Chapter 18: Demon Event 2

  “Looksie looksie here, I’ve found the first one!” Thomas walked slowly through the magical forest, he had gotten up to level 4 a few hours ago and was just now biding his time. But now, he had one of the 5 demons in front of him. The thing was short, human like, with two arms and two legs. Completely bald without skin, like it had been stripped of it and all that was below was the muscle and bone. Its face, if you could call it that, was a hole, revealing an empty innard.

  “Are you scared?” Thomas laughed and walked to be in front of the demon, it simply faced forward, its hands were human-like as well, though sharp at the edges where they could be used as knives. “Okay. Boring.”

  Thomas whipped his hand forward and shot the demon backwards into several trees, its body quickly ignited the leaves it touched, and left sparks where it had slammed into the bark. It landed on its feet, not at all bothered by being shot backwards.

  “Are you going to put up a fight? Hm?” Thomas unsheathed his sword, looking to his side to make sure he could take it out cleanly. That split of time, what must've been a second, the demon was right in front of his face and delivered a slash to his face.

  Thomas kicked downwards to avoid most of the damage, he felt his face receive three distinct scratches that cauterized immediately. “Hah!” He shot the demon back again, though it managed to ground itself and only slid across the grass, kicking up dirt as Thomas continued to barrage it with his spell. It broke the skill as it took a step forward, pushing through the constant pull of Thomas’s skill.

  “Oh.” Thomas decided to change tactics and instead pulled the creature towards him, holding the sword out to get a clean slice across the beast's chest, the blade slid across its muscle like exterior which caused sparks to fly. The blade did break through as Thomas pulled the demon towards it, using velocity to finish the strike before jumping away from the demons striking range.

  The chest of the demon began to bleed out an oily substance that stuck to the grass below and ignited it, the trees just above Thomas were on fire as well, creating a brilliant shine of light in the dark forest. “You’re flashy.” He laughed, as the creature pressed against the wound, spreading the black substance along its body, once it was fully coated, its entire body ignited into flames.

  It rushed towards Thomas again, its speed reaching just barely below his perception. Thomas had a good authority on his agility so he kicked himself backwards, using telekinesis on himself to dodge the intense heat the monster was generating. Thomas knew he was getting worse and worse odds, he needed to be by that river he found earlier.

  “Fancy a walk?” He dodged another slash, and tried to whip his sword to the demon, letting it leave his hand and joust forward, the sword turned a bright white as it went through the monster's shoulder, glowing even after it left the flames range.

  The sword landed onto the grass a little bit warped by the tip, bent inwards. He definitely couldn’t pick it up, as the handle looked just as hot as the blade. He discarded it for now, continuously lifting his body off the ground, trying to find any opening.

  He activated his profession's level 5 skill, something he got for being a human hunter, it was an uncommon skill that made his blood poisonous. He quickly bit his lip, spreading blood along the roof of his mouth, being careful not to swallow any.

  He lifted himself upwards and slammed down a tree on the creature, the leaves ignited instantly and told him exactly where the creature was while making him able to buy time. The thought was, to have the fire, or that strange black substance to stick to the leaves of the tree and allow him to shoot the poison right into the wound.

  The demon ran out of the leaves, the front of its body no longer having a constant blaze. Thomas spat out and shot the blood right into the gaping wound, hoping its internal body heat wouldn't burn out the poison.

  He wasn’t going to leave it to chance, he kept his sword floating beside him and sprinted towards the river, knowing that it was only a minute away, and hour in terms of combat. He felt the heat following him, somehow boiling him from under the armor he had on. He pulled himself forward with the skill, a risky thing to do with the trees flying by, he shot himself left, then right, then had to slip between two all the while his armor kept heating up. “This is bullshit.” He flew right above the river with incredible momentum, reaching the halfway point before he stopped himself completely.

  He held himself up, levitating above the body of water as the demon stood by the bank of the river, looking up at him. “Witness me.” He looked up at the moon and changed the tide of the river with his skill, splitting the current, taking an abysmal amount of mana and rupturing the veins in his hand, “witness my creation.” He breathed out, every breath feeling like the first one he ever had, it rose up his mouth as a warmth that was adjacent to euphoric. He spread his arms to his side, looking cross-like in posture.

  The water slammed into the demon, steaming upwards, but as more water was added, taking away trees, completely rewriting the flow of the river, the steaming stopped, and all that was left was a spreading fire and water flowing back to its original stream.

  [You have five hours to destroy 1/5 Lower Common Demons]

  He broke into a fit of laughter.

  —

  “Grace!” Jacky held the head of Eddy as his body lay a couple meters to the left of her, she was trying to find a way to put it back into place, waiting for his body to respond.

  Jason blocked another attack from the demon with his axe, the thing was blisteringly hot in his hand, practically fusing into his skin as a part of his limb, he should feel sad about this, discouraged, but it just made it easier to keep hold as he slammed the blunt end into the creatures head as it tried to grab him again.

  Joey ran in behind the demon, using his skill to cut his second slash into half a second, barely scratching the back of the creature yet again, the poison hadn't done anything. It turned and yet again Joey had to retreat, if Jason wasn't there to constantly take the brunt of every attack he felt like they’d be laying there with Eddy. “GRACE!”

  Grace was sitting on the ground eating some grass from the ground, then spitting it out, she didn’t return any screams with any verbal or physical means, she just kept eating grass. Useless, goddamn useless. Joey watched as Jason took a mean hit to his chest, the claws finding that the crevices and connective tissue between the body were the best spots to dig its fingers into.

  Jason slammed his stubbed hand into the creature's head, finding purchase in the hole and then pushed it over, getting on top. Most of his skin was being constantly assaulted by flames while he dug the glowing axe into the neck of the demon, sawing it back and forth and back and forth.

  You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.

  He let out an awful scream as the axe hit what must've been the bone of its spine, that was when black oil oozed out from its wound, igniting right in front of Jason's face and instantly igniting his skin alongside it. His hair burnt off instantly, and his eyebrows, and the slight stubble he had gotten from the days here.

  He punched the creature in the head some more as his skin melted off of his face, especially around his jaw where Joey could see it drooping down like a water drop. Jason didn’t even seem awake anymore as he continued to assault the demon, his eyes had a glassy feeling to them and the punches seemed far above what the body would usually allow.

  The demon's skull broke apart and stopped burning, leaving the flames to bite off and then flatten out. The grass was burning around him as he continued to sit on the corpse. He had a lost look in his eye, like he was some place far far away.

  He stood, the axe falling off of his hand as it cooled, patted the flames off his leather armor, which by this point were black and charred. And turned towards a random direction, “‘nother.” He decided to walk that direction before Joey ran up and grabbed his shoulder, instantly burning his hand to a blister.

  “Stay, stay…” he said out of breath, he watched as Grace finally stood up, he was beyond angry at her, though, what could she even do to help? “Grace… heal?”

  “Surely.” She reached into her robe pocket and took out a small glass vial full of red liquid, “was saving this for a special someone.” She poured it into the mouth of the unconscious boy, easing the burns, though she doubted they'd ever go back from scarring with such a weak potion.

  “And Eddy?!” Joey shouted, looking over at the corpse, “where the hell is Marx Jacky!” He shouted at the woman holding Eddy’s severed head. “Where the hell is he?!”

  “I don't know.” Jacky said softly, “I don't, I don't, I simply don't, I don't, I don't. Stop yelling at me.” She placed his head in front of her knees and pressed her hand to her head, “I’m burning up, my eyes hurt, we haven’t slept…” she wiped at her face. “We had it all, didn’t we?”

  Joey wasn’t quite sure what to say, his heart was still pumping with a relentless anger, he needed an outlet, they had nothing, “what do you mean?”

  “We really just had it all, on that island, we had it all. We were kings and queens.” She pressed her thumbs into her eyes, sighing deeply before standing up, “we really just had everything, and we threw it away without a punch thrown.”

  “Yeah… yeah I guess.” Joey took her hand into his, hissing at the pain in his palms, “stay with me? Stop speaking like crazy?”

  Jacky shook her head, “I want to go back…”

  “Me too, so we can agree, right? That we should stay ourselves so we can go home and continue our lives… didn’t you have a partner back on the island?”

  “I did…”

  “I’m sure he really wants to see you again, so you have to live…”

  “We don’t even know if we will go home after this!” She shouted into his face, making him unreasonably angry yet again, “you are just lying! You’re always lying! There’s no proof we go back after this!”

  Joey let go of her hand and walked away, not needing this right now, never, “Jason… or whatever you are, find us Marx.” He watched the burnt boy huff out some steamy air and make an animalistic groan, turning in a vague direction and walking with his head drooping to his shoulder.

  Jacky followed behind Joey, and Joey had wished that it was her that got decapitated, not Eddy. He was instantly disgusted at the thought, but found it true in his mind, selfishly, he knew she was less useful than Eddy was.

  —

  “Oh.” Marx pressed against the invisible barrier at the edge of the forest, they hadn’t even gone too far, they walked past the snake cave by the cabin, through the thicket, through some rougher swampy terrain and then here, there was a barrier. He could see that the forest extended for miles but he just couldn't reach it. “We’re birds in a fucking cage.”

  Fay figured as much, “right.” He turned back, looking over at Lily who had been unusually quiet and calm for the past few minutes. “Lily?”

  “Huh! I’m not hiding anything.”

  Fay shrugged, “okay. Come on, I have another plan.” They turned back, Fay figured that if they were going to fight these demons then it would be beneficial to be in an area that tended to not have as much flammable material, as demons would likely be similar to Marx in ability. Of course oxygen deprivation was a worry in an enclosed space, but that snake dungeon had a lot of holes, so he wondered if it might work.

  Not like oxygen deprivation would stop him, he could wager quite well to hold his breath and last for just as long as he did in that snake lake. “Lily you aren't going to fight, okay?” He stated obviously, the girl would just be in the way, which was another reason to go to the snake dungeon, as she could crawl into the holes and be safe for the time being.

  They could see a buzzing of fire in the distance, making the dark sky a beautiful crimson in some parts. The orange glow was taking up half of the forest now, definitely flame magic, Fay assumed, strong too. They got out of the swampy area and back into the usual forest, which was where they spotted a man looking thing, simply strolling through the forest with its back turned to them.

  Fay knew what it was instantly and turned right away, though Marx was slightly too slow and made noise upon ruffling a bush in his movement, making the demon turn and spot them. “Okay. Bad.” It was a second or two by the time the demon lunged at them and tried to claw Lily in the face, she bent out of the way, looking like her neck had snapped as she did. A burn appeared on the side of her face as everyone got distance however they could.

  The demon stopped in the middle of the group, splitting them apart into easy to identify prey. It made a clicking noise, steam rose from its feet and ignited the ground below, the grass sparking a flame and quickly turning into a burn.

  Marx shot out a compressed fireball into the creature, but the fire was just absorbed into the overall surrounding heat of the demon, igniting the grass further and letting out a shockwave of heat that reached Fay and the leaves above, igniting them too.

  Huh… Fay didn’t see the issue with this one, it was all manageable. The demon turned yet again to Lily, Fay used this chance to unsheathe the claws in his glove and lunged for the demon, heat instantly made his eyes burn and water, though the gloves did scratch the surface of the demon.

  It whipped backwards and tried to kick Fay in the chest.

  [Activated Stop Momentum]

  The leg stopped to his surprise, as it was weak and slow compared to a lot of what he fought today, that also made the heat the leg was spreading have no outlet into the air and tapered off, the flames along its body dissolved completely.

  The creature's arm swung next.

  [Activated Stop Momentum]

  Fay scratched the leg and then swiped the gloves along the arm, feeling his hand burn from under the cloth, luckily it wouldn’t be destroyed if it ignited. An ooze of black coated the gloves claws, exploding and spreading a heat through his hand to his shoulder.

  He disabled the gloves and dropped them on the grass below as he moved backwards, the demon rushed forward for a swipe along his face, Fay jolted his hands forwards in front of him.

  [Activated Stop Momentum]

  [Activated Stop Momentum]

  The thing stopped, though he couldn’t do much with that opening but run away from the heat, tallying up burns along his body. He looked over at Marx who had a finger to his mouth, whispering to himself, “so that's how you do it…” he held his hand up and it ignited, “oh… oh…” He laughed as the flame that coated his arm didn’t burn him one bit.

  The demon turned away from Fay, for a reason, because it had just found out its prey was copying it, it had an ego, obviously. “Fay!” Marx shouted, “I’m fine! You go!”

  Fay used this opportunity to wager that the demon would win the fight, just in case, and reclaimed his gloves from the burning ground below him. “Lily!” He felt a huge explosion of flames between Marx and the demon, “come on.” He grabbed her arm, she was looking around and studying the area. Fay wished he could stay and fight but he had a duty to fulfil, no matter how annoying it was. “Come on.” He pulled on her arm and she followed. He planned to store her away in the snake dungeon and then come back.