The effort to summon Makeri almost bled Jiang Xuande to death. Makeri reported rather reluctantly to the magician and gave him an insouciant and bored greeting.
Makeri hadn’t anticipated that Jiang Xuande had built a trap for him, and Jiang Xuande bound Makeri’s metaphysical essence to the peasant girl, making it impossible for him to escape without fusing his soul to hers. Makeri realized that he was obligated to do Jiang Xuande’s bidding or forfeit his existence as he knew it, and so he had little choice but to help the magician carry out his mad plans until he was released from the cage of the peasant girl’s body.
Jiang Xuande needed the Neku to execute his plan. The first thing he made Makeri do was to provide detailed information about Astaroth’s palace in Persepolis. Jiang Xuande was delighted to learn from Makeri that the palace was, relatively speaking, unoccupied, for Astaroth and her entourage had gone to Egypt on an errand.
One of the more sinister magics that Jiang Xuande had learned from Ninalla was how to separate his own consciousness from his body and, in essence, become something like a Neku himself. It was through this dematerialization that he was able to travel thousands of miles at a great speed (a speed that’s hardly impressive to those of you in the 21st century, but nonetheless impressive for an actual mortal without the aid of a machine) to Astaroth’s palace. Given what he’d learned from both Ninalla and Makeri, he knew exactly what he needed and exactly where to find it, for Jiang Xuande’s intention was to sneak into Astaroth’s palace and steal from her library the most discreet of grimoires. This grimoire was particularly powerful (and is now lost, having been “misplaced” in ab urbe condita 560, or 193 BC), and it was unique, for it was a remarkable source of demonic magical secrets tucked inside a miniature orrery.
You might ask yourself how an orrery could function as a grimoire, for an orrery is merely a machine meant to represent the movements of the planets in this solar system. In this case, each planet had different meanings assigned to it, and dependent upon the geometric relationships that were created, it was able to harness specific demonic energies that could then be used. As Jiang Xuande was an astronomer, alchemist and magician, Ninalla had told him all about this particular grimoire, known simply as the Orrery, for she felt that he had the specific expertise necessary to make it work if he were ever able to lay his hands upon it.
But knowing what he needed and where it was located was less than half the battle, for Jiang Xuande had to get the Orrery out of the palace, and he couldn’t do it without a physical form. He possessed the body of a young beggar boy (which was a horrible state of existence for both, particularly the boy, if you can imagine such a crime against nature). He then summoned another Neku named Piktaungitok who was associated with neither Astaroth nor Sitri, for he needed her to gather the magics necessary to transport the Orrery back to the state of Qin in China.
Jiang Xuande had envisioned many different scenarios involving the success and the failure of his plan before he had put it in motion, but he found himself pleasantly shocked at how easy it had been for him to thieve from Persia and return to China as the most powerful magician in the world.
And so now we’re at the part where we angels got involved…The angels Sabrathon and Kochabiel had been keeping an eye on Jiang Xuande over the fourteen years that he had been a practicing magician, for they had found his alliance with a demon to be particularly dangerous. His return to the state of Qin with one of Astaroth’s grimoires was particularly worrisome—especially the Orrery—and that was when Sabrathon and Kochabiel contacted the Archangel Michael and explained to him what they had observed.
Michael understood that the situation could feasibly spin out of control—and quickly— so he sent his two best lieutenants, Jophiel and Sidriel, to stand guard with Sabrathon and Kochabiel. Jophiel and Sidriel were ordered to crush anything that could disrupt the balance of the Earth if it arose and bring in further help if necessary.
(A note: I know that when I began my tale, I mentioned that a squadron of the Heavenly Host was sent into battle. I should probably clarify that Jophiel and Sidriel are a squadron by themselves, for the two of them are were some of the most powerful weapons in Heaven. Jophiel is was a Seraph. The Seraphim are were the Order who served as God’s personal guard, and Jophiel is was their general. Sidriel is was a Cherub and always will be a Cherub, in one respect or another. The Cherubim are were the warriors within the Orders, and Sidriel is was one of the Commanders of the Heavenly Host, after Jophiel, Camael and Michael.)
Michael assured Sabrathon and Kochabiel that he would gladly lend his personal assistance and a battalion of the Heavenly Host if the situation escalated into all-out war. Michael also saw Azrael to inform him that a powerful human magician had it out for him. Azrael was rather amused by the notion of a human trying to cause his demise. He pledged to Michael that he would be on hand to make sure that the balance of souls would be preserved on Earth should a battle come to pass, and he went on his way.
And of course, just as one would expect in a situation like this, everything did spin out of control with magnificent speed. Jiang Xuande’s luck seemed to run out on two days after he had returned home. Piktaungitok, the Neku whom he had summoned to help him get the grimoire back to China, had inflicted enough damage on her host for her to die and release her. Jiang Xuande had seen to bind her to the body of her host, but not to the soul. He was about to regret that misstep, for even though her alliegiance was to the Apokomistis Tohil, she ran straight to Astaroth to tell her that the Orrery was in the hands of a mortal.
I will conclude this tale next Tuesday. Dominus tecum.
