Guardian Evil

CHAPTER 29: The Angel Of Death

Luciel carefully put Romina on her bed, still gasping for air. The palm marks starting to run over her shoulder that Simeon and L couldn’t help but feel worried as well.

“She’s burning hot yet her hands were cold…” L said while he was on top of Romina’s left hand.

“I should ask for the healing angel’s help. This not looking so good right now,” Simeon said as well.

“Get out… both of you,” Luciel told them in a low voice.

“What?”

“I said… get out.”

“But Luciel, at least let us help…” Simeon told him.

“You’ve done enough already. Let me do the rest and besides, I am her guardian. I must do this…”

“My master said we have to step out. Let us respect that, angel.”

Both L and Simeon looked at each other and bowed at him and silently went out of Romina’s bedroom using the window.

As the room became silent, Luciel started his ritual to seal the two of them inside of a circle. Then, he stood up beside her bed and held her hand gently using his left hand. He put his right hand over the palm mark and his eyes started to gleam into a crimson one. As he ran his hand over the mark, he couldn’t help but winced as his hand started to wipe away the said marking. It took him almost an hour or two to finally eradicate the said marking from Romina’s arm. When it was finally gone, he looked at Romina who kept on gasping for her. He gently opened her mouth and as his mouth was a few centimeters away from her, a gray smoke went out of her mouth and transferred to his. It also took him a minute or two for Romina to finally breathe in a stable manner. The circle vanished and as Luciel stood up and walked away from Romina, he coughed some black blood.

Immediately, Simeon and L went inside the room and the angel held Luciel. “Luciel, are you okay? What happened?”

“I managed to...” he coughed. “Take the mark away from her body,” he wiped his blood away from his mouth and looked at his hand. The burnt mark was also on his palm but it took a while for him to regenerate and make it fade away. “It somehow strange to me that the markings affected me so much like this. If this is caused by a demon, it’ll be too quick for me to get rid of the marking and it will not going to affect me so much like this.”

“So you think that... that Soul Eater is not a demon?” Simeon asked.

Luciel nodded. “Probably.”

“Could it be the reapers?”

“I don’t think the reapers will do that,” he responded. “It’s a violation of their code and besides, if one of the reapers will do this, it will not affect me this much except if they’ll going to use their death-scythe.”

Luciel nudged Simeon’s hand away from him and he walked towards the window. “L, watch over Romina while I’m out.”

“Where are you going?” the angel asked him.

He turned his head to Simeon. “I’ll just have to confirm something,” he jumped out of the window and flapped his wings, flying somewhere.

Both L and Simeon kept watching him until he was already out of sight. Simeon turned his head to Romina and sighed.

Romina felt something heavy on her forehead yet it was still comforting and warm for her.

She slowly opened her eyes and saw Luciel just wiping her forehead with a warm towel. “Luciel...?”

“You’re awake,” Luciel said as he put the wet towel back in the basin. Before Romina could even get up, he stopped her. “Just stay there. I already told your mother that you’re not feeling well and you’re having a mild fever that’s why you can’t go to school. She even asked me to watch over you.”

Romina slightly frowned. “Mama didn’t allow any people, especially strangers to enter my room, you know? So how come you convinced her that you’ll be going to stay just to watch over me? Don’t tell me you used your powers on her again? I told you not to do that!”

“For a human who’s actually sick, you talked too much,” Luciel said as he tapped her head. “Do not worry. I didn’t use my powers on her. Don’t you remember that she actually treated me as one of your best friends and she’s so fond and trusted me—which is too gullible for a human to trust a being like me—so she let me watch over you? She’s not even suspicious about me. And oh, Marivic was also here to visit you and she’s also the one who brought your excuse letter to the school.”

“Mabait lang talaga si Mama. Mama is nice and a loving woman that’s why,” she commented and slightly winced because of the headache she’s feeling. “A-Anyway, what happened yesterday? All I could remember is that I went to the library to find some reference book and a certain schoolmate that I don’t know who that is approached me and... and that’s all that I could remember.”

“You fainted after that. Turns out, you have a fever,” he patted her head once again. “Don’t stress yourself too much. Just rest. I’ll take care of the rest.”

Hesitant, Romina nodded. “Okay, I trust you, Luciel.”

Luciel flaunted a tiny smile on his face and he waited for Romina to finally fall asleep before he went out of her window to meet Simeon on the roof of her house.

“How is she?” the angel immediately asked him.

“She’s okay though she forgot her encounter with Soul Eater yesterday. I couldn’t ask her how does he look like so we could get rid of him,” Luciel told him.

“I guess it’s actually a good thing that she forgot about him. It’ll be traumatizing to her if she’ll remember that she almost got killed,” said Simeon. “I’m also worried about her.”

“Damn that beast. I couldn’t even feel his presence,” Luciel said as he gritted his teeth.

“I should search around and ask some of the guardians nearby. For now, just focus on guarding Romina since she’s the one that the Soul Eater was after,” Simeon told him.

“I don’t have the plan of just sitting around and doing nothing. I’ll search for him and eliminate him in an instant.”

“No. You have to watch over Romina because anytime, that creature will appear and take her soul away. Leave this mission to me.”

“I don’t trust angels.”

Simeon stared at Luciel for a moment before he responded. “Sachiel will not be going to be happy if he’ll hear you saying that. Trust me for now.”

Before Luciel could even breathe a word, Simeon flapped his wings and flew away.

“That idiot.”

The night was silent and Romina was in her deep slumber when a wind breeze entered her room and her eyes snapped open. She sat up on her bed and blankly stared at the window then at her door. Her eyes’ irises were black and her expression was blank. She stood up and walked towards her door and opened it as the wind breeze was around her, as if guiding her somewhere. She walked out of her room and out of her house, barefoot. She walked in a silent road until she turned her head to a faceless being that opened his hand to guide him to her.

“Come...” with an airy voice, he told her.

With her soulless expression on her face, Romina walked towards him and was about to hold his hand when a black spear blocked her way then three other spears aimed towards him which made him move backward as fast as possible.

Luciel immediately went in front of Romina and held her while her hand was still in the mid-air as if she was trying to hold the anonymous being in front of her, face blank like a doll.

“My, my, I didn’t know you can actually detect me like that. What a clever demon you are, Luciel. As expected, you didn’t fail to amaze me. Such a shame that you chose the wrong path of yourself. Sachiel must be disappointed.”

Gritting his teeth, Luciel spoke. “So all this time it’s you...”

The anonymous being smirked at him and immediately flapped its wings in front of him. The being’s hair started to light up from gray to a rich shade of white.

“Percival.”

The angel of death, Percival.

The angel named Percival chuckled and with a smug smirk on his face, he spoke. “Long time no see. I never thought you were still alive. It’s been centuries, Luciel.”