CHAPTER 4

The day that changed Axis Demkil’s life was not the day that he failed Demkil’s Test of Humanity; rather, it was the night afterwards. After the incident, he was locked into a room and ordered not to come out until allowed. He didn’t remember whether it was his mother or his father that locked him in, but since it was a room within the castle, stocked up to where someone could live an entire week without needing to come out, he had believed it was the former, so he obeyed the order. However, he spent only a bit more than a full day locked in that room, and during most of that time, he could hear his parents arguing in and out through the thin walls.

“What did I tell you?! You’ve seen it for yourself, now! That thing is a Monster through and through! The way it retaliated against that knight was proof enough, no?! No Human child would have reacted that way!”

“Even so, he didn’t kill him! The worst that happened was that the knight was knocked down and stunned, which is quite tame compared to other things I have seen for myself previously! Meanwhile, you didn’t seem too eager to stop that knight! If Axis hadn’t reacted when he did, that blade would have pierced through me!”

“Not if you were to stay still, like I asked you to do!”

“You didn’t ask me a damn thing! You ordered me to, as if I was just another one of your knights! You should have known that I wasn’t going to just sit back and watch my son get impaled, and that knight was not planning to stop his attack, even if Axis didn’t react!”

“That’s right, he wasn’t going to stop his attack. I told him to kill it, if he could. I’ve known since its birth that it wasn’t Human, while you continue to deny it, making one excuse after another for every strange occurrence when the cause was evident! You’ve been protecting something that means to kill us all, so of course I had no intention of stopping the attack, and I still plan on killing it!”

“You talk so much about something not being Human… What the hell happened to your Humanity?”

The argument would continue, with the voices fading as they grew more distant. Then hours later, their quarrel would fade back in briefly, just to fade back out within minutes. Axis wasn’t sure what he did wrong; he only acted to protect his mother, just as she had protected him so many times before. There were many times where she was contested for these acts, but never before that day was the resulting conversation so heated. It seemed like there would be no end to it, and Axis feared the possible one-sided resolutions that could be forced into play. Yet, he remained in his room, doing exactly as he was told.

Then, at one point, their argument woke him from his sleep in the middle of the night. How he managed to fall asleep was unknown to him, between the shouting and his own anxiety, but both were heightened to their peak once he realized that his parents were arguing directly on the other side of the door to the room. He could hear every word they said clearly, and there was no mistake in where things were leading.

“Step aside, Terra. I won’t let anything stand in my way, not even you.”

“Please, you have to listen to reason! No matter the circumstances, it is wrong to kill children! Perhaps he is technically Supernatural, but showing malice towards him, or any like him will not save this country! If we show him the same love we would show to any other child, he wouldn’t even think of destroying anything! Rather, he would want to do the opposite, and protect his home and people, just as you’ve sworn to do!”

“Step aside, Terra. I will not say it again. If you choose to continue blocking my path, I’ll have no choice but to consider you a threat to Demkil as well.”

There was a brief period of silence, before Axis’s mother spoke again, with a trembling, heartbreaking voice.

“I see… I suppose that answers a question that I’ve kept to myself for a while now. It was a mistake to follow you. Someone willing to kill their own family has no right to lead a country…”

“Enough!”

Axis knew what was about to happen; without any evidence, he could sense that the worst possible event was about to occur, and he had to make a choice. He didn’t spend any time thinking about it, and simply rushed to the door and opened it, to see his mother standing between his father and himself. As soon as his father laid eyes on him, that man became something that was no longer his father. Physically there was no change, but behind that man’s eyes, a transformation took place to discard any paternal reservations. Perhaps Axis’s mother didn’t notice at first, because she was startled when she discovered that his father’s eyes were no longer looking at her.

The moment she turned away from him decided everything; in that moment, he charged towards young Axis, wielding a weathered spear to thrust at Axis’s heart. His mother, too slow to prevent it. Axis, frozen stiff and uncertain of what action to take. His father, only a step away from running him through.

That’s when it happened for the second time, but Axis didn’t remember this feeling the first time. The first time, it was instant like a kneejerk reaction; he didn’t experience the paralysis, the palpitations, or the removal of all his senses, but at the very moment his own father meant to cut his life short, it was as if the world he knew had ended abruptly. When he was able to see, hear, and feel again, he found himself within the wreckage of the castle, surrounded by Slayers. His father stood before him, wounded and enraged. His mother, buried underneath the rubble.

#

“Hey, what the hell?!”

Suddenly, the Slayer that had Axis pinned to the ground exclaimed, drawing the attention of the others, including the Dark Elf. In spite of the weight from the Slayer's heel upon Axis’s back, he was slowly but surely pushing himself up from the ground. Eventually, the Slayer was forced to step back as Axis stood up. He readied his sword, calling out to one of the other Slayers.

“Hey, it’s resisting! Can I cut off its arm now, Captain?”

The Slayer that had called out before, who seemed to be the one leading the squad surrounding Axis and the Elf, sighed heavily before responding.

“Seth… What did I just tell you? During this mission, you know that Swinger is the boss, right? He expressly said not to cause any harm to Nexus before he could start his research. If you cut him up haphazardly like an asshole, guess who gets in the most trouble?”

There was an awkward moment of silence, as the Slayer named Seth didn’t provide an answer in spite of the Captain genuinely waiting for a response. Eventually, the latter’s patience ran out.

“Me, stupid! So, just knock him out, so we can kill this Elf and call it a day!”

“Why does it even matter?! This little bastard can’t be killed, and it heals from any wound we could inflict on it anyway! It could probably regrow its arm, for all we know…!”

“Seth!”

The others in the squad started laughing and teasing Seth, while he clicked his tongue in annoyance. All the while, Axis simply stood there, as if their conversation didn’t bother him in the slightest. Silent and unmoving, almost like a statue, Axis showed no signs of a reaction as the Slayer aimed to chop his neck with his armored hand. Just as the Elf was prepared to rush through the knights and Slayers to defend Axis, disregarding the wounds she would surely sustain, a sudden change in the atmosphere halted her advance. It was at that moment that she would discover why Axis Demkil was called the “Cursed Child.”

Just before the Slayer’s hand could contact Axis’s nape, he was suddenly struck by a bolt of lightning. This was not just happenstance; firstly, there was no sign of a storm just moments before, as though the night sky was indeed dark, it was still clear of any clouds. Then, not only were the black clouds suddenly covering that sky abnormal, but the lightning that had struck Seth was also black. What’s more, the thunder that followed sounded more like the roaring of a beast than a natural thunderclap, and finally, while Axis remained standing there unperturbed, the Slayer known as Seth had completely disappeared within that thunderclap, leaving no trace, not a scrap of armor nor a severed limb. It was as if his very existence was obliterated.

After that, there was only the sound of rain. The Slayers and knights stared, baffled at first by what happened. The Captain called out to the missing Seth, as the reality had not yet set in for her.

“Seth…? I swear to the Gods, if you’re dicking around, I’ll kick your ass for it later…”

There was nothing, no response whatsoever. Only the sound of rain.

“SETH!”

As the Captain screamed out the Slayer’s name in desperation, the confusion among the squad turned to horror. The Captain trembled for a moment, before turning towards Axis with fury.

“Damned Monster! What have you done to my man, Seth?! I’ll make you pay for this! Everyone, Nexus is now considered hostile, and must be taken down by whatever means necessary!”

One of the knights foolishly called out to the irate Captain, questioning her order.

“But Captain, what about the Dark Elf?”

“Fuck the Elf! Nexus is a much bigger threat! It’s the highest priority! Do not question me again!”

With that, the knights and Slayers turned away from the Elf entirely. Of course, she was too stunned to react to the insult by the Captain.

Rather, it was more like she couldn’t move at all; as if her nerves had been shocked into a state of unresponsiveness, she could only stand there and watch. She watched, as an aura frighteningly similar to the black clouds in the sky obscured Axis's appearance, to where only his silhouette could be seen, as well as his piercing silver eyes.

The once calm and still Axis began to move again, glaring towards the approaching squad and addressing them with an irritated tone.

“‘Monster’ this and ‘Nexus’ that… You motherfuckers keep calling me names over and over again, not bothering to explain what any of them mean! I’m tired of this shit! At the very least, someone tell me…”

Then, the black lightning streaked through the sky once again, but this time, it was directed towards the sky from where Axis was standing, and the opaque aura that surrounded him before was replaced by black sparks travelling across his body. Along with the thunderclap, he roared aloud his frustration.

“What is a Human, even?!”