The Messengers of Sanctuary

49 - Lianmin

Jeremy was still giving her odd looks whenever he thought she wasn't paying attention. They'd left the fence almost an hour ago, and he still didn't seem to be sure what she was trying to do.

She mostly just followed him around as he walked about the space, glancing at the fence every so often. "So...no going back until the sun rises? But just for tonight. Tomorrow I can sleep in my bed?"

Min frowned, "You do not sleep anymore." She pointed out once again.

Jeremy didn't seem to believe that, but he was determined to get the first part answered, "so?"

Min shrugged, "Yes, you can...stay inside next."

He seemed mollified at that, and he trotted past a patch of flowers, not even glancing at them. Min stopped, crouching down to examine the blooms. They were very nice flowers, not many had grown back home because the tian tried to 'ration water' after the great drought.

Min hummed slightly, running her hand through the stalks, savoring the moment. Then she got up and hurried after Jeremy, who didn't seem to have even noticed Min had left his side. He'd improve in awareness with time.

The light was almost completely gone at this point, but as always happened with the sunset, the graduality of it had her demon relaxed, it would take a bit until it seized control. Min examined Jeremy though, waiting for him to realize that the darkness was pulling at him. It took practice to feel it, most new demons didn't notice until their mind already fell back.

Curiously, Jeremy blinked and stopped in his tracks, looking in the space where the sun had been, "It's dark now." He said it as if only just realizing the fact.

Min nodded, "and you can see."

He nodded absently as well, blinking several times as he examined the land around them, his eyes a bright golden with perception. He gasped slightly and looked down at himself, and then at Min, "we're glowing?"

"Yes, do you feel strange?"

Jeremy frowned, looking out at the darkness, "yes, there's-"

He cut off, falling to the ground as his demon reared its presence, Min could somewhat smell as the two parts of him tried to overpower each other, the human mind growing fainter as the darkness dug into his soul.

Min watched as the demon won, shaking himself off with a clearly annoyed growl. Min growled back and it examined her curiously, apparently having not noticed her. It seemed Jeremy's terrible perception skills crossed over to his other half...which could be either a blessing or a curse.

The other demon finished regarding her silently and stalked off, scenting the air and snarling as he caught a whiff of the zombies that weren't far off.

Predicting where this would go, Min followed behind the man, feeling her own mind begin to fade. She didn't need to fight it off, her demon understood the necessity of having a mind sometimes, and so it wasn't pining for dominance just yet. It conserved energy to simply take over once Min gave up on staying awake.

There was a strange balance they shared.

Min found the group of wandering zombies, they were clearly following a trail that the humans had left at one point and blindly stumbling forward in the darkness.

Min examined them for a long moment, making sure that none of them were intelligent. It was an idle wish, a dream really. The possibility that at least one zombie had managed to retain their mind. For all Min knew, the virus simply put it to sleep as the darkness did to herself.

But there was no telling what was going on in there, so Min shook her head sadly, humming a tune she remembered from some distant point in her childhood.

She let go, giving control to the demon

What am I?

'Destruction' Was the sad reply.

The demon woke up, stretching her back with appreciation, it decided that if it was ever chained again for several cycles at a time, it would be much less accommodating when the mind returned.

There wasn't much it could do about this, but it would fight next time, perhaps to spice things up.

The demon scented the air, vaguely recalling the presence of another demon. She scanned the area and oh blood and sorrows there were undead here! She'd been increasingly annoyed with the world ever since the undead had run out back at the old place, it was much less satisfying to tear into living flesh.

The mind would have berated her for that thought if she'd been awake, saying some nonesense about not tearing into any flesh, but there wasn't much that either of them could do about it.

The demon pounced with glee, sparks and flame erupting onto her arms, enveloping her targets. The other demon seemed just as content to destroy. To purge the world of sorrow. It was a twisted kind of ideal, the kind of thing that lonely people dream of and crazy people strive to achieve. It's the kind of ideal that perhaps a person might have in a moment of weakness, in a moment of hatred, in a moment that they might one day regret but not live long enough to do so.

I've always found it interesting that demons see the world as such. But nevertheless, unaware of the poetic nature of their ideal, the demons prowled through the night, gleefully bringing end to the things that had ended the world.

---Benjamin---

The flaming reapers rode with the sun.

And Min was there too, having won her bargain.

Ben honestly wasn't sure what she wanted to get out of the experience, every so often one of the women would come with them in an effort to work out aggression, but really it wasn't where most of them were best suited. They were good at the job, they just didn't like how it felt.

So it wasn't to the surprise of many that Min came along, especially since she'd gained a reputation as 'abnormally aggressive.' Plus she probably had nothing to fear from being bitten, she was already undead so what more could it really do?

What Ben wasn't expecting, as they approached a group of zombies, was for Min to rush ahead completely unarmed.

In retrospect, he probably should have told her to sit on the sidelines and watch, but in the moment all he knew was that the idiot was about to get herself killed. Ben rushed after her, making it exactly five steps before Min summoned her flame and started burning zombies alive as if she'd been born for it.

All she had to do was touch one of the things and it was gone a moment later. Her fire also seemed to be more effective somehow.

Flaming reapers. How ironic...

Ben had been feeling rather realistic when he'd come up with the name, but as he watched Min rushing through the ranks of undead, possessing inhuman speed and agility, he got the feeling that the name fit her better.

He was also increasingly certain that she wasn't undead at all, the certainty only increased as she looked back at them and her eyes bled into gold. 

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Vote to remind me to write Zach another chapter...