NOVEL NEXT 50 – Trials!
The trials were pretty straight forward. Kind of cliche, as well.
First she had to face off against some golems – who Jessica crushed – to prove her strength, then she had to solve some puzzles – it reminded her of video games – to prove her mind, and then finally she entered the last room where the great ancestor or whatever waited for her.
Long story short, Jessica understood about one tenth of what the ghost said because of his weird accent and ancient word use. She still offered her soul to serve the king and whatnot, but wasn’t really paying attention by the end of it all.
It was like automatically clicking the agree checkmark on the terms of service of some random software.
Maybe a little irresponsible. They were discussing her soul, after all. But, eh. Not like she was going to back out now, was she? She was always going to do this, so whatever.
Frankly speaking, the hardest thing about the trials was forcing herself not to accidentally stab the other general candidate. It was a bit of a letdown. She had expected something grueling and difficult. But then she remembered that Forneus had supposedly passed these trials as well, so they couldn’t be too challenging.
All in all, she breezed through them.
“Congratulations,” the spooky ghostly voice called. “Thou hast passed the trials.”
Finally.
Jessica stood there, holding her spear, waiting to finally be let go home.
“I shall grant thee a new name,” the voice continued. “Thy demonic general name shall be Tepes.”
Now, Jessica had no clue what the name meant, if it even meant anything, but it sounded cool enough, so she was satisfied.
“Thy designation shall be ‘the enchantress’.”
Tepes, the enchantress. Huh. I had a pretty cool ring to it. Better than Salem, the moon witch or Forneus, the incinerator, that was for sure.
“Thank you, honored ancestor,” she said, making sure to put as much reverence she didn’t feel into her tone as possible.
From the satisfied tone the great ancestor took on, he hadn’t seen through her act. These boomer ghosts sure were easy to trick. Jessica felt a little dumb going all out on her acting game.
Again, she remembered that Forneus had passed this test, and immediately felt even dumber for trying so hard and stressing out over the trials beforehand.
With a few more words of encouragement and promises to be super loyal and crap like that, the boring old ghost let her go.
The demon lord waited at the entrance of the volcanic tomb along with Nomed and Aura.
“Jessica!” Nomed called out. “So… did you pass?”
Seeing Nomed so excited, Jessica couldn’t help but tease him a little.
She forced herself to tense up, balled her fists, grit her teeth, and glared at the ground as she stopped walking.
A moment of silence followed as the trio stared at her in shock.
“Huh… No way! Seriously? Are you telling that you…”
Jessica directed her glare at the mumbling Nomed, her expression turning grim.
“Yeah…” She grunted in fake frustration. “I can’t believe it! Why was it so fucking easy?!” she finally yelled.
“... wait, what?”
“Why even have trials at all if it’s just going to be a little more than a formality?! Why hype them up like there’s no tomorrow if I hardly had to try to pass? Pche!” She scoffed. “I am completely and utterly disappointed.”
“Wait, wait, wait, so you did pass?”
Jessica rolled her eyes theatrically.
“Of course, I did, idiot! I mean, think about it. Forneus passed this thing.” She pointed back into the volcano with a thumb. “I would have to be asleep – no, dead – to not pass.”
Nomed sputtered at how smoothly she insulted Forneus and his abilities.
“Well,” Aura drawled. “She definitely has the arrogance of a demon general.” She nodded to herself. “So, what do we call you now?”
“Mm? Ah, right.” Jessica spun her spear, raised her chin, and put on an evil grin. “From today on, I am Tepes, the enchantress.”
“Enchantress… Very fitting,” Nomed noted with a shake of his head. “Well, congratulations regardless. I’m sure you will be an amazing general.”
Part of Jessica felt pride at the praise, but she was trying to get into a role, so she didn’t preen or even smile. Instead, she scoffed again.
“Of course, I will. That’s a given. It’s me.” She finally walked closer and out of the volcano. “Well, now that that’s done, let’s get out of this dump.”
“Err, Jessica… I mean, Tepes. The other candidate is still undergoing the trials…” Nomed tried to remind her.
Jessica gave him a deadpan stare. “Do I look like I give a shit? He should have hurried up if he didn’t wanna be left behind,” Jessica said as she strode out of the volcano outside.
“Wait! Oh, come on now…” Nomed trailed behind her, leaving Aura and the dumbstruck demon lord behind.
As she made it outside, she dropped the haughty arrogant demon general act for a second and narrowed her eyes as her thoughts wandered over to her future plans.
Finally knowing the truth changed some things. For one, she wasn’t planning on betraying the demon lord anymore. After all, although she liked some drama, helping the world implode would be a little too much even for her.
The whole ‘magical girls losing their attunement’ thing was another problem. Obviously, she wanted to try and figure out what triggered it in the first place, but didn’t actually want to cause it herself. In other words, she had to keep everything secret from the magical girls.
And sure, she could just say that she couldn’t tell them, but…
She had pledged to serve the demon lord and whatnot, and the demon lord wanted the magical girls thinking that demons were their enemies.
Never mind that she had been leading a rebellion against the demon lord just the other day.
And also, more importantly, it wouldn’t be any fun.
So, she was going to have to act as if they were her enemies again. The main problem was that she had already told them that the demons weren’t really evil, so they now expected Jessica to come back to them with all the answers.
Well, she’d had plenty of time to think about it during the trials since they had been so braindead.
The plan?
She was going to pretend that the trials somehow turned her evil or whatever and that the previous tidbits about the demon army’s true aim had just been a bait for her.
Yes, the trials were a disappointment incarnate, but she was still going to pretend they were something much grander.
The role of an eccentric demon minion Jessica was officially over.
Next up, the terrifying demon general Tepes, the enchantress.
