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 Posted: Sat Sep 19, 2009 1:58 pm
"That was sarcasm." Altar shot back with indifference, eyes returning to the window. He could hear the demon leave, but his mind was mulling over the other's words. Pondered over it and then simply discarded it. He hated being talked down to, simply because the other was a demon? He had no right.
"Ignorance, ignorance. Who can say whom is more so? I don't know your experiences, neither do you know mine. Don't speak as if you have knowledge of the entire world. We're different, you and I. But no wiser on the topic of emotions and desires."
His volume rose ever so slightly as the demon walked off. Altar spoke as if talking to the window, the restrained mix of anger and melancholy betrayed ever so slightly in his fluctuating tone.
It was odd to hear him address the topic when the two were so similar. Prideful, overly confidant. Perhaps the man did know and understand a lot more than he let on. It was just easier to ignore it and live as he had been. In the lies he'd been taught-- it was easier when he approved of himself when everyone else did not.
What was it with today?
Altar rarely did any self reflection. In fact, he abhorred it. Even in his many bouts of silence, he distracted his mind with music and stories that were not his own. It was simpler and much more interesting. Perhaps he'd go do that now.
Slamming the window close to vent at least some sort of his pent up emotions, the man made his way down the opposite end of the stairs, making a beeline for his favourite corner of the vast library.
Yeah, he'd go do that.
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Posted: Sat Sep 19, 2009 2:11 pm
Rayne didn't reply and instead waved his hand carelessly as if saying good bye. He didn't really care what the boy had to say, he could act as if the demon was the ignorant one if he wanted to, but the matter of the fact was, between him and the boy of twenty-four years, no human experience would have been able to fill the gap.
He went back on with his duties, ignoring the boy's radiating frustration. Simply said, he had enough of his petty attitude.
He made quick work of finishing up the rest of the books before patting the dust off his hands and heading to the next section which interesting was around the same area the human had headed. Much to his dismay, the human was in clear sight and he felt like he was almost following him.
A few children running about ran towards him and attempted to climb on top of him, much to his misfortune, he ended up on all fours as they began pile on top. He really couldn't refuse them, children that is, he oddly enough had a soft spot for them.
"Gooo Raymun. GO."
He grumbled and his hung his head before growling "The name's RAYNE you damned ankle biters." He shot back but despite his angered tone, an amused expression remained on his face. He stood up and the kids jumped off. They all looked at him expectantly.
"You better run or I'll catch you and eat you up like I did Azrael!" He said, his voice booming and the children squealed, scattering like baby spiders. He grinned proudly for having shooed them off so quickly. He turned and went back to his work.
Putting books back into shelves was a tedious job. Nothing interesting came out of it. He went through books, looked for missing ones, put them back and so on and so forth. Not a particularly plum role.
Fishing through the shelves, suddenly he became alarmed and his eyes narrowed. A book was missing and not just an ordinary book. "s**t."
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Posted: Sat Sep 19, 2009 2:24 pm
Altar winced at the sudden volume. He knew the voice well-- had it etched into his mind the second the other had spoken. It cut through his music, which had blocked out the sound of children's voices before.
Gritting his teeth, he fought the urge to turn around and berate the demon. There was no further point, and he was already stewing in his dislike.
Flipping the page, the man continued to read with the novel he had found-- the missing one from the shelf Rayne was at. He quite liked the story, though the book had actually felt a lot heavier than it should. It wasn't particularly a small volume, so maybe he was just forgetting the texture and weight of certain older text.
As his eyes trailed down half of the page, it finally occurred to the man that something was wrong. The middle of the page was too..... Dark.
Flipping a few more pages, Altar blinked. In the middle of the text, a couple hundred pages had a perfectly square hole cut in the middle. Sitting within was a smaller, slightly thinner book. It was black, with gold bindings and some sort of symbol he couldn't make out in matching gold thread.
Curious, the heir divided the book in clean half, enough to lift the black volume out. Turning it over once or twice, Altar frowned. Who would keep a book in a book? .. And did it interefere with his previous story?
Finding no summary on the back, the man opened up the cover. There was nothing there, either. He flipped it around, checking the back of the book.
One with no summary? That was weird. Maybe he'd just read an excerpt in the middle.
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Posted: Sat Sep 19, 2009 7:31 pm
Rayne gasped and began to search through shelf by shelf frantically. His hands moved quickly past the spines as he sped read title by title, looking almost desperately for the missing book.
He wasn't particularly fond of it or anything. The book was a dangerous one, luring its readers almost sweetly and silently into its pages. Literally. The story wasn't a pleasant one either, in most cases in which readers were caught within its grasp they usually met rather unfortunate endings, meaning death.
They could never keep the book still, it was impossible. It was always on the look out for its next victim to consume. He couldn't let it go free ********! Where did it go?" He muttered to himself as he ran about.
Turning the corner he came across a sight that made his heart drop. It was that young man and in his hands a book and inside, another book. A black book.
His eyes widened and sprinted towards the human, his hand stretched out "Don't touch that book!" He yelled at the top of his lungs.
He leapt forward and before he could do another thing, the most unexpected turn of events happened
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Posted: Sat Sep 19, 2009 11:23 pm
Altar frowned, worrying his bottom lip as he sat up straight and uncrossed his legs to slip his feet into his shoes. Curiosity fully peeked, he was turning the book around when the demon yelled at him again.
What the ******** is he overreacting about?
Whatever it was, the voice cut through his music again, this time making him jump slightly with its urgency. The book fell open on the table, clean in the middle. Its pages ruffled, automatically returning to the first page-- as if determined to force the reader where to begin.
And then.... The heir wasn't sure whatever happened next. But regardless, it did finally fully convince him that magic existed.
The world flashed before his eyes, a sharp pain that enveloped him from head to toe. It was hardly a pleasant experience-- Was this how it felt to die? The man gritted his teeth, eyes half opened to see the white space before him. It happened too fast to react-- Tendrils of mist spilled in waves from the book, White, cyan, grey, black. Silence.
His body felt like it was being constricted, breath squeezed from his throat and skin tightening to a mind numbing level. If this was how it felt to be transported, he didn't ever want to do it again.
To the outer appearance, there had merely been coloured wisps that enveloped both the demon and the heir. But in the split two seconds it fully took to draw them into the book, the light had grown to a blinding white. In the silence after the flash the book lay innocently closed, returned into into its hidden compartment. It looked to be slowly disintegrating, finding its way to another part of the library.
The transport really looked normal. As normal as one would expect-- and the fancy Hollywood magic movies weren't too far off in their cheap CGI effects. But nobody said anything about the pain.
Altar gasped as he was literally hurled out of the portal, managing to land on one foot but bowled over backwards by the sheer force of his momentum. He skidded down the black, polished marble, only stopping when he gently collided with the far wall. The marble was like a sheet of ice.
It was dim where ever he was-- walls on both sides, like a long corridor. Stripes of dim blue lit up the place just enough to see shapes and objects, but not clear enough for details.
It was like he had walked into a really, really bad sci-fi movie.
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Posted: Sat Sep 19, 2009 11:47 pm
The crazy transportation thing was not on the top of Rayne's 'To do list'. Not only was it painful, aggravating and a large time waster, it was something he had already experience before. At least, he experienced something similar to it.
Being summoned was much like going through the portal into the book, only a bit less painful.
The movement was rather sickening the tug that seemed to pull on his insides would have made him want to scream in pain if not he felt oddly used to it. His face scrunched up in mild agony as he bit his lip almost viciously, keeping his voice in. It was only at the end of it had he opened his mouth to gasp and take in the air.
Having felt like he had been chewed up and spat back out, he hadn't stood up right away and instead leaned over, all fours on the ground. He groaned and slowly picked himself up from the ground. Standing up, his right hand clutching the fabric of his clothes near his stomach, he looked down an endless hallway and suddenly his heart felt like it was crashing down.
Damn it. Of all places to be it had to be here. A place even worse than hell.
He glanced at the other man "Welcome to the Labyrinth through the looking glass." He said rather sarcastically as he straightened himself up "Or the Alice in Wonderland Hell."
He grumbled to himself as he pat the dirt off his clothes, he always did have bad luck. First with Azrael and now with with this....
"It's just the two of us now so we should stick close while we're here. This place... can get very dangerous. So... we might as well get to know each other while we're at it. My name is Rayne, and you are?"
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Posted: Sat Sep 19, 2009 11:59 pm
He felt like he was dying.
Being killed before, but now it felt as if he had been mauled and left to bleed his way to the Hell he probably rightfully belonged.
But he wasn't dead. This was confirmed when one sharp emerald eye opened and pain ricocheted through his system from even that weak stimuli. Like Rayne, it took him a moment to return to his senses. Even longer for him than the demon actually, as Altar's body had never before taken such a shock-- ever. Not even when he jumped two feet out of the university building.
Right... University. How he wished he had actually attended classes that day.
Rolling over onto all fours, the redhead idly pushed himself up on one hand, leaning over as if he were going to hurl. He didn't have any lunch, so there wasn't anything to cough up.
When Rayne spoke, Altar furrowed his brows in bygone anger. He was in too much shock to really be hostile and bitter about their earlier meeting. Perhaps it was the same for the demon. With some visible effort, the man stood up. His hair tie had broken off, and now his shoulder length hair pestered his face.
"Altar.... Altar Nevarus. Where are we?"
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Posted: Sun Sep 20, 2009 12:11 am
The young man had begun to cough viciously at the floor. Dry heaves. There was a split, splat, splattering of saliva hitting the floor and it echoed rather eerily through the hallway like the timed dripping of blood.
He watched the man silently as he awaited the reply and the man had, at first, looked at him with a an expression of lost anger. Clearly he knew that they were both stuck in a potentially life-threatening situation and they had to work it out together, the chances of surviving alone were close to none. They would have better luck as a pair.
He swept back a few strands of his long hair and then folded his arms "Okay, Altar, if you really wish to know... we're inside the black book you found." He replied simply "It's a mischievous book that finds it's way around the library on it's own and contains a malicious intent. The readers are always sucked into it's story, a frightening tale of an Alice in Wonderland like world that consists merely of a seemingly endless maze. The captives' objective is to find the way out back into the real world but of course... that's easier said than done." He paused, looking once more at the young man "Most people who end up in here have died. There have been only one or two that have managed to live to tell the tale.
"Of course, following what they say isn't going to be wise since the maze always changes with each reader. We'll need to find our way out on our own. Not only will it be a tasking thing it'll be dangerous. A lot of things happen in here.... many, many things. We'll need to be careful and we'll need to cooperate."
"We should get moving."
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Posted: Sun Sep 20, 2009 12:20 am
Altar's mind had frozen at the demon's words. Not so much that he was completely against being paired with a man he clearly abhorred-- that part would come later-- but something tugged at his mind relentlessly.
"Inside... The book? How? What? Why?"
Pushing his hair out of his face and licking his suddenly dry lips, that man was about to touch a hand to the walls for support, barely catching himself in time. He wasn't sure what the hell was happening, but it didn't seem like the realm had any rules-- and his God sure as hell wasn't going to help him now. So much for being omnipresent.
"Please tell me you're just ******** with me for earlier. I'm sorry, okay? Take me home."
Altar's hand twitched, his ramble betraying his fright and disbelief. Being human, he was still prone to such feelings-- even if he didn't show them most of the time. The redhead figured this was an exception. After all, he had nearly died not once, but twice in the day now, and he was stuck in a place that was less inviting than his grandmother's birthday parties. Stuck in a place he didn't know the rules of, and therefore couldn't manipulate to his use. Stuck with a demon who could also kill him just as easily if he proved to be more hinder than help.
He wasn't sure which to be more terrified of. But with considerable will, he shut those emotions off, snapping the lid on and facing Rayne head on. Like before, it was as if he was someone completely different. Calmer. Accepting the fact.
"Where do we go? And what are we looking for?"
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Posted: Sun Sep 20, 2009 12:30 am
"This book consumes people, like how humans eat food." Rayne replied rather nonchalantly "Seemingly innocent but really a nightmare in disguise."
The demon had managed to keep himself in check so far, but really, he kind of wished he hadn't tried to help the human. Now he was stuck and there really wasn't a way to change that fact except finding the ending and he had learned to accept it. The past was the past and he needed to put it behind. Sure, he wanted to get the hell out of there but they weren't going to get far acting irrational and panicked.
He sighed and looked at the man rather sympathetically "I wish I could tell you that this is a joke but... it's anything but. We're stuck here and we're going to have to deal with it." He said and in his head he thought to himself 'Even I'm having a hard time dealing with it. It's almost as ******** up as human obsession for food that only results in fatal heart attacks.'
"We're looking for some sort of door or clue that'll lead us back to our world. If we choose the wrong doors we could potentially be stuck here forever. There should be some sort of guide around, if I'm not mistaken. We might find some clues from the guide... assuming we can even find the person. Or thing." Rayne explained "Watch my back and I'll watch yours. We'll be able to get through this."
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Posted: Sun Sep 20, 2009 12:51 am
Despite himself, Altar flashed a dull grin. Yeah, that was reassuring. They didn't even like each other, for one thing.
As if on cue, there were the distant sound of footsteps when the guide was mentioned. There was probably a password or something of the sort--... Wasn't there? Perhaps Rayne had uttered it, perhaps it was just coincidence.
Soon, the footsteps were close enough that even the heir could hear it-- but after a second, it seemed to revert to something else. Clicking. In a sort of morbidly curious fashion, the man turned his head to look. His heart beat sped up considerably, expecting all things terrifying from all those movies he watched.
What he was met with was something less, but also something more.
There was something to be said when one met a hellhound in person. Huge, sleek, wispy-- Terrifying, but alluring all at once. Icy blue eyes smoldering in a black fog-like mist that vaguely took the shape of a vastly overgrown canine. Black claws matched the vicious fangs that protruded from its bottom lip, but it seemed to be relatively calm rather than aggressive. Not that it didn't naturally look and emit a feeling of aggressiveness.
Altar paled considerably as his mind raced to keep up with what it was receiving. Was he going to die?-- A monster that theoretically shouldn't exist by the laws of physics.-- Seriously, s**t, was he going to die?
This couldn't possibly be good for his heart.
"A guide? Do you need one? What do you have to offer me? A demon and a human."
The voice didn't sound very solid, hard to pinpoint exactly where it came from. But it was probably further off. Too mildly pitched and distant to have come from the beast.
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Posted: Sun Sep 20, 2009 1:02 am
There was a clicking sound.
It was a clear, distinct yet strangely vague noise that seemed to get closer and, at the same time, farther away. He gazed blankly down the hallway, absorbed by the noise, disregarding the boy's look of insecurity.
Rayne felt no fear seeing the strange creature that approached him. It seemed eerily familiar and it wasn't really out of place.
He felt tension at his side and gave a sidelong glance at Altar "Don't be afraid. Despite me roots, I'm not so cruel enough as to let you die here. We'll come out of this world alive." He muttered to him before looking back at the abstract being.
"We do need a guide and we can offer what we can, but what do you seek from a human and a demon?" he asked calmly, the creature's voice echoing curiously in his head.
"We seek the way out of this place. What can we give to you that you might take in exchange for the way out?"
Damn it. He just wanted to organize the books and be done with it. Now he was going on adventures with the little prince and acting as if they were characters from a game like Legend of Zelda or something.
Stupid stupid books.
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Posted: Sun Sep 20, 2009 3:37 am
The disembodied voice was quiet for a long while, almost as if the speaker had disappeared; simply neglected and dismissed them both.
But eventually it did respond, sounding a lot closer now. Coming from behind the hellhound.
"K will guide you. Follow him as you will. As for your debt........ You will have to procure it for me on a later date."
There was a hidden malicious note in those words, but otherwise they were neutral. Carefully worded and cautious, if Altar had been in his normal state, he would have immediately caught onto the familiar game of ambiguous wording. He used it himself often when he needed a loophole later to trick past some sort of rigid rule.
Taking a few paced closer to the demon, if for nothing else than to get away from the beast who had taken to-- the redhead could only guess-- preening itself, Altar's mind slowly recovered and began to function, albeit on a rather basic level.
"And how are we to trust you?"
But it wasn't as though they had much of a choice. Even in his blank state, the heir knew well enough that it was either find their way out, or follow this faceless 'guide'. Neither looked like a tempting offer.
"What choice do you have?"
If one closed their eyes, they could almost imagine the self satisfied smile.
"The hound will see to it that you both remained unharmed in these tunnels. Now do move, before he gets bored and decides to maul you both."
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Posted: Sun Sep 20, 2009 2:02 pm
Rayne had a bad feeling about the whole entire matter. Something didn't settle right in him with the mysterious voice and its choice of words. Of course, that was to be a given, he knew that these sorts of things could be tricky.
He wondered vaguely what they would have to give later on and it worried him. There was surely going to be a huge consequence at the end of this. He shook his head. No. He'd worry about it later.
Rayne glanced over at Altar and shrugged "It's a good point. The guide is all we have right now." He said to him before beginning to move himself in pursuit of the shadowy, malicious figure. He wasn't concerned that it might be leading them to their doom. They hadn't much choice in the matter, their options were limited.
He had been caught in a lot of situations that were rather unfavourable before but it had been a long time, he wasn't used to it. Being in the library was no feat, not for him. Being inside a man-eating book, however, that was a different story. He figured that they weren't about to leave unscathed.
He grew tired just thinking about it.
"Are you feeling better now?" He asked Altar, curious as to his condition. The voice may have said that they would go through tunnels unharmed but who knew when the decision would suddenly be reversed. It was a tricky and fickle thing, this book. Very mischievous.
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Posted: Sun Sep 20, 2009 2:17 pm
Altar didn't respond right away, though it was obvious he wasn't going to put up a fight on the matter. As the demon moved past him, the mortal merely fell back quietly into line. He hated this new, exotic feeling of being completely powerless. Suppose, indeed, there were things in this world that he simply could not fight. He simply wasn't born to.
That thought aggravated him to no end.
Gritting his teeth, the man had to blink twice as his mind finally caught onto Rayne's words and digested them for their full worth.
It came as both a shock and a surprise, those simple words. People rarely asked about his health-- or even how he was doing. In fact, most would prefer he had the shittiest day in the world and dropped dead by the end of it. Especially ones who had just bickered with a few short hours ago.
Working his jaw, he nodded, taking another full second to realize that the other couldn't see him, up a few paces ahead.
"Yeah... Um, thanks."
His words came stiffly, unsure. But that could have easily passed for his fluctuating emotions. Except Altar wasn't really thinking or feeling too much anymore-- whenever his system overloaded, it tended to just blank out. And that was how he was going about things now, too numb to really be coherent. The fear, the exhaustion, thoughts, curiosity-- all being held at bay. He could say he even felt a little calm.
"Sorry... For dragging you in."
Although it wasn't particularly his fault and the heir would have made that clear if he wasn't so out of it, Altar felt the need to say something. A return it for the little sliver of kindness, maybe.
As the silence seeped back in, the man took a moment to glance from one side to the other. There really wasn't much to see and Altar figured that one out after five or so minutes of staring at identical black marble walls.
Where ever they were going, he had no hopes of finding his way back to the start.
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