Caidie caught a glimpse of two slender revolvers, and before she could scrutinize them further, they whisked away into Aza'zel's backhands.
"There," said Aza'zel, undisguised jubilation in his tone of voice. "I've kept my promise, I owe you nothing!"
"Your Highness!" Caidie exclaimed, complaining in a manner uncharacteristic of her thirteen-year-old persona from the past.
Aza'zel knew he couldn't win this argument with such half-hearted unreasonable acts. Thus, he skillfully shifted the topic by saying, "It's time for my daily nourishment and the follow-up lessons on the four arts! This topic has to end here, dear Caidie!"
Watching this young chap put on a dignified act, Caidie felt so exasperated, she started laughing. No matter how Aza'zel tried to put on an image befitting his imperial upbringing under the tutelage of the former Disgraced Queen, Rebecca, his baby fat and thin frame wouldn't cooperate.
It was at this moment that the duo heard the chime of a bell. Aza'zel's ears twitched visibly, a testament to how keen his sense of hearing was, making one wonder how on earth had he not heard it when the aria stopped playing.
Caidie was also in awe of the young boy's perceptiveness to the passage of time, as she hadn't anticipated his lackluster of an excuse to fit well with the chiming bell.
As the sound echoed, Aza'zel hopped off the wooden counter, and with a twitch of his ears, he seemed to perceive an illusory world of insubstantial details taking shape within earshot.
This world seemed fleeting, about to disperse like the echoes of the soft chime lingering therein. Knowing that this perceived world was limited to the lifespan of the distant echoes, Aza'zel rushed through the open door to the library and into the vacant hallways.
There were but a few rules in this empty mansion, and one of them forbade closing the doors.
Aza'zel seemed like he was escaping certain doom as he shuttled through the hollow hallways with familiar ease. His footfalls were light, borderline soundless as he withheld from creating and disruptive noise.
As he dashed away, muffled hums and hisses entangled his senses. Reflexively, Aza'zel would halt his march by tapping his toes gently, deviating his center of gravity and revolving in place, relying on the soles of his feet to pivot and evade thin needles that threatened to puncture his vest and abdomen.
One stray needle poked through the biceps of his right arm, the sensation not unlike a mosquito's bite.
Numbness Aza'zel was well too familiar with permeated his flesh, and his right arm hung limb to his side, the uncontrollable weight causing his rhythmic steps to falter.
Where there was a first, there would always be a second and a third. In no time at all, Aza'zel found himself riddled with hair-thin needles that numbed his body from head to toe.
The young boy laughed bitterly, coughing. "I'm not there yet… Eh? T-this drug feels a little too potent…"
Near the end of his sentence, Aza'zel gradually fell into unconsciousness, his lean body tilting back, falling into the fragrant embrace of Caidie who was following in tow.
"Was this necessary?" Caide asked softly, her dark eyes level with her mother's gaze down the hallway.
Rebecca stepped into the dimly lit corridor, her fair yet gloved palms hoisting an embellished cartridge box molded from metal alloys of unknown origins.
"The pain would have been overwhelming for him if we did it otherwise," Rebecca explained softly. "However, there wasn't that much drug left, so I'm afraid you'll have to bear with it, my dear."
"I don't mind a little bit of pain," Caidie responded with a sigh, her fair hand dancing along Aza'zel's chest even as she unbuttoned the vest.
She continued in the same breath, "I simply believe that it's too early—he's too young. What if the metamorphosis leaves hidden deficiencies?"
Rebecca shook her head. "His body is devoid of source energy, more so than you and I. You should be worrying about yourself more than him, as no matter how much the continent regresses over time, your body is afflicted by polluted source energy nonetheless."
Rebecca unlocked the box through the mechanism, revealing two luminous gems, their bodies swirling with nine-colored prismatic light.
"Such pure source energy…" Rebecca exclaimed, but her eyes had not a trace of covetousness, envy, or hesitation.
There was a noticeable tremor reflected within Caidie's pitch-black eyes. This small gem was the difference between the disgraced race and the myriad sacred races. Years of regression prevented their people from condensing source crystals, hence preventing them from growing together with the world.
"Our ancestors thought everything through before leaving behind these two source crystals… One of them is for His Highness, and the other is for the destined servant to accompany His Highness, and serve as his eyes, sword, and shield. I'll have to trouble you with this thankless task, my dear Caidie…" Rebecca's soft voice accompanied her light steps as she approached the two.
Caidie remained silent for a short moment before voicing out a question, "What about you, Mother?"
There was a hint of unnatural stress on the word 'mother', but the mere mention of this word brought a smile to Rebecca's face.
She said, "The metamorphosis will tap into your minor eight-meridians and major twelve-meridians. However, the body of a woman is quite delicate, and I'm no longer a virgin maiden, which would complicate the metamorphosis in unpredictable ways."
Rebecca chuckled to herself, adding, "It's not that I haven't thought about going outside by myself, how can I entrust His Highness to my immature, dear daughter?"
Even as she spoke, she plucked one of the two source crystals with light hands, and during Caidie's slight lapse of judgment and focus, Rebecca thrust the source crystal into Aza'zel's solar plexus.
There was a muffled bang, an eruption of multicolored light, and a patch of fabric around the young boy's chest exploded to bits as hair-thin fissures spread all over his body. It resembled a porcelain vase on the verge of shattering apart, rendering Caidie's face pale as the young woman hurried to lay Aza'zel on the ground.
His chest undulated as his breathing, heartbeat, and the pulsing multicolored prismatic light fell into a rhythmic synchronization. His right palm flared gray, while his left, flared crimson.
His body quivered on high-tension frequencies as the gray and crimson flares blazed a path through his veins and toward the source crystal, igniting it alight with overwhelming, radioactive heat.
When that happened, his heartbeat and the pulsing crystal fell out of sync momentarily, and Rebecca's heart couldn't help but rush to her throat.
Long and agonizing, dull moments flitted by, but everything quickly fell back in order.
Rebecca heaved a sigh of relief, ignoring the young man and his convulsing body as she smiled weakly at her daughter.
"Your turn…"
Little was left to be said about what Caidie and Aza'zel had experienced from pain as three full days and nights went by. The former had every second engraved into her body, mind, and soul—it was no exaggeration to say that were it not for the rubber gag contributed by her mother, Rebecca, she might have bitten her tongue in search of an early release.
Aza'zel had it better, as the young man had been unconscious throughout, courtesy of an overdosed mixture of anesthetics, but the metamorphosis had indeed squeezed out whatever sweat and moisture stored in his small body, and yet a hint of crimson joined the ranks of the former, presumably blood rushing through his pores.