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Sal fixed up a couple of plates for both him and Marcha, putting them on the table. As Marcha switched to a more humanoid form to sit at the table, Salanio traced his finger up her arm, arcing some light, harmless electricity into her in a pleasing way, hitting nerve endings in wonderful ways for just a few seconds. Grinning, he took his place at the table and began to eat, soon losing himself to thought.

Ever since he came to the "surface" from Heegh, there was some strange... essence or force that he couldn't name, affecting him, though it felt filtered or dimmed by something... possibly by the something Heegh put in him? Perhaps it was something he was forbidden to feel. If he had anything to compare it to, it was similar to the affections he was starting to feel for Marcha, only... different somehow. From some other source unseen. He wondered what this meant, and if the others had felt it.

He then thought to his conversation with Duran. Heegh... Deities should be able to spend little or no energy to create something. He had to admit that the few times he saw Heegh creating demons, and the even fewer times he saw him creating something massive and deadly, that there was a drain of energy in the area... and it seemed to affect Heegh himself, as after a while, the Satan would retire to his private quarters. So Heegh's claims to being a God were most likely false then. And why would he punish Salanio for those other questions, if there wasn't an all powerful God somewhere? What did this mean? If such a God were true, what was He like? Perhaps with so much power, He could care less what his tiny creations do day to day, or perhaps He toyed with them. Or maybe... there was the rare chance that He watched over them, and looked out for their overall well-being? Sal frowned. What sort of all powerful being would concerned themselves with more insignificant things like that. Then again, he reminded himself that he was raised by Heegh and Heegh's way of thinking, so who knew.

The chains... If what Duran had said was true, then why didn't Heegh just pull on the missing trio's chains, and force them back into Hell? He'd seen him do the task on stronger demons, so what was stopping him? Unless he couldn't for some reason. But what would stop Heegh from being able to use the chains? Some interfering magic? That one All Powerful Being if He existed?

...broken. What if the chains were broken? Could she had somehow found someone in her group of rescuers that had the ability to destroy Hell chains? Unconsciously, Salanio was scratching deep into his arm in thought, drawing slight amounts of blood again as he always did when thinking so hard or so much. He'd have to find more reason to study the group longer than the others, if Adira was with them, and there was someone who could destroy the damned things.

So much in thought was Salanio, that he had stopped eating and seemed to be staring off into space, scratching at his new wounds to make them bleed.

Salanio blinked, wide eyed. What was THAT? It was a very strange sensation, and it made him bark out in laughter, even though he bumped his head against the wall kind of hard.

"It's.... okay? What did you do to me? That was very odd. I've never felt that before."

When he learned that the sensation was that of being tickled, he thought for a moment, and tried to do it to himself, with less than successful results. He then asked Marcha to "tickle" him again, and ended up laughing once more, flailing a little, soon wanting her to stop. He realized the sensation made him sensitive, but it felt good at the same time. He asked her to do it again, and again until he grew tired of it, until there was a point that she was tickling him and wouldn't stop until he'd begged for it. That was a sort of entertaining torture, and he lay there on the floor catching his breath. He grinned up at Marcha and growled a little, though it wasn't a threatening sort of growl, more of an "I'm very amused and enticed to do something" sort. He then suddenly tackled Marcha and started to tickle her. Needless to say, when they got back to their dinner, it was cold. Thankfully, a little application of "shock therapy" made the meal warm again without burning it.

Duran smiled wondering if she would have chosen another mate or be promiscuous if she had more options. "That, my dear, is the right question."

He leaned his head towards his door. "Stop lingering you furless sloth and come in here. I was going to give you clothes to your liking like Sal and Nerissa, but your slow dirt-like nature might have lost you the opportunity."

Turning back towards Nerissa with a rather pleasant face. "Before I answer your questions, would you please fetch your brother for me so that I can give you all a thorough answer all at once."

While she was gone he still granted the same opportunity to Nym anyways and did basically the same thing he did for the other two earlier. When all were gathered into his room he began, "as Heegh has interest in a fledgling angel that lives there, many of us have taken some interest in the matter as well. What should you expect? You should expect highly paranoid residents able to sense your presence in more ways than one who may figure you out if you do not act just right which is why I suggest you all put some time into studying the mannerisms of the species you selected and putting it into practice. Expect your doom or capture if you are discovered. A lack of hostility if you are discovered has a high probability of capture, but watch their reaction to determine this."

"How many are there? That number is in constant fluctuation as people come and go due to the house being open for anyone who visits. It can also increase or decrease in strong characters depending on how insecure they feel. That being the case, I expect there to be many strong people."

"These are the people who live there." A holographic image appeared before them of BlackMN, Galantros, Daphne, Rosemary, and Sephiroth from his memory of what they looked like. "These are people of note who are frequently there," enter Veni, Jacob with his mask covering his half face, and the pixie Willow, "though this one has been practically living there lately," pointing at Jacob.

"Now to add in everyone who might be there." Ma Jian-shen, Githar, Malos, Minazi, Eztli, Thas, Dieamos, Inazuma, Dan, Daisy, and a very shadowy Cian figure as he knows he exists but isn't entirely sure what he looks like.

"Now this one," BlackMN came into focus and everyone else shrunk like they were minimized, "is not likely to be there since Rosemary," Rosemary enlarged for a moment and shrunk again, "suspects something is up. When Rosemary thinks it is dangerous she usually sends this girl someplace safe. However in case she is there, she is a fox demon of the fire type. Her since of smell is quite possibly more refined than yours in your normal form. Her hearing and eyesight are still quite good, but nowhere near the smell."

He pointed at BlackMN and flicked his finger to the side and she got shoved to the side and appeared as if going through a door, such was the manner in which she vanished since he was emphasizing that he didn't think she'd be there. He also didn't explain Willow at all and flicked her away too. Rosemary, Veni, Ma Jian-shen, Dan, Daisy, Daphne, and Cian grew again. "All of these are vampires. Vampires are very well adapted natural hunters with many strengths and many weaknesses. They have excellent eyesight and can see a much broader spectrum than humans can. Their hearing is also very good. Some say they can hear a faint heartbeat a block away. Their sense of smell is slightly lower than that of a normal canine, but when it comes to smelling exposed blood few can compete. Do not ever look into their eyes. All are immune to the deadly poison effects unless delivered directly to the heart, however it can still be used to weaken them in enough quantity until they develop an immunity to the type being used. All of them are weak or at least afraid of fire."

Highlighting all but Rosemary. "These ones should be weak to prolonged sunlight exposure." Rosemary highlights now, "she is a special case and only habitually avoids it now."

Dan and Daisy highlight. "These two are still fledglings and are the least of your worries as far as vampires go. They are not likely to be there either." Those two left the scene in the same mannerism as Black.

He focused Daphne into view. "I am not sure of Daphne's threat level as far as vampires go, but do know she is over 220, but less than 300 which is still a young vampire. As far as I can tell she is average in strength and speed as far as vampires go which is about 10x that of humans. Among other oddities I do know she is a healer especially if it is another vampire. Her familiars are rabbits and ravens. She is very likely to be there."

Next came the mostly shadow of Cian. "I do not know what he looks like, I just know he exists and would likely be around Daphne. If she is there so should he. He is skilled to an unknown extent at telekinesis and is able to cast an anti-magic barrier which is luckily not problematic for the bird forms you will be taking with the rune."

Ma Jian-shen was next (and probably ironically enough the most detailed in appearance of them), unlike the other vampires his eyes appeared almost black until he turned his head to the side which then looked more red. "Ma Jian-shen is one to two hundred fifty years older than Daphne. I am not sure if he has familiars. His training in martial arts makes it difficult to tell if he truly is faster or stronger than the average vampire or if he has made the best of what he has. I am not sure if it is his specialty or precision when he hits, but his blows really hurt. Weapons of choice fists, Dao (Chinese broadsword), or Jian (Chinese sword). He may be there some days and not on others."

"Veni to my knowledge is the oldest. He is very likely the fastest among them and I mean everyone who is there. He is able to walk in one shadow and out the other and do other things to manipulate them. If he ever perfects the art, he would be all the more dangerous. His familiars are unfortunate and include the house cat, bat, and butterfly. Weapons of choice are throwing knives and swords. Is very likely to be there."

"Rosemary is best known for her brute strength and temper. Likely the most physically strong out of everyone there. She is one of the best vampires I know with a gun. She was born a telepath when human and has her own watered down hellish aura. She will be there."

"She is also an angel," the other angels popped up and vampires minimized. "The angel of air to be exact. Still new at it, so she has not reached her potential."

"Inazuma here is the elemental angel of lightning. She might be there, but I give it only a ten percent chance." He flung her away.

"Thas is a messenger of sorts slightly higher in rank than the elementals. He has energy tendril wings that can hold multiple weapons. Think of it as being like a chain ghoul."

"Eztli is the new elemental angel of fire. He his also a reaper."

Galantros, Githar, Malos, and Minazi. "Reapers are immune to fire and lightning and actually draw strength from them. They have a high tolerance to poison and are not likely to die from it. I am not sure if these three will be there," referring to Githar, Malos, and Minazi, "but of them this one, Githar is the most likely. He is a martial arts warrior type."

"Galantros is a half-reaper whose combination with a succubus baffles me. This is his demon form. Uses a scythe for his weapon." GL became a strange demon with elongated limbs with sharp claws, teeth, and a ghastly eye on each wing. "I am not sure of its full potential, but if he is in that form he should be wearisome to you."

"Speaking of demons, if this one is there," Dieamos came into focus in his gentleman form and then suddenly grew and grew, "and you are discovered either get out of there, surrender, or die. You cannot win against him. I can barely do anything without help against him. Dieamos is a trump card. There is absolutely no taking him on... especially for you."

Dieamos minimized and up came Jacob. "Jacob here is a natural necromancer. He can create golems out of flesh and other matter. He studies curses and other arcane arts. He is the most magically skilled of all of them and can detect it in objects sometimes without even searching. Uses a dagger most often. Physically he is above average for a human. He can be disabled, for the most part have common human strengths and weaknesses, but he cannot be killed. He may figure you out if he suspects something is amiss."

"Last but not least is Sephiroth. He is a humanoid of unknown species. Being such I am not sure of his tolerances or weaknesses. I think his poison tolerance is above average though. I am also not sure if his keen senses are trained natural or completely trained due to his suspected military background. As you can see he has a far reach with his sword, but he can reach much farther than that with it and slice even dense metal at a distance beyond the sword's tip. One would think he would be not as skilled with that sword if you managed to get close to him, but he is just as deadly. He knows some magic and his most notable of it is his ability to produce a barrier and magically increase his speed and possibly strength which makes it hard to tell how strong or weak he really is. He is also able to at least increase the speed of others by this touch spell for a short period and put up a barrier on them as well."

"All those aside there might be new allies that I am not aware of as my knowledge is about four or so months old. The angels I mentioned are ones who most commonly associate with Rosemary, but more may show up. There are also going to be basic Limbo military soldiers and elite ones. Those ones you can easily look up on your own. Any questions before I disable this illusion?"

Sal frowned for his part, studying what would be the resistant forces in their mission just as carefully as Nee. His powerful lightning may be able to handle a few, but some of the characters seemed.... dangerous. The reapers with their ability to absorb his energy moreso. If he got stuck in a fight with them, he would have to rely more on his claws, teeth, and machete than his electrical prowess to kill if he had to. Sylin possibly joining their forces as an extremely deadly marksman and gunman didn't bode well either. This was definitely going to have to be a strictly reconnaissance only mission. Spot Adira, confirm her location, get out.

Thinking back to why Adira wasn't pulled back and his guess at her chains being broken, he wondered who in the group could have done it for her and the other hounds. He narrowed down to either Dieamos, looking like a demon that had great power, possibly something called an Abomination that he had heard of once before, or that necromancer since he had the most potent magic abilities.

"Transportation? How are we to get out of there quickly if we run into trouble? I've seen people in this world use some manner of magical charm or trinket and crush it in their hand, opening portals as if they were every day practice, others like the reapers, using their bare hands. Do you have such a device that would allow us to.... Nym. You searched their place once already I believe, how did you get back to this realm without the assistance of Heegh and enraging him further?"

What Sal didn't know is that Nym had stolen such 'portal charms' from individuals rather brazenly before he went on his search, allowing him quick travel. Sal could run fast, move almost like lightning even if he wanted, but the ability to move between worlds or realms, or very large distances was still beyond him.

With their little briefing done, the hounds left the room. Sal went "Wheee" as a burst of lighting flew out of his a**, propelling him back into the living room. (NOT AN ACTUAL POST)

Nym stared, thoughts and questions racing through his mind. "So...How long do you think that they will be under high alert? Is there anything we could do to minimize their suspicion?" Nym was a clever hound occasionally. He was mostly stubborn and that often caused his logic to be clouded, but not, it seemed, in this circumstance.

Just as Duran finished talking about how patient Heegh was, there were tugs at Nym's and Nerissa's hell chains. Sal narrowed his eyes a bit.

"He's right. Our best bet would be just to wait a few days. They may not have lowered their guard entirely, but it'd be down a bit than going right in. Waiting too long wouldn't do well for us either."

With their briefing done, the hounds left the room. They spent the day with Marcha first teaching them how to use Limbo's technology for things such as computing. Once they got a handle on it, Sal started searching for common knowledge on soldiers. He found out they wore special armored suits that repaired themselves and even healed damage done to the soldiers, resisted harsh impacts and various bio-hazards, and did a great variety of things. Most of them were reapers, who had other abilities such as instant understanding of languages and a varied selection of uses they could use their energy for. Some of Limbo's weapons seemed particularly wicked and nasty as well, far exceeding the firepower on most other mortal planets and realms. Sal frowned at this. This was getting more and more risky as they went. Still, better to do this then face Heegh's wrath. He wasn't able to find very much if any information about the Elites, but surmised that they were much more potent versions of the regular soldiers.

The rest of their time was spent studying, preparing, and killing off the hours.