Necronomicon

[Kayito-san]

Allan's gaze poured intently over the crusted leaves. He licked his thumb and carefully turned to the next page, a different set of foreign syllables peering up at him. He'd studied it, learned its language and wisdom. It was mystifying, written as one would expect in such this nefarious tome. It was the Necronomicon, an ancient grimoire of 'untold power'.

That was if you believed in magic. Sadly, Allan was the skeptical type. As much as the occult drew his interest, he knew it was a work of fiction. Nevertheless he found solace reading through its pages. He could only imagine what these spells were said to do. The language in the book was strange, but somewhat poetic, and he'd taken it upon himself to decipher the passages. He flipped to the next page.

Allan was surprised to find an illustration– the first image thus far. He leaned closer to the book, tilting it upright so as to study the image further. Two circles, one within the other, some other symbols between their circumferences, a pentagram in the centre, a symbol in each of the five corners. He reached aside and drew a piece of paper and a pencil. He laid the paper down and carefully traced the diagram. Lifting the sheet from the book, he set it aside, and turned his focus to the opposite page. There was something unusual about this page. The syllabary was different this time. Rhythmic, closer to a pentatonic poem than to the multi-rhythmic prose otherwise featured.

Allan sat back in his chair and rubbed his chin. This was an interesting discovery. He understood what previous passages had indicated. While many of them had been instructions on how to create potions, mystical wards, and other spells, the Necronomicon had directed him that poems were only ever used in powerful incantations, such as materializations, charms… or summons. He'd used the information to create a variety of his own 'charms' and 'incantations', not because he thought they'd do anything, but because he found the book's language to be poetic. He felt that creating his own poetry based on the book's content and syllabic structure had been somehow justified– respectful.

His curiosity bested him; he stood, and tossed the sheet of paper to the centre of the floor. He cradled the book in his arm, and begin to slowly read…

… Allan waited momentarily. He cleared his throat. Nothing, of course. He was faintly disappointed, but not at all surprised. The Necronomicon was fictive, after all. He gathered the various sheets of paper from the table, and put them all together in a neat pile, closing the book and placing it beside them on his desk. It was late, he'd gotten carried away again. The paper on the floor sat there, motionless as he peered down at it. He shook his head and bent to pick it up.

"Ow, fuck" he muttered, the page falling back towards the floor. "Fucking papercut, ow." Allan sucked on his finger and then shook his hand gently. He looked down at the paper, one corner of which was smeared very lightly with blood. His finger, however, was still bleeding. "Nasty spot to get a cut…" he observed, and trod quickly to the bathroom to wash up.

 

[TakodaVega]

In Hell things were pretty much routine by now. You get summoned, you take the soul, you come back. Not much changed between Point A and Point B. You came, you fucked, you conquered. Though now humans were much smarter than they were now they always made mistakes.

Like this one had.

You did not necessarily need the belief to summon someone from hell to do your bidding but you did need to give up a piece of yourself in the process. In this case, blood. Soon though the paper began to glow in the hellish gold fire that all demons of hell knew. It was as though she slid through the paper those light brown eyes, almost gold as she finally rested with her feet touching the bare ground, the paper all but gone.

A succubus by nature was a creature that had been handcrafted by the Devil himself to bring man to sin and be recognized before God has Adulterating sinners. Mastema, had slowly risen amongst the ranks as their understood leader. For now anyway. She had to fight to keep that hold on her reputation and she was winning by tooth and nail. It didn't help that a succubus by most standards also appeared in the form that was the most arousing to their victim so that they fell into the carefully sprung trap with release.

Mastema, was running into a very unthoughtful snag and thus the reason for such falling. Her last few summoners had done the spell dreadfully wrong and instead of summoning the male counterparts, the Incubus, they summoned her. Her kind didn't exactly work on women, not even lesbians. So they saw her as she really was. With long raven locks and serpentine eyes that turned into slits when angered, hands that were tipped with retractable black claws rather than nails. Her ears were pointed, articulated much like a harpy rather than a demon. Though the the archaic circle tattooed on her chest gave her away to be that of a demon. The unfortunate mortal's soul would pass through that and be forever damned to hell.

All she needed to do now though, was find her quarry, do her job, and go back home. Hopefully with a soul to keep her title a little while longer.

 

[Kayito-san]

Allan returned momentarily, but halted, staring through the doorway into the study. He quietly stepped into his study and peered at the new arrival, and then at the floor where she stood. For a second, he stood in stunned silence, his jaw loosened. This was… clearly something unusual, the paper looked as though it had been consumed by fire, and there was this girl standing right there above it. There was no reasonable explanation for this: the summon had worked.

Hushed, Allan backed out of the doorway. Something he'd read in the tome came to mind: salt was mentioned several times throughout his readings. Maybe it would be handy in dealing with this creature. He hurried into the kitchen and fetched from a drawer a largish box of sea salt and tucked it into his back pocket. Returning to the room, he kept the box hidden as he navigated carefully towards his desk. He pried open the tome and flipped to the page by which he'd summoned her. He cleared his throat nervously and mustered, "Is this how you came to be?"

Slowly from behind his back, he drew the box of salt and flipped open its spout. He glanced at the book and flipped a few pages. There it was: demons could not cross salt.

 

[TakodaVega]

Mastema should have gone after him, however with the lack of time that could be determined how fast the human would be able to move she lightly kicked the remaining ash from those heels before making her way towards his desk. One leg slowly crossing the other. The sheer outfit didn't hide much from his gaze as she looked towards the book. "Yes, my Master. You summoned me?" She stared at him with those serpentine eyes. "You know the Law. What is thy Desire? You know my price."

Succubi, by nature, were highly sexual creatures, they did not kill their quarry only destroyed their souls into the black fire of Hell. Still though, Mastema slid more forward to run one of her fingertips under his chin. "Unless you do not have a reason for summoning me, and then I'd have to kill you." She purred out slowly before retracting her way. At least she was giving him time to correlate his thoughts before she decided whether or not to grant his request. She doubted her summoner was a virgin, pity, she liked those best.

 

[Kayito-san]

Her latest threat confirmed it. "Alright, uh… demon… I didn't anticipate actually seeing you face-to-face." He retrieved some of the papers in the back. He looked through them, namely for the page references he'd scrawled at the bottom of each. If the summon had worked, maybe one of the other incantations would work. But, to her credit, he glanced quickly at her, his eyes scanning her. She was really quite stunning. There was an otherworldly charm about her. Something incredibly taboo and equally alluring. He struggled to return his eyes to the page. If he didn't know of the horrendous consequences that would happen were he to act upon his impulses, he would have eagerly jumped on the opportunity. He paused as something clicked in his head. "I… ah…" he muttered, his breath drowsy and his words fumbled. He lazily stood and walked over to her. "Well, succubus. I am a human man and um…" he muttered, closing the distance. She was just about his height, perhaps just a bit shorter. He smiled, leaning his head forward slightly and looking directly into her eyes. His arms reached out slowly to encompass her, "I have a proposition," he whispered slowly, his hands meeting behind her back. He continued to smile as he gently slid open the box of salt and, passing it from one hand to the other, silently poured a semi-circle behind her. His lips neared hers and his arms slowly retracted. As his smile grew, he brought his hand in front of her– completing the circle. He stepped back and his smile faded. Sweat beaded down his forehead and across the bridge of his nose. His heart pounded, and he closed the lip of the box. The circle was complete.

Allan put the box of salt on the desk and sat down. He wiped the sweat from his brow and finally smiled. "I haven't decided, actually," he admitted with a mild chuckle, "But dying and losing my soul are both things I'd, ah, rather not do. So, give me a minute while I collect my thoughts, and I'll um, get back to you about that, I guess."