Chapter 11 : The Inquisitors

“Wellllll, I suppose there's no point in talking about it here…” Yohei's eyes analyzed the vicinity.

“Why not?” Haru was legitimately confused until he felt a chill up his spine, something was watching him.

A growl rumbled behind him, a loud one. He turned slowly and saw it: a head. The gigantic head of a cyclops leaning over to look at him from across an alleyway. Its body was ginormous, but unlike a typical cyclops its body was incredibly frail and malnourished. Making it nothing less than disturbing.

Is that a cyclops!!!??

Haru couldn’t comprehend it, his body froze in place, unable to move even an inch.

Yohei yawned. “Angel, get the boy out of hereeee!”

Wings swooped down from the sky, picking up Haru in an instant as the cyclops' massive fist swept the streets below.

Haru’s mouth was still dropped, his body exceptionally queasy. A literal warrior elf waifu, a bunch of ninjas, a magical clown, a guy in pajamas with wings, AND NOW A CYCLOPS. WHAT THE FRICK IS GOING ON!!!??

At this point he could believe the literal master of all of this was a space alien and he wouldn't be surprised.

Angel lazily swooped down again, picking up Celia from Yohei's shoulder with exceptional strength, almost as if he was handling a pair of babies.

Haru watched from afar as Yohei simply incinerated the cyclops to cinders, it wasn't even fair for a moment. The entire street bathed in white flame. This guy is unreal…

Yohei smirked at him from below, noticing Haru’s look of awe before giving him a goofy wave back.

Nah he's just weird…

Haru redirected his attention back to his current situation. Flying miles into the air and being carried by a guy he barely knew to an unknown location.

“Where are you taking us?”

“To safety.”

“Yeah, I get that but where.”

“Can't be asked to explain.”

After flailing in the air for another ten or so minutes, they finally arrived at their destination. An abandoned car park under renovation.

“You sure you're not planning on killing me.” Haru asked as he landed.

“Would've left you to die in that alleyway if I did” Angel responded, half-joking, half-serious.

Gulp.

“So you gonna explain what's going on?”

“That’s the ol’ man's job.”

“Is he your dad or something?”

“Nah, he's the boss.”

“Boss of what?”

Angel didn't even bother to respond, after dropping Celia into Haru’s arms, he laid down on the floor and fell asleep in an instant.

Rude!

Haru carefully adjusted Celia on his shoulder — not wanting to inappropriately touch her — he laid his clothes down on the floor and let her rest on it.

“Hopefully she recovers quickly.” He didn't want to spend too long by himself, Angel's loud snoring was the only thing keeping him company.

He sat on the floor, resting his head on a nearby pillar in thought. The minutes counting down as he contemplated the last two days, and he couldn’t help but think… Am I actually a prince……?

At this point that was the least of his concerns but still. If it was true, what did that mean for him? If he was from another world, how did he get here? What was his purpose? Did he have one?

“Does that mean…” Haru had always wished to be special, not in the bad way like he had always been but in a good way. To live a successful life where he could be important, where he could finally matter, where he could be praised and applauded for who he was. That was a dream he had long since given up on, believing that if he could even touch it, that would be enough.

Whether it was a beautiful girl that was way out of his league or a stupid business that would make him lots of money. He wanted something that would prove he could be successful but now he was finding out that he could be a prince. He could be from another world, he could be a chosen one.

“Am I… the MC?”

“Well it depends. Do you want to be?”

Out of the darkness, Yohei walked out, carrying the shopping that he and Celia had got from the mall.

“Is that—”

“Yeeeessss indeed.”

Haru smiled softly. “Thank you.” He meant those words sincerely.

“I do not need your thanks. After all, I should be apologising, should I not?”

“For what?”

Yohei looked at Celia’s unconscious state.

Of course. What other reason should he be apologising for?

“Yeah, true…”

“Good, it seems we're on the same page. In full honesty I merely wanted to test her strength. I realised on that ‘punch’ she threw, she was still holding back, no Fiend would do that.”

“Fiend?”

“I seeeeee, so you really are ignorant of this world. I suppose my intuition was correct then, you must've been summoned here as a baby.”

Haru’s eyes widened. Was this man confirming that he was from another world?

“Are you saying—”

“Yes indeed.” The noble clown had already read his mind. “You are an otherworlder.”

He was speechless, unsure how to process, yet alone respond to such allegations.

“If you wish to know the truth, you must first make me knowledgeable on how much youuuu know.”

So Haru did — from the very start — from what he knew of his childhood, to the moment he saw her at the train station, to what she told him about his status as a prince and all of what had happened today.

“I see…, well let me try to explain the nature of this world in simple terms.”

Haru nodded, gone was Yohei's usual vocal semantics, the jester was now straight laced.

“This universe exists in a multiverse, not a multiverse in the typical sense of different timelines per se, rather multiple ever-expanding universes that were birthed from this one. You get the gist?”

Haru nodded, while this would normally be hard to believe, he had seen and experienced too much to simply put this as myth.

“Good. Now what separates these universes are spiritual barriers, created by Angels to preserve distinction and prevent chaos.”

“Angels, like… real Angels.”

“Yes, real Angels, but with Angels' existence there are also Demons, fallen Angels that like to cause chaos amongst mankind. You still with me?”

“Sort of….” This was a lot of information to process all at once.

“Good enough.

Now, Demons are unable to manifest them in physical form, otherwise Angels will hunt them down for breaking the natural law. So instead, demons will make immoral pacts with humans in secrecy. But regular humans are incapable of doing much without a source of power behind them. So they do what is called an incarnation.”

The atmosphere darkened. Sweat beaded down Haru’s forehead for reasons unknown, as if the tension itself had raised the parking lot's temperature.

“An incarnation is when a human host is implanted with another being from beyond this universe. The demon breaks the spiritual barrier to illegally summon another worlder into that physical body, the new spirit will override the DNA and soul of the original host, turning them into the otherworlder. This summoning does not necessarily need to be the one who made the pact, it can also be done by someone who is lured and made spiritually open to a forced incarnation. This can also be done for non-sentient things but that is a different process entirely.”

Haru was starting to understand now. Essentially a person could have their spirit, soul and body overridden by a more powerful entity from another plane of existence. The implications were terrifying! And him saying that could be done to non-sentient things meant that practically anything could be summoned to earth in an instant.

But if otherworlders are summoned through this incarnation thingy, does that mean…?

“No. If you are wondering, you are not an incarnation. Those that are incarnations, weeee call Fiends. Summoned to create chaos on earth, through what we call ‘Breaches’. You are different, otherworlders can also be summoned legally by Angels, transported to this world by a more standard form of summoning in order to counter the Fiends that threaten this world.”

Haru took a deep breath. That's a relief.

“So what you're saying is that it was summoned from another world, to kill Fiends?”

“Maybe. That is determined by the given purpose from the Angel, there could be a multitude of reasons why you are here but it is certainly not to cause evil. Rather, to stop evil in whichever way is your purpose.”

“Gotcha. So then what do ‘we’ call ourselves?”

Yohei smirked. “We work for the Church.”

Haru looked at him in confusion. “Catholic? Orthodox? Protestant? Charismatic?”

“You do not know of this church, its roots are far deeper than those four. It is an institution behind the denominations themselves. We are called Inquisitors.”

Inquisitors? I like the name of that!

“We hunt, track, expose and eliminate Evil. Sometimes we also deal with rogue summons, individuals like her who may have deliberately committed a crime.”

“But she didn't do anything wrong!?”

“I see that now but beforehand the mysterious death of your uncle coinciding with her entrance to this world — made her quite suspicious…”

Haru couldn’t really deny it. It made sense after all. “So what do you think now?”

“I believe your story, it seems that there is a mastermind at play here who has been incarnating Fiends in secret. For us, the Inquisitors, not to know, they must have been doing it gradually for many years. This city must be fully under control, a quite terrifying prospect indeed.”

Haru’s eyes widened. For years, running the city, how could no one have noticed?

Haru looked at Yohei, who was currently theorizing the extent of the mastermind's influence.

“So how is it that no one noticed?”

“Do you mean, the normal human eyes?”

“What else would I mean!?”

This was the same question that Haru wondered when it came to no one noticing that Celia was a half-elf.

“The answer is quite simple but unbelievable.”

“Give it to me straight, doc!”

Yohei sighed. “Their brains refuse to believe it's real.”

What!?

“The human brain and soul does not want to cross examine its existence, nor what it knows. It inherently wants to believe that it matters and that the world is understandable — even if they consciously want to disagree with that. So the brain itself either pretends it isn't there or makes it up to look like something believable, even if under threat. It will see it for as long as it must, but then cease to remember it, finding a logical explanation for it to cope or simply believing that it was their delusions.”

“That's insane.”

“Hmmm, that is the lack of faith we have in the mystical.”

“So then…” He didn't want to ask this question. “Why can I see it? I've never been able to see them beforehand.”

Haru looked towards Celia. She was the beginning of all of this, when his life changed forever. No, she didn't change my life at all. She merely opened my eyes to the truth that I was incapable of seeing.

He couldn’t blame her for a single thing.

Yohei looked over at him and asked an even simpler question back. “Are you ready to learn your origins?”

Haru didn’t want to know the truth. It was easier to stay in ignorance. But still…

“I can't be blind anymore.” He whispered to himself, if he was going to live a new life. One where he could truly become something special, something valuable.

“I have to know the truth!”