Chapter 405: 405 - Why Burn
"... What?" After a pause, Noah asked, completely lost to their question.
"I mean... The Blessed Governing Body is a government institution to protect people and Blessed from Blessed who are doing wrong things or that could endanger society. The only time I saw someone get a Summons was when they found out about one of our assassins and summoned him, to arrest him without the risk of a full blown fight," Khish explained, making Noah very thoughtful.
"Same here. The only time I saw one of those was when a Blessed abandoned their party to die. One of them survived and denounced him," Sha said, making Noah furrow his brow. "I—I wasn't there! It was a party of a person I had dived with once... He was one of the ones that died that day," she said, slowly turning gloomy.
"Welp, it probably has to do with the Arena, then. I kinda went overboard," Noah said, dissipating the tension, making everyone sigh, since that was a thing they considered so normal by this point that memory had failed them. He did kill many Blessed.
"If that's the case all you gonna get is a warning or a request to kill less people next time. They overlook most events in the arena." Carlos felt the tension in the air, and calmed Maggie and Bel down, since both had some very strange expressions.
"Oh well. We arrived," Noah said, as he saw his old house further down the road, and the car slowly rolled to a stop in front of his room, with Noah warning the monsters of the visitors. 'Unicorn, Terrence, we arrived. There's two girls who will now live here, so you will be relieved of the hassle. I'll leave imps to protect them.' Noah said, as he slowly heard a yawn.
"Uwaaa... I slept so well! Eh, did we already arrive at your house?' Lilith said, looking out the window as soon as her eyes got used to the light.
"Yeah, we did," Noah responded out loud, as he arranged her around his neck and stood up, being the first to leave the car. 'Terrence, unlock the front door, please.' he told the bird, whose presence he felt flying towards the door, and turning the key.
"By the way, I'll introduce you guys to my guards," he said, opening the door, and making the girls freeze on the spot.
"A—A—Are those—?" Al stuttered, staring at the flaming unicorn and the large black bird landed atop it's neck. The feeling was stronger than what she felt when there was the spill, these were even more powerful monsters than the ones that destroyed the city.
"N—Noah... What in the fucking hell are you?" Khish asked, her eyes wide.
And Alice silently watched with fear. She had never seen a monster in her life aside from Lilith. And those, at least to her, felt a lot more wild and aggressive.
"Uwaa... The unicorn is so beautiful," Sha, however, had a different view. She knew it fairly well, a demi-boss of one of the Fortresses she had dived. But then, her eyes fell on Terrence, and her gleeful atmosphere vanished, almost as if she had flipped a switch.
"Noah, why do you have a Boss Monster with you inside the city?" she asked, serious, while Noah turned to face them with a smile on his throat while laughing.
"We can have that conversation in a more private space. Come on, let's get home already," he said, stepping inside, the monsters coming too.
"Hey, you. Don't be afraid, those monsters are nice and cute. Come!" Maggie exclaimed with glee, grabbing Alice and Sha by the hand and pulling them inside. Al and Khish gulped, realizing they would now live with such powerful and dangerous monsters, but silently followed the two.
Behind, Carlos and Bel looked at each other while giggling, matching Noah's behavior. To them, this was more of a joke than whatever else it might have been seen as.
Inside, Noah went straight to the living-room, sitting on his favorite armchair. "Get some more chairs from the dinner table, the house is small," he told them, as Terrence flew towards him, landing on his forearm. Lilith had also slid down towards his lap, growing in size and coiling herself, Noah's and resting on top of her head.
Bel entered the room, "Wow..." and instantly recognized the aura Noah exuded. The fear this image was capable of instilling in demons was something he was rather familiar with. And Noah, now surrounded by Terrence, Lilith and the unicorn was rather similar to what Lucifer's presence felt like.
'He's turning more and more like him...' Bel thought, as he watched the girls shyly enter the room and take her seats on the sofa, which was clearly not designed for four people.
Carlos and Bel soon came, carrying their chairs about, staring with anticipation to what the girls would ask Noah.
"So, what do you want to know? Let's start with you, Sha," Noah said, petting Lilith's head, who hissed happily. Why was she hissing? Not even Noah knew.
"Um... So, first of all, how the heck did you get a fucking Boss?" she asked, completely overwhelmed by recognizing Terrence as the species of a Boss.
"I defeated the Boss and found an egg that just so happened to be this chick," he said while shrugging. After all, there was nothing so special about how he caught Terrence in the first place, differently to unicorn, that had quite a backstory. "Also, hadn't you already seen me with him many times before?" he asked, making her release a groan of confusion while making a face.
"Yeah, the bird I always use for reconnaissance in the fortress. It's terrence," he said, making her eyes widen.
"EH?! But that bird was tiny, there's no way it could grow this—come to think of it... it's a boss-kind monster, it makes sense it'd grow fast..." she muttered, shaking her head in defeat.
"Who's next?" he asked, making Al and Khish look at each other, mustering courage to make their questions, knowing they might as well be murdered by his words.
"So,um... Aren't you scared they might get out of control and attack people?" Al asked, carefully placing her words.
"Nope, not at all," Noah responded, gleaming with confidence. "If they even think about breaking the contract, they'll burn into ash. I assure you they won't ever try it."
"... I... see?" Al blinked a couple times, trying to digest what Noah had just said. Either way, Khish still had a great question to make that had been on the back of her mind ever since she entered the house.
"Are you using monsters to keep us in check?" she asked, clenching her fists waiting for someone to pounce at her. But that didn't happen.
"Absolutely not. They won't even be the ones helping with security once you guys move in," Noah told her, making her tension disappear into a face of disbelief.
"They were here because I could trust leaving the house alone to them knowing they could take care of anyone who tried to break in. But since you will be here, it's better to put a nice squad of Imps, since they are smaller and can somewhat stay hidden, and I can make them obey other people."
"Why can't you make the two stronger ones obey others?" Sha asked, listening in to the others' questions.
"I probably can. But these kinds of monsters hate responding to people weaker than them, so I'd rather keep them happy," he said, implying these monsters had wills of their own, something most Blessed were completely blind to.
"I see..." Sha muttered, letting Noah finish.
"Also, I'd rather have them free in case I go into a dangerous fight. Back when there was the Spillage downtown, I had them protecting the house, and I didn't want to leave it empty after calling them back." As he said this, everyone's expressions, including Carlos', changed drastically.
"You can call them up from anywhere?!" Carlos exclaimed, his eyes wide. "Just like the imps?!" he asked, very pleasantly surprised.
"Well, kind of. I can dispel the Summon, and summon them again where I am. But I have no way to send them back to where they were before," Noah explained, making Carlos nod in agreement, but it seemed like he was the only person around who was really satisfied with this answer.
"Doesn't this spend a lot of mana?" Khish asked, prying about his skill.
"It does, but I have a method of restoring my mana during the fight, so it's not a problem," he said matter-of-factually, taking the former assassin aback.
"You can recover mana?! I thought it was impossible!" Sha said, a smile starting to grow on her lips, as she thought, 'If I can do this then I'll be more useful and maybe even my rank will rise!'
"I can... It's more like an energy generator, though,' Noah started, making her brows frown. "Long story short, I can exchange matter to mana, by burning it with my flames," Noah said, striking his fingers as if it were a lighter, a small sparkling flame appearing every time.
"Oh..." Sha sank, seeing it was impossible for her. "IS that why you always seem to burn the monsters we have nothing left to collect from?" she asked him, making Noah smile.
"Yep, that's exactly why. It's also why, in the arena, I always burned to ash every person I ended up killing," he explained, a faint smile appearing on Sha's lip as she was able to take a weight from her chest, that of the criticism people gave him for having burnt the enemies that way.
If he had this good of a reason, and it was what allowed him to keep fighting, then who was she to complain of his means.
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