The Replacement
Dante hunkered down before Damon. "So? Are you gonna talk? "
"Why are you doing this? I'm your father. Shouldn't you...ahh!!" Without waiting for Damon to complete his sentence, Dante stomped on his chest before kicking him as he flew and skidded towards the wall.
Damon staggered to stand up straight but his eyes bulged when he noticed Dante was already seated on a chair and facing towards him with two glittering white lightning bolts in both hands vividly aimed at him.
****
Although while Suzanne was asleep in his room, Dante had used the time afforded to him to speak with Mary who had informed him of everything she knew.
But after listening to what she told him, Dante knew something just wasn't right. Firstly, a curse capable of granting an household regenerative abilities seems to be suspicious on its own for him to fully believe it.
And though he might not be an expert in spell casting and potion brewing, still he knew quite a lot about both aspects. And after racking his brain for so long, he had come to a conclusion.
But even with his conclusion, he could only describe it as mere speculation until he could witness the truth with his own eyes.
And so, to do this, he had to use
Though Damon reacted composed and relaxed in front of her because he knew there was no way she could do it but still Dante was able to notice the slight dread his eyes reflected as it constantly kept stealing glances towards her ring.
And this could only mean one thing, the ring was of significant value to him.
****
Both lightning bolts were fired straight to Damon. With one of the lightning bolt impaling his hand to the wall while the other was aimed to his chest.
"Ahhh!!" He screamed, trying to remove one of the bolt with his freed hand but was zapped upon contact. His screams didn't seem to cease due to the bolt still impaling him.
His ruptured arteries couldn't heal back as they were continuously zapped as they tried to return to their original form.
His screams continued to resound within the mansion but Dante had instructed Mary to send all maids and butlers away for the time being, so right now the mansion was completely desolated. Alfred had yet to return with Darik and Deborah.
"Son, stop this at once. What have I done to you to deserve this...aah!!" His second hand was impaled to the wall. Followed by his two legs, now his arms and legs were left unfurled on the wall, as Dante continued to increase the voltage of the bolts.
"Oh please. Spare me the sentimental talk. I know you aren't human. Although I do commend you for finding a way to conceal your aura, I must say that your trickery ends here," Dante said, his hands having a ball of lightning glowing on it.
Indeed, this was the conclusion Dante had come up with. The fact that his father never really felt pity or sadness or any form of emotions towards his mother had always bothered him but with this fact, it would explain why Damon was always cold towards her.
"Huh!! What nonsense are you.... Eii!!" Damon shrieked as the lightning was shot at the side of his face.
"Next time, I won't miss," Dante confirmed with his eyes locked onto him
"This is nonsense, there's...." *Boom* Damon's head explodes due to Dante's attack. After a few seconds later, his head had regenerated back to it's original form.
"Son!! Stop this ....." The same thing happened again.
"I will not accept this...." His head exploded once more.
Innumerable hours went by but the brutality didn't stop. Dante's face still maintained its stern appearance. He was ready to keep doing this until Damon's will breaks.
"Please!! Please!! Stop!! I'll talk. I'll talk," With blood gushing out of his mouth,Damon pleaded. His face was currently burned with half of his head showing how his muscles began to heal once again as it tries to cover up his exposed skull.
His head had been made to continuously explode and heal without being offered the chance to heal completely. This was evident by the torn attire he had on him. His shirt was currently no where to be found and the last piece of fabric remaining on him could barely cover his lower region.
Though he could regenerate, still the pain of having his head explode still hurt and burns till this very moment. Of course this was coupled by the fact that the lightning bolts present on all his limbs still remained there as his veins and arteries couldn't heal properly.
"Just stop. I promise to talk," Damon said as his figure then transformed from that of a human into one with a demonic physique.
His body shrank and a pair of wings appeared from his back. He now had elf ears and a pair of long goat horns on his head. He was now a demonic creature common in the demon realm.
An imp. Imps are the weakest race of the demon realm. In terms of strength, recognition and reputation, they are the lowest in the table.
"Ahhh!!... C'mon!! I just said I would..."
Not granting the imp any luxury of escape, Dante fired another lightning bolt straight at his chest. Impaling him once again to the wall.
With the ceaseless attack now reaching a pause, the imp could finally take his time to remember all what had happened to this very moment. And surprisingly, he couldn't help but laugh.
*Haha*
"What's funny?"
"You fool! Do you not know what you've done?! Now you will be hunted by my Lord himself," Damon said seemingly forgetting that he was recently in the mercy of the one sitting before him
Dante seemed uninterested by the imps words of trepidation. The imp noticed this and soon cleared his throat a little.
" How did you know about the truth of the ring?" The imp asked.
'The ring of voluminus' It was a ring Dante had managed to get a glimpse of while he was having an erotic session with Suzanne.
He immediately recognized what it was, and since Mary was the one person Suzanne could really be free with in the mansion, Suzanne had explained what she experienced on her wedding day to Mary.
And the secret Mary was meant to keep was in turn now revealed to Dante. Dante was able to understand that though the ring could curse its wearer to die by his/her child, the ring was still incapable of exploding anyone's heart.
Removing the ring would only allow the ring to appear in the wearer's finger once again, hence the person will still remain cursed and the only way to lift the curse was by killing the one to whom the ring originally belonged to or by having someone else remove the ring thus allowing them to take the place of the wearer.
This meant that Suzanne was no longer cursed but now Dante had taken her place as the wearer of the ring and so now he is cursed to die by the declamatory words of his own children.
Though Dante removed the ring and destroyed it using his lightning ball, still he couldn't prevent the curse from happening. He could feel the weight of the cuffs on his wrist, so he knew he had taken Suzanne's place.
He wasn't bothered by this fact. He had two options of stopping the curse and he knew very well the one he was interested in doing.
After all, the safety of his women remains and always will be his utmost priority.
*Sobs*
Tears had begun to crept out of the imp eyes but Dante felt neither sympathy nor joy towards its fleeting change of emotions. One second ago, it was laughing and now it seems to be crying.
It appears it hoped to be freed from the lightning bolt currently impaling it to the wall. But still, Dante remained reticent as he stared at it with death glares and was ready to cause more misery at a moment's notice. The imp noticed this and whimpered inwardly.
'There's really no way I can fool him huh?' The imp thought inwardly.
Although it may seem as though he was trying to fool Dante with its tears, the truth was that part of those tears were actually how it felt.
"It seems you need a reminder of the situation you currently find yourself in, " Dante commented, with his hand now having a glittering lightning ball on it which was sparkling and getting enlarged by the second as the sound of thunder reverberated around the ball.
"Okay!.... Okay!... B...but...you should know that any information you want to know will be useless b....because my Lord will be coming for everyone of us now,"
The imp words made Dante to raise one of his eyebrows.
"And why would he?" He asked.
"Do you not know who Vladimir Lucifer is? Seriously, what era do you mortals live in?" The imp couldn't believe what he was hearing.
"Mortals?... You say it as though he is an immortal," Dante said, feeling a little bit interested in what the imp was saying.
"Of course he is. He is the immortal Lord that rules over the Dark Mirror Dimension. He is the Lord of all demons and demonic beasts over there. He was banished away from this dimension by forces I do not know but he fought his way back up to the peak of demonic hierarchy on his own in the dimension I came from. *Sighs* It's annoying to see both humans and demons of this dimension being naive towards the existence of an immortal being that was once feared across the seven realms of this dimension," The imp shook its head in disappointment.
Dante's excitement seemed to be rising by the second as the imp kept talking about its Lord. He had involuntarily made a grin on his face which didn't escape the imp eyes.
Dante noticed this and urged it to continue.
"I was sent here to supervise and to make sure the corpse of your mother's body gets a successful teleportation towards our dimension once you three eventually bring about her death,"
"Why do you need to teleport a corpse?"
"How the hell should I know? Following instructions and commands are the only things I'm meant to think about. Going beyond that and concerning myself with trivial matters will only lead to my demise!" The imp yelled in frustration. This was because the lightning bolt was still stinging and hurting him immensely, it seems to be currently hurting it more than it was before.
*Click*
Dante heard the imp rude words towards him and clicked his fingers, enabling the lightning bolt to increase it's voltage.
"Ahhh!!!" The imp yelled in pain and a visible skeletal image of the imp could be seen as it got stunned by the increased voltage of the lightning bolt, which made it incapacitated and paralyzed from the neck down.
For a few moments it won't be able to move it's body and limbs except for it's mouth and eyes until it's regenerative abilities kicked in.
"Come to think of it, you made mention of me being hunted by your Lord earlier. It seems you meant my soul was marked and there was no escaping for me. This could mean that your Lord requires the body of the soul sent to him for an ulterior motive known only to him," Dante suggested while attempting a sardonic smile towards the imp.
"Oh! It seems I asked a stupid question earlier. How stupid of me," Dante continued as he places his palm on his forehead in disappointment while flashing a wry smile towards the imp.
Dante knew of this fact but still he asked while subtly increasing the volt to frustrate the imp which made it to insult him as it groan in pain.The imp gritted its teeth in ire as it noticed that Dante was merely trying to provoke it earlier.
"I can see you have a knack for dodging important questions. You still haven't told me what brought you here in the first place," Dante said, clicking his finger as the voltage increases once again.
"Aahhh!!" The imp groaned and whimpered in pain, anger and frustration.
'Bullshit!! I never said I won't tell you anything. You're just doing this to me for your own amusement.' The imp thought inwardly as it caught a glimpse of Dante's ominous smile just before he clicked his fingers.
'F*ck!! This is all bullshit!!" Right now blood was gushing out of the imp mouth as it cursed inwardly on the cruelty it currently felt. At first it thought it had escaped it's heartless Lord in the dark Mirror Dimension and now it seems it was destined to feel the same unjust cruelty in this dimension as well.
"Your father," Dante's eyebrows were furrowed as he heard the imp words.
"Your father, Damon, had sought a means to get rid of his family's curse alongside his brother and to do that they had to seek an audience with the one who cursed them in the first place. But summoning the mere presence of a supreme immortal being such as my Lord requires more than the single life they were willing to offer,"