Ch.13

[Adam's bucket list]

1. Meet Lucifer2. Punch his fucking pretty face3. Interrogate and get the fucking answer

Yeah, simple!Adam put down the pen and looked at what he had just written. Then he burned it so that no one would find it. Yeah, those simple things took seven years. He waved a hand to remove the smoke.

He had tried these for the last seven years. On the first extermination day, he had chased Lucifer in the rain like cats and dogs. But he had failed.

As it turned out, it was the closest approach he had ever had success with.

On the second and third, he couldn't even see anything of the king. On the fourth, he found Lucifer through the castle's window. But then Lucifer closed the curtain. What Adam could do was only glare at the window.

On the fifth, he failed to track him again. On the sixth and seventh years, because Lute had kept her eyes on him the whole time, he couldn't even leave the battlefield. She said nothing, but Adam supposed she was following orders from her highest superior.

Sera had started to suspect Adam. She knew Adam had been trying to meet Lucifer.

Adam, one of the seraphim, was in the top class in the hierarchy. But he was restricted from accessing the core secrets sometimes. There was a clear line between Adam and the other Seraphim.

Adam guessed Lucifer had been hiding something, and Sera knew it. But she would never disclose it as she had done before.

Yeah, that's what heaven does. Adam clenched his jaws.Fooling people with those plastic smiles, telling them this is for their own good.

Adam had followed their rules. Even though he had had free will since being an angel, he couldn't defy heaven. He had chosen to be a good kid to them and benefited from them.

But after he had met Lucifer again, he couldn't take it any longer.

So Adam had to find it out himself. Adam had never been obsessed with something to this extent. He had been pretending to be casual in front of angels so as not to look suspicious, but for the last seven years, his mind had been full of meeting Lucifer again every day.

He had to know what the inner voice meant. The name of those freaking strong emotions. The reason why his emptiness of life had never been filled forever. What he had lost and what he should find.

If I can get neither permission nor information, okay then.I'm going to go to hell by myself.

...

"Uncle Adam!"

After many attempts over seven years, Adam had invented a new idea. To escape the vigilance of the seraphim, he should become well-versed in their schedules. That was the only way he could uncover the secret passage to hell.

The key to this plan is a bit...annoying, though."Emily," Sera said gently. "You really like him.""Yes! He's so funny and silly. I like him."

Emily was the youngest member of the Seraphim. Despite being one of the powerful angels, she was, in Adam's words, naive and childish so Sera tended to be overly protective of her.

Emily clung to Adam like a monkey. Adam tried not to let the corner of his mouth drop.

"Thank you for taking care of her, Adam. I thought you would find it bothering."

"NO- no ho-hoo! I'm the first man, Sera! The sitter-master. I see every kid as my kid." Emily climbed up to his shoulder, playing with his hair.

Sera smiled in relief and left her with the man.

As soon as Sera exited the room, he held Emily with both hands to let himself off of her.

"Oookay! Sweetie, um. Before we have fun and an amazing day, we make a deal about-"

"Uncle Adam, why haven't you come to meet me these days? I nearly died wanting to hear your story! How was hell? How's the world going?"

Emily liked him because she was so interested in the world outside of heaven. Adam had lived the longest life as a human. He knew many things that angels would never tell her.

"Adam, I've missed talking with you! Say fun stories, please!"

She flew up with her six wings to get off his hands and jumped into him again. Adam was knocked over like a bowling pin.

"Ugh, alright! What do you want?" Adam sat up on the floor. Emily laughed on his lap, enjoying his silliness."Fun story!"

...Shit. Kids! Why are they so obsessed with funny stories? Adam wanted to pick her off again, but he should please her humor. She was the last key that would teach Adam the blind spot of the Seraphim's monitoring.

Adam sighed deeply. Okay. Let's do it. What do kids like today? Adam put his brain to work.

An entertaining extermination? Nah. Um... the hot as fuck night I had? Sera will kill me again, no. Then... what about fairy tales? Shit. I don't know any. I didn't even have parents who read me bedtime stories!

"Tell the story of the world! When you are not in heaven."

Adam tried to recall any memories. Everything was older than ten thousand years at least. He barely remembered only a few impressive images. They were dim like an old dream.It would be better to make up any story.

"Okay. Um... Once upon a time."Emily looked up at Adam in excitement, sitting on his lap. Adam couldn't meet her twinkling eyes.

"There was a star. A twinkling star."He awkwardly kept telling the story, looking at nothing.

"The star lived on the biggest tree. Because... um, he was a shooting star. He had fallen from the night sky. So he climbed on the highest branch to see his hometown. And he... beautifully sang every day there."

Adam glanced at Emily. She looked already immersed in the story. Adam kept making up the story from the bottom of his memories.

"The star sang every day, missing his home. The melody was bright, but it was sad. I don't know, I just... felt sadness in the song.

Because it was too sad, the leaves were stirred by the wind to cry with him, and the tree bore the poisoned fruits by his tears. He missed his home so much. But he couldn't go back."

Adam stopped the story. Was this... too gloomy? He tilted his head to Emily. Her big eyes were in sorrow.

"I wish the star was an angel like us," she said with a sad voice."Why?""He could have flown up to the sky."

Adam wasn't sure what he was talking about. He just created the story. "Well, actually, the star could do so. He had many wings."

But why did he keep telling it as if he knew it?Emily frowned lightly. "Then why didn't the star just fly back home?"

"Because... the star met a traveler." Adam glanced at her too serious face.

And he pressed his palms against his cheeks, contorting his features into a funny face. "An ugly traveler- like an ugly duckling!"Emily laughed aloud. Adam made a small smile too.

He got his hands off and slowly started to rock her while hugging her. He continued the story.

"He was a silly traveler. The star worried about him. So the star couldn't leave there. He shined on the tree every night so that the traveler could find his way home.

Every time the darkness fell, the star protected the man with its starlight. It was his guardian star. It was always there with him."

Adam saw Emily's eyes looking sad, transparent like a mirror. Or they may have been just reflecting someone else's.

"One day, the star disappeared. The traveler looked for him, but he couldn't find him. The man wandered in the dark. Then he fell down and hurt his knees. They were hurt, so he cried aloud.

He realized how the star had lightened his path. Only then did he realize why the starlight was the brightest. He thought the star was the strongest, but it was wrong, just the closest to him. The star was the nearest to protect him. He realized it only after the shine had left him."

Adam finished telling the story, but neither of them moved. He noticed Emily had been holding his hand like stopping its trembling.

"Uh..." Adam tried to sober up from the weird mixture of memories.

"Then, what happened to them?" she said with pleading eyes. "Did they meet again in the end?""At the ending, they..."

Adam sprang to his feet holding her in his arms. "To be continued-!"Ee-ek! Emily pouted like complaining. "So cheap!"

Adam laughed like a villain. "You want more? You should pay for it! That's how the world works, kid!"

Adam spread his golden wings and lightly flew up like dancing with her.

"How?" She asked playfully. Adam stood on the floor and put her down."Simple! Just a single favor." The angel smiled like a devil. He whispered into her ear.

"If you happen to know when Sera and the elders..."

...

In the midnight of hell, the only ruler had been living in a castle.

It was huge and had a magnificent garden. A profound silence hung over it as usual.

But a small noise broke it. Someone was hiding in the bushes of the garden, someone who didn't belong to hell or perhaps anywhere.

Adam, the first man, had ended up sneaking into the castle.

He came here to find out about Lucifer. The chief of heaven's military had intruded into hell, a big deal that should have been called something beyond rebellion.

But it didn't bother him. He needed to do this. He had to meet Lucifer.There was nothing that could stop his will.