Post by Bernael on Dec 19, 2015 7:24:05 GMT -5
Mount Paozu was a place that Bernael certainly wasn’t familiar with, but it looked rather tranquil from the outside, which made it the boys next stop. He had recently bought a heavy weighted flak jacket, to up the effectiveness of his training. But he sort of missed the idea of the heavy part of the heavy weights. The only reason it was increasing his training effectiveness was because of how much more strenuous it was to move, and thus, causing his reaction time and battle power to drop. He hoped to surpass this downside soon, but he was sort of skeptical of his ability to for the time being. His base battle power was 7,408 but with the heavy weighted flak jacket he was wearing, his battle power was dropped down to only 1,852. This didn’t discourage him very much (mostly because he had no idea how much his power dropped), but he suppressed his power as much as he could so as to make it harder for others to find him among any other powers in the area, just in case the weights would provide a hinderance for the time being.
Bernael would press forward, knowing absolutely nothing that would be standing in his way until it would come at him first hand. “Hmm, this place seems a hefty bit peculiar, the air is thicker than anywhere I’ve been before” He would say to himself, slowly looking around, feeling an odd sensation rushing through him almost as if he was about to run into something that would require his direct attention, he shook it off as nothing and just decided to push on without worrying too much about it, hoping that he could find a good, out of the way place to train without being troubled by anyone or anything.
The demon’s gaze would search, passing through misty low points, and breathtaking views, searching for a good place to plant his feet for the day. He came across many different animal adversaries on his search for a spot, being attacked by the harsh environment was nothing new to Bernael, so he just put most of them down, hoping that he didn’t fatally wound any of them as he continued on. He didn’t want to actually kill any animals, knowing that they could be hunting for food, or just being territorial, it was just basic animal instinct for them and he had no reason to take that away from them. Especially, after losing close animal friends and having to put down another animal for the sake of his rage in the past, he didn’t want another situation like that to be had for him.
However, not every creature up in the mountainous region was fight able by Bernael, as some could overpower him in his weakened state, those being mostly Dinosaurs of all shapes and sizes. They would chase him around, the heavy flak jacket he was wearing proving near lethal to him as it slowed him down and made him less lethal back to the enemies, going so far as to power up just to get a bit of an edge on them. He was slowly getting scared of this environment and the possibility of it taking his life, especially since he was only coming here for some relaxing training to try out his new weights and to get off of the path to finding his father for the time being.
His bad luck continued on even fiercer, as he was walking down a dirt path, continuing his search for a good training spot, and without any warning, a cry of sudden despair and a bit of desire came abruptly from behind him. He would turn and while off guard, a woman ran into him and grabbed around his waist, crying deeply and sadly while saying “Finally I found someone” in a very broken tone. Bernael was confused and didn’t know what to do, but decided to try and calm the woman down nonetheless, he didn’t want to appear completely heartless when someone else appeared genuinely despaired. “M-Ma’am are you okay? What's wrong?” he would ask, stuttering a bit to show a slight bit of confusion in his voice. She would stare up at him before backing a bit away. “S-Sorry for getting in your personal space, I’ve been trying to find someone to help me for a while and I just… I just was so relieved to finally find someone!” She would say out to him, in a rushed, still broken tone. Bernael didn’t know quite how to respond, but he would just try to stay calm in his response. “What happened? Why were you trying to find someone to help you in the first place.?” the boy questioned, wondering what the lady could be doing up here in the first place. Before he could think much more on what he just said, the lady looked back and pointed down the road “S-Something stole my son, I don’t know what but it was a large, red, slithery figure, it just snatched him right out of my grasp and dragged him away. I don’t even know if he’s okay, but I know he’s not safe at all! He was taken so forcefully and powerfully it hurt my arm! There's no way I could do this on my own!” the lady would panic, continuing to get more broken and exhausted with each sentence of speech.
Bernael wondered why a lady would bring their son into this mountainous region by her lonesome, especially when she was one of the people out there that DIDN’T know how to fight back against the elements. But he slowly realized he was being a hypocrite, as he himself didn’t know anything about this place, and went in here searching for peaceful training, and had been taunted with hostile encounters left and right. Despite the story sounding absolutely staged, he decided to trust the woman, not wanting to call her out or leave her behind, just in case her story was true and a kid truly was in danger.
“Red, slithery figure huh?” Bernael would question more, staring at the lady as he walked by her side as she led him towards the spot that the kid got snatched from her from. The lady would nod, while also shivering at the words uttered, almost as if she was deathly scared of them. He didn’t want to scare her or remind her too much more of something so terrible, and would just continue thinking in his mind about the possibilities of the mystery kidnapper. Large Red Dinosaur Snake? No that sounded absolutely ridiculous, least the dinosaur part did. That's it! A Large Red Snake, as simple as that! Wait no, that made no sense either, why would a large snake snatch up a young boy and just take him away, it made no sense not to take the lady, if its purposes were for hunger, the lady would provide a better meal than any little boy would. He didn’t know of any true reason other than hunger, for a giant snake to snatch ANYBODY up after all, so his mind tracked onto different ideas. Maybe it was too fast for the lady to get a real read off of it? It could have been something that wasn’t slithery at all, he had no real way to proof check the lady until he saw the creature or its tracks himself.
His mind churned with ideas. Was it for some kind of ritual? Maybe a way to get a ransom out of the lady for the kid back? Ugh he didn’t know! The story just sounded absolutely fake the more he went through it, there was no reason for anything to steal the kid from the lady and just let her run off to find somebody to get help, there had to be an ulterior motive from this lady, or the kidnapper, for this to be happening. He didn’t want to say anything out loud, or show emotion for his thoughts on his face, as that could divide the woman into not trusting him, or he could get ambushed instantly if he didn’t play along.
All his thoughts after the snake thing were instantly destroyed once him and the lady reached the spot however, as definite slithering snake tracks plowed through the area and past the tree’s towards who knows what. It was that, or a some sort of slithering tractor had come through, rolling up the area to make it look like it was a snakes doing, but that was a little far fetched, even for his mind to believe. The woman sort of shuddered as she stared at the tracks, looking over at Bernael with a look of hope on her face. “Do you think you’ll be able to track my son down? S-Sir?” she would say to him while showing an obvious worry about his answer. His doubts of her story were slowly slipping, if she wanted to ambush him or something, she wouldn’t have to go through all this trouble, at any point in time she would be able to pull a fast one on him and possibly take his life. he just sort of studied the tracks for a second, there were telltale signs of direction for him to be able to find it wherever it went so he gently nodded. “Yes, I can, the names Bernael by the way, Bernael Adonael” he would just say quietly to her, while starting to follow the tracks.
The woman made the happiest noise he had ever heard in a long while once he started following them. Her mood was boosted tremendously just by him accepting and saying he could track the creature down. There was no promise about finding her son, alive even, as he didn’t know if the creature would just want to off the boy as soon as possible. But he certainly didn’t want to bring that fact up, as seeing the woman more calm was better for the both of them, as being panic’d would just lead to possible mishaps. The tracks led for quite a while, leading it to become night time quickly and he certainly didn’t want to stay out deep into the night with his visibility dropping for the tracks. It was risk, but it had to be taken, the two of them found a little rock crevice to stay under, and Bernael set up camp there, the two of them relaxing to try to rest the night away. The demon boy didn’t say much, as he was still very antisocial and didn’t want to attempt to start conversations with someone he could possibly have to give bad news to, or someone he would never see again.
That wasn’t a problem in the end, as the lady decided to start up the conversation herself. “Oh uh, I forgot to introduce myself, sorry.” She would say to him, in a way that sounded like she was trying to break the silence between them. “I must have missed that, it's alright” he would respond, not giving her much attention. “W-Well it's, my name is Naomi, Naomi Bishop, but you can just call me Naomi, or Nao if you want.” She would follow up with, considering he wasn’t giving her much to work with. He just nodded and continued to give her absolutely no attention aside from acknowledging her words. “So uh, Bernael Adonael right?” she’d ask, getting a firm nod once more. “That's quite an unusual name, is it something special?” she’d continue to ask, seeing if she could get some sort of worded response. “Well, it’s mostly angelic, Adonael being angelic and Bernael being a corrupted angel. But I was given this name for incorrect purposes.” He would reply back, looking sort of down while looking off towards her a bit more. “Oh? But an angelic name sounds so nice, except for the corrupted angel part, but an angel in general just sounds like a nice gesture towards your name!” the lady would say, trying to change Bernael’s mind. The only reply he had to that was “I’m part demon and part human, my mother gave me this name because I am her ‘little angel’ even though I am still a demon, it's more ironic than anything.” he would say back, shaking his head and looking even more sad. At this, the woman sort of got quiet and stopped talking. “You can leave if you want, or go look for someone else, I understand if you want to… being with a demon is probably not very appealing with your son missing.” he would then add on, waiting for her to just run off afraid or hating him. “No it's quite alright, I just didn’t know what to ask after that, I don’t mind if you’re a demon Bernael, you decided to help me and that's all that matters, and it's not like you’re being hostile to me, you being a demon just makes me a tad bit more confident in you completing this for me~” she would just say, smiling and giving a little head cock, almost as if all her worries were gone, or if she was trying to clear his own worries. But this caused him to blush, someone that didn’t absolutely hate him for being a demon? Or someone that wasn’t afraid? Aside from a few key people, who were all strong in their own right, nobody had ever accepted him being a demon until now. This was the first, average, non fighter, non relative person that had accepted him even though he was a demon. He almost couldn’t believe it, he just smiled and sat back against the walls. “Thank you” was all he said before attempting a rest.
The rest was easy to go through, and the night passed by quietly and calmly with his rest coming to him on good terms. By the time he was up and attem, he was already back on the trail looking for the kidnapper creature. Nao didn’t say much at all, just following close behind him and looking around, hoping that they would possibly find her son soon. After a short while, they realized they weren’t getting that close, and decided to focus more on talking to each other to pass the time once more.
“Hey uh, Naomi?” Bernael would ask, looking back at her, which she’d just give a simple ‘hm?’ back to show she was paying attention. “Where’s your boy’s father in all of this? I would expect him to be out here with you, or is there a reason for that.” Bernael would ask, before realising how personal the question was, and how insensitive it was as well. “Well, me and the father are broken up now, have been for a short while, this was my time with him and I wanted to take him on a nice relaxing trip through a forest, I heard good things about it, but so far it's been quite troublesome. But yeah, that's why he’s not out here with me.” she would respond, staring back. “Oh, that is quite understandable then, I am glad you found me when you did.” He would say, this would go on for quite a while, the two of them bantering back and forth among themselves, delving deep into each other’s backstory to get to know who the other was. The more backstory the lady gave, the more believable she became to Bernael. There was so much to her, and she said it all so calmly and relaxed as if it truly was her backstory, sealing the deal in Bernael’s heart that this lady was true to her word and not pulling a scam in any way. Though, it probably would have been better for Bernael if she was lying to him about everything.
He would tell her about his trips around the world, to all those different locations, telling her about all the different fights he had been in, and all the different people he had met. She seemed extremely interested in his history, and he was happy to have someone to tell it all to, as he never really got long times with people where he could do something like this. A blush would develop on his face and his heart would tug a little bit. She was so nice, so so very nice… could this be love? No it couldn’t be! How could he be falling in love with a woman he had only met yesterday, though it wasn’t as far fetched as it sounded, least after he thought to himself for a little bit. The only women that he had met in the past were, his mother, girls who hated him, some stronger people who didn’t have this much time with him, and some ninja’s that wanted to murder him for a short time. While he thought it over, it was probably normal for someone like him to fall in love with someone like this. But he couldn’t let his special feelings for her cloud his objective! He continued forward, carefully studying the track making sure that it would never leave his sight, as he for sure wanted to track this snake thing down and get this lady’s son back.
But he wasn’t the only one giving out personal information during all of this. It turned out that Naomi was studying to be a teacher, and actually completed her studies not too long ago. She would start her first week of her teaching career in a month, and she seemed to be very good at it. She trained to be a geography teacher, and that's why she even knew about Mount Paozu in the first place. Sadly enough, her training didn’t prepare her for the danger that was lurking in the mountain. It was a bit sad however, as this was the last time she’d be with her son before her job started, and then it would be a bit before she could see him again, so she wanted to show him something cool. That was completely destroyed the moment all of this drama happened, as there was no way the time would be a good one after everything that was going down. Their turns would keep swapping for them to tell each other stuff about themselves, and both seemed to love the little chat, it helped drop worry while still working towards the goal. Before the two of them knew it, it was night time once again, and they found a cave entrance before it got too dark to see anything.
Bernael was worried for the kids safety at this point, way more so than he was letting on. How far did the damned thing take him? Was it even keeping him alive? He hoped that the answers to his questions were, not far from here, and absolutely. But he understood that worrying would only hurt his mood that had been picked up recently, and decided to shake it off. Naomi seemed to be trying her best to stay happy as well, as she’d continue on her conversation about telling Bernael her history, telling her about her popularity in school, her mishaps that occurred at a young age. Her reasoning for pursuing a career in teaching, and she even got a little into the happenings that drove her to break up with her ex husband. That was all a bit too serious for his taste at the end however, but he listened all the same, giving this girl a good ear to talk to.
After a bit, she paused and stopped talking about her history to stare over at Bernael, she gave him a genuine smile that was probably the lightest, most calm he’d seen in awhile. “You know, I don’t think I ever discussed a reward with you, for helping me with this.” She would say to him, sighing a bit thinking that she was greedy. Bernael just couldn’t have her be down, so he instantly responded. “It's quite alright, I don’t need a reward for helping you out, the adventure and very nice company is all worth it.” he would just say, feeling pretty good about himself turning down the reward. However, it seemed that Naomi was pretty intent on giving him at least a tiny reward for her troubles, so she slowly moved over and gave him a kiss, his first kiss infact. It turned out that he wasn’t very good at hiding his emotions that he was, interested in her that way, as his blushes and feelings were seen through all the way back during the day, and she just didn’t act on his feelings till then.
As she explained that to him, his face was just lit up deeply. It was almost as if his skin had turned a pure red. Was that because he was a demon? Or was he just too embarrassed and blushing that deeply? It was most likely the latter that was causing this change in skin pigment. She slowly questioned him as he didn’t have a face of happiness with his reward however, he just had a shocked expression added onto his deep blush. “T-T-That was… m-my first kiss… n-never had one before.” he would respond, stuttering constantly as he didn’t understand what was going on. “S-Sorry!” She yelped back, not sure that it was the right thing to do. “I-I took your first, the most important one, from you without even asking, I’m so so sorry!” she would continue on, making matters worse as phrasing was quite a problem, everywhere, and he just sort of passed out right then and there.
When he woke up in the morning, he found Naomi sleeping next to him, she was pretty much holding onto his arm for dear life as she was against it. He once more blushed but realized that it was another day and that he couldn’t sit there and wait, even though he wanted to talk more about last night's happenings to her, he understood his mission and gently woke up Naomi. “Hey uh, sorry to wake you up all of a sudden, but it’s morning so it is time to get moving.” he would say, moving his arm to allow her to get up freely. As he would get back on the trail, Naomi would pester Bernael constantly about what happened the night before, saying that she was extremely sorry and that she didn’t know how to get forgiven, but he just kept telling her that it was fine, and quite welcomed because her assumptions of his feelings were quite true. But the fact that it was true, was the worst part of it all. She would begin to say how sorry she was again but before she could, Bernael just turned around and gave her a big hug while saying. “Everything’s alright, everyone gets their first kiss taken by someone somewhere, so just be happy that it was you and not someone else~ Also, we’re going to get your son back, don’t worry about it at all, I promise you from the bottom of my heart that we will get him back to you safely, and when we get you and him out of here, you’ll be in the clear, and you can continue on with your lives.” he would say, his voice cracking up a bit as it didn’t sound very happy. “What about you? Won't you be coming with me, and my son.” she would ask back, just sort of sitting his his holding arms. “No… I have so much stuff to do, you know I’m looking for my father, I can’t stop after all this work to just be with someone yet… I promise, I’ll come visit though” he replied back before releasing her and turning around. “Once I find my dad, I may just take you on that offer to ‘come with you’ because, it’ll be quite appealing.” he would state happily, while taking another step forward as a red figure would blindside him, knowing him to the floor.
Bernael would scramble to his feet, making a blade in his hand out of ki while staring down the red beast, waiting to strike it before he realized it had grabbed Naomi. He couldn’t fight it, not now. The ki blade vanished as he realized it had a human looking face. “Follow me, Inbred, if you want to get these two back so bad, you’ll have to face a pure demon” the red creature would cackle, slithering away faster than Bernael would keep up with, but the tracks certainly did show up, enough to track that is. Bernael would set off in a dead sprint, not caring what was getting in his way, even going as far as to power up with demon heart to gain speed. He really regretted the heavy weights at that time, as them slowing him down was a mighty distress on his mind. It took him a little over four hours to catch up the beast at its lair, he thought about what it said, a pure demon? Could that snake creature be some sort of form of a demon? Perhaps, who knew what the extent of Demonic forms could go, aside from demons themselves. He stood at the opening, not knowing how he’d take what could happen inside, but he wanted to get it over with, and thus, he stepped inside to face whatever his adversary may be.
Inside, he found many bones of fallen beings that had fallen prey to this demon, some being animal, some being humanoid, others he couldn’t even make out. But at the very least, he looked across the bones and rock to see Naomi, and a boy held closely to her, safe for the time being. But the demon would be nowhere to be found, Bernael didn’t mind this as he rushed over to Naomi and the boy to see if everything was alright. The boy was completely unharmed, almost illogically so in fact! He was even clean, he looked nicely fed and safe in every way. But Naomi… she looked fatally wounded! Bernael would have to get her out of here fast if he had any chance of her surviving. He would pick up both the boy and Naomi and start heading towards the exit, but of course, the last possible second was blocked out by the giant Demon Snake coming in to confront him. The snake demon sort of changed till it looked more like an absolute feminine woman than anything else. It carried a sword that looked like an old fashioned Odachi, it was held expertly and looked almost beautiful, but Bernael didn’t care one bit about the beauty, he wanted this demon dead, and now. He set Naomi and her son down, and got into a ready stance.
Naomi would struggle to look up at Bernael. “Would you please… take Jonathan to my ex, in east city… if i can’t make it out of here to do that myself” she would say, a bit of blood coming from her mouth. “No don’t say that! Everything will be fine just trust me okay~ I said you two could go on your way right?!” Bernael would barely whimper out, turning back towards the demon who began to interrupt him. “I made sure to gash a major artery, there is no way that she’s making it back out, out of this cave even!” the demon would chuckle insanely, getting a wide grin on her face. Bernael would just go dim eyed for a second. It was happening again, a tough opponent was killing something he held dear. He just sort of got prepared once again, and breathed in and out slowly.
Within a mere few more seconds, he clashed with the demon, the sword almost coming down right on his head, but he held it tightly between his palms, not ready to go down without a fight. Him and the demon were about on par, which was incredibly sad to him as he realized how weakened he was. He wasn’t even in demon heart anymore and he started laughing a heart wrenching laugh. “I am the hybrid son of a human female and a demon male, I am not even at one hundred percent of my power, and I can double that easily if I wanted to! How will it feel to have your pride broken, you pure demon!” he would shout, as he quickly released their sword as he went demon heart, reversing the sword and using it to stab directly through the demon’s own heart, plunging it through where the blood pumps, causing the sword to get covered in demon blood. “I fought a ninja at least six times stronger than you, now why don't you think about how weak you truly are, feasting on weaker prey, you pure demon scum.” he would whisper into her ear before ripping the sword out of her body and placing it in the back of his flak jacket. He slowly turned back to Naomi and the child and noticed that Naomi had gone limp……. for the first time in a long while, the demon boy cried tears that meant something to him, he lost something dear to him once more.
After giving the woman known as Naomi Bishop a proper burial Bernael would kneel before the boy that had just lost his mother, telling him that everything was going to be alright from now on, and that he would be returned to his father safely. The boy kept on asking why ‘mommy had to go in the ground’ but Bernael was too heart torn to answer in a straight way, especially to a little boy such as this. He would just answer with things like ‘mommy had to take a nap, she’ll catch up later’ and ‘she’s not feeling good right now, just wait a bit youngster’ but none of it was true, his mother was gone and there was nothing Bernael could do to help ease the pain that would befall this boy. Bernael just bit his lip and led the boy to east city with him. When they got there, the boy said he knew where his father’s house was, and Bernael followed him there just to make sure he was safe.
The father, would run out of the house and hug the boy, happy to see his son that he loved so much. He would stand up and only see Bernael, the boy with a dead eyed look on his face and no emotion to show. The guy would look on with a bit of shock, before saying “W-Who are you.” in a broken voice. Bernael would just respond "Well... I am Naomi’s contact to bring your son back to you…… in the event that she herself couldn't do so on her own terms. I am very sorry that it ended up that way, but with your son returned, and my job complete, I'll be on my way.” with absolutely no emotion in his voice. The man would cover his hand over his mouth before looking down at his son and hugging him once more, by the time he looked back over to say a thank you and a goodbye, Bernael would be gone.
Bernael would make his way back to Mount Paozu to say his final goodbye’s to Naomi’s grave, and then he would take out the sword he stole from the demon. The demon’s blood on the odachi stained it, making the blood basically infused with the sword. He felt that he earned the sword after the display he pulled against it, and let it to rest on his flak jacket once more. “I am sorry Naomi… looks like I won't be staying with you after I find my dad…” he would say to her grave, staring at it longingly. “I guess it was foolish of me to have feelings for anybody… this always happened, if I just decided to ignore your attempts to be nice, you’d be alive right now… most likely” he would say again, before sighing “Or maybe I am just overthinking things, well, sorry Naomi… I would have liked to know you for longer than I did, but it looks like that just isn’t possible.” he would lastly say before turning and walking away from the grave.
A dark red tint shimmered in his eyes, his demonic energy was running rampant in his body and he wasn’t letting them out, he slowly fell to the ground and held his head. He couldn’t believe that once more, he couldn’t protect something he cared about, shortly after he started to care about it. How could he show himself to anybody, how could he care for anybody after that. What if he had a curse?! What if he was doomed for all eternity?! For everyone he cares about to die, for them to meet a tragic end right after he felt these immense feelings. He couldn’t believe that, there was no way to believe that right?! Bernael didn’t know what to do, his mind was breaking and he was very well aware of it. He just sort of burnt out and passed out one more time.
By the time he woke up, his feelings and emotions were at a boiling point, his demonic energy was just eating at him, waiting to be released. He gave in, and all of his demonic energy was released out of him in demon heart, even though he gained the same strength boost to his power, his aura was going wild, even causing minor erosion around him in the serene forest. Before he even knew it, was running around, LOOKING for a fight, creature after creature, monster after monster, prey after prey would fall before him, as he didn’t even let his morals come before his anger now, even going as far to kill most of them. And what he didn’t kill, he would physically cripple. Sometimes he’d even cause intense mental harm to them by taking a long time to apply the pain to their bodies. He wasn’t dealing with loss well this time, and he wanted to show it. To every little miserable creature in the area if he could. Though that rage anger lasted a very short while, as his energy depleted and his anger was satiated.
After he was done, he pulled back out the sword that he stole that was covered in demons blood and stared into his reflection. "This can never happen again, we can use power to make sure we never lose someone we care about again right?! No that's ridiculous... how about we just never care about anybody ever again! Unless they are strong of course, then they wouldn't need to be protected, we could stop feeling this pain that way, right?" He would just say in a sad tone towards the sword, he didn't really pay attention, but the reflection in the sword that stared back at him was less than him, much less than him in fact. He was probably more a demon than he ever was before, but he didn't mind, maybe it was just his destiny to be a full out demon some day.
WC: 6011
Bernael would press forward, knowing absolutely nothing that would be standing in his way until it would come at him first hand. “Hmm, this place seems a hefty bit peculiar, the air is thicker than anywhere I’ve been before” He would say to himself, slowly looking around, feeling an odd sensation rushing through him almost as if he was about to run into something that would require his direct attention, he shook it off as nothing and just decided to push on without worrying too much about it, hoping that he could find a good, out of the way place to train without being troubled by anyone or anything.
The demon’s gaze would search, passing through misty low points, and breathtaking views, searching for a good place to plant his feet for the day. He came across many different animal adversaries on his search for a spot, being attacked by the harsh environment was nothing new to Bernael, so he just put most of them down, hoping that he didn’t fatally wound any of them as he continued on. He didn’t want to actually kill any animals, knowing that they could be hunting for food, or just being territorial, it was just basic animal instinct for them and he had no reason to take that away from them. Especially, after losing close animal friends and having to put down another animal for the sake of his rage in the past, he didn’t want another situation like that to be had for him.
However, not every creature up in the mountainous region was fight able by Bernael, as some could overpower him in his weakened state, those being mostly Dinosaurs of all shapes and sizes. They would chase him around, the heavy flak jacket he was wearing proving near lethal to him as it slowed him down and made him less lethal back to the enemies, going so far as to power up just to get a bit of an edge on them. He was slowly getting scared of this environment and the possibility of it taking his life, especially since he was only coming here for some relaxing training to try out his new weights and to get off of the path to finding his father for the time being.
His bad luck continued on even fiercer, as he was walking down a dirt path, continuing his search for a good training spot, and without any warning, a cry of sudden despair and a bit of desire came abruptly from behind him. He would turn and while off guard, a woman ran into him and grabbed around his waist, crying deeply and sadly while saying “Finally I found someone” in a very broken tone. Bernael was confused and didn’t know what to do, but decided to try and calm the woman down nonetheless, he didn’t want to appear completely heartless when someone else appeared genuinely despaired. “M-Ma’am are you okay? What's wrong?” he would ask, stuttering a bit to show a slight bit of confusion in his voice. She would stare up at him before backing a bit away. “S-Sorry for getting in your personal space, I’ve been trying to find someone to help me for a while and I just… I just was so relieved to finally find someone!” She would say out to him, in a rushed, still broken tone. Bernael didn’t know quite how to respond, but he would just try to stay calm in his response. “What happened? Why were you trying to find someone to help you in the first place.?” the boy questioned, wondering what the lady could be doing up here in the first place. Before he could think much more on what he just said, the lady looked back and pointed down the road “S-Something stole my son, I don’t know what but it was a large, red, slithery figure, it just snatched him right out of my grasp and dragged him away. I don’t even know if he’s okay, but I know he’s not safe at all! He was taken so forcefully and powerfully it hurt my arm! There's no way I could do this on my own!” the lady would panic, continuing to get more broken and exhausted with each sentence of speech.
Bernael wondered why a lady would bring their son into this mountainous region by her lonesome, especially when she was one of the people out there that DIDN’T know how to fight back against the elements. But he slowly realized he was being a hypocrite, as he himself didn’t know anything about this place, and went in here searching for peaceful training, and had been taunted with hostile encounters left and right. Despite the story sounding absolutely staged, he decided to trust the woman, not wanting to call her out or leave her behind, just in case her story was true and a kid truly was in danger.
“Red, slithery figure huh?” Bernael would question more, staring at the lady as he walked by her side as she led him towards the spot that the kid got snatched from her from. The lady would nod, while also shivering at the words uttered, almost as if she was deathly scared of them. He didn’t want to scare her or remind her too much more of something so terrible, and would just continue thinking in his mind about the possibilities of the mystery kidnapper. Large Red Dinosaur Snake? No that sounded absolutely ridiculous, least the dinosaur part did. That's it! A Large Red Snake, as simple as that! Wait no, that made no sense either, why would a large snake snatch up a young boy and just take him away, it made no sense not to take the lady, if its purposes were for hunger, the lady would provide a better meal than any little boy would. He didn’t know of any true reason other than hunger, for a giant snake to snatch ANYBODY up after all, so his mind tracked onto different ideas. Maybe it was too fast for the lady to get a real read off of it? It could have been something that wasn’t slithery at all, he had no real way to proof check the lady until he saw the creature or its tracks himself.
His mind churned with ideas. Was it for some kind of ritual? Maybe a way to get a ransom out of the lady for the kid back? Ugh he didn’t know! The story just sounded absolutely fake the more he went through it, there was no reason for anything to steal the kid from the lady and just let her run off to find somebody to get help, there had to be an ulterior motive from this lady, or the kidnapper, for this to be happening. He didn’t want to say anything out loud, or show emotion for his thoughts on his face, as that could divide the woman into not trusting him, or he could get ambushed instantly if he didn’t play along.
All his thoughts after the snake thing were instantly destroyed once him and the lady reached the spot however, as definite slithering snake tracks plowed through the area and past the tree’s towards who knows what. It was that, or a some sort of slithering tractor had come through, rolling up the area to make it look like it was a snakes doing, but that was a little far fetched, even for his mind to believe. The woman sort of shuddered as she stared at the tracks, looking over at Bernael with a look of hope on her face. “Do you think you’ll be able to track my son down? S-Sir?” she would say to him while showing an obvious worry about his answer. His doubts of her story were slowly slipping, if she wanted to ambush him or something, she wouldn’t have to go through all this trouble, at any point in time she would be able to pull a fast one on him and possibly take his life. he just sort of studied the tracks for a second, there were telltale signs of direction for him to be able to find it wherever it went so he gently nodded. “Yes, I can, the names Bernael by the way, Bernael Adonael” he would just say quietly to her, while starting to follow the tracks.
The woman made the happiest noise he had ever heard in a long while once he started following them. Her mood was boosted tremendously just by him accepting and saying he could track the creature down. There was no promise about finding her son, alive even, as he didn’t know if the creature would just want to off the boy as soon as possible. But he certainly didn’t want to bring that fact up, as seeing the woman more calm was better for the both of them, as being panic’d would just lead to possible mishaps. The tracks led for quite a while, leading it to become night time quickly and he certainly didn’t want to stay out deep into the night with his visibility dropping for the tracks. It was risk, but it had to be taken, the two of them found a little rock crevice to stay under, and Bernael set up camp there, the two of them relaxing to try to rest the night away. The demon boy didn’t say much, as he was still very antisocial and didn’t want to attempt to start conversations with someone he could possibly have to give bad news to, or someone he would never see again.
That wasn’t a problem in the end, as the lady decided to start up the conversation herself. “Oh uh, I forgot to introduce myself, sorry.” She would say to him, in a way that sounded like she was trying to break the silence between them. “I must have missed that, it's alright” he would respond, not giving her much attention. “W-Well it's, my name is Naomi, Naomi Bishop, but you can just call me Naomi, or Nao if you want.” She would follow up with, considering he wasn’t giving her much to work with. He just nodded and continued to give her absolutely no attention aside from acknowledging her words. “So uh, Bernael Adonael right?” she’d ask, getting a firm nod once more. “That's quite an unusual name, is it something special?” she’d continue to ask, seeing if she could get some sort of worded response. “Well, it’s mostly angelic, Adonael being angelic and Bernael being a corrupted angel. But I was given this name for incorrect purposes.” He would reply back, looking sort of down while looking off towards her a bit more. “Oh? But an angelic name sounds so nice, except for the corrupted angel part, but an angel in general just sounds like a nice gesture towards your name!” the lady would say, trying to change Bernael’s mind. The only reply he had to that was “I’m part demon and part human, my mother gave me this name because I am her ‘little angel’ even though I am still a demon, it's more ironic than anything.” he would say back, shaking his head and looking even more sad. At this, the woman sort of got quiet and stopped talking. “You can leave if you want, or go look for someone else, I understand if you want to… being with a demon is probably not very appealing with your son missing.” he would then add on, waiting for her to just run off afraid or hating him. “No it's quite alright, I just didn’t know what to ask after that, I don’t mind if you’re a demon Bernael, you decided to help me and that's all that matters, and it's not like you’re being hostile to me, you being a demon just makes me a tad bit more confident in you completing this for me~” she would just say, smiling and giving a little head cock, almost as if all her worries were gone, or if she was trying to clear his own worries. But this caused him to blush, someone that didn’t absolutely hate him for being a demon? Or someone that wasn’t afraid? Aside from a few key people, who were all strong in their own right, nobody had ever accepted him being a demon until now. This was the first, average, non fighter, non relative person that had accepted him even though he was a demon. He almost couldn’t believe it, he just smiled and sat back against the walls. “Thank you” was all he said before attempting a rest.
The rest was easy to go through, and the night passed by quietly and calmly with his rest coming to him on good terms. By the time he was up and attem, he was already back on the trail looking for the kidnapper creature. Nao didn’t say much at all, just following close behind him and looking around, hoping that they would possibly find her son soon. After a short while, they realized they weren’t getting that close, and decided to focus more on talking to each other to pass the time once more.
“Hey uh, Naomi?” Bernael would ask, looking back at her, which she’d just give a simple ‘hm?’ back to show she was paying attention. “Where’s your boy’s father in all of this? I would expect him to be out here with you, or is there a reason for that.” Bernael would ask, before realising how personal the question was, and how insensitive it was as well. “Well, me and the father are broken up now, have been for a short while, this was my time with him and I wanted to take him on a nice relaxing trip through a forest, I heard good things about it, but so far it's been quite troublesome. But yeah, that's why he’s not out here with me.” she would respond, staring back. “Oh, that is quite understandable then, I am glad you found me when you did.” He would say, this would go on for quite a while, the two of them bantering back and forth among themselves, delving deep into each other’s backstory to get to know who the other was. The more backstory the lady gave, the more believable she became to Bernael. There was so much to her, and she said it all so calmly and relaxed as if it truly was her backstory, sealing the deal in Bernael’s heart that this lady was true to her word and not pulling a scam in any way. Though, it probably would have been better for Bernael if she was lying to him about everything.
He would tell her about his trips around the world, to all those different locations, telling her about all the different fights he had been in, and all the different people he had met. She seemed extremely interested in his history, and he was happy to have someone to tell it all to, as he never really got long times with people where he could do something like this. A blush would develop on his face and his heart would tug a little bit. She was so nice, so so very nice… could this be love? No it couldn’t be! How could he be falling in love with a woman he had only met yesterday, though it wasn’t as far fetched as it sounded, least after he thought to himself for a little bit. The only women that he had met in the past were, his mother, girls who hated him, some stronger people who didn’t have this much time with him, and some ninja’s that wanted to murder him for a short time. While he thought it over, it was probably normal for someone like him to fall in love with someone like this. But he couldn’t let his special feelings for her cloud his objective! He continued forward, carefully studying the track making sure that it would never leave his sight, as he for sure wanted to track this snake thing down and get this lady’s son back.
But he wasn’t the only one giving out personal information during all of this. It turned out that Naomi was studying to be a teacher, and actually completed her studies not too long ago. She would start her first week of her teaching career in a month, and she seemed to be very good at it. She trained to be a geography teacher, and that's why she even knew about Mount Paozu in the first place. Sadly enough, her training didn’t prepare her for the danger that was lurking in the mountain. It was a bit sad however, as this was the last time she’d be with her son before her job started, and then it would be a bit before she could see him again, so she wanted to show him something cool. That was completely destroyed the moment all of this drama happened, as there was no way the time would be a good one after everything that was going down. Their turns would keep swapping for them to tell each other stuff about themselves, and both seemed to love the little chat, it helped drop worry while still working towards the goal. Before the two of them knew it, it was night time once again, and they found a cave entrance before it got too dark to see anything.
Bernael was worried for the kids safety at this point, way more so than he was letting on. How far did the damned thing take him? Was it even keeping him alive? He hoped that the answers to his questions were, not far from here, and absolutely. But he understood that worrying would only hurt his mood that had been picked up recently, and decided to shake it off. Naomi seemed to be trying her best to stay happy as well, as she’d continue on her conversation about telling Bernael her history, telling her about her popularity in school, her mishaps that occurred at a young age. Her reasoning for pursuing a career in teaching, and she even got a little into the happenings that drove her to break up with her ex husband. That was all a bit too serious for his taste at the end however, but he listened all the same, giving this girl a good ear to talk to.
After a bit, she paused and stopped talking about her history to stare over at Bernael, she gave him a genuine smile that was probably the lightest, most calm he’d seen in awhile. “You know, I don’t think I ever discussed a reward with you, for helping me with this.” She would say to him, sighing a bit thinking that she was greedy. Bernael just couldn’t have her be down, so he instantly responded. “It's quite alright, I don’t need a reward for helping you out, the adventure and very nice company is all worth it.” he would just say, feeling pretty good about himself turning down the reward. However, it seemed that Naomi was pretty intent on giving him at least a tiny reward for her troubles, so she slowly moved over and gave him a kiss, his first kiss infact. It turned out that he wasn’t very good at hiding his emotions that he was, interested in her that way, as his blushes and feelings were seen through all the way back during the day, and she just didn’t act on his feelings till then.
As she explained that to him, his face was just lit up deeply. It was almost as if his skin had turned a pure red. Was that because he was a demon? Or was he just too embarrassed and blushing that deeply? It was most likely the latter that was causing this change in skin pigment. She slowly questioned him as he didn’t have a face of happiness with his reward however, he just had a shocked expression added onto his deep blush. “T-T-That was… m-my first kiss… n-never had one before.” he would respond, stuttering constantly as he didn’t understand what was going on. “S-Sorry!” She yelped back, not sure that it was the right thing to do. “I-I took your first, the most important one, from you without even asking, I’m so so sorry!” she would continue on, making matters worse as phrasing was quite a problem, everywhere, and he just sort of passed out right then and there.
When he woke up in the morning, he found Naomi sleeping next to him, she was pretty much holding onto his arm for dear life as she was against it. He once more blushed but realized that it was another day and that he couldn’t sit there and wait, even though he wanted to talk more about last night's happenings to her, he understood his mission and gently woke up Naomi. “Hey uh, sorry to wake you up all of a sudden, but it’s morning so it is time to get moving.” he would say, moving his arm to allow her to get up freely. As he would get back on the trail, Naomi would pester Bernael constantly about what happened the night before, saying that she was extremely sorry and that she didn’t know how to get forgiven, but he just kept telling her that it was fine, and quite welcomed because her assumptions of his feelings were quite true. But the fact that it was true, was the worst part of it all. She would begin to say how sorry she was again but before she could, Bernael just turned around and gave her a big hug while saying. “Everything’s alright, everyone gets their first kiss taken by someone somewhere, so just be happy that it was you and not someone else~ Also, we’re going to get your son back, don’t worry about it at all, I promise you from the bottom of my heart that we will get him back to you safely, and when we get you and him out of here, you’ll be in the clear, and you can continue on with your lives.” he would say, his voice cracking up a bit as it didn’t sound very happy. “What about you? Won't you be coming with me, and my son.” she would ask back, just sort of sitting his his holding arms. “No… I have so much stuff to do, you know I’m looking for my father, I can’t stop after all this work to just be with someone yet… I promise, I’ll come visit though” he replied back before releasing her and turning around. “Once I find my dad, I may just take you on that offer to ‘come with you’ because, it’ll be quite appealing.” he would state happily, while taking another step forward as a red figure would blindside him, knowing him to the floor.
Bernael would scramble to his feet, making a blade in his hand out of ki while staring down the red beast, waiting to strike it before he realized it had grabbed Naomi. He couldn’t fight it, not now. The ki blade vanished as he realized it had a human looking face. “Follow me, Inbred, if you want to get these two back so bad, you’ll have to face a pure demon” the red creature would cackle, slithering away faster than Bernael would keep up with, but the tracks certainly did show up, enough to track that is. Bernael would set off in a dead sprint, not caring what was getting in his way, even going as far as to power up with demon heart to gain speed. He really regretted the heavy weights at that time, as them slowing him down was a mighty distress on his mind. It took him a little over four hours to catch up the beast at its lair, he thought about what it said, a pure demon? Could that snake creature be some sort of form of a demon? Perhaps, who knew what the extent of Demonic forms could go, aside from demons themselves. He stood at the opening, not knowing how he’d take what could happen inside, but he wanted to get it over with, and thus, he stepped inside to face whatever his adversary may be.
Inside, he found many bones of fallen beings that had fallen prey to this demon, some being animal, some being humanoid, others he couldn’t even make out. But at the very least, he looked across the bones and rock to see Naomi, and a boy held closely to her, safe for the time being. But the demon would be nowhere to be found, Bernael didn’t mind this as he rushed over to Naomi and the boy to see if everything was alright. The boy was completely unharmed, almost illogically so in fact! He was even clean, he looked nicely fed and safe in every way. But Naomi… she looked fatally wounded! Bernael would have to get her out of here fast if he had any chance of her surviving. He would pick up both the boy and Naomi and start heading towards the exit, but of course, the last possible second was blocked out by the giant Demon Snake coming in to confront him. The snake demon sort of changed till it looked more like an absolute feminine woman than anything else. It carried a sword that looked like an old fashioned Odachi, it was held expertly and looked almost beautiful, but Bernael didn’t care one bit about the beauty, he wanted this demon dead, and now. He set Naomi and her son down, and got into a ready stance.
Naomi would struggle to look up at Bernael. “Would you please… take Jonathan to my ex, in east city… if i can’t make it out of here to do that myself” she would say, a bit of blood coming from her mouth. “No don’t say that! Everything will be fine just trust me okay~ I said you two could go on your way right?!” Bernael would barely whimper out, turning back towards the demon who began to interrupt him. “I made sure to gash a major artery, there is no way that she’s making it back out, out of this cave even!” the demon would chuckle insanely, getting a wide grin on her face. Bernael would just go dim eyed for a second. It was happening again, a tough opponent was killing something he held dear. He just sort of got prepared once again, and breathed in and out slowly.
Within a mere few more seconds, he clashed with the demon, the sword almost coming down right on his head, but he held it tightly between his palms, not ready to go down without a fight. Him and the demon were about on par, which was incredibly sad to him as he realized how weakened he was. He wasn’t even in demon heart anymore and he started laughing a heart wrenching laugh. “I am the hybrid son of a human female and a demon male, I am not even at one hundred percent of my power, and I can double that easily if I wanted to! How will it feel to have your pride broken, you pure demon!” he would shout, as he quickly released their sword as he went demon heart, reversing the sword and using it to stab directly through the demon’s own heart, plunging it through where the blood pumps, causing the sword to get covered in demon blood. “I fought a ninja at least six times stronger than you, now why don't you think about how weak you truly are, feasting on weaker prey, you pure demon scum.” he would whisper into her ear before ripping the sword out of her body and placing it in the back of his flak jacket. He slowly turned back to Naomi and the child and noticed that Naomi had gone limp……. for the first time in a long while, the demon boy cried tears that meant something to him, he lost something dear to him once more.
After giving the woman known as Naomi Bishop a proper burial Bernael would kneel before the boy that had just lost his mother, telling him that everything was going to be alright from now on, and that he would be returned to his father safely. The boy kept on asking why ‘mommy had to go in the ground’ but Bernael was too heart torn to answer in a straight way, especially to a little boy such as this. He would just answer with things like ‘mommy had to take a nap, she’ll catch up later’ and ‘she’s not feeling good right now, just wait a bit youngster’ but none of it was true, his mother was gone and there was nothing Bernael could do to help ease the pain that would befall this boy. Bernael just bit his lip and led the boy to east city with him. When they got there, the boy said he knew where his father’s house was, and Bernael followed him there just to make sure he was safe.
The father, would run out of the house and hug the boy, happy to see his son that he loved so much. He would stand up and only see Bernael, the boy with a dead eyed look on his face and no emotion to show. The guy would look on with a bit of shock, before saying “W-Who are you.” in a broken voice. Bernael would just respond "Well... I am Naomi’s contact to bring your son back to you…… in the event that she herself couldn't do so on her own terms. I am very sorry that it ended up that way, but with your son returned, and my job complete, I'll be on my way.” with absolutely no emotion in his voice. The man would cover his hand over his mouth before looking down at his son and hugging him once more, by the time he looked back over to say a thank you and a goodbye, Bernael would be gone.
Bernael would make his way back to Mount Paozu to say his final goodbye’s to Naomi’s grave, and then he would take out the sword he stole from the demon. The demon’s blood on the odachi stained it, making the blood basically infused with the sword. He felt that he earned the sword after the display he pulled against it, and let it to rest on his flak jacket once more. “I am sorry Naomi… looks like I won't be staying with you after I find my dad…” he would say to her grave, staring at it longingly. “I guess it was foolish of me to have feelings for anybody… this always happened, if I just decided to ignore your attempts to be nice, you’d be alive right now… most likely” he would say again, before sighing “Or maybe I am just overthinking things, well, sorry Naomi… I would have liked to know you for longer than I did, but it looks like that just isn’t possible.” he would lastly say before turning and walking away from the grave.
A dark red tint shimmered in his eyes, his demonic energy was running rampant in his body and he wasn’t letting them out, he slowly fell to the ground and held his head. He couldn’t believe that once more, he couldn’t protect something he cared about, shortly after he started to care about it. How could he show himself to anybody, how could he care for anybody after that. What if he had a curse?! What if he was doomed for all eternity?! For everyone he cares about to die, for them to meet a tragic end right after he felt these immense feelings. He couldn’t believe that, there was no way to believe that right?! Bernael didn’t know what to do, his mind was breaking and he was very well aware of it. He just sort of burnt out and passed out one more time.
By the time he woke up, his feelings and emotions were at a boiling point, his demonic energy was just eating at him, waiting to be released. He gave in, and all of his demonic energy was released out of him in demon heart, even though he gained the same strength boost to his power, his aura was going wild, even causing minor erosion around him in the serene forest. Before he even knew it, was running around, LOOKING for a fight, creature after creature, monster after monster, prey after prey would fall before him, as he didn’t even let his morals come before his anger now, even going as far to kill most of them. And what he didn’t kill, he would physically cripple. Sometimes he’d even cause intense mental harm to them by taking a long time to apply the pain to their bodies. He wasn’t dealing with loss well this time, and he wanted to show it. To every little miserable creature in the area if he could. Though that rage anger lasted a very short while, as his energy depleted and his anger was satiated.
After he was done, he pulled back out the sword that he stole that was covered in demons blood and stared into his reflection. "This can never happen again, we can use power to make sure we never lose someone we care about again right?! No that's ridiculous... how about we just never care about anybody ever again! Unless they are strong of course, then they wouldn't need to be protected, we could stop feeling this pain that way, right?" He would just say in a sad tone towards the sword, he didn't really pay attention, but the reflection in the sword that stared back at him was less than him, much less than him in fact. He was probably more a demon than he ever was before, but he didn't mind, maybe it was just his destiny to be a full out demon some day.
WC: 6011
