Chapter 3: The Price of Freedom

Chapter 3: The Price of Freedom

22 Hours After the Battle of the Grey.

“Scoot over,” Able said, staring at the woman in pink pajamas laying in the only bed in the cabin. A heart-shaped piece of furniture that made both he and Kane wince when they saw it.

“I’m sorry, repeat that?” Kane said, looking up from her book amidst the mess of her luggage scattered about the room.

“I said scoot over. Make room.”

Kane blinked, the silence almost deafening as the pair existed around the heart-shaped bed.

“Like hell!”

“Look, there's only one bed in this place-”

“Then be a good dog and sleep outside!” Kane spat, throwing a pillow at Abel.

“I decline,” Abel said flatly as he caught the pillow and threw it back into Kane’s face. “I don't particularly like sleeping in the grass. And I'm not a dog. Also, nice pajamas.”

“Tch, so it's a fight you want?” Kane scowled, covering her pink pony pajamas with her blankets and setting her book down to get up.

“For a bed? Damn right. We can just sleep sideways. Your feet-*

“Aw hell no! You just want to be next to my feet, what kind of idiot do you think I am to let a perve-”

“First off, ew. Don't flatter yourself. I'm not into boob sizes that are passing grades.”

“I-uh-how crude!” Kane’s eye twitched, “Fine, then I guess we'll just have to fight for the bed.”

The demon’s eyes flared with power, her body releasing steam as the air boiled, the mana in the space swirling at her command.

Abel chuckled, “Oh, not a bad idea, but instead of destroying the house, how about a compromise?”

Kane narrowed her eyes, “Go on.”

“Tell me about your life on earth,” Abel said, flashing a grin. “And I'll cede the bed to you.”

“I think I'd rather fight.”

“Aw, come on. Please? Pretty please? I'll even chill a cup for you.”

“Why are you so interested in my life back on earth?” Kane said, folding her arms.

“Can't I be interested in the life of my fellow earthling? I've been stuck here for five years, it's good to know I'm not alone in this.”

“Five years huh…” Kane scoffed, “Try twenty, amateur.”

“Wait, you've been here for twenty?!” Kane went wide-eyed.

“Mhm. Got reborn as the daughter of the former demon king. Was promised riches, power, and freedom. Yet all I got was another shackle,” Kane said, glancing down at the silver bracelet on her wrist as she sat down on the bed. “Anyway, you want to know about my life? Fine… I was Kane Satoru. Born in Fukushima in ninety-six, I lived an uninteresting life, died at twenty three, and was reborn here.”

Abel pursed his lips, his eyes picking up the subtle twitch of the woman's lip and avoidant gaze. There was more there, more to her story, but he wouldn't hear it today.

“Wait. You were twenty-three when you died, and have been here for twenty years, that would make you like… nearly fifty,” Abel said, flashing a grin as he lay beside Kane on the heart-shaped bed. “I guess I should call you senpai or something huh?”

Kane closed her eyes and inhaled, the demoness remaining motionless for a whole second before she turned and planted her foot into Abel's chest and kicked him from the bed.

“Get the hell out!”

“Fine! Fine!” Abel chuckled as he left the room, “You win!”

But just before he left, Abel paused, flashing a look over to Kane, “I'll let it pass this time, but I would like to know more about you… grandma.”

“Just get the hell out!” Kane yelled, throwing a pillow at Abel.

****

The next morning Abel and Kane sat at the dinner table, a small rectangular piece of furniture that was barely big enough for the pair’s elbows.

“Damn you Marceline, the least you could have done is got demon-sized furniture!” Kane hissed, adding another mental sin to punish the dwarf for when this purgatory was over.

“Well, at least Marci gave us salt and pepper,” Abel winced as he crunched down on his breakfast squash.

“And that's the only reason I'm not giving her the death penalty!”

“Say…” Abel said, looking at the hard cucumber-like object in his hand before staring at the woman eating a bowl of diced up and boiled squashes. “When did you make a fire to boil water?”

“Make a fire? What are you? A caveman? I used fire magic,” Kane said, easily piercing the exterior of a boiled squash with a fork.

“Ah…I see…” Abel smacked his lips, reaching over the table to try and pluck a diced squashed only for his hand to be zapped with a bolt of electricity.

“Why do you insist on being near me? There's a hundred feet of anywhere else to be,” Kane scowled as she pulled at her shirt sticky with her sweat.

“Since you made me construct my own living quarters out of ground,” Able chuckled, “Why are you so cold to me? Aren't we friends?”

“We aren't friends.”

“Fine, associates.”

“We aren't associates.”

“Coworkers? Technically when you think about-”

“No.”

“Fine, you're a demon, so let's make a deal.”

“Tch! That is an extreme stereotype!”

“Come on, you have something I want, and I have something you want, why not trade?”

“God damn it why do you insist on being annoy… annoy…” Kane trailed off as cold air blew from Abel's smirking lips and washed over her body causing her to tingle. “Bastard. That is a cheap trick.”

“I’m conniving aren't I? So? How about a trade?” Abel said as the room seemed to cool by several degrees, “I lower the temperature, and you give me some boiled squash. It's really that simple. A quid pro quo.”

“Tch, and give you the satisfaction of eating my cooking? I'd rather die!” Kane yelled, slamming her fist down on the table and knocking over the salt and pepper shaker. “I may not be the queen anymore but I still have my pride as a demon! And every moment you suffer is a moment of ecstasy for me!”

Abel let the temperature rise at Kane’s words.

“Pride as a demon huh? So you get off on people suffering huh?” Abel replied as he straightened the season shakers. Then, Abel’s expression went dark, his brow furrowed, hands clasped together as he focused on Kane with intense precision.

“What? Why are you looking at me like that? Are you trying to pick a fight?”

“So this is actually your kink-”

“That's! That's not what I meant and you know it!” Kane yelled as she flipped the table. “God damn it all to hell, why is it so hot in here?! Is it you? Are you doing this?!”

“I don't have access to fire magic remember? Ya know, me being the avatar of Order and all that,” Abel said before looking upwards at the ceiling, “Although I will agree with you, it is unnaturally hot.”

****

With hot breath and glimmering eyes, Marceline smiled in the darkness of her dimly lit cove at the top of the foundation’s tower.

Alone, save for her countless instruments, a now bald dwarfen magician watched through a large mana crystal as the two former heroes of their respective nations yelled at one another, joy evident in her gaze as she listened to them fight and moved her hand to up the temperature in the cabin.

“Now kiss! Kiss! KISS ALREADY! No wait, there has to be more progression! Don't get impatient Marci it'll all be worth it! Wait… am I being creepy? No! No of course not! I'm just looking out for them! Yes yes! I’m a good friend! The bestest! Especially after they gave me lice!” Marceline giggled madly before the door of her domain opened, casting away the shadows as a figure in gold with white wings entered.

“Crapcrap!” Marceline exclaimed before turning and closing the encrypted feed that led to her friends.

“Oh! Bishop Marigold, it's funny seeing you here, how may….” Marceline trailed off as the papal guards in white and red began to line the walls of her laboratory. “What is this?”

Before Marci was a Bishop of the Ordo Imperium, a theocracy which encompassed half the world whose might was only matched by the demonic forces of Angolia.

The yellow-haired angel narrowed his golden eyes while the shimmer of his snow-white wings ignited the room in brilliant illumination as he pointed at the dwarfven.

“Grand Magus of the Magnolia Foundation, Marceline Agus,” Marigold said, the angel’s voice feminine yet masculine at the same time. “You are hereby accused of Heresy and breaking the neutrality pact of the Three Nations. In accordance with said pact, you are ordered to surrender yourself into our custody for interrogation.”

“What?” Marceline spat, all mirth vanishing from the tiny woman's body as her body ignited with mana, the tools within her workshop coming to life as dozens of automatons responded to her will. “Are you insane?! What grounds do you have to accuse me of Heresy?! Do you know what will happen if the Demon council hears about this?!”

The papal soldiers shifted, summoning their holy weapons as Marceline's metal guards drew near.

“Why, your relationship with the Demon Queen Kane of course,” Marigold smiled, the gesture a facade that didn't match the glow of danger in his eyes.

“I'm the headmaster of the Magnolia Foundation, of course I'd have a relationship with the Queen of Angolia!” Marceline replied before her eyes went round at the sight of the figures with horns that now emerged into her room.

“Marceline Agus,” A figure wrapped in shadows hissed, his red eyes flaring as he stood side by side with the angelic bishop. “You stand accused of interference with the Holy War. Surrender yourself for questioning.”

A bishop and demon prince! No way they found out this quickly! Marceline grit her teeth, her eyes darting between Marigold the Destroyer and Nobux The Ghostblade. Two high ranking generals of two opposing sides that were supposed to be fighting each other!

No… They don’t know, they’re just grasping at straws… but… if they get there hands on me.

“So… I was right after all,” Marceline spat as she gritted her teeth, her foot tapping against one of the thousands of magic seals carved into her home. “This whole war is just a facade.”

“Marci…” Marigold whispered, arms opened wide in a gesture for an embrace, “We can do this the easy way where you simply come with us to talk, OR I extract every tooth from your skull and every nail from your phalanges until you're nothing but a sniveling demi-human strapped to my chair. How does that sound, dear?”

“It sounds like I'll get to use some earthen language,” Marceline exhaled before the little dwarfven’s eyes exploded with madness, “How about a third option?! Where you all go FUC-”

The magus stomped on the floor, igniting a chain reaction of mana runes that engulfed the entire room in a maelstrom of magic, the deafening explosion sending ripples across the world.