CHAPTER 5

The four rabble-rousers had finally reached the castle which was half demolished with only two floors left. Ongoing closer to the castle, we found that it had a thick protective veil that restricted entry to monsters. Us not being monsters easily passed through the veil and entered the mysterious castle which was the key to finding the Grimoire.

The entry was the only safe place, for after every step there was a trap hidden, flaring out rows of arrows and fire coming out from the thick walls, even rocks were being thrown from above.

While walking, Kaleb accidentally stepped on a trap which made a big rock come our way, it came rumbling behind us, no other choice but to run, we sprinted for our lives and found an open door and jumped sideways. It had Aztec writings all over it just like in the dream the only problem was that this wasn’t the room where our treasure was kept. Soon we realized that this was the only room without any traps, deducing that the owner of this place lived here.

“It’s like a castle of traps, I bet even the person living here couldn’t step out of his room.” groaned Bruno.

“Let’s split into two teams and search for the underground basement. Whoever finds it, shouts ‘vanilla’ three times, ok?” I suggested.

Agreeing, all of us split into two teams. Carla and Bruno took the first floor while Kaleb and I took the second floor. We started carefully searching every nook and corner of that place.

On the second floor, while I manipulated the arrows to go sideways to prevent mine and Kaleb’s possible death, Kaleb tried searching for the basement when we heard those three magical words, “VANILLA! VANILLA! VANILLA!” shouted Carla with an excited tone. Upon hearing it we rushed to the first floor to find Carla and Bruno in the third room with the entrance to the basement already opened.

“There was a star-shaped brick which, upon pressing opened the entrance, sent herds of arrows towards us that I deflected and fire, which was put out thanks to Carla here,” said Bruno with exhaustion.

“Finally!” beamed Carla.

We entered the underground basement in which dwelled red-eyed bats, old cobwebs made an eerie atmosphere. Ironically, this time we had to face no adversity. It had some kind of demonic art and verses that none of us could understand.

“Guys, is it just me, or does this feel too easy to you?” asked Carla.

“Ohh please don’t jinx it, we already had three fights on our way here including that bastard Rafe, good thing he is tied up and unconscious,” replied Kaleb.

I was exploring the place when I saw it. It was there, we finally found what we were looking for, the Grimoire! After catching sight of the book everyone swiftly ran towards it only to be stopped a few paces back to see a huge demon’s vicious shadow lurking from the corner of the wall near the mantel.

“Great! Just great!” roared Kaleb with an angered look in his eyes, “ahh, why is life so difficult! Well? What are you guys waiting for? Let’s kill this damned demon, For SaberFaith!”

“For SaberFaith!” Everyone yelled and charged at the demon.

Carla summoned acid water and kept attacking it while I pitched in to strike using daggers and Bruno was trying to reach the demon to slash out its guts. Kaleb had a pistol in each hand shooting constantly but not callously. Our formation was astounding and given the amount of damage we had done, we might as well win against it.

Almost at its limit, the demon growled and lashed out at Kaleb, injuring him badly. His left leg was completely numb and blood was oozing out of the injury. He hit the ground with a terrified yelp. Seeing one of my friends injured, I got angry and snapped, letting the power of Nightshade overrule me but not to the extent that it could devour me entirely. The rush of letting the power of my demon overflow was excruciating but I managed and opened the gates of my invincible Nightshade. With three blows the demon vanquished back to hell leaving the four of us alone. Everyone rushed towards Kaleb.

Bruno screamed, “The holy water! Give it to him, it can heal him.” Carla rushed to bring the vial of water for Kaleb. But even after drinking it, his injury didn’t heal so Carla made him drink the other vial as well. Ultimately, his injury vanished as if it was never there, making Kaleb fit as a fiddle.

Making sure that everybody was alright, I went towards the Mantel where the Grimoire was placed and examined it. It was brown and its pages looked ancient and dusty. The front page had a vague design of many high-class demons.

When I flipped the pages, to my surprise, the pages were completely blank! While trying to figure out what the hell was wrong with the book, a few drops of my blood suddenly fell on the book.