[center] AMPELLIO
With one idiot out of the way, Ampellio silently prayed that they wouldn’t run into anymore. If he could keep the demons away from Ryuu and Ryo, Marcellina, Vencentio, Anastasio, Izel….infact, if he could keep the demons away from [i]everyone[/i], that would be just great. It was a sheer miracle that Valente left right before the demons arrived and Ampellio didn’t want to test that luck any longer than he had to. He didn’t even know if Valente was aware that the demons were here and the last thing he needed was Valente arriving out of nowhere.

“ Great. Follow me.” He said with a smile and lead the demons out of the kitchen. It seemed that Marcellina had actually done something as the halls were clear of unconscious bodies, allowing them to move freely with-in the fortress. “ Excuse me for asking, but why are you searching for a duck of all things? Do demons have an unfounded amatide complex that no one knows about?” Ampellio, of course, knew the exact answer, even lived under the same roof as the person who caused it, but he wanted to know how much the demons knew about the situation, or how much they were willing to disclose.

ZRA
“ Well….” The demon started off, looking to Alu uncertainly, “ All we can say is that this duck is very important to us. It is important that we find him,” He trailed off warily, “ ….it, soon.” He corrected himself, hoping he hadn’t given too much away. The only species that should know about the Prince’s disappearance should be the wizards and demons alone, but Zra wasn’t sure how much the other species knew about the situation, or if they had chosen sides in this conflict. It was best not to say anything too revealing for now.

AMPELLIO
“ Ah, I see. Well, I hope you find the duck you’re looking for soon.” Ampellio smiled sweetly, turning the corner sharply. “ Here we have the main room, where most of our members relax, but it seems empty at the moment.” Because all of them are recovering in their rooms, he finished off in his head, deciding whether or not the spirit’s attack had been a blessing in disguise. “ I am not sure where all of our members went…maybe its lunch time?” He wondered out loud, flashing a smile to the demons to show off his pointed fangs. “ Would you like to come back at another time, when there are actual people here, or would you like to look around some more? You’re welcome to do so, but I don’t want to waste your time when you obviously have more important matters to attend….to…” His sentence was cut short when one of the demons, the one with blue hair, suddenly bolted from the room, running down the hall as fast as he could. Honestly, Ampellio wasn’t used to being surprised, but he hadn’t expected the demon to make a run for it like that. He turned his gaze to the remaining demon and looked at her expectingly, “ Well, I wonder what that was about.”

ANASTASIO
“ Wow Izel, this is amazing!” The young vampire said with excitement, amazed at how the amulet was actually glowing like Izel said it would! Because of Valente, Anasatio loved magic and loved watching him preform it. But this was something totally different. Izel was a vampire like himself, who shouldn’t possess magic like Valente, and yet here he was, in a magic circle!! It was amazing! 
At that moment, the door to the office open and Protettore walked in, his eyes darting straight to the magic circle on the floor. An awkward silence filled the room as Protettore stared at the circle and Anastasio and Izel stared at him. Finally, a disappointed sigh left Protettore and he began to shake his head, “ I’m going to skip the what and go straight to the why.”

“ Izel said that it’ll protect me from the evil spirit haunting this fortress!!” Anasatio explained, turning to look at his brother with excitement and wonder in his eyes. “ I asked if he could do it for everyone but he said it only works for one person….but isn’t it cool?!”
It took a second for Protettore to reply, but when he did, he sounded just as fed up as before. “ Valente has dealt with the spirit already, there’s no need for this.” He said, crushing their dreams with a single sentence. Immediately Anastasio’s excitement left him and he looked down at the amulet with a frown, “ Oh….”

Before anyone had the chance to say anything else, the door slammed open once more, but this time, a man Anasatio had never seen before stood there. Maybe he was a new hire? There were a strange pair of…horns on top of his head, and his hair was an eccentric blue, but more than that, there was something off about him that set him apart from everyone else. Much like Valente, he had a different aura around him. Protettore obviously felt it too because Anastatio watched his brother immediately tense up as he glared at the stranger. 

“ Who the fuck are you.” He demanded, his anger rising at an incredible rate. Anastasio was hardly around whenever his brother got this angry, so seeing Protettore like this made the hair on his arms stand up. Worriedly, he turned to Izel and whispered to him in a low voice, “ Izel…is this the spirit you were talking about?”

ZRA
Suddenly running off like he had wasn’t his plan, nor his intention, but when Zra had picked up a faint use of magic in the fortress, that wasn’t coming from the kitchen, he had to follow it. It could have been the outlaw wizard trying to cover his tracks, or further hiding himself in the fortress. So without him even realizing it himself, he had taken off in top speed to catch whatever it was using magic. But to his surprise, the trail had lead him to a room which he kicked open and found three vampires inside, one of which was inside a magic circle of some sorts. Okay, so not the wizard he was looking for, but atleast there was magic being performed….however small it was. Zra felt the foreign feeling to regret seep into his bones as one of the vampires, perhaps the most threatening one in the room turned his attention onto him. 

With nothing else to say, Zra spoke the truth. “ I am Zra. I am a demon looking for an outlaw. The red haired vampire let me and my partner inside to inspect the premises.” He said with the most even voice he could. His gaze shifted back to the magic circle, inspecting it. Just as he thought as soon as he saw it, it was not the magic of a wizard, nor was it powerful enough to turn a demon into a duck. “ When I sensed magic I had to follow it. I apologize.” He returned his attention to the main vampire, expecting to be forgiven, but instead, he was greeted with a fist to the face. Demons were strong in their own right and a simple punch from a human would be nothing but an ant bite to them, but this vampire held so much strength in his punch that Zra stumbled backwards and fell to the ground. Having never been hit like that in his life, Zra remained momentarily stunned and confused as the vampire moved to loom over him.

“ I’m going to give you until the count of three to get out of my fortress, you trespassing son of a bitch.” The vampire warned, cracking his knuckles loudly. “ One.”

VALENTE
“ Your hair?” Valente questioned, actually having to take a second to think about what Jecht meant. Then, just like that, everything clicked together like the world’s most amusing puzzle. “ Oh! Aha, your hair! I can’t believe I forgot about that! I was starting to think that your hair was always like that, ahahahaha!!” He doubled over in laughter. Sure enough, when he looked back at Jecht, his attention went straight to the hair, making him laugh even harder, “ Ahaha, holy shit that’s so funny! And you fought with Trixxtal like that! Aha, no wonder he dumped you!” His laughter continued the more he thought about it. If he had known turning Jecht’s hair into a rainbow would be this funny when he did it, he would have made it a permanent feature.

“ Okay, okay, okay, I’ll stop now.” He chuckled, wiping a tear from his eye. “ I’ll turn your hair back to normal, but first, let me take a selfie!” His phone materialized in his hand quicker than even vampires could see and he appeared beside Jecht just as fast, smashing their faces together to fit in the screen of the phone. The flash went off and then Valente was gone just as quickly as he had appeared, safely out of Jecht’s reach before he knew what was happening and get his hands around Valente’s neck. Safe in the air and out of reach, Valente triumphantly reviewed his selfie, or as he would call it, his [i]masterpiece[/i]. The myth about vampires not appearing in mirrors or photographs was complete bullshit because the stunned/shocked expression on Jecht's face was just too PRICELESS not to be real. The rainbow hair only improved the picture. “ You’re lucky I don’t have social media Jecht, or else I would post this on insta! Look at us, we look like best friends!”

But Valente knew that he could only push his luck so far, and if bringing up Trixxtal and taking a selfie were strike one and two, he did not want to stick around for strike three. With a simple wave of his wrist, the color in Jecht’s hair dissolved into it’s usual dark locks and his hair was returned to normal. “ There, all done! Are you up for playing volleyball now?” he said, looking down at Jecht with a smile. 
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