Chapter 9.5: Requiem for the Hell Bane—The Tales of Dead Men. (B-side)

Part 0

A nightmare.

At the faint sound of a woman's screams, a small black-haired child with bright red eyes opened to a ceiling, whose only source of light came from a flame lamp hanging on the wall nearby.

Alistair

Lying on a bed, the child felt lost as he stared at the ceiling.

All the noise around him felt muffled and distorted.

The child closed his eyes tightly as the sound started to become clearer.

As he did that, several images flashed in his head.

People running.

His mother dragging him along.

A dragon.

Ruins.

His mother bleeding and holding him.

At the image of his mother, the child shot up, but-

The child attempted to move his body, but something prevented him from doing so.

Whatever it was, it was heavy and scraped across the floor as his body pulled upon it.

The child turned his head.

Chains.

Binding chains.

His wrists and ankles were bound and shackled to the floor around the bed.

In a panic, the child began looking around.

Brown stone walls.

A small window is near the ceiling.

Bars that came down from

"So, you are awake."

A deep voice spoke out from the other side of the bars, which startled the young child.

The child turned to the source of the voice.

Beyond the bars, sitting on a wooden chair, was a man who, all but a helmet, was dressed in white, dented amour reminiscent of knights with a light blue hue.

A dark blue cape rested on the table near the man.

The man had long black hair with a soft ponytail and a weary face.

His blue eyes were staring down at his lap as he glanced at a knife in his hand.

Without looking at the kid, the man spoke.

“My name is Cassius Marcellus, and your name is.

There were a few seconds of silence from the child.

“Alistair…..Amadeus.”

Cassius looked up at the child, his light blue eyes meeting his light red eyes.

“We found you amongst other things, in the rubble of a destroyed village, in what we are assuming is from an Dragonborn attack.”

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

"Yes,” the child replied in a soft tone.

Cassius only silently nodded.

“Do you remember anything else about that incident?”

“…My mother, and my sister….” The child started to speak, with tears forming in his eyes.

"Well, for starters, the infant is alive, but your mother is dead.” The man said it in a calm tone. “But you.....you are a different matter, entirely."

From the man, something was thrown from him towards the child.

The child was only able to see a quick flash before something grazed his right cheek, impaling the wall behind him.

The child felt something drip from his cheek.

Without thinking, the child lightly touched his cheek.

It was a sharp, stinging pain.

The child pulled his hand away, glancing at his fingers.

Although the room was barely lit, he was able to make it out clearly.

Blood.

The child turned his head to stare at the wall behind him.

Firmly implanted in the wall was a knife.

Fear.

Panic

Alistair looked back at the man, shocked.

The man now had a stern look on his face, as if the person he was looking at was lower than trash.

“Do not misunderstand; as you stand right now, you are a cursed individual with a cursed existence, and I have several questions for you, and depending on your answer, after that, we will figure out what we will do with you.”

Emergency sirens blared out.

Yellow caution tape.

Orange cones on the street.

Various chatter.

“Wow!”

A voice broke out.

“Knowing you, when you said you got into a fight with the old man, I had expected nothing more than a simple hand-to-hand bout, but this...”

The voice came from Alistair Michaels.

Right now, he stood on the ledge of a two-story building with his right hand in his pocket and his left hand above his forehead, blocking the sunlight from his face and eyesight.

A grin appeared on his face.

“....I didn’t expect that would be anything like this.”

Across the street was an abandoned warehouse, or what used to be an abandoned warehouse.

The building looked like an explosion had gone off inside, ripping through the building and tearing into the walls.

But-

What spilled out into the street from the building was ice—a lot of ice.

His eyes glanced up.

From the roof of the building, several flames and smoke had broken through upwards, forming a flammagenitus cloud in the sky that had frozen over solid.

Alistair lowered his eyes to the street.

From the front of the building, large icicles had burst through the walls, piercing the nearby cars and several buildings across the street, including the building whose roof this makeshift group was standing on.

Alistair Michaels.

Aurelius Lucia.

Valeria Lucia.

Camellia Lucia.

Aoi.

And Haruko Matsumoto.

“Right under our nose, a few blocks away, and none of us were any wiser,” Aurelius said, grumbling.

“Well, he is the mage killer after all.” Alistair replied.

Alistair kept looking at the building and the surrounding area across from him.

In that chaos, there was something particular he was looking for.

Noticing this, Aurelius spoke to Alistair.

“You’re still going on with this half-baked theory of yours?”

“Until it gets proven wrong, and besides, it is the only lead we have on him.”

“About the dead bodies.”

“Believe me, I wish it was something else, but we play with the hand that we are dealt: nothing more, nothing less.”

He sighed.

There was too much damage to see if anything was there.

He hopped off the ledge, turning to see Haruko, who was sitting on the ground with Aoi healing his right midsection.

“Haruko.”

Haruko raised his head as Alistair stopped a few feet from him.

“When you fought this guy, did you happen to see a dead body nearby?.

Blank.

Everything went silent.

Blank.

Everything went quiet as the teen tried to process Alistair’s question.

He wanted to believe that he was joking, but the look on Alistair's face was anything but.

A body.

(Wha….)

A dead body.

Haruko tried to wrap his mind around that concept.

But-

Was there even a way he could answer this question correctly?

“Umm... none that I can recall.” Haruko replied.

Alistair stared at Haruko.

“Are you sure?”

Haruko paused.

It felt as if he was being questioned by a cop.

The man that was pinned down under the old man slowly stared to come back into his mind.

“Not a dead body, but someone was there; he probably would have died had I not intervened."

Alistair did not reply beyond glancing back over to the building.

"With no body, perhaps we may need a different method for this individual." Aurelius said.

"Maybe," Alistair said in a low tone, turning to Aurelius. "Mark this location down for the time being."

"Are you sure?"

"It is not a coincidence that he chose to attack here, and it would be a grave mistake to overlook or disregard an area of one of his attacks; whether there is a body or not, there is something about this place." Alistair replied to Aurelius.

Blank.

Haruko stared at Alistair.

(That’s odd....)

Haruko had known Alistair for over two years, since the start of high school, and during that time during classes, he was just as much of a slacker as he was, but now-

It was like he was someone different or-

(...Was he always like this?)

Everything seemed surreal to him right now.

Something important.

Something important was being discussed in front of him, something he could not even begin to comprehend.

"Alistair..."

The low growl from the teen caused Alistair to turn his head toward Haruko.

With his hands on his knees, Haruko began to stand up.

"Wait, don't move yet; I am nowhere near done healing you." Aoi shouted at Haruko.

"I'll live." Haruko grunted

Alistair put his hands in his pockets.

"Between my necklace, Aoi, that old man, this group here, and you, what the hell is going on?"

Alistair stared at Haruko.

"Then, I guess I have to bring you up to speed."