Time passed, and night fell over the city. Zero and Soma, chatting about the day's respectable earnings, headed up to the loft. As they climbed the stairs, they were met not with the usual quiet, but with the sound of a heated argument.
They went up to find Legolas and One bickering over a new pile of books and parchments that had been delivered.
"Okay, okay, what's going on?" Zero asked, stepping between them.
"He's accusing me of lying and making up stuff!" One said, pointing an accusatory finger at Legolas.
"I'm just saying," Legolas retorted, his elven grace completely replaced by human frustration, "you don't need to pretend you can read some squiggly, unreadable nonsense just to make yourself look smart."
"From the top, please. What happened?" Zero said, his voice taking on a note of command.
One took a deep breath. "Sebas just dropped off this new batch of books. Unfortunately, they weren't sorted by topic, but by author. Who the hell does that?"
"So I was just trying to help," Legolas cut in. "And this one book, the one with the alien script, was in the pile. Since I can't read it, I was going to put it in the 'other' pile, but he says it's not unreadable."
"It's not!" One insisted.
Zero and Soma both looked at the book in question, the one Sebas had shown in the Hub. In a moment of perfect, conflicting unison, they both spoke.
"It's readable," Zero said. "It's unreadable," Soma said.
Zero and Soma froze, looking at each other. A cold, dawning realization hit Zero. "Oh, fuck," he whispered. "It's the book Sebas was talking about."
He walked over to One and grabbed his original book, 'The First Principles of Abyssal Weaving.' He held it up to all three of them. "All of you can read this, right?"
Soma, Legolas, and One all nodded. "Yes," they said in unison.
Zero then took the new book, 'Understanding the Cosmos Within Abyssal Weaving.' He held it out again. "Can you read this?"
"No," Soma and Legolas said, shaking their heads. "Yes," One said, looking confused as to why this was a question.
They all looked at each other, the strange, impossible truth settling in the room.
Zero sighed, a heavy weight pressing down on him. "There are too many proofs leading us to it."
"Leading us to where?" One asked.
"It's a Demon God Inheritance," Zero said, the theory that had been forming in his mind finally spoken aloud.
"Whoa," Soma and Legolas said at the same time. "That's a huge leap."
"That's why it's a theory," Zero said, his mind racing. "But look at the facts. Book 1, 'First Principles': that demon girl in the library, a normal demon, couldn't read it. But all of us, clones of an Archdemon, can. That means it's an Archdemon-locked text." He then held up the new book. "And now this one. A book that only I, the original, and One, the newest clone, can read."
"What are you talking about?" Soma asked, not following. "We're all your clones."
"So is Sebas," Zero countered, the final piece clicking into place. "And he can't read it. But One, who has no card, no other influence, can. It means this is a Pure Archdemon-locked text. Your cards... Soma, Legolas, Sebas... your new natures have locked you out of this advanced knowledge."
"How does it know?" Legolas asked, staring at the book. "To me, it's just a bunch of squiggle lines."
Zero looked at One, then at the two books. "I guess that's what we're going to find out. At the end of this training."
"Just saying all this... it sounds dangerous," Soma said, his voice low and worried.
Zero made a decision. "Soma," he said, his voice firm. "Can you handle the café floor alone?"
Soma's face fell. "Uh oh. I don't like where this is headed. For how long?"
"Until we're done exploring this book," Zero said, gesturing to himself and One.
Soma thought for a long, hard moment, then let out a resigned sigh. "Fine. As long as there are no more 'commotions' happening when customers are here. I can't cover for you. You're a demon, like it or not. Every bit of weirdness, every bright light or shaking building, will be reported straight to the Watchers. Remember Sal's... explosion... yesterday."
"I'll keep that in mind," Zero promised.
…
Three days passed. The loft of the café had transformed into a whirlwind of obsessive research. Zero and One were at it constantly. They cross-referenced the magical parchments from Sebas with the two Abyssal tomes, their notes and diagrams covering every available surface.
There was a palpable sense of ease when they practiced the Abyssal Weaving, a natural, intuitive flow of power. In contrast, trying to follow the complex, rigid formulae of traditional runic magic felt foreign and clunky, like trying to write with the wrong hand.
Soma and Legolas watched the two of them work. Their diligence was inhuman. They seemed to sleep for only an hour at a time, waking up instantly refreshed, and then diving right back into their study—a constant, exhausting cycle of theory, hypothesis, and practice.
"That's a demon body for you," Legolas remarked to Soma as they stood at the bar, watching the two "Zeroes" in the loft. "One hour of sleep, and you're as fresh as a new morning."
"We also have demon bodies, you know," Soma pointed out, wiping down a glass.
"Yeah," Legolas said with a light shrug. "But I love sleep too much to not enjoy it." He took a sip of his morning tea.
"Speaking of which," Soma grumbled, "where is my self-cleaning apron?"
"Your absurd request will not be adhered to until I get the means," Legolas replied, his voice laced with mock-aristocratic boredom. "Lower your expectations, would you? I just got here."
"Just say it if you can't make it, loser," Soma jabbed, a grin on his face.
"Hey!" Legolas shot back, offended.
"Hehehehe!"
…
My name is Marc Auch, a young demon. I live with my grandma; my mother works as a nanny for a wealthy merchant, while my father works at the docks. With them as the pillars of my life, I've worked and studied to be here, at a school—a prestigious one, filled with all the fancy nobles. I got here on a full scholarship, all because a professor was once saved by my father at the docks.
I remember it clearly. When I was a kid, my father came home, awkwardly smiling, with a dwarf whose face was clearly tired, his eyelids swollen from crying, and he seemed so thin. Mother was mad at Father for bringing him home, but I can't really remember what their argument was about. I just went to the dwarf and gave him my blanket, since he seemed to be shivering in the cold of the night.
In the end, he stayed. He sat by our fireplace and told me stories I'd never heard before, stories of distant lands and other continents. By the end, he asked what I wanted to be, and I said I wanted to be like him. He chuckled, a sad, tired sound, and patted me on the head. "You should be better than me," he said.
After that night, I never saw him again. Years passed. When I was of age for work, my father urged me to join him at the docks. "A strong demon is an alive demon," he'd always say. But then, a mail-bird arrived. It was an offer: a full scholarship to the most prestigious academy in all of Evercrest. Without a second thought, I filled in the form and registered myself.
Long story short, it's been three years since I started at this school. One would think I'd have at least three friends by now. But no. It seems that each year, I only make more enemies. And there's no use complaining; talking to the faculty only makes it worse.
One time, one of the clique leaders threw a bag of piss on me right as I arrived at the school gates. Having only one uniform, I couldn't go home to change. I had to take off my blazer and shirt and desperately try to wash them in the bathroom sink.
But not only was I accused of "indecent exposure" for not wearing a proper uniform on school grounds, but when I tried to tell them what really happened, they just called the clique leader's parents. A baron and a wealthy merchant. They came to the school, pushed my father around, and forced him to prostrate himself on the floor, to beg for their forgiveness for my "slander" against their precious son.
After that, I just kept to myself. There is no use in fighting back when the ones you're fighting never have to step onto the battlefield to begin with.
But one day, a new commotion started. A new, trendy café, run by that master chef from the food competition. I knew I would never be able to go there. Not with them around, always so happy with themselves, always so loud. After school, it always just felt like a race to get home as fast as possible. Go back home, take care of Grandma, who has been forgetting things more and more lately.
Then, a new rumor started to spread: the trendy café was run by a demon. My classmates, the noble and rich ones, stopped going. They called it a "filth-den." But for me it was a chance. One day I walked past Delancey Alley. The trendy café, Café LeBlanc, suddenly didn't seem so out of reach anymore.
For the first time in my life, I saw it. The impossible. I saw a demon, his horns clear as day, standing, talking and laughing easily with an elf and a dwarf customer at one of the tables. He even had a human employee.
The demon saw me. "Hello, kid," he said. His voice was... cheerful. "Never seen you before, but I recognize that uniform." He knew about my classmates.
The human employee, the chef, threw a rag toward the demon. "Stop scaring the kid, just ask him what he wants."
So, the demon owner was just a rumor. The demon was still an underling to the human cook. But then... the demon caught the rag and threw it right back. "I did, you jerk! Go back to your station!"
I flinched. 'Oh no, they're going to beat him now.' But... no. The chef and the demon just... laughed. As if it were a joke all along. Where was I? And since when could a demon laugh with, and not just be laughed at?
The demon turned back to me, his voice kind. "Come on and sit, kid. My name is Zero, and that inconsiderate chef is Soma."
From then on, I started helping Father at the docks on the weekends, just to get paid enough so I could buy my parfait at the start of every week. For the first time, I had something to look forward to after school.
But... one day, my grandma's memories got worse. I remembered she would always cook something, a special kind of stew, and sit by the porch whenever she missed Grandpa, and just eat that meal. I remember the ingredients, I remember the taste... but I don't know how to make it.
Today was the day I was going to ask Chef Soma. He's a good human. He always smiles and treats me like anyone else. I've been saving my money for months, enough to pay him to make it. Surely, with this much money, I could finally ask him for this one request, right?
…
Soma was stationed at the bar, handling the mid-lunch rush by himself. The ding of the bell over the door chimed, and he looked up.
"Marc! It's been a while," Soma called out, a friendly grin on his face. "The usual parfait? Lucky for you, Zero's not here today, so I'll be the one making it."
One of the regulars, a dockworker, laughed from his table. "I'm telling the boss you talk behind his back the moment he gets in!"
"Hehe, go ahead," Soma shot back without missing a beat. "Then I'll just make your portion smaller every day. See how you like that."
The regular gasped in mock-horror, and the café chuckled.
Marc, meanwhile, was standing by the door, wringing his hands. He took a deep breath and, with a burst of courage, said, "Can... can I order a special menu?"
Soma's eyebrows raised. "Owh? Trying something new from my fixed menu, huh? That works. What can I get for you?"
"No," Marc said, his voice trembling slightly. "I... I... uh... um..."
Henry, the keymaker, who was sitting nearby, gave the boy a gentle but firm slap on the back. "Spit it out, kid. The chef's a busy man."
"Ah! Eerm..." Marc said, startled. "Canyoumakespecificdishbasedofmemoriesihad?"
"Huh? What?" Soma said, leaning over the counter.
Marc took another, deeper breath. "Can you make a specific dish... based on a memory I had?"
Soma's playful expression faded, replaced by one of intense, professional interest. "Is this related to what you asked me about last week?" he asked, connecting the dots. "I mean, like I said, I can try. But I need to know the specifics. How specific is it?"
Marc, his voice growing a little stronger, began to describe the taste. The salty, savory broth, the specific tenderness of the meat, the slight bitterness of a root vegetable he couldn't name, the way it made him feel warm.
Soma listened, his hand on his chin. "I've never heard of a dish with that combination," he mused. "But... let's see what I can do."
"Are you gonna close the café again?" a regular called out, half-joking.
Marc immediately panicked. "I... I've got some Sol," he said, pulling a small, heavy pouch from his bag. "I've been saving. I know it's not enough for all your trouble, but this is a compensation—"
Soma held up a hand, cutting him off. He walked over and gently patted Marc's head, pushing the money pouch away. "No need for that, kid," he said softly. "Buy a gift for your parents or your grandma for me. That's the only payment I need."
He went to work. The challenge had lit a fire in him. He moved through the kitchen, not with the flash and spectacle he'd shown Sal, but with a thoughtful, investigative precision, trying to reverse-engineer a flavor from a feeling. In the end, he had three small sample bowls.
"Tadaa," he said, placing them in front of Marc. "Now, try these and tell me which one is closest."
Marc tasted each one. His eyes lit up. "This is... this is really good, Chef Soma! All of them are!" He paused, his expression falling slightly. "But... there's something off. Something... missing."
Soma frowned. "You think?" He looked at the bowls, then at the clock. The day was almost over. "It's too late to try again now. Come back tomorrow. I'll try something else."
"Oh, no, it's okay," Marc said, gathering his things. "I've troubled you enough."
"Nonsense!" Soma said, a competitive glint in his eye. "You brought this challenge to me, and now you want me to back out? No way. You just come back tomorrow. I'll crack this."
"Thank you, Chef!" Marc said, a new hope in his eyes.
…
The next morning, Marc was there the moment the doors opened. Soma, who had clearly been thinking about it all night, was ready. He presented three more samples, each with a different variation of spices and cooking times.
Marc tasted them. He looked up at Soma, his face apologetic. "It's closer... it really is... but it's still not it. I'm sorry."
Soma was genuinely stumped. He'd used the best ingredients, the most advanced techniques. He leaned against the counter, racking his brain. Then, the first, most important question hit him.
"Marc," he asked. "Who cooked this dish for you?"
"My grandma," Marc replied.
"Where does your grandma live?"
"Why do you want to know?" Marc asked, a little confused.
"I need to know where she gets her ingredients!" Soma said, the "Aha!" moment hitting him like a thunderbolt. He realized the problem. He'd been using the best of the best ingredients from the café's magical storage—perfectly butchered meat, flawless, uniform vegetables, purified water. But a dish from memory, a dish from a grandma... that wasn't made with perfection. It was made with local, cheap cuts, with the specific, mineral-heavy water from their district's well, with the slightly-too-bitter roots that grew in the nearby fields.
The problem wasn't his skill. It was his ingredients.
Marc told him the small, outer district where his grandma lived.
Soma's competitive fire was back, burning brighter than ever. "Okay," he said. "Come back in two days. I need to do some... research... tomorrow."
**A/N**
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**A/N**