A Day Like Any Other – Yet Not Ordinary at All
Sary opened his eyes. The room was still quiet, the faint greenish-blue light from the luminous stone on the ceiling casting a gloomy shade across his face. He turned on his side, lazily staring at the ceiling as if hoping he could sleep a bit longer.
Sary (thinking):
(*"What should I do today? Should I ask for leave to go out and wander?")
A dry "knock knock" echoed at the door. Right after came the monotone voice of an attendant:
> "Captain Sary, the Demon King summons all captains to the Summoning Chamber."
Sary froze.
Sary (thinking):
(*"No... Not another meeting. I hate those meetings. In there... the way they look at me is like they're checking if I even truly exist...")
---
[Summoning Chamber – Where Darkness Gathers]
The meeting room was nothing like a grand hall. It was a circular chamber deep underground, with walls and ceiling inlaid with ancient symbols shifting in a faint glow – a language only those who had crossed into death could comprehend.
At the center, a long stone table of blood-red hue, cold and curved like the spine of some ancient beast. Surrounding it were nine chairs, each one entirely unique, representing the race of each captain.
---
[Captain of Unit 2 – Velmira, Vampire Clan]
A graceful figure cloaked in deep crimson velvet, as if woven from the moans of victims.
Her long, black hair flowed like dark silk to her waist. Her pale purple lips pressed gently, walking the fine line between nobility and monstrosity.
Her eyes were the red of coagulated blood – a gaze that could make the hearts of the living wish to stop beating.
---
[Captain of Unit 3 – Tharok, Infernal Clan]
A mass of flesh and horns – his body forged of petrified magma, cracked like a restless volcano.
Horns twisted around his head like a burning crown, and his eyes were flaming pits, without any whites.
No one dared sit near him for long – the heat around Tharok could burn away the will of the weak-hearted.
---
[Captain of Unit 4 – Nyss, Dreamshade Clan]
She didn't sit – she floated, like a dream that had never woken.
Her body semi-transparent, indistinct between flesh and mist. Her eyes always closed, but... there was the sense she was seeing through layers of one's thoughts.
Her voice – if it spoke – was like a call echoing from a forgotten memory.
---
[Captain of Unit 5 – Durge, Undying Lich]
A skeleton inlaid with magical gemstones, who once incinerated dozens of mages with just the empty stare of his skull.
His voice did not come from his mouth – but resonated inside the listener's head, like the echo from a nameless grave.
Durge was once a genius sorcerer, but he strangled himself during the lich transformation ritual, rejecting death – and humanity.
---
[Captain of Unit 6 – Zegram, Demonic Insectoid Clan]
Tall, thin, and deformed, he cloaked himself in cocoon silk, occasionally shivering from the calls of parasitic bugs within his body.
He had four arms – two holding books, two catching insects to eat raw.
The chitinous wings on his back buzzed like fever. No one knew whether he saw with eyes or with a nerve-web spread like spider silk.
---
[Captain of Unit 7 – Ilhena, Dark Dryad Clan]
Still as a dead ancient tree, her body bark-gray, her long hair flowing like coiling roots.
Each step she took left a quiet trail – like hell sprouting from the soil.
Her eyes were dark green, without light, only veins of decay.
They say Ilhena could turn an entire forest into a graveyard – or the reverse.
---
[Captain of Unit 8 – Karthun, Giant Oni Clan]
He did not sit on a chair – but on a massive boulder, as his body stood three meters tall, shoulders as wide as fortress gates.
His skin cracked like broken stone, and his back sprouted jagged plates like natural armor.
Karthun didn't speak much – every word was a death sentence.
When he walked, the earth cracked. When he stood still, the air stopped moving.
---
[Captain of Unit 9 – Lysaria, Spirit Clan]
She floated like an unrested soul – no shadow, no footstep.
Hair white as ash, skin almost translucent. Her eyes… saw no one, only what will happen.
---
The air in the room thickened. Not smoke, not steam – but the pressure of presence from those gathered around the bloodstone table.
Velmira leaned back against her chair, her slender fingers lightly stroking a goblet of wine as dark as dried blood:
> "Here we go again... another meaningless meeting where everyone pretends to be noble but secretly wants to tear each other apart. How dull."
Durge – his skull flickering with eerie blue light – responded in a voice with no sound, but heard inside every mind:
> "Dull? I find it amusing. It's quite the show watching a bunch of monsters trying to talk like civilized people."
Zegram chuckled softly, the sound hissing like cockroaches crawling across a skull:
> "Spoken like someone who once had flesh, Durge. And you, Velmira... that blood in your cup was a gift from me – though I suspect you watered it down with something vain called 'etiquette.'"
Velmira glanced at him, her gaze like a deadly kiss:
> "If it were your blood, I might have thrown up."
Karthun tapped his fist on the table, the sound like breaking stone:
> "Enough. Don't you get tired of bickering every meeting?"
Ilhena, her voice like wind through dead trees, whispered:
> "We don't argue because we're tired, Karthun. We do it because... none of us trust each other."
Nyss still kept her eyes closed, but her voice rang out from... somewhere:
> "Trust is a concept for dreamers. I only trust in death."
Tharok growled, the fire in his eyes flickering as if ready to explode:
> "Good. Then let's start killing, and skip the meetings."
Durge shifted slightly, the sound of bones grinding echoing like drums from a tomb:
> "...I only wonder... if he'll be on time today."
No one replied. No one mocked.
Zegram – voice lower than usual – spoke of Sary:
> "Whenever he enters... every insect in my nest falls still. As if... he carries something that does not belong to this world."
Velmira took a slow sip of blood, her crimson eyes flashing with pride:
> "You're all beneath me. He shows me great favor."
Nyss – whispering as if to herself:
> "He once asked if I could disappear at any moment."
Karthun, eyes like obsidian, said nothing. But the giant arm he placed on the table clenched, the stone beneath cracking – not from rage. But... anticipation.
Ilhena toyed with a brittle branch in her hand, whispering in an ancient tongue only rotting trees could understand.
The roots in her hair curled inward.
Tharok – the infernal warlord always eager for battle – this time rested his head in one hand, staring at the tabletop.
> "I cannot comprehend him," he said, voice low and uneven. "And because of that... I dare not underestimate him."
Lysaria floated silently, not seated. Her hair drifted though there was no wind, her empty eyes fixed on the empty chair:
> "Whenever he looks at me, the souls around me scream in chaos."
Durge finally spoke, concluding with a vague dread:
> "Perhaps... not even the Demon King understands him."
---
The door to the Summoning Chamber creaked open.
A soft "screech" – like a whisper from a blade sliding out of its sheath – yet enough to make all nine captains turn their heads in unison, eyes like spears ready to be thrown.
A figure stepped in. Not fast. Not slow.
Sary.
He wore pitch-black clothing, simple yet without a single crease – as if darkness had sewn itself into human form.
White hair cascading down, in sharp contrast to eyes so deep they reflected nothing – the kind of gaze that made one wonder: is he looking at me, or through the entire world?
Sary said nothing.
Did not bow.
Did not smile.
He simply walked past the captains as if they were nameless ghosts.
Velmira instinctively held her breath.
Tharok clenched his fists until the stone table cracked further.
Zegram... for the first time, the insect chatter in his body fell silent.
Lysaria closed her eyes, as if to block out the cries of the spirits pouring into her ears.
Sary sat in the last chair – the only empty one, directly across from the Demon King.
No one spoke.
No one dared move.
And then the Demon King appeared.
Not by footsteps.
Not by sound.
But as if... he had always been there, only just now allowing himself to be seen.
> "The meeting begins."