Part 1, Chapter 1 - The Devil's Advocate: Loros!
“Say, Papa Denson, why do apples rot so fast?” Looking down at the red fruit in his hand, a young man bent over a chair.
A multitude of bite-marks had placed themselves into the skin of the delicate, juicy snack. Wearing dark blue robes, the individual scratched at his lengthy, blonde hair. All the length seemed to stop, however, just passed his ears.
An older man, dousing the air around him with an active cigarette, coughed into his hand. “Because everything in this life is mortal, I guess? Heheheh. Yeah, it’s all been mortal for quite some time. That’s whyyouwere created, Loros!” The white-coated individual wielded a long nose, and a head full of gray hair, rabid in its directions.
“I was created. Yes, that’s right. I’m a new kind of agent designed to work for the Complexia Portia.Um, Papa Denson, may I go out into the foyer and play with the other... agents?”
The older man snorted. “Oh, boy, I think I messed up when computing your intellectual design. You were supposed to already be born with the acuity of a twenty-year old, but it seems I screwed the pooch on one of the steps, and now you wanna know things like ‘why do apples rot’ or ‘if you can play with friends’. Heheheh. You’re one of thespecialones. I keep tellin’ everyone that, but they don’t wanna listen.”
“I’m one of the special ones?” Loros looked down at the fruit in his hand, now withered away further from oxidation. “You mean to say I do notrotlike the others?”
Mr. Denson cleared his throat. “That’s precisely it, son! All the other agents here will one day ‘rot’. It’s the cycle of life, but you won’t. You’ll live on. Maybe one day, you’ll even make it out of this old, dusty place.”
Loros blinked, his muscular and shirtless torso flexing itself as he stood, and began pacing around a dusty, enclosed area. “This old and dusty... place? I’m not sure what you mean. This has been my home for the past few days. And it’s more than just home. It’s the world. This shadowy cellar and the foyer upstairs- It is all I have ever known.”
Mr. Denson coughed into his elbow crease just then. “HEHEHEH! That’s bullshit and you know it. Come on! You have a certain essence about you, Loros. I programmed you to have one. You’re built with... mana.”
”Ma... na?”
Mr. Denson shook his head. “You’ve a lot to learn, which is good. Youdidjust come into this world, after all- More or less. Yes, Loros,mana.”
“What is ‘mana’?”
“The supernatural essence in all living things here on Earth. The thing which helps organisms, at times, reach into other dimensions and pull things out. Wedolive in a multi-dimensional omni-verse, after all. And so, with you possessing a lot of mana, you have the innate nature about you to know that there’s more to life than whatever people tell you. But the other scientists wouldn’t want you to talk about that too much, so, let’s keep all this between you and I, eh? HEHEHEH! They’d think thedevilgot a hold of me.”
Loros blinked, his chiseled lips furling. ”Devil?”
Mr. Denson nodded, his teeth yellow under a gray mustache. “Oh yeah, that good ol’ demon of demons. He’s supposedly thebadorundesirabilityin everyone. He’s just from legend, though. Not real- Not real in this world, anyway. Though, as it turns out, there are a number of devils.”
Loros shook his head as he continued speaking in his smooth, monotone voice. “I have a lot to learn.”
The old man nodded, licking his lips as he put his cigarette out over his forearm. “Yes, Loros, yes you do. But fear not, forIwill teach you!”
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