20 Come in

Juin trembled when Lucifer suddenly stopped laughing and glared at him.

"Do you know what this means?" Lucifer asked as he glanced down at Juin's wrist, the one that he grabbed onto earlier and still had fingerprints mark on.

Juin looked down. That was when he noticed the dents made by Lucifer's fingerprints. Realization dawned in, and he gasped softly before looking at Lucifer. "You… This… You can physically touch me?!"

A shiver ran down Juin's spine as tears started to well up in his eyes. He knew what would happen from now onwards. Before this, no matter how scared he was, he knew that Lucifer could not harm him physically. Well, the guy managed to cause him to feel as if he was being burned the other time, but that was probably magic.

But now… The fact that Lucifer could touch him meant that the demon king could directly hurt him, without anything to stop him.

Lucifer narrowed his eyes as he sniggered evilly. "Yes… Let's try another experiment."

He put his right fist out in front of Juin, and when he opened it, a bluish-red flame appeared on his palm. "Let's see…"

"NO!" Juin yelled. "You're NOT burning me!"

"Just a little… Come on, don't be a coward. We need to test things out."

"No!" Juin yelled as he tried to scramble farther away, all the while keeping his eyes on the creepy flames on Lucifer's palm.

Lucifer sighed. He snapped his fingers, upon which Juin's mouth was taped shut by an invisible tape.

SNAP!

Another snap of his fingers, and Juin's body constricted in a weird manner, almost like he was in a straightjacket.

"Mmmh...N…" Juin struggled to move in a worm-like manner away from Lucifer.

Meanwhile, Lucifer merely walked toward Juin with a devilish grin, which made him look devastatingly handsome, as he said in a low voice, "Come now, you big baby. It would only hurt a little pain. Heck, you might even enjoy it."

"Noo!" Juin thought loudly as he tried to "worm" his way to the door. However, before he could do so, he felt someone stepping on him, and he knew that his chance of escaping was below nil.

Completely uncaring about his vessel's feelings, Lucifer then took out his Daemon Flame and set it to the lowest setting. At its lowest power, Lucifer's Daemon Strength was fully yellow in colour.

He pulled his fingers into a fist before putting his index finger out, upon which a small yellow flame was burning. With a flick, he sent the yellow flame to Juin's right index finger and watched as the flame covered Juin's index finger.

He then looked at Juin's expression with a serious expression. When he noticed that while Juin was still fearful, he did not show any reactions to his finger being burned. Lucifer then slowly increased the strength of his Daemon Flame, until it was completely bright blue.

That was when Juin showed some reaction. His right index finger was twitching badly, and he was sweating profusely. Seeing that, Lucifer waved his hand nonchalantly, upon which the bright blue flame disappeared.

"I have to use the highest strength flame to hurt his physical body, whereas a simple flame could have hurt his soul… Is it because his body is somewhat mine now, that's why it's hard to hurt it?" Lucifer thought to himself as he looked at Juin's poor index finger. "Not even a scratch, no sign that it was burned at all… Maybe I should try burning his soul again."

He then removed the restraints he placed on Juin. The moment the restraints were gone, Juin stopped struggling, and he turned his body around so that he was lying on his back. He then held onto his right index finger as the memory of those intense pain was still on his mind.

Juin was crying his eyes out as he glared at Lucifer, and at that moment, there were hate and anger that were both clearly reflected in his eyes. Lucifer looked at Juin's eyes, and instead of being offended, he was secretly proud of his vessel, even if he did not show it.

At least Juin's eyes told him that his vessel wasn���t completely defeated by his lack of strength. As long as Juin was capable of showing anger and hate, he was capable of getting stronger. All Lucifer had to do was to tap into these feelings of his vessel and use them to his benefits.

"I'm going to kill you one day…" Juin thought to himself angrily as he slowly pushed himself off the floor and climbed onto the hospital bed. The hospital gown he was wearing was completely soaked with sweat.

"Oh, come on. That's nothing," Lucifer said as he floated back to the chair he was sitting earlier. He completely ignored the stare that Juin shot at him as he tried to think of the implications of his experiments.

"When I merge with his body, I can use it freely as if it were mine to begin with, but my strength is a lot lesser than when I was at home. He can see me now, and we can touch each other, and I can inflict physical pain on him only if I use physical strength. Is that the universe way of telling me not to kill my vessel?"

He then groaned and cursed out loud, scolding himself for not taking his lessons properly. He then suddenly looked up at Juin and thought, "Would it be possible for him to take on my power without the merge?"

Knock! Knock!

The knocking sound took him out from his thoughts, and like Juin, he turned his head toward the door.

"Come in," Juin called out, hoping to see someone else so that he could take his mind off the pain.

The door was slowly pushed open, and a woman peeked in and said, "Were you sleeping? Is this a good time?"

"Max!" Juin quickly sat up straight and softened his expression. "Come in."

Max walked in, and when she saw Juin looking at her dress, she said, "I'm getting discharged. I thought of checking in on you again before I leave."

She sat on the edge of the bed as she asked, "Are you feeling a lot better now?"

Juin nodded.

"Why are you sweating so much?" Max asked with a frown. She then leaned forward to take his temperature with the back of his hand.

"She smells nice…" Juin thought as a light blush appeared on his face. Max was taller than him, which meant that when she leaned forward like that, her br*asts were very close to his face, and he had to look aside.

Lucifer smirked as he thought, "That guy's lucky enough to have such a hot friend."

"There's no fever…" Max frowned slightly as she sat back down properly. "But why are you sweating so much, and why are your face so red?"

"It's probably heat…" Juin said with an awkward laugh. He then cleared his throat and asked, "How about you? How are you feeling now?"

Max's eyes went unfocused for a while, but she quickly shook her head. "I-I'm fine… The doctors said that I had a bit of a shock…"

When she told the doctors and her parents that she was dangled in midair by an invisible force, they had looked at her weirdly, so she decided not to speak about it to anyone anymore.

"Hey, Max…" Juin said when he noticed her confusion. "I'm sorry."

"For what?" Max asked with a smile.

"For not being able to protect you."

Upon hearing that, Max's eyebrows went up slightly before she chuckled. "It's an earthquake, Juin. No one could have protected any of us."

"No… It's…" Juin wondered if he should tell her, but when he glanced at Lucifer, the latter shook his head.

"The more she knew, the more danger she would be in," Lucifer said in a calm tone. "It's up to you though."

Max looked at Juin and cocked her head. "It's what?"

"Nothing..." Juin smiled and said, "You're right… But even so, I wished that I could have protected you."

Max smiled back at him, but she did not say anything. She looked at him, and the image of him with red eyes was back in her mind. Her mind was blurry, and the doctors told her that she was confused because of the shock.

But when she was in between consciousness, she saw Juin… or more like two of him… She woke up for a short moment and saw Juin standing next to a huge crater, while the weird guy who was in the basketball court earlier was nowhere to be seen.

And before she passed out again, for a split second, she saw the image of another man in Juin.