also had deep bags under his eyes. So, instead of sleeping, John headed towards the teens house.
When he arrived, he entered nonchalantly and started searching through the books for something to read. Eventually he found an old book about an ancient demon legend.
The demon had been banished a long time ago and his body was killed. But the demon managed to keep his soul together and he started travelling to different worlds. It was a famous book because it was written over the course of centuries, using the knowledge of different time periods to make compelling stories.
In fact, the book was based off of a real demon. The real demon's name was Adrian Auclair, but because the demon who wrote the book didn't want to be cursed, he changed it to Mathias Leafe.
John flipped the book open started reading. But his heart skipped a beat in the next second.
"You should at least knock before entering someone's home."
John quickly looked over and saw the teen staring at him in a dark corner of the room.
"You scared the shit out of me!" He quietly shouted.
"And you broke into my house, twice, or technically thrice."
A silence grew between the two as they stared at each other.
"Why'd you go back last time?" John asked.
"A family heirloom."
"Why'd you kill those people?"
"Because I wanted to."
"I feel like there's more to it than that."
"Obviously."
The silence came back after John's rapid-fire questions ended.
"Who are you… and what are you?" John asked staring at the teen.
Instead of answering, the teen asked a question of his own, "That was an apostle, right?"
"Correct."
"Did they die?"
"Probably not. They're tougher than most."
"I see…" He looked down, in his lap was the box he had grabbed earlier. He opened the box and lifted the object inside up.
It was a silver bell that hung on a crimson ribbon. The bell itself was weirdly silent and very cold. The teen didn't care and just put it on his neck and tucked it under his shirt.
It didn't escape him that John's eyes widened upon seeing the bell, although he tried to hide it.
The teen looked up and stared into John's eyes. Eventually the teen spoke, "My name is Leonardo Blight, First Prince of the Kings."
John slightly tilted his head. He slightly opened his mouth before closing it. He repeated this a few times and they sat in silence once more.
Eventually John shook his head and said, "Give me a reason to believe that. Because there are a million reasons why I shouldn't."
"How many half-bloods are in the middle of bumfuck nowhere and even have a slight comprehension of what goes on with the Kings? I'll even go a step further and tell you things even you probably don't know."
"…" John was silent, only listening to the person in front of him.
"My father, Felix Blight, is the only demon King to have died. He was killed by the other two demon Kings. My mother, Lily Blight, originally Elizabeth Dalloway, was the first angel created by the angel Kings. She was recaptured by the angels. My mother's capturing and my father's death both happened semi-recently."
John narrowed his eyes after hearing this, he asked a question.
"Then why are you so young? When were you born?"
Without missing a beat, Leonardo said, "Because of my dormancy, something in which I have no say or control over. And I cannot answer your second question as I only have a handful of memories of my parents, none of which include my birthdate. But I suspect I am technically very old, although mentally and physically I am the youngest of the princes."
John leaned back in his seat, sitting upright.
"Mind if I smoke?" John said as he took out his cigarettes.
"If you smoke, I'm going to slap the shit out of you." Leonardo answered clearly.
"Allll right…" He hesitated slightly but put them away in the end, "I believe you by the way. About you being the first prince. It's very classified that he, well, you, were dormant for, well, practically forever."
John said, standing up, "As a Knight of the Abyss, it is my duty and honor to serve underneath you."
He bowed towards Leonardo, "Tell me to jump, and I shall only ask how high. Please give me orders."
"I don't care about any of that." Leonardo muttered.
John looked up and eventually stopped bowing when Leonardo spoke no further.
"You're different from the other princes. I assumed that you would want to reclaim your birthright, not that I expect a new King to be selected anytime soon to replace your father."
"As I said, I don't care about that."
"Then what do you care about?"
"Do you really want to know?"
"Yes sir."
"Drop the sir. And you're not to let anyone know about this, not even your squad mates."
"Yes s-" He caught himself, "Yes Leonardo."
"Just call me Leo. That was an order before, me asking you not to tell anyone. Another order is that you're going to be my confidant. Now… I'm sure you noticed the patterns."
"Yes, people relating to the government, military, and weapon manufacturing."
"It's not doing much, they're all puppets for the angels. I was hoping to kickstart the war, but I doubt that'll be happening until the angels or demons want it to." Leo said as he placed a finger on his temple.
"…" John was completely silent.
"So, then I was hoping to get lucky with someone where the humans would start the war. I also needed souls."
"Yes, I wanted to ask you about that. If you're a half-blood, why do you smell like an angel?"
"Don't worry about it, but I will die if I don't eat souls. My body isn't balanced anymore, it leans towards angelic, so I need demonic blood. I found that consuming souls can temporarily substitute the blood though." Leo said, he continued, "But starting the war with the humans wasn't panning out either, I was going to give up and go somewhere else. But then you showed up."
John looked slightly saddened as he looked at Leo. Then Leo did something that replaced his sadness with shock.
Leo bowed to John and asked him, "Please, can you take care of me? This isn't an order, but a request from the bottom of my heart. Help me accomplish my dream."
"Your dream?"
"To massacre the angels who took my mother and to eviscerate the demons who killed my father." He looked angrily at John and said in a harsh tone.
John replied after some time had passed, "It would be my honor…"