**Year Nine: The Study of Life and Death**
At nine years old, Caelan Lucifuge had mastered seventeen different fields of study.
Mathematics.
Physics.
Magical theory.
Psychology.
Philosophy.
Military strategy.
Devil politics.
Ancient history.
Modern sociology.
Thermodynamics.
Quantum mechanics.
Biological systems.
Chemical reactions.
Particle theory.
Dimensional mathematics.
Entropy studies.
And now, biology.
Not the sanitized, simplified version taught to young devil nobles—the kind that focused on bloodlines and inheritance and which clan had which magical traits.
No, Caelan had moved past that years ago.
He was studying *real* biology now.
The kind that made some of the estate's older servants uncomfortable when they saw what books he'd pulled from the restricted sections of the library.
Anatomy.
Physiology.
The precise structure of devil cardiovascular systems.
How demonic energy interfaced with physical tissue.
The exact mechanisms by which magic flowed through blood, through bone, through the very cells that made up a devil's body.
Why? Because what else was there? His days had become a rhythm of solitude so complete it felt almost meditative.
Wake.
Study.
Practice his precision ice magic in the privacy of his room.
Study more.
Sleep.
Repeat.
No interruptions.
No visitors.
No acknowledgment that he existed at all.
The library had become his only companion, and lately, it had been teaching him about the fundamental building blocks of life itself.
Because if he couldn't store magic the normal way...
If his pathetic reserves would never grow no matter how hard he trained...
Then perhaps he needed to *rebuild himself* from the ground up.
**The Command**
The note had been slipped under his door three days ago.
Not delivered personally—no one spoke to him directly anymore.
Just a simple piece of parchment in his mother's precise handwriting:
*Present yourself in formal attire in the East Meeting Hall on the 15th at precisely 2 PM. Do not be late. *
No explanation.
No context.
Just a command.
Caelan had stared at it for a long time, his analytical mind running through possibilities.
A formal meeting.
The East Meeting Hall—used for receiving important guests.
Formal attire required.
Something significant, then.
He'd done what he always did when faced with incomplete information: he'd gathered more data.
Three nights of careful sneaking through the mansion's corridors, hiding in alcoves and behind pillars, listening to servant gossip and his father's discussions with Lord Zeoticus.
Piece by piece, he'd assembled the picture.
A marriage arrangement.
One of the noble houses was visiting to formalize an engagement.
Their daughter would be meeting the Gremory heir as a potential future bride—a political alliance to strengthen both families' positions in the Underworld's complex web of power.
Standard devil nobility nonsense.
But why did they need *him* there?
**The Hallway**
Caelan stood alone on one side of the grand entrance hallway, dressed in the formal silver-and-black attire that marked him as House Lucifuge.
The clothes were fine—expensive, well-tailored—but they felt like a costume.
Like he was playing dress-up as someone important.
Across from him, on the other side of the hallway, stood Rias and Lucien.
His aunt.
His brother.
Both dressed in Gremory crimson and gold, both radiating that unconscious confidence that came from knowing exactly where they belonged in the world.
Lucien looked bored but dutiful, standing with the perfect posture that had been drilled into him by etiquette tutors. At nearly ten years old, he was already tall for his age, his crimson hair perfectly styled, his golden eyes sharp and aware.
Rias—now four and a half—was less patient.
She kept fidgeting with her dress, a adorable little frown on her face as she clearly wished she were anywhere else. But even her childish impatience had a kind of charm to it.
The kind that made adults smile indulgently.
They didn't look at Caelan.
They didn't even seem to register that he was there.
It had been years since Lucien had acknowledged his twin's existence.
Caelan wasn't even sure his brother *remembered* him anymore.
In Lucien's mind, he was probably just another servant standing in the hallway.
Background decoration.
The massive doors at the end of the hall swung open, and the visiting family entered.
Two older devils—Lords of some significant house, judging by their elaborate formal wear and the power that radiated from them even at rest.
A lady, elegant and poised, with sharp eyes that immediately began assessing everything in the room.
Typical noble behavior.
And then— A girl.
Seven, maybe eight years old.
Dark hair styled in elaborate curls, wearing a dress that probably cost more than most devils earned in a year.
Pretty, in the way noble children often were—well-fed, well-cared-for, with the kind of refined features that came from generations of selective breeding.
But what struck Caelan wasn't her appearance.
It was that she looked at him.
Actually *looked* at him.
Her eyes met his—brown meeting silver—and for the first time in *years*, someone saw him.
Not through him. Not past him.
*At* him.
Recognition registered in her expression.
Curiosity.
She tilted her head slightly, as though trying to figure out why he was standing alone on the opposite side of the hallway from the other children.
Then she started walking toward him.
Caelan's breath caught.
She was going to talk to him.
Someone was actually going to—
"No."
Grayfia's voice cut through the hallway like a blade of ice.
She appeared from seemingly nowhere—though of course she'd been there the whole time, standing near the entrance to the meeting hall, perfectly positioned to intercept.
Her silver hair was immaculate as always, her maid uniform pressed and perfect, her expression professionally neutral.
But there was steel in her voice.
The girl stopped mid-step, confused. Grayfia placed herself between the girl and Caelan with the practiced efficiency of someone erecting a physical barrier.
"You are here for Lord Lucien," she said, her tone polite but absolute.
"The engagement discussions concern him, not—" She didn't even gesture toward Caelan. Didn't acknowledge his presence at all. "—others. Please, this way."
The girl's parents had already moved toward Lucien, and she hesitated, looking between the silver-haired boy who'd been invisible and the crimson-haired one who was clearly the focus of everyone's attention.
"I—I'm sorry," she said, the words directed vaguely toward where Caelan stood.
Not even sure if she was apologizing to him or to Grayfia or to the universe in general for the awkwardness.
Then she turned and walked toward Lucien, who greeted her with a polite bow and a charming smile that had probably been rehearsed with tutors.
The families moved into the meeting hall—Sirzechs and Lord Zeoticus emerging to greet their guests with warmth and political grace. Lucien and the girl followed, chaperoned by their respective parents. Rias was scooped up by Lady Venelana and carried along, still fidgeting. The doors closed.
And Caelan stood in the hallway.
Alone.
*Not others. *
Not "him."
Not "my son."
Not even "Caelan."
*Others. *
As though he were a category.
A non-entity.
Furniture that happened to be vaguely humanoid.
He stared at the closed doors for a long moment, his silver eyes reflecting the elaborate carvings on the wood.
Then, silently, he turned and walked away.
No one noticed.
**The Biology of Ice**
The next few months, Caelan buried himself in research with an intensity that bordered on obsessive.
Biology.
Specifically, *his* biology.
He needed to understand, with absolute precision, how a devil's body functioned.
How demonic energy circulated through the cardiovascular system.
How magical circuits interfaced with neural pathways.
The exact cellular structure of devil tissue and how it differed from human, angel, or fallen angel physiology.
Because he'd had an idea.
A terrible, dangerous, possibly suicidal idea.
If he couldn't store magic in his pathetic reserves...
If his body simply wasn't capable of holding the kind of power that made devils matter...
Then he would *force* it to hold magic a different way.
Ice.
His element.
His mother's legacy.
The one thing he could actually create, even if only in pitiful quantities.
What if he froze himself? Not on the surface—that was trivial, and useless.
No, what if he froze his *blood*? His internal systems? What if he turned his own body into a reservoir of frozen demonic energy, held in stasis until he needed it?
The human world had a concept called cryogenic preservation.
Freezing biological tissue to preserve it indefinitely.
The theory was sound, even if the practice was still experimental.
But Caelan wasn't human.
He was a devil.
And devils were fundamentally magical creatures.
Their bodies operated on principles that would make human scientists weep with frustration.
So why not exploit that?
**Months in the Library**
No one checked on him.
No one asked what he was doing, spending eighteen hours a day in the library, surrounded by medical texts and magical theory books that made even the estate's scholars uncomfortable.
No one noticed when he started "borrowing" items from the estate's medical wing—diagnostic tools, magical monitoring devices, vials of alchemical reagents that were technically restricted to licensed physicians.
No one talked to him.
He was a ghost, and ghosts didn't require supervision.
He studied the exact chemical composition of devil blood—how it differed from human blood in its ability to carry demonic energy like a electrical current through a wire.
He calculated the precise temperature at which blood would freeze without causing cellular rupture.
He researched how magical circuits would react to extreme cold, whether they would shatter or simply enter a state of hibernation.
He experimented on himself in small ways.
Freezing a single finger, monitoring how long he could maintain it, what the side effects were.
Then a hand.
Then an arm.
Each time pushing a little further, gathering more data, refining his calculations.
It hurt.
God, it *hurt*.
Freezing living tissue from the inside out was agony on a level that made him bite through leather straps to avoid screaming and alerting the servants.
But pain was just data.
Information about what worked and what didn't.
And slowly, painfully, he began to understand the process.
**The First Attempt**
On a cold autumn night, three months after the engagement meeting, Caelan decided he was ready.
He'd prepared his room meticulously.
Medical monitoring spells etched into the walls and floor—primitive, but functional.
Emergency warming charms on standby in case he needed to reverse the process quickly.
Notes documenting his procedure, sealed in a envelope addressed to no one in particular (because who would read them?). He sat on his bed, wearing nothing but simple undergarments, and took a deep breath.
Then he began.
The ice started at his extremities—fingers and toes, the parts of his body he'd practiced on most.
He felt the familiar burn-that-wasn't-burning as the temperature dropped, as his blood began to crystallize in his veins.
Then his arms and legs.
The pain was *exquisite*.
Every cell in his body screamed in protest as it was forced into a state it was never meant to enter.
His muscles locked. His nerves fired chaotic signals.
His magical circuits—those pathetic, underdeveloped things—flickered and sputtered.
But they didn't break.
He kept going.
Torso.
Chest.
The ice creeping inward toward his core organs.
His lungs froze mid-breath.
His stomach solidified.
And finally—carefully, so carefully—his heart.
The moment his heart froze, everything stopped.
Not died—devils were remarkably hard to kill, and his magical nature kept him technically alive even in this state.
But *stopped*.
No heartbeat.
No breath.
No warmth.
For several minutes, Caelan simply... existed. A living statue of ice, perfectly preserved, perfectly still.
And then—slowly, using every scrap of control he'd developed over the past year—he began to thaw.
Carefully.
Incrementally.
Monitoring every stage to ensure his organs restarted properly, that his blood began flowing again without forming clots, that his magical circuits rebooted without catastrophic failure.
When he finally took a breath again, it came out as a cloud of frozen mist.
His eyes opened.
And he knew—*knew* with absolute certainty—that something had changed.
Not dramatically.
Not in a way that would make his family suddenly notice him.
But his body temperature had dropped.
Permanently.
Not frozen solid, but significantly colder than a devil's body should be.
And his magical reserves—still pathetically small—felt... different.
Compressed.
Denser.
He'd turned himself into a reservoir of frozen magic.
A streak of pale blue had appeared in his silver hair, starting at his temple and running back toward his crown. Physical evidence of what he'd done to himself.
No one would notice.
No one ever noticed.
**The Discovery**
Over the next few weeks, Caelan tested his new state.
His body temperature was stable at zero degrees Celsius.
Not fluctuating, not slowly warming—just... zero.
Constant.
As though he'd fundamentally altered his body's thermostat.
And the ice—the magic frozen in his blood, in his very cells—responded to his will in ways it never had before. The air around him bent to his element.
Not dramatically—he wasn't creating blizzards or freezing entire rooms.
But within a meter of his body, the temperature dropped noticeably. Frost formed on surfaces he touched. His breath misted even in warm rooms.
It was subtle.
Limited.
But it was *his*.
A field of cold that surrounded him, an aura of ice that was entirely under his control.
He could suppress it when needed, forcing his body to radiate normal warmth (though it took conscious effort).
Or he could release it, letting the cold seep out naturally. Did his parents notice? He walked past his mother in a corridor once, close enough that she should have felt the temperature drop. She didn't even glance at him.
Did anyone care?
A servant had entered his room to deliver his meal and yelped in surprise at how cold it was, wondering aloud if the heating spells had failed. She didn't connect it to the silver-haired boy sitting in the corner, reading by candlelight.
That was his existence.
Even when he fundamentally altered his own biology, even when he turned himself into something *other*, no one noticed.
Because no one was looking.
**The Theory of Absolute Zero**
But Caelan wasn't satisfied.
Zero degrees Celsius was just the beginning.
A proof of concept.
If he could freeze his blood, his organs, his very cells... what else could he do?
He returned to the library with renewed purpose, this time diving into chemistry and advanced thermodynamics.
Human science, mostly—devils had their own understanding of temperature and energy, but humans had studied it with a precision and rigor that Caelan found... refreshing.
And there, buried in a human physics textbook he'd acquired through questionable means, he found it.
*Absolute zero. *
−273.15 degrees Celsius.
The theoretical lowest possible temperature.
The point at which all molecular motion ceased.
Where even atoms stopped vibrating.
Where the fundamental forces that governed reality, itself began to break down.
At absolute zero, nothing could exist in a conventional sense.
Heat couldn't transfer.
Energy couldn't flow.
Even *magic*—which was just another form of energy, another way of describing the movement of particles and forces—would theoretically freeze solid.
The book presented it as impossible to achieve.
A theoretical limit that could be approached but never reached, like the speed of light in reverse.
But Caelan wasn't thinking about physics
. He was thinking about *magic*.
What if he could lower his body temperature to absolute zero?
What if he could create a field around himself where all energy—
all magic—
simply...
stopped?
It would be the ultimate defense.
A barrier that didn't block attacks but froze them in place before they could reach him.
Magical spells would crystallize mid-flight.
Physical attacks would slow to nothing as they entered the field.
Even the Power of Destruction itself—that supposedly unstoppable force that could erase anything—was still energy.
Still motion.
Still *something* that could theoretically be frozen.
The idea was intoxicating.
Impossible.
Suicidal.
*Perfect. *
**The Problem**
But there was a catch.
Several catches, actually, but one that stood above all the others:
His body wouldn't survive it.
Zero degrees Celsius was manageable because his devil physiology, altered as it was, could function at that temperature.
His blood was frozen but his magical nature kept him technically alive.
His cells were preserved in a state of suspended animation but hadn't ruptured.
Absolute zero was different.
At that temperature, *everything* stopped.
Including the fundamental magical processes that kept a devil alive.
His heart wouldn't just freeze—it would cease to exist as a functional organ.
His blood wouldn't just stop flowing—it would become an inert crystalline structure.
His brain, his thoughts, his very consciousness would freeze solid.
He would die.
Not temporarily.
Not in a way he could reverse.
Just... die.
Unless.
Unless he could find a way to keep his heart—just his heart—warm enough to maintain minimal function.
A tiny pocket of warmth in an ocean of absolute cold.
His core, still alive, still pumping just enough to maintain consciousness and magical control.
The theory was sound.
He'd run the calculations a hundred times. The problem was execution.
How do you keep your heart warm when your entire body is approaching absolute zero?
External heat sources wouldn't work—they'd be frozen instantly by the field.
Internal magical warming was possible, but at absolute zero, magic itself would stop functioning.
He needed a heat source that was mechanical.
Physical.
Something that generated warmth through friction or chemical reaction rather than magic.
He spent weeks researching.
Diving into human biology texts, looking for inspiration.
And finally, he found it.
Thermogenesis.
The human body generated heat through metabolic processes.
Chemical reactions in cells, particularly in muscles.
When humans exercised, their bodies heated up not through magic but through pure biochemistry.
What if he replicated that?
What if he manually stimulated his heart, creating friction, generating just enough heat to keep it above absolute zero?
It would require physically squeezing his own heart.
While simultaneously lowering his entire body temperature to −273.15 degrees Celsius.
While maintaining perfect control over the ice magic preventing it all from spiraling out of control.
While remaining conscious.
The margin for error was zero.
If he squeezed too hard, his heart would rupture.
If he didn't squeeze hard enough, it would freeze and he'd die. If he lost control of the magic even for a second, his entire body would shatter like glass.
The theory was incomplete.
Dangerously so.
He knew this.
And he didn't care.
**The Tenth Birthday**
The Gremory estate erupted in celebration like Caelan had never seen.
Lucien's tenth birthday.
A milestone age for devil nobility.
The age where children transitioned from "promising youths" to "legitimate heirs." The age where their training became serious, where they started being introduced to Rating Games and political negotiations and all the machinations of Underworld power.
The entire estate had been decorated for weeks.
Banners in Gremory crimson and gold hung from every tower.
The grand ballroom had been transformed into something out of a fairy tale—magical lights, elaborate ice sculptures (ironic, that), tables laden with delicacies from across the Underworld.
Devils from every major house had been invited.
The other Satan's and their families.
Noble heirs from the 72 Pillars. Even some representatives from the Angel and Fallen Angel factions, maintaining the fragile peace. It was a spectacle.
A statement.
*This is our heir.
This is our legacy.
This is the future of House Gremory. *
Caelan watched from a third-floor balcony, hidden in shadows, as the guests arrived.
Watched as Sirzechs greeted them with his politician's smile, as Grayfia stood beside him in her perfect maid outfit (though everyone knew she was far more than a mere servant).
Watched as Lucien—dressed in formal attire that probably cost more than Caelan's entire wardrobe—charmed every single guest with the effortless grace of someone born to leadership.
The girl from the engagement meeting was there too. Apparently, the arrangements had progressed. She stood beside Lucien, and they made a striking pair—both beautiful, both powerful, both *perfect*.
Rias bounced around in a frilly dress, being adorable and receiving doting attention from what seemed like every adult in the Underworld. The family gathered for the cake cutting.
A massive, elaborate confection that towered three feet high, decorated with magical flames that didn't burn and tiny ice sculptures that didn't melt.
Everyone sang.
Everyone cheered.
Sirzechs hugged his son, genuine pride shining in his eyes.
Grayfia allowed herself a real smile.
Lord Zeoticus made a speech about legacy and the future.
It was perfect.
A perfect family celebrating a perfect son's perfect birthday.
And somewhere, in a forgotten corner of the estate, there was a second cake.
Smaller.
Simpler.
Left outside a door by a servant who remembered that technically, there were *two* boys who'd been born on this day.
The note attached read: *Happy Birthday, young master. *
No name.
No personal message.
Just... acknowledgment that the date existed.
Caelan stared at that cake for a long time.
Then he picked it up, walked to his window, and dropped it.
Watched it fall three stories and splatter across the garden path.
No one would notice.
No one would care.
And that, more than anything else that had happened in his nine years of life, crystallized something inside him.
**The Decision**
He walked to his room.
Not the celebration.
Not his family.
Not the warm lights and laughter and love that filled the Gremory estate tonight.
Just his room.
Cold.
Empty.
Silent.
His theory was incomplete.
He knew that.
The survival rate of what he was about to attempt was maybe thirty percent.
Probably less.
But as he sat on his bed, listening to the distant sounds of celebration, he realized something.
He didn't care.
Not in a suicidal way—he wasn't trying to die.
But the fear that should have stopped him, the survival instinct that should have made him wait, refine the theory, test it more thoroughly...
It wasn't there.
Because what was he surviving *for*?
Another year of being invisible?
Another birthday spent alone?
Another decade watching his brother achieve greatness while he was systematically erased from existence?
He'd spent nine years trying to matter.
Trying to be smart enough, skilled enough, *something* enough to earn even a scrap of acknowledgment.
And he'd failed.
Not because he wasn't smart—he was smarter than most devils ten times his age.
Not because he wasn't skilled—his precision with ice magic was probably unique in the entire Underworld.
But because in a world that valued raw power above all else, intelligence and precision meant *nothing* without the strength to back them up.
So.
If he was going to fail anyway...
If he was going to fade into nothing regardless...
Then he might as well fail spectacularly.
He might as well push himself to the absolute limit and see what happened.
Maybe he'd die.
Maybe he'd succeed and create something unprecedented.
Either way, at least it would be *his* choice.
His decision.
His control over his own existence.
Not theirs.
Never theirs again.
**Absolute Zero**
Caelan lay back on his bed, staring at the ceiling.
Below, he could still hear the celebration.
Music.
Laughter.
The sound of a family that loved each other.
He took a deep breath.
Then he began.
The ice started the same way it always did—extremities first.
But this time, he didn't stop at zero degrees.
He pushed further.
Colder.
Colder.
−50 degrees Celsius.
−100 degrees Celsius.
His body began to seize, magical alarms screaming warnings that he ignored.
−150 degrees Celsius.
−200 degrees Celsius.
The monitoring spells he'd set up were going haywire, trying to trigger the emergency warming charms.
He suppressed them with an effort of will that made his skull feel like it was splitting.
−250 degrees Celsius.
−270 degrees Celsius.
He was in uncharted territory now.
No devil—no *being*—had ever willingly done this to themselves.
And then—with his left hand—he reached into his own chest.
Not metaphorically.
*Literally. *
His ice magic parted his frozen flesh like it was water, creating a cavity that exposed his heart.
The organ was already slowing, already beginning to freeze.
He wrapped his fingers around it.
And *squeezed*.
The friction—flesh against flesh, muscle against muscle—generated heat.
Microscopic, but real. Chemical reactions in his cells, forced metabolism, thermogenesis.
His heart warmed.
Just a few degrees.
Just enough.
−272 degrees Celsius.
−273 degrees Celsius.
−273.14 degrees Celsius.
The world began to still around him.
Air molecules stopped moving.
Magic in the atmosphere crystallized.
The very fabric of reality seemed to *pause*, as though the universe itself was holding its breath.
−273.15 degrees Celsius.
**Absolute zero. **
Everything stopped.
Sound.
Light.
Motion.
Energy.
All of it frozen in perfect, absolute stasis.
Caelan's body lay on the bed, a sculpture of ice so perfectly preserved it looked like art.
His silver hair had gone completely white, the blue streak now glowing with an eerie light.
His skin was translucent, almost crystalline.
His eyes were open but unseeing, frosted over.
He looked dead. He looked beautiful.
He looked like a ghost made flesh.
And in his chest, where his hand still gripped his heart, maintaining that tiny, crucial friction—
A beat.
Slow.
So, slow it was almost imperceptible.
But there.
*Thump. *
Sixty seconds passed.
*Thump. *
Another sixty seconds.
*Thump. *
One heartbeat per minute.
The absolute minimum to maintain consciousness.
To maintain control.
To maintain *life*.
Hours passed.
The celebration below continued.
Peaked.
Began to wind down.
Guests departed.
The family retired to their rooms, exhausted but happy.
**The Awakening**
A breath.
Cold—so cold it would have killed a human instantly—but a breath nonetheless.
Caelan's eyes moved.
Just slightly.
The frost on his pupils cracking.
Slowly—so slowly—he began to raise his body temperature.
−273.14 degrees.
−273.10 degrees.
−273.00 degrees.
Each increment was agony.
His frozen cells screaming as they were forced to move again.
His blood beginning to flow, sharp ice crystals scraping against vein walls.
His organs restarting one by one, each one protesting.
−272 degrees.
−270 degrees.
–250 degrees.
His hand released his heart, the friction no longer necessary.
The organ beat on its own now, faster, stronger.
−200 degrees.
−150 degrees.
−100 degrees.
His flesh knitted back together where he'd parted it.
The wound sealed with ice magic, leaving not even a scar.
−50 degrees.
Zero degrees.
He stopped there.
Didn't let himself warm further.
Zero was his baseline now.
His new normal.
Caelan sat up.
Every movement felt strange.
Foreign.
As though his body were a machine he'd just learned to operate.
He looked at his hands.
The blue streak in his hair had remained, now permanent.
A physical marker of what he'd done.
His body temperature was stable at zero degrees Celsius.
But more than that—he could *feel* it now.
The field around him.
A sphere roughly one meter in radius where the temperature dropped significantly.
Where magic itself seemed to hesitate, to slow, to crystalize before it could fully form.
It wasn't perfect.
It wasn't the absolute zero field he'd theorized.
That would require him to enter that deathlike state again, and it wasn't sustainable for combat. But it was *something*.
He stood, his movements still slightly unsteady.
Walked to his window.
Looked out at the Gremory estate, now quiet in the early morning hours.
Below, in the servants' courtyard, he could see the demonic hound and her puppies.
They were bigger now.
Playing together.
Even the runt, the one with the twisted leg, was roughhousing with its siblings.