In the end elder Agnes brought Nick to her quarters. She was delighted to see how the little demon’s eyes lit up and the heartbeat accelerated when he saw her work.
Actually Nick’s eyes did not lit up at all. He was shocked beyond any words, in fact, he could not mutter anything when he saw hundreds and hundreds of jars filled with bodies of different fetuses and children, both human and those of animals.
‘How many people has this old witch killed? How can anyone be this sick? Please, someone, arrest all of them and burn this place down!’
Elder Agnes was happily watching Nick’s reaction, “Do you like it? Lord Baal, have you done a research like this as well?” she probed.
But Nick was trying to calm down his messy thoughts, ‘Breathe, just breathe. Damn, I have to say something smart – I’m a super-demon after all!’
He slowly turned his head so he could see elder’s Agnes face, “Not bad. Looks like you are the mastermind behind the rapid development of this body.”
Elder Agnes was all smiles as she nodded.
“But I see you are still in the stage of researching only the physical aspects. You obviously understand that fast growth comes with a price.” Nick made as serious face as he could. It did look a bit funny, but elder Agnes was not bothered by it even a little bit.
“Yes, Lord Baal, but the bodies I am able to create are stronger and way more resistant.” She carried Nick to a shelf with weird fetuses sorted in the progression of their size. “Look at this, for example. I can grow a human in the womb within three months. It would not have your resistances though. But even with applying resistance treatment it would not take longer that six months. Although to this day I don’t clearly understand how could you remain inside the womb for so long.”
Nick still remembered the fragments of the conversation he heard when these freaks were trying to cut him out for the first time. They were talking about some magic number thirteen or something like that.
“It’s a different because it is I!” He calmly stated.
Then he tried to think of something smart to say again. From elder’s Agnes perspective it look like demon was in deep thought.
“You want to make strong warriors in the fastest way possible.” Nick continued.
“Obviously!” Agnes was confused and disappointed at the same time since she expected more insight form the Primeval demon.
“Don’t interrupt when I am trying to help you!” Nick shook his small fist at her, pretending to be angry, and continued to spout random nonsense that came into mind, “You are sacrificing long term effectiveness for a short term gain! Also, this definitely increases the cost of the end product. A cheaper short lived warrior will always be inferior to a stronger long lived one. Basically two or three cheaper warriors would be at the cost of a stronger, but a properly built one. But the stronger one could easily take on five, maybe even ten cheap ones. And I don’t take the costs of logistics, equipment and other expenses into account! You should better consider building strong warriors with enhanced mental powers … Bah, I am tired. Bring me to my room!”
Nick really was tired and disgusted with what he saw. After rambling about a random stuff he vaguely remembered from the economy class in high school, he really wanted to get out of here.
He did not forget to play his acting role to the end though.
“Stupid humans, what’s the use of teaching an idiot!” He mumbled.
“I’m sorry, Lord Baal!” Elder Agnes had a much thicker skin compared to the grand elder and did not pay attention to the insignificant insults. Especially when they were helping her to make ‘groundbreaking progress’ in her work. She brought Nick back to his room while smiling all the way and even did not feed him herself this time, but ran to the library to report the ‘incredibly important’ news.
Nick, on the other hand, did not pay much attention to her. He cursed the old witch while eating in the arms of the chubby apprentice and soon fell asleep.
It was not as calm in the grand elder’s library though. Elders had gotten so many findings in one day and there were too many things that pointed towards the little demon being Belial. Also him being aware of the soul sealing was important ‘clue’ they had found. They decided to postpone the ‘groundbreaking’ development in research of growing fetuses, but they had to find more ways to get Primeval demon Belial to share his experience and knowledge accumulated in thousands and thousands of years.
But the next five days turned out to be boring. The demon was lying in his bed and, between eating, bathing and sleeping, he was only doing weird exercises with his hands and legs, rolling over to belly and then back.
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The only exception was when on the second day Nick ‘ordered’ prettier apprentices to serve him, while leaving the chubby one to guard him through the night.
Of course, form the Nick’s point of view it was absolutely harmless. He was not a perverted person to begin with and even more – currently he was a toddler – there was no way he would do anything improper. Days ago when his vision improved he saw the mistake he made when choosing the ‘strongest’ guard. The chubby one, called Elsa, apparently was apprentice from some non-combat department and was guarding him because she was trustworthy, not because of her strength. And since these girls were not strong, it did not really matter which one would take care of him. The main thing was to keep Mumbler away.
Although Elsa was trying really hard, during feeding and baths she tend to sweat a lot and smelled a bit odd as well. Thus Nick just used the opportunity to let the prettier ladies take care of him. After he asked for the change, Elsa got very upset, because obviously she did not manage to please Lord Baal and he ‘requested’ other girls. Nick saw that, got sympathetic and just ‘let’ her stand guard during the night shifts. There was nothing more to it. The ‘new’ girls were not country toppling beauties, but Nick did not really care that much since they were more pleasant to the eye than Elsa.
Obviously elders did not see it this way. They noted down multiple pages of hypotheses and conclusions as they grew more confident that there was the Primeval demon Belial sleeping in the room next to the library.
After three calmer days the excitement of elders was reignited once again – the demon asked to teach him to read and write. In addition, he requested a soft big carpet or a blanket on the grand elder’s balcony so he could continue his exercises there.
Elders held a short meeting and came to a conclusion that they should use the demon’s ‘damaged soul’, ‘lack of knowledge of the world’s surface’ and ‘vulnerability of the child’s body’ more to their advantage.
Thus, when Nick was brought in the library, the grand elder approached him, “Lord Baal, you have requested to learn how to read and write. But we have invested so much resources in you and we will keep investing. Maybe as an appreciation of our work you could tell us more about the Hell, demons and your life? Such knowledge would be an incredible boon to our successors.”
While lying in elder’s Agnes arms, Nick pointed his small index finger at the grand elder and said, “Boy, seems you are more intelligent than this stupid girl. You want me to teach you my knowledge!”
Nick really enjoyed badmouthing these freaks right in their faces. He could not shut down this establishment for now or put them all in jail or asylum, but calling them stupid did make him feel a better. Although it was a bit childish, he was, in fact, in a child’s body in front of mass murderers and psychopaths.
“You can see right through me, Lord Baal.” The grand elder still did not enjoy the insults, but he pretended not to notice and smiled with an ugly grimace.
“How would you like to make a deal with me?” Nick squinted his eyes and crossed arms in front of his chest. He was doing his best to look bossy.
Although all the present elders were prepared for this, they still were shocked. The grand elder looked at elder Silvio, the latter slightly nodded and then the grand elder, full of fake smiles, said, “But of course. Making a deal with Lord Baal is our honor!”
“Hahaha!” Child’s laugh filled the library, “Of course, it is! Let’s do it this way. Since this is our first deal, principles should be simple and the punishment mild. What do you think, grand elder?”
The grand elder’s face was twitching a little bit already. He was the grand elder of the Holy Order, possibly the greatest hidden power in the world, but a child, or rather a demon in child’s skin was laughing at him, “Sure, why not? What would be the deal then?”
“You want to learn my knowledge and I want to read all of this. I will answer one of your questions for every book I read here.” Nick looked at the full bookshelves with a smile.
‘This might not be The Great Library, but I will be informed enough about this world when I finish all these. Also, there might be some hidden gems in here, after all this old freak seems to be some kind of a big shot.’
“This contract will last until all the books in this library are read. I can not postpone the reading, but it also can not be in the way of my meals, baths or exercises. You can not ask personal questions and I can not ask you to share books or scrolls about your personal life. Research does not count as a personal information. My answers, of course, must be truthful and thorough, but you can’t expect me to blabber more on the subject just because you want to hear more. If the answer is given, next question can come only after the next book. If the question in any way touched my personal interests in a roundabout way, I can choose not to answer and you can ask another. What do you think?” Nick just made up random rules that allowed him to read as much as he could.
“This sounds all right.” The grand elder thought for a bit and agreed.
There were some rare books and scrolls here, but nothing ‘that’ special – they cleared the books about demons and hell out already few days ago. Other than that, the demon has seen their research and looked to be even more knowledgeable than they were. It seemed that there was nothing really to loose. But if this was the Primeval demon Belial, there was definitely some trick! The grand elder looked expectantly at both other elders. They understood what he wanted, but could not figure out any traps here.
“Wait!” Elder Silvio suddenly said, “We want our right to ask the question before you read the book, not after.”
“That is reasonable. You can ask me a question right before I start reading the particular book.” Nick nodded.
“Deal!” The grand elder smiled. Such deal was not harmful to them at all.
“What do you mean ‘deal’? We still have to agree on the punishment!” Nick snorted, “Since this is our first contract, let’s do it like this: punishment will be enforced if I refuse to answer a question or if your side does not ask a question or let me read a book. And the punishment itself would be – the guilty party will be the slave to the other party for one month. This will be agreement between gentlemen and we do not need to make any blood pacts or wows. It might be considered a contract that shows our friendship!”
The grand elder furrowed his brows, ‘Surely there is a trick somewhere! We are not using wows, we do not put our signatures on scrolls or do not use any blood to confirm the deal. And fulfilling the contract is basically each parties free choice – in a way we already are serving him, but on the other hand – he is in a body of a child and can’t resist us!’
Elders Agnes and Silvio were also deep in thoughts.
Nick looked at them with surprise, ‘What the hell? They are intelligent people, don’t they understand that I just want to read some books and answer as few questions as possible? And the amount of reading time and quantity of books is the limiting factor! What is there to think of? The slave stuff – they can’t be taking that seriously, right?’