Chapter 1

Erick Blight was a thirty-five-year-old pessimist who had long concluded that romance was an elaborate scam that was designed by nature to drain a person’s time and sanity. He was living proof. Throughout his twenties and early thirties, he had put in the effort. He had dressed well, showered every day and listened attentively, hoping that his good deeds would eventually lead him to the right person. But the universe had other plans. Every time he thought he had built a genuine connection with a woman, reality opened a nasty can of worms. He had courted Selene for three months before discovering she had a husband who worked overseas. The second attempt, the sweet and timid Tara, had conveniently neglected to mention her fiancé until Erick bumped into them at the mall. By the time he hit thirty-two, Erick had stepped off the carousel entirely. He locked his heart behind an iron wall and tossed away the key.

Erick managed to buy a modest single-bedroom apartment on the third floor of a cheap complex, choosing to focus on his drab work as a data archivist, where the only thing that was interesting was going home.

He was still a virgin. And in the modern world, confessing purity was deemed a cardinal sin.

“Blight!” his desk neighbor, Robert, called out, leaning over the low divider between their cubicles. Robert was the polar opposite of Erick. He was loud, confident and optimistic to the edge of being cocky, which made Erick feel a strong urge to stab him with a pen every time he spoke. “There is the company anniversary this Saturday. The boss man has hired Flores Gardens for the event, and he said we can bring family over.”

Erick paused his typing, adjusting his wire-rimmed glasses. “Interesting…” Robert frowned. “You don’t sound that interested. Wife problems?”

Erick chuckled humorlessly. “I wish.”

“Dude, you’re missing out. Five more years and you will be in menopause. Tell me you’re seeing someone at least.”

Erick sighed, staring at his monitor. He hated it when people probed at his personal life.

“Love is not for everyone, Rob. I have tried to ‘see people’ before. It never ends well. Consider yourself lucky if you found a woman with less than a thousand skeletons in her closet. Not all of us are that fortunate.”

Robert’s expression softened to something close to pity. He stepped around the partition, glanced left and right to ensure the aisle was empty, and pulled a plain, off-white card from his wallet. He set it squarely on Erick’s keyboard.

“I know that exact look,” Robert said quietly. “And I know exactly what you need. I was once in your situation. I was recommended to this doctor, and she fixed whatever broken frequency I was broadcasting.”

Erick picked up the card. It bore no name, no credentials, only an address in the city’s older district and an embossed crescent motif. “A therapist?”

“Something like that,” Robert whispered, giving him a meaningful nod. “Don’t ask questions. Just go. What do you have to lose?”

The card sat beneath Erick’s keys on his entryway table for the whole week. Every evening, he glanced at it with sneering skepticism. A frequency? Mental fixes for loneliness? Pure nonsense. Yet, on Saturday morning, as he opened his windows, seeing a young couple walking with their daughter stirred something in his heart. He felt like he was looking at a future fate had denied him. Desperation won. An aching desire of finding someone waiting for him on the other side drove him to act. He dressed in a casual button-down, got into his sedan (bless the good old loyal engine), and drove toward the older edge of town where brick storefronts leaned into narrow alleys.

The address led him to a nondescript doorway wedged between a dry cleaner and a dusty antique bookstore. A small brass plaque read: Consultations by Appointment.

Erick knocked. The door immediately swung inward, revealing a small, sunlit parlor lined with floor-to-ceiling apothecary cabinets of dark wood and smelling faintly of dried lavender and burnt honey. Sitting behind an antique mahogany desk was a young woman who couldn’t have been older than twenty-five. She wore an oversized wool cardigan, round spectacles perched on a dainty nose, and her hair was gathered into a loose, messy chestnut bun. Erick found himself subconsciously matching her appearance to that of an owl.

“Erick Blight,” the woman said in a neutral tone, folding her hands over a leather-bound ledger.

“To what do I owe the pleasure of this early visit?”

“I uh…” Erick murmured, hovering by the threshold before stepping inside. Had Robert arranged this? “I am not sure if it’s the right place...”

“I can assure you it is,” the woman said, “Come in, come in. Love does not wait for men who dally.”

Erick took the upholstered armchair across from her. The woman introduced herself as “the Doctor”. She asked him uncomfortable questions about his childhood, his career, and his romantic life. The ordeal lasted for about an hour, and Erick found himself spilling details he had never thought he’d tell another living soul.

“Yours is not a case that can be solved by talk,” the Doctor mused, leaning back and studying him with eyes that seemed far too piercing for her youthful face. “Let me put it this way. You’re like a lamp that attracts moths, which is good, except that you’re supposed to be a flower that attracts bees. Tell me the truth, Mr. Blight. Have you ever laid with a woman? Have you ever shared flesh with another?”

Erick felt the blood rush to his ears, heat burning his cheeks. He looked down at his shoes. “No.” The Doctor’s eyes shifted slightly, a calculating spark igniting in her gaze. “Well. That changes things.”

She rose from her seat. She was tall and effortlessly regal, and Erick noticed she looked a lot older once he saw her full, athletic stature. She walked to one of the cabinets and opened a locked drawer with a tiny silver key. She retrieved a thick stick of chalk that looked as dark and dense as slate, along with a brittle, yellowed piece of calfskin parchment. The parchment was roughly torn, covered in jagged geometric runes that seemed to shift slightly when Erick wasn’t looking at them directly.

“What is that?” Erick asked, his skepticism flaring back up.

“The fix,” she replied, placing the chalk and parchment on the desk before him. “When you return to your home tonight, clear the center of your floor. Grind the tip of this chalk with your blood, and draw a continuous circle around yourself. Stand in the center, hold this codex page, and read the words written upon it.”

“Tell me this is not a blood ritual,” Erick scoffed, glancing at the bizarre angular script. “I don’t read ancient hieroglyphs.”

“You won’t have to,” she countered. “The script will read your blood, and your blood will translate the words to your tongue. But it will only work on one condition: your desire to find a genuine connection must be honest. No half-measures. No cynicism.”

Erick shifted in his chair. He had not come to make pacts with the devil. He just wanted one faithful damsel to share his miserable existence with. Was that too much to ask?

“I will not attempt to convince you,” the Doctor said dismissively. “You are free to leave.”

“Is this… safe?” Erick asked nervously. “I mean, for me. What will happen after I do this… ritual?”

“You will encounter something,” the doctor replied with carefully concealed impatience. “It will fix your spiritual constitution. What you choose to do after that will be completely up to you. If I wanted to harm you in any way, I could have done so in a more efficient way than going through all this trouble.”

Erick stared at the parchment, his heart throbbing with a mixture of curiosity and fear. “How much do I owe you for… whatever this is?”

The young woman smiled, a sharp, enigmatic expression that sent a momentary shiver down his spine. “I don’t take money up front. If it fails, I’ve wasted your afternoon. If it succeeds, you can show your gratitude afterwards.”

By eight o’clock that evening, Erick had pushed his coffee table against the living room wall and rolled back the rug.

He stood in the middle of the bare hardwood floor holding a sewing needle, the slate-colored chalk, and the brittle parchment. The city outside his window was dark, rain drumming a steady, melancholic rhythm against the glass.

“I am an idiot,” Erick muttered to the empty room.

Still, something stubborn and reckless inside him pushed his hand forward. He took a breath and pricked the tip of his left index finger. A bead of dark red blood welled up. He smeared it across the head of the chalk, watching in mild surprise as the porous stone greedily absorbed the crimson ichor from his finger until it felt numb.

Bracing himself on one knee, Erick traced a broad, unbroken circle around himself on the polished wood, roughly making the diameter of his own height – which was approximately six feet. The chalk left behind a faint, shimmering purplish residue that smelled oddly like wet soil after rain.

He stood up in the center of the circle, holding the parchment with both hands. He looked down at the angular, incomprehensible scribbles. For a second, they remained jagged lines. But when he blinked, something unraveled. The alien runes shifted. They didn’t become English; rather, an ancient cadence resonated in his mind, unlocking a language his throat somehow understood.

Erick parted his lips, and a deep, melodic voice that hardly sounded like his own echoed through the apartment.

“Leu uare thur... azael mar... vok’ren khorath...”

With every syllable, the ambient light in the room dimmed. The ceiling lamp flickered and went black, yet the room was far from dark. From the chalk line on the floor, an intense, luminescent violet radiance flared upward, casting a sharp circle outline onto the ceiling. Runes made of pure, crackling amethyst light materialized in a helix that spiraled around the perimeter of the circle and rose to the ceiling like a vortex of glowing dust. The temperature in the apartment plummeted, freezing the moisture in the air until Erick’s breath puffed out in white clouds.

The air at the center of the circle shattered like glass. A dense cloud of violet mist erupted from the air, carrying with it a heavy, intoxicating aroma – a sweet, overwhelming musk of crushed lilies, burnt vanilla, and spiced honey that hit Erick’s senses with the intensity of a sledgehammer.

A force threw him out of the circle. The helix shifted and morphed with the mist. Within the swirling violet fog, a silhouette began to take form.

First came the curve of slender shoulders, then the generous arch of hips and the line of long, shapely legs. The light solidified into flesh, collapsing inward until the mist vanished, leaving a figure kneeling on the hardwood in front of him.

Erick froze, his breath catching in his throat. The creature before him was a voluptuous young woman. Every part of her seemed dipped in varying shades of violet. Her skin was a pale, luminous lilac that possessed a faint and pearlescent sheen. A pair of tiny, glossy obsidian-violet horns curved gently backward from her temples, nestled within a thick cascade of deep amethyst hair that fell past her waist.

Behind her, a short, stubby tail tipped with a spade-like fin twitched nervously against the floorboards.

She raised her head, locking her eyes onto his. Her pupils were sharp, vertical slits of glowing gold set within deep violet irises.

Erick stumbled backward, his back hitting the wall. His heart hammered furiously in his chest. The demoness lowered her head immediately, pressing her palms against the floor in total subservience. When she spoke, her voice was melodic and sultry, yet laced with an undeniable, trembling deference.

“I have answered your summon,” she whispered, her golden slit pupils looking up at him through thick, dark lashes. “I am here to serve you, Master.”

Erick pressed his shoulders flat against the drywall, his heart hammering a frantic rhythm against his ribs. The glowing purple circle on the hardwood slowly lost its luminescence, fading into an inert, chalky ring. The room was suddenly plunged into dimness, illuminated only by the amber glow of the city streetlights filtering through the blinds.

And there she remained. Kneeling on his floor, her nakedness shielded by nothing but her long hair, the demoness kept her head bowed. Her lilac skin caught the amber streetlights with an almost iridescent sheen, and the spade-tipped tail behind her gave a faint, tentative twitch. Erick stood paralyzed, regretting every choice that had led him to his current predicament. Eventually, he mustered the courage to move.

“Wait – don’t move,” he blurted out, his voice cracking. His eyes darted everywhere except directly at her. “Just... stay right there.”

He scrambled backward toward the hallway, practically tripping over the edge of the rolled-up carpet, and ducked into his bedroom. With trembling hands, he yanked open his closet door and grabbed the largest items he could find: a heavy fleece hoodie and a pair of gray drawstring sweatpants.

“Good heavens, what have I gotten myself into?” he whispered to himself. When he returned to the living room, the woman had not moved an inch.

“Here,” he said, holding the clothes out at arm’s length like an offering to a wild animal. “Put these on. Please.”

The demoness lifted her head. Her golden slit pupils dilated slightly as she took the fabric from his hands. She stood up with effortless, fluid grace. Erick reflexively looked up at the ceiling, though it was impossible to ignore how tall she was – nearly reaching his chin – and the sheer perfection of her silhouette.

She fumbled clumsily with the hoodie, clearly unfamiliar with the tailoring.

“I do not know how to put these on,” she confessed timidly.

Erick stepped forward. He held the hoodie for her and guided the hem over her small horns, careful not to snag the delicate obsidian tips. She slipped her arms through and looked at her frame curiously. Erick held out the pants.

“Do you wish me to conceal my tail?” she asked.

“Yes please,” Erick said, trying his best to resist the urge to sate his curiosity. “It will keep you warm.”

“Thank you, Master,” she murmured, her voice vibrating with that same sweet, bell-like timbre. She donned the pants with relative ease.

The air between them was thick, almost syrupy, saturated with that intoxicating scent of burnt vanilla, crushed lilies, and warm honey. With every breath he drew, a heavy, hypnotic warmth pooled in his chest, making his thoughts sluggish and slow. His rational mind screamed at him to run out the front door, to call the police, to run before it was too late, but his body felt rooted to the floor.

“D-don’t call me Master,” Erick stammered, rubbing his temples to fight off the rising fog in his brain. “My name is Erick. What are you?”

“I am a succubus,” she replied with the same timid tone, folding her hands over the front of the oversized hoodie. Her golden eyes tracked every micro-expression on his face with rapt fascination. “I was drawn from the Nethers by the glow of your blood and the sincerity of your heart.”

Erick almost laughed. Sincerity.

“A succubus,” Erick repeated, the word sounding absurd on his own tongue. “And... do you have a name?”

She shook her head, a cascade of violet hair spilling over her shoulders. “I have no name. Where I come from, the low-born exist as unvalued spawn until summoned. You are the one who opened the gate for me, and because you are my first summoner, the right and the duty to name me belongs to you.”

Erick did not know if he was supposed to feel honored or terrified. He swallowed a dry lump in his throat.

“Okay. Okay, good. Let’s just call you... something simple. And then we figure out how to send you back. The Doctor didn’t mention this. There was some kind of mistake, I’m sure.”

“I cannot go back,” she said softly, stepping closer.

The distance between them shrank to a mere foot. The sweet musk flared, hitting Erick with the intensity of an open flame. His pulse spiked.

“Why not?” he whispered, his throat suddenly dry.

“I have to fulfill the purpose you summoned me for first,” she explained, looking up at him through thick, dark eyelashes. Her fangs peeked over her lower lip, glinting in the low light.

“You have not claimed me yet.”