"Locious, there is one more thing I need to tell you in private," Xar said when they were getting up to leave half an hour later. Sandy and Rose looked at him, and when he nodded, they closed the door behind them. Locious felt his heart lurch by the seriousness in Xar's face.
"Please tell me you don't have any more bad news," he said, touching his eyebrow for the thousandth time in the last few days. There had been so much bad news coming at him from all sides that it had become a new quirk. He had never done it before and now he couldn't stop.
"Depends on how you want to see it. As you very well know, I can keep track of every demon and human that wants to set foot on Earth." Xar emphasized every word, as if making it clear the information was linked to that power. Whether through the symbols he branded on humans after a contract or the blood pacts he formed with his demons, Xar had a tracking system completely at his disposal. But that had nothing to do with the drug or the Aetherium Umbra. Unless…
"Wait, are you trying to tell me the demons who stole the samples are not your people?" Locious's voice dropped. Greed's office was a fortress where no one could overhear them, but the idea that some demons could escape Xar's clutches was unheard-of. Still, he recalled how the demon club owner had been overlooked, leading them to where they were now. Also, the attacks had not only come to the Society but also the Association. None of the people there would ever have the guts to go after Dexaryz so it must have come from someone outside the Association.
"Bingo. Not only that, the demons who drugged your girl and chased you are not my people either. I did a full scan here because I feared someone had the balls to betray me. I do not want to get my hands dirty with someone from my own ranks. Turns out, they weren't mine," he said. Locious's mouth twitched. His fear wasn't based on being betrayed, but on the inconvenience of getting his hands dirty? Why do I have to work with these twisted demons? Locious thought but his fury for the situation was stronger than any friction or discrepancies among them.
"So what does it mean? Demons are escaping Hell? Someone is setting them free under our noses? What in the Angels' name is going on?" he asked. As outrageous as it seemed, a hard truth remained: neither the Society nor the Association wanted both sides to collide. The world had been balanced for centuries, but suddenly hidden mysteries threatened to make both sides crumble.
"I have no idea what's going on. If someone is working against us, it has been brewing for a long, long time deep in the shadows. Every human, demon, and King I talked to knew nothing about leaks or suspicious activity. I ask you to be on your guard and don't mutter a word about this. If there really is someone capable of playing both you and me, they are either incredibly powerful or a full-time idiot. Just be wary and let me know what you decide about the Aethium Umbra," he said, and both stood up. Locious left Xar's office feeling as if his head weighed a hundred pounds more.
Moreover, he had spent only a few minutes talking to Greed, but he was starting to feel frantic. He was breathless by the time he reached the elevator. I am losing my mind. I can't feel this way just because she isn't by my side, he thought, but the sensation was too intense, almost as if he could break in two from a light breeze.
On the top floor, Rose and Sandy were chatting with the boy who had escorted them. If he had found Rose and the guy talking alone, he might have broken the boy's bones. A chilling thought that made his whole body tense up. However, he took a deep breath and reminded himself there were more pressing matters to take care of than a sting of jealousy.
"Sandy, call a meeting with everyone in the office. We need to talk," he said. Despite him trying to keep his temper on a leash, he gave the boy a freezing look. He grabbed Rose's hand and they left the Association.
"I have a doubt… How did he know we had… you know?" Rose said in a low voice only for him to listen when they were in the car.
I should just go back and kill Lux, he thought, gritting his teeth. He answered her question with as much dignity as he could gather, hoping she wouldn't press further.
"You know Angels and Demons have a tracking skill. We track essences and Energy waves. They track Auras and scents. Think of it as if we were part of a whole. Lux—I guess you realized he is a Demon King?" He looked at her and she nodded. It was impossible not to notice the strong aura and the difference in power between the demons at the club she faced before and the Kings she met that day. "He is the Demon King of Lust. So he is abnormally sensitive to… sex… smells," he stuttered, his cheeks flushed red once again.
"Oh my God, Locious! What's that explanation?" Sandy interrupted with a loud laugh. "Lux is a pain in the ass, but he is incredibly good at tracking scents. When he sniffed Locious's neck, he probably smelled you on him. That's why he directly asked if it had been you." Rose looked at Sandy and now her face reddened too. Even if she tried to whisper, Sandy's hearing was too good not to hear them.
Locious wished a hole would swallow him at that very moment. That day had been the longest rollercoaster of his life, and it wasn't even over yet.
****
They were entering the office when Rose remembered something she had forgotten to ask and called her attention when they were at Xar's office.
"Oh! Why did the symbol on the boy's face glow when he was near Xar?" she asked. That was something they hadn't been taught at the Camp, either. Actually, at that time it seemed like too much information to study and remember. Now, in just a few weeks, she realized how much bigger the world really was.What they gave her in that year was baby food in comparison to everything she had learnt and all the unknowns she still had in her mind.
"That's because he probably signed a contract with Greed or he was pawned as collateral. When the Association fulfills a contract but the other party doesn't fulfill their part, Greed has the right to take whatever they put up as collateral. It can be people, money, souls, blood, or objects. It doesn't matter. Actually, he is so greedy that I think he really hopes people don't do their part." Sandy rolled her eyes, it was obvious the Society didn't accept the Association's ways of handling things. Their temperance when cooperating was efficient and astounding, though. "Anyway, he can brand his possessions. It's a spiritual connection that ties the person to him as a way to track them and show everyone that they belong to him. No one really wants to mess with Greed," Sandy explained.
Rose felt a chill. That meant the boy was being held because someone else put him up as collateral in a contract with demons. She was sure a boy that young couldn't have made such a deal himself; he seemed, as if being there was entirely out of his control.
"Can't we do something to help him? It's so unfair. He might not have done anything to deserve being turned into a slave for a Demon King!" she said gloomily. Sandy and Locious exchanged a strange look, but before she could press them, Mike came rushing into the hall.
"Everyone is gathered and waiting for further instructions in the meeting room," he said in his monotonous voice. He had returned to his usual self, with not a trace of the vulnerability he had shown a few hours ago. However, this time when he looked at her, the usual hate in his eyes was gone.
"Great! Let's go," Locious said, and the talk about the boy next to Greed was forgotten.
When they entered the meeting room, everyone was there, even Ron and Ethel, which explained why she had only seen Pete, Mike's little brother, at the reception desk by himself.
"Hello everyone! I know you have been working really hard on the ritual investigation. However, we finally have a clue. After the club setup, we discovered a circulating drug that induces a state of total submission. We believe that was what the priest saw when he said they were there willingly but seemed lost. Yesterday, Dexaryz discovered that the drug is coming from the Aethium Umbra."
He paused, giving everyone a moment to breathe and let the bad news sink in. When all color drained from their faces, he continued:
"We are planning a trip there in the upcoming days. A team from the Association and a team from the Society will go and take a look. We can't do much, but at least we hope to find traces of whoever broke the Pact of No-intervention. I have not decided who is going, but whether you are on the team or stay here, I need all hands on deck still investigating. We only add one more layer to the investigation: research as much as you can about the Aethium Umbra and report everything to Mike in my absence."
Questions started flowing. It was indeed a massive problem, and as much as Rose wanted to be useful, she remembered everything she had heard about the Aethium Umbra and didn't think she was prepared to face it. She went home hoping that, this time, Locious wasn't thinking of sending her or teaching her a new lesson.