Underneath the realm of highrises, sounds pertaining to tires experiencing centripetal forces could be heard echoing between structures.
It was a deep night where stars were blotted out by the city lights, artificial neons becoming the centerpoint of illumination for the sleepless city.
A blue-haired Sankta with horns and a tail observed the scene while perched at the edge of a skyscraper.
Unfortunately, her moment of peace would not last.
There was a presence that caught her senses like a fowlbeast caught in a net, along with the two staves by her side beginning to hum.
If there was one thing that made life a whole lot easier with the staves, it was that it could detect presences extremely well. She could already do as much considering her field of expertise requiring such, but to get a second-hand gauge?
Very useful.
However, the way the staves were reacting was far removed from the familiarity it had with Yith, the vagueness it had for the Doctor, or the 'sulkiness' it had when in a bad mood.
Instead, it was… hard to articulate.
What's got it like this?
She arched her brow, just about to communicate with it.
Mid-motion, she felt the presence coming closer, and turned around. She saw a black-haired man carrying a silver-skulled staff—an Arts Unit most likely—with an unreadable complexion.
"My name is Beelezbub," the black-haired man spoke bluntly. "And you must be Mostima?"
"That I am," Mostima replied, keeping herself half-wary. Now, how did he locate me? What does he want?
Beelzebub bobbed his head in recognition. "It's been a rarity since I've seen a 'Fallen Angel'… but you're far from the kind I'm accustomed to."
"Accustomed to? Whatever do you mean by that?" She tilted her head.
"Oh, just a trivial recollection." Beelzebub waved it off like flicking ash from his sleeve, both hands perched atop the silver skull of his staff like it were a gentleman's cane.
"Oookay, sure." Mostima let it go, lazily swinging one leg over the ledge. "So, what's the occasion? You got a message for me?"
It was an assumption, but it seemed like she was right on the mark with his next response.
Beelzebub confirmed, "A message for the messenger, from another messenger."
"Talk about recursive. Alright then, what needs delivering?"
Mostima put on her best work face.
Which was her usual countenance.
"Dr. Kal'tsit," Beelzebub began, flicking his hand with astonishing dexterity, and a pristine white envelope appeared between his fingers.
The moment Mostima heard the words 'Dr. Kal'tsit,' she connected it to Rhodes Island, and now…
"Go on. I'm listening," she said, no longer doubting his trustworthiness that much.
Beelzebub continued as if reciting a prompt, "Dr. Kal'tsit informed me that the Chief Executive of Lungmen seeks to relay a message to the Lateran Pope. Sadly, all his Messengers are presently entangled in their own affairs… so the burden falls to Rhodes Island."
"Mhm."
"We aim to enlist Penguin Logistics. Particularly, their most reputable Messenger."
He offered the envelope toward her with strange decorum, the gesture limp and indifferent, an uncanny counterpoint to his honeyed voice.
"I wouldn't mind taking up the job, just another day at work really." Mostima rose in one motion, staves slung over her shoulders. "But what do I get out of this? Normally, if it were the Chief Executive asking himself, I'd do it for free, but you're outsourcing a Penguin Logistics employee here."
"You're quite right," he conceded with a blank look.
"So it's not pro bono, yeah?"
"If that's the case, compensation has been arranged in advance. Feel free to check your device and see if the terms appease you."
She dug into her jacket and unlocked her phone, thumbing through a few screens before humming softly. "Huh, nice."
Then her eyes narrowed.
"…Hey, just one thing. How do you have my number?"
"…Pardon?"
"My personal number," she clarified, arching a brow. "You didn't message my work line."
Beelzebub tilted his head, mildly confused. "Did I not?"
"Nope," she popped. "Guess you know my personal number now?"
"It seems I do." He genuinely sounded unsure.
"…Alright then."
She let it drop. It was creepy, sure, but more annoying than alarming. Odds were, Emperor handed it to someone who passed it to someone who fumbled it down the line until Beelzebub texted her with it. What a classic.
Whatever, numbers could always be changed.
Fiammetta and Lemuen could get the new one easily. Especially Lemuen, because Laterano's signal couldn't even reach Lungmen, so updates were always done face-to-face.
"Anyway," Mostima broke the silence with a casual shrug, "everything looks fair. I've got no complaints." She swiped the envelope from his hand.
"Much appreciated."
He didn't sound like he appreciated anything.
What an emo.
The priestly robes didn't help either. Naturally, it felt wrong on somebody like him.
At the very least, it bolstered his gothic look, if he were going for a gothic look; which she assumed to be the case.
Beelzebub concluded the meeting without much flair, "I'll take my departure, then—"
That was until a crossbow bolt was shot directly at the path he was just about to take. He didn't react in any meaningful way, tracing his bored eyes to the side, before following what Mostima saw as a red blur passing by.
Yikes, Mostima voiced in her psyche. Somebody's pissy.
The swift blur revealed herself to be a red-haired Liberi whose crown and scalp faded to white. She stood in front of the black-haired man, grabbing him by the collar with a real agitated look plastered upon her mien.
Fiammetta.
"You'd better tell me where you got that number," Fiammetta growled, glaring into his eyes.
"Calm down Fia, it's not that serious," Mostima sighed.
"Don't act like it's normal, Mostima." Fiammetta jerked her head the Fallen Sankta's way, before swerving back to Beelzebub. "Well? Spill it. How did you get her number?"
Beelzebub continued to meet her harrowing glower, yet not on equal measure. "Perhaps the number I had received from my benefactor was misaligned." It was hardly on equal measure.
"Yeah, like he said," Mostima walked forward, casually placing a hand on Fiammetta's shoulder, "Emperor was probably stacked with a whole lot of work and handed off the wrong number to Rhodes."
Fiammetta looked behind to gauge Mostima, seemingly not convinced. That was until she turned back to Beelzebub with one last glare, before relenting.
"See? Crisis averted," Mostima said, shrugging. "No need to blow his head off over a little misunderstanding. Talk about an overreaction."
"Yeah, yeah, I know," Fiammetta huffed exasperatedly.
"If you desire to maim me hideously, then go ahead," Beelzebub off-handedly commented, fixing his collar.
"Do you really want me to?" the Liberi chirped back.
"I can't tell if you're attempting to instigate or not," Mostima referred to Beelzebub, slightly motioning him to 'cut it out.' "But I wouldn't suggest doing that, y'know?"
"Duly noted," he replied. "I have other matters to attend to. I'll take my leave."
"He's awfully calm after the stunt you pulled," Mostima whispered to Fiammetta, elbowing her. "He might think you're my overly protective girlfriend or something."
"Hey…!" Fiammetta elbowed her back more aggressively.
Mostima rolled her eyes playfully, the Liberi giving her an earful. Even then, she kept them fixated on the black-haired man.
His short cloak gyrated just barely in the wind as he walked away.
She could still feel it, her staves vibrating as if disturbed.
It would be a lie to say she didn't find him suspicious.
Bad vibes, real bad vibes.
…
She also didn't miss the small glance he gave toward her staves.
"Mostima!" Fiammetta raised her voice.
"Yes?" Mostima blinked, noticing the other woman right in her face. "Some space, please." She hovered a hand in-between.
"Were you listening?"
"Nope. Sorry."
"Ugh, forget it." Fiammetta rubbed her forehead. "I heard you two talking from a distance. You don't need to fill me in with your objective."
"That much was obvious," Mostima replied. "However, that guy…" She glanced back to where Beelzebub had left.
"What about that creep?"
"Still not gonna let that whole number thing go?" Mostima didn't receive a response, only a deadpan, so she continued. "Well, I know you don't really take the whole staves thing seriously…" She placed a hand on her staves.
"You lost me."
"And~ there we go."
Mostima expected as much.
***
Beelzebub had left the garden.
There was not much to do whilst roaming a wasteland, aside from observing.
Beelzebub noted the many intriguing sights he had been exposed to, ranging from blackened rocks to the many peculiar creatures scurrying across the land. The creatures in particular, were not too dissimilar to the many animals he had once experimented on.
Though, different enough to denote how far away he was from Valhalla, or even Midgard for the matter.
He celebrated whether or not he should dissect the many organisms that had caught his eye, all in the name of 'science,' and 'learning.' To further a goal he had been reaching at for so long.
The field of expertise he had cultivated was naught more than a means to an end; a tool.
Whether the tool had borne any fruit still had yet to be seen. Nonetheless, Beelzebub could wait patiently, to see whether said fruit would sprout.
What was another eon to an already countless eternity?
Barring those enthralling creatures, what provoked his interest the most were those black rocks gouging into the land. There were a hideous amount of them no matter where he stalked the wasteland, exuding some force far beyond what minerals could do.
He made his way toward one of the shards jutting high, a first-time exposure.
"Now, what are you…?"
Beelzebub let his fingertips scratch the material, an indistinct energy radiating off of it. The formation was smooth in some parts, and coarse at others. The further he probed into it, the more he could 'study' some aspects.
It was definitely not a terrestrial phenomenon native to the realm, an almost artificial sprout which persisted for so long, assimilating, that it was nothing but natural for the natives now.
Or, that was his assumption.
It reminded him of the many abnormal artifacts belonging to Helheim. Those unknown, festering pieces that ranged from useless trinkets, to destructive weapons that wrought destruction on grand scales.
Beelzebub's eyes drifted toward the Staff of Apomyius, the silver-skulled gift from Hades he carried wherever he went, held in his free hand.
At that juncture, he released his hand from its engrossed examinations. Then, he swiped it in a chop, a shuddering force accompanying it like the fluttering of the Devil's wing.
A cracking sound was heard, and a palm-sized shard was torn from the gigantic land tumor. As it fell, Beelzebub withheld his powers, grabbing it with his free hand.
He brought it close in front of him, doing some last minute appraisals.
His body was rejecting it.
"Assimilation," Beelzebub said to himself, wondering if he could utilize his Divine Blood to stimulate it. "Perhaps—"
Something else within him was stirring in its boiling pot in the attempt to gouge his own hand.
Thorns sprouted from his body, a tattoo ingrained on his pectoralis major beings its genesis, forcing his hand to drop the shard with a snap.
He stepped back, eyes seldom widening both in fascination and perplexity.
"What…?"
The shard, the black rock, whatever it was…
"Lilith's Mark? Does it… reject this mineral?"
Beelzebub's heart beat faster, optic orbs bearing a distraught light within its pupils. He was reminded over and over again of their faces, the Mark a delineation of his sins, imparted by death so he could continue to live a miserable life.
He lowered his hand before turning back to the sleeping shard on the sandy, crusted ground.
Lilith's Mark never activated in response to dangers that didn't jeopardize his life.
Nothing of the black rock could have imperiled him in such ways.
He deduced it was by some other workings that Lilith's Mark rejected the mineral, perhaps the divine powers vested within the tattoo?
Still, it was mere conjecture, and not a concrete answer. Just the most probable proposal he could justify.
But just as finding an answer that could eradicate all traces of Satan, discovering more of the black mineral's secrets would take time.
Time he had.
Even if the universe were to crumble and perish, there would be a black light that would guide him.
Toward Satan's visage hanging in his imagination, the effigy of evil awaiting with darkened silence.
***
'Oh, save me from Satan's pow'r should I be gone astray…' Beelzebub recounted a prayer in his head.
Prayers from the Lord of the Flies himself would most certainly be unexpected by any religious folk residing in Midgard... however, it didn't matter to Beelzebub who had been tormented by a profane apparition for eons.
He would do anything to rid him, even if it were useless incantations, useless prayers, or useless rituals. Thousands upon thousands of years had been spent and splurged with those arbitrary superstitions.
At most, those activities had become a habitual self-suggestion in some sense.
Its efficacy?
Completely and utterly lackadaisical.
Even talismen used for warding off even the highest of Demons, provided by Hades himself, were blazing pieces of placebo parchment in face of this malignant force.
In the end, nothing could stave Satan's curse.
Sing for eternity he could, but the Devil would ne'er find love.
Beelzebub finally came to a halt, placing both hands atop the argent skull ornament of his staff, and setting it in front of himself. A gale passed by and tussled his hair lightly, and in it, carried the sound of scraping heavy armor bits clashing against one another.
Rot's stench came along too, so did blood, flesh, and the repugnant squalor of war. All laid bare for his nose to acclimate to.
His gaze sauntered to who emitted such pungence.
Lo' and behold, his eyes bestowed a figure who walked like a cracked and broken wooden doll held by meager strings.
"Ah, a cannibal," Beelzebub stated matter-of-factly, staring at the limping figure.
Just from a glance, as the Priest of Gluttony, Beelzebub could tell what all sought as their meal, what they found palatable. From this nameless soldier, he could tell they desired flesh, blood, intestines, sinew, muscle, and whatever was within the human body.
They groaned, like a blood clot was stuck in their throat, traces of gurgling audible.
All he could perceive was gluttony, gluttony, and gluttony.
"How pitiful," Beelzebub continued, "that your existence is bent on such sin."
The armored figure halted in their tracks, rusted and battered armor cracking against one another. Their lowered head turned upward, toward him.
"But I understand," Beelzebub said. "You are not long for this world anyway. Come, consume me if you so wish."
He spread his arms, his staff loosely balanced in his right hand.
The thing driven mad by hunger twitched as if revulsing, before roaring, spit being seen spilling out from the crevices of their mouthguard.
Their enormous, hefty blade was lifted in their charge, ready to bisect Beelzebub who hadn't moved an inch from his spot.
Just as the weapon reached the epoch necessary for slaughter, it froze in the air as if coiled by chains. The figure was just a meter away from Beelzebub, before they started to quake, blood spontaneously bursting from their mid-section.
They fell back, clacking unceremoniously onto the ground, weapon dropping. A puddle of crimson elongated further in a pool of burgundy as it coagulated, Beelzebub watching it in front of his eyes.
"…Your innards are unlike anything I've seen," Beelzebub spoke to them as if they were still alive, lowering back into his normal posture. "What a peculiar specimen you are."
His eyes stabbed into the cadaver with an unbiased lens, analyzing every single part of their unfamiliar body.
Beelzebub's medical cognizance, ranging from the myriad bodies of Gods, Demons, humans, animals, etcetera; hadn't recognized much resembling the figure he had slain.
One that held an appetite for war, and flesh.
Beelzebub jotted down all intricacies he was exposed to within the pages of his brain, shutting the book, and then storing it deep down into echelons of his memories.
He decided to search for any signs of civilization afterward, leaving the corpse to decay.
No experimentation for him today.
***
A/N: Adam What-If Omake below.
***
Kal'tsit had to recount the time where this golden-haired man had first stepped foot into the landship. Or, could it be he had spontaneously appeared within its confines, rather than entering? There were no accounts, even from Logos' incantations, that he had entered from the outside, or in any way, breached the defenses.
Unless he was such an expert in stealth that he went unnoticed into the landship with a large majority of Elite Operators concurrently present.
What was even stranger, was that nobody displayed any hostility to him.
It was as if his presence was automatically accepted—aside from his scantily clad, borderline naked figure—by the landship-goers, something that Kal'tsit also felt. It was strange, and not to herself when she gauged some other Operator's response to the bizarre feeling.
It was not just them, either.
Pets and animals in general displayed friendliness upon first interaction, ranging from sandbeasts, to burdenbeasts, to fowlbeasts, and even to Originium slugs.
Aggressive creatures even if showing hostility to someone else, if they were an animal, immediately became docile in his presence.
"This place really reminds me of Noah's Ark, you know? Not that I ever boarded it myself, mind you."
It was by then Adam's voice interrupted her thought process like a passing zephyr.
"Did I interrupt your thoughts? My apologies," Adam said.
"…It's fine," Kal'tsit shook her head, "perhaps you could, in turn, adorn yourself in a more appropriate attire?"
"I wasn't aware there was a strict dress code. Weren't there some others ambling around with swimsuits?" he questioned.
"Wearing a swimsuit and wearing a fig leaf are two entirely different matters, Adam," she replied curtly.
"I see." He nodded with his eyes closed, the very painted picture of someone not seeing in any capacity.
"But I believe we are digressing," Kal'tsit moved on. "I have a general gist of what you are, Adam."
"So you do."
"Then let me be direct for brevity's sake. What side do you stand on?"
"…Side, huh? Why does that matter?" Adam sighed, swiveling on the chair he was on, as if he had never been exposed to the concept of an 'office chair'. "I stand on the side of humanity."
"You're being vague."
"Well, I guess you would have to define what humanity is." Adam lightly bobbed his left and right, contemplating.
"And how would you define it?"
"'Humanity'—my sons and daughters—do not exist here," he answered.
"…"
"However, humanity does. Do you understand what I mean?"
Kal'tsit chewed over his words for an interval, before nodding. "I do."
"Then that's all you need to know." Adam sighed whilst stretching. "Whatever is human, I seek to protect."
She let his words linger for a moment longer, staring into his eyes.
"Hm?" He tilted his head.
"…I understand," Kal'tsit finally said as if a boundless ton had been lifted, discerning no lies nor treachery from him. "Welcome aboard Rhodes Island, Adam."