Fucking asshole.
I feel a hand on my shoulder, and I turn ready to snap at someone, but pause. It’s Michael.
“I understand your frustration with the situation, Evander,but you need to realize that…” I hold my hand up, halting his unwanted speech.
“I came back to apologize for my actions and to ask if we could resume my training.”
“That’s good, but you need to remember where your place is in all of this. Just like in the Army, there is a chain of command here and nothing is above it, not even me,” he mutters, frowning.
“I do understand. I just want to get her back, no, I need to get her back,” I reply.
“We want to get her back as well, along with all of the angels that were taken, but what you don’t know is, the last time that we went into Hell to rescue our comrades we lost thousands. When we finally reached them they were already dead. Lilith killed them as soon as she got them to Hell. It was a trap. We fell for it and paid heavily,” Michael says with a hint of sorrow in his voice.
“Then let’s not waste time talking and get to training,” I retort, bringing the conversation back to my objectives.
Michael sighs, nodding. “Head to the training arena and I’ll meet you there shortly,” he replies, walking off.
I moveover to one of the training rings to rest, plopping down onto a bench and my mind is flooded with images of what could be happening to Frida.
I’m pressing my palms into my eyes, trying to get theimages to stop, when I hear, “Get up, let’s go.” When I look up Michael’s there.
“What do you mean ‘let’s go’, we are already here?” I reply a bit confused.
“The training that we are going to do is far too dangerous to conduct here, so follow me and I will show you,” Michael says, walking past me to the back of the training ground.
Running to catch up, he stops at a wall and I hear a faint sound as if he’s chanting something. There is a low bellowing rumble and the arena starts to shake as the wall opens up to a spiraling staircase.
“I’m going to take you where we do our training, which is only accessible to Archangels. We have to conduct our training here, not only because of the power that we have, but also because we bring powerful demons here to interrogate them. They also make better opponents, since we can use our full might against them without hesitation,” he explains as we descend the stairs.
When we reach the bottom we are confronted by Raphael and Azrael, standing before a sealed archway, covered in Angelic sigils. Michael locks eyes with them and nods. Without a word, they turn around facing the arch, lower their heads, put their hands together, closing their eyes and start chanting.
I can’t understand what they are saying.
A light radiates from the center as the seal begins to fade, then disappears completely. Stepping through the archway, the space opens up to a massive circular room, with a bloodstained pit in the middle, covered by a dome with silver and gold bars, covered by more Angelic symbols.
Peering through the bars, there is a giant pentagram onthe floor that stretches to the walls of the pit, stained with blood and covered in deep gouges with even more symbols in each point of the star.
“That is what we use to confine the demons to the pit, those symbols engraved on the door and arch are Enochian, which is the language of the Angels. When we are here, either training or interrogating, we always have at least three Archangels, to ensure that nothing happens unless we deem it,” Michael says, sensing my confusion.
“So I’m going to train by killing demons?” I ask. I’m a bit excited to get my rage out.
“Yes, but you need to realize that these are not going to be soldiers, or scouts, we only bring exceptionally powerful demons here. Also you saw the arch we passed through?”
“Yes.”
“This place exists in a separate dimension. So time flows differently, weeks here are only hours back in Heaven. So we can conduct a lot of training in a very short amount of time.”
“So, that seal on the arch was the barrier between dimensions, like the portal to Hell in Purgatory right?” I interrupt.
I seem to impress him as he gives me a small grin. “That’s good, Evander. I see, Raphael was right about you. You do catch on quickly.” He points. “That on the floor is how we prevent the demons from escaping, once they enter it they can never leave.”
He explains some more, then he turns to Azrael. “Bring in the first demon and take Evander, let’s see what he is truly capable of.”
Azrael nods, then motions to me to follow.
We walk around the top of the pit, until we reach a dead end with a lever, then Azrael pulls it and the floorstarts to lower like an elevator. When it stops, he swings the gold and silver gates open.
“Go on, hopefully you last longer than the last one,” he says with a smirk.
