30 Days | (ONC 2022) ✓

Chapter 7: A Memory

December 3, 00XX

Last night Zaila sent Elliot back to his room where he slept. Captain Adrianne let him off the hook blaming the demon magic attack for rattling his brains.

The Castiel incident which turned out to be renamed as Elliot-getting-attacked-by-a-demon was being discussed by the higher-ups. Elliot returned to the tree and saw Ythyr practicing a spell. He waited for Ythyr to finish detecting if there were angels nearby, as soon as the coast was clear he began.

"You're alright," Ythyr said in relief.

"What happened? I connected the glass panel and then Zaila woke me up."

"You fainted. My apologies for leaving you behind. Bad timing really, I sensed she was coming. I tried my hardest to wake you up but to no avail, so I had to leave you. Who knows what conclusion she'd jump into if she saw you fainted and me near you. What happened?"

"I saw something," Elliot sat down. "It happened all so fast."

"What did you see last time?"

"It wasn't clear but..."

Last night he dreamt of it, this time more vivid and horrifying.

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Another dream. Elliot dozed off and then he found himself back at the church. Thankfully he could still move his body but he couldn't physically move any objects in this place, he was merely a spectator.

"Azaroth, is it finally finished?" Elliot heard a smooth voice and looked back. It was Castiel. He wore a white robe with gold embroidery on the cuffs and hem. His hair was as black as night and curled around his face like a halo. This was the first time he saw him clearly without the blur that hid his face.

The background cleared out and Elliot looked around. It's the church in the process of being built. A huge stone building covered by scaffolding. Castiel flew down holding various materials in his hands. Elliot noted that he was building the church.

"I'm afraid not," said Azaroth. "There are still some details left." Elliot turned around and saw a demon standing at the front. He was holding a hammer. His skin was dark red, his head had three pairs of horns all curved backwards. He has long black hair and clothes that were the opposite of Castiel's, light gray with silver embroidery. The gems and jewels decorating his horns and head glimmered in the light.

"What's taking so long?" Castiel asked, dropping his box in a nearby chair.

Azaroth scoffed teasingly. "You are an impatient angel. Art takes time and certainly creating this glass panel would not take a day."

Castiel held his hands up. "Alright, I'm sorry I'm just–"

"Excited?" Azaroth interrupted with a smirk. He gently placed the glass panel down on the table and crossed his arms.

"You caught me," Castiel laughed, rubbing the back of his neck.

"I believe it will take longer. Today I have to teach the boy advanced spells. He's a natural; big dreams, skillful, talented. I see greatness in him. How about you?"

"Your student's great, maybe he'll surpass you soon you old coot."

Azaroth chuckled and cast a spell that blew heavy wind on Castiel's face. Castiel glared back before sighing. "Not like that you pompous angel, I meant how about getting a companion or student you can teach?"

"I'm better off working alone, it's already dangerous to practice light magic with a demon. And angels are too busy training to become gargoyle stones. While humans can't bear the weight of any magic and need to take years of training."

"I'm flattered you think I'm so great that you stick with me."

"Jumping into conclusions, are we? I didn't say that one bit."

"Oh, I don't need to jump to conclusions. Because I already know I'm your favorite." Azaroth winked as Castiel rolled his eyes. "Besides, what are you planning?"

"I was planning to see what light magic would do to humans."

"Hmm? The usual you know, healing humans from diseases. We demons could do it too but it takes a lot of preparation."

Elliot walked towards Castiel, he had his face down, he was definitely not talking about healing humans that way.

"I would like to know more. Maybe light magic isn't all just healing." He confessed.

"Here we go with getting ahead of ourselves. Let's finish building the church first and then I'll help you with your curious magic experiments. Oh, and won't you be late for angel training soon?"

Castiel jerked in surprise. "What?! Oh no, Caelum is going to murder me! I'll get back to you, Azaroth."

Castiel opened his wings and left in a hurry. Azaroth's laugh rang in Elliot's ears.

Then sudden flashes appeared and the view before him warped in a disarray of color until he saw another shard on a table. Green walls of fabric surrounded him, bookshelves, tables, and a bed swirled. The world spun and he heard Azaroth's quiet soft laugh. He felt a touch of vertigo, then everything went black.

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"That's all I remember," Elliot said.

"Whatever plan my master had, it required an angel that could see the past, how amusing... Have you met my master?"

"Azaroth?" So that was the demon Ythyr highly regarded. If Ythyr was already knowledgeable and powerful when it came to spells, who knows how scarier Azaroth was. "Yes I met him, I also figured out that he made the glass panel."

"How curious. Oh right, here's the shard. It changed once you fixed it. It isn't just a green shard overflowing with magic."

Elliot took the bigger piece and his eyes narrowed. It had formed a picture and showed clothes that looked very familiar. It was an image of an angel robe.

"Angel robes, similar to the glass windows in the church," Elliot observed it meticulously and gave it back to Ythyr. "Well, what now?"

"Obviously, we need to find and get the next shard. According to your information, it might be a tent."

"A green tent," Elliot corrected. "Do you have any idea where to get it?" Ythyr exhaled in frustration and buried his head in his hands.

"Green tents? Elliot, you just described every other tent in every other demon camp to exist. That'll be hard. I know because you said you heard and saw master in one, it could be any tent! With your time constraint, we're going to take two weeks minimum for this."

"Well then what are we waiting for? We can start now–"

"I think today's enough. Let's continue tomorrow, you shouldn't have a pattern in your disappearances les an angel catches a whiff of our schemes. Let's keep this one short." Ythyr stared at Elliot with force. Elliot sighed not wanting to get thrown into a tree for being stubborn.

"Fine but I'll make sure to leave early tomorrow."

"Then get your dumb face out of here," Ythyr smirked. Elliot rolled his eyes and waved goodbye. "See you tomorrow!"

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