33 – Hunter and Iphis make up

“You bastard, let me the fuck out!” Hunter yelled, trying the door handle and quickly finding that it wouldn’t open.

Moros always gave off the impression that he was a dandelion in danger of being blown away by a soft breeze, so since when was he so strong? And why, even though Hunter had joined their team, were these damn clerics still treating him like a sack of potatoes?

“Don’t blame him. He always gets a little dramatic when it comes to conflict resolution… It’s my fault.” 

Hunter turned to the side and saw that what he’d initially mistaken for a pile of laundry on the opposite seat was, in fact, Iphis. 

“What do you mean, dramatic? He was acting totally normal!” Hunter shouted, pulling off the stupid mask and throwing it aside in a fit of pique.

Then he winced, as without the mask to block it, he was hit with a strong smell of alcohol.

“Yes. He very normally got you to put down your guard, and then locked you in a carriage. Just like how he very normally said he needed my help with his curse back in Eleusis, and now I’m in Kastri. We are in Kastri, right?”

“Wait… are you saying that if I’d refused to go with him earlier—?”

“You’d still have ended up here, in some other way, just like I did,” Iphis replied, some of his words slurring together in amusement. “Haha… classic Moros.”

“For fuck’s sake, what is wrong with the both of you?” Hunter sullenly tried the lock again, found that it still wouldn’t open, then pounded his fist on the door. “Moros, I’m serious, open this door! And Iphis, why am I more upset about this than you are? I got lured here, but I’m pretty sure you were actually kidnapped!”

The pile of clothes briefly trembled and then mumbled in a pleased voice, “I know, right? He pretends to be so aloof, but he really cares about me… hehe.”

Hunter gave up on both of them, dragged his hand down his face, then counted slowly from one to ten and back again a few times.

What was the point of getting angry? If anything, he should be used to this by now. At least he hadn’t been tied up this time.

Sitting down across from Iphis, he glared at him and asked, “Are you drunk? You smell like you slept in a wine barrel.”

“I was drunk. Now, I’m hungover. Oh, and dizzy, I’m very dizzy…”

“Then sit your hungover ass up and yell at me or something so he’ll let us out of here!”

Iphis obediently sat up partway, the folds of his clothing leaving red lines on his golden-brown skin from where their edges had pressed against it. With his dark hair covering most of his tear-streaked face, Iphis looked at him with one bleary eye and said, “You’re actually a little distressed by being locked in here, aren’t you?”

Seeing him like this, Hunter tensed up.

He couldn’t help it. He’d learned very early on to interpret tears as the prelude to an attack, so even as heartless as it made him feel, his first reaction to seeing them was never sympathy, but fear.

Usually he could quash that feeling pretty quickly when it came to someone like Euphy, but with someone like Iphis it was almost impossible for him to resist the surge of panic and defensiveness he felt.

The only thing that made him feel a little better was that Iphis was being very calm about the whole thing. There was no quaver in his voice, no sobbing, no shaking—it was as though his reddened eyes had simply sprung a leak, and he didn’t seem to expect Hunter to do anything about it.

Crossing his arms over his chest, Hunter pressed himself back against his seat and growled, “I’m not distressed. I’m pissed off by the way you two keep hazing me like I’m pledging your fucking fraternity. Seriously, would it kill you guys to treat me with a little respect?”

“… Oh. Okay then, I’m sorry.”

“About what, exactly? The list is getting pretty long, so I’ll need you to be more specific.”

“I see. Then I’m sorry for leaving without saying anything, and not answering your messages, and for scaring Moros into taking desperate measures,” Iphis replied, and then pointed to the door. “I think he just wants us to go back to normal, so as long as you yell that you’ve accepted my apologies, he should let us out.”

“You…” Hunter trailed off, inexplicably frustrated by how quickly Iphis folded, and gave his face another angry rub. “Is that all you want to say to me? Really? You aren’t just gonna bottle the rest of the shit up for later, are you? At least get mad about the stupid demon thing!”

“Oh right, that… I mean… I guess I was a little mad, at first,” Iphis admitted. Then, turning over to lay down and curl up again with his back to Hunter, he continued in a muffled voice, “But it wouldn’t be fair to blame you for my own professional failing. And I understand why you felt you had to hide it, so really… It's fine.”

Hunter was tempted to throw his hands up and say ‘great, glad we worked this out,’ and demand Moros let them go, but he hesitated.

The more they talked, the more he got the impression that, while his lies might have kicked things off, whatever was going on with Iphis wasn’t actually about him.

Usually he’d consider this a good thing, since his automatic response to any emotionally charged situation was to ignore, deflect, or flee.

However, after reuniting with Euphy, he’d come face to face with the consequences of that kind of cowardice, and he could no longer pretend that the way he preferred to protect himself didn’t hurt anyone else.

In fact, if he looked back at his life, at the series of callous decisions he’d made that always felt insignificant at the time until one day they all came together and swept over him like a fucking avalanche, he had to admit that avoiding this kind of shit might have been the biggest mistake he’d been making all along.

Shutting people out felt more tolerable, but it also meant never really understanding what was going on under the surface until it was too late.

It was also, without a doubt, a shitty way to treat them.

Taking a breath, he braced himself and seriously asked, “Okay. If you’re not mad about the demon, then what’s got you so upset?”

When Iphis didn’t respond, Hunter reached out to nudge him with his foot and cajoled, “Come on, I’m not touchy-feely like you. I don’t know how to handle this stuff. Can’t you work with me here?”

When the silence continued, he added, “Plus, we both know I’m an awful person, right? Whatever you’re worried about, it’s not like I’m in any kind of position to judge you.”

After digesting this for a while, Iphis eventually mumbled, “Hunter… Have you thought about it yet? What will happen to you, if your demon takes over?”

“Huh? Yeah, of course—either I take myself out, or someone else does it for me.”

Both Calliope and Chiron had made it very clear that, while they were willing to work with him, that agreement didn’t extend to the demon. If he ever became fully possessed they’d put him down for good.

As brutal as that sounded, he didn’t really mind. If it was between dying again or letting some dybbuk wear his face so it could prey on his loved ones, the choice was easy to make. Thus, he hadn’t really thought about it since.

“If they have to send someone, it’ll probably be me,” Iphis said softly.

“Uh… is that so?”

“Yes. It’s my specialty, actually. I’ve probably killed more people like you than any other cleric alive.”

Despite the boastful way this was phrased, it didn’t sound like something Iphis was happy about.

In fact, now that Hunter thought about it, hunting demons was a pretty depressing job. Having to search for signs that someone’s family or friend or neighbor was already gone so you could destroy whatever was left of them didn’t sound like the kind of work you got thanked for.

It also hadn’t occurred to him that the person who’d take him out might be someone he knew.

“Hunter, I don’t want to kill my friends. Even if it’s out of mercy, even if it’s what she—what you would want,” Iphis continued, his face still hidden as his voice cracked, “it doesn’t feel like it.”

… Oh.

So this sort of thing had happened before.

“I… I’m sorry,” Hunter said, scratching the back of his head awkwardly. “I guess I didn’t think it through.”

Shit. Now that he knew why Iphis was actually upset, he felt like an asshole for getting mad in the first place.

“Do you think I’m being selfish?” Iphis asked.

“What? How in the world would that be selfish?”

“I just mean… If you had to die, wouldn’t you prefer it to be by someone you knew?”

Hunter wanted to say ‘absolutely not,’ that making someone do such a thing was incredibly cruel, but he hesitated.

He didn’t know the context surrounding the situation. Where he was from, it wasn’t uncommon for people to be forced to decide when to give up on trying to save terminally ill family members, and wanting to spare them that pain didn’t mean you necessarily could. Trying not to sound like he was blaming either of the parties involved, he said, “For me? No… Personally, I’d rather the last memory they had of me was a good one.”

“I see. I guess I feel the same way, I was just… worried I was being biased.”

After that, both of them fell silent. Iphis stayed curled up in a little ball by himself while Hunter remained across from him, twisting his fingers in his lap, unsure what to say. 

He felt like he ought to make up for his earlier misunderstanding and comfort this guy, but how the hell was he supposed to do that? He was terrible at this sort of thing.

“They, uh… was she a good friend?”

“Mmhm. The best.”

“I see. That, uh… that fucking sucks.”

He heard something that might have been a ‘yes,’ but it was choked and quiet, so he wasn’t sure.

Fuck fuck fuck, if only he had a script for this, if only he were a kind and empathetic person, maybe then he’d know what to say instead of sitting there floundering like an idiot.

“I, um… I did something similar myself, once,” Hunter blurted out.

There was a hushed rustle of fabric, and then a faint, “… You did?”

He hesitated, his fingers tensing so tightly he half-expected to hear the joints creak.

This was a secret he’d planned to take to the grave, and… Well, now that he thought about it, he’d been successful in that regard.

But now that he’d climbed back out, did keeping it really matter anymore?

Especially since Iphis seemed like someone in the unique position to understand.

“It was a long, long time ago, but, uh… they were someone I loved… or used to love, anyway. To be honest, by the time it happened, I’m not sure I felt that way anymore.”

“Do you regret it?”

“Do I regret it? Of course—”

He paused.

He usually tried not to remember that far back, and in truth, what little he could recall was so distorted that he wasn’t entirely sure what parts of it had been real and what parts his mind made up in the years after the fact.

Only a few things still stood out clearly. 

A pool of flickering blue light like an island in the darkness, its air thick with the sticky-sweet scent of decay, of neglect, of filth.

A wall of static, whispering like a faceless chorus in condemnation of his decision.

And amidst it all a feeling not of sorrow, or even relief, but instead a profound and agonizing loneliness. As though he had, by his own hand, destroyed his last chance of ever finding rescue.

“… No,” Hunter said. “I regret the situation that forced me into it, and I regret what it did to me, but if I was back there right now I’d make the same choice again.”

“Oh.”

“What about you?”

“Probably the same,” Iphis murmured.

Unsure if it was the right thing to do, Hunter got up and moved over to Iphis’ side, perching on a sliver of the seat. Then, feeling stiff and uncomfortable, he reached out and put his hand on Iphis’ shoulder. 

Iphis flinched at the touch, but didn’t protest, so they sat like that for a while, lost in their own thoughts.

Iphis was the one who eventually broke that silence, saying, “You must think I’m a hypocrite.”

Hunters’a mouth, responding faster than his brain, instantly agreed, “Yeah, but about what exactly?”

Iphis let out a small, self-deprecating little laugh and said, “I meant… Considering my job and the kind of blessing I have, isn’t it pathetic? I spend so much time telling other people how to handle their grief, but I’m terrible at it myself.”

Hunter gave Iphis’ shoulder a squeeze and said, “Well, I think that knowing how to do something doesn’t necessarily make actually doing it easy. Anyway, even if you are a hypocrite, you still helped me when I got here, didn’t you?”

“Did I?” 

“Yeah. I mean, at the time I was so busy trying to survive that I didn’t realize just how much things were fucking me up,” Hunter mumbled reluctantly. “You were the only one who noticed, or who even tried to say anything. If you hadn’t given me advice, I’d probably still be bottling everything up and steadily going crazier, right?”

“Well, not necessarily.”

“Just shut up and take the credit, will you?” Hunter snapped. “God, how can you stand to do this sort of thing with people all the time? Seriously, I feel so fucking awkward right now I could die!”

Realizing what he’d said, Hunter quickly stumbled to apologize,

“Wait, I’m sorry, I didn’t mean it like that—”

Only to be met with muffled laughter.

“Shut up, man, I’m trying, okay? I told you I’m not good at this shit!” 

Now Iphis finally sat up, leaning against Hunter and resting his head on his shoulder, still shaking with choked laughter.

“Fucking asshole,” Hunter muttered, crossing his arms. Despite his annoyance, he didn’t push Iphis away.

“I’m not laughing at you.”

“So you’re what, laughing adjacent to me?”

This just made Iphis laugh hard enough that he choked and ended up having a coughing fit.

“Come on, that wasn’t even funny!” Hunter began to say, only to be cut off when Iphis suddenly lunged at him, wrapping him up in a crushing embrace so startling and strong that a little embarrassing squeak of air escaped him.

“Hey! What gives!?”

“Why are you always so kind to me?” Iphis asked, shamelessly burrowing his tear-soaked face into the crook of Hunter’s neck.

“When have I fucking ever?” Hunter protested, pushing at Iphis’ shoulders and then, when that didn’t work, smacking him violently on the back.

“I told you I killed one of my friends. Don't you know how most people would react to that?” Iphis asked, his breath uncomfortably hot against Hunter’s skin, his embrace as warm as a furnace. “Shouldn’t you want to get away from me? Shouldn’t you be afraid of me?”

Hunter, abruptly reminded of the reason he’d been comforting this grief-stricken jerk in the first place, stopped struggling.

Oh. In this case, he supposed a hug wasn’t that inappropriate.

“I already told you, I’ve always known what kind of guy you are, and I also know that I’m just as garbage as you,” Hunter sighed, awkwardly giving Iphis a less violent pat. “You stupid bastard, if you want a hug, can’t you just ask for one normally?”

“Would you give me one, if I asked for it?”

“I mean, I guess?”

“Oh,” Iphis said. Then he pressed even closer, and mumbled something against his neck.

“What was that?”

“I said ‘thank you.’ You’re a really good friend.”

“I’m not, you just have low standards and a warped sense of normalcy, and—and can you let me breathe a little, please?” Hunter asked, jabbing Iphis in the side until he loosened his hold enough for Hunter to catch his breath.

Unfortunately, part of being hugged meant that he was now forcibly reminded of just how much this guy had been drinking, so he complained, “Also, seriously, did you drink the wine, or did you bathe in it? I feel like I’m about to relapse just breathing next to you… wait, are you bleeding?”

Among the overpowering scent of alcohol, he sniffed and caught a faint, familiar metallic scent.

“Only a little,” Iphis reassured him.

“Okay, okay, that’s enough, let go so I can give you first aid or whatever, yeesh.”

To his surprise, Iphis obediently let go and backed off to give him some space.

His face was still flushed and wet, and strands of damp hair clung to his skin. While he wasn’t crying anymore, tears stuck the long dark lashes of his lowered eyes into thick clumps, as though framing the helpless sense of desolation within them.

Feeling his heart clench, Hunter gritted his teeth and looked away.

Damn it. Iphis was very good at appearing pathetic when he was perfectly fine, but this genuinely upset version of him was truly on another level. Somehow it made Hunter feel like he’d kicked a puppy even though he hadn’t done anything except try to comfort the guy.

Unsure whether or not Iphis was doing this on purpose, Hunter decided to give him the benefit of the doubt in light of the circumstances and asked, “Okay, just tell me, where are you hurt?”

“You don’t need to worry, I’m alright.”

“You said you were bleeding! Just show me already, stop being coy, it’s fucking annoying!”

Iphis grabbed his hand and Hunter, stupidly thinking that Iphis was going to show him, let Iphis press his palm against the left side of his chest as he leaned close and looked up, whispering, “Right here.”

Hunter paused, looking down into Iphis’ eyes and calculating the likelihood that this prick was just teasing him, then promptly ripped his hand away and spat, “Fuck off! God, you’re such a fucking asshole!”

“I’m sorry, I couldn’t resist.”

“I don’t know if I should be pissed or glad you feel better enough to joke around,” Hunter grumbled, putting some distance between them by moving back to the other side of the carriage.

“I’m sorry, don’t leave… Here, I’ll clean up a bit,” Iphis offered, casting a couple quick cleaning cantrips on himself. 

It didn’t eliminate the wine smell completely, but did seriously improve it.

“You could have done that this whole time!?”

“Yeah, sorry. To be honest, I’m still pretty drunk,” Iphis said, flashing Hunter a dazzling, somewhat inebriated smile.

“I…”

Hunter sighed, slapping his hand on his face.

At this rate, he was starting to worry he might leave a permanent hand print there.

“Iphis, if I could open that door, I would throw you out.”

Prompted by this, Iphis took the initiative to knock on the door himself and called out, “Moros? We’ve made up, could you unlock the door?”

Just like that, the lock clicked and the door swung open.

Hunter, who’d been ready to tear out of the carriage and start yelling, was surprised back into his seat when Moros calmly entered of his own volition, removing his mask as he settled down next to Iphis.

Placing his hands neatly in his lap, Moros solemnly opened with, “I’m sorry, I was wrong.”

“Oh you were, were you?” Hunter sneered, squeezing his hands into fists. “Then why’d you do it!?”

Iphis had taken advantage of Moros’ appearance to drape himself over him, so Moros gently pushed his face away as he explained,

“Because you refused initially, and I was worried if I pushed you, you’d get angry and… attack me, like you did with Dean Hegias and the others. So, if you’d like to hit me now, please go ahead.”

…

Hunter choked, ready to call Moros’ assumption absurd, but when he thought about it, he recalled that although Iphis and Moros had taken turns watching him, Moros was far less social than Iphis, and they’d had very few meaningful interactions.

It wasn’t until his mana cuffs were off and he went back to work that they really spent any time together, during which Hunter had gleefully terrorized anyone who dared piss him off without ever bothering to explain the context to Moros…

Hunter, unexpectedly finding himself face-to-face with the consequences of his own actions, thought, Oh no, is this actually my fault!?

Iphis looked between them in confusion, asking, “What? Hunter was in a fight while I was out? What happened?”

Taking a deep breath, Moros began, “Well, technically one of the fights could be considered defending his employees, but the other three altercations I witnessed, starting with menacing Dean Hegias with a pen and threatening to pull out all his teeth—”

“Hey hey hey! Hold on, it’s not like I actually hurt anyone, I just scared them a little—and more importantly, I only roughed those people up because Euphy wanted me to act tough, and because those guys were assholes trying to take advantage of my ‘injury!’” Hunter said, trying to ignore the sparkling, wide-eyed way Iphis was now looking at him. “Moros, buddy, I don’t randomly go off on my friends like that—if you’d just taken a minute to explain what was really going on, I would have listened and agreed to talk to Iphis, I swear!”

Moros frowned slightly, the fine skin between his pale eyebrows wrinkling, and asked, “You… consider us friends?”

“Umm… yes?”

“Oh. I see. My mistake,” Moros nodded, finally appearing somewhat contrite. “I didn’t realize… I wish you had told me beforehand…”

“What? Was I supposed to?”

He looked to Iphis for help, but Iphis was busy grabbing Moros by the hand and shaking it as he said, “Moros, I’m so happy for you, congrats on making a friend!”

“I’m really not sure how I did it, but thank you,” Moros replied with an air of humble bewilderment.

You know what, I… I give up, Hunter thought, most of his anger doused by confusion. They’re not normal, neither of them are normal, but at least nobody's crying anymore.

“Hey, Moros… In the future, as my friend, please don’t do the kind of stuff you did today again, okay?” Hunter asked, feeling like if he wasn’t very clear now he might regret it later. “No tracking me without my consent, no lying to get me to follow you to a second location, no locking me up anywhere. Those things really upset me, alright?”

“Oh… you said something similar to me once, didn’t you? Maybe I should have told him that earlier,” Iphis murmured under his breath, which got him a glare from Hunter.

“I see… I really do apologize for misjudging you,” Moros said, nodding slowly. “But I didn’t lie to get you here. We really have been called to the scene of a demonic massacre.”

“What!?” Hunter and Iphis asked in shocked unison.

“Yes, actually… Chiron’s been sending all of us messages this whole time, he’s probably pretty angry at how late we are…”

“You—what do you mean, you—“ Hunter searched his pockets, and came up with nothing. “You swiped my receiver, too?”

“Mmhm, I borrowed both of yours,” Moros explained, reaching into his robes to pull them out. “Here, you can have them back now.”

Iphis, hands shaking, took the receiver and blanched at the sheer number of messages lighting it up. Grabbing Moros by the sleeve, he begged, “Moros, please tell me you’re joking.”

“No? Would… would that have been funny?”

Iphis leaned his forehead on Moros’ shoulder and let out a very long, very deep sigh.

You two are fucking made for one another, Hunter thought, judging them in silence.

After realizing they were all very late to a serious event, Moros volunteered to drive the carriage the rest of the way while Hunter and Iphis rode inside it. Iphis focused on sobering up and putting on a cleric uniform over his clothes while Hunter entertained himself by playing the increasingly furious messages Chiron had sent them one by one.

When they arrived, Iphis stopped Hunter from following after Moros and said, his voice distorted by the cleric mask he was now wearing, “No, let Moros go alone, he can handle it.”

“What? But I need to talk to Chiron too,” Hunter protested through his own mask, thinking that Chiron could yell as much as he liked, but since Hunter was just a freelancer in this scenario he didn’t really give a shit.

In fact, considering that Chiron’s employees had wronged him twice now, he had half a mind to file another complaint.

The neighborhood Moros had brought him to earlier was pretty fancy, but this new place was quite literally on another level. The historic mansion before them sat alone on the highest spot in the city, blocked by a massive iron gate and surrounded by a tall stone wall. The clerics stationed outside of it wore silver-white uniforms identical to their own, the biggest difference being that their faces were unmasked. 

A little further ways down, some other clerics and a group of Kastri Guardsmen were engaged in an argument, but since it was all happening behind a sound barrier, to Hunter it just looked like a rumble about to go down between two troupes of particularly fierce mimes.

Ignoring them, Hunter and Iphis paused to check in and verify their identities. He noticed one of the clerics frown as their mana signatures registered, but the man still let them through.

“What did you want to speak to the Boss about?” Iphis asked as they continued on foot up the wide, manicured driveway.

“I wanna make sure you don’t have to take care of me if—you know,” Hunter said, making a cutting motion at his throat.

“Really?”

“Of course! Seriously, it’s irresponsible that they’d even consider you for the job. Do they not know about what happened in the past, or do they just not care?”

“The… well… the latter, mostly,” Iphis admitted. “I know Chiron wouldn’t approve of sending me to do that kind of thing, but he doesn’t always have the final say.”

“Oh, well, at least I know he’s not the one being a jerk here.”

“Consultant,” Iphis continued in a hesitant tone, “I feel like I should caution you that what you’re asking for might not be so easy to achieve...”

“So? I’ll burn that bridge once I get to it,” Hunter said, happy to throw his newfound weight around on behalf of his friends. “Hey, when do I get my own code name? Can I pick what bird I wanna be?”

“Ah, so my little Crane told you about those? Good, good—and no, technically you’re one of our assets, so your code name will probably be similar to those for the Heroes.”

“Oh really? What kind of names do they get?”

“You need to ask the Boss for clearance, sorry.”

“Can I ask why you’re ‘Rook?’”

“Oh, hmm… I… got in trouble for stealing a few times when I was younger…”

“Haha, yeah, that sounds like you.”

“Which reminds me, what were those ‘altercations’ Moros mentioned? Did anything serious happen while I was gone?”

“Like I said earlier, just some people testing my boundaries,” Hunter said. Keen to change the subject before Iphis started pressing for details, he added, “Oh, by the way, I went to that tailor you recommended—nice lady.”

“Really?” Iphis asked, his distorted voice surprised. “But you seemed so reluctant to take my suggestion before.”

Well, yeah, that’s because I thought you were being a pervert.

Ever since Iphis noticed that Hunter was using bandages to handle his chest problem, he kept trying to suggest ‘other options.’ Hunter, who already didn’t like thinking about his stupid chest, was annoyed by the fact that Iphis seemed to be thinking about it to an inappropriate degree, and had coldly brushed him off every time.

In fact, he’d only gone to that shop at all because they just so happened to specialize in ready-made clothing, something which wasn’t very common in this country, and he’d wanted to buy Euphy some new outfits.

Somehow the tailor had clued in to his problem, and what she’d offered looked so promising that he’d immediately taken her up on it.

“Why didn’t you tell me the solution was so simple? I mean, really, it’s just like a short little vest. I don’t know why all women don’t wear them.”

Even with his face covered by a mask and hood, Iphis’ body language somehow radiated the impression that he had tried to tell him, but rather than press the matter he just sighed and said, “Well, it’s good as long as you like it…”

There was far more activity as they reached the mansion’s wide-open main doors. More silver-robed clerics swarmed in and out giving orders, arguing, and carrying equipment back and forth.

After stopping at the door to verify their mana signatures yet again, Hunter noticed two things.

The first was that, just like the clerics at the gate, a few faces became unhappy the moment their identities were revealed. He glanced aside at Iphis, wondering if this was because they were annoyed by people from the Golden Shield running around in their uniforms, or if it had something to do with him and Iphis specifically.

The second thing was that, despite the summery climate outside, inside the mansion it was freezing cold. Hurrying to deactivate his cooling artifacts, he quickly cast a warming cantrip on himself. Then he studied the big refrigeration spell drawn on one of the walls, and at the magical circuits snaking away from it towards other rooms.

“Is the cold for the bodies?” he asked as yet another cleric forced them through a series of decontamination spells, so that by the time they were finished he’d been stripped of every last bit of debris, dirt, and oil, leaving his skin parched and his hair dry and stiff.

“Yes, so let’s follow those lines, they usually don’t set up the command center on top of the victims,” Iphis replied, still eager to avoid Chiron.

“Do you know what’s going on here yet?”

“Not really. I’ll ask someone to brief me soon. I can tell you that this is the mansion of the Archduke of Kastri, and that it’s the same building I’ve been trying to get into all week… Isn’t it funny that it just so happens to be a crime scene now?”

“You’ve been trying to get in here? Why?”

Leaning closer to Hunter as they walked, Iphis whispered, “Last weekend, the Boss’ nieces ran into a smuggled basilisk. Four people died before it was caught, and the wardens and some of our people tracked its origin to the sewers in this area. Unfortunately, because it’s an imperial residence, the Kastri Guard kept coming up with all sorts of red tape to keep us out.”

“Damn, that’s fucked up.”

“Isn’t it? Oh, and on another note, I’ve been meaning to ask: have you told your daughter about your possession yet?”

“Uh… no, not yet. Why?”

This was partly because he didn’t want to, and partly because he’d genuinely forgotten that he needed to.

“Are you planning to tell her?”

“Yes! Yes, it’s just, she’s already been through a lot this week, I don’t want to make her worry about me on top of that.”

“I see. You’d rather put it off a bit longer so that when you do tell her she’ll be upset and angry in addition to being worried?”

Iphis stared down at him—or, at least, the three creepy silver eyes on Iphis’ mask seemed to stare at him.

Cringing, Hunter moved a step away from him and replied, “When you put it like that, it kind of sounds like I’m being a selfish asshole."

“Does it? I wonder why.”

“Look, it’s easy for you to say, but how am I even supposed to tell her! What if she doesn’t believe me, or she thinks I’m a demon and freaks out, or—”

“Or, I could help you explain things, so she won’t just have to take your word for it,” Iphis offered. “In fact, let’s recruit Hebe, too—your daughter likes cats, doesn’t she? Hebe is very cuddly, I’m sure they’d get along.”

“Oh, uh, yeah. I guess that is a good idea. Thanks.”

Hunter had nearly forgotten how reliable Iphis could be when he wasn’t acting like a madman. No wonder he’d felt so uncomfortable the whole time this guy was giving him the cold shoulder. 

The path they followed led them down into the lower floors of the mansion, and soon the opulently decorated surroundings became more bare and utilitarian. Where the hall began to show signs of battle, someone had set up a kind of semi-translucent magical walkway which allowed them to continue without having to tiptoe across the bloody handprints and drag marks strewn across the floor.

Ahead, two big doors hung open, looking like they’d been blasted halfway off their hinges. Beyond stretched a wide open space featuring an ornate vaulted ceiling supported by rows of carved columns and walls covered in carved friezes. As far as dungeons went it was surprisingly beautiful, so long as one ignored the monstrous corpse sitting in the middle of it and the piles of unidentifiable meat scattered amidst gratuitous splashes of even more blood.

“Looks like we found the place,” Hunter said. Then, as they stepped through the doors, he was hit with a strange sensation. 

It was almost as though he’d walked out of a rainstorm and into a desert, and it took him a moment to realize this was because there was no ambient mana in the room.

He was now so used to sensing it around him all the time that its absence actually felt somewhat uncomfortable. This was compounded by the fact that, as a necromancer facing so many remains, he’d unconsciously expected to encounter a great deal of, for lack of a better term, ‘death-flavored’ mana.

After adjusting to this atmosphere, he turned his attention to the lifeless demon in the center of the room and let out a low whistle in appreciation. 

“Damn. Hey, Rook, are all demons that big?”

“I’ve seen bigger… although, honestly, big is usually better for us. The tiny ones can get into all sorts of places when they manifest. I can’t tell you how many little holes I’ve had to crawl through…”

In this room, unlike elsewhere, all the clerics present were masked. Judging by the fact that Hunter couldn’t smell anything despite the prevalent gore, it looked like their masks were good for more than just giving people the heebie-jeebies.

Iphis left to speak with one of the other clerics while Hunter went to take a closer look at the demon. He’d heard they could come in all kinds of shapes, but this one was particularly disgusting, like a mutated pile of flesh and tendon and tumors that’d been randomly slashed open and left in an elephant-sized pile.

Circling around it, he saw that beyond the dead demon, on the farthest wall, someone had left a message.