Chapter 18: The Leviathan
A/N: Serafall Time!
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Serafall Leviathan was, contrary to popular belief, pretty damn good at her job. Oh sure, she certainly cultivated a certain… outward facing persona, but to be fair that was entirely purposeful. Being known as a whimsical, over the top personality who got way into roleplaying as a Magical Girl was a choice through and through… a choice made as much for obfuscating her true nature as it was because she actually did love Magical Girls with all her heart.
Still, when it came to being a Great Satan, and especially being the Satan in charge of Foreign Affairs, Serafall didn't slack off or ignore her work. She didn't let her Magical Girl TV Show or any of her hobbies and passions get in the way of doing her job. If she had, the Underworld would have been in far more wars over the past five centuries. The fact that it wasn't was as much to do with Serafall's efforts as it was to do with everyone being a little afraid of Lucrezah and Ajuka's power.
Sure, Serafall and Falbium were both extremely powerful in their own rights, but they weren't Super Devils like those two. Lucrezah and Ajuka were their heavy hitters, with Lucrezah coming out on top between them. But there was still a reason that Serafall had her position and Lucrezah didn't!
She was actually quite the hard worker in spite of the opinions of others, and she always made sure to stay on top of things in the Satan's Office of Foreign Affairs. She even had her own desk where she did plenty of paperwork, and despite hating every last second of it, Serafall never allowed it to pile up like some people might!
And so, as she's sitting at said desk finishing up the latest carefully worded letter regarding the latest instance of someone filing a complaint over a young devil reincarnating the 'wrong' person, Serafall receives an unexpected message to her inbox without there being anything else in the way.
The newest sheaf of parchment appears in a flash of magic, landing in her empty inbox in a gentle manner as Serafall pauses and stares at it for a moment before sighing. Shaking her head, she puts the finishing flourishes on her current letter, signs it, and puts it in an envelope before sending it on its way.
Hopefully, with any luck, this would be the last thing she had to deal with today before she could go do something fun. With that uplifting thought in mind, Serafall reaches out and pulls over the parchment, immediately noting from its quality and the ink used that it comes from the Eastern side of Earth… Korea, if she's not mistaken.
That realization puts Serafall on edge before she can even read what the parchment says truth be told, because the Underworld has not had official diplomatic relations with Korea in over a hundred years. Serafall should know, she was the one who helped write the treaty between herself and the mudang, otherwise known as Korean Shamans, all the way back then.
Although, they'd alternated between referring to themselves as 'shamans' and 'hunters' at the time… hunters of demons specifically.
In general, devils and demons had a rather contentious relationship. They got along like oil and water… that is to say, they really didn't mix well. Your average devil was more inclined to look upon your average demon with disdain, because frankly… your average demon gave your average devil a bad name.
The Korean demons were no exception to that rule and finding out that they had a barbaric 'Demon King' called Gwi-Ma who had been locked away behind a barrier by the mudang was… well, it both was good news and also wasn't in any way Serafall's problem.
Or at least it shouldn't have been. Alas, some devils had been sniffing around the mudang and their apprentices, looking for potential targets to reincarnate and add to their peerages.
Once again, Serafall was NOT bad at her job… she'd nipped that right in the bud, because quite frankly there was a lot more value in leaving the demon hunters to their self-imposed duties of containing their demon king, rather than having them torn away from their responsibilities all for the sake of having a new toy for the next Rating Games.
And so she'd met with the Mudang Elders and they'd come up with a very simple treaty. No devil would attempt to reincarnate a mudang and in return, the Korean shamans would keep their efforts focused on both Korea and demons in general. Effectively, both sides would ignore the other because they had bigger fish to fry.
Some of the younger devils in the Underworld hadn't been happy with Serafall for that treaty, of course. Especially the ones who had been sniffing around Korea. But really, it was better for all involved so she was perfectly happy being the bad guy there.
However… the parchment she now holds in her hands has said hands slowly curling in on it. The more she reads of the page's contents, the more Serafall's fingers dig in and her eyes widen, darting back and forth as they are.
This was… this was bad. Really bad! Someone had gone to South Korea in direct defiance of the treaty and reincarnated the latest generation of hunters! And their elder was filing a formal complaint over it!
But that wasn't even the bad part, not really. Serafall was used to a lot of the treaties and bits of diplomacy she managed to get done being violated. More than half her job was figuring out how to handle the latest Pureblood Devil going out of their way to steal a recruit from another faction, be it the Church, the Grigori, or one of the many other supernatural groups all over the world.
No, the problem was who that latest generation of hunters were! Serafall hadn't even realized… she probably should have known though, because frankly they always did seem like something else! Still… forget the treaty… if the rest of the Underworld found out that some random devil upstart had reincarnated Huntrix, there were going to be riots! To say nothing of what Lucrezah would do if she heard about this! That woman wasn't just a Super Devil… where Huntrix was concerned, she was a Super FAN!
To be fair, so was Serafall. Those girls were absolutely amazing, utterly phenomenal… and in hindsight, Serafall probably should have realized they were also demon hunters ages ago. After all, she'd been at that final stop on their World Tour just a couple of weeks ago. She'd watched them perform a sixty-thousand foot landing without parachutes and 'kill' more of those demons that were in so many of their performances.
… Yeah, she definitely should have realized. But she just thought it was all Special Effects!
Still, this was really, really bad. Serafall would need to keep this all super close to her chest and hide it for as long as possible. Hm…
With a 'hup!', Serafall hops out of her chair and to her feet, hands on her hips and parchment clutched in one of them. First things first, she'd go and talk to this… 'Celine' personally to find out what was going on. Then, she would get to the bottom of this… personally. Because sending anyone else would just result in this information leaking and the last thing Serafall needed was the Underworld in an uproar because some no-name devil had snagged the greatest K-Pop Idols that human civilization had ever produced!
Seriously though… who even was this Lord Amadeus guy? No house name? He was clearly trying to be subtle… but his first name alone sort of gave him away, didn't it? After all, Mozart, aka Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, had only lived and died near the end of the eighteenth century, meaning that for this particular Devil to be named after him, they would have to be around two hundred years old or younger.
Practically a babe in the grand scheme of things! It should be relatively easy for Serafall to track him down and browbeat him into submission. And hey, maybe the solution to this whole mess would be her bringing the Huntrix girls into her own peerage. It was really the best for everyone involved. This Amadeus fellow wouldn't get hunted down and mobbed by the entire Underworld, and the members of Huntrix would have the full resources of a Great Satan for whatever they wanted to do next!
Yesss… but first, the elder. Serafall wasn't about to go off half-cocked… she was going to collect every piece of information she needed before she did anything else. And that meant going and finding out what Celine knew about this whole mess.
As Serafall begins forming a magical circle beneath her feet that will take her straight from her office up to Earth, an errant thought passes through her mind. There was one other Lord Amadeus that she remembered predating Mozart. Lucrezah's greatest regret, 'Amadeus Valefor' of the defunct Valefor Clan.
… Eh, but he was long dead. Lucrezah was certain of that. So even as the thought passes through Serafall's mind, she just as quickly discards it and focuses back on the present and what she knows to be true. One way or another… there way no way this Lord Amadeus fellow could be allowed to keep possession of Huntrix!
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"Huntrix don't miss, how it's done, done, done!"
As the girls come to a stop, posing together, Amadeus can't help but stare in disbelief. This? This was what music had become in the past five hundred years?
…
It was amazing! Absolutely spectacular! Breaking out into a joyous grin, Amadeus claps excitedly, as he's done for the past dozens of songs that Rumi, Zoey, and Mira have all been running through. They've honestly been going for hours now, each song leading into another as they went back to back to back to back.
Apparently, they'd decided to just start showing him their whole 'discography' as they'd called it… and they simply hadn't stopped. Ever. Not that Amadeus was complaining! He'd been enthralled for every moment of it, absolutely overjoyed by what he was witnessing. They were INCREDIBLE!
Of course, it HAD been a while… hell, Bobby had literally had to beg off over an hour ago so he could get back to work apparently. Amadeus though… he'd stayed and so had Grayfia, a two person audience to Huntrix's longest private show ever, more than likely.
How does Amadeus know that? Well…
"This is insane! I'm still not really tired."
Zoey's words draw a nod from Mira.
"I know right… being a devil is bonkers for the stamina. I could keep going… but at this point we really only have a couple of songs left and…"
Mira grimaces as she trails off at the end there and Zoey and Rumi grimace in agreement. Finally, Rumi shakes her head.
"Let's… end it here for today. Golden and Takedown are… we can talk about them later."
Then, she looks to Amadeus with a bright smile.
"I hope that was a satisfying showing?"
Letting out a disbelieving laugh, Amadeus nods his head.
"More than satisfying! You girls were amazing! All those dance moves combined with the singing, all at such a high energy and pace for so long… I'm so impressed!"
The three new reincarnated devils all straighten up at that, wearing their pleasure at his words openly on their faces. Then, Zoey winks at him.
"You know, you could join us for a few of our dances I bet. A body likes yours is made for moving~"
Amadeus blinks… was Zoey flirting with him? Rumi seems to think so because she blushes crimson and squeaks out her bandmate's name.
"Zoey!"
On the other hand, Mira smirks and crosses her arms over her chest, cocking out a hip.
"Nah, I think Zo is onto something. She's certainly not wrong."
Rumi looks between her two bandmates clearly mortified, even as they both look at Amadeus with something like… hunger in their eyes? He really doesn't know how to respond to that. Eh, it was probably just…
"Haha, you girls are too much. I think it's just the adrenaline talking though… but I certainly wouldn't be opposed to learning some of your moves sometime!"
Rumi, Mira, and Zoey blink at his response. Mira in particular snorts derisively.
"Right, adrenaline…"
Before anything else can be said, a loud growl fills the room, making all of them jump… and then stare down at Amadeus' abdomen. Its his turn to blush a bit as he coughs into his fist, realizing it's been… quite a few hours now since he last ate.
"Master Amadeus, allow me to go and prepare a meal for you."
Grayfia's voice rings out for the first time in ages, making him blink and look to her with a smile. But before he can respond…
"Oh! You know, if you wanted to just relax, we can have the kitchens make anything that sounds good."
Zoey's suggestion pulls their attention over to her, Grayfia's brow furrowing.
"Oh? Do you have an entire staff of servants dedicated to cooking for you?"
Rumi is quick to clear her throat.
"Ah, not quite… but also yes, sort of? Let me explain… basically, this entire building we're in is Huntrix Tower… our tower. Every bit of it is dedicated to us, however we only live and work in the top few floors. The rest of the tower is focused on people doing other things for us to keep our group moving like a well-oiled machine. Because of how many people we have working for us, the tower has its own cafeteria with some of the best chefs that money can buy. They cook for everyone who works in the tower… AND they can cook for us as well whenever we have something we want to eat."
Grayfia absorbs all of this in silence for a long moment before humming thoughtfully.
"And you trust these cooks implicitly? If one of them were to poison the Lord…"
Amadeus clears his throat and steps in before Grayfia's paranoia gets the better of her.
"Grayfia, I doubt that's really a concern, nobody even knows I'm here to be able to poison me, right? Yes, that actually sounds good… and surprise me with the food why don't you girls? I'm sure whatever you have them make; I'll love it!"
He intends to make things easier, passing his order off to them to make. Plus, a surprise sounds fun at this point, especially if human food has improved as much as human music in the past five hundred years.
… And yet, when he sees the matching looks in Rumi, Mira, and Zoey's eyes spring to life in unison, he can't help but wonder if he's maybe presented a challenge to them, however inadvertently. They certainly look determined…
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The Vote:
[X] Grayfia notices Huntrix's interest and gives them The Talk when Amadeus is absent - 87%
[ ] Grayfia notices Huntrix's interest but stays quiet and close to Amadeus for the time being - 13%
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Also PLEASE go and give my new Original Novel a try for me!
https://www.NovelFire.com/series/2243275/relentless-potential-original-fantasy/
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If you'd like to read more of my work not seen on this website, check out Hentai-Foundry.com and QuestionableQuesting.com where I have over a thousand stories!
Thanks for reading!