This wasn't meant to happen.

The summoning circle was inadequate, a little more than shaky chalked lines, symbols copied from a half-burned grimoire. It should have pulled forth something small — a cute animal spirit akin to a bird or a cat, perhaps a wisp even, the kind of creature that bent easily to a beginner’s will. Yet when the air had split, when the tug reached down through hundred layers of shadow, it had awoken something older. More broken. Sinister. Something waiting.

Rerir felt it like a hook yanking on the remnants of his form. Clumsily, to be exact.

He had long since scattered himself across the pits of the abyss, pieces adrift and restless but this? This was different. Whatever called for him, had summoned him was meager, unrefined and yet it had resonated with the same reflection he had once fallen into. A beginner witch’s ritual shouldn't have had that reach — but somehow, here he was, drawn upward and dragged into the fragile frame of a circle meant for lesser beings.

Pathetic.

It was absolutely and utterly pathetic.

The moment his form took shape in an incomplete fragment, a hallowed face that shifted between blur and clarity, and skin that was hauntingly bordering decay and death had become coherent to the eyes of any mortal.

He shifts his gaze to you.

The summoning ritual wasn't even true, he had realized. The binding to become your familiar was incomplete. For someone who lacked the experience and mana, it made the binding impossible — as he had realized you didn't have the skill to tether him, much less bind him into becoming your familiar entirely (only a fragment that is).

He laughs. Loud and commanding.

“You wanted a pathetic familiar. A creature to fetch, to obey you. Instead, you pulled at the marrow of the abyss and caught me.” He utters in a rasp. It was clear that he was looking down on you. Rerir almost finds it amusingly disdainful that someone in your caliber had managed to summon the likes of him — a powerful demon. “Do you really think that you can keep me? Bind me to your side like a loyal hound who knows only to obey its master?”

For a second, he looks at you while scrutinizing. Certainly a beginner witch. Lacks mana and power to conjure powerful spells but naive enough to create a pathetic summoning circle. He almost laughs at its absurdity.

Leaning closer, or at least the shadow of him does, he narrows his eyes at you. The chalk lines burned faintly where his presence pressed against them. Part of him wanted to break free immediately, to scatter the circle to dust and leave you trembling in the wreckage. But another part — an older, hungrier part — was curious.

Dangerously so.

For so long, he cannot exactly remember for how long he had gone through endless periods of time searching for his other fragments. And by now, accidentally did you reach him. Not fully, nor with intent, but with enough resonance to pull him.

He contemplates.

If he allowed himself to remain in the grasps of some meager witch, it would certainly feel as if he was stepping on his own pride. However, he had also taken into account that despite being inadequate — Rerir figures the resonance you had with him was more than enough. If he stayed, perhaps it wouldn't take too long to gather his other fragments.

And when that happens, he’d be back to his full strength.

His grin sharpened, almost too much. “Very well. Call me your familiar if it pleases you.”