[Location: Morningstar Manor, New York]

I raised an eyebrow, smirking slightly at her confession. "So, you sent your little spy friend to check on me? That sounds… dangerous. Reckless, even." She huffed, leaning her forehead against mine again, claws lightly grazing my chest.

"Dangerous? Maybe. Reckless? Possibly. But I didn't care. Nothing matters more than you, Darling. Not the rules, not threats, not even… the consequences." Her words were low, almost trembling, each one carrying the weight of unshakable devotion.

I let out a slow breath, eyes flicking briefly to the chandelier above before returning to her crimson ones. "Consequences, huh?" I murmured. "You talk about them like they're background noise."

Zeraphira's lips twitched into a ghost of a smile. "Because they are, for me. For us."

Her tone shifted—softer, yet haunted. "You think any of us care about punishment after what happened? After we almost lost you?"

"Lost me?" I repeated, the words rolling out before I could stop them. A strange heaviness settled behind my eyes. "Zera… I think you keep saying that like I'm supposed to remember—"

Her expression froze. The warmth in her gaze dimmed, replaced by something sharper—like a blade slipping through silk. "Darling," she said slowly, "what do you mean by supposed to remember?"

I blinked. Frowned.

"Did something happen after the ceremony? And know that I noticed, I don't particularly remember anything after the ceremony to the day I was sealed by Grayfia..."

Zeraphira's breath hitched. For the first time since she'd appeared before me, her confidence faltered. Her claws, usually steady and poised, retracted slightly, trembling.

"…You don't remember," she whispered, her voice almost too soft to hear. Not a question. A statement.

"I remember fragments," I said slowly, pressing my fingers to my temple. "The ceremony. The chains. The pain. And then—nothing. Just… darkness." I exhaled sharply, trying to ignore the dull throb that was beginning to pulse behind my eyes. "After that, it's all blank until I woke up in that coffin."

Zeraphira stared at me, her crimson eyes widening as if something inside her cracked. "No…" she muttered, shaking her head slightly. "No, no, that's not possible. You almost destroyed the entirety of Hell. In the wage of losing your demonic hearts, your... body or was it your bloodline? Your royal Morningstar bloodline... You entered a berserk-like state, releasing your own essence in ways no demon—or even god—had ever survived. You… you should remember it!" Her voice cracked, a mix of disbelief, fear, and frustration.

I blinked slowly, letting her words sink in. "I… don't. Not fully. Only flashes. Anger. Pain. Fragments of power… and you. all seven of you."

Zeraphira's hands flexed at my chest, claws grazing my coat as she drew in a shuddering breath. "Darling… you lost it. All of it. Your memory, your fury… everything that made you… you… until Grayfia sealed you. You were… gone. And now… now you've returned, and yet you are… hollow, in ways I cannot describe."

I let out a low hum, pressing a hand lightly against her trembling fingers. "Hollow?" I echoed. "I don't feel… hollow. Just… different. Lighter, somehow. And stronger. But yes… something's missing. Something vital."

Her crimson eyes glimmered, reflecting a mixture of awe and terror. "Different… stronger… but missing. That is exactly what happened to you after the ceremony. You were broken, and the only thing keeping the rest of you… Alive, was Grayfia's coffin, her seals, her will."

I leaned back slightly, letting the words wash over me. "So… I'm… the one who lost the memories. The boy I was… gone. Only… fragments remain. And yet, here I am." My voice carried a subtle irony, tinged with something more dangerous beneath the surface. "Alive. Awake. Standing before you. And yet… I don't remember the chaos, the destruction, or the wrath I unleashed."

Zeraphira's breath trembled. "And you may never remember… fully. Some things were too… overwhelming, too… consuming. But, Darling… even hollowed, even broken… you are still… mine. Still ours."

I let her words settle, feeling the weight of them press into the hollow spaces in my mind. "Yours… ours… yes. That I remember." My hand brushed along the curve of her waist, feeling the tremor beneath her fingers, and I let a faint, teasing smirk curve my lips. "But Zera… if I don't remember everything, how… how did you survive it? How did the others survive it?"

"Satans nearly died as somehow even in that state, you targeted those who harmed you. Then a figure appeared, shrouded in dark matter like mist, and later I came to his title or what my father used to address him with—"

"I want to know what happened," I pressed, my voice low but insistent, the faint pulse of the Lucifer Sigil beneath my sternum thrumming in sync with my heartbeat. "Every detail, Zera. I need to understand… even if my own memories betrayed me."

Zeraphira's crimson eyes glimmered, dark with memories she had long carried alone. She drew a slow, trembling breath, as if gathering the courage to unravel a tale that had nearly broken her. "It was chaos… absolute chaos. You… the moment the ceremony ended, your essence—your fury—ignited like a storm no one could contain. The runes, the chains… they shattered under the force of your awakening. Every demon, every minor lord, every shadow that dared breathe in Hell's corridors felt it. Forcing everyone to kneel or… or face death, so immense it could have torn the realm itself apart. Your body was no longer just flesh and blood—it became a conduit for a force that had no name, a storm of pure will, rage, and despair. The Morningstar blood that had been dormant for centuries surged, spilling over in waves that obliterated everything in its path, yet somehow…"

"Yet somehow that figure... it felt like it switched something 'off' and…somehow pushed you out of that state," Zeraphira whispered, her voice trembling as if the memory itself burned her. "The figure… my father called it the first resident of hell. It was there even before Lucifer Morningstar fell from grace. A being older than time itself, cloaked in shadows that devoured light. It didn't interfere with your essence—it merely… contained it, guiding your storm away from total annihilation. And then… Grayfia came. She defeated my father in the blink of an eye, and almost killed Satan of Lust too. Then she scooped you in her arms and vanished without any hesitation..."

"We couldn't find her for more than two years... then she came and announced you were dead to the whole of hell, but to the satans she told that your c-corpse was sealed..."

I exhaled slowly, letting the story settle into the hollow spaces of my mind. My fingers brushed against Zeraphira's trembling hands, grounding myself in the warmth of her presence. "So… Grayfia… she carried me away, sealed me, and… kept me alive all this time," I murmured, the weight of that realisation pressing into my chest. The thought of her, alone, maintaining her vigil for over a millennium, sent a ripple of guilt and awe through me.

Zeraphira nodded, biting her lip as if restraining herself from saying more. "She… she did everything. She held back not just your power, but the chaos that would have consumed everything. She sacrificed herself in ways none of us could understand… to save you. And all the while, we… we endured. We watched. We waited. We—" Her voice cracked, a tremor of pain threading through it, "—we suffered, because we couldn't touch you, couldn't be near you. Every day, every night, we felt your absence as if it were a blade cutting through our very souls."

I tilted my head, crimson eyes locking with hers. The fire in hers was the same fire that had always burned for me—unyielding, obsessive, and yet laced with pain. "And… the others? My sins, my… fiancées? How did they endure while I was… gone?"

She hesitated, then whispered, almost reverently: "We clung to what remained of you, every fragment of your soul that lingered after the ritual. Every heartbeat we could sense, every aetheric pulse, every… whisper of your essence. It was enough to survive on. Enough to… wait for you. We each… became twisted, desperate versions of ourselves."

From the hollow where you once were, and are now returning to be."

A low hum escaped me, fingers tightening slightly on her waist. The weight of the lost memories, the chaos I could barely recall, the devastation I'd unleashed—it was staggering. Yet, beneath it all, a new clarity settled: I was back. And whatever had been lost, whatever had been broken… I was still standing.

"What about the figure? Its name? anything else?"

Zeraphira's crimson eyes darkened, her pupils narrowing as if she were peering through the fabric of time itself. "It… has no true name. Not one we could speak aloud without trembling. Satan of Pride, the oldest of the Satans, even he only dared whisper…"

"The Knowledgeable One."

I froze.

The Knowledgeable One?!

Is it the same...?

***

Stone me, I can take it!

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