1 Apologies... But Who Are You?

"On your feet, you maggot!"

A voice so deep, its bass reverberated through the area blasted into Ryujin's ears, threatening to deafen him and explode his head.

The resultant ringing noise assaulted his senses, prompting his eyes to snap open.

"Ah!" He jumped in terror, slipped and landed on his butt.

"A-a a demon???" He stuttered in disbelief, as he scurried backwards in fright.

An eerie silence spread across the area as several gazes locked onto him.

Looking around, Ryujin saw a scene straight out of horror movies.

Several souls lined up ahead of him, heading towards n unknown location; however, at the moment, they were all staring at him weirdly.

The five meter tall demon who had given him the fright of his life, stood there, staring daggers at him with eyes blazing with yellow flames that contrasted its purple runed skin.

Then before he could register the scene playing out before him, his eyes caught sight of a flaming whip rapidly magnifying towards him from the corner of his vision.

It arrived before him in the fraction of a blink, leaving even the most nimble of beings with no room to react, much less evade.

Wha-Pa!

One lash... It was just one lash, but Ryujin could have sworn that the brightness of his soul dimmed by half.

His soul shuddered like a blanket in strong wind, before the pain sunk into the very core of his being, causing him to trash around like a worm dipped in a bowl of salt.

His vision clouded and watered up in no time; leaving him with the sight of nothing but the moving shadows all around him.

However, the biggest shadow around him moved, Ryujin swiftly scampered to his feet ignoring his pain and fears; his instincts warning him of the possibility of another impeding lash if he wasted any more time.

With gradually clearing vision, he looked towards the long queue of souls that were being herded towards an unknown destination, and quickly joined the line.

Upon seeing Ryujin's reaction, the demon looked at the flaming whip in its grasp and nodded with a smirk of approval.

It had inherited the whip from its ancestor and it was relatively old; however, it felt that with each lash he gave any misguided soul, the whip's ability to restore people's concentration improved significantly.

As his clarity returned, Ryujin began to scan his environment, trying to make sense of his current situation.

He noticed he had lost any memories he had prior to this moment, and all that he was left with were his instincts and intuition.

However, at the moment, the most active of his instincts was one that desired to make observations and assess the plight of his current situation.

He committed every sight and sound to memory as he brooded in stride, trying to understand what had happened to him, where he was, and why he was here.

He would hear occasional whiplashes and a few miserable shrieks, and on fewer occasions, total silence; which could only mean that some miserable souls had met unfortunate ends.

However, compared to his recent experience, he couldn't help but think that the demon had somewhat gone easy on him.

He looked over, and coincidentally saw the latter gazing back at him with a fiendish grin that could make any child develop a phobia for sleep.

Swiftly returning his attention to his front, Ryujin quickened his steps, putting some much needed distance between himself and the fiend.

'Is this hell?'

He thought to himself in stride; shaking his head just as quickly as the question had popped to mind.

'That's not right... There are no billowing flames, and constant torture in sight.

Though we are being beaten, it's just to ensure that we don't deviate from our path and keep striding.'

He continued in his thought; his brain overclocking in speed as he tried to make sense of the situation; an endeavor that left him drowned in an ocean of incoherent information.

Days swiftly passed, and weeks flowed into weeks, before Ryujin's focus returned to his environment.

He looked around and realized he had lost track of time; at some oblivious point, he seemed to have been sorted into a new group of souls; all of them white in color.

As he calculated the timelapse between then and now, his intuition told him years had passed; however, another newborn instinct kept telling him he had only been here for a day.

As he stewed on in the dilemma, a deep booming voice suddenly broke his concentration.

"Ryujin?" The voice called out with a tone suffused with a sense of urgency.

Ryujin looked towards the source of the noise in irritation; however, the moment he laid eyes on the latter, his irritated expression swiftly warped into one of petrifying cowardice.

Standing above a patch of dark clouds was another demon that was twice the size of the one that had nearly killed him with a single whiplash.

This demon was even more terrifying, possessing eyes that was blazing with purple flames and a skin that was bordering upon looking obsidian.

The mere thought of the being whipped by the demon alone was enough to crippled his mind with palpable fear.

"Who amongst you is Ryujin?" The demon asked once again in a voice that boomed even deeper.

The dark patch of cloud it was standing rumbling in a disgruntled fashion; almost as if it was portraying the demon's discontent at the lack of response.

Then Ryujin's gaze mistakenly landed on the demon's.

"Ryujin?" It asked in a menacing tone.

Frightened by an impending lash, Ryujin nodded stiffly, prompting the demon to waved its massive hand at him.

Ryujin flinched in anticipation of a soul-rendering pain; however, even as seconds passed by, he felt nothing.

He opened his eyes and realized that he had been caught up by the demon.

Being in such a close proximity riddled Ryujin's mind with an overwhelming sense of utter helplessness.

The sheer amount of bloodthirst seeping out of the demons presence was enough to make anyone wet their pants; especially when one gazed at the purple colored runed tattoos spiraling all over its body.

However, contrary to Ryujin's expectation, the demon simply picked a direction and zoomed towards it with a level of speed that stretched his vision like an elastic band.

The other souls watched on in desolation as they began to wish they could swap places with him, despite having no clue about the kind of fate that may await him at his destination.

Unfortunately for them, the demon with the flaming whip quickly noticed the lack of movement, and thus, several whips and shrieks later, they all resumed their endless exodus.

-------

Ryujin stood on the patch of cloud, mute and petrified, as the black patch of cloud rose higher and higher the more they gathered momentum.

Then a few moments later, he felt something phase through him; or more precisely, he felt himself break past a barrier of some sort, prompting him to turn his attention towards their destination, and right there, hanging mystically on thin air was a massive golden palace radiating a warm beckoning glow.

It started out as the size of an egg, but as they blitzed their way towards it, it expanded just as fast, and a few moments later, they were finally standing before it.

Its walls seemed to have been made out of a cross between ivory, steel and jade; it seemed sturdy, looked grand, and radiated an ancient scholarly aura that had no hint of pressure whatsoever.

Ignoring the awestruck bumkin standing beside it, the demon stretched forth its hand, and the moment its palm touched the palace gate, it rippled slightly before swirling into a portal that gave way to its interior.

Upon emerging from the portal, Ryujin's face was brightened up by the warm glow being emitted by his environment.

Now he was able to truly appreciate the full glory of the palace.

Not only did its architecture look like someone had impeccably merged three mansions into one grand super mansion, its surroundings was also serene, and upon the arch of its doubledoor was a plaque that read; Palace of First Order.

Then the demon moved as the doubledoor made way in a welcoming manner; however the moment they entered, Ryujin was once again stunned speechless.

The interior of the mansion totally debunked his expectations, leaving his mind in a jumbled mess.

Not only was there no red-carpet corridor awaiting them, there wasn't even a throne room in sight, talk less of an actual throne.

Instead, what greeted his vision was the sight of several souls scampering around in a mad rush, bringing in, sorting and leaving with piles of scrolls, manuals and books of all kinds, sizes and colors.

The place looked like a large admin office, with an unorderly traffic of souls that looked too much like scampering stockbrokers during active market hours.

The demon's expression didn't even flinch at the sight in front of it; instead, it simply dove straight into the messy traffic, maneuvering its way through with a level of speed that gave no consideration to the safety of the scurrying souls.

As they moved past the chaos, they arrived before another doubledoor that was currently ajar.

From his vantage, Ryujin saw a similar sight to the chaos they just left behind; however, this one was quite orderly and neat, as each of the souls within the room sat at its desk with its attention deeply embedded into whatever it was doing.

But just as Ryujin thought they were going enter, the demon suddenly grabbed the handles of the doubledoor and pulled it shut, confusing him further.

Then it whipped out a token which it slotted into a lock that had been carved into the doors frame.

Turning the token like a dial, the demon pushed the door open once again, and this time, any view of everything pertaining to an office had mysteriously vanished, and in its place was a huge library.

This time, upon entering, the demon didn't rush or whisk its way around, instead it carefully began slowly skirt its way around the towering bookshelves scattered all over the place, giving Ryujin an ample time to make some observations.

At first glance, the towering bookshelves numbered about a hundred, and each of them seem to be housing about a thousand books each.

Then upon closer inspection, Ryujin realized that the bookshelves weren't actually scattered around, but rather, they were in fact moving, albeit very slowly.

After maneuvering its way past the rows of towering bookshelves, the duo finally arrived at what could only be described as a quiet study.

It was a small circular opening created by series of bookshelves arrange in a circular fashion.

The study seemed simple and plain, housing just two sets of furniture; a reclined resting chair in front of a tea table with an open game of domain, and a desk stacked with books of various kinds.

"Your highness!" The demon went down on one knee as it greeted curtly.

Narrowing his gaze, Ryujin looked through the gaps between the pile of books, trying to make out visage of the person who the demon was greeting.

However, in that same moment, the said person walked out from behind the stack of books with his face buried in a checkered green-grey colored book.

It was a middle-aged man draped in golden robes, and Ryujin's first impression about him was, Middling.

The middle-aged man was neither too tall or short, too slender or athletic, and despite donning an attire that portrayed royalty, his presence denoted nothing of that sort; in fact, the only aura wafting off him was one of books.

"You may leave, I will take it from here."

The middle-aged man waved off the demon, who gave another bow before leaving Ryujin behind.

Ryujin apprehensively waited for the man to say something; however, the latter barely spared him a glance and seemed to have no intention of paying him any attention anytime soon

As a result, Ryujin began to look around, observing the entire study and the shelves of packed books.

The first thing that caught his notice was the fact that each of the bookshelves surrounding him were all carrying the tag;

'Office of the Supreme Judge'

At first Ryujin was shocked, then surprise, and when he took a sneak peak at the middle-aged man, he was left speechless.

'How can someone so middling be a king or supreme judge?' He muttered to himself in disbelief.

However, in the next moment, a realization suddenly dawned on him.

'Wait. Why has he summoned me?'

The moment the thought popped into his mind, the man finally shut the book in his hand, capturing his attention.

"Oh my, aren't you one curious traveler." The man said with a sigh.

Ryujin was stunned by the reaction.

'Wait. Can he read my mind?'

He thought to himself, and when he saw the amusing smile on the latter's face, his question was answered.

Ryujin scrutinized the man's appearance further, trying to figure out what was amiss; however, no matter how hard he tried, the man was totally obscured from his senses, leaving him speechless for the umpteenth time.

It was as if, anytime he caught onto something definitive about the man, a mysterious force would suddenly muddle his perception, throwing him completely off discernment.

Then out of sheer frustration, he subconsciously blurted in disrespect.

"My apologies... But who are you?"