As the Tremebrus was properly restrained with mystical bondages, the two men hurried her out the door. Suddenly, the man with long blonde hair shifted his gaze to Raymond's pitiful form on the ground.
"Medical team, I need you on site," he commanded.
At that moment, a small group of people all clad in white and green uniforms ran through the opened doors, approaching Raymond's unconscious body. They quickly unbuttoned his shirt and surveyed his injuries. Near the bottom left of his abdomen was a red welt as if someone had struck him with a blistering hot object.
On the top of his chest beside his heart was another wound similar to the one below it. On his shoulders and thighs were deep red and black injuries with protruding tissue and grotesque amalgamations.
"It's like his limbs had been torn off," One of the doctors, a man with a broad forehead, commented after observing the boy for a few moments.
"Patch him up," The blonde captain said.
Upon hearing the order, the doctors and attendants became more vigilant. They quickly opened the medical kit, which looked like something completely foreign to our previous world. Inside were numerous long needles, herbs, and tiny vials with liquids inside them. One of the doctors took out a particularly long needle from the bunch inside the kit.
She slowly lowered it into the injury on Raymond's right shoulder, which looked more bent out of shape than the other ones on his body. After she had injected the transparent liquid, a strange green growth engulfed the injury. The crimson, raw tissue was quickly submerged with plants and foliage. The greenery sprouted flowers that emitted a faint pink mist into the air.
As the mist coursed through the room, it spread to the other injuries on his body. The less noticeable bruises and cuts quickly healed themselves, and the tears on his left shoulder and legs quickly sealed themselves shut completely.
Upon a quick completion, Raymond slowly opened his eyes, coughing as he slowly moved his body. His expression slowly morphed to confusion as his eyes adjusted to the faint lights of the crimson moon.
"You can thank me," a voice sounded behind me and Shinso.
Our bodies tensed, but Shinso gathered the strength to turn around. We caught sight of Mr. Ryujin, looking at us with a half-baked smile. For the most part, he seemed concerned for my current condition.
"What happened to you?" He asked, extending a finger and running it along my forehead. The transparent substance stuck to his finger, and he hesitantly extended his tongue to get a taste. The moment he made contact, his entire body seemed to shrivel up.
"I was stuck in a cocoon for the last few hours, that Tremebrus took me there," I explained, my eyes half lidded as a wave of exhaustion from the night's events washed over me.
"Captian, we've surveyed the rest of the house and found the rest of the family. The Madame and her servants, …well, …almost all of her servants are in satisfactory condition." A man with a beard, accompanied with a burly appearance and broad shoulders, strode into the foyer from upstairs.
"You can just say they're alive, Ralph." The man with long blonde hair sighed, rubbing his glabella.
At that moment, he turned to look at the two of us. "You encountered a Tremebrus, a rather peculiar demon. I'm honestly surprised you two made it out alive."
Shinso's cheeks burned up slightly, and he rubbed the back of his neck with his free arm. Mr. Ryujin removed me from his back, strapping me around his shoulders.
"I mean, the second worst thing was the dog in the front yard," the boy made a sheepish joke in an attempt to lighten the mood.
"May I ask…" The captain pointed to my now unconscious form on Mr. Ryujin's shoulder.
"What happened to him to make him so…revolting?"
"W-we found him in some strange cocoon downstairs," Shinso explained.
"A cocoon?" He cocked an eyebrow.
"Bring me to it."
Shinso opened the door to the cellar, plucking a candle from the wall and heading down into the darkness. The blonde-haired captain followed him, one foot striding in front of the other with a refined elegance that clashed with his demeanor.
"It appears I've forgotten formalities. My name is Brindo Moffin, but you may address me as Captain Moffin. I'm the captain of the Pollinators, one of the organizations within Seraphis Kingdom."
Shinso silently registered the name in his mind before sighing softly and continuing. As they walked deeper into the cellar, the air around them grew colder. Suddenly, the candle Shinso was holding flickered out.
"Shit…"
Within the darkness, Captain Moffin's lips curled up as he unfurled his palm. A peculiar, small brown box with engravings suddenly lit up. The lid opened, and a short blue flower erected from inside, its petals and stem radiating a soothing glow.
"Amaindina Petals, you can find them in the east fields," Captain Moffin said with a small smile.
Some time later, the blonde-haired man froze in his tracks, his gaze gravitating upwards in the direction of something hanging from the ceiling. Upon raising the glowing petals, he caught sight of its complete form. The sac-like structure was suspended from the ceiling by a black tendril.
The outer shell crawled with small bugs within its skin, and inside of the sac was a small creature, its form slowly being devoured by the tiny organisms inside it. When he caught sight of this, he took out a small knife and sliced the tendril on the ceiling, causing the sack to land on the floor and unfurl.
At that moment, the pungent odor of rotting flesh quickly filtered into the room, filling the air with a malignant stench that even made the Captain wince at first. Once the dust receded, the duo was taken aback when they saw the body of a cat sprawled on the ground—bits and pieces of its form had been eaten away by the small bugs, revealing layers of bone and tissue underneath its thin white fur.
"Demon Maggots," the captain observed the numerous white organisms scatter underneath the floorboards.
He then turned back to Shinso, raising an eyebrow. "Assist me in collecting them."
"What?" The boy's face paled, taken aback by the order by the Captain.
The blonde man turned around to face Shinso, prompting his hands onto his hips. "You claim your friend was in a similar state, yes? If that's true, we'll need to analyze the maggots interior composition to ensure they didn't consume any of his flesh."
Shinso's face paled as a wave of disgust washed over him. "Why couldn't we just look for bites on his body?"
The Captain sighed gruffly and continued speaking. "Demon Maggots aren't like the regular specimens. Their bites burrow beneath the skin where you can't see them, and they can lay their eggs in the most unsuspecting places."
Shinso stumbled back. The thought of me or Oboro contracting eggs under their skin was enough to make him want to tear off his own skin and dart outside. He felt a nausea accumulating in his stomach burst open like a macabre dam, forcing him over onto his knees as he unleashed a torrent of vomit onto the moldy wooden floor.
Seeing this, the Captain slowly let out a sigh. "Up now. My teammates are busy at the moment with the other people in this house."
Shinso gazed up at the man with glazed eyes, the unsettling glint in his dark pupils unsettling him further. Since he knew that these were the Pollinators inside of the establishment, refusal of orders from the Captain of all people would most likely result in some sort of punishment.
The boy coughed up some more before he completely stood up, surveying the dark basement for a few more seconds. Captain Moffin walked over to one of the wooden panels, which had turned a grizzly green color from decomposition and mold. With bare hands, he lifted the wood.
Shinso felt his skin litter with goosebumps as he turned away from the sight. "You're using your bare hands?"
Captain Moffin nodded his head. "Being a Seeker of the Vitality Pathway, you naturally gain specific pheromones and properties that render you unable to contract or suffer from disease."
"That makes it sound like Demon Maggots are a normal thing," Shinso slowly walked over to the floor panel, kneeling down as he took a pair of gloves from the man. As he slipped them over his hands, he raised his collar over his mouth as he inhaled deeply through his mouth and nose.
"Are you sure you wouldn't like a mask?" Captain Moffin turned to look at him, cocking an eyebrow.
Shinso scoffed inwardly and shook his head. Due to the positioning of the lapels, accompanied by the insufficient lighting of the Amandina Petals, he knew the Captain was unable to see the blush on his face. The last thing he wanted to appear was a coward around him, not a reluctant boy who had been given a grotesque task.
The Captain lowered his hands into the large cluster underneath the floorboard, scooping them up and dumping them into a jar. Shinso immediately felt like he was about to pass out upon realizing that was his task.
"Don't be a toddler," The Captain looked in his direction, scoffing.
Shinso's body immediately went rigid when he felt the man's vice-like grip take a hold of his wrist, forcing his arm downwards into the bunch of maggots. Shinso bit his lip so hard he knew he'd bleed the moment he felt the bugs writhing and crawling on the gloves.
"That wasn't so bad, was it?" His lips curled up into a mocking smile as he patted Shinso on the back.
The boy remained silent, unable to speak properly from the experience.
"That's all?" He asked in a low, trembling voice.
"Nope," The Captain replied, pointing to the floor tiles across the cellar.
…
Upstairs, Mr. Ryujin was situated in the kitchen of the establishment of Oboro and Aizawa. The three men were silent for the most part. Aizawa's hand traced soothing circles along Oboro's back, loosening the tension.
"I never wanna go back inside there," Oboro groaned, lowering his head onto the table with a sickening splat. He was still covered in the transparent substance, but he had received assistance from the Pollinators in cleaning up for the most part.
"What, …was it like in there?" Aizawa asked softly, raising an eyebrow.
"I couldn't see, …I couldn't hear, …I could only feel and smell that awful liquid, and the feeling of those damn bugs crawlin' all over me."
The blue-haired man absentmindedly scratched at his arms and legs as he spoke, the sensation of the bugs was akin to an insect bite that itched non-stop.
"I'm…sorry I couldn't protect you," Aizawa's voice lowered even more, a small amount of moisture accumulating in the corners of his eyes as he sighed softly to himself. The grip on the man's back habitually tightened, in an almost protective manner.
"Don't blame yourself, Aizawa. Blame that damn demon woman for all of this bullcrap."
"He was trapped too, but he´s asleep right now." Mr. Ryuin looked back at my form on his shoulders. My lips were parted slightly as I buried my head into the crook of his neck. I had also been cleaned to the maximum they could supply, but I still smelt of the sustenance, and I was still dripping to a certain extent.
The sound of footsteps echoed in the chamber as one of the Pollinators entered the kitchen area, her eyes scanning the trio at the table, along with the boy on his shoulder. Her hair was tied into a neatly rested bun on the top of her head, and her cheek and jaw bones were prominent along the edges of her head.
"We've harvested useful samples for research, if you feel comfortable, you all may go back to your houses."