226 The Ritual of Serpents and Death

The Storax oil that had been sprinkled around the room brought a leathery, balsamic smell that calmed his mind, and the veil of darkness comforted him.

Using his dagger, Valentine made an incision on his left palm and let his blood drip down to the scroll below. He followed the pattern, which was four crosses interlocked together with ankhs in between them. His blood seeped into the scroll, painting the sigil dark red in color, but to paint a small section of the sigil, a lot of his blood was required.

Once he was finished with the crosses, Valentine redrew the crown on the right side, feeling weaker with each second because of the loss of blood. The moment the sigil was completed, he covered his wound with his right hand and it began healing right away.

Pant... Pant...

He took a deep breath to recover for a second. However, he couldn't waste too much time; he had to proceed with the ritual.

The brown parchment scroll on the desk now had its pattern completely redrawn in blood, emitting a mysterious faint glow that was consumed by its surrounding darkness. After placing all the materials on the sigil neatly, Valentine picked up Graham's lighter that was placed near the scroll.

Flick!

With a quick movement of his finger, the lighter in his hand was now lit. He brought the flame closer to the four orange votive candles that were placed in the four cardinal directions. Starting from the one pointing north, he lit the candles all the way to the west.

After the candles were lit, the darkness in the room seemed to have intensified instead of dissipating. Its comforting embrace blanketed Valentine, slowly engulfing his entire being.

Opening his mouth, he began the summoning chant calmly, although his heart was starting to race with each passing second.

"Thee I invoke, the One born from Fire,"

"Thou art the master of Curses,"

"Thou art the master of Serpents,"

"Thee, that teachest Death and Deathly Knowledge,"

"Thee, that bringst Pain and Suffering,"

"Come thou forth, and accept my offering,"

"And grant me your power, worthy of thy name!"

Suffocating silence crept onto the room once he finished the chant. Not even the sound of the clock ticking nor his heartbeat could be heard.

"Hiss!!"

Snakes of different sizes came slithering out of the blood sigil, coiling around the ritual offering until there was no more. The snakes then scattered around the place, consuming every tiny bit of remaining light, bringing about pitch blackness into the room.

Under the blanket of absolute darkness and silence, Valentine's heart was beating faster and faster in anticipation.

Rattle...

"Hiss..."

Valentine noticed that he was unable to move. Through his night vision, he could see that his legs had been locked in place by the other snakes that coiled around them tightly. He couldn't even feel any sensation from his legs as they had grown numb.

"Shit..."

The giant snake was now right in front of him, its eyes staring right at his. The snake then opened its jaw wide and bit into Valentine's head, its sharp teeth sank into his skin.

Its backward-facing teeth made it impossible for Valentine to break free without tearing himself open, and its strong suction force kept on swallowing him whole. Its strong, tight jaw felt crushing on his bones as he entered the snake's body, slipping deeper inside without being able to resist.

Flesh and enzymes surrounded him, slowly eating away at his clothes and skin. The cramped space made him feel claustrophobic, but this time, it was warranted. He really couldn't do anything to break free, and could only accept his fate of being eaten alive by a giant serpent.

His bones were slowly being crushed and his skin corroded away. Valentine was alive to feel the agonizing pain the whole time, unable to even fall unconscious. He felt his arms, the first to be digested by the snake's stomach, fall off and turned into tiny snakes that slithered away. His legs were next and his body followed not long after. What remained was only his head and his consciousness, wishing he would die with every breath.

Just when he thought he would be digested thoroughly by the giant serpent, the flesh around him moved and pushed his head outside.

He was spat out!

His head hit the hard wooden floor, rocking his brain and giving him a throbbing headache.

Rattle...

Tiny snakes slithered towards the bodiless man and coiled against each other, solidifying into a new body for Valentine. It was a very strange sensation as his body clearly felt like it was made out of numerous tiny slithering creatures. His skin felt hard like scales and the itch that came with it was unbearable. He wanted to scratch his skin open, but he was still unable to move.

After several seconds of lying on the floor with the agonizing itch, Valentine was finally able to move his body again. He got up and the moment he did so, the room returned to normal.

He found himself in the middle of the office, nearer to the door, so he walked back to his desk blew out the candles in reverse order. After that, he rolled the scroll back. Sending his energy to the belt that he was wearing, he focused on the vial of silver liquid on the desk.

"I order you to seal this scroll!"

The mercury inside the vial came out and wrapped around the scroll on the desk, effectively sealing it. Once it was sealed, the scroll burst into flames and the ashes entered Valentine through his nose.

With that, his ritual was over.

"That was painful and strange," he muttered, touching the skin on his left hand.

His skin still felt like that of a normal human, but there was definitely something hard if he pinched hard enough. It was as if his skin was resisting the force.

"Yes, something has definitely changed about me. And as usual, something has also been taken, but I still don't know what,"

Valentine sat down in the armchair and leaned back with his arms crossed. He began accessing the knowledge about his new power that he had received from the Deity of Serpents and Death.

"This Deity seems to be all about curses, G, but before that, let's see the abilities that have evolved because of this Deity,"

"First, my Anti-Divination now will allow us to disrupt divination attempts. After I place Anti-Divination on something, we'll know if someone is trying to divine it. At that moment, we can use a curse to disrupt it. The explosion you got back then was an example of it,"

"Although it's powerful on its own, the strongest part of this ability is the fact that we'll know if someone's trying to use divination on us, G," Valentine concluded.

"We can use it ten times per day. Let's call it Divination Disruption,"

Just as Valentine finished saying that, his spiritual intuition was triggered. It seemed that someone was trying to use divination on one of the places that he had put Anti-Divination on.

"Speak of the devil. So this is how it feels like; it feels like something is pulling my shirt trying to remind me about something. Although we can't know for sure what is being divined, we can damage the divinator if we're lucky. This divination at this hour must be about Pompoen Village, G. Let's not do anything for now since I don't want to reveal my status as a Demise that early."

"Alright, let's move on. Besides Anti-Divination, Illusion Substitutes have also been influenced by this Deity. Now instead of turning into a botch of ink, I'll turn into countless tiny snakes if it's triggered. I don't know if it's an upgrade or just a visual gimmick, but it sure looks cooler that way."

"Now onto the main course. This Deity granted me the ability to use curses. There are many different types of curses and the knowledge of some of them has been transferred into my brain. Basically, to curse someone, I'll need a part of their bodies, be it their hair strands or their nails. Blood doesn't work, however. After that, I'll have to set up an altar and conduct a cursing ritual using an offering. Different offerings will bring about different curses."

Valentine stared into the darkness in his office. His mind was racing, thinking about how to best utilize his new ability, and his eyes were brimming with excitement.

"I really want to try this right away, but there is no suitable target. We can maybe try a harmless curse on Luuk," he decided, "But for that, we'll need his hair strand. We'll do it after I finish telling you about my abilities, G,"

"The next ability I got is likely a hybrid between the two President rank Deities I'm in a contract with. It allows me to turn into a giant snake. It's not real, of course; it's but a mere illusion. However, we can intimidate our enemies that way, or trick them. Let's call this Snake Illusion,"

Valentine was curious about the ability, so he wanted to use it right away. He got up from the chair and went to his bedroom, where the vanity mirror was.

Standing in front of the mirror, he began chanting.

"I, in the name of the Deity of Serpents and Death, hereby turn myself into a giant snake!"

His body didn't undergo a transformation process like when Graham used his ability, but he felt that something was growing out of him. Although he still felt human and looked human when he looked at his arms, when he looked at his reflection in the mirror, it was of a giant snake!

It was the same snake that had swallowed him before!

The snake's eyes were glowing orange and its scales glistened in the dark. It emitted a malevolent aura that could probably intimidate even the bravest of men as its body was stretching more than four meters long. In the mirror, Valentine was no more, and in his place, a giant deathly serpent was standing.

"So other people will see us this way. The duration seems to last only ten minutes, but that should be more than enough, right, G?"

Valentine then placed Concealment on his aura to hide the snake's intimidation.

While still under transformation, Valentine left his apartment and walked toward his neighbor's door; room number 24. He knocked on the door with his hand, but it looked like a giant snake banging on the door with its head.

He waited patiently for Luuk to come out. After several seconds, the sound of footsteps was heard approaching the door.

Click!

The door was unlocked from the inside and then opened. Luuk was standing in the gap, and the moment he saw Valentine, the young medical student froze in terror. Although the intimidating aura had been concealed, looking at the snake directly still sent horror to the victims.

While the young man was still in shock, Valentine swiftly used his dagger to cut a little of his neighbor's curly brown hair. He took just a little at the tip so it wouldn't be noticeable. After he got the hair, Valentine quickly returned to his own room, leaving the young man whose face was as pale as a corpse alone.

Thud!

The door was closed behind him and he sat at the desk, placing Luuk's hair strands on it. He then crouched and opened his safe, taking the essence of a lingering spirit that Graham had managed to collect long ago. It could be used in a cursing ritual and the effect was mostly harmless, so he would experiment with that one.

Using the desk as the altar, Valentine began drawing the sigil of his deity using his blood on it. It was much easier because there was no scroll that kept sucking his blood dry.

Once the sigil was completed, he placed the hair and the essence on top of it and four candles around the sigil. Strangely, the hair didn't soak the blood that was used for drawing the sigil.

Once his preparation had been finished, Valentine lit the candles one by one, starting from the one pointing the north and ended with the west one. His mischievous face was illuminated by the orange light from the flames, and his eyes were glowing in excitement.

In the candlelit room, Valentine began chanting.

"I, in the name of the Deity of Serpents and Death, offer you this hair,"

"Please bestow upon us Your blessing,"

"And bestow upon my target Your curse,"

"With this essence from a lingering spirit, make my target experience a nightmare in his sleep!"

The flames burned brighter and the blood on the desk started boiling. The hair and the essence were then slowly engulfed by the blood, being reduced to nothing. After the offerings were accepted, the flames went out on their own and the smoke spread in the room.

"The curse is successful. The nightmare shouldn't be that bad since we only used one essence. Tomorrow, we have to treat Luuk to some meal as an apology. We've scared him enough today," he said without even a tinge of regret in his voice.