BXBX NOVEL Chapter 198 - The Price To Pay
It still didn\'t feel real. Sometimes these kinds of things take time before you could fully accept that they did indeed happen… but then sometimes even then, you just have to pinch yourself every two seconds cause you swear you might still be dreaming.
Hell, I might still be dreaming. Like who knows man? Maybe everything that was happening was really just one big bizarre fantasy my mind cooked up while all this time I\'m actually all tubed up in some hospital bed somewhere hooked up to all sorts of machinery.
Had half the mind to ask Amanda to completely slap me silly in the hopes of waking me up, but I had a feeling that\'ll only make her think I\'ve gone total psycho following the summoning.
Thankfully it was just a wandering thought, I\'m not that far gone in delusions that anytime I\'d fling myself out the window just to confirm it, cause hell, even if this was a dream… why would I end it?
Everything was going right here, and the good news just kept on piling. The rainfall all around the world came with it also a tsunami of news broadcasts and site articles to flood the search indexes worldwide to the point where many websites started to crash from the amount of traction it was getting.
Like a video would be uploaded barely ten seconds ago, and within those same seconds, already it would have amassed views in the thousands. I don\'t think I\'ve seen a more unified people than the ones dead set on breaking the entire internet.
Didn\'t take long for the PSAs everywhere to start blaring that people who have been stricken down by the gooey stuff should be tossing away their raincoats and putting down their umbrellas - don\'t worry about getting a cold, just go frolic in the rain.
It was also through one of these broadcasts where we struck gold once more - following the cleansing of the Blight, just as we had hoped, the countless that fell into a deep slumber at the start of all this was finally waking up to the rise and shine of a stormy Wednesday morning.
Euphoric couldn\'t even begin to describe how I felt hearing that news. If I could yee-haw and pump my fist in the air, I would, but I\'m pretty sure that would set me back like six hours in rehabilitation… so sadly, I had to settle with just a big ol\' smile on my face.
Amanda, meanwhile, practically got down on her hands and knees anxiously begging to borrow my phone again so she could call her folks back home, seeing as hers was dead, and it\'s like - do you seriously even have to ask?
So after making me solemnly swear for the umpteenth time hand over heart that I wouldn\'t be up to any funny business while she was gone, off she went elsewhere for a moment to have a little private moment which I\'m sure would involve a lot of happy tears, and a lot of warm smiles.
I\'m sure she wasn\'t the only one reuniting with loved ones.
As for me, as promised and sworn, I never moved an inch… didn\'t have to, didn\'t want to. I was completely satisfied just sitting there looking out the window at a job well done.
The building right across didn\'t look as drab no more with all the black bits cleansed off. City streets too, the lamp lights, the stop signs… the cracks in the pavement, the graffiti on walls, I could see them all again. Slowly but surely, things were going back to normal.
I wanted to keep staring straight, I wanted to stay smiling away… but in the back of my mind, I knew this was far from the end of it. Jay was out there somewhere, and he was definitely seeing what I was seeing.
The rain had a mistiness to it, a thick white fog that engulfed the highest skyscrapers… if I strain and focus on the swaying of the mist in front of me… I could almost see it take shape - forming into an outline, his outline…
Now if it\'s real or just a dream, either way, he was just hovering there, barely a ways away, never once saying a word… and the more my eyes lingered, the more of him I could see, until almost, just almost… the swirling mist formed the ghost of a smile.
"Is it true? Were you really the one to have summoned the Fey-hybrid here?"
I nearly fell out the window myself. I jumped at the sound, gasped at the voice - my eyes bulging by how vaguely familiar that sternness sounded, and nearly snapped my neck turning around trying to find out who it was.
Those harsh black eyes shaped to almost permanent scowl, pointed fangs poking out the corners of narrowed lips, and long jet-black hair billowing in the breeze.
I looked at her sharp claws, met with her harsh gaze, and by all rights, I should be on high alert - but surprisingly, even if I were to be maimed and shred to bits, I still felt like running up to her and embracing with her with all my might.
Not cause I liked her, not cause she meant much to me - but only because she was up and awake right in front of me.
I never thought there\'d come a day where I\'d be smiling wide at the mere sight of her. So I\'ll only admit this once, and no more - but Amelia, you are truly a sight for sore eyes.
Just this one time.
"If so, then I guess you really are more than meets the eye," She continued, eyeing me up and down with a stare most peculiar. "Perhaps I have judged you a bit too harshly."
"Really?" I raised my brows. "What did you think of me beforehand?"
"I rather not say now," Amelia said. "Just know that my opinion of you has changed somewhat."
"Oh, okay. Thanks, I guess?"
She says these things so stone-faced it was hard to tell if she was being serious or not. Ah well, I don\'t really much care to know, anyway.
"When\'d you wake up?" I asked.
She started moving towards me and didn\'t stop. I had to stand aside myself or risk a collision, rudely taking my spot at the windowsill all the while not a single \'excuse me\' to be heard.
And just to kick common courtesy in the gut even harder she decided to ignore my question for her entirely.
"That overpowering presence is no longer with us," She said, poking her head out and leaning into her elbows. "Was that you too?"
I shrugged. "Long story."
Presence had gone, huh? Maybe that smile in the mist really was just mist… maybe...
"I awoke quite a while ago," Amelia said, tilting her head slightly my way. "It was a confusing few moments… how I was awoken, who had done it, I had many questions. Then a few rooms away, I overhead a discussion… to my surprise I saw the Succubus there, alongside your Elf-Knight… and along with a strange individual cloaked in purple I couldn\'t quite recognize.
"It was from them I understood most of the situation…" Suddenly, she stopped, suddenly, she was looking at me with furrowed brows. "By the way, I can sense every presence in this building - and I\'m curious to know why my sister isn\'t among any of yours."
"Oh, Adalia?" I waved her concerns away. "Relax, she\'s safe, she\'s snug. She\'s in my room, probably burying her face in my bed… I know she likes my bed."
For some reason, Amelia only looked even more disconcerted.
"Your room?" She spat like venom. "Your bed?"
"Amelia…"
"She likes your bed?"
"Why do you think of things the way you do? You think what you\'re thinking is actually the case?" I said, feeling a little twanging in my insides. "Would it actually kill you to trust me for once?"
"Ah, true," She looked back out to the view, that glare gone in a flash. "My sister is no fool. Certainly, she knows too that there are far more desirable options apart from you."
"Okay, yeah… nearly died trying to save you all, but… sure, fair enough, I guess."
With her concerns quelled, and my self-confidence rendered non-existent, we got back to the original topic at hand at once.
"From the things I heard…" She glanced at me, wearing this time a rather sly smirk. "Your Elf kept getting vocal with the hooded figure you summoned here. By the Divines, I\'ve never seen a more perturbed look on an Elf before."
Alarm bells again. I did not like what I was hearing at all, and I wasn\'t really much in the mood for more patience.
"You gonna tell me what they were talking about or would you rather just keep smiling?"
"I suppose if I want to infuriate you further, I should," Amelia said. "But I don\'t. Frustrating as it is to admit, you are my savior twice now… I suppose you deserve a lot more than my nonsense, just for now at least."
"Great," I nudged my head. "And so?"
"They made a bargain it seems, in exchange for her services."
A bargain? Fuck, it\'s always a bargain with these folks, isn\'t it? And every time I don\'t come out of it feeling as if I got my money\'s worth.
Hopefully, it wasn\'t the same for them. But judging from Amelia\'s expression right at me, I don\'t think I should be crossing fingers here.
"And this bargain, what did they deal for?" I asked.
"In exchange for cleansing away the Blightfall on the Earth," She said, the curve of her lips still very much in amusement. "You are to relinquish your role as Master to the Elf."