Gate

Erin remained silent.

"Find out for yourselves...", the clown's expression fell. His back was sweating and his insides were a mess.

'Those idiots. There's no telling what this lady would do. I warned that madman!'

Remembering the conversation with them, the man felt his lifespan shortening. If looks could kill, then the eyes of those poisoned ones...

"Just lick the wound."

"Huh...", he was lost for a moment. "What?"

The Queen of Eden looked at him as if he hadn't said that. She shrugged elegantly and repeated.

"Avinicit, that's the name of the poison. The wound hasn't healed, right? It doesn't allow the wound to close. The poisoned blood... if you rub it on your lips you'll feel the urge to tell the truth, if you drink it you'll feel an urge. The effect wears off in two hours and during that time, the poisoned person is forced to tell their secrets related to the moment."

The clown sighed deeply and suddenly laughed. He laughed like crazy. As if he had never heard anything so funny. As if it was his last laugh. And it really was.

The plan had come to fruition. His superior was right. The memory of that moment remained clear in his mind.

'Are you pushing a defective product on me? It's no use if they don't believe me!'

'I can't give you the impossible, child. This is the only one I've achieved and it's been an effort of centuries.'

'I know! More than anyone, I know your challenge, but... We're going to die in vain.'

The voice sighed.

'You will die impatiently as always, I see. I tell you I do not know the name, composition or anything about it. I only guarantee the effect. Even the person who gave it to me does not know much. It is something ancient, already lost. But not forgotten. After all, its inventor is still alive... and she is the most honorable person you will meet today.'

Back to the present. As his spirits calmed down and the guests of the four banquets became excited, he looked at that divine-looking woman.

And even completely stained with blood, he allowed himself to be a knight for one last moment.

When he bowed softly. She raised an eyebrow and raised her glass.

A toast and a smile. That was all he saw before a breath of fire came towards him.

Before making his exit into a hell of ruby flames he smiled at the screams and murders spreading throughout the hall.

The pain was just another spice of joy.

...

..

As soon as Diana heard the first sounds of destruction, her heart started racing. It was as if she had entered a war zone where bombs were falling in succession.

Luckily, Nero was still holding her. She didn't know where she was going, she was being carried like a doll, but when she felt the fresh air and her body floating, she imagined he had jumped.

From where? She didn't want to know.

Her heart only calmed down when another group met them.

Diana was still catching her breath when a portal opened a few steps away and they began to leave.

Most of the women in the group they were in were together with Erin, Alice and their two blind companions.

Alice led them like two little ducks to Diana.

"You can open your eyes now."

"No, we can't..."

"Just a minute."

Alice raised her hand in the air as if shooing away a fly and suddenly the two's expressions trembled.

"Oh, now yes. What happened in there, I felt like everything was going from bad to worse."

"Have you been like this since the beginning?"

"I think so. Your mother-in-law warned me she was going to cast a spell. I felt much calmer after that, but I still couldn't open my eyes."

"It makes sense."

"So, what happened?" Carla watched Nero argue with the group, they seemed so calm that she doubted what she was hearing.

"So many rats among us... I think at least two hundred will die."

"The other three have less quality and more quantity. Two of them have more than seven hundred guests."

"Yes, I would double that number."

"I agree."

"It makes sense."

In the distance, the girls listened attentively. They seemed to be talking about someone's death. The death of many people, or rats.

"Do you know about that?", Ema's serious question caught her off guard.

"I don't. My eyes were closed too."

Diana remembered Nero's hands, his embrace and his words.

"It seems like they want these people to take action?... Something like that."

Alice, who had almost disappeared next to them, agreed.

The girls expected them to be in the middle of the discussion, as well as Nero and most of them. But she and Erin were next to them.

The portal had disappeared and the two would have looked like a pair of lost queens, if Erin hadn't been holding a bottle in her hands, offering a glass to Alice.

And most importantly, the young woman accepted.

The trio watched with curiosity as Erin filled the glasses with a cheerful smile.

She would have been humming if it weren't for the looks on everyone's faces. After taking a deep breath over her glass and taking a clean sip, Alice turned to them.

"There are more important and bigger banquets than these, you know. Some are so old and powerful that they are legends," the two drank each sip so perfectly that the girls swallowed hard. "They are the ones who control all of this..."

She looked at some guests tied up in a corner.

"Some groups don't like that."

Erin smiled.

"Always the same thing. Expand the supernatural world, give titles to those who help, empower the best and dominate the worlds. Well, at least this one had some class."

"Yes. He didn't make a speech..."

"And that's the most impressive thing," Nero returned, the group dispersing in the back. "They're going to make each other fight."

"Then form new groups, clans and alliances. It's a good plan."

Diana felt lost. Why was she always lost?

Focusing on the present, she wanted to know and connect to that world, because it was his world...

A loud explosion reached her ears. A hall in the castle was in flames.

...But it always seemed like his world was disconnected from hers. Almost too dangerous, and... it was ending.