"Sometimes you just gotta choose between the lesser of two evils… I choose the ladder"
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For the group, there was no telling how much time had passed since the first trial had began. After all for Aaliyah who was in hell's second circle, time probably didn't pass for her.
For everyone else however, at some point they took shelter in a nearby desolated catacomb once they took notice of the red sun rising into Hell's crimson sky, peering through the black clouds.
As they lurked around the corners of the catacomb's tunnels, Kahal with the use of his Hivemind power could see through Aaliyah's eyes, and could even see what was going on in Hell's second circle.
His eyelids lowered, the halls were filled with echos as he spoke in his usual raspy voice.
"This ain't good at all. It's hard to tell how time works in the seven circles, but judging by what I'm seeing right now, Aaliyah is succumbing to the assimilation process faster than I thought she would."
Jason and Selene who both walked on each side of Kahal could feel their heart beats speed up slightly. In Jason's eyes, there was no way Aaliyah of all people would succumb to psychological fruits hell has to offer.
Well, not as quickly as the average sorcerer would.
But Selene knew her mother just was well as her younger brother did. She knew all too well that despite the monstrous physical strength Aaliyah possessed, there was only one flaw to all that brute strength she had…
And that was her own mental state. Meditation was widely known as the way to open the doorway to one's sorcery and spiritual energy.
And with that comes training the mind to prepare one to avoid letting their sorcery act independently, which is a rare case that only occurs when a sorcerer experiences a mental breakdown, or unless their mind isn't mature enough.
In fact, mental training is the first thing children of the big sorcerer clans partake in before awakening their spiritual energy.
One would think Aaliyah who is the daughter of the Yamikei clan's patriarch and matriarch would have an unshakable mental fortitude, and she did… but it would be wrong to say that certain unfortunate factors tied into her flawed mental state.
The main factor would be her lukewarm relationship with her mother growing up. Growing up having to experience the harshness of her indifferent mother, as expected, played a huge part in shaping Aaliyah's fragile emotional state.
With a sigh, Selene spoke after a stretched moment of silence.
"I can't say I'm surprised. Ma's more of a brute strength type of sorcerer… but her mental fortitude is her weak point."
Kahal glanced over to Selene, and asked:
"What's she like?… your mom I mean."
It was still a surprise to both Selene and Jason that they were walking alongside their grandfather who they knew nothing of.
And maybe they didn't want to know about him…
Though his curiosity about the daughter whose life he was absent from for thirty eight years was understandable. After all, he was sealed inside Hell's heart from the night she was born and since his release a day ago, the time to ask about her hadn't really came.
Jason looked over to his older sister, and waited for her to answer their grandfather's question. There was a lot she wanted to say to describe Aaliyah, but all she could say was the minimum that she knew.
She took a moment to gather her words, and then finally responded.
"She's a hot head. But she's soft at heart… and this little punk's basically her mini-me."
Selene nudged Jason's shoulder as she kept her stoic expression. With a slight chuckle, Kahal simply nodded.
"Thanks for telling me that."
Suddenly Kahal grunted and asked the two siblings:
"Oh yeah, I know your grandmother along with anyone else never told you lot about me, but has she at least introduced you all to your great-aunt… my sister?"
It wasn't a surprise to either Jason or Selene that they had a great aunt, after all, it seemed that one trip to hell had suddenly become a family reunion rather than the doomsday it seemed to have been.
Selene thought back to her time as a young child when she rarely had less tense conversations with her grandmother, and replied:
"She only ever mentioned that we had an aunt on ma's side, who's been in hiding on the old earth… but that's really it."
Kahal simply chuckled, his last thought was of his sister's treacherous nature before he led the two siblings into a spacey room.
***
The room had a pillar of skulls at its center. He had a feeling that the skulls he was looking at belonged to the humans and sorcerers of the old earth, who were all unfortunate enough to cast down to the depths of hell.
This only furthered his curiosity of the true nature of sorcerers from the golden age.
Selene, who began to grow a little impatient had left to join with the rest of the group who were scouting through the rest of the catacomb, while Jason and Kahal remained in the spacey room.
When Jason sat across from Kahal, there was an awkward silence between the two. Then out of nowhere, Kahal had suddenly been staring right at Jason.
"Why're you staring at me?"
Kahal kept his gaze fixed on Jason's striking dark grey eyes before he spoke, indifferent to Jason's obvious discomfort.
"Your big sister said you're just like your mom. I guess I can see it in the face…"
But that wasn't the only thing that caught Kahal's attention. The second thing was mainly what was inside of Jason.
"So, those old bastards sealed Malum inside you, huh?… how long ago was this?"
Jason relaxed his tense shoulders and put his palm to his chest when he responded.
"Two years ago… after I was put in the academy, the grand elder and the other four generals locked me up in a dungeon where they sealed Malum's essence inside me."
Kahal's crimson irises grew slightly brighter, as if he could see right through Jason's body. He was met with the same sight from when they both fought just a few hours prior.
Six shattered fragments of Jason's soul swam around in his soul space, along with a red ball of spiraling energy at their center.
Once Kahal saw this, he could feel that familiar malevolent aura Hell's king had from when he had fought against him at the peak of the war's end.
But this time, there was something missing. Remembering his and Kesean's exorcism which took place once the two had brought Hell's king to his knees, Kahal had remembered the difference between an exorcism and the state of death.
In the final moments of Malum's death, unlike the usual case where a demon's body disintegrates, Malum's physical body has disappeared, but Kahal could still feel the king's essence making its way to the abyss rather than hell.
In a grim tone, he asked Jason once more:
Run it by me again. how many years ago was Malum sealed inside of you?"
Squinting one of his eyes, Jason tilted his head slightly and responded.
"Two years ago."
'Dammit'
To Kahal who knew all to well about the flaw of exorcism as opposed to just killing Hell's king, this was something that gave him a better sense of why the king of Hell settled for being sealed inside of a human vessel.
With his HiveMind ability, Kahal had earlier sensed no traces of humanity inside the boy's body, apart from his physical appearance and human emotions. Jason's human DNA had been completely rewritten by Malum's demon DNA, making him a full blooded demon.
But there was more to it than just a form of assimilation. Earlier, Kahal had mentioned that whenever Malum hijacked his body and used his inner domain, only nine layers of Hell had manifested.
But only Kahal and the rest of the supreme generals knew the true horror of malum's world ending power. There was a hidden tenth layer that Jason was yet to have seen.
Granted, a little while after having Malum sealed inside of his body, the supreme generals had explained to Jason that Malum currently was not at his full power due to not having his physical body with him.
Soon into the stretched few moments, Jason perked up and broke the tense silence.
"What?"
Kahal lowered his head and pressed his elbows onto his knees. Then after a few more seconds of silence, he brought his eyes up a few inches and responded.
"You're gonna die soon… and that's only if we make it out of this hellhole without dying."
Jason stared at the damned man for a moment. Wondering if he heard him correctly, but… there was a somber expression in his own eyes once he seemed to realize what Kahal meant.
Kahal gave a small sympathetic look toward the boy, and gave him a moment of silence before he continued.
"I'm sure you realized it just now… Malum's rewriting your whole essence, meaning that you're slowly becoming him, until he can kill you from within, and take over your body long enough so he can open the doorway to Hell's tenth circle, and recover his physical body."
For Jason, Kahal's words didn't register in his mind. But he already understood.
Throughout the past two years, he had always told himself he was ready to die if it meant saving as many lives as he could. But now that he was faced with the knowledge that his death was all but inevitable, it sparked something in his heart.
Both fear and a deep rooted sadness. A part of him wanted to at least find a way to distract himself from thinking about his inevitable demise, but the silence in his own head was disturbed by the image of his mother and older sister cradling his lifeless body with faces of unbearable anguish.
Kahal's eyelids lowered slightly, as though silently expressing his own form of sympathy for the child who sat in front of him. For a moment, he even saw himself in the reflection of his grandson's dimming eyes.
Placing his flexed palm over his heart, Jason spoke in a somber voice.
"Hey… grandpa. There's something I want you to do for me…"
"What is it?"
Jason took a breath before he continued. As he spoke, it seemed as though the room had grew more silent than it already was. Only sounded with his own somber voice.
"When malum assimilates himself inside my body. I…"
His heart sounded. Once, twice… then a third time.
The words Kahal found himself hoping his grandson wouldn't say would then be brought into existence.
"When that time comes, I want you to kill me."
Kahal squeezed his eyes shut for a moment. Of course he understood where Jason was coming from, and hell he himself even knew all too well how hard it was for a kid his age to have such a resolve to die even though deep down, the mere thought of dying struck an unbearable fear in his entire being.
As though reading Jason's mind, Kahal said:
"You're a lot like me when I was just your age… picking between the lesser of two evils, right?"
Jason nodded.
"That's all we can do sometimes kid… after all in this world, there are no good guys, just selfish people trying to survive and attain their own selfish agendas…"
"And hell, me and you are no different… two men trying to do what we believe is best for the ones we care about… only you're not a man. You're a child with the mind of a man."
As much as Kahal wanted to say no, he couldn't bring himself to deny his grandson the request that could both save the lives of the people they both hold dear, and would end his own suffering.
There was a brief moment of silence between the two before Kahal responded. For a second, his lips opened as he readied himself to say no, but then they closed.
"Sometimes you just gotta choose between the lesser of two evils… I choose the ladder."
For a moment, it seemed as though there was a silent understanding between them both. And then, Kahal finally gave his response.
"I'll do it."
Hearing these words gave Jason a small sense of reassurance. And with a small bittersweet smile, he simply said:
"Thank you."
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Continued in chapter 111: Shrine Of Death's Eternal Paradise
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