Modern World Warlock

After Dante explained to Clara why practicing creating healthstones with her own blood was a bad idea, he decided it was time to give her another method for training.

"It's time to learn some spells…" The warlock commented.

Paige, who had been monitoring Clara's training, took notes of all the spells and wrote down the effects in a cheat sheet so that it would be easier for her to practice when Dante wasn't around.

Once he gave his instructions, the warlock asked Clara for the cleansed soulstones she used to practice her umbra control, and the woman gave him three orbs.

Each orb was a different color—red, blue, and clear—which prompted Paige to ask Dante the reason for the various colors.

The warlock elaborated and said that the colors varied depending on the demon's soul inside the stone.

"Are those the same ones that Zac and Megan had to eat to make the contract?" Paige asked.

"Almost… The ones I gave them were soulstones that had an amalgamation of demon souls inside—cleansed of malice, of course…" Dante replied.

"Zac and Megan didn't have any umbra control abilities when they ingested the orb, so I used my blood as a catalyst to control the output to a level they could manage," Dante continued.

The scientist kept taking notes of the warlock's explanation, and when she pondered what he would do with the three soulstones that Clara cleansed, he decided to show them.

After summoning the Shadow Well, Dante placed the three orbs inside the bowl and hovered his hand above it, slicing his palm and pouring blood into it.

As he circled his hand around the bowl, he explained that he was fusing the three orbs together into one. Still, he was also going to add a few more soul pieces of other demons he thought would be helpful.

Clara was the only one in the room who could clearly see Dante's synthetization process, as she could discern the flow of umbra going out of his body into the well.

'Woah… The difference is overwhelming,' Clara thought, admiring the warlock's power level.

When she cleansed the orbs, she could see small trails of umbra coming out of her body and being directed at the bowl on top of the well.

However, Dante's umbra seemed like a torrent of overwhelming energy, giving the woman a glimpse at the vast gap between their abilities.

After a few minutes, the process was finished, and Dante picked up a yellow soulstone from the bowl, getting it closer to his face to scrutinize it in more detail.

"Mhmm, looks good…" Dante muttered, nodding with satisfaction.

"Here you go, Miss Alice," he continued, handing the soulstone to the woman.

The rest of the individuals in the room were a bit confused, so Alice addressed everyone present and said that she had decided to make a contract with Dante, surprising them.

Paige's eyes lit up with excitement, and Zac pondered what "RPG class" she would get, unsure of the ex-detective's abilities.

After Alice took a deep breath, she started munching on the orb, which made an unsettling cracking sound.

*Gulp* "Now what…?" Alice asked after swallowing.

"Now we wait… Let's meet up here again tomorrow at the same time," Dante commented.

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A few hours later, Alice went to her room in the Jade Palace, and her roommate June asked about the soulstone and the contract with Dante.

Still, Alice explained that it hadn't affected her yet and confessed that she was a bit nervous from the wait.

After June expressed her excitement about watching her abilities the next day, the pair shut off the lights in their room and went to sleep.

That night, Alice had a vivid dream where she found herself walking behind Dante in a hellish landscape.

"What the…? Hey!" Alice shouted at the warlock, but the man didn't react to her words as if he couldn't hear them.

Dante was walking slowly towards a pair of massive double doors that were at least twenty meters tall and had two blood waterfalls on each side.

When the warlock stood tall before the entrance, the heavy doors began to open slowly, generating a loud screeching sound as they scraped the ground.

Alice shut her ears and flinched but still couldn't stop watching the scenery. Even though she could tell it was a hellish landscape, it was something she had never seen before.

Suddenly, the scenery around her changed, and she found herself behind Dante once again. This time, however, he was facing an expansive lake with boiling blood.

The woman couldn't see where the lake ended, a testament to its sheer size. The thick blood was bubbling from the heat, and the vapor that came out of it produced a sickening stench.

"Sanguinax… I'll do the contract," Dante's reflection said as he faced the blood sea.

'Who…?' Alice pondered.

As the boiling blood accumulated in a single spot, the figure of a person with no facial features appeared, letting out an eerie, deep laugh that resonated in Alice's mind.

"Tainted blood of the warlock… I accept," said the foreboding figure.

At that moment, Dante started to walk into the lake, creating a sizzling sound as his feet stepped inside, shocking Alice, who was watching everything from behind.

'Is this a memory of how he got his blood abilities…?' Alice thought.

When she looked back at the warlock, he was gritting his teeth in pain as his body had been fully submerged under the boiling blood.

Suddenly, she heard a loud explosion that splashed liters of blood all around the area, followed by a loud scream by Dante.

The warlock was in excruciating pain as all of the blood inside his body was forcefully extracted, making strands of blood come out of his eyes and mouth.

Alice kept watching in utter shock, and just as Dante's body seemed to be lifeless, the boiling blood began to flow into him just as violently as it came out.

The burning blood from the Infernal Bloodsea made the warlock's body burst into flames for a brief moment. Nevertheless, he kept withstanding the pain.

The woman could see that even Dante's eyes were burning from the flames as he kneeled on the ground, screaming in pain and tightly clenching his fists.

"Alice!" The woman heard a voice calling her.

"Alice!" she heard it again, and at that moment, she let out a gasp and opened her eyes.

"Ngh… June?" Alice muttered, seeing her roommate standing in front of her with a worried expression.

"Are you okay? You were sweating and rolling around…" June said, placing a hand on Alice's forehead to check her temperature.

*Sigh* "Was that a nightmare or his memories…?" Alice pondered aloud, telling her roommate what she saw while sleeping.