Chapter Text
The sky was dark as Iruma was dragged through the air. No moons, or even stars, lit up the sky. An unusual occurrence for the Netherworld, "Or maybe that's just my vision fading," Iruma thought as the grip around his throat tightened. He barely had time to process the thought before he was dragged through an open window into a cold, almost sterile, building and thrown unceremoniously into a metal chair, restraints latching themselves around his wrists and ankles while he was recovering from nearly being choked out.
Coughing a bit, he looked up at his assailant. The demon before him had long black hair that fell to the small of his back. He was dressed in the typical uniform of a member of Border Patrol and as he turned around Iruma saw that the demon's face bore a striking resemblance to Professor Kalego's. The jaw, nose, cheeks, even the eyebrows were a dead ringer for his teacher's. The only thing about his face that struck Iruma as truly distinct from Kalego's was the eyes. Kalego may not have always been the most outwardly affectionate towards his students but his eyes often gave away some of his true feelings, a flicker of pride at a student's accomplishment, a spark of satisfaction when his class's scores improved, and a consistent warmth, pervasive even through his most withering glares, that indicated a genuine drive to ensure his wards succeeded. This demon had no such aura about him. His eyes were empty of any desire to protect, almost looking hollow the longer Iruma looked at them. That, however, is not to say they held no passion whatsoever. In fact, his eyes held a concentrated zeal, bordering on madness and honed to an edge, an edge currently focused directly on Iruma.
"You should consider yourself lucky," the demon said, "If it were up to me you wouldn't even have had the chance to process what was happening before I eradicated you, but for now Mr. Azazel outranks me within Border Patrol so you'll get the standard procedure for all humans who dare trespass within the bounds of the Netherworld. Frankly, even within those rules, I find this to be far too lenient," the demon slunk closer to Iruma, grasping the boy's right hand and tracing along the ring permanently bound to Iruma's finger, "I mean seriously, letting a human of all things keep a gluttonous feeder ring, we could just cut off that finger and be done with it but no, he would much rather risk you accidentally unleashing the stored mana in the human world and have us try to clean up the fallout from that mess than let me maim one boy." The demon released his grip and backed away from Iruma, pinching the bridge of his nose in exasperation. "Whatever, I'll be back in a few minutes after I gather the materials needed for the spells," the demon said as he walked out of the room.
Iruma, for his part, looked as terrified as he felt. Eyes wide as he took shallow breaths, staying quiet as the menacing demon gave his speech before leaving. After he was alone he felt himself relax a bit now that the immediate threat was gone. Suddenly an inky figure flew out of his ring as Ali appeared.
"Ali-san!" Iruma said, his mood brightening despite the situation.
"Well Iru-boy we're really in the thick of it now, I'm not sure we're getting out of this one."
"C'mon Ali-san, there's gotta be something we can do. Can't you at least eat the amnesia spell or something?" Iruma asked, trying to focus on the more immediate problem rather than get overwhelmed by the larger issue of his imminent deportation.
"Well, I could quite easily devour such a spell, but I'd have to be out of the ring to do that and there's no way he wouldn't catch on that we're up to something once he saw me." The small figure looked up at Iruma, worry evident in his eye.
Iruma closed his eyes in contemplation, trying to think of a solution. Suddenly, his eyes flashed open with inspiration. "So the issue is specifically that he could see you?"
"Yeah, that's the main issue, but if you turned me into a fly he would probably notice his mana being pulled into such a small point."
"Right, I think I have an idea, I'm not sure it'll work but it's all I've got."
"Whatever it is, it has to be better than nothing."
"First things first," Iruma quickly cast cherushil nonverbally on his rank badge, turning it into a feather, akin to the one on the earing Bachiko gave him, which Ali then caught, "Can you attach that to my earring? I want to make sure they won't confiscate it." Ali did as he was asked and then turned back to Iruma, who then began explaining his plan properly. "So, I'm going to use cherushil to turn you into a bunch of mites and have you spread out on the surface of my skin, that way you're small enough that he won't be able to see you but you'll be spread out enough that it won't be obvious that you're absorbing the spell."
"Hey, that just might be able to work," Alikred said, waving his finger as he got on board with the idea, "but can you really visualize something like that properly?"
"I'm gonna have to, we're almost out of time."
Ali nodded as Iruma used cherushil once again, turning his partner into a dark cloud which quickly dissipated around Iruma and settled onto his skin imperceptibly. Just in the nick of time too, as Narnia burst his way back into the room.
"Alright, let's get this over with," the demon looked dispassionately at his equipment as he readied his spell.
Narnia deftly mixed ingredients together into an iridescent gray potion, which he then carefully poured into a pattern around Iruma. After ensuring that the pattern was drawn properly, he used his fang to nick his finger. Dripping some of the blood onto the pattern while pouring out some mana caused the pattern to light up as the amnesia spell activated.
What looked like ash began raining down on Iruma. It fizzled as it came into contact with his skin, Ali quickly consuming the spell before it could have any real effect on Iruma. Iruma did his best to react to the spell in such a way that it appeared to be working. The initial panicked response wasn't difficult to muster since he was already in crisis mode to begin with, but acting like the spell really was wiping his memory was trickier, he wasn't entirely sure how that would appear to an outside perspective. Flicking through his mind for any information that might help, he managed to improvise another plan. He increased the pace of his breathing, playing into his panicked performance, until eventually reaching a climax and he let his whole body go limp. By applying the ability to play dead, which he acquired due to his harsh upbringing, he perfectly mimicked someone passing out from fear, circumventing the issue entirely. The demon seemed to buy the act, at least from what Iruma could tell given that he had closed his eyes to better feign unconsciousness.
After a few minutes the rain of ash began to wane until eventually it stopped entirely. Iruma heard boots clack over to him and noticed his restraints were subsequently released. He then felt a hand grip the back of his neck as he was hauled off to a different part of the facility.
Once they had arrived at their destination, Iruma was haphazardly tossed onto the floor in the middle of yet another magic circle, though this one was permanently etched into the floor. Narnia crouched near the edge of the circle, marking it to set the specific destination in the human realm that it connected to while erasing the marks from the last time it was used.
After finalizing the preparations, Narnia once again released his mana and poured it into the circle. The pattern started glowing a bright scarlet as lavender colored smoke spiraled out from its center. The smoke got thicker and more voluminous until it eventually obscured Iruma entirely. The smoke began to dissipate shortly after, Narnia watching the entire time to ensure that the process went off without a hitch. Eventually the smoke became thin enough to see through, revealing that Iruma was nowhere to be found. Satisfied with a job well done Narnia turned to exit the room and attend to his other business.
Iruma felt his body drop onto the ground, the grass he was dumped onto distinct from the tile he was laying on a moment earlier. He laid still for a few moments longer, ensuring that he wasn't still under scrutiny by Border Patrol, before he moved up into a sitting position.
He gazed at the environment around him. A world sickeningly familiar yet one he was agonizingly separate from. A layer of clouds blanketed the sky, sunlight diffusing evenly through them and causing the world to be fully illuminated but entirely without shadows. Structures of metal and glass towered several stories into the air. Streets of black stone carried self propelling vehicles to their destinations.
The sounds of the cars burned into Iruma's ears, thorny vines of anxiety wove their way between his ribs, the grass he was sitting in felt as if it might bore its way through his hands at any moment. His pupils constricted as his breathing quickened. Unable to focus now that he had no immediate threat to focus on, his emotions rapidly spiraled until they pushed their breaking point. He gripped his knees tightly, almost to the point of bruising, pressure built up behind eyes that were welling with tears but couldn't quite manage to cry.
At this point, Alikred excitedly popped out of the ring. "Iru-boy! Your plan worked! I can't believe it, isn't this grea-" his voice was cut off as he noticed the state of the boy. He switched to his full sized form to better be able to comfort his companion. Reaching out a hand, he placed it between Iruma's shoulder blades. Iruma flinched at the sudden contact but didn't pull away.
For a time, they sat like that, Iruma feeling through his emotions and Ali silently accepting them. Eventually Iruma began to work past the most overwhelming sensations and was able to open up verbally.
"S-sorry Ali, it's just… a lot being back here," he gestured broadly, indicating that he meant the wider world and not this specific location.
"Yeah, I understand Iruma, take all the time you need."
"Meeting Grandpa and Opera and everyone was the best thing that ever happened to me y'know and now it's just… gone." He stretched out one of his arms, reaching out into the air before letting it drop. "I know that I can survive here but without them the world feels so empty."
"Well I'm still here, that has to count for something."
"Yeah, you're right. I still have at least one of my friends from the Netherworld."
"Oh, Iruma! You really do think of me as a friend, I'm touched." Ali swooned overdramatically, wiping a tear from his eye. The attempt at humor prompted the boy to smile slightly before it was quickly pulled back into his somber facade.
"I guess it could be worse, even though I'm here I don't have to stay with my parents anymore."
"Yeah, from what you've told me they don't seem like the type of people you'd want to live with."
"They're the worst," Iruma turned his face upwards, a slight rush of catharsis coming from admitting it, "Seriously, who sells off their own kid to a demon for money? They could have at least sold their own souls first," Iruma huffed.
"How'd they even figure out how to do that anyway?"
"I… don't actually know," his eyes lit up, "Hey if someone like them managed to summon Grandpa then what's stopping me from doing the same and going back that way?"
"I like where your head's at Iru-boy, but there's an issue or two with that plan. The biggest of which is that Border Patrol is going to be on tighter lookout for that type of summoning so a repeat event is unlikely to happen. Plus, the only demon of a high enough rank to be able to answer such a call, and who isn't aligned with Border Patrol to some extent, is Sullivan, and I imagine that he's not as free to move as he'd need to be to come up here."
The boy's face fell a bit at this news, "I see, still, it's not like it's impossible for someone to travel between worlds right now."
"I'm sorry," Alikred's ears drooped a bit, "I wish the outlook was better, but it seems like the best chance you have of going back to the Netherworld is for someone unrelated to Sullivan to illegally come over on their own accord and bring you back with them. Given the circumstances, I'd say that it's pretty much impossible for that to happen."
"So that's how it is," Iruma stood up, prompting Ali to return to his smaller form, "I guess I won't have to wait too long to go back then."
Ali looked at the boy incredulously, "Didn't you hear me? It's almost impossible for anyone to be able to do such a thing even if they were ranked as highly as your grandfather! For anyone else that's so far out of reach that it's not even conceivable, how can you be so confident that someone will come to get you?"
Iruma pulled at his earring, releasing the spell he had placed on his badge and returning it to its normal form. Standing unusually steady, he began to speak, "Within the Netherworld, there is a class, separated from the larger student body due to their unruly natures and wild personalities. Those demons, disadvantaged as they were, refused to accept the circumstances dealt to them. They turned fantasy into reality and made pipe dreams their playground. For them, nothing is out of reach and doing the impossible is just another week."
He began fixing his badge to the collar of his jacket. "You want to know how I know that everything will work out? It's because they are, no we are, the Misfit Class of Babyls and we wouldn't settle for anything less." With that, he had fully reattached his badge and gave his collar a confident tug. "Isn't that about right," he said as he gave Ali a broad, genuine smile, his first since returning to the human world.
Ali rubbed the back of his head, accepting Iruma's determination. "Geez kid, for someone who tries not to stand out you sure have a way of pulling people along with you. Alright, I'll take that answer." He floated up to perch on Iruma's finger before speaking again, "I'll keep an eye out for any spikes in mana usage that would indicate a portal opening up. It should be pretty easy considering no one else in this place can use mana."
"Thank you Ali-san."
"Don't mention it Iru-boy, you take care of yourself now. I can't bail you out of every situation since we have a limited mana pool to work with."
"I will," Iruma beamed.
Ali gave one last wave before returning to the ring. Iruma took a moment to collect his thoughts, centering himself before turning to face the world head on, and despite the situation, he couldn't stop smiling.