Crazy Awakening: My luck can copy Talents.

Ishtar raised her arms to check the damage. Her pants were still intact. Her skin was still intact. The only victim had been, specifically, the top.

And beneath the top, there was no bra.

Adrián spun around so fast he nearly twisted his neck.

"Oh my god," he said, staring at the opposite wall with the intensity of a monk contemplating the divine. "Oh my god, sorry, sorry, Ishtar, sorry, I didn’t mean to, I—"

"Bro-in-law."

"Yeah?"

"Look at me."

"No."

"Look at me."

"Absolutely not."

"Vega," said Ishtar, and her voice had a new note to it, rougher than normal. "Turn around."

Adrián didn’t turn around.

Rhea, from the side of the room, brought a hand to her forehead and sighed.

"Ishtar, put something on."

"I’m fine like this."

"Ishtar."

"I’m comfortable."

"Ishtar."

"Fine, fine."

Adrián heard the rustle of fabric. Heard Ishtar grumbling something about "adults repressing natural physicality." Heard Rhea say something sharp to her in a language that wasn’t Spanish. After thirty seconds—which were the longest thirty seconds of his new demonic life:

"Okay, bro-in-law. You can turn around. I’m dressed."

Adrián turned around, very slowly.

Ishtar was now wearing a black training vest that Rhea had obviously lent her and that was too big for her. Her arms were crossed. Her expression was half-mischievous, half-offended.

"Bro-in-law."

"Yeah?"

"Just so you know, if you want to fire off another blast, you’re welcome to. I don’t take offense. On the contrary. Clothes can be bought."

"Ishtar—"

"I’d just like a warning next time, so I can pose better."

"Ishtar, please—"

"I’m joking, bro-in-law. Mostly. Eighty percent joking."

"Ishtar," said Rhea, with exhausted patience, "leave the room. Vega, get that mask off if you can."

Adrián looked up. The mask was still there. The gauntlets were still on his hands. He didn’t know how to turn it off, if that was even what he was supposed to do.

"..."

"Think about the mask turning off," said Rhea, tiredly. "Reverse concentration. Push inward instead of outward."

Adrián tried.

The mask flickered twice. Then vanished. The gauntlets dissolved into the air with a small silver flash.

Adrián felt a wave of exhaustion hit his knees—not from energy expenditure, he still had plenty of energy, but from the mental effort of sustaining something whose shape his brain barely understood—and he sat down on the stone floor.

Rhea approached. Crouched in front of him. Put a hand on the back of his neck.

"Good," she said quietly. "Good. Now we know two things. One: your Relic responds to danger. Two: it’s far more powerful than I expected. That Void pulse had enough energy to disintegrate a lesser demon. And Ishtar is a Major demon. It only ruined her clothes because her Talent has natural resistance to physical damage."

"Did I hurt her?"

"No."

"You sure?"

"Ishtar. Are you hurt?"

From the doorway—where she was already leaving—Ishtar answered without turning around:

"Only my pride, sister. That recovers quickly."

And she left.

Rhea let out a long sigh. Squeezed Adrián’s neck with a warmth that didn’t match the rest of her personality, and straightened up.

"We’re going up. You need to rest. We’re going to do this every day. You’re going to learn to control it. It’s going to take time. It’s going to hurt. But you’re going to learn."

"Why?"

"Why what?"

"Why do you care? I’m a contract. You could keep me as decoration. Why go through the trouble of training me?"

Rhea looked at him.

And for the first time since Adrián had known her—which, admittedly, was less than twenty-four hours—he saw her hesitate. Just for a second.

"Because what you are is too valuable not to be trained," she said. "And because if another house finds you untrained, they’ll kill you to make sure you can’t be used against them. I saved you. Now it’s my responsibility to make sure you survive."

"...okay."

"Besides, I like you," she added, with studied casualness, as she turned toward the elevator. "A little. Not much. But a little. Don’t get used to it."

Adrián remained sitting on the floor.

He watched her walk toward the elevator, her black dress moving with each step, her wine glass forgotten somewhere in the library, with the calm of a queen who had just said something she probably hadn’t said to anyone in many years.

"Rhea."

She stopped, without turning around.

"Yeah?"

"Thank you."

"Don’t thank me yet."

"Someone else told me that recently."

"And they were right. Let’s go."

She stepped into the elevator. Adrián stood up, still trembling, and followed her.

---

(Far from there, in a building shaped like a dark stone bell tower on the outskirts of the city, Sariel Corvax knelt before an altar of black marble and presented her report with her hands crossed over her chest.)

"Mission completed," she said, her voice perfectly controlled. "The target was eliminated on Mercier Street at ten minutes to eleven on Saturday night. Direct heart strike with a black light spear. No witnesses. No residue."

In front of the altar, a tall woman with almost-white blond hair and yellow eyes identical to Sariel’s listened to the report with an impassive face. Four black wings folded against her back. A ring with a feather engraved on the same finger as Sariel’s, though hers was gold and not silver.

"Are you sure, little sister?" said Uriel Corvax, in a soft voice that wasn’t soft.

"I’m sure."

"Hmm."

Uriel approached. Placed a hand under her chin. Lifted it carefully, almost sweetly, to look into her eyes.

"Because our sensors detected a pulse of energy at ten minutes to eleven that doesn’t match a sacred lance. It matches... something else. Something we don’t know. And that pulse echoed for almost five minutes, which is impossible if the bearer is dead."

Sariel didn’t blink.

"The boy convulsed as he died. It must have been a spasm of his dormant Relic. But it didn’t awaken in time. He’s dead."

"Sure?"

"Sure."

Uriel looked at her for a few more seconds. Then released her chin and caressed her cheek, almost with maternal tenderness.

"Good. Good girl."

She walked away. Sat down on a stone throne at the back of the hall. Picked up a silver chalice. Drank.

"You may withdraw, Sariel."

"Thank you, sister."

Sariel stood. Walked out of the hall with her back straight and her head high, her four wings folded and her step perfectly measured.

Only when she closed the door behind her and walked three full hallways did she stop in a dark corner, lean against the stone wall, and have to cover her mouth with both hands to keep the sound she’d been holding in since she’d left the alleyway from escaping.

She had lied.

And Uriel knew it.

Sariel had read it in her eyes.

And now, for the first time in all her long and orderly life as a fallen, she was going to have to decide what to do with that truth that her sister already knew and was pretending not to.)

---

When Adrián reached his new room—a different room from the reincarnation one, smaller, more his, with a desk, a normal-sized bed, and an enormous window overlooking the city—he dropped onto his back on the bed and stared at the ceiling.

His whole body was vibrating. He could still feel the echo of the mask. Could still feel the sensation of the Void pouring out of his hands. Could still smell, very faintly, Rhea’s perfume on the robe they’d left hanging for him.

Okay. Let’s recap.

One. I’m a demon.

Two. My master is an aristocratic tsundere with a red wine addiction.

Three. Her little sister is the most dangerous thing that’s happened to my mental health in twenty-four hours.

Four. I have a floating mask on my soul.

Five. I can shoot black energy beams that tear people’s clothes off.

Six. Other demons are going to want to kill me when they find out.

Seven...

His phone, resting on the nightstand, vibrated.

Adrián looked at it.

His blood ran cold.

Yuki Amasawa. Incoming call.

Shit.

Shit shit shit.

It’s Monday morning.

I didn’t go to class.

I didn’t go to statistics.

And I promised Ishtar the notes, though I don’t think that matters anymore.

And Yuki must have gone by my apartment this morning with breakfast, and I wasn’t there, and now—

The phone kept vibrating.

Adrián watched it vibrate.

After seven rings, the call ended. Three seconds later, it rang again.

Adrián took a deep breath.

Swiped the screen.

"Hey, Yuki."

On the other end of the line, Yuki Amasawa’s voice said, with barely contained trembling:

"Adri, where are you?"

Adrián looked at the ceiling. Looked at the window. Looked at the city stretching out beneath him from thirty floors up, in a neighborhood he’d never been to, in a building whose name he didn’t know, with a body that was no longer his own, with a power that had torn a demon’s clothes off half an hour ago.

"...it’s a long story," he said. "Can I call you in a bit?"

A silence.

"Okay," said Yuki, very slowly. "But call me. Please."

"I will."

"Adri."

"Yeah?"

"I’m worried."

"I know."

"Okay."

She hung up.

Adrián left the phone resting on his chest.

Stared at the ceiling.

And for the first time since he’d opened his eyes that morning, he realized with absolute clarity that he now had two lives.

And he had no idea how he was going to keep them separate.

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