Family Meeting

__________POV Ashton__________

And just like that, I managed to gather every single circlet. In retrospect, our fight with the Hellbell was only possible because I could resist their mind-altering prowess.

I could also provide for a perfect distraction to allow the Zoldycks to destroy their bells. That was the main strategy that leads us to this point.

Without the Hellbell's special ability, the Zoldycks could've taken care of this without me. Although, not without casualties. Zeno did almost get bitten, and his resistance isn't as good as Maha's.

Maha probably stood up many nights trying to figure out the perfect way to actually kill those things. After all, the grudge of the worlds greatest assassin isn't really something to joke about.

I think I might be the only thing in Lake Mobius that Maha can't actually kill. Bar the calamities obviously. Those aren't really fair competition for humanity.

Hell, without the relics, I wouldn't have survived living in the Dark Continent after everyone went mad. Well maybe I would've, but it wouldn't have been easy.

With the relics, I could basically walk around like I owned the place. Well, minus a few really dangerous spots, where either the vegetation or the wildlife were too unreasonably strong.

Because plants obviously could kill you in my homeland. Although most only reacted if you tried to do something funny.

Some had a poisonous aura around them, it was so powerful it basically made them untouchable.

Well, enough reminiscing about the dangers in my homeland.

The Hellbell's special ability was much stronger than I had expected. No wonder Zigg was affected so thoroughly. He also didn't know how to escape its control.

So he did the best thing he could've thought of at the time. Protected his family in the process. After all, if Zigg went on a rampage, even Maha in his prime wouldn't have been able to stop it.

Still, if only he thought of fleeing the scene at the time... Or maybe his mind was too clouded in murderous intent, so he decided to direct it all to himself instead of those around him...

At least I finally found out what happened to him. I always hoped that everything was fine and that he just got bored of us.

I knew just how unlikely that was, but, I was also trying my best to distance myself from everyone at the time. Seeing them all grow older was affecting me.

Now I've matured a bit, I realise that distancing myself only exacerbated problems. It also almost ruined whatever relationship I had with Linne.

Thankfully, she didn't blame me in any way. Netero probably made sure to maintain her friendship with me.

The same way he always gave me news about her, in hopes that I would finally arrange a group meeting... Really... I have always been a shitty friend huh?

At least Maha doesn't blame me for prolonging his suffering... Zeno and Silva also seem to be fine with it.

They are all mature enough to understand that maybe I had other problems. Even if all I did was drown myself in whatever research I could find.

It's already too late to think about those things.

Regret is a sickening feeling, and it comes in waves, the tides only getting stronger and stronger the more you dwell on the past.

Whilst I was pondering, the four of us managed to reach the top of the mountain again. We had walked all the way here in silence.

Each with our own thoughts. Either mourning the dead or sighing in relief at finally finding closure.

When we entered our previous meeting room, four people were standing there, looking like they were preparing for something serious.

I could obviously recognize all of them. The cross-dressing child, Kalluto. The weird hospital security guard, Illumi. The lady of the house, I don't really know her name though.

Oh And Milluki, the fatty with the strange doll. He seems to be properly dressed this time though. And he looks even fatter with a shirt on.

Kalluto must've decided to visit his home for a bit, I don't know much about Illumi's deal though, I guess he's just here now?

How come neither of them was here earlier? Did they just arrive together? That's the most likely answer.

Why do I suddenly care about their whereabouts? I'm probably just trying to distract myself with useless matters.

"Greetings!" I waved my hand with a bit of grace. They didn't really react much to me, except for Kalluto, who seemed pretty happy behind his cold mask.

I think they are all a bit more curious about their ancestor carrying a skeleton with him. Oh, and the fact that two of us have some sort of injury.

Maha's is the most obvious. Although his bleeding stopped long ago. It's quite clear that he got bit by a snake. Especially to a family of this nature.

"Father! What happened?" Asked Illumi, looking quite angry. I guess he thinks someone attacked us or something.

He won't really make the mistake of thinking we fought each other. Although that would be a bit more entertaining.

Silva decided to seat everyone down and give them the truth. Now that the Hellbells were dead there was no reason for them to hide this matter anymore.

Most of them seemed surprised about this entire part of their families history they had no idea about.

Silva didn't get into too much detail about how strong the Hellbells were. But it was still enough to make the rest of the family understand why they would keep it hidden.

Although the lady of the house didn't look pleased with all of this being kept from her. Although, only me and Maha realised that, this lady is pretty good at hiding her emotions.

Maha and I also spoke for a bit whilst Silva was giving his speech. He had already sat Zigg's remains onto one of the chairs. One nearest to him in fact.

During our talk, I learned a bit more about the things he went through to prepare for killing the Hellbell. Apparently, whenever he scouted the place, only one of them were present.

He said he doesn't realise where the others came from. The smaller ones might've hidden in the bark of the trees, but the larger one would've been hard to miss if it was aboveground.

Which lead us to think about it building itself an underground nest. It sounds like a logical conclusion, but not enough is known about the Hellbell to make such assumptions.

The realisation prompted us to go back to the scene. We searched around for a bit in order to find the hole.

We managed to find and destroy all of the eggs in that nest, preventing any more hellbells from growing in the Zoldyck mountain range.

I also decided to spend the night at the Zoldyck mansion.

Mainly because it's late and I want to rest for a bit before setting off on another trip back to my laboratory.

But I wasn't expecting to receive a visitor in the middle of the night.

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Eyy, took me a while. Busy day and all that, hope you liked the chapter tho!

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