World of Women - World of Women – V4 – Chapter 26

We drove for the longest I had been in a car since coming to this world. I’d like to say I handled it better, but the posh life I had lived up until now meant I was stiff and sore after six hours of driving and was eager to just get out of the car. On top of that, the trip was extremely boring. At least, in the back of the truck, I didn’t have the fear of being caught as well as the ability to stretch my legs. Although I worried about our destination, I also knew we were leaving Rebecca and Ashton behind in Amaryllis. This should be a relatively safe journey.

After I fought the urge to ask how much longer for the tenth time, the car suddenly pulled over to the side of the road, and Brooke turned the engine off.

“Are we there?” Cornelia asked, sounding about as impatient as I felt.

“No, but we’ll need to walk from here. It’s not exactly like I can just walk in.”

“The government has it surrounded?” I asked worriedly.

“In a manner. They can’t show the area too much attention or they might attract the news, but it’s definitely being watched,” Brooke explained.

I supposed that made sense. If you discovered some kind of archeological dig, you would keep it under surveillance to keep anyone from damaging the site. However, if they made their security too obvious, it’d key in the observant that there was something questionable there that they didn’t want people to do know about.

“Is this the limestone quarry?” Cornelia asked.

Brooke looked back at her. “You’re observant.”

“Not really. I just kept track of the direction we had been heading. If these castles are underground, then to find one, there would have to be some kind of dig site. The quarry just happens to be the only place I could think of near here. The digging started five years ago. It started an uproar with some environmentalists because they were chopping down a nature preserve.”

“Well, as far as anyone knows, it’s just a revenue stream of limestone that Amaryllis so desperately needed that lead to this.”

“But the reality…”

“I can’t confirm they knew the castle was down there before digging, but it would explain some things.”

“A quarry… good.” I sighed causing the two girls to glance back at me. “Ah… the demon lord castle will collapse once the inheritance is taken. Last time, it was under the capital city of Matahari. That quake that destroyed a third of the city? Well, it wasn’t a quake. It wasn’t the illegal mining either. It was…”

My voice caught in my throat. I was going to say that it was me, but memories of that were still difficult. I had ended up costing a lot of people their lives. I had come to terms with it, but it didn’t mean it was something I liked to think about it.

“It wasn’t your fault.” Brooke put a hand on my shoulder. “No one could have predicted everything that would happen.”

I put my hand on the back of hers. “Yeah, I know. Ah… actually, before we go, I should put some runes around here. In the likelihood that we need to escape this place, it’ll be a lot easier to teleport with a rune destination. I assume that the quarry is a few miles away? Yeah, without Lilith, I wouldn’t be able to make such a distant teleportation easily.”

“Hmph… at least you acknowledge you need me!” A voice came from the dark.

The three of us spun toward a batch of trees. Even Brooke was shocked by the sudden interruption. Before I could react though, a girl came sprinting out from a hiding point in the bushes.

“Clyburn!” She called out with pure joy as she threw her arms around me.

“Mia!” I laughed as I felt her grab me.

This was the kind of union I had expected from all of my girls. However, the world was so messed up right now and everyone had too many worries. Periods of happiness were fleeting. Mia was the one who had been most ingrained in this stuff, but she was also the one who had seemingly changed the least. She was the same girl I had slept with three years ago and ripped up the contract after.

“I’ve missed you…” She smiled, kissing me boldly.

“How did you find us?” Brooke demanded.

“Hehe… I have my ways.” Lilith snorted, putting her hands on her hips.

“I see…”

She hadn’t changed much either. My eyes fell on her chest.

“Why does it feel like you’re thinking something rude!” Lilith pointed a finger at me. “You may have seduced my assistant, but you’ll never have my body, Clyburn!”

“Who wants your body you dumb lolith!”

“It’s pronounced Lilith…” She said clearly with an obnoxious voice. “Lil -ith”

“This is… Lilith?” Cornelia’s eyes widened.

“No, I’m calling you… ah, never mind. You won’t get it.” I shook my head.

“Don’t look down at me! You may have gotten some of the Demon Lord’s skills, but I gained his knowledge. I know powerful spells you haven’t even conceived!”

It wasn’t so finely cut as that. The Demon Lord had split his inheritance into four parts. Each part wasn’t necessarily equal. From the two examples we had, it seemed like Lilith had a more in-depth knowledge of the spells, not to mention the Demon Lord’s power. As for me, the power I absorbed was somehow eaten, and all I ended up with was a conceptual knowledge of magic.

It was the difference between knowing a really complex spell and knowing how to develop complex spells. This was how I was able to reason out a means of allowing aseeded to use magic, as well as most of my other spells. It was once believed that some people were just born unable to use magic. These peopled were called aseeded. It turned out that it was more like being left-handed versus right-handed. All magic was designed to be right-handed, fundamentally making it difficult for left-handed mages. Well, that was the simplest way to imagine it, I guess.

I hadn’t developed too many spells on my own. Even my communication and teleportation spells had been copied, not conceived by me. I had seen some of the spells Lilith used and modified the concept with my knowledge. I still needed time and thought to develop such spells, while Lilith could pull from a lifetime of the Demon Lord’s creations. It was only natural she was much more powerful than me.

“I get it. You’re special.” I sighed, holding Mia next to me with one arm. “What I want to know is why you are here.”

“Isn’t it obvious? We were informed that the third demon lord inheritance was found. Why wouldn’t I show up? To think, it was in Amaryllis. I wonder where the fourth is.”

“The third might contain that knowledge,” I said.

“I know.” She sniffed, crossing her arms. “Why do you think it’s so important that I absorb it?”

“You? Shouldn’t I be the one to absorb it?”

“You!” Her eyebrows raised. “You think you should even be involved with this?”

“Lilith… I only absorbed a partial inheritance, and even a lot of that was lost, but isn’t it better that way?”

“How can it be better? The inheritance my ancestor absorbed allowed us to bring back men and saved this world, or did you forget? The demons have caused so much damage to this world. If I could gain the rest of the Demon Lord’s inheritance, then we could fix a lot of this world!”

“I’m not sure…” I responded uncertainly.

“Think about it! There are still demons out there who want to claim the inheritance. If I claim this inheritance, then I’ll have half of his inheritance. With only one last inheritance surviving, not only would we be more likely to claim it, but even if we failed, I’d be stronger than any opponent I faced. We wouldn’t have to worry. If you absorb it, there is no saying we’ll even learn where the 4th location is, and if they claim it first, we’ll be on the same level.”

Lilith nodded to herself as if this settled things. I had no reason to doubt what she said, and I believed she was speaking from her heart. She genuinely believed that this was the right course of action. However, I just didn’t agree.

“Lilith… I’ve been going through the information I gained from the inheritance, and I’ve found something I haven’t mentioned to you yet.”

I didn’t personally know how to do it, but there was a possibility that the demons did, or if not, they might gain that ability if they got their hands on the other inheritances.

“What’s that?” She asked.

“There is a possibility that they might be able to take the inheritance from you.”

“Wh-what? That’s impossible!” She responded defiantly.

“Lilith, when your mother had you… the inheritance left her, right? The power went on to you.”

“H-how did you know that?” She took a step back.

“And… she had also told you that you must not, under any circumstances, have a boy?”

She cocked her head. “She never mentioned such a thing.”

I let out a breath. It was possible that she didn’t know. When you only had a one in a thousand chance of having a baby, it probably had just never happened in the twenty or thirty generations that had passed by.

“Well, that’s not important.” I shook my head. “The point I’m making is that your inheritance passes down to your baby. Would it be so difficult for the demons to capture you and force you to pass down your inheritance, by… you know…”

Although that was one method, it wasn’t the method I had been thinking about. They didn’t need to wait a decade. I believed that they’d be able to sacrifice her and extract her inheritance that way. However, explaining it in this term seemed like it would reach her a lot better.

She looked confused for a second, but then her face turned red. “I-I’d never allow it! I’ve maintained my virginity so far! Why would I let demons do anything like that!”

“The point I’m making is that I can’t pass down my inheritance. I lost my inheritance. Thus, it’d be better to destroy it than risk having it taken.”

“If that’s true, I’m already vulnerable with the inheritance I already have,” Lilith explained after a few moments of consideration. “I won’t give up this power. It has been in my family for generations. We have always kept it safe. I don’t see that changing now. If I take the next inheritance, it’ll only be that much more difficult to bring us down.”

“I suppose you’re right.”

I didn’t agree with her, but I also realized arguing with her, especially out here seemingly in the middle of nowhere, wouldn’t do us any good. Right now, we needed to get to the inheritance before we could discuss who would take it. From my point of view, power corrupted people. There was a second reason I wanted to take it that I didn’t even suggest to her. It was the possibility that there was a bit of the Demon Lord in that inheritance. If she had over half his inheritance, would he be able to take her over? Would she become corrupted, and eventually support demons? I felt like that might be a very real possibility.

As for Lilith’s other excuse that she was already vulnerable, that was something else that could be fixed. I wasn’t completely certain, once again, but if Ashton could be believed, then all I needed to do was get her pregnant. The inheritance would pass on from her to her child, but that child should be like me. The demonic blood would be destroyed, and the inheritance would be lost. Getting her to agree to such a thing was nearly impossible though. Perhaps, given time, I could convince Mia and she could slowly warm Lilith up to the idea, but that might take years, and certainly wouldn’t be resolved by the time we snatched this inheritance away from Rebecca and the demonkind.

Either way, these were only some random thoughts of mine. I didn’t expect to be able to convince Lilith of anything here. If it came to it, I’d try to take the inheritance for myself. However, if it ended with Lilith taking the inheritance, it wouldn’t be the worst thing. Frankly, both of us just knew too little about how any of this worked. The Demon King was an elusive creature from a time so far in the past that no one even remembered. Even demons were a difficult thing to wrap my head around. I wasn’t in any place to act like I understood everything that was going on.

“Perhaps it is best if we just worry about getting into the Demon Lord’s castle for the moment,” Brooke cut in when she saw that my face still held reluctance.

Thankfully, all Lilith heard was me saying that she was right, and that was good enough for her. Ultimately, who took the inheritance, or even if either of us would be able to get to it, was up in the air. From the moment the demon castle was discovered, it had become a race for everyone to obtain the award. Lilith and I just happened to have run into each other. As for how she had found us, she probably had some kind of tracker on me and noticed as I got close. I wasn’t going to push into her secrets, as I didn’t plan to reveal to her my secrets either. It was a complicated relationship the pair of us had.

“Let’s go,” I responded instead, keeping all of my thoughts inside.

The group of us, now two people larger, began to head in the direction Brooke had planned. Lilith seemed content allowing Brooke to lead for the moment. As for Cornelia, she had mostly remained quiet since the other woman had arrived. Although she had already had to come to terms with a lot in the last 24 hours, every time she found another person who was part of this strange story, it only affirmed the validity of it more and more.

It was easy to declare a single person insane, but dozens of people all sharing the same delusion? Even Cornelia couldn’t ignore that. If one thing was true, then possibly everything was true, and having those things confirmed one after another could be alarming.

“Are you doing okay?” I whispered to her as I noticed she was being strangely quiet.

“She… isn’t what I imagined.” Her eyes flickered to Lilith.

I quickly understood what her current dilemma was. Lilith was known as the Demon Lord by modern standards. Well, the Lilith who had that name had died a long time ago. This was only a descendent. However, she was the source of worship and the Lilith Followers were a group closely associated with the WRA.

In short, what happened to Cornelia on that day of WRATH was something she probably thought was Lilith’s responsibility. It was her story that encouraged a lot of women to become demon worshippers in the first place. Then again, it was a story filled with misinformation. Lilith was against demons, not for them. The same women who despised men didn’t understand that it was men who would become the demons that subjugated them.

They heard that bringing demons into this world would get rid of men. They heard that demons would contain power and strength. Both of these things were true. However, men would cease to be in this world because they would become demons, and those demons would hold all the power. It was extremely ironic just how much time and lies had warped the truth. The reason Lilith Worshippers had failed to summon demons into this world was exactly that they had fundamentally misunderstood that demons needed a male host to survive. Only Diba Monic figured out and tried to deliver a male host. She had just picked the wrong guy. Yet, none of that would alleviate Cornelia, who had experienced a great deal of trauma thanks to that day. It was no wonder her feelings toward Lilith were complicated.

She seemed lost in thought, so I didn’t want to continue to antagonize her on the details. Instead, I kept my mouth silent and my eyes on Brooke’s back. At this point, there wasn’t much of a need to hide. We weren’t that close at all, but Brooke wanted to be certain we weren’t seen approaching, so she had chosen a relatively hidden path a fair distance away. We hiked for nearly an hour, and Lilith started complaining about it after ten minutes.

“Couldn’t we just teleport closer?” She whined.

“Lilith, they might have something to detect that much magic. We’re sneaking in,” Mia reminded her with a voice that sounded like she was very used to this kind of whining.

Lilith knew the truth of her words, but that didn’t stop the small girl from whining anyway. She was always complaining about something. Mia had chosen to travel with her exactly because Lilith was so bad at taking care of herself. She’d likely collapse from starvation if the other woman didn’t make sure she ate regularly.

At this point, it was starting to get dark. We just emerged from a brush, and I could see lights in the distance.

“Shh!” Brooke hissed back to Lilith and Mia. “We’re getting close.”

From this point on, she crouched down and everyone joined her. As I got closer, I could see that there was the giant basin of a dugout quarry. It was currently abandoned, with large digging equipment sitting around unused. There was a large wired fence set up around the basin, as well as various watchtowers. The lights were pointed outward, clearly indicating their intent on making sure no one approached, rather than keeping watch on the place itself.

At that distance, it did look like a military compound. I gulped as I peered into the distance. Just how were we going to get past that? The only way to make the path to the fence harder to cross was if they had filled the area with landmines. I wouldn’t put that past them at this point. Brooke seemed to have fallen into thought as well. I had thought they had this all planned out, but perhaps, she was playing it by ear as much as I was.

“I know you said they might have anti-magic detection… but…” I whispered out loud to no one in particular.

Without the use of magic, I didn’t see us getting in at all. I was expecting a response from Mia or Lilith, but they had both gone quiet. I would have at least assumed Lilith would have some kind of complaint to make. That was when I heard a click. Brooke turned back, looking over my shoulder. Her expression had become grim. I sighed, turning as well.

There was a flurry of movement and a bunch of people came racing out. They had guns raised. Lilith and Mia behind me already had their hands raised. Cornelia next to me had a bitter expression on her face as she raised hers as well.

A woman dressed in black raised a radio device to her face. “Yeah, we’ve got them.”

“Bring them in,” a mysterious voice came back through.

They must have had some kind of hidden proximity alert that we triggered when we approached. Ultimately, all the care we had taken had been for nothing. Amaryllis now had me, but more alarmingly, they had Lilith.