That day was the first day my son stormed into my office. I could tell he had done his best to not make a scene in front of the others and instead waited until everyone else fell asleep before he came to confront me.
"What the hell is wrong with you? Do you realize what kind of place this is? What passed through your mind when you decided to adopt a demon?" He demanded as soon as he entered my office.
Ah, he's talking about Olivia... I didn't expect that he would be the one against her presence; if anything, I expected Michael to be the one doing this.
"Can't you realize, the closer you get to that demon, the more you put us in danger!" He shouted as he marched over to my desk and slammed his fist against it to get my attention.
"This demon is completely unrelated to the case of the Laughing Widow." I quickly corrected as I shifted my attention from the computer to him.
He had come in in such a rush he had forgotten to close the door to my office; thankfully for him, it was late enough for no one to still be working in the large facility.
My words seemingly struck him like lightning, as all the arguments he had prepared beforehand were slowly crumbling in front of me. I could tell he still wanted to protest and was trying to find the correct words to express himself.
All the anger was washing away from his face as he began to think of what to say next; he seemed confused, then he became doubtful, he looked me in the eye for a short while, and after that he slammed his fist against my desk for a second time.
"She is the daughter of that friend of mine; you probably don't remember him since you were barely old enough. He was the one who found you hiding in the sewers and kept you safe until I could retrieve you." I explained to him as I got up and headed to close the doors of my office.
He, on the other hand, was still leaning on my desk, waiting for me to sit back down in my chair.
"Still…" He shouted without following up with the rest of the sentence.
"Should I have left his daughter to rot on the surface after he helped me get you back from the fracture, where your irresponsible mother—"
"Don't make this about her; she had nowhere else to go. You almost killed her that day, and along with her, our brother." Before I could even finish my sentence, he burst out in a flurry of emotions; whenever I even alluded to her, he would always get defensive.
You almost died, for fuck's sake; your brothers suffered through hell, and you even lost that cursed child as he perished alongside his mother. For how long are you going to protect her…?
"I don't know what happened. I don't know who or how they managed to turn a kid into a demon, but if I left her there, who knows how long she would've lasted?" At last, I tried to appeal to his emotional side. I knew it was most likely going to fail, but trying didn't hurt there.
"You could've just helped your friend find a safe place; you didn't need to bring his daughter here. What does he even think about this arrangement? He might not see her for the rest of her life. And I'm sure you definitely won't treat her like a daughter; I can see through your intentions!" He lowered his voice but still wasn't willing to sit down or stay still; he was moving left and right in front of my desk.
I, on the other hand, began to use my power to check our surrounding area, looking through every wall only to spot someone sneakily trying to listen to our conversation; judging by his size, he was most likely an adult, a tall one, incredibly so.
"The emperor ordered me to bring him his head; I had no other choice but to deal with him if I want to keep our business flourishing." I responded as I headed towards the intruder, pretending to make myself a cup of coffee.
"What the fuck are you involving our family in?" he asked. I was too focused on keeping my eyes on the intruder to see his expression or pay attention to the tone of his voice.
"This is the only way." I responded as I filled my cup and then took a loud sip.
To keep us safe, I need power and influence. You have no idea how many people are looking to rip us apart, take away the fruit of the labor of all of our ancestors, take away the result of the research we did, our riches, and our demons.
It's strange that security hasn't… No, what if… security has already been dealt with or, worse, sided with our enemy? Better play it safe.
"There's no way." Ilay repeated in the background.
"You already know why; I explained it to you countless times, and I'll continue to repeat it as many times as you need—" I said as I turned around, finding a spot where I could lean with my back against the wall near the spot where the intruder was hiding.
"Stop!" My son suddenly yelled, taking my attention off the intruder.
"The world out there is not sunshine and rainbows!" I repeated.
"I know of this already!" He responded while looking at the ground, his fists clenched.
"You don't know just how bad things are out there." I warned him, but he was simply too stubborn to listen; I could tell by the glare he launched at me.
"You take me for a fool?" He asked me in a low tone. His body was slowly starting to exude demonic particles as he was losing his cool.
"If you truly knew, then you wouldn't be making a scene; you would've already figured out many things by now." I reprimanded him before turning back around.
"The world isn't as dark as you paint it to be." He objected.
What a load of bull—
"Is that what your mother told you?" I asked him; I couldn't believe the words that were coming out of his mouth. Despite accompanying me so many times on my trips, he seemed to not have learned a single thing.
"Why do you always have to mention her?"
Haaa, will you stop being so defensive? Can you listen to what I'm saying, to what I've shown you so far?
"Why do you keep defending her ideals? Those are what shattered our family." I kept an eye on the position of the intruder the whole conversation. Making sure not to miss a single movement from him.
"Don't even try to spin it as if it was only her fault." Ilay's conviction was resolute; none of my words was truly reaching him. All he could do was point fingers and be adamantly against everything I believed in.
"Those same ideals made her trust complete strangers, and look now where she is. If that is not big enough—"
"Enough! I've listened to enough of your bullshit today; it's clear that no matter what, we're not going to reach—"
Before he could finish his phrase, I plugged my arm into the wall, breaking through it and grabbing the neck of the intruder standing on the other side, before forcefully pulling him inside the room.
"What the—" Ilay was clearly surprised by that sudden turn of events.
I immediately recognized him; he was one of the gladiators that fought in the arenas, he was present the day they tried to end our family, and he was not hiding within my facility. He was no longer skinny and malnourished.
In the past months he was able to get back up; he had gained a lot of muscles, and he was even able to emanate demonic particles.
His eyes began to glow, and I stopped him by stomping over his head, crushing his skull and splattering the entire office with his brain.
"He's probably not the only one present in the facility; take his body and place it in one of the many containment rooms. I'll deal with the others." I said as I summoned one of my many demonic artifacts; it looked like a wooden cane with a golden lion placed on top.
I used the power of the artifact to teleport my body over many floors below the office, inside an empty room where a copy of the same artifact was stored.
In that room were many other intruders attempting to retrieve the cane from the slab of metal it was currently stuck in. All of them were dressed in ragtags; they all smelled like demons, yet this time the smell was extremely faint, not enough to trigger the automatic response from the artifact.
"Ab—" Before those intruders could even open their mouths, I had summoned my chains, commanded them to wrap the heads of the intruders, and crushed them.
When I came out of that room, everything else looked fine; the many people at work didn't even realize there were intruders and were quick to gather the corpses and drag them somewhere else.
I swung one of the chains against the containment room, forcing the alarm system to activate.
Everything seems fine, yet these people couldn't even detect their presence. The security works just fine; the agents aren't dazed or hypnotized or seem compromised in any sort of way.
All the agents are more than capable of handling themselves and passed through a rigorous screening, so the problem lies outside, so what did I miss?
As the alarm went off, all the containment rooms for the demons immediately entered emergency mode, shutting themselves tight, with many turrets emerging, ready to shoot at anything that moved out of line within their reach, even the demons held inside the zone.
All the cleanup agents were now patrolling the hallways while most of the research team was rapidly being escorted out towards the control room.
I, on the other hand, followed protocols and teleported myself to the power generators. There I found all the guards currently preparing themselves for battle, as many portals were forming in front of the entrance.
Wow, how bold. At least they were smart enough to do this in the middle of the night. A shame they couldn't…
I tried to get my phone out to contact Robert and his wife, but I couldn't find my phone anywhere.
Sneaky bastard, so this is how you plan to do it? You think I'm an easy target? I may not be the strongest, but I still know how to pull my weight.