B5 C39: Demon

Before I even opened my eyes, two things stood out to me. First, my Transitory Hut of Restful Slumber was already paying off. This was not t

Before I even opened my eyes, two things stood out to me. First, my Transitory Hut of Restful Slumber was already paying off. This was not t

Before I even opened my eyes, two things stood out to me. First, my Transitory Hut of Restful Slumber was already paying off. This was not t

Before I even opened my eyes, two things stood out to me.

First, my Transitory Hut of Restful Slumber was already paying off. This was not the first or second or third or fourth time I’d woken up in an unfamiliar place after being forcefully knocked out, but it was doubtless the most pleasant. Instead of feeling groggy or nursing some horrible headache, I found myself waking up all at once, full of energy.

Second, we were definitely back in the demonic region. Something seemed to be protecting me, at least partially, but my stomach turned and my mana core groaned from the surrounding demonic mana.

After a surreptitious cast of Sense Minds and a few moments of careful listening, I was fairly sure I was alone. Opening my eyes and pulling myself up, I scanned my surroundings, expecting to find myself in some sort of demon jail cell.

The truth was far stranger.

For one, I was indoors. If I had to pick a single word to describe the building around me, I would have picked “temple.” Towering pillars held up a high ceiling, making for a spacious open area. Universally slate gray, the room should have looked bland, somehow managing to give off a hallowed and reverent air despite that. A large open archway stood at the room’s far end, looking out into the rest of the region.

Much more importantly, at the very center of the temple, directly behind me, was something I’d long been searching for. Sitting there without a care in the world was a giant crystal, nearly identical to the one I’d seen a year past in the mental region.

At last, I’d discovered the dungeon’s second mana collection site.

Better yet, the crystal was constantly releasing a chaotic mixture of different mana types, pushing out the bulk of the demonic mana. 

Despite the fact that it was keeping me safe, I still summoned my bow, contemplating if I should destroy it now while I had the chance.

“I wouldn’t if I were you.” A gravelly voice bounced off the myriad of hard stone surfaces, echoing through the chamber.

Spinning about, I found a massive figure now standing in the archway. Horned and winged and overly well-muscled, the being’s identity was never in doubt. Seemingly without a care in the world, the demon boss stood there, gazing down at me with a smirk.

No longer under attack, I had a bit more time to take in a few details I hadn’t before. For one, despite the fact that the dungeon was clearly able to conjure clothes and weapons for its bosses, the demon had none. Absolutely none. 

This brought me to my second realization, which was that my captor appeared to be a woman. Rather than show any hint of embarrassment at her current state, the demon seemed to relish in showing off her reddish black skin, stretched taut over bulging muscles. An unkempt mop of black hair fell down her neck, only barely covering the two ram-like horns protruding from her skull. Combined with her towering stature and the two massive wings at her back, she was undoubtedly an imposing sight.

God’s Eye only backed that image up further.

Cezerra: Level 32 Demonic Brawler, 1932/2600hp, 327 Prestige

Cal was right. She has a class and everything. That certainly wasn’t the readout I was used to for a standard dungeon boss. Did she keep fighting the others after I got knocked out? Her health was lower than expected, but the source seemed to be a few nasty burns dotting her flesh. Given that neither of my companions were fire mages, I was fairly sure they weren’t the cause.

Still, lower-leveled than I would have thought, and she only has an Uncommon class. Can I take her? At some point, my armor had been stripped from me, but with my class, it took only a thought to replace it.

Noticing my battle preparations, Cezerra lifted her arms in a sign of surrender. “Peace. Not that I wouldn’t mind going a few rounds with you, but if I was looking to kill you, I’d have done it already.”

That was something, at least. It wasn’t enough to make me dismiss my armor, but it was certainly true she could have killed me while I was unconscious. Then again, who knew? Maybe she needed me alive for now so that she could sacrifice me in some ritual. It wouldn’t be the first time someone had tried that.

“Why, then?” I was sure that Verin -- or even Cal -- could have teased the information out of her with more finesse, but social skills weren’t my forte. More than that, I wasn’t finding myself very charitable after being kidnapped.

Thankfully, if my captor minded the bluntness, she didn’t show it.

Closing her eyes, Cezerra took a deep sniff while menacingly licking her lips. “Mmm. You have a scent to you. Spatial magic. And something else…”

Spatial magic? Ignoring how she can even tell, why would she care? With her wings, I strongly doubted she had much trouble getting around the dungeon. The only thing I could think of was…

“You want me to cast a portal out of the dungeon? Are you trying to escape?” According to the grand magus, her level was too high unless she sundered her class, but that wasn’t too big of a hurdle. Hells, if she just wanted out of the dungeon, maybe we could even recruit her to help us with the other two collection sites. This was shaping up to be a lot less horrific than I’d been envisioning.

Dashing my hopes as soon as they formed, Cezerra filled the chamber with a harsh, grating laugh. “Escape? You think I want you to teleport me out?” Stomping forward, the demon neared until she towered over me. “No, I’m afraid you have it backwards, little human. You’re here to help me teleport something in.”

In that moment, I seriously considered my chances of making a break for it. If I shattered the crystal and then raced off with Spatial Step and Portal, would she be able to follow?

Probably. I doubt her wings take up nearly as much mana as my movement skills. Failing that, she might chase me all the way back to the prairie.

Holding back a sigh, I motioned for her to continue. Just what was it that she needed me to summon?

Why do I feel like this might take a while? I could only hope that Cal and Verin were fine without me.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Cal, it had to be said, was not doing super great. Then again, that was to be expected right after being attacked by a demon.

“Don’t want to say the obvious, but that went… badly.” Drifting down to the ground with her body dispersed into air, Cal looked back in the direction Tess had been taken, trying to figure out they were possibly going to get her back.

Even with Tess’s dire predicament, there were still more pressing concerns, however, and Cal swung her gaze over to where a small glacier plummeted through the air. Based on its trajectory, it would fall right at the border between the fire region and the spatial region, and Cal followed close behind it.

Under other circumstances, she would have been panicking to see Verin’s glacier in free fall, but that issue had thankfully been taken care of some time ago. Right as the mass of ice was about to slam into the ground, a great gust of air appeared to cushion the blow, courtesy of the Ornithological Ornamentation trinket Tal’Ket had gifted Verin.

Cal wanted to say that given the severity of the situation, she didn’t laugh when Verin landed upside down, cracking open her glacier to awkwardly right herself and stumble out. Sadly, she would be lying. At the very least, Cal didn’t manage to reach the noble until she’d already straightened herself out. Canceling her Apex Shroud, she appeared directly next to Verin, and the very moment she was in view, Verin launched into a series of hurried commands.

“Lady Calilah! Quickly, we must follow them. If Tess proved unable to escape the demon already, she will require our aid. Come, fast. We will depart at once.” Marching off at what was a fairly rapid pace for the physically weak mage, she rushed back into the fire region beckoning Cal to fall in line.

Though it slightly pained her, Cal stood her ground, earning only a withering glare from her companion.

“Hey! Slow down. Take a second. Think it over. Never mind that it would take us days on foot to get back to the demonic region. Do you even have enough food to make it there without Tess’s storage? Because there’s nothing to hunt between here and there.”

The rebuke visibly soured the noble’s mood, with her face puckering up in turn. “So what? We simply leave her there at the whims of some giant demon? Certainly, you are not suggesting we abandon her.”

Man. You think I’d get some grace after spending so many months hunting down those frost treasures for her. Then again, Verin was Verin. Cal knew she was only lashing out from genuine concern.

“Look, if the demon wanted her dead, she would be by now. If it doesn’t, it’ll keep her around. And from what I know about demons, it’ll do the latter. Come on. We can talk on the way back to the forest.” Cal was hardly looking forward to how unpleasant Verin was about to get as she got hungrier, and they had a long walk before they were back in a functioning kitchen.

Realizing any arguing was futile at this point, Verin reluctantly turned about with the shadow of a pout. “Fine. But you will explain as we walk. You believe it will not kill her. You have some idea of what the demon is after, then?”

Cal could only shrug. “It’s a little like the story with Emperor Diorus and Sett, right? At our level, killing a single person doesn’t make a lot of sense unless you have a class quest for it. Especially considering that it didn’t kill you, I doubt it’s some bloodthirsty savage. I’m betting it thinks Tess can do something for it, which means she’s safe for now. I have some guesses for what it wants, but it’s hard to say for certain.”

As they crossed back into the spatial region, Verin mulled Cal’s words over for a time before eventually finding her voice once more. “Now, and while we were returning as well, you seemed to know quite a bit about demons.”

Though it was technically a statement, Cal could hear the question in her voice. Suppressing a sigh, she did her best to wave the question away. “Read a lot of books as a kid. Here, I’ll tell you more about them on the way back.”

In fairness, it wasn’t a complete lie. Cal had learned most of what she knew about demons from books. At best, however, it was a partial truth. Trying to decide what was safe to say, Cal found her mind wandering back to her childhood. 

Even as she continued to engage in the conversation on autopilot, her memories overtook her, taking her back to a time she tried hard not to think about anymore.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

For the many gossips and rumour mongers in Ftheran, the birth of the Royal Princess was no small thing. As the sole offspring of the king, she would have been a topic of interest no matter what, but it didn’t hurt that the child was noteworthy in her own way, either.

In some ways, she was exactly as expected, full of energy as only kids could be and with an attention span that had her flitting about between whatever caught her interest. In others, she was a precocious child, perhaps even a prodigy, depending on who you asked.

Certainly, these rumors were far preferable to the ones preceding them -- that she was an unnatural baby, one who never slept or cried to be fed. If those same rumors ended as abruptly as they began, aggressively stomped out, then no one thought too hard of it. Plenty of servants already spouted all manner of contrived intrigues and baseless conspiracies. What was one more?

Regardless, at the ripe age of one, Princess Calilah had already begun to speak in full sentences, and her ability to read came shortly thereafter.

In a sense, it was inevitable. With all manner of nannies and royal tutors working their hardest to shove new words into her head, Cal was constantly expanding her vocabulary. Whenever she encountered a new word, she would pester whoever was closest to define it for her, with a singular exception. There was one source of words she had been told never to read aloud or share with anyone, save perhaps for her father.

And so it was that, shortly after turning two, Cal sought the man out. While he was by no means unknown to her, the king hardly had time to raise a small child by himself, and Cal could count the number of private audiences they’d had on one hand. Still, he was the only one she could ask.

The memory was still crystal clear in her mind. There her father sat in his study, official reports and documents scattered across his desk. Far from the stony and stern countenance he tended to bear in the throne room, his lips were drawn into an easy-going smile. Somehow, it did nothing to diminish the aura of authority he radiated.

“So, my child? I was told you have a question for your father?” His eyes crinkled up as he prepared to impart his wisdom, doubtless expecting some sort of childish drivel from her.

Instead, Calilah maintained an almost unnerving level of eye contact as she tilted her head to the side and spoke. “Father, what does the word ‘demon’ mean?”

Any trace of levity vanished from the king, replaced with a fit of poorly restrained anger -- and perhaps a hint of fear -- as he shot to his feet. “Who told you that word? Was it…” A sudden realization seemed to dawn on him, slowly forcing him back into his chair. “Is it… Of course it is. I should have expected this.”

Too many emotions flashed across his face for the young Calilah to process, and she wondered if she’d done something wrong as the king fixed her with a bitter glare. “Read it then. Pull it up. Tell me what it says. For better or for worse, I won’t say I haven’t wondered.”

If her father’s ire frightened her in any way, the Royal Princess didn’t show it. Instead, she was mostly confused as she pulled up the screen she’d been told not to share with anyone else: her status. 

Just as it always had, the same line that had sparked this conversation sat there, as if waiting for her.

Race: Halfling (Human/Demon)