4.7: Dark and Mysterious
He caught a glimpse of someone moving past the bounds of the contest area; someone he didn't recognize; someone who had no place being in any areas restricted to the public. His body seemed to fade out of reality for a split second before he rematerialized, and walked silently down the hallway after the intruder.
He made no noise as he moved, his breathing calm and soft, his steps completely inaudible. Even drawing a pair of daggers from their sheathes under his coat was done in total and complete silence. The figure rounded another corner as he glided down the hallway behind them, readying himself to pounce on his unsuspecting victim. He turned the corner and leapt into motion, closing the distance between himself and the intruder in the blink of an eye. He was just about to plunge both razor sharp daggers into their back when they turned suddenly with a look of surprise on their face.
Several things happened at once.
The figure moved with liquid grace as they swept their arm upwards, swiping Judas's arm with a small blade that appeared in their hand. They used their momentum to flip backwards into a handspring, putting a fair bit of distance between themselves and their would-be attacker. Upon landing back on their feet, the figure held up both hands in a placating manner. Pulling down the facemask that obscured the lower half of their face and lowering the hood on their shadowy cloak, the figure studied Judas intently. Despite looking like a teenage girl, her glowing yellow eyes, slightly pointed ears, olive skin with a slight reddish tint, and elongated canines marked her as a full-blooded demonkin. A peculiar crescent moon shaped birthmark below her left eye immediately drew Judas's eye and caused his pulse to quicken slightly. Before he had a chance to say anything, however, the girl spoke in a rapid burst of exposition.
“Ohhellsyouscaredme! I'm uh… sorry for slashing you. I sorta have a ‘slash first and don't ask questions’ policy. It's gotten me into trouble a few times… hard to interrogate a corpse without the proper magic. In my defense… you weren't supposed to be able to sense me. Pretty impressive old man.”
Judas held up his arm and inspected the cut, seeing it was little more than a small scratch. As a familiar cold numbness began to spread up from the wound, a faint smile ghosted across his lips as he narrowed his eyes and stared at the demon girl.
“Death's Caress hmmm? Tell me… when did the Cult of Noctose start doing the bidding of angels?”
The demon girl's eyes went wide and she drew in a sharp breath.
“Death's what? Cult of what now? I don't know–”
Judas held up his hand to silence her as all traces of amusement on his face disappeared all at once.
“Save it, girl. I'm familiar enough with this poison to know its origins.”
The girl gave Judas a coy smile before shrugging. A small blade appeared in her hand and she absentmindedly began tossing it up into the air and catching it as she adopted a relaxed stance.
“Fine fine. You're right, old man. I am a member of the Cult of Noctose. And that is Death's Caress poison. But I don't know nothin’ about working for some damn halo. My master sent me here to eliminate a political rival of the Empress. Now… if you're as familiar with Death's Caress as you say… you know there is no known antidote. So if you would be so kind as to direct me to the person in charge of this castle before you die, I promise to make her death quick and painless.”
Judas let out a wry chuckle that echoed eerily in the otherwise silent hallway. He shook his head and narrowed his eyes as he glared at the demon girl, doing his best to avoid staring at her birthmark.
“You're wrong on several counts, girl. First, if you think I'm going to stand aside while you threaten my mistress, you are sorely mistaken. Second, the woman you've been sent here to kill is no political rival of Empress Infernos, but is in fact her successor and future wife. Finally, just because there is no known antidote to Death's Caress, doesn't mean there isn't one. I am intimately familiar enough with it to have no fear of it.”
Judas held up his arm as he finished speaking, pulling his jacket off his left side and quickly rolling up his sleeve. As the girl studied his arm, she could see that the faint dark blue blotches that spiderwebbed out from the small scratch were already beginning to fade. As she continued to stare in utter amazement, she suddenly let out a scream as a stabbing pain lanced through her head. The vision in her right eye dimmed and then faded, and she had to fight against the intense agony to keep her knees from giving out.
When sent out on a mission, every member of the Cult of Noctose was given a special hex that could be mentally activated if they were ever at risk of being captured. Once triggered, the hex that had been placed somewhere in their body would release a potent cocktail of poisons that would both end their lives and completely dissolve their body within minutes.
Upon seeing the girl's right eye cloud over with a black substance like a droplet of ink in water, Judas moved without thinking. He caught her as she began to fall back, and clutched her tightly as she started to spasm in his arms. She spoke in a panicked voice as she stared up at Judas with her good eye.
“What in the hells is happening?! My Phantom's Mark isn't supposed to activate unless I do it! Why did it activate on its own?!”
Instead of answering immediately, Judas ground his teeth and let out a low growl of frustration.
“I can save you, girl. But it will not be a pleasant experience, and there is a chance you won't survive.”
“Cause what's happening now is all fun and games! Ughhhh.”
A spasm of pain caused her entire body to tremble slightly, and she looked up at Judas with a pleading expression.
“Please help me old man… I really don't want to die...”
Judas gave a single nod and held the girl's head still with one of his hands. With the other he summoned a dagger and drove the blade into the girl's orbital socket. With expert skill he severed her ocular nerve, and used the tip of his dagger to pry the hexed eyeball out of its socket. He threw both the eye and bloody dagger as hard as he was able, and carefully laid the girl on the stone floor.
Seeing that the girl had passed out from the pain immediately left Judas with a sense of panic. Her breathing was shallow and her skin was cold and clammy, but he could still faintly hear her heart beating. He quickly opened his inventory and retrieved an ornate potion bottle filled with a shimmering gold and silver liquid. He hastily thumbed the stopper and brought the vial to the girl's lips, lifting her head with his other hand and tipping the contents into her mouth. After completely emptying the vial, he then retrieved a second bottle, this one filled with a sickly glowing orange substance. He drew in a sharp breath as he studied the vial in his hand, before pursing his lips and exhaling loudly. He looked down at the girl whose breathing had mostly returned to normal, and then nodded his head resolutely.
“Lady Hana, I require your assistance.”
Hana appeared at Judas's side in an instant, first looking at the girl then at Judas. She opened her mouth to speak, but he cut her off with a gesture of his hand.
“Before you ask any questions, I will also require Lady Jade's assistance as well. Please tell her the situation is of dire importance and somewhat of an emergency.”
Hana stared at him blankly for a moment before slowly nodding her head, after a couple minutes, Jade came rushing down the hallway.
“I came as soon as I could… What's–”
She stopped speaking as she caught sight of the grisly wound on the demon girl's face and the grim expression Judas wore.
“How can I help?”
“Lady Jade, you told me you are training to become a nurse in your world, yes?”
“Yeah…?”
“I require your assistance with a rather delicate… medical procedure.”
She narrowed her eyes at him and looked at the vial of strange liquid in his hand.
“The way you just said ‘medical procedure’ makes me think you're about to ask me to help you do something I'm not comfortable doing.”
Judas nodded his head slowly and sighed.
“You are likely correct. Be that as it may, in order to save this girl's life, it must be done.”
“I'm probably going to regret asking this question… but who is she?”
“... an assassin.”
“Right… and I'm assuming she’s here to assassinate… Allie?”
“That would be an accurate assumption.”
“And you want my help to save her?”
“That is correct.”
Jade groaned slightly and rubbed the bridge of her nose before sighing loudly.
“What do you need me to do?”
Judas's shoulders sagged in relief and he held up the vial.
“I need to coat each of her internal organs in this substance. They will all have to be removed one by one and then put back into place with healing magic.”
Jade looked at Judas skeptically before sighing again.
“Right. You need me to cut out this girl's organs so you can smear your magical orange goop on them. That makes sense.”
“I can do the cutting… I just need you to instruct me where the safest place to cut will be and for you to reattach the organs in their correct places… and use healing magic.”
“Oh. Is that all? That changes everything...”
Before Judas could respond, Jade held up a hand and opened her inventory. She pulled out a bundle of leather and knelt down next to Judas without another word. She unrolled the bundle to reveal an expertly crafted set of scalpels made of enchanted metal. She handed the knife roll to Judas, who took it with a thankful nod. After muttering something about sterile environments, Jade motioned for him to begin.
The aspiring nurse marveled at Judas’s skill with a scalpel. Every movement was perfectly precise, every cut exactly as she had instructed. At first Jade had wondered what the purpose of doing this entire procedure was, until she began to notice small infernal runes carved into each of the organs. She watched as the orange substance first adhered to the runes, then slowly dissolved them. Quick bursts of healing magic were all that was required to complete the process and place the organ back into the girl's body. There was some difficulty working with several strange organs that were definitely not something she recognized, but she was able to adapt quickly enough, and before long, that had finished the task. After closing her back up with healing magic, Jade demanded they move the girl to a better location than the floor. After making sure she was resting comfortably in a plush bed, Jade moved to sit next to Judas, who had set up a few chairs nearby.
“So… you wanna tell me what the hell that was about?”
Judas stared at the sleeping girl silently for a few moments before turning to Jade.
“The assassin order she was a part of doesn't allow its members to leave. Once you're in… the only way out is death.”
“You sound pretty familiar with this particular assassin order. Have some sort of history with them?”
“Something like that.”
Jade sighed through her nose and looked at the girl.
“What happened to her eye, and why didn't you want me to heal it?”
“It had a powerful hex cast on it that had been activated. Had I not removed it, her body would have been completely ravaged by several different poisons. This particular hex is typically combined with one called [Healer's Bane]. Had you healed her eye, it would have also restored the original hex that was killing her.”
“Gotcha. OK. Next question: who the hell is she and why did you save her?”
“As stated before, she is an assassin. She told me herself that she was sent here to kill what she was told was a political rival of the current empress.”
He paused for a moment, seemingly choosing his words carefully.
“As to why I chose to save her… Given her age and relative inexperience, it was obvious she was just a sacrificial pawn, a tool for her masters to use and discard. No one should live like that.”
While his words sounded true to Jade's ears, there was something off that she couldn't quite place her finger on. Instead of pushing the topic, however, she changed the subject.
“What are you going to tell her when she wakes up? I'm sure she's going to be hella confused and scared. I know I would be if I woke up minus one eye and a strange scar that ran down the entire length of my chest.”
Judas's eyes never left the girl's face, occasionally flicking to the strange crescent shaped birthmark. He shrugged slightly and continued to stare at the sleeping demon girl.
“The truth. She has likely been lied to her entire life… so she deserves nothing less than complete honesty.”
Jade waited for him to say more, to elaborate further, but he instead chose to remain silent. She reached out and squeezed his shoulder gently before moving to the side of the bed. She checked the girl's overall condition and turned back to Judas.
“I have to show a new healer we just recruited around the castle, but let me know if she needs anything when she wakes up. I'll be back in a few hours to change the bandage on her eye.”
Judas finally broke his stare as he looked up at Jade. He gave her a warm, sincere smile and bowed his head slightly.
“Thank you again for your invaluable assistance, Lady Jade. I am deeply indebted to you.”
Jade knew arguing with the demonic retainer wouldn't dissuade him from attempting to pay her back, so she merely nodded and exited the room.