I was busy recovering from the while Krahinn kept turning ethereal to float around me; it seemed to take no effort for him to maintain the ethereal form. One of the rings in the tattoo glowed as Krahinn tested that out which was interesting to me. Krahinn anchored back onto me, before hijacking my to summon my sword. I needed to set some ground rules and boundaries for his hijacking of my body. Krahinn couldn’t move my body, but he could control my , which was frankly splitting hairs given how good at manipulating he was. My sword was now covered in an elaborate aura as Krahinn chuckled to himself; part of me was hoping this was not the start of a trend of how Krahinn kept himself amused.

Krahinn, we need to set some boundaries about you hopping into my body. I told him. Krahinn mentally groaned.

I’m having fun. Krahinn whined at me.

Why are you acting like a petulant child? I snapped at him.

Because Daaaaaad, it’s not a phase. Krahinn mocked me and I could for some reason picture a raven stomping its feet perfectly.

Where did you learn that phrasing? I checked, wondering how Krahinn possibly came up with that phrasing.

We can link our minds genius. What are these golden stick things and why did you eat so many of them? Krahinn probed. I immediately shielded my mind with , hoping to quell his reading. Why did everyone seem to latch onto my love of fries?

Oh yea, like I can be stopped; we’re linked ya dilwaul. Krahinn taunted. We were not delving into my love of fast food. I tried kicking Krahinn out, but he just kept laughing.

I want some boundaries you old bird! I snarled at him.

What’s glowing from ? You need to learn to control this too. Krahinn pointed out; I looked at the glowing on my hand. Oh. I immediately felt around with and turned it off. Krahinn appeared next to me in an instant.

“Congratulations, you figured it out.” Krahinn praised sarcastically with a small clap.

“I shouldn’t have to actively try to repel you from combing through my mind.” I pointed out to Krahinn.

“I’ll get bored of it, eventually.” Krahinn stated with a shrug.

“How long is eventually?” I checked, not liking his cryptic answer.

“Fine, I won’t randomly possess you or browse your memories.” Krahinn grumbled unconvincingly.

“I want to hear you give me your word that you won’t.” I pressed him. Krahinn looked at me with narrowed eyes.

“Was hoping you wouldn’t notice that. Sheesh. Alright. I give you my word I won’t randomly possess you or browse your memories.” Krahinn promised. Good. Good. That made me feel a bit better.

“What do we do from here?” I asked Krahinn while he was pouting how I wouldn’t let him comb through my memories.

“First and foremost, summon the between you and Scius because I need to go over it carefully because knowing what loopholes that he left in there is important. I only skimmed it before, but now that I’m more invested, I will be looking much more thoroughly for mistakes. Luckily, Scius still hasn’t learned to calm down before acting. Granted, he likely was getting bombarded with time resets flooding his brain which is wildly disorienting.” Krahinn explained while extending his hand.

“Wait, when I reset time, how did it impact ?” I checked as I summoned the for him.

“We all got to see the countless timelines you made. Unlike Scius, we are a bit separated from our memories. being unanchored from time saved your life, as I guarantee if all of Ygdazi was being tortured like that by your resets you would’ve received a less-than-diplomatic approach.” Krahinn informed me. Ah. They would’ve killed me.

“What should I do for now?” I probed as Krahinn was stretching.

“Spend time with Luna for all I care. Maybe work on apologizing to Helga for assisting with Luna’s plan.” Krahinn answered in a bored tone.

“I’m guessing from here I won’t have much time to relax.” I sighed. But I need to work hard if I want to defeat the Void King. Krahinn looked at me as he bobbed his head back and forth a bit.

“Working yourself into the ground will only guarantee our death. There is a difference between the reckless, obsessive pursuit of being stronger which is more your style from my understanding, and training hard as efficiently as you can. Relaxing is an important step of training you seem to struggle to grasp. Now that my life is involved, that’s not happening. So, when I say go spend time with Luna or something along those lines, I mean it. Luckily, you are a Demon, so even if the next two decades are going to take gargantuan effort for our goal, you will have centuries of life to enjoy after.” Krahinn lectured me. I guess he had a point.

“I understand. Was there more to, ‘luckily you are a Demon’?” I replied. Krahinn mulled over his response for a few seconds.

“Demons are one of, if not the best, race when it comes to . Naturally strong , powerful , long life spans, and the highest amount of of any non or race I can think of. It comes with a few downsides, a few of which aren’t overly relevant to our goal, but if you need to become powerful enough to fight Scius on a relatively short timetable, it is fairly ideal. I guess you don’t fully grasp the difference between the races which is fine as it’s not ultra pertinent. The most concise answer would be, Demons are excellent at , especially , and the weakness of Demons are not relevant to needing to get strong enough to fight Scius on the time you have. I can elaborate more for you later if you’re curious, but that’s for after I’ve looked over that .” Krahinn explained. I guess I never really thought about it; I was interested in what he was talking about, and what he meant by weaknesses.

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

“Okay, I guess I’ll talk to you after you’ve gone through the .” I told him before he vanished.

I felt around the castle with a few probes to search for Luna, but saw she was still in training with Nautilus. I guess I shouldn’t bug her if she's training. I hadn’t seen much of Ein or Riva recently, so I began searching for them. Riva was napping, so that wasn’t happening. I mean, I could, but if I woke her up Mom would lecture me for easily an hour about it. Ein was in lessons with my uncles, so I used to enter the back of the lecture room. Thinking about it, I haven’t spent time with Julius either. It was odd, as mentally I was way older than them, but it was nice to hang out with them. My thoughts definitely have been influenced by my age a bit. Uncle Nox and Nez both saw me enter but said nothing. Ein hadn’t noticed me just yet as the lesson continued. Uncle Nez was instructing Ein on the basics of which was oddly boring to me. I usually like lessons, I guess relearning something even as interesting as can be dull. Uncle Nox mouthed the word later to me as Ein was absorbed in his lesson. My head sunk a little, but I used to leave. I knew Dad was in meetings all day, so that would result in a similar bust. He always works so hard; I need to find time to spend with him.

What should I do? Go play piano? That wasn’t fun without Luna nearby. Julius, Cesar, and Cleo were currently out of the castle. Lux was in Phestia. It was kind of odd being alone and not having anyone to spend time with. Maybe check in on Mom? She, Mama, and Papa were preparing new laws to pass today. Would they mind me hopping in? I used to reach that section of the castle and had to walk the rest of the way. For some reason, the wards around the castle got upgraded after a certain method of circumventing them was found. I knocked on the door to the room I knew they were in before entering. All three’s eyes shot to see who entered before relaxing upon seeing me.

“Hey Mom. Hello Mama and Papa.” I stated as I walked in.

“What brings you here, Nil?” Mom asked, looking happy to see me.

“I had some free time and wanted to see what you all were up to.” I answered while scanning the small workspace for a place to sit.

This workspace had a sturdy wood table in the center, with six chairs around it, and several small end tables with documents strewn around. I put my hand on the table, and Mom’s eyes locked onto it. Mama and Papa also seemed to look at me hand with great interest. Oh yea, I had a and several kind of tattooed on it now. Or would the word be branded? What was the proper word for it now that I thought about it? For now, I was sticking to tattoo. Wait, why was the air in here so tense? I looked at Mom who was fighting to keep her expression neutral as her wolf eyes intensely glared at my right hand. I lifted it off the chair so the three of them could really look at the tattoo. I was tempted to get piercings in this life as I always wanted a few but didn’t want to deal with the hours of screaming that would ensue, however, Mom’s reaction to this is giving me pause on that idea. Mama and Papa were looking between the tattoo, me, and Mom, gauging to see what the outcome of the current standoff was currently going to be. Part of me was tempted to activate it and try to summon Krahinn; the smart portion that didn’t feel like pressing my luck with my knew better than to interrupt him when he was working on our future success.

“What is wrong, Mom?” I checked innocently. I need to remember no contractions. Duthane was really starting to harp on that recently. I was trying to keep my tone nice and neutral, hoping it would help. Her eyes shot to stare directly into mine; I think it was safe to say that attempt failed.

“Who?” Mom snarled. Who what? Her feelings on the tattoo were thinly veiled in that single word as I knew I was on the thinnest of ice at the moment.

“I do not understand the question.” I deflected. Mama and Papa both looked at me with extreme doubt in their eyes.

“Who decided that they were willing to give a child, and more importantly, the Crown Prince of Speranza, a tattoo?” Mom clarified. Tattoo definitely seemed like the more appropriate term given the appearance.

“It is not a tattoo, technically.” I answered. Somehow, that was not helpful as Mom looked even more annoyed at me now. Mama and Papa both smirked in response to my answer.

“And that makes it so much better. Who?” Mom pressed as the anger was starting to slip into her face.

“Krahinn.” I told her. Mom looked like she sucked a lemon as I said his name.

“What motivated King Krahinn to assist in getting you that definitely not a tattoo?” Papa checked. His amusement crept into his voice which earned a glare from Mom.

“He gave it to me. It is fr-“ I began, but Mom at this point had had enough.

“We are removing that this instant young man! A tattoo! You are the Crown Prince! It may look cool, and stylish in your opinion, but you need to look proper! I know it is archaic, but being the Crown Prince comes with certain restrictions. One of which, is you need to set the example for proper appearances of nobles which prohibits tattoos!” Mom lectured. Um. I don’t think it was possible to remove this, especially given Krahinn made the that created it. Papa stood a chance, but Mama or Mom? Not a chance.

“Wait, M-“ I tried interjecting in vain; Mom was on a roll.

“And did you try a small tattoo in an area that would be hard to notice? Noooo! You chose to cover most of your right arm with it! You did not even ask if you could! You apparently decided to just do it and hope we would be okay with it!” Mom continued. At this point, Mama clearly took a better look at the tattoo as I was putting my hands up in a calming gesture.

“Hold on dear.” Mama ordered as she shot to my side to investigate it.

“Why? Did you two want to add in on how against the rules it is?” Mom checked sincerely, making sure she didn’t talk over them. That’s nice, in an odd way.

“I am taking a better look at this mark as I do not think this is actually a tattoo.” Mama explained. Mark was a solid term too. Maybe I should pay more attention when I was getting lectured or at least focus on looking alert and like I was repenting my actions. Papa casually walked over to look at it better.

“What do you mean?” Mom inquired as she now joined them in looking at the mark better. No, tattoo definitely sounded better.

“Nil, did you make some sort of contract with Krahinn?” Mama asked with a knowing stare.

“Yes, he agreed to be my .” I informed them. Mom let out a sigh of relief while Mama and Papa both chuckled.

“Oh, that is much better.” Mom quipped looking quite relieved.

“You seem oddly relieved.” I pointed out.

“I thought you were innovating yet another way to make me worry.” Mom shot back. Preposterous, I was an angel. I did feel this odd warmth as she said that though.

“How did you deduce the answer to your wager?” Papa asked as the three of them returned to their seats.

“I did not. I somehow said the right combination of words for him to decide I was worth taking the chance on and he just told me the answer. I believed him, told Ipnerslei to verify my victory, and then we made the contract.” I told them. Papa’s eyes narrowed at me.

“Do not blatantly lie Nil.” Papa chided me.

“It is the rough happening of events.” I defended myself.

“If I were to guess that you thought Krahinn was trying to trick you at first and only decided to try to win the wager after he began, how to phrase this, expressing his displeasure, how close would I be?” Mama probed. These elder demons and their somehow knowing exactly how I reacted.

“May or may not be the more elaborated upon answer.” I deflected as now all three of them were giving me raised eyebrows.

“What is it like having a ?” Mom asked with a smile.

“Awesome! And kind of weird. We can link our minds to a high degree that is going to take getting used to. Overall though it was so fun being able to use that much !” I exclaimed excitedly.

“Want to tell us about it?” Papa inquired. I immediately began recounting what happened in the Wastes.