Vabula's Intelligence

Flesh-Forging Pool Region.

Charred Shell Garden.

There was nothing garden-like about the Charred Shell Garden.

In truth, it was a barren dirt mound strewn with rubble. At its top was a stone-rimmed opening leading inward, while a thin stream of flesh wound around its base before looping back—further proof of how miserable this place was and how sparse its energy was. It could not even form a small pool of flesh.

From afar, Ichaint gave the area a cursory sweep and saw only a dozen or so sallow, emaciated low-ranking demon soldiers with faint scents. They were clearly rejects passed over by other legions.

Their discipline appeared severely lacking.

With no one managing them, two duck-billed demon soldiers squatted facing each other beside the little river of flesh. One was trying to fish out intestines, while the other had apparently just made a catch and happily tipped his head back to put a liver into his mouth.

Four demons with lizard legs, gray wrinkled skin, and twisted postures lay crookedly across the dirt mound. If all their parts had not been intact, with no missing arms or legs, Ichaint would have nearly thought they were dead.

Another demon paced aimlessly around the only small tree—truly aimlessly, since he had no eyes. One more held two stones, knocking them together and listening to the sound with a foolish grin on his face. The last two soldiers sat beside the opening at the top of the mound, both hugging their own tails as they dozed.

Not a single demon noticed his presence.

Vabula was nowhere in sight.

If he had not gone out, he should have been in the chamber inside the dirt mound.

Ichaint saw no need to avoid these soldiers. But to be safe, he still calculated the distance and slipped stealthily into the chamber.

His estimate had been fairly accurate.

He did not get stuck underground or somewhere equally awkward, successfully landing in a crammed storage room.

One small mistake was that he knocked over a rack made of gleaming black scales, sending a pile of assorted little objects tumbling off it.

Damn... These were probably Vabula's collection. With his sharp eyes, he immediately realized they were all handicrafts.

Ichaint swept up his hand and caught most of them—but two curvaceous stone statuettes resembling succubi escaped his control and fell toward the ground...

Crash!

He heard the flutter of wings.

Then a demon with the lower body of a griffin and the upper body of a humanoid appeared before him. His eyebrows were thick and long.

Duke Vabula.

Vabula did not look up at Ichaint—he did not even express the slightest surprise at the sudden intrusion. He merely spread one thin-feathered wing and, together with his two upper hands, clumsily gathered the broken stone fragments into a pile.

"I can fix them for you." Ichaint stood to one side, feeling an itch on his face. Perhaps this was what embarrassment felt like.

"Ah. Useless." Vabula drawled listlessly. His thick, white, straw-like eyebrows drooped all the way to his pointed ears.

Ichaint snatched up the fragments and casually cast a sorting spell and a reinforcement spell. Law energy flowed, arranging the pieces bit by bit and gently binding them together.

"Done."

Ichaint stuffed the two restored succubus statuettes into Vabula's hands. It had to be said, the repair was a success—even the fine patterns on the two shells over their chests had been restored exactly, without the slightest misalignment.

"What meaning does that have?"

Vabula gazed tenderly at the two succubus statuettes, stroking their smooth bellies. "Tell me. After they have been shattered and glued back together, are they still the same as before?"

Ichaint did not answer.

That question had to be a philosophical trap.

After a deliberate silence, Vabula finally raised his head slowly.

"What do you want with me, Duke Ichaint?"

"I only wanted to ask about Lord Beelzebub's battle arrangements. I assume you noticed that I failed to make it to the assembly."

Ichaint spoke a carefully edited truth. Instinctively, he looked for somewhere to sit, but found nowhere suitable—griffin bodies did not need chairs, so there were none here.

"I didn't notice." Vabula placed the two statuettes back on the scale rack, his face becoming gloomy again. "There was a group assembly this morning that all high-ranking demons had to attend. Let me think. Viscount and above. Is that the one you mean?"

Viscount and above. I should have been included too, Ichaint thought.

He had received no notification. Beelzebub had already struck him off the list of demon dukes.

Or perhaps it was some effect of the miracle...

"Chaos above, I'm truly ashamed," Ichaint said without the slightest shame. "I missed both of them. What was discussed this morning?"

"Three times. By the normal, commonly accepted method of counting, it was three times."

Vabula slowly folded his bird legs and settled onto the floor, like a bird incubating eggs. "You should have also missed the time troops were assigned to you. Useless."

"That really is a pity." The sight of the unhealthy demon soldiers directly above them, separated only by packed earth, rose in Ichaint's mind. It truly was not a pity. "Did Lord Beelzebub mention when we would depart?"

"Tomorrow. When the light of three torches exactly fills the Unopenable Door. We will ignite the Chaos Child, break through the restraints of the planes, descend one after another, and slaughter them all. And so on and so forth." Vabula answered without enthusiasm.

Ichaint nodded.

When the light of three torches exactly illuminated the Unopenable Door.

By human time, that meant noon tomorrow.

There was still one day.

"Oh, right." He asked tentatively, "Did you see Duke Andras and Grand Duke Asmodeus at today's meeting?"

Vabula's expression went blank for a moment, and his thick, long eyebrows trembled faintly. "No."

Of course not.

Ichaint was merely confirming whether Andras's death and Asmodeus's betrayal had spread—both matters were closely connected to him.

It seemed that no one knew yet.

At least, Vabula, whose status had already reached that of a duke, did not know.

Come to think of it, Vabula had not shown any wariness toward his sudden intrusion either.

If, at the time, everything had happened too quickly, and Beelzebub had only called Yifomiet to deal with him before personally rushing over himself, without thinking to spread word of it, that was still understandable.

But now, four and a half days later, it was strange that the other demons—even Vabula, a duke—still knew nothing of his crimes.

In any case, it was a good thing.

"Do you have anything else to ask? I'm tired," Vabula said.

"Ah. Right." Ichaint put on his most indifferent manner. "I heard something might be wrong with the Chaos Child? Do you know anything? I'm rather curious."

"Curiosity is a disease. Useless." Vabula said firmly. "What does any of this have to do with—"

He stopped.

The storage room suddenly darkened.

Much darker.

How was that possible...?

"Chaos above! Lord Beelzebub!" Ichaint heard the demon guarding the stone-rimmed opening above cry out in panic.