After calling "Cut!" on Apollonia's tragic demise, I made my way over to Vivienne. She seemed to be avoiding eye contact, but I pressed on, determined to clear the air.
"You're quite a good actress," I said, trying to sound casual. "I can see you're passionate about your career. I admire that."
"Thanks," she replied with a small smile. "You're unexpectedly great at acting too."
I chuckled inwardly. 'Unexpectedly'? She wasn't wrong - I was as shocked as anyone by my newfound acting chops.
"Well, I hope you had fun acting in my film," I said, extending my hand. "Hope to work with you in the future."
She shook my hand, her grip firm. "I'd have had more fun if you weren't using your position as director to take advantage of me," she quipped, a mischievous glint in her eye.
I laughed, relieved we were back to our usual banter. "Take advantage of you? If anything, I think I'm the one being taken advan—"
She cut me off with a light punch to the shoulder. "Ow! Okay, okay. Maybe I'm not a good director after all. I'm a bad demon, remember?"
Once our laughter died down, I couldn't help but ask, "By the way, why did you suddenly run away from the room yesterday?"
Her smile faded, replaced by a guarded expression. "Hmph. That's none of your business, Your Highness," she said sarcastically, turning to walk away.
I scratched the back of my head, watching her go. Working with an actress like her had definitely been... an experience.
As we packed up and headed back to Ferland City, I couldn't help but feel relieved that our time in Ashen Plains had gone smoothly. The Asmodeus family hadn't interfered - a small miracle in itself.
Hours later, we were back in the familiar chaos of Ferland City.
As the crew dispersed and the actors said their goodbyes, I found myself lingering, watching Vivienne disappear into the crowd.
Me and my team went our separate ways to rest.
***
The next few days flew by in a whirlwind of activity. Despite our collective inexperience in filmmaking, we were starting to find our rhythm. Each scene we shot felt a little smoother, a little more natural. It was like watching a bunch of fledgling demons learn to fly - awkward at first, but gradually gaining confidence.
"You know," George remarked one day as we wrapped a particularly complex scene, "I think we might actually be getting good at this."
I grinned, clapping him on the shoulder. "Don't jinx it, my friend. We've still got a long way to go."
Then came the big one - the death of Don Vito Corleone. Rocky outdid himself, his performance so moving that I almost forgot he was the same guy who used to sell me tickets at the theater.
After that, we moved on to the funeral scene at "Hades," our stand-in for a demon graveyard.
It was a somber affair, at least on camera. Off-camera, it was more like a circus, with extras tripping over headstones and our makeup artist chasing after demons whose horns kept poking through their wigs.
The four family heads gathered to pay their respects, each one a character straight out of a demon's fever dream. I'd cast powerful, intelligent-looking demons for these roles, but Don Barzini was something special. The wolf demon we'd snagged for the part looked like he'd stepped right out of a nightmare, with piercing eyes, pointed ears, and a tail that seemed to have a mind of its own.
As we rolled camera, I was blown away by the performances.
These "rock bottom" actors were pouring their hearts out, their faces a masterclass in subtle emotion. They sympathized with Michael on the surface, all sad eyes and comforting pats on the shoulder. But underneath, you could see the gleam of satisfaction in their eyes, the barely concealed joy at the Corleone family's misfortune.
"Cut!" I called, feeling a surge of pride. "That was... that was incredible, everyone."
Rocky sidled up to me, still in his Don Vito makeup despite being very much dead in the scene. "Not bad for a bunch of demon rejects, huh?"
I nodded, watching as our wolf-demon Don Barzini chatted amiably with the other family heads, his tail wagging slightly.
***
With Don Vito laid to rest, we jumped forward in our story timeline. 'Weeks' had passed since the funeral, and it was time for one of the most iconic scenes in the film - the baptism.
Our location? A Solarus Church right in the heart of the Gloomstone District.
The irony wasn't lost on me. A human god's church in a demon city? If you'd told me about this in my previous life, I'd have laughed you out of the room. But here, in this world? It was just another Tuesday.
Solarus, the human Sun God, had quite the following, even among demons, though it was a minority.
It was a fact that still boggled my mind sometimes.
This divine popularity had led to a subset of demons becoming more... well, tame isn't quite the right word, but let's go with "less prone to spontaneous acts of chaos and destruction."
Sure, the majority of demons might look down their noses (or snouts, or whatever) at these Solarus-worshipping minorities, but you couldn't deny the power the human god held.
It was like watching a bunch of cats suddenly decide to follow the ways of a particularly charismatic dog - unexpected, but undeniably intriguing.
Using a scene where a demon family like the Corleones gets baptized in a Solarus church wasn't just acceptable - it was relatable. I could already imagine demons across the kingdom nodding along, seeing a bit of themselves or their neighbors in our fictional family.
Of course, in the world of our film, things were a bit different. The Corleones and the other families existed in a version of Empirica that was a melting pot of races, not the human-dominated powerhouse it was in reality. We'd taken some creative liberties with place names too, crafting a world that was familiar yet distinctly our own.
We arrived at the church, a surprisingly grand affair for a demon district. The demon priest, an actual man of the cloth (or whatever the demonic equivalent is), had agreed to let us use the place for filming. Apparently, having film crews in churches wasn't all that unusual. Who knew?
I couldn't help but chuckle to myself, though. If this priest had any idea what we were about to film - Michael denying the evil in his heart while simultaneously ordering a series of brutal assassinations - well, let's just say we might have found ourselves looking for a new location.
As my crew bustled around, setting up lights and cameras, I watched the demon baby who'd be playing Michael's godchild. The little tyke was gurgling happily, blissfully unaware of the pivotal role it was about to play in our demonic drama.
The priest approached me, his face solemn. "Do you reject the forces of evil and darkness?" he intoned, clearly expecting me to repeat after him.
I nodded, fighting to keep a straight face. If only he knew.
We breezed through the church scene, the contrast between the holy setting and what we were actually filming giving me a perverse thrill.
Then it was on to the real meat of the sequence - the assassination of the four family heads.
By the time we wrapped for the day, everyone was exhausted but buzzing with excitement. We were in the home stretch now, the end of filming finally in sight.
Later that night, I found myself alone in the studio as usual.
As I began editing the baptism scene, intercut with the brutal assassinations, I felt a surge of excitement. This was it - the moment where everything came together, where Michael's transformation from reluctant outsider to cold-blooded Don was complete.
Watching the footage, seeing myself swear to reject evil while images of violence flashed across the screen, I couldn't help but feel a twinge of... something. Pride? Guilt? Maybe a bit of both.
I shook off the feeling. This was art, after all. And if it made people uncomfortable, well, that was kind of the point, wasn't it?
As I continued to work late into the night, piecing together our demonic masterpiece, I couldn't help but wonder what people would think when they finally saw it. Would they understand what we were trying to say? Would they see past the horns and tails to the universal story underneath?
Only time would tell. But one thing was for sure - the Demonfather was almost ready to make his debut. And demon world or human world, nobody was going to know what hit them.