Chapter 320 - 320 Hidden Powers
"To our newest multi-millionaire who wiped the floor with the next head of the Hyu Family!" Carlos" voice rose above the kids, as he tad down on the sofa, the table in front filled with food and drinks.
"Multi what?!" Maggie turned towards him, incredulous, as she heard Carlos" cheer. Noah had really hit the jackpot.
Noah put his fingers on his temples, imagining how long the night would be.
"Guess it"s not all fun and games, huh," Lilith told him telepathically, making him wonder whether he made a ma.s.sive mistake making that bet.
"Yeah... I just wanna head straight to bed, but Maggie won"t let me at all..." he beamoaned his circ.u.mstances, "And we still need to talk to Bel about that whole thing," he continued, thinking about at what time he would actually get around to going to bed.
"Eh... wouldn"t it be better if we left that for another time? Like, even I am tired, and I barely helped you fight," Lilith retorted, trying to help him get some rest.
"No, look at his face," Noah turned towards Bel, who fiddled with his fingers anxiously. "If we leave him like this for the night he"ll probably never forgive us." Noah took a deep breath, preparing to handle the fallout.
The clock in the edge of the living room told Noah it was already way past three. It took him a lot of bargaining, but he managed to calm Maggie down after promissing her to go to the mall on the weekend. Carlos savored his hardships with a grin on his face, making Noah curse him at least a handful of times, both mentally and out loud. But after all that time, Maggie had fallen to her sleepiness, pa.s.sing out of the sofa.
"Hey man, can you carry her to the room?" Noah asked him, as Carlos bid him goodnight.
"I mean, sure, but why don"t you do it?" Carlos asked, turning around and facing Noah.
"I need to deal with this little guy before heading to bed," he said, leaning his head towards Bel, who was still anxiously fiddling with his fingers in silence.
"Oh, okay. I"ll take her, then," Carlos nodded, as he realized it would be best for the two to talk alone, taking Maggie in a princess carry. In the past, he would"ve struggled, but now, he had gotten a lot stronger, and carrying her was a piece of cake.
Noah waited for the two of them to leave, before telling Lilith to get down to the sofa and grow in size.
Bel watched with glee, as Lilith slowly grew in size to that of a large tropical snake, cpiling herself while raising her head up by Noah"s side.
"Whoah... mom has gotten a lot bigger now. Reminds me of the good days, though back then she was still hundreds of times bigger than this," he slipped something absurd, making Noah choke on his saliva, before clearing his throat.
"So, we need to talk about what happened earlier. Bel, I need you to tell me more about Lilith," Noah told him, still trying to piece things together in his mind before the conversation started.
"Eh, you want me to talk about her? Why?" Bel was confused, not understanding why Noah was taking such a roundabout approach to things.
More importantly, Lilith felt this was a waste of time. "Noah, I think it would be better if first he explained why he"s behaving like this. Seeing him this anxious doesn"t strike me that well. If we start from there, things will be more efficient, and you can get more sleep." The was she was speaking made Noah feel like leaving the whole conversation on her hands, but Bel was not that easy of a kid.
"EH?! Mom is able to talk now?! That"s so great! I"m so happy, if it stays like this it won"t be long before you recover you powers!" If anyone were to tell Noah this brat and the anxious one from before were the same person without him knowing so, he would say they were lying. The shift was so large Noah felt like Bel had completely forgotten what he was worried about.
"Her being able to talk again is that big of a deal?" Noah asked, not understanding his point.
"Not really, no, but it means she"s starting to recover at least some part of her powers. Even if it"s just the beginning, it"s something!" But he quickly realized it was just Bel being a good child, and being happy for his mother, though it still felt strange for Noah to acknowledge that fact, rather than it being a meaningful landmark of any kind.
"I see. If that"s the case, let"s not sidetrack too much, it"s very late already and I"m tired. I"m sure Lilith is also tired, so, it would be best if we got things moving along. Bel, what exatly happened? Both Maggie and Carlos were very worried after you made that show." Noah reprimanded him, making Bel sulk a little with guilt.
"I"m sorry, I didn"t mean to make them feel like that, but it was something very dangerous. It was just for a second, but I felt a guy"s power, and was very worried for you two..." Bel resumed fiddling with his fingers, his proud self nowhere to be seen, in a way that reminded Noah a lot of how Lilith had behaved when she told him about that guy"s arrival.
"Who exactly are you talking about. Is it that angel guy?" Noah asked, trying to see if he could get something from Bel"s reaction.
"How did you know?!" Bel jumped on his feet, his eyes wide.
"We met him. Now, tell me, who was that guy?" Noah told him, making Bel grow impatient.
"Are you two really okay? What happened? Did he do anything to mom? Or to you? I was right, I should"ve gone there as soon as I felt him." Bel started mumbling incomprehensively, making Noah himself grow worried. First, Lilith behaved like that, now him. Him gut feeling was right, that guy was not a power to be messed with.
"Bel, I need you to calm down and tell me, who exactly is that guy?" Noah put his hand on Bel"s knee, pushing him back onto the sofa with care. Bel was still distressed, but Noah could tell he was trying his best to help.
"... That guy, he"s the strongest Seraphim, Michael." Bel clenched his fists, anger obvious on his face. "He"s the guy who fought with mom, when father faced G.o.d, thousands of years ago. Back then I was so weak I couldn"t even see his moves. Even with my full strenght, I"m not sure I could take a single hit from him and live... He"s too dangerous," Bel"s words made Noah swallow dry. "I was afraid he somehow knew father had disappeared and mom was weakened, and appeared to do something to you and her."
"I see..." Noah took a deep breath, gathering all his resolve, before telling him everything that had happened this afternoon, including what he hadn"t told Lilith after she recovered. He told him about the t.i.tles, the status, the skill that stopped time, and about the angel"s words. Everything he could remember, he told Bel, who heard it all in silence, his fingers meshed in front of his face as he stared at the ground in thought. Noah felt his anger when he told him about Lilith"s pain, and that she lost some of the memories after the encounter, but as Noah stopped talking, he took a deep breath, leaning back against the sofa.
"This feels weird. It looks like G.o.d wasn"t involved into any of this." Seeing Bel this immersed in thought left Noah with a bitter taste on the back of his mouth. Especially when Bel stared him in the eyes. "Noah, I think we should be very careful from now on. I need your help recovering my strenght too... We need to go back to h.e.l.l as soon as we can," Bel"s words felt like a warning more than anything, but Noah didn"t have the leisure of feeling nervous.
"Why is that?" he asked back, pushing the fact that Lilith was dead silent all this time to the back of his mind.
"I have a feeling that all of this is connected. Father"s disappearance and chosing a descendant, Mother"s loss of memory, this guy saying that "G.o.d couldn"t afford messing with humans"... I feel all of this is someone"s doing, but I have no idea whose"s. If the heavens had nothing to do with Mother"s loss of memory and disappearance hundreds of years ago, this has to be the doing of another G.o.d, one strong enough to avoid all detection for all this time."
Bel"s words made Noah remember something that felt out of place ever since he started researching about Lucifer and the Christian G.o.d. "Bel, do you think this could have something to do with why the Christian G.o.d was unable to provide humans with blessings during all this time since the Fortresses started to appear?" It was a question Noah had on the back of his mind for a long time now, but Bel"s answer could give him a new perspective on the whole thing.
"If the same power is behind all of this, including the fall of christian religion as a whole. This whole thing could be something much larger than just ourselves..." but Bel"s answer was enough to make him burst into cold sweat. After all, Belzebulb was one of the 7 generals that represented the capital sins, one of the 9 most powerful demons of them all.. After all, just what kind of thing could be involved in all of this.