Noth had been very busy since he’d gone out, and a month had flown by before he’d even noticed it. The assassins had unsurprisingly not stopped visiting him, intruding into his villa at least twice a week now. Noth had gotten so used to them showing up that he’d even started using them for practice with his powers. The boy was making good progress, getting better and better at making his demands with each new attacker he faced, and was now able to use the ability 6 times in a row before he got into dangerous territory with his bracelet and had to kill them off. It slightly disturbed him how little he cared about having to kill all these people. He was so worried, in fact, about his lack of care about them, that he started getting more serious with his prayers just to compensate. He’d even read some texts on funeral rites that the young priests would often study, just so he could better learn what words he was supposed to be saying.

Actually, Noth had also been very busy holing himself up in his library as well as of late. The most pressing reason was of course to look for a suitable name for his angel. He’d looked through various holy texts for mentions of the names of past saintesses, or female popes, choosing what he deemed to be the holiest of the names to add to his list. It had taken longer than he cared to admit to whittle them all down and decide on one, and he felt bad for the many times he’d had to warn his angel not to peek, but when he’d finally picked it, he felt so accomplished.

'Serris'.

She cried the first time he called her by her new name.

Her tears faded away just like the blood drops she perpetually dripped always did.

Noth couldn’t help but be fascinated by the blending of the two dripping liquids.

But even bigger than that fleeting fascination was how right it felt to call her name.

He couldn’t help but feel that with this new name, he’d managed to somehow prove that his angel was well and truly his.

There was another cause to look up names that had recently occurred as well.

Elillith, caring friend that she was, would help him to look after Noth’s new cat whenever she decided to come visit, and when the time had come for it to give birth, the boy had ran over to ask for her help immediately. The kitchen maid had insisted that he needed to calm down and that the cat would do just fine, but Noth’s nerves had never once left the edge during the entire night. He was so grateful to have the calm and steady Elillith there with him, someone who could be trusted to take care of the poor feline, should his high strung nerves betray and paralyze him. When everything had finally calmed down by the end of the night, Noth couldn’t help how his eyes wandered over to the angel who had been completely unhelpful in this situation. Serris had thoroughly insisted that she loved animals, but that she’d much rather be there for moral support, since she didn’t really feel like touching such a dirty cat. The boy chastised himself for having expected anything at all from the unreliable angel.

At least having a friend had proven fruitful, once again, so that was nice.

There was no need to force the angel to be what she wasn’t. Someone else could fit that role instead.

After everything was said and done, and all the felines had been nice and cleaned off, Noth was left with a litter of 7 kittens, and a very tired mother cat. They’d replaced the towels and blankets that the feline had crawled into, and made sure that there was food and water nearby, so now all they had to do was sit and admire the cute little twitching potatoes in front of them. Elillith brought up the topic of names and collars for the little babies, and Serris muttered an unhelpful comment that only Noth could hear. And the boy couldn’t do anything about it but grimace, because she was right; Noth hadn’t even bothered to name the mother cat anything but ‘Cat’ before, just like he’d done with his angel. He was really coming to dislike the topic of names.

On top of Noth’s reading and his practice with his powers, there was one more thing that had been eating up his time this past month: Training. As his neurotic mind continued to obsess and replay over the failure he’d had with the children, something unexpected caught his attention. Noth realized that if there’d been more than one thug in that situation, he might have actually been in trouble. His bracelet was already in bad shape after he’d confronted just the one opponent, and even though he’d been practicing to increase the amount of times he could use his demands, he actually very much disliked that it was his only source of attack. Yes, he could just wish instead of demand, and yes, that would do much less damage to his bracelet, but there was no way that in a real fight his enemies would just let him quickly make all the wishes he wanted. At the end of the day, being able to do a simple one word demand was just much more suited to the situation.

The only answer Noth could think up on such short notice was to start training his thin, teenage body up.

Thankfully his father hadn’t even batted an eye at the request for a trainer. The Earl was just happy that his son was no longer in the depressed trance from before. Honestly, Noth was pretty sure that if he’d asked his poor worried and thankful father for a gold mine at the moment, the man would have actually considered it. It only took Ruth Kieran a day to decide on the new instructor, simply choosing a retired knight from the local town and paying the man off to not speak of this to anyone. It would start rumours if people found out that someone from a lineage of powerful [Warriors] needed lessons. Loud enough talk could lead to the church asking questions, and they already disliked Noth enough; There was no reason to give them any excuses to pay any closer attention to him.

The knight himself was a big burly man with the corresponding [Great Warrior] abilities. He’d served in a number of wars and monster raids, and even mentioned having to fight off a few demons during his service, too. Age catches up to everyone eventually, however, and with such age, he’d slowed down and lost the strength he’d once had. The knight had had no choice but to retire once he’d made it into his 60’s, and had been living in relative peace for the past couple of years. He explained to Noth that he’d been enjoying his newfound freedom, but when the Earl called on him he decided that he’d been getting bored lately anyways. Besides, who could pass up joining in on such a hush hush situation? The knight seemed to find the fact that he was being paid hush money to teach the boy, combined with the order that he wasn’t allowed to talk to the servants, extremely interesting.

Noth was determined to do his best to not let the nosey old man find out a single damn thing.

***

Thergurd shuffled the papers on his desk around with a bored look on his face. His neck folds slightly jiggled as he looked left and right, scanning over contracts in front of him. After a few moments he sighed, stroking his plump, rumbling stomach. He really was in no mood for this right now. If anything, he was feeling hungry again. He got up and made his way out of the poorly lit office, strolling down the pathway and stopping in front of a well armed man.

“Therrus is out for the evening, so I’ll have to have you show me the latest stock.”

The young guard’s face wavered for a moment, but he did his best to quickly hide it, bowing to the portly man and undoing the lock on the door he’d been guarding. The duo entered with the guard at the lead, the dank dungeon they were now treading in echoing with the sounds of their steps, as well as faint sobbing and low tortured moans. They stopped in front of a particular cage that was tucked up against one of the cells, one with a small maroon, goblin-looking creature. It had tiny horns adorning its head, and the littlest wings fluttering upon its back.

“An imp! I see Therrus was successful in procuring the lesser demon I’d tasked him with. Good, good… And the [Gifted] children?”

Once again the young guard’s face wavered, this time falling into a grimace. He took them both over to a cell further down the hall. This one held two children inside of it, both huddling up together and whimpering in fear, their wrists and feet restrained by chains. The guard couldn’t help the tremble in his voice as he reported to the man, fearing what the bad news he had to deliver would bring.

“These two came in a few days ago. It took the man we hired a week to track them both down, and then he had to wait until they left their homes to nab ‘em, which apparently also took a few days. Supposedly that’s why they arrived so behind schedule.”

“Ah yes I see. That’s what we get for using such an amateur this time. But, there seems to be a problem here.”

The pig of a man turned and looked the guard straight in his eyes. His arm jiggled slightly as he lightly pointed towards the cell.

“I ordered 5 children. Why is it that I only see 2? Judging by their looks, I seem to be missing the [Greater Charming Beauty], the [One Who Hears], and even the forsaken one.”

As the guard lowered his head and started to tremble, Thergurd narrowed his eyes and crossed his arms, clearly fed up with how the young guard was stalling. After gathering his courage for a few minutes, a response was finally spat out, along with a deep bow.

“I’m so sorry, sir! We hired a separate man at first to catch all five of the kids, but then he never showed back up. It’s been almost a month now, and there’s still no word from him, so we went ahead a week ago and hired a good tracker to do the job instead. From what I’ve heard, the first man’s disappearance is one of the things Mr. Therrus went out to check today, and the second man we hired is still trying to catch the other three kids.”

Thergurd let out a piggish snort, his obvious displeasure increasing a notch with this new news. The porcine man absolutely hated having his plans interrupted, not to mention that he had patrons who would be waiting for the goods as well. The rumbling of his tummy only increased along with his anger, and as his eyes scanned over the two shivering children, a wicked grin pushed back his oversized cheeks. He quickly did some mental weighing of their worth, and eventually motioned towards one of them. The fearful guard didn’t miss a beat, thankful that he hadn’t been chosen instead. He separated the desperately clinging children and grabbed up the chosen one, hauling her down the hall and into a dimly lit room at the end.

The only things in this new room were a small but sturdy table, a chair, a plate, a spear-sized skewer, and a dastardly looking cleaver.

The child quivered and whimpered as she was placed down on the little table, her head hanging uncomfortably off the end of it despite every effort she made to lift it up. By the time she started to feel a little light headed from all the blood pooling in her brain, the door opened. Thergurd entered, the relieved guard exited, and not a single word was exchanged. The terrified girl’s gaze was practically glued on the portly man’s eyes. They seemed crazed, looking almost as if he were drugged, from his excitement. The man sat down in the little wooden chair with a loud creak and produced a large napkin from somewhere, placing it along the chest of his clothes as if he were about to enjoy a great feast.

And he was.

Thergurd was going to have a very enjoyable feast.

It had been a while since he’d gotten to enjoy such a fresh one like this.

His mouth was watering.

His stomach was practically roaring in demand.

He grabbed up his cleaver and raised it high.

The countenance of a madman was etched across his features.

The screaming child only managed to keep up her screams for the first chop.

Nothing but gurgling came out until the second chop.

By the third chop she no longer had a head to gurgle with.

Thergurd hated having his food look at him, so he quickly removed her head and tossed it away into the corner, letting it roll forgotten along the dirty floor as he got to work cracking open his feast.

Yes, young girls were definitely a wonderful meal.

Perhaps if he couldn’t quickly find good enough buyers he’d take his time enjoying the other girl as well.

***

At this same time, Therrus had arrived at the alley he usually met with the hired thugs in. He’d scoured the outskirts of the slums for almost two hours, searching for the stupid bastard who’d been dumb enough to stand up one of his father’s requests. So far every lead seemed to prove insignificant. The best information Therrus had been able to find was that his quarry had been seen chasing some children into a nearby alley a few days ago. Although he hadn’t found much in the alley he’d been pointed towards besides an abandoned cart, he had decided to do a thorough check of the other nearby alleys and streets, just to be extra doubly sure.

Yes, Therrus had learned to be very very thorough over the years.

He had a habbit of running his fingers over the nubs on his right hand where his pinky and ring finger used to be, whenever he needed to be reminded to be thorough.

Trauma was an excellent teacher to not repeat the past.

Therrus was terribly determined not to see his fingers disappear into his father’s mouth ever again.

As he roamed along the alleyway, his keen eyes were suddenly pulled towards something; An oddly shaped lump was peeking out underneath a cloth. It looked as if whatever was underneath had been hastily covered with some dirty and forgotten rug had been lying nearby, and left there. Therrus was far too dutiful to leave this rug unturned, and of course lifted it up to take a look at what it was hiding.

He instantly regretted being so thorough.

Underneath the rug was the thug he’d hired. The man’s burly limbs had been twisted and tangled around in all different directions, and his head was lying at an odd angle as if his neck had been snapped by a great force. His mouth was wide open in anguish even in death, and it was precisely because it was so open that Therrus could notice what might just have been the most disturbing fact of them all; The man was missing a throat. His wide open mouth was just a mouth, ending abruptly as soon as it reached the end of his teeth, almost like a doll.

The grotesqueness and unusual nature of the corpse left Therrus speechless. He moved on reflex, immediately putting the rug that had been covering the body back into place once he’d seen everything. It wasn’t hard to guess why someone had put it there in the first place, now. Therrus left the alley swiftly, pulling up his collar and doing his best to blend in with the street crowd, hoping that no one noticed him leaving and later fingered him for this disgusting murder. So many thoughts raced through his mind as he tried to understand what he’d just seen. The situation was so confusing, so abnormal. But in the end, there was only one sure, hated outcome.

Therrus would have to question the kids his father wanted if he planned to learn any more about the man's disturbing death.

They’d be able to tell him what happened.