He Who Hunts Demons Chapter 22: 23-Runic Projections

Read chapter 22 of He Who Hunts Demons by A_Random_Turtle on NovelPedia.

Closing my eyes, I took a very deep breath, calming myself as much as I could to prevent the anger bubbling inside of me escaping to the surface. But when I opened my eyes once more and locked gazes with that of Martha’s, my fury was reignited. It was impossible. There was no point in trying to pretend like everything was fine. So I tossed the rumpled card of the fool at Martha as a sign of my fury, but Gaston caught it in her stead, so I walked forward. “What was that?” I asked, my tone very unpleasant and every bit disrespectful. She hadn’t earned my respect yet. In fact, her stunt with my memory had placed it on a negative scale. Martha’s smile vanished, seemingly realizing that I wasn’t particularly pleased with her idea of a puzzle. She raised her hands as a show of peace, I assumed, and the blood trickling out of her right hand streamed down towards her arm. “I apologize,” she said as she brought out a white handkerchief with a click of her tongue and wiped the blood away. “My puzzle has apparently angered you. That was not my intention.” “Most certainly.” I didn’t deny it. “My memories are private. I do not tolerate people—or demons—” that one was for Gaston, and I glanced at him to make sure he knew that, “prying into my life without my permission.” Martha jerked back slightly as her expression shook. I was surprised. What exactly had I said to warrant her being shocked? Then her brows jumped up as she seemed to come to a sort of realization, after which she chuckled lightly. “It seems there has been a misunderstanding,” she began, tying her handkerchief over the cut on her hand. I was curious as to why that had happened despite assuming it was as a result of her pulling me out of the puzzle-world she’d thrown me into, but I left that for later—if we eventually settled things amicably. She looked at me and smiled. “I have zero clue as to what went down in your puzzle.” I frowned. “What?” “It’s as you heard.” Honestly, I didn’t believe that. Was she trying to say that my mind created that puzzle all on its own? Then what about the words she’d said when she pulled me out? “Well, that’s disappointing,” I began and Martha blinked owlishly. “Those were your words. To me it sounded like you were gutted things didn’t turn out as you had expected. Why would you be if you had no clue what was going on in the puzzle?” Martha took a second like she was digesting my words, then leaned backward and sat halfway on the desk beside Gaston, who was trying his hardest to return the card of the fool back to its normal state. She chuckled again. “That’s because I know when things are going awry in every puzzle I initiate,” she explained. Then she raised a finger before I could even think about uttering a word and continued, “Take note that the word ‘initiate’ was not a mistake. Because that is all I do.” She pointed at her head. “I initiate the puzzle and the minds of those called to participate in it do the rest. Whatever you saw, however your puzzle came to be, you did that yourself. Technically, your mind did. The fact that you’re not happy with whatever you saw forces me to believe that you and your psyche are not exactly in cohorts with one another. Do settle that. In this line of work, you cannot afford to be at odds with yourself.” I tilted my head slightly with a grimace. “You’re saying all I saw in my puzzle stemmed from something I harbor deep down?” “Precisely.” My lips twitched indistinctly. I believed her to some extent. After all, it was true that I did harbor a deep hatred for the summon that had killed my parents, and I stood on the fact that exerting my revenge on both it and its summoner would be the only way I could get justice. The problem came from the fact that not only were there some internal consistency problems with the way the setting of my puzzle had been presented—but I chalked that up to the slight variations that came with dreams and nightmares and anything that had to do with venturing into the mind—but tha