The Young Master in the Shadows

Chapter 429: THAT DEMON

Micheal slowly opened his eyes and sat up.

“Ahh…” he grimaced in pain. His entire body hurt just like when he was scammed into that dominatrix club by his friends last year. What happened? Where was he? Why did it smell so bad? He wondered as he looked around.

He was in a dumpster… A very stinky one.

How the hell did he reach here? Was it his sister Mona venting on him again?

No wait… 

“Bianca!” he blurted out as began to look around while trying to recall what happened last night.

The last thing he remembered was going with Abe and Bianca for a meal that turned into a drinking session in which they went into a lengthy description of his novel and from where he got his inspiration.

Bianca seemed to have been really into that stuff.

After that, everything was a blur. The last thing he remembers was Bianca offering them toast from a very expensive bottle of wine.

Wait… Why was he naked?

…

“...” Meril sighed as she watched the elven horse enjoy his meal of carrots. Could this thing really be her brother?

Of course not… She was not that stupid.

She thought that she was hallucinating, but when her bloodline was awakening, for a split second she noticed him when his disguise broke, a guy that perfectly matched Macil's description of Victor was standing at the back by the door, observing how things went. 

Someone who could infiltrate an elven prison could easily fool her gullible young master and act as if he turned into an elven horse.

“The question is, where is the real one?” she asked the elven horse as she pondered. 

“I am right here!” someone replied to her, making her look back with her sword drawn.

It was a very handsome young man with purple hair, a black cloak, and an extra cute little girl in a white dress holding onto him with a lollipop in her mouth.

“...” carefully Meril looked at him. “Do you care to induce yourself?” she asked despite knowing the answer.

“Ahh, My name is Victor, Victor Von Weise… Macil should have told you about me, my dear sister!”

“We are not sure about that yet... And who is that one?” she asked, pointing at the little girl who seemed to be a little wary of her.

“She is Emira, just a good girl I picked up along the way… You can ignore her for now, she is just being naughty not wanting to stay away from me…” he said making the little girl relax and chuckle. Her eyes looked around the room with interest.

“Oh… Meril told me you turned into an elven horse…” Macil said, looking at the elven horse who ignored them. Those carrots were fresh.

“I had to fool him, he is kinda gullible,” Victor said as ignored her and approached the horse, “Sorry pal, I had to leave you like that to take my place… ” he said as he petted him.

“Macil said that you claim to be my brother…” Meril, ignoring what he said earlier, asked. 

“I AM your brother…” Victor said, activating his dragon bloodlines inside his body.

“AH…” Meril yelped as she felt her bloodline begin to boil, it was as if it were telling her to bow. Involuntarily, she dropped her sword and fell to the ground.

“See… This is your bloodline effect… “ he said.

Meril just frowned. Yes, she could feel it. a deep bloodline connection.

“Where is Macil?” he asked, looking around, as he stopped suppressing her.

“The young master was summoned to the royal palace…” she responded, grabbing back her sword as she stood up. She still didn’t trust him, but she became a little less alert.

“Ah, just as planned… The princesses were arrested right?” Victor asked with a smile.

“Yeah… Did you have a hand in that?” Meril frowned.

“Yup, it seemed like mentioning them stealing an artifact in front of the …. “ Victor stopped talking and looked around making sure no one was near. “In front of Him who shall not be named, when I was fighting him a few days ago…”

“Who shall not be named? Who do you mean…”

“I can’t mention his name in his domain just in case he had some kind of stupid curse… I swore to be extra careful after all,” Victor said.

“His domain… Do you mean his eminence, the su…” Before Meril could continue, Vicor, vanished then appeared right in front of her, pressing her down with his hand on her mouth.

“Don't say it damn it… What if he heard you… We would both be dead!” he whispered.

“LET GO!” Meril tried to push him away, but it was to no avail.

“Sorry… ” Victor said. “I just got a little emotional. My fight with him a few days ago was really close, I almost died you know, that guy is way over my level…”

“Fight… You Fought the…. HIM?” Meril asked in shock.

“Yes… It was intense, half of the city was ruined… That guy is so merciless, not even sparing his own kind!” he said as Emira stuck back to him again, glaring at Meril.

“YOU WERE THAT DEMON?” she asked, almost yelling as her hand grasped her sword's handle hard.

“I am not a demon… I just activated my demonic bloodline to the fullest and my shape just became like that!!” he clarified.

“What is the difference?” Maril asked, if he had a demonic bloodline, he was a demon.

“Although I am not sure, it is not the same… We are not demons to begin with after all! “ Victor seemed to ponder. “You should have known the feeling, you did activate your demonic bloodline too early in the cell…”

“I don’t know what you are talking about…”

“Don’t play dumb,” he said. “If it were not for that activation, I wouldn’t have had to go berserk and take all the heat off you…“

“Oh…So that’s why.” Maril said, realizing something. “I didn’t expect you to sacrifice your life for me…” she said, testing him.

“No, I was not sacrificing my life or anything… I just miscalculated how powerful that son of a bitch would be…” he said, sweating a little. “Thankfully, you are smarter than me in that regard… I can feel you suppressing your bloodline with all your might right now! If we were not in the elven capital, I would have suppressed you using it moments ago, forcing you to release it and come to terms with it!!” he sighed. 

“There will be no need to… I can already feel it…” she said. Although she was not sure her bloodline was demonic, she could remember the desire for the destruction she felt when she first awakened, that’s why she suppressed it just in case.

Later, after hearing Macil questioning her about being a demon, she realized what this feeling was, deciding to hide it while dreading the results of it being exposed... “Wait… That was not the demonic bloodline you used earlier?”

“Yeah, It would have triggered all kinds of alarms if it were. That was my dragon’s bloodline… After taking the bloodline purifying pill combined and having a lucky encounter, my Elder dragon bloodline, the same as the one you had earlier, evolved into two distinct bloodlines.”

“OH… Two?”

“Yes! One is that of a Demon and  The other of a Dragon... On the other hand, your bloodline first turned into a Noble dragon then quickly changed to Devil Dragon bloodline,” Victor said. “Exactly like what happened with Lara, our little sister! It seems to relate to something we inherited from our paternal grandfather!”

“Devil dragon? ” Meril asked. She had no way of reading her bloodline in the system menu. "You can see bloodlines?"

“Yeah, it is a skill I picked up by accident…" he said. 

"I see... Let us say that I believe everything you said," She squinted her eyes. "How the hell did you survive fighting HIM?"

"Ah... Well, I tricked him, he thinks I am dead!" he chuckled. "How about you prepare some elven tea for me and Emira, as I tell you what happened,” Victor sighed looking at her. “We also have a lot of catching up to do, and there are a few things that I need to explain to you before Macil returns!”

"Oh.... Fine..." she said.

…

“Mistress… Abe has disappeared!” a bald muscular man said as he bowed in front of Margret.

“When?” she asked in surprise as she put down the documents in her hand. She didn’t expect them to act this fast.

“Last night, they went into a private room at a pub, then didn’t go out…” the muscular man said. “When it got too late, we sent someone to check on them, but the room only had scattered clothes and two smartphones on the ground. It seemed as if they had vanished into thin air! No one saw anything, and the cameras had nothing!”

“Oh… Micheal and Bianca were taken too?”

“Yes, Bianca is missing but Micheal is not. He was taken into custody for indecent exposure earlier in the morning. Last night he seemed to have been thrown naked in a dumpster 3 miles away from the pub. He had many bruises as if some woman repeatedly kicked him and stepped on him with her high heels…”

“Oh…”

“The last thing he remembers is drinking some expensive wine… And now, he is accusing Abe of kidnapping his girlfriend. He filed a report with the police…” 

“I see… keep an eye on him for now… You may leave…” she said, looking at Elise who sat opposite to her. “What do you think?”

“They are more careful than we expected… But they would have never guessed that we already expected that… Hopefully, they would not kill him and dispose of his body, or we would really have to let Lin do that expensive summoning ritual to get back the parasitic demon in his brain,” Elise said.

In this world despite there being a myriad of different kinds of demons. A summoner had to know a creature's name, world, and a suitable offering in order to summon it. So there are still a lot of unknowns in that field.

That Memory Parasite was something Lily told them about based on knowledge from the future. It was an undetectable worm, no bigger than a grain of salt that lived in its host's brain and integrated with it. Usually, it can hold onto 1 to 7 days worth of memories depending on the circumstances.

In case its host died, it would return to the demon realm, allowing them to summon it back!

“Yes…” Margret sighed. A part of her really felt sorry for Abe, but the moment she remembered how she trusted him before he sold her to some pervert pimp in her past life, all sense of remorse disappeared. “Let that idiot rest in hell!”

…

“So… Let me Think about it for a moment…” Meril said after hearing Victor for three straight hours.

“Please do!” Victor said as he patted Emira who was napping with her head on his lap after eating some exotic elven treats. 

This girl was learning at a very fast rate. 

After he took her out of the gorge, he first let her enter the cauldron with him, making her appear inside the zone where he kept the demons just in case.

As expected, the moments she got near any of them, they began to grow old and die. It was as if the air around her was death itself.

At first, he was worried about what to do as he couldn’t leave this bomb alone in the cauldron by herself. So it occurred to him to try and teach her. 

As a test, he released his bloodline a little and let Emira see how withered his hand became as it got near her.

To his surprise, the girl quickly realized it and began suppressing her power with a worried face. It only took her 1 hour to get the hang of it and get rewarded with an ice cream popsicle!

After that, making sure she was completely safe for handling, he spent a couple of days with her and the elf girls trying to teach her many things.

She absorbed knowledge like a sponge, learning at a very crazy quick rate. At the moment she could already understand almost anything, but for some reason refused to speak.

It was as if there was something she feared a lot and could only find solace in being with him all the time.  

If Victor had to guess, he was now sure that this girl was someone who was thrown into the gorge to die and somehow managed to survive. 

The strange thing was her power. It was very peculiar as when he decided to leave her with the girls and come to see Meril, the girl was able to escape the cauldron on her own with ease. It was as if he had no control over it. She just turned herself into black smoke and followed him out.

He did consider using the Blood slave seal to force her to stay inside, but seeing how much she was attached to him, he decided that this would be too cruel at the moment. He had no choice but to bring her along.

“So… What do you think of my proposal?” he finally asked Meril after giving her 30 minutes to think things through.

“Let me make things clear first…” she said. “We all hail from another world where we belong to some great power?”

“Yup… as I said, your mother and others from the family came here through a portal!” Victor explained. “They probably thought it was a normal dungeon…”

“I see… You said that you can open that portal back? really?” she asked with a frown.

“Ah... I have a scroll to do that...!” Victor said. “But it needs some very specific conditions to activate and I am searching for a suitable location!”

“Oh... How did you get it?" She asked. Can such a thing be easily found? This was the first time she heard of such a thing.

"I found it near the portal that led me here... It seemed to be some kind of an old ruin..." he said. "It was only after I came here that I knew what it was... The instructions on it are written in Elvish!" he said.

"Can I see it?"

"Later... I don't dare to expose it here... You know, HE, might feel it... It is a high-ranking tool after all!" he said in a worried voice.

"Fine… Let me ask you about something else... You said you plan to go look for my mother?” she asked.

“Yes! I am sure she would love to go back to her original world!”

“How do you know she is still alive... How do plan to find her?”

“Oh… Well… I can't tell if she was still alive or not, I have this skill that allows me to find my family members and I can feel their existence in the West,” he said, not particularly lying.  “Other than your mother, Rosette, there is also my Great aunt Ariana and a few others who should be here!”

“What a convenient skill...” she pondered. The girl was the skeptical type.

“It was the way I managed to find this mansion! Macil never brought me here before!” he explained. 

“I see…”

“Come on, Meril… You can’t stay here… You know that if your demonic bloodline were to be discovered, it would put not only you but also Macil in grave danger!”

“I know…” she said as she bit her pretty lip.

“You can consider the things about returning to our original world later, for now, you only need to follow me for a couple of weeks, allowing me to teach you how to control your powers as we go and meet your mother…” he said. “It is not a bad deal!”

“Um… Give me a day to think about it and sort things out…” she said, seemingly 99% convinced.

“Good… I will be waiting for you west of the city near the large golden boulder,” Victor said. “Just make sure not to tell anything to Macil, Although I like him, he is a sun elf, and as I told you, all of them have bloodline restrictions and can not be trusted!”

“I know… I know…” Meril sighed.

“Good… No matter what, just be careful,” he said.