[IC] Really? You're the Demon King?

[YamiCuoreLaroux]

"Reflect!" Deflecting the worst of the electricity again, Soreth still found himself pushed back to the ground by the force of it. She seemed to have become a lot more serious in a short time, and it was only a matter of time before the extra effort pushed him into a corner at this rate. That last attack very well could have killed him, he realized.

Swallowing back the anxiety threatening to throw him off, he held out both hands with the claws curling toward the floor to his sides and looked up at Wrenna for a moment. "I'm sorry." Raising his hands, he began chanting, the floor beneath his feet starting to glow as symbols began to appear in a circle around him. If he wanted to end it quickly before he ended up skewered on that sword, this was the best way he could think of. Not the most painless, but at least he could probably survive it. Raising his voice as he chanted, he could feel the vibrations radiating from beneath his feet...

In the middle of the chanting, however, he gasped and stopped suddenly, dropping to his knees. The light faded and the vibrations stopped, leaving the boy to wrap one arm around himself and prop himself up on the other, breath heavy and quickly becoming ragged.

[onenote]

Wrenna cursed again as Soreth reflected her spell again. Surely the demon didn't have unlimited energy to use all of these spells! She thought about using her clone spell again, the last clone having been pelted too much by what remained of the ice shards to remain. But she stopped herself when she noticed that Soreth was up to something else. And he apologized...Wrenna fought back the urge to groan and quickly ran towards Soreth as he started to chant. She almost lost balance when she felt the vibrations started, but before she was even halfway to him and was about ready to use another wind speed boost spell, he was stopping, falling to his knees as what little reactions that was caused by his spell disappeared. Wrenna continued towards him, but quickly slowed down until she was taking the last few steps towards him in a gentle walk.

She stared down at the coughing boy. This. This was who she was supposed to defeat, to kill, to bring peace to her lands. This was some sickly boy who apparently managed to keep the crown in his condition. "...I spent years training for this moment and...this is it? I'm going to win because you have a coughing fit?" She didn't know why she was hesitating. A easy win, destiny was being favorable to her. Kill him and be done with it her mind was telling her. And yet..."Get up." She told him, dropping her sword as she tried to stand him up. "Get up and try to finish me off like you're supposed to! I can't win with you like this! It wouldn't be fair!"

[YamiCuoreLaroux]

Struggling to catch his breath, the weak boy tried his best get back on his feet. "Right...*hah*...sorry...give me just...a moment..." Though he slowly began to rise with Wrenna's unexpected help, he found his legs buckling beneath him before he could even fully stand. "Ah...it's bad this time...I probably overdid it with the fight, too..." He shivered again, seeming to somehow pale even further. His whole body ached and his head was swimming...he was certain that there was no way for him to continue fighting at this point.

Sighing heavily, he eventually looked up from the ground to face the girl once more. "I'm sorry, I really hate to ask this... I know you were looking forward to killing me and all...but could you help me back to my room? I think the cold in here is making it worse."

[onenote]

It was not every day that one met up with their destiny and apparently today was not that day for Wrenna as she continued to stare down at the weak king. Weak because that's just how he was not cause she had worn him down in a fight (well she had but...he just had a weak body too). Trying to help him stand only caused him to fall back to his knees and now he was shivering from the cold? (Wrenna herself had found the demon realm to be hotter than her own but more in a tropical sense then hell fire hot. The room itself felt comfortable to her).

"Fine." Wrenna finally sighed. "Fine! why not!" she said as she went over and grabbed his cloak and draped it over the boy to help him warm up before grabbing his arm and putting it over her shoulder. "Why not help the enemy! The prophecy was apparently wrong up till now, why not just openly defy it at this point!" She exclaimed as she lifted him up and let him lean on her. "Which way..." She sighed after a moment of calming down and letting him get used to leaning on her.

[YamiCuoreLaroux]

Soreth pulled the cloak a bit tighter around himself, feeling a little bad for disappointing the hero so much. He shifted a little in his position before he found himself reasonably comfortable with it, or at least as much as was probably possible considering the entire situation. "Thank you. Straight out the door from here and take the first left all the way down. It's another left to get to the living quarters and just a few turns from there."

Trying again to steady his legs a bit more, he gave a small, weak smile. "I'll probably be fine with a little rest."

[onenote]

"How great..." Wrenna sighed as she started to walk slowly, being careful not to go to fast and to watch out in case his legs went out again. They shuffled down the halls slowly for a minute before Wrenna finally spoke up again. "Okay so listen. You have to understand some things. My name is Wrenna and I'm the daughter of a guy that was thought to be a few spells short of a magic book. He'd proclaim to all that was around that I was going to save the day. He spent years training me and teaching me. I had to go through a bunch of trials that started out by clearing a basement of a deadly rat infestation to solving ludicrous puzzles in temples to sneaking into your kingdom and finally fighting you. I am THE hero back home. I am the one. I am the person that was going to save everyone. And you were supposed to be the one I kill. But..." Wrenna paused for another minute as she continued to help Soreth along.

"I honestly can't believe that you are the person I'm supposed to kill. King or no, you're just...its not right. This whole situation isn't right! I can't kill you! And that means I can't go home either cause what am I supposed to tell everyone? "Oh you don't understand. The guy was sickly. I couldn't just kill him!" Cause they would definitely understand that. What the heck am I supposed to do now!?" Wrenna asked him as she finally got him to his room and set him down on his bed.

[YamiCuoreLaroux]

Soreth breathed a small sigh of relief as he lay back on the large bed, just enjoying not standing for a moment before he answered. "I see...that's pretty impressive. I guess we'll have to figure out an alternate plan until I can fight again, though."

"Anyway, while we're doing introductions...my name is Soreth Sephiran Dizoralth, King of Demons and Ruler of the Realm of Darkness, formerly Heir to the Darkness and Son of the Great King Dizoralth... Ah...I've been raised from birth to eventually lead the demons in the absence of my father...which is where I am now, and to someday do battle with the hero of legend." He paused and looked up to the ceiling for a second in thought. "Yep, that's about it. I've lived here for pretty much my entire life, except for a few brief periods of recovery and field training, if you can believe that."

Shifting around again, he soon sat up and removed his gauntlets before he began pulling at the armor still strapped to his body. "This really isn't the most comfortable thing to lie down in... Could you do me a favor and look that way for a minute? There...isn't a lot underneath this...so..." His face grew slightly pink as he pointed away toward the other side of the room where a small door stood ajar.

[onenote]

"Yes, you mentioned your name at the beginning of the battle." Wrenna told him with a sigh. She wasn't surprised to hear he had been mostly cooped up in this castle for most of his life. Sickly people tended not to travel around...She was surprised that he got field training. Surely no one thought someone in his condition as going to be much use during campaigns...

Wrenna began to feel a bit more at ease when he started to remove his armor...but then tensed up again realizing this could be some sort of trap. Of course...he didn't really have anywhere for him to hide anything that he could draw out quickly so there was that...And then he asked her to look away because he was going to change..."How are you so nonchalant about this! I could have killed you earlier! You could have killed me!" Wrenna told him as she stomped over to the door. "You just basically said "Well we'll have to reschedule our fight to the death! What is wrong with you!?" She added as she stepped out.

[YamiCuoreLaroux]

"Ah...I guess I did. Well, now you know the rest of it." He messed with the straps for a moment longer before muttering a few words and snapping his fingers. With the command used, the armor undid itself the rest of the way and fell around him to be pushed onto the floor. It was so much easier to deal with changing that way. If only my other clothes were that easy to switch. Reaching under the pillow on the bed, he grabbed an undershirt with an open back and some comfortable trousers that he had left there in case of similar situations requiring returning to the room in the middle of the day to rest. It seemed to happen maybe a little too often lately...

He shrugged at Wrenna's assessment, not so sure how to answer it. "Um...I guess not being dead helps somehow? I'm really too tired to do much else, honestly. This kind of thing tends to happen a lot, especially when I'm stressed...and that room is pretty awful. It almost feels like the cold there saps my energy sometimes..."

Finally changed into the spare clothing, he turned around to see that the girl was no longer within sight. "Wrenna? Did you leave already?" Looking over at the door at the side of the room, his eyes widened as he realized what had probably just happened. "Wr-Wrenna! Not that door! It's not supposed to be--!" Moving to jump off the bed in a slight panic, he only really succeeded in falling right on the floor with a dull 'thump'. Groaning, he only hoped that he had remembered to close the box containing the portraits. He had made them based on some of the visions of her he had seen while scrying, but that wasn't exactly something she needed to see.

[onenote]

"Being not dead only helps so much in this situation." Wrenna told him, feeling like she was at her wits end as she started to look around the room. This must have been someone's art room as there were drawing and painting materials scattered all around along with numerous paintings hung onto the walls. But what caught Wrenna's attention the most a box with what appeared to be a drawing of...her head inside...she went over to investigate and found many, many pictures of her. "What in the..." She looked over them Yes..they were all her, there was no mistaking her own face. A few of them even showed them completing the trails and in other settings...

Wrenna was brought out of her stupor by the sound of a low thud and soreth's frantic calling. She turned and marched back to the door. "Why in the name of good and evil, are their so many portraits of me!? Who drew those!?...It was you wasn't it!?" the room was connected to his after all and he was worried about her seeing the drawings. "Why did you do that!? And...You were spying on me!?" It was the only way he would have known what she looked like up till now..."I can not believe you! We're prophecied to kill one another and you're not taking this seriously!"

[YamiCuoreLaroux]

Soreth wasn't sure whether he wanted to pass out or just die from the embarrassment. He normally would have been pretty careful about keeping that door locked, but with everything else going on that day...

With his face turning an unnatural shade of red even for some demons, he stammered horribly for a few seconds as he tried to come up with something to say. "Ah, I-I...I mean, i-it's not...there's a g-good reason! I j-just...uh, um..." He flinched again at the accusation and crawled backwards up against the bed, raising his hands in front of him defensively. "I-I wasn't exactly spying! Or well, maybe, but, um...y-you're supposed to know your opponent, r-right? Yeah, that's all! It was r-research! It's completely serious! Pleasedon'thateme!"

[onenote]

Wrenna could feel anger boiling up inside of her, rage that she had been spied on (and drawn too!) and that he kept saying things like "Please don't hate me!" to her. She felt like she was about explode...but she didn't. She couldn't keep up being angry like this for so long, it was too tiring. With a sigh that was close to being a groan, she slowly fell to her knees, and then back into a sitting position, hands over her face. "You really are my worst enemy, you know that?" she finally said after a minute of silence, bringing her hands down. "You single handedly messed up my whole life. And the worst you've done to me physically is a few cuts and some bruises. But I can't bring myself to fulfill my own destiny, not to save my people, not to make Dad proud, not even after I found that out! UGH!" She groaned and fell back so she was lying back onto the castle's floor. "What is with you!? What's with me?!"

[YamiCuoreLaroux]

"Uh...um..." The boy watched as her rage seemed to build...only to deflate. When she dropped the rest of the way to the floor, he hesitated a minute indecisively before slowly crawling over to sit next to her. It took him another few seconds of internally fighting with himself before he could speak again. "You, uh...you said that you can't go home. Do you need a place to stay until you figure things out? It's the least I can do right now...granted, probably the most until I can finish resting up, too."

He looked away as soon as he finished speaking, sorry that he really couldn't come up with a better solution at the moment. "I doubt that you'll be able to get back out, anyway. The guards won't all be gone forever. Unless you have a better idea?"

[onenote]

"I'm beginning to understand that your naivety knows no bounds Soreth." she told him in a deadpan voice as she looked up at him when he told her finding her a place to stay at would be the least he could do for her. "Where would you have in mind for me. I mean, I doubt the other demons would like someone who is supposed to kill you staying in the demon realm alive. And what are they out there doing anyways?" She asked as she sat up, "They ought to be ashamed of how easy it was for me to sneak into the castle and get to you."

[YamiCuoreLaroux]

"They don't have to know. I can come up with something." He curled his tail around him and played with the end of it as he continued. "I asked them to keep watch out there. They couldn't exactly be interfering with a foretold battle, and it's kind of my job to take care of anyone who makes it that far. It's kind of like a traditional display of power. Sometimes others watch, but they're on the alert for a different threat right now. I didn't actually think that you'd come alone, you see..."

Any further explanation was cut off by an odd growling sound. Tensing up at the sound, Soreth blushed slightly when he realized where it came from. "Oh... that's right, I forgot to eat again... Do you want anything, by any chance?"

[onenote]

"What ever you come up with would have to be a temporary solution." Wrenna told him before he started to explain what the guards were up to. "...You...You mean I could have brought an army with me!?" wrenna exclaimed, "Dad said I had to do it alone! UGH!" Wrenna put her hands over her face and took a deep breath. "Okay I guess I'm glad I didn't bring an army since I could sneak in here so easily, no one had to die so I could get to you and find out I can't kill you." Wrenna stoped when she heard Soreth's stomach growl. All this sneaking, fighting, and getting angry over things which she had control of and things she didn't have control of had actaually made Wrenna pretty hungry. It could be posioned but Wrenna didn't care to much at this point. "...Do demons actually eat things Humans can eat?" She asked him.

[YamiCuoreLaroux]

"It kinda depends on the demon, but we do eat a lot of human food, for the most part. Or things similar to it. It kind of depends on what we can grow, catch, or buy, really, since some things can only be gotten in certain regions. Some of us do need things like blood or spiritual energy to survive, though." Standing up slowly, he swayed a bit on his feet and grasped the side of his head. "Ugh... We' re not going far. Just through the door over... not there, there." He waved at the art room door to make it close - and lock properly this time - before he pointed to a second small door at a different part of the room. "This happens a little too often, so there's a small kitchen over there now. It's supposed to make it easier when I can't move much."

[onenote]

Wrenna stared a little suspiciously at Soreth as he mentioned that some demons needed blood and what not...Perhaps he was one? Of course if he was, he probably had his own stock of it in that kitchen of his. Wrenna was surprised how much she could still care after saying she was done caring..."Do you need help again." She asked as she grabbed Soreth's arm when it looked like he was about to fall over again after he locked the art room door (which she made note that he could do...). Wait...ugh...she was getting accustomed to asking him if he needed help and actually helping. That was just wonderful...

[YamiCuoreLaroux]

Soreth gave a small smile at the action made to help steady him. "Thank you. It feels like I'm walking around with a fever right now, to be honest. I guess I was really nervous this morning or something." Reaching out toward the kitchen door with his free hand, he flicked his wrist to get it to open, revealing a some of the room inside including a small table and a couple of chairs along with a counter. "Let's see what's available, then."

"By the way, were you really sent here by yourself? That's pretty dangerous. Didn't you have help getting into the kingdom, at least?"

[onenote]

"You really shouldn't move around if you feel that way." Wrenna told him, but she still continued to lead him into the kitchen to prove to herself she didn't care that much. "Seriously, how do you have all of this magic." She added, a little jealous. Then again, if she had to stay cooped up all the time, she might get pretty darn good at magic like that too.

"You sit down, and I'll see what's here." She told him as she sat him down at the table. "it'd be bad if you feel over and hit your head or something." Then I'd be up the creek without a paddle, she thought but did not say out loud..."And yeah. I came alone. The kingdom outfitted with the best armor, the best sword...which I left back in that other room...ugh...Anyways, and the best supplies. Even a really good horse I had to ditch once I got to your capital...But yeah, I had to come alone. Father said I didn't need an army and no one wanted to go on a possible suicide mission with the chosen one." You tell him as you start to look through the shelves.