Ch 23: Heart Demon: Begins

"Lucifer, we're surrounded!" Seraphina's voice was shaking, and her eyes widened in alarm while she held onto his shirt, her fingers digging deep in fear. The oppressive weight of impending danger pressed in on her from so many sides that it was like a hard constraint on her breath.

From the windows and the door, ghouls—their ugly shapes creeping closer, which must be drawn by sudden commotions. Their low growls weighed the air as they started to get closer to them.

"I see," Lucifer bit out, making his voice a low, steely rasp. His fingers tightened on the knife as if he was ready to prepare for the sudden collusion with them and his crimson eyes started to become even more sharper. He knew the nightmare closing in around them was all too real, and he also understood they were running out of time.

"Whatever happens, stay close to me, okay?"

He looked in the eyes of Seraphina and then urged her not to leave his side. His heart was telling him to protect her from this horror, but something whispered the bitter truth deep inside him: His mind was telling him to focus only on himself, but his heart kept telling him too whatever happened he had to keep safe her.

Lucifer was fighting the conflicting parts of his own self; he was not a hero or a villain, but for now, he was a man that being lost in the dark. But right at this moment—everything that urged him was to getting Seraphina out of this messed up place. They needed to get away fast from this place as the danger was chasing them direly.

"I-I don't want to be your burden," she whispered, lifting her head to meet his gaze. But before she could see the resolve in his eyes, he was already moving, charging at the nearest ghoul with a feral snarl.

The next instant, the calculating mind was not there, it was replaced by pure instinct. He flung himself at the ghoul, not a man haunted by doubt, but for the warrior fuelled by desperation, and something more.

His feelings toward her? Realization indeed dawned upon him, but there was no time to linger about this topic. Seraphina was already his woman to protect as she had given him her trust, her heart, and her innocence too, without a second thought. And how could he let anything happen to her? What kind of man would that make him, if he couldn't protect what was the dearest to him?

To Seraphina's eyes, he looked like an animistic fighter, fighting with everything he had, tearing apart each ghoul to their demise one by one.

But seeing how Lucifer was fighting with those things, Seraphina felt even more helpless. Now, how could she help him in this battle? She was just mortal, who had not walked the path of the ascendant. The weight of her perceived uselessness crushed her spirit even more.

Bang!

A ghoul inflicted a heavy blow, causing Lucifer to come crashing down beside her.

"Got a little careless," he said to her, a crooked grin belied by the pain he tried to pass off. "But don't worry, I'm not that easy to take down."

He pushed himself to his feet while wiping blood from a cut on his lip. His effort to be reassuring only made her feel worse.

"Lucifer, I am so useless, aren't I?" she let the tears fall down her face. "I am nothing but dead weight. I don't even understand why this is happening. It is like we are stuck in some kind of terrible nightmare."

Lucifer's heart twisted in his chest at her words. He couldn't bear to hear her like this. Gently, he cupped her face, wiping her tears away. "We'll survive this. I promise you, there's a brighter future waiting for us."

But even then, even while speaking, doubt started to consume him.

Are we really trapped in something?... Huh, trap? Are we inside a dream realm? Or we are inflected by a curse? Or is there something weird going on?

But unattainable answers to those questions fluttered by, just beyond his reach, like shadows.

Normally, he would have grasped at every shred of evidence until he found the truth. But now, survival was all that was important. One misstep, one second of indecision, and the ghoul might leap, and then, all would be lost alongside Seraphina. He could afford no handicap now.

But would the danger give Lucifer time to think? No… As the ghoul closed in, their eyes met for just one moment, having a silent conversation. They couldn't stay here; they had to go. They had to go somewhere, but where to? The realization of not knowing pressed on them.

"Is this nightmare just in Forgot Star Town?"

"Or is this happening everywhere?" Lucifer thought critically.

When they walked out of the door, the world seemed to contort around them. The familiar town was now apparently laced with a sinister chill, and the air was oppressed by an added measure of dread.

"Seraphina, do you know anything about what is happening?" he asked, urgency creeping into his voice. He looked into her eyes, desperate for any single clue that would explain the malevolent force engulfing them. Was the town cursed, or how did everything change so very suddenly?

She shook her head, looking helplessly at him, like a lost kitten who was unaware of anything. Her wide, innocent eyes said the rest: I don't know at all, that's why here I am running with you.

As they were running away from the inn, desperate cries cut through the chaos, halting them in their tracks.

"Help! Someone, help us!"

"Don't touch my child—no, please!"

"What's the matter? Huh? Argh! …. Someone, help us! Ahhhh!"

The haunting noises of despair and desolation struck a chill through the air and their hearts. Seraphina turned back to glance at Lucifer, whose face was a canvas of twisted concern. He, however, seemed deep in thought and contemplation, eyes knitting his brow in silent consideration.

"Lucifer?" she trembled, and that brought him abruptly out of his thoughts.

"Hm?" He snapped back to the present, then glanced back over his shoulder abruptly. "What's wrong?"

"There are others out there," she told him with a whisper, barely audible above the screeching noises from a distance like she did not want to draw commotion.

"I can hear them," he said, his lip curling into a grimace. "But do you really think we are in any condition to help?"

He pointed back to the endless tide of ghouls coming after them—twisted forms crawling from the shadows, drawing closer to them like predators.

Seraphina fell silent, his words really weighing down on her. She realized—with a sinking heart—that he was absolutely correct. If they couldn't save themselves from this nightmarish fate, really, how could they hope to save anyone else?

It was a vision of town turned into hell: flames that had devoured homes, with towers of smoke touching the sky; the once clear serene river was now flowing red with blood, littered with debris and bodies. Corpses of townsfolk were strewn all over the place, their bodies torn apart in unspeakable violence. It was so devastating enough to break someone.

Seraphina did little but gulp to try and keep the bile rising in her throat at bay; it was so hard—impossible—to try to comprehend the devastation before her. but Lucifer held himself back, as this was not his first time seeing this type of cruel fate.

Then they drew to an abrupt stop, not because of the cries of the desperate but because of a massive ghoul that was blocking their path ahead, standing over two meters. This grotesque creature was on a completely different level than they had encountered before.

What the hell is that thing?

As he looked around in horror, a gut-wrenching feeling settled in his stomach. They were surrounded. The ghouls kept pouring out of the dark, the number growing—over twenty, maybe upward of thirty or more. Within the mass, he even picked out some familiar faces, horribly contorted—he knew the fisherman in the same nightmarish expression. Not only that there were females and children too.

"Cruel fate doesn't care who you are, does it?"

He turned back to Seraphina, to urge her to step back, but the words died on his lips as a chilling dread flooded his veins. His heart pounded in his chest, louder than any battle drums. A ghoul had slithered out of the shadows, claws already sunk into Seraphina's side.

"Luci…" she gasped. Blood trickled from her lips.

"I guess… I won't be stepping forward… the same path as you… cough."

Her voice was weak, trembling as though life had poured through her eyes. She dropped to the ground, a sickening thud. "If fate's got a hand for us," she said, straining against the darkness, "we'll be brought together. But …"

Although her cheek streamed with tears, she concealed the pain with a smile. She had already anticipated this ending but had held out hope for more time, more memories with him. But destiny seemed to have other plans.

Lucifer stood there like a statue as if the world was planning some prank to him. Was this real? Was he really losing her? Moments they shared flitted before him—were they just a cruel dream? He couldn't imagine the void her absence would leave. His crimson eyes blazed as the pupils disappeared, leaving just a flickering flame of agony as blood began to trickle down his face in place of tears.

At that instant, his mind went blank and the all-engulfing fury took over. Overwhelming urges to hasten on pushed him headlong toward the pack of ghouls. Reason abandoned him; vain, insatiable vengeance took over. With each stride, he slashed blindly through the monsters that had taken everything from him, his actions fed by that aching void left by her sacrifice.