Chapter 70: Hellish Training: The Secret of Generals

It was a cold snowy night at Mt. Levi, people were going all around the mountain from top to bottom to find a missing girl.

The snowstorm was already starting to get bad, but they still haven't given up on the search.

"Akemi! Akemi..!" The girl who was missing was Akemi; age 6(Earth year) age 6000 (Hell year)

One night, when Akemi was with her brother alone in their house in the depths of the mountain.

They saw Akemi gone in her room when they came to check on her.

"Akemi! Are you there!?" Civilians were helping with the search, and the soldiers are at the top of the mountain searching for Akemi.

This was the first time in a long time in Hell that they did a massive search.

Since Akemi was the daughter of the former second-generation General of Envy and the sister of the inheritor of the Archduke Behemoth name, everyone would start to get worried about her.

"My King, we couldn't find any sign that she was at the west." One of the soldiers hurriedly said.

"It has been 3 weeks already and we couldn't find any sign..." Jarren was worried about Akemi right now.

Almost everywhere they went, they couldn't find clues on her whereabouts.

"Is Ryou okay Jarren?" Behind him, was Xuntea asking him. "Since last night I saw him sleepless at the castle."

"Ryou was anxious at the castle and even begged me to find her no matter what, so I'll do it."

"*Sigh* Don't worry, Akemi is a strong child, so we'll find her okay..."

Jarren let out a smile. "I hope so..."

***

On the deep parts of the forest, was a crying girl all alone on the forest. "Ryou! Where are you?!"

She has been walking for a long time on the cold snowstorm, with nothing but a leather jacket with her. Not a single food with her nor a healthy water source.

She can only rely on her skill in frost to make water out of it.

"Ryou!" That night in her room, she saw a mysterious light coming from outside.

Her curiosity rose upon seeing it up close when she went outside.

She was bewitched by the beauty of the light, and without noticing the light led her deep inside the forest of Mt. Levi.

Akemi realized that she was lost inside the forest when the light suddenly disappeared.

"Everyone!" She was crying immensely that she doesn't know her way home.

Mt. Levi being a giant mountain that most of it hasn't been mapped out, made the searching of her hard for everyone.

As Akemi was walking inside the forest, she found a small cave to rest in. "Ryou... Father... Mother..." She said slowly and fell asleep.

"It's so comfy..." Upon waking up, Akemi felt something soft on her head, and on her head, she felt someone gently touching it.

"Mother..." Akemi could only think that the person who was gently patting her head was her mother.

"You guess wrong little one..."

Akemi stood up and checked who was the woman that was with her, and when she saw it was someone she doesn't know. "Who are you..?" Akemi asked her.

"Me..? I'm the guardian of Mt. Levi little one... My name is Leviathan..."

"Leviathan..? Why is your name the last name of my mother..?"

"Your mother... Her name is Eira Leviathan... And you Akemi is her daughter alongside your twin brother Ryou Behemoth..."

"If I may ask Leviathan, how did you know my mother and my brother's name?" Akemi was confused that a stranger knows about her family.

She was getting worried about who this woman with her is.

"Your mother Eira and I were friends..."

"Friends..? Which is why she took your name as her last..?"

"No little one... She used my name since I made her do it, but that was a long time ago, you were not born at that time yet..."

"I see... But what are you doing here?"

"I came here since I saw a little girl with purpose, being lost..."

"Purpose..? Me, purpose in what?"

"Purpose in life... So tell me Akemi, is there a deep secret that you are hiding from someone?"

She feels pressured at the woman's presence that she started telling her darkest secret that she hid from anyone even her brother who is her last family member.

"It was about 10 years ago..." Akemi was already crying when she started remembering what happened that day. "There was a girl who has everything in her life that she hoped for... She got many friends, she got a beautiful pet, she got beautiful accessories, and most of all she got a family... She had an amazing older brother, a caring mother, and a hard-working father..."

Akemi remembers what she felt at that time. "When I saw her, I felt something triggered inside of me that I didn't even know... I couldn't control myself, I couldn't stop myself from feeling deep hatred that she got everything that I hoped for. I wanted a perfect and complete family like her! I wanted to be with my mother and my father again! But life was cruel to me! The angels killed my father in front of my own eyes, and my mother was killed protecting the city!-"

Leviathan looked at the crying Akemi and patted her head gently to calm her down.

"So without noticing it happening, I slit the girl's throat with my own hands... I killed an innocent girl who has nothing to do with me!" Akemi remembered the bloody way she murdered the girl in that family's house. "Eventually, her family got back home and saw me with the body of their body dead... The family was terrified at what happened, and all I could do was be crazy... I said to them 'Isn't this beautiful mother and father... Now we won't have an intruder in our wonderful family...' And they cast me away... I was angered at them for doing it, that I killed the three of them too mercilessly... And that's when I found out that I was insane, I didn't think to myself that my parents has been long dead, and every time I see a child with their family, all I could feel was jealousy that they have someone they love beside them! While me, I only have my brother, and both of us grew up all alone in this mountain all alone... With no mother to give us love, and with no father to look up for... So I know that I'm not a normal devil! I did what the angels do here in Hell, I killed an innocent family because I was jealous of them! I should've not been born in the first place!"

Leviathan hugged the crying Akemi tightly. "Don't worry, I wouldn't judge you little one... After all, I'm the same as you little one... Like you, I am filled with nothing but jealousy to everyone..."

"I killed her because I'm jealous of her... I killed her because I wanted to replace her... I killed her because-"

"Shh... Don't worry little one, I'm here for you. And I know that everyone will soon forgive and help you find your path..."

Akemi hugged Leviathan back and cried on her shoulders.

Leviathan just smiled and comforted the crying Akemi with her until she fell asleep.

Thud! Thud! Thud!

"She's here! My King! Akemi is here!" Akemi was sleeping at the cave all alone, and when the snowstorm has stopped, one of the soldiers found her laying on the cave.

Jarren along with Gusion and a young Lucas was with the soldiers at that place looking for Akemi.

Gusion carried the weak body of Akemi and brought her to Jarren and Lucas. "Looks like she has a cold, but it's amazing that she survived all alone..."

Jarren smiled and patted Akemi's head gently. "Yeah, it's amazing-"

"Jarren, is something wrong?" Gusion asked worriedly

"Gusion look at her soul..."

Gusion was confused about why Jarren was ordering him to do that, and when she looked he was surprised. "The mark of Leviathan..."

Jarren could only smile in disbelief and joy after seeing the mark of Leviathan. "Lucas..." He said in a soft voice. "It looks like you have a new friend from now on, because right now Akemi was chosen by Leviathan to be her successor and as the new General of Envy. From now on, Akemi will be named as Akemi Leviathan."

***

{Day 12/14}

When I woke up I saw myself starting to cry. "It was just a dream..." A dream, no more like a memory.

Seeing how Akemi got her position as a General and seeing how she met Leviathan and got her name as Akemi Leviathan, I was speechless.

So that's what Ryou meant by "-Being jealous of someone to the extent that she wants to destroy their life."

I stood up and look at the clock. "It's almost day..."

Fighting the wyrms was very easy, they're actually weaker than the ice golems and the yeti, which is why I easily defeated them all. And also, I got a fragment of Leviathan's teeth and gave them to Dawn yesterday.

She wasn't a bit impress because she knew it was an easy task, maybe she actually became nicer when I found out about who that dwelling ice spirit is.

Now that I have free time, I'm waiting for Lucifer to transport me to that world. And also, he promised me that he'll tell me the sole purpose of creating him creating his clone, Milicas. "*Sigh*" 3 more hours and I'll see the sunrise.

Until then let's try going up the mountain to further complete my real goal of reaching the peak.

"I can't believe that 2 more days and my training here in the mountain is gonna end." I've learned quite many things here.

I learned how to survive by myself all alone, I learned to not rely on Soul Bound when danger comes, I learned to strategize and think smartly, and also... Looking at my right hand I summoned Ignisvem. "I learned how to fully use the power of Ignisvem."

Being able to use Ignisvem properly, I had more hope to be on equal footing with my friends.

Even if I hardly survive in some of the tasks here, I believe that with those mistakes and losses, I'll get stronger. "You hear me! I'll become stronger-" While walking I shouted that and because I was distracted I slipped on a rock and fell on the ground really hard that I hit my head.

Sip... "It's nice to see you again Haruki..." Lucifer was drinking a cup of tea and looking at me with a smile.

While I was just here sitting in front of him; embarrassed by what has happened to me.

I knew that if I'm gonna talk to him, I need to sleep, but I didn't expect to meet him from a fall on the head.

If I wake up with a concussion on my head, I'm gonna instantly lose at tomorrow's training.

"If you're talking about your body Haruki, don't worry I made sure that your body won't be harmed when I made you fall."

"Really... Thanks for the info- wait! You're the one who made me slipped?!"

"Of course, because there's no way that I can transport you here when you're wide awake, so I controlled your legs for a bit and made you slip on a rock."

Even if he has good intentions in bringing me here, Luna, Dawn, and Ryou are still watching me succeed in my training at Mt. Levi. So if they saw me slip and fainted by hitting my head on the ground, they'll be disappointed in me.

"*Sigh*" Guess I'll just explain to them that Lucifer made me slipped on purpose. "*Cough* Anyway, so now that it's the 12th day, I guess it's time you tell me about Milicas, Lucifer..."

"I did promise to tell you and I'm not the type of guy that breaks promises... *Sigh* Where do I start..?" Lucifer drop his cup of tea and started telling me. "It was a long time ago, it was when the battle on the 6th floor has first started. So at that time Michael and l were about to start our duel to the death since I planned on putting a curse on him that's hard to recover from... So before the battle between me and him started, me and Mammon started experimenting on the DNA of the fallen Archdukes and Archangels, and after months of trial and error, we found the solution to make the perfect clone. It was first tested with Archduke Abaddon, and it was a success, we created an exact copy of him."

"Millie told me about that, she said she and the others defeated the clone." Apparently, Abaddon was an Archduke who rules over Sheol before, and was known as an equal to Satanael, but how could they defeat him if she's an equal of Satanael though?

"But a problem occurs, the clone is much weaker than the original counterpart and they can't move without someone ordering them to do so, and so the experimentation failed, but Mammon didn't give up, so he told me to combine my clone with half of my soul on it. Even if I'll die if the experiment failed I still did it, and when the day of the experimentation came, we succeeded. Even if Milicas is not entirely a perfect clone of mine, he still has inherited my skills, and after that Michael and I battled and I was killed by Michael. And while I'm dead, Milicas can continue to do my legacy."

"Legacy? Do you mean your legacy to destroy the world? Is that what you made Milicas for?! Tell me Lucifer?!" I couldn't hold back my anger when I heard the true purpose of Milicas.

In the end, I was tricked again by someone I believed in.

"No, I did order him to follow my footsteps, but in the end, he didn't listen to me, Milicas grew prideful and became the new General because he believed what he was doing is right. So you see, I didn't order him to destroy the world, he just decided on it."

"So what you're saying is that Milicas has his own free will? But I thought the clone needs to follow an order to move, so why does he have his own free will?"

"The clones that we created first didn't have a real soul; only an artificial one that Mammon and I created, so if you put a real soul on a clone, what do you expect to happen Haruki?"

"He can have a mind of his own because he has a real soul that controls and serves him... Then! Did you failed on creating a clone then now that Milicas has his own free will?!"

"I can't answer that, it can be a success because my goal was to just create a clone to do the bidding of the Generals and a failure because Milicas is entirely different from me. He has a different face even if he looks like me a little bit, he has a different personality than mine, and a different goal than mine, so he's both the combination of success and failure."

A combination of success and failure? Then destroying the world was just what he wants all along and not Lucifer.

But why did Milicas follow the will of the Gods then if he can do anything he wants with the power of Lucifer?

Could it be something deeper than just destroying the world? Because if it isn't then with his power as Lucifer and Yahweh's power as the creator, also with the help of the Gods. Why haven't they started doing something yet?

What's their goal in destroying the world? And why are they destroying Hell first, instead of preparing for the world's destruction?

Lucifer let out a small laugh. "Haruki I'll tell you a secret, do you want to hear it?"

"Sure, what is it?"

"Yahweh and Satanael's goal is far different from destroying the world."