Kouji and Beliamon were now just steps away from the keep underground in the belltower. However, it was easier said than done. Upon entry, Beliamon had to, again, light the way using a ball of flame she apparated slightly above the palm of her hand.
Even though the strong gates that once barred the outer walls were all missing, getting to the keep was still a challenge, as there was a somewhat mazelike interior. Thick, sturdy wooden doors appeared every now and again in the passages, although many were bolted or equipped with heavy, rusty, iron chains, padlocks, or rings. Some were even boarded up with lumber.
Oddly, Kouji noted that there was little to no dust in the area. He kept on following Beliamon, who strangely seemed more intent on observing the walls or the floor than the path she was taking. She knocked her idle hand against the wall every now and again without a second thought, intently listening closely for something.
Kouji stepped softly and tried to remain as quiet as possible, so that he might hear whatever it was Beliamon was listening for. After several, similar turns and about five minutes, Kouji gathered that they had just carefully paced and listened to the same walls three times. They were going in circles...
"Hey, Beliamon?" Kouji asked, his voice a little heavy in his throat for not speaking for a while.
"Yes?" the golden haired Digimon replied, turning to face him. Kouji and Beliamon were now just steps away from the keep underground in the belltower. However, it was easier said than done. Upon entry, Beliamon had to, again, light the way using a ball of flame she apparated slightly above the palm of her hand.
"Uhm... well, where exactly is this keep?" the dark haired boy questioned.
"Well, er, it's..." she started, before suddenly, Beliamon leaned back, so her hand hit a certain stone in the wall. Spinning around, she quickly knocked it out of the wall, fished her hand in the hollow, and removed a gray key, "I knew it was hidden somewhere within these walls," Beliamon smirked, her grin twitching weakly as she returned the stone to the wall.
"You mean you were looking for a key the whole time?" the slightly pudgy boy raised his eyebrows as he placed his hands in his pockets.
"Well... yes, this is how to get into the basement keep where the food is stored. All the doors are locked after all," Beliamon nodded as she turned down the hall, motioning for Kouji to follow.
"But you couldn't just first try to knock the door down or pick the locks?" Kouji doubted, "It seems pretty lucky that you just reached your hand out and-"
"I could do many things," Beliamon retorted, "But I choose not to. Anyway, don't worry about it, Kouji," she said, turning the key in a rather bulky looking padlock, "We're almost there..." she said almost silently as the padlock fell to the ground with a crash. Beliamon pulled away the chains that bound the door locked and placed them off to the side, the links clinking against one another. She put her hands on the iron ring and gave a swift pull as the wooden door creaked open.
Beliamon increased the flame burning above the palm of her hand as she descended down a cool, steep, stone staircase; strangely, they weren't damp at all. Kouji didn't fear the vast, unknown that lay below him, the great darkness, with Beliamon standing near him, illuminating wherever the two stepped.
How could he even honestly THINK he felt safe with his captor!?
As she stepped down the staircase, whenever she passed by a torch post, she lit it, putting some of the flame near her hand on the unlit torch, spreading light where she passed. Kouji followed Beliamon as the two descended several flights of stairs, and with every landing they passed, the way became brighter and brighter. Soon, Kouji could see the bottom as light spread to the depths of the room.
Soon, as if in a dream, Kouji felt his foot hit solid ground. Beliamon then went to light any torches in the corner of the room, fully illuminating the entire vastness of the keep, bringing the fullness of the room apparent to Kouji's eyes.
Beliamon dropped her backpack onto the ground with a plop. Stretching out her arms for a bit, she sighed. Nonetheless, Beliamon soon picked her backpack up again and started for a large, sturdy set of sliding doors, similar to those in a western saloon except for the fact that they covered the full entryway, stained a deep, dark red. Engraved all over the door were obscure runes similar to those that Kouji noticed here and there there over the city ruins and even certain parts of the Digital World.
Beliamon made a motion for him to follow her. The now borderline chubby boy in blue could only guess that she was heading towards the store. Kouji increased his pace to keep up with her, sadly noting the small bouncing of his belly with his steps. He certainly had gotten some excercise done today, and hopefully he had lost a pound or two by the time they returned back to the Temple... if they were even going to go back there.
Suddenly, Beliamon made an quick, gasping noise in her throat that lasted half a moment, almost undetected by Kouji's ears. But Beliamon stood there, frozen, turned away from Kouji, her arms straight against her sides.
"Beliamon?" Kouji asked, with a strange, creeping feeling beginning to surround him, "Are you alright?"
A few seconds of silence pulsed on throughout the room... but a few seconds can seem all the longer when they bar the way to what one anticipates.
Beliamon's head was, again, turned to the ground. Kouji's eyes widened when he saw some shapes lined up near the wall. Rags? Bedsheets? Pillows? All of them were faded, dusty, and hadn't been touched in a while... but there were many of them surrounding the walls.
Kouji now could see how the staircase wound to the side of the walls, the landings were confined to the corners, and he fathomed that the entryway was somewhere way up there on a ledge... it had to be some tremendous refuge the two of them were in- almost the size of four basketball courts, paired two by two. Hundreds, maybe thousands of people could fit in here.
"Never mind," Beliamon said, trying to reassure Kouji, shaking her head and biting her lip, "I'm fine," she grinned falsely, placing both her hands onto the large doors to the food store. Kouji lined up next to her and tried to push the doors along with her... they were heavier than he thought, but the doors both swung open, revealing a somewhat dark room.
"Here we are," Beliamon said, her mood brightening up a little. Quickly lighting a few, ornate, paper lanterns using her magic, the store was soon brightened up. Kouji could see that it wasn't your average kitchen cabinet. There was a central walkway dividing the room into two columns of aisles of cabinets and shelves to the back wall. Then, lined up to the wide shelves were sliding ladders, which could reach the higher shelves. There was even a platform above, reaching from shelf to shelf.
Beliamon immediately went from one shelf to the next, hurrying and scuttering about with her backpack in hand, observing the rows of shelves, pulling out a few drawers and examining their contents. Kouji just stood, watching her blankly as she managed to stuff a large jar of flour, sugar, a box of eggs, several cartons of milk, a container of what was supposedly a cake of yeast into her backpack. Beliamon pushed the drawers back into place and picked up her backpack, which Kouji could tell was already quite hefty.
"Is that all?" Kouji grumbled meekly, raising an eyebrow.
"Oh no, no, no," Beliamon laughed, "These are only basic ingredients- I could barely make more than bread and maybe sugar cookies with just this, but then again... you might be amazed with what I could make in a pinch."
Hefting the backpack up, Beliamon crossed the corridor quickly as she began to take out sacks that were found in another drawer and fill them with things like apples, raisins, and melons.
"It's hard to imagine how much is still left in here," Beliamon commented, as she put a block of cheese into the backpack.
"Yeah," Kouji remarked, not sure of what to say, watching as Beliamon struggled to put a large bag of rice into her backpack, "Uhm... how is this all fitting?"
"Magic, silly," Beliamon giggled before going back to stuff her backpack with more food. Kouji sighed and ran a hand though his hair... Melancholy and depressed one moment, but gradually becoming bouncy and a little bubbly a while after... would he ever be able to fully understand her?
"You look a little wiped out," Beliamon noted as Kouji wiped a bead of sweat off of his forehead, "Why don't you go take a rest while I pack up, or maybe..." Beliamon stopped, but continued to suggest, "When was the last time you took a bath?"
"What?" Kouji exclaimed, slightly alarmed.
"No, no, I didn't mean you reek or anything," Beliamon smiled, holding up her hands in peace, "You saw the stream, right? There should be a hot spring off to the eastern side of the bank close to the city, and there are towels there, both hot and dry- why don't you go there and relax for a bit? It should be perfectly safe if you strictly stay to the hot spring area and don't go wandering off to the far reaches of the river."
"Well..." Kouji said, considering the idea. He wouldn't mind a nice, hot, relaxing bath at all. In fact, it seemed desirable. Too good to be true, almost.
"Hold on," Kouji started, "I'm supposed your prisoner, right?"
"Well, again, there's nowhere to run off to- but this is the first time I've ever heard a prisoner telling his captor her job," Beliamon stated smugly, "And what, you'd want me watching you take a bath?"
"No, no!" Kouji cried, now it was himself holding his hands up in peace, "It's just that... oh, I don't know," he sighed, "Sure, I'll go. Could you give me any hints on where to find it so I don't spend most of my time finding my way?"
"It's right by the remains of the house with the red roof," Beliamon noted, suddenly with a tinge of sadness, as if she remembered something special about it that now ceased to be, "I'll wait for you in front of the belltower when I'm done, so that's where you can find me," she smiled.
"Alright... I guess I'll see you later then," Kouji said awkwardly as he walked out, pushing the doors with the spells on them aside. Beliamon watched as they closed behind him.
***
Beliamon began to wonder if she had made a mistake in letting Kouji free to the hot springs for a while. It wasn't that she felt he would acquire a new sense of freedom and rebel against her; no, she wouldn't believe that in a thousand years. She hadn't been a good tyrant to him, after all, and Kouji didn't seem like he was about ready to do that do her.
As mentioned before, he had nowhere to run off to... but what was worrying Beliamon was Duskmon. Kouji was absolutely defenseless without his digivice... However, Beliamon was almost certain that he was stuck in the labyrinths of the Temple of Earth, and was struggling to find his way around. She had sensed him moving around outside the Temple, and she could only fathom that he was still in there.
Hopefully, the Warrior of Darkness was still at bay.
But aside from that, there was another thing clouding her thoughts, the instigator of all the terrible memories she held and had to relive with every step she took in this dead, deserted city.
Cherubimon.
That twisted, fallen angel of a Digimon was still monitoring her, perhaps even closer now than ever. He was the reason why the risk of Duskmon was about in the area. She could have almost sworn he was oblivious of her exact location, seeing it was, for the most part, cut off from the rest of the Digital World, but he had to have known if he were to despatch Duskmon.
She couldn't allow herself to feebly be afraid of him, but she had to admit that he was very, very powerful, and she should know he very well had the power in him to destroy her several times over. Plus, he had the backing of Lucemon, a power incomprehensibly greater than he.
She was in enough hot water seeing that she had only proceeded in her plan on only one child. The fattening of the others was a cheaper, backup scheme that he had concocted only minutes before conferring with Cherubimon a while ago. But that wasn't the only reason the Dark Lord had to be angry with her, for Kouji had barely fattened up since she captured him.
Cherubimon's face was seething with a feeling that he had been betrayed by her. Beliamon knew that he sensed something wrong with her, and she also feared that in the back of his mind, he recognized her from long ago somehow...
Beliamon had been summoned by him to do a task... to fatten the chosen children up for him, a task that she was recognized as specializing in for some reason.
Packing baking chocolate into her backpack furiously, Beliamon wondered what to do. Cherubimon wanted progress from the Warrior of Light and he wanted it fast. But what could she do? More importantly, why would she do it other than to save her own neck?
There was always the possibility of her conjuring food up with magic, but no... that would be wrong.
Sure, it would drain a little energy out of her, but that was nothing she couldn't get back with a little sleep. It was just that when she... magicked up food, it was... perfect. It tasted delightful and never ceased to please, and maybe it could be considered a little addictive. Perhaps her magical confections could be thought of something far and beyond the caliber of her homemade foods, the like of which Kouji had only eaten thus far.
By using magic, she could do many things; one of them was to instantly cause something like a cake to appear by apparating ingredients immediately and using magic to combine and cook it all in the same instant, using memories of how the food was prepared; it was all very complicated and hard to do, but she had mastered it.
The magicked food could be very fattening, and it could probably speed up his gain make him more willing to food, but very unnaturally. Beliamon was almost sure he would eat the meals she cooked if he completely trusted her.
It wouldn't be fair to Kouji if she were to give him magicked-up food, she thought as she stuffed several varieties of fish into the backpack before zipping it up.
She hated the thought of abusing Kouji's trust, especially seeing that Kouji was one of the few out there she had trust in at all...
Beliamon sighed, shook her head, cleared her thoughts, and struggled to heave the incredibly heavy backpack onto her back. She proceeded to carry it to another aisle as she still had some things she wanted to load into it before she headed up.
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