They had only needed to wait twenty minutes for a carriage, which was a nice change. Usually, they made people wait for at least a half-hour or more before they showed up. Katy climbed in first and sagged against the soft sofa running along the edge of the cabin, her head lolled back. Kito closed the slightly rounded door as he crouched inside, took a seat next to his wife and held his hand out, splaying his fingers with his palm facing away from him. Blue light flashed and a flat, translucent screen appeared in mid-air showing a map of the city and surrounding area. He placed a finger on the image and flicked, the map moving and showing a huge swathe of trees slicing into the city from the side. Within this dense forest was the Tiko estate. He pressed his finger there and quickly input his payment details before sitting back. Kito felt the slight rumble as the carriage started up, but after the initial bumps, the ride was perfectly smooth. He didn’t think of it much these days, but apparently, once upon a time, animals had been used to pull carriages. The new carriages seemed much more convenient to him, and with no animal exploitation required! He imagined it would also make the ride a lot bumpier than using a Spirit Orb. Essentially a ball of Elemental magic created by a group of mages and mostly self-perpetuating, needing recharging very rarely. Spirit Orbs had become massively common over the years with the techniques used in making them becoming more and more accessible – even more so since the end of the war. It was extremely commonplace for a household to have one, since they were amazing for regulating temperature, supplying water and insulating buildings. It was quite nifty, considering the tenant didn't even have to be an Elemental mage to use the Orb – though only Elemental mages could recharge them, unfortunately. Kito being unable to recharge his own had been a problem due to how far from the city he lived. That is, until Katy had moved in, and not least of all because of how much those charlatans charged for five minutes of work, but then there was the 2-hour trip into the town on peak-days. Now the only treks necessary into the city proper were for food and supplies, and for Katy to get to work. Being a General, though, she was respected and powerful enough to warrant an Airship stopping off to pick her up.

The ride home was calm, soothing even. Kito had wrapped an arm around Katy's shoulders and her head fell onto him, resting on the hollow between his neck and collar bone. “What do you want to watch when we get home?” She asked softly, eyes closed.

“I'm not sure. I picked last time, anyway.” Kito looked ahead, at the seat in front of them with a small smile.

“I'm in the mood for something sappy.”

“Oh?” Kito raised an eyebrow, “That's rare.”

Katy shrugged, “I've seen quite a lot of action these past few weeks. I want some romance.”

“Well we can watch something sappy,” Kito said, and kissed the top of Katy's head, “And you can get all the romance you like.”

“Mmmm...” Katy nestled in further, cuddling into him as Kito chuckled. He brought her in closer with the arm around her shoulders and rested his free hand on her knee. The carriage fell into a comfortable silence. The early years of the relationship had been intense and passionate. While that intensity and passion did come back on occasion, Kito felt the strongest for his wife in moments like these. The quiet moments, when he could hear the quiet and slow breathing, feel the rhythmic beating of her heart. He looked down at the messy red hair, that one tuft on the top of her head that always stuck up no matter what and bounced when she moved. For years he had been convinced she was far out of his league. It still made him smile when he thought of her reaction the first time he'd mentioned it, her confused expression followed by the punch on the shoulder. He smiled down at her, all of his worries drifting away as they always did when they were alone.

***

The Tiko Estate was massive. The main structure especially would feel rather intimidating if it were in a city, with its arched battlements and an imposing tower reaching into the sky. Out here in the wilderness, however, this castle-like appearance seemed almost a part of the forest around it. Three floors of intricate and ornamental architecture, the biggest of the buildings towered with giant windows and heavy doors that lent the building an air of experience and authority like a wizened mentor secluded in the trees. The grounds around it matched the splendour, stretching the property so that the small satellite buildings were quite the walk away from their ancient parent. One of these smaller structures was specially made for training of all kinds. The other was a barracks area of sorts: full of bedrooms and daily essentials. The garden was vast and well maintained. Three huge greenhouses housing Kito’s main hobby, his intense interest in taking care of the exciting and exotic flora from all over the physical Realms, stood proud on one side of the path leading to the mansion.

Night shrouded the Estate in nigh-impenetrable darkness, only beaten back by the bright lights that shone from one of the large, arched ground floor windows looking into the mansion’s front living room. This one, in particular, set up with surround sound, a large screen and a multitude of couches, sofas and chairs, was where Kito and Katy had been curled up and watching their film. It was over now, though, Katy's head lying on Kito's lap. He waved a hand and the large screen closed in on itself, and the lights began to dim. He smiled and slid an arm under Katy's knees and shoulders. Lifting her gently, he took her from the living room without waking her and made his way across the hall to the grand staircase that led to the first floor. Up the main stairs, then the branching staircase to the right and through the perpetually open double doors that led into a long hallway. He walked along and nudged into the master bedroom open. A nod of his head and dim light warmed the large room as he lay Katy on the bed. He smiled at her one last time before putting out the lights and closing the door behind him. A stretch, a yawn and some cracked knuckles, then Kito was off back down the corridor. He made his way to his office, situated right next to Katy’s in a hallway off to the side of the main hall. He walked in and, with a grin, looked at the pretty exotic fish that swam and danced around in the floor-to-ceiling tank that acted as the wall between Kito and Katy’s office. He looked at it, beaming happily. Katy had only had it installed a little under a month ago, but already she had used it to make what would otherwise have been mundane or boring study sessions immeasurably more fun and interesting. The water itself, refracting the light of the small bulbs in the tank, illuminated both rooms with rippling blue and silver that never ceased to soothe Kito to his core. He filled a tumbler with rich whiskey, only dropping in one cube of ice like his father used to, and sat at his large desk. The mess of papers, documents and books were strewn around would surely annoy his big sister: Talya, were she here, but seeing as she wasn’t, Kito simply took a sip and waved his fingers slightly. His ‘space’ appeared: a manifestation of his Sight magical Discipline that took on the form of three screens that resembled paper-thin panes of glass with a slight blue hue. He enlarged the middle screen and closed his eyes. After a moment, he flexed his hands and the fight from earlier appeared on the screen. He cracked his fingers and got to work examining the mayhem.

***

Kito awoke with a start, taking several seconds to acclimatise to his surroundings after a very exciting dream. He shook his head and wiped his chin as he caught sight of his whiskey, and then a frown started to creep its way onto his features, turning after a few moments into a pout as he took his whiskey tumbler and looked at the condensation on the glass itself, more water now than alcohol. He stood and stretched his arms out above his head for a moment. He refilled his glass, dismaying slightly at the wasted alcohol. Rubbing the bridge of his nose, he sank back into his chair and got back to reading the massive leather-bound tome before him. It was definitely strange that the Demons they had fought had so many Dregs under their control. Green-eyed Demons were powerful – of course, all Demons were – but the simple fact was that physical beings such as Dregs took a level of precision and power to animate that green or blue-eyed Demons simply didn’t have. It would usually take a whole group of green-eyed Demons to reanimate a single patchwork of corpse parts made from the remains of monsters and magical beings – which was only the first step to creating what is commonly known as a Dreg. These Dregs then needed to be filled with Demonic power from the souls of the Demons creating them. Fueling only a dozen would likely be enough to kill a green or blue-eyed Demon instantly, but there were only two green-eyed Demons present leading a force of hundreds of Dregs. As with most Dreg batches, the size and shapes also varied massively, which did little to reflect their power. It was the toughness of the skin and the strength they showed that was of particularly low quality. This would indicate that they were mass-produced, though that raised another problem. For lower-level Demons, the process of creating Dregs was complex and arduous, requiring physical beings and a ritual that can only be performed in a physical Realm such as Midgard, Sentria, or Tartarus due to the lack of experience and power of these lower Demons. It was impossible for green-eyed Demons to create a large force of Dregs without alerting the Alliance to the large amount of magical power it required. Higher-level Demons could bypass this problem altogether. Demons with red and yellow eyes could create fully physical Dregs relatively easily without the need of freshly killed corpses. Not only that, but they could also even do so in their own magical Realm of Naraka since they didn’t need to harvest living creatures like Green and Blue-eyed Demons did, meaning Demons with at least the strength of a red-eyed or higher could build whole armies well outside of the Alliance’s reach. These higher-level Demons could even maintain their physical form with as much ease as it takes a human to breathe, or blink. A conscious task, but not a difficult or strenuous one like for lower-level Demons. It was obvious this wasn’t a random attack. All of the evidence was leading towards higher level Demons being behind this. Why though? Kito had never been comfortable going into battle against an opponent with unknown goals. This was an interesting subject to start delving into, as well. Questions regarding Dregs have been around for as long as humans have. How can higher-level Demons make them? What are they really? Why did they decide on patchwork monstrosities instead of simple reanimated corpses like the Necromancy Discipline can create? It was possible that following this up could potentially lead to the answers Demonologists have been looking for, for centuries. Kito smiled to himself. He couldn’t help but feel the overwhelming urge to make this a case study on Dregs and their benefits for Demonology as a whole. It could even revolutionise Demonology.

Kito went through the fighting one last time before planning on heading to bed, watching how the Dregs fought – how easy it was to destroy them – and of course the Demons themselves. They were definitely a very low level. Katy had finished the other one present in seconds, not even needing to use her lightning magic. He watched to the end before letting his space dissipate and stretching his arms out once again. Draining the contents of his tumbler, Kito stood and walked around his desk, catching movement out of the corner of his eye. His gaze flickered to the fish-tank wall and he stopped in his tracks. Katy was standing on the other side of it in a short bathrobe, thumbs hooked into the sash with a small smile. Kito gulped and blinked, his heat rising instantly when in one fluid movement Katy’s sash was removed and the bathrobe fell around her feet. She raised her hand and made a delicate show of beckoning Kito before leaving her study. He scrambled for the door, almost forgetting to switch the light off in his rush. It occurred to him that he’d probably never left a room so fast in his life.