“Are these the words of a Demon or a human?” Lis asked and smiled as he had not smiled for a long time. And, opening his mouth, showed them the tip of his tongue, which was now bifurcated, like the sting of a snake.

And Nikto turned away.

“Enriki’ss girl, Agatha, turned out to be alive, she served Caspar Janti in the hospital until his arrest, and later was sent to an orphanage in the “Lower City”. Agatha escaped from the shelter and returned to our Castle. Zara likes her a lot and allowed her to pick up a kitten. The kitty has grown up and has now brought three kittens,” Karina read, but, looking up and seeing the expression on their faces, stopped short.

Nikto had studied Vil’s report for a couple of hours and wrote a response to him and Morgan Talas. And Prince Arel was lying on the bed, unable to fall asleep, and now he drank, then smoked, then admired his Nik, then tossed and turned from side to side. Finally, he could not resist:

“Nik?”

“Yes. What? Arel, I'm a little busy, you see. I'll fuck you later. Be patient.”

“I am not talking about that…”

“Come on! And what about then?” Nikto spoke distantly, without taking his eyes off the notes.

“Will you… will you take revenge on Leonardo? He… he… did a lot of harm to me. And Enriki and Mily, and this favorite doctor of yours. So? The one who saved you from death and from whom you studied. Is that so?”

Nikto looked up, looking up from the papers:

“Everyone will get what they deserve,” he said very seriously. “Don't worry, Arel.”

He looked down at the papers again.

And Arel sighed, he lay on the bed and looked at the ceiling. And his face was sad, as if he was remembering or thinking about something bad.

“The devil is perfectly aware of his weakness and impotence. He understands that he has no real power to influence people. That is why he tries to persuade them to cooperate, to assist. Having found a weak point in a person, he tries to influence him in one way or another, and often he succeeds. First of all, the devil wants us to fear him, thinking that he has real power. And if a person falls for this bait, he becomes vulnerable and susceptible to “demonic arrows”, that is, those arrows that the devil and demons shoot into the soul of a person.

Mily looked gratefully at Vil, Zara, Morgan Talas and his friends who stood next to her in the Temple of the Gods.

“How can I thank you?! For saving me from prison and finding laws that made me innocent!”

Vil looked at her with an affectionate smile.

“Mily, don't thank us. Thank our Gods, they saved you!”

“Yes, yes!” Mily warmly supported, folding her hands in a prayer gesture. “I, too, will go to the Temple now, like you, and thank the Gods, and pray to them for the salvation of my precious Enriki!”

She looked with benevolent lust at the preacher, who continued his sermon to the audience.

“The entrance of the devil into the soul of a person is opened, as I said, by magic, witchcraft, drugs, alcoholic addiction. Sexual, mental and other forms of addiction pose a tremendous spiritual danger. We must take care not to be dependent on anything in life, in order to be spiritually and physically as free as possible. A person who controls his mind, his heart, his actions can always resist the devil. The one who turns out to be a slave to some passion or vice becomes unable to repel the onslaught of the devil.”

You may ask: to what extent is the devil able to influence our thought at all? How much does he even know what is happening in our thoughts, in our heart? How competent is he in matters of spiritual life? I have formed the conviction, on the basis of the holy scriptures and my personal observations, that the devil has no direct knowledge of our internal processes. At the same time, being very experienced, he dealt with many people, and worked with each one individually, he uses these skills and recognizes what is going on inside a person by external signs. And looking for the most vulnerable spots. For example, when a person is in pride, it is very easy for the devil to influence him. But the only thing that the devil is capable of is to throw some sinful thought into a person. For example, the thought of even greater power, the crown. And he does this not because the inner world of a person, his heart is open to him, but only focusing on external signs. Having instilled in a person some thoughts, the devil is not able to control what will happen to him next. And if a person knows how to distinguish which thought came from the Gods, and which – from the demons, and reject sinful thoughts at their very appearance, the devil cannot do anything. The devil grows stronger as a sinful or passionate thought enters the human mind. There is a teaching about the gradual, step-by-step penetration of sinful thoughts into the soul of a person. The essence of this teaching is that if a person is on guard of his mind, he can reject this thought, “blow and spit” on it, and the devil will disappear. If a person becomes interested in a thought, begins to consider it, to talk with it, he conquers more and more territories in a person's mind until he embraces his whole nature, soul, heart and body!