Shadow Slave: Heir of the daemons

"Ah, she said that she wanted to take a stroll, though that was about half an hour ago. I don't know more than that, my apologies."

'Why do I think that those two will still somehow meet, though? …whatever. I held up my end of the deal in not telling her. What happens beyond that is his problem,' Ray couldn't help but think as soon as he heard about Nephis.

"Okay, whatever. Was another meeting already scheduled, or are the next days just the normal routine?" he asked, already putting his prior thoughts to the back of his mind.

Cassie's doll-like face remained neutral as she answered, "There should be a meeting this afternoon. If you would take the time to attend, Neph would most likely appreciate it."

"Sure, why not." Ray turned to Kai with a grin. "Well, you heard the lady. We'll just come back later. In the meantime, you can already start looking for a nice house to call your own."

Kai had already seen the state of the encampment outside of the castle, and to be honest, he wasn't very thrilled to need to sleep in one of the makeshift huts, but that is just what he chose. And now he would need to go through with it. 'It can't be that bad, right?' he thought, trying to convince himself.

"See you later then, Cass. As for us, let's go, too," Ray spoke and already began leaving again.

The other two followed closely behind. Henry was already questioning why he had even joined them in the first place, mostly because he hadn't been able to witness any of the drama he had been hoping for. He wasn't someone who would go looking for trouble, but watching it—especially if one knew that it wasn't anything too serious—was still relatively fun.

The guys said their short goodbyes and headed out again.

-----

The trio stepped out of the main building and into the bustling, open area of the slum-like settlement. They began walking, exchanging light banter on the way as Kai looked around at the various ramshackle huts and repaired ruins.

Having just left the headquarters, Kai turned to Ray with a hopeful, almost pleading look. "Hey, Ray… since we're friends and all… could I maybe crash with you for a little while? Just until I can get one of these buildings restored to an acceptable state?"

Even before Ray could respond, Henry burst out laughing, a loud, genuine sound. "You? Live with Ray?" he choked out between laughs. "Buddy, you have three options there. Either you get 'devoured' by Effie on a late night visit, be bored to death by this maniac who literally did everything but sleep for a while, before giving mediation even a chance, or you don't get a wink of sleep for the foreseeable future, because of… loud sleeping on Effie's part. Pick your poison."

Ray didn't say a word. He just gave a slow, thoughtful nod in response to Henry's assessment, though if one looked closely, a slight, weary scowl could be seen on his face, confirming at least part of the joke. Especially the last part sounded about right.

Since they were just walking by his own hut at that moment, Henry decided to sit this one out. "Alright, I'm gonna go find… literally anything else to do now. Catch you guys later." He waved and veered off, leaving Ray and Kai alone.

Now with just the two of them, Kai sighed, his hope of avoiding immediate construction work dashed. "Okay, fine. Any tips for what to look for, then?"

Ray smirked, clapping him on the shoulder. "Sure. First, look for a hut that already has a pretty female Sleeper living inside. Saves you the trouble of redecorating one, and brings some extra fun along with it." He chuckled at Kai's exasperated expression before getting serious.

"For real, though," Ray continued, "look for one that is somewhere in the middle of the camp, not on the edges. The ground it stands on should be solid, no major cracks. And check the walls. You want something that seems either mostly intact or appears to be easily replaceable with new materials. Don't pick something where it looks like more than one part would collapse if you sneeze too hard, besides that, good luck."

After giving his advice, he gestured back towards his own shelter. "Alright, I'm heading back to my place to rest up a bit before the meeting. You can either come find me there later or just head directly back to the meeting place, namely, the building we just left."

-----

Meanwhile, Sunny was slowly finishing up on his business in the memory market.

Thanks to the description given by Ray, he had managed to spot Aiko as soon as she entered the entrance hall, and instantly approached her. She had also quickly realized that he must be the person, Ray was asking her, to guide to the memory market.

The two had moved towards it immediately. Since Aiko was good friends with the owner of the memory market – thanks to both owning and managing businesses inside the castle – and therefore didn't need to be part of the host or have an invitation.

On entering, she had introduced him as an acquaintance who wanted to get a few memories richer. Steff – as any normal business owner – didn't think too much about it, and since it was Aiko who introduced him, let him wander the store freely.

Sunny had stopped in front of most memories and seemed to be waiting for something, but often just continued walking. In the end, he had bought quite a few memories, though, all were what Steff – who currently owned the memories, and therefore knew the enchantments – could only call trash. Even among the ones here.

Especially, the last one Sunny had selected. A broken armor memory that was as heavy as it came, appearing as if made from pure marble.

Nevertheless, since the young man didn't want to reconsider, even after a short warning from him, Steff didn't care anymore. He was payed, and that was it.

After that, the two left the memory market and headed back to the entrance hall, since Sunny himself had already made it clear that he did not want to remain much longer hear, and for Aiko, she attributed anything weird about him – like buying that piece of scrap – to him being friends – that's what she presumed – with Ray.

Very soon the two parted, with Aiko heading back to her gambling den, and Sunny once again leaving the confines of the castle.

Once out, he immediately headed to the nearest dark alley, to disappear as soon as possible and not accidentally meet Neph.

Sadly, this plan immediately failed, since as soon as he had entered the alley, what greeted him was the exact person he wanted to avoid. What followed, was once of the most awkward conversations Sunny had ever had in his life, and that really said something.

-----

In another part of the settlement, Ray had been inside of his hut for just a few minutes, tinkering a bit with some monster parts they had scavenged from some of the dead nightmare creatures they had hunted.

Regardless, a few minutes in, he began to see that he could rather use the current time before the meeting this afternoon, to try to finally finish the last step in learning the next technique. To do this, he put down his tools and the monster scraps, before entering his soul sea.

Here he could at least try to unleash it, without anyone noticing it, or without him accidentally damaging his own home.

Though, as soon as he appeared in his soul sea and wanted to get to trying it out, his – by now familiar – guest called, "That's a waste of time, right now. Instead, study something else inside the tome for once, it will bring more immediate, as well as long term benefits to you."

Ray was stunned for a moment, it wasn't that the advice stunned him though, it was just the person who said it did. They had grown somewhat familiar and it didn't really insult him, but being nice, or giving genuine advice was unheard of, till now.

"Or don't, I don't care, if you won't believe me," It spoke again, directing it's gaze to a tome and looking at it… melancholic?

Ray tried to put this thought of his away immediately, it being melancholic, that must be impossible. Nevertheless, now he was hooked for real and began looking at the index, trying to understand what it wanted him to look at, but was relatively quickly guided to what he was supposed to look at by the figure.

"The second to last," it called over.

He looked at where he was supposed to, and couldn't help but roll a certain word over his tongue while doing so, "Sorcery"