Chapter 4
"Hey Brother!" Zick spoke in a raised voice as the wind was making it hard to hear.
The other man standing a few steps ahead of Zick turned to look at him for a second, before responding, "You can call me Nelson."
With a nod of confirmation he continued, "we have to mobilize all who are good in exorcism so we can hold that demon in place."
"I really hate the fact that I'm powerless in this situation. The least we can do is contain it so it does nothing crazy, till the priest gets here."
The two men nodded to each other almost at the same time as they went the opposite directions. At that moment, the priest was on the road, blazing through traffic like a madman. He could feel the oppressing energy emanating from the direction of the church, which made him frantic with a sense of urgency. As the priest reminded himself of the fact that nobody present in the parish at that moment could handle this situation, he whispered to himself, "O Lord, help us."
Back at the parish, Zick and Nelson gathered all the seminarian exorcists that were good enough at a level able to cast out evil spirits with ease that they could lay their eyes on. Though most of them were beyond scared, they will have to push through as this was part of the reason why unlike others, they choose to learn exorcism after the general course ended.
With a serious look on his face, Nelson shouted, "Alright brothers, we mustn't waste any more time here being idle. I believe we all know why?"
Although none of the men and women standing answered, they all couldn't hide their fear as it leaked into their expressions. They moved into the hall following Nelson's command, walking slowly but with a steady pace. As the first seminarians who where following Nelson entered, the possessed boy turned slowly to face the entrance, with his eyes so widely held open that it pushed the eyeballs out of their socket, almost to the point where they looked like they would fall off at any moment. The boy's face had slim black venous lines emerging from the eye sockets to the left and right side of his face.
The ones who made eye contact with the boy shivered in horror at the site before them. Coupled with the thing concerning the eyes, the boy who was still levitating above ground held the woman that was once his mother in the grasp of his palm, as she hung there in midair lifeless. Saying she looks pale would be an understatement. For, how could someone who could easily be considered chubby look like a skeleton covered in old human skin that was taken from a saggy old grandmother.
"HOLY MOTHER OF GOD, what exactly am I witnessing?" one of the seminarian exorcist exclaimed with a face filled with horror, as he was witnessing something he never thought he would see in his entire life. It turned out that the possessed boy has been sucking both the life essence and the physical mater of the woman's body.
As the exorcists each took position in what seemed to be a circle formation that started at about 7metres away from where the boy was, going in similar circular fashion from the first circle back, the thirty-one seminarian exorcists started the restraining formation immediately without a single second. A dim turquoise light appeared around each of the shaking exorcists, with each person's own varying from the other in brightness, as the level of brightness showed how much spiritual energy you had. Although the level of brightness signified the strength of someone during the spell, they were all pushing themselves to their limits here, as no one wanted to die. Despite that, they could only amount to this meagre level of brightness. Truly weak before the face of the monstrosity before them.
Out of all this weak lights, Nelson's light shown the brightest, as he had also taken the most important part of the formation stationed in front within the first circle. While Zick stood within the last circle as the light that was emitted around him was so weak that a well lit candle would easily overshadow it.
As the possessed boy dropped the woman who had been completely drained of every single drop of life she had, her skin turned to dust as it hit the floor to reveal bones. The sound of the body dropping made most of the exorcists flinch a little as they tried to maintain the formation. Starting from behind, the light surrounding each person flowed through the air like dust till it reached in front of the first circle. It merged to form a turquoise coloured transparent wall of energy that reached the ceiling.
Finally, the boy's eyes that were popping out of his skull the entire time went back to normal as a strange energy swirled around and throughout the boy's body, giving off an aura of pure evil.
"Hmm.." the boy spoke as he landed on his feet while slightly tilting his head left then right to look around as if he had been oblivious to his surrounding all the while.
"It spoke" Zick said, as now it was pretty clear that the original owner of the body was no longer present (dude's left the group chat long ago. tut. tut.).
"You dare attempt to contain me in this pathetic formation. Humph, pitiful, brainless good for nothing bastards." The demon spoke with a calm but firm voice and, although it looks like a question, the demon conveyed it as a statement.
As Zick thought up different scenarios in his head about how things could play out, a young man roughly at 24years of age entered the hall after pushing open the heavy doors. The people holding the circle looked at him with bafflement, as they couldn't understand what was happening.
"Pftt, it's the red hair bastard," someone spoke beside Zick with a disgusted face.
The young red-haired man walked calmly with a half smile creeping from one side of his mouth as he took confident steps through the exorcists, into the first circle.
"Hey Jonathan, what are you doing here?! Go back and wait for the priest to come. Besides, someone needs to be outside to stabilize the commotion!" As Nelson spoke, he made sure not to divide his attention away from the formation.
"Hum, hum. Hahahahahhahaah," Jonathan laughed as though it was at what the brother had just said, as he pulled out an object from his pocket. The moment Nelson saw what he pulled out, he became furious, which almost broke the formation.
"Isn't that?.."
"Yeesss! indeed it is. With this in my possession, I can stand face to face with this demon with no fear at all." With a big grin on his face, Jonathan said this with confidence while holding it slightly to the front above his head.
"You idiot! The power contained within that artefact cannot be harnessed by anyone who's spiritual energy is not of a certain amount or inexperienced. Don't get full of yourself just because of the minor accomplishment from the past. This is not the same as then. This is way more serious"
Even as Nelson tried to warn him, Jonathan had already grown his confidence to a point where if it were to be a person, it would be enough to face off with the entire country of Russia and come out victorious twice. Since from before he became a Priest, the young seminarian has had a fat stream of luck, so much so that he could exorcise considerably powerful spirits alone. It was mostly because he always got lucky, but everybody else thought he was a veritable genius. Even the church had put much hope in his future.
He wasn't under this parish; he was just sent here by one of the big branches on a special assignment, together with the parish priest. But now fate had given him another chance to showcase his talent by carrying out yet another impossible looking exorcism. And everything seemed to be going as planned. First hide so Zick and Nelson wouldn't find him during their search for exorcists, then wait for them to reach a point where the tension was high enough. And finally, enter their midst like a saviour and cast out the demon. Flawless plan...
Or so he thought...
"Keep your worries to yourself. For I, am not ordinary. If there's anyone more fit to wield the power of this artefact, it would be me. Heh."
While Jonathan was busy praising himself, the venous line by the side of the demon's face retreated into his eyes as he placed his attention on him.
"Yes, look here demon, today you shall know of the might of my God and I"
Jonathan tightened his grip on the artefact as he spoke in Latin. The artefact that looked like a mace reacted to his words as it began lighting up from each symbol engraved on it to another. During the whole time everything was happening, Zick had already fallen to the ground in exhaustion as he possessed one of the weakest amount of spiritual energy among the others, but that didn't stop him from cursing the idiot who was standing there talking rubbish, instead of working this whole time.