24 A Witch's Instruction Of A Spear Boy Part 3

(Sirzechs Lucifer POV)

To be a devil and a satan especially is to understand that happiness is fleeting and life is a game, and we devils must play to win or we die. Politics define a devil's life before they are even born, and power is the only true currency, yet many delude themselves into believing political power means anything in this world.

Yet here I am, smiling as I see the council of all the remaining pillars arguing and asking us Satans to deal with the new wielder of the Spear of Longinus. But none of them truly understand what it means to be in the presence of that thing. I fear little in this world, but that sacred gear terrifies me to my core.

 I once met a user of the Spear of Longinus, and simply being in the presence of an experienced wielder is enough to make my skin start to smoke and my insides crawl due to the purity of the holy light. 

Luckily, we never fought, as he only desired something from the devils, and that was information. What it was, I will never know as I was not the devil he made a deal with but with my father, Zeoticus Gremory.

Due to the nature of devil contracts, my father could not say what the deal was nor what he got out of it, but he never stopped smiling the whole day after he made the deal. When I asked what he got out of it, he looked at me and said, "Something invaluable, Sirzechs, something invaluable."

He never spoke of it after I asked, but now, with the reveal of the new user and of his current position, the entire Underworld was thrown into chaos. 

Serafall and Ajuka are now next to me as we listen to the "demands" of the pillars, but unlike myself, Serafall is fiddling with her wand, and Ajuka has put everyone in an illusion that he is listening but is actually studying some papers on a new spell he was working on.

Falbium avoided this by simply sleeping with his absolute defense when anyone tried to talk to him, so now here we are.

"This presents a danger to the devil race and must be eliminated! I call for a vote to send the Satans to deal with this welp immediately!" The head of the Naberius house says as I refuse to remember his name, and as the room looks to us, I answer the man.

 "Firstly, I would ask you not to shout like a toddler, Lord Naberius; we have no idea the political leanings or any alliances this child holds to charge against the child willing the Spear of Longinus, even if inexperienced, is a danger, and an idiotic choice. Until he leaves the Land of Shadows, we will do nothing but watch and wait. What do you think the consequences would be from the Angels or anyone else backing him if he were to die? Or the consequences if any of us perished?"

The other heads nod in agreement as one of the Old Satan faction sympathizers says, "So you are afraid of this spear? Does this child truly represent such a threat that you are unwilling to eliminate him?"

Sighing, I simply say, "That spear holds the undying will of the Biblical God, and while I did not fight in the Great War, I have seen the records, and they tell of the mere presence of God, eliminating Devils that are high class and lower. One stab from that weapon could kill nearly any devil instantly due to the pure poisoning of holy energies, and I am not going to risk an attack on a possible asset. Also, if you have the gall to ask if I am afraid, why are you asking us to deal with it?"

My answer causes him to sit back down, grumbling as Lord Phenex says, "While I do agree that this user may present a threat, we have yet to ascertain his political leanings or his bias in terms of the various races and from the information we have received he has only activated that spear a month ago. It would be foolish to turn away a potential Longinus user. Besides, if we were to gain a positive relationship with him, he may be a deterrent for the other factions. I assume all of you have seen as well as heard the news of the armies of monsters walking through the Underworld towards Tartarus to head to the mortal world? Hades sees us as an inconvenience, not as a threat other than the Satans, of course."

Most of the evils are left silent as they think of a response, with Serafall then saying her piece, "I agree with Zechs as he seems to be innocent in this but has had a swing of bad luck. And besides, he seems cute and would be a perfect character for my show."

Never change, Sera, never change.

Soon after Sera says this, I hear a surprising voice amongst the council: "I agree with the Satans; let the boy come to us, and maybe he shall deal with those Greeks in our stead." Zekram Bael says as I raise my brow at his support of us, and while that does bare investigation, that shall be for later.

As no one seems to be adding anything more, Ajuka stands and says, "Well, if no one is offering anything else, I'm going to return to my lab. Once the child has done anything drastic, we shall approach him for a hopeful alliance or at least some form of agreement. Now, since we are done with this, I shall depart."

Ajuka nods to us as we do so in return, with Sera trying to give him a hug, to which he just teleports away, and I pat her back in support. You would never think that this woman is the strongest female devil in the Underworld, but here we are. But sometimes I see her true face, and in those moments, even I feel afraid.

Many of us seek to forget what happened during the devil Civil War as it was a time when rules simply went out the window as anyone could have been a target or an enemy. 

I still remember a city of devils that used to be thriving with a population of 50,000 people. Now it's a ghost town after a single attack from the Old Satan faction. Walking through that village with all my battalion with me, all we heard was nothing, as we found nothing left.

Even though I still have nightmares of those days. I did meet my love during that war, so it was worth it.

Speaking of which, I feel a presence behind me as my wife Grayfia asks, "I assume the meeting went well, my Lord?" Shaking my head, I sat down in my office as she began to give me a shoulder massage. 

As I melted into the chair, I said, "It was the usual meeting with all the pillar heads, as most of them wanted me to go attack the spear wielder simply because he exists out of fear of all things. It is truly a sad state of affairs when one sacred gear wielder can make the entire devil race quake in fear. Is it too late to quit so I can spend my days hugging Millicas and having fun with my lovely wife."

I could see a microscopic blush form on her face as I smirked, to which she said, "Well if you are feeling stressed, my lord, I can take care of it for you if you desire." As I watch my wife stand before me, I nod, and she closes the door and places silencing seals over the room.

And as her maid robes drop, all I can think of is how lucky I am.

(Cao Cao POV)

"You are in your head again, disciple. Do I need to smack you with the bat again?" My Master asks as I stare out the window of the castle, to which I say in a flat tone, "Master, you and I both know that the hammer you were talking about is just your spear again, and no, I am fine, but I must ask the reason for why you brought me here."

Scathach then goes to a wall and places her hand on it, and after pushing a brick in, the wall begins to fold into itself, and a new room is revealed that is lined with books from end to end. I do admit to being somewhat awed as the collection seemed never to end. 

I almost see a smug expression on Scathach's face to which she explains, "This is my library where I hold all of my knowledge that I've collected from everyone that has come here seeking training or simply stuff that has ended up in the Land of Shadows. But more importantly, this is the place where I shall teach you "that" magic."

My eyes begin to widen as she says this. I enter the room and look at the endless books gathered across the centuries. As I took a seat in the circle, she grabbed a chalkboard and began to show me various magical formulas and calculations, to which I asked: "Master, why do you have formulas for various elemental magics?"

Scathach then grabs the board and erases it as she explains, "Simply something I am researching in my spare time, disciple, as one must always keep to their disciplines and make sure that they never become rusty. Human magic is one such discipline I am adept in, and since I am stuck here, I have to keep myself busy lest I go insane, as even I can suffer from the ravages of time."

Nodding, I then ask, "Are you going to teach me what I think you are going to teach me?" She nods as I hide my excitement with a stoic expression, to which she says, "It is all right to feel excited as I felt the same thing when I was able to learn it, at least at first. as learning the primordial letters that defined creation is truly a wondrous experience."

In the last part, she says with an almost jealous longing, but I say in return, "Well, I am most definitely excited, but I must ask if you are willing to teach me so soon?"

And I do mean soon, as it has only been two months since she taught me her spear arts, and my LP is now at 41,770,200, which is the true sum of points. I am trying not to overwhelm myself with new skills, but when she spoke of skills becoming rusty, I decided to buy three new defenses.

Those were negation, entropy, and copy resistance, and as the defenses set in, I felt more secure as my powers had no chance of being copied by any means. In addition to the fact that the copy defense keeps me from being cloned, the stronger I get, the more esoteric I become to technology and magic-based cloning.

Entropy defense helps with keeping my memory sharp, which I know is what the essence of the archmage does. It simply keeps my memory perfect and infinite, but it doesn't help with the fog of ages due to time as well as skill decay with time. 

Negation defense is meant to counter abilities like the sacred gear canceler and magic negation. Also, I have to simply ensure I'm covering all of my possible weaknesses, even if they may overlap with some of the defenses from my essence.

In total, all three defenses cost 8 million LP, leaving me with 33,770,200 LP, which I think is worth it as clones are always a problem in many universes like Marvel, DC, or Invivncible. 

Thankfully, this purchase barely lasted a couple of seconds thanks to my increased mental acceleration as I have been able to increase the speed at which my thoughts move by around 500 times with multiple partitions helping to focus various lines of thought.

I am also currently training these two skills by having various clones throughout the Land of Shadows train in spear arts and instinct, which I have been learning at a decent rate as now I am almost untouchable unless the opponent is simply that fast. I am also making sure to study my sorcery as well as haki and chakra as I have come up with various jutsus and techniques. 

Most of those clones are training in the mirror dimension against one another, so I returned my attention to Scathach as she sat down in front of me and stared at me in the eyes. We remained silent. Her eyes seem to be going through hundreds of thoughts at once as she simply asks, "Do you think you are ready?"

Looking into her eyes, I say in complete honesty, "No, but I have to be, and I want to be, and I think you want me to be, too." The answer causes her to close her eyes and stand back up, and her chalkboard disappears. Runes appear around me, and the room turns into something different, a room that has a well with a head staring right at me.

The head then asks, "Well, another young lad here to learn from the smartest man alive? I do hope you know what you're gettin' into, lad."

Walking forward, I stared into the well with my eyes staring back at me, and I made a choice.