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Newly Summoned Demoness - Chapter 63 – Relain’s Hound
🕑 Added 2023-10-21 06:10:05 +0000 UTC
Elania reacted instantly, pushing forward to chase after the mana shard chest. Tessa didn’t let her close, jumping back equally fast.
The razor-sharp looking teeth grinned madly. “Hahaha! My master needs this.”
A curved blue wave of energy flashed towards both of them as Anton turned and charged toward the stolen prize.
There was no dodging the wave; Elania punched it with a burst of energy, and the section slashing through her dissolved. Tessa leaped over the attack easily, latching onto the side of the bookshelf. It tilted and began to fall straight on top of the charging paladin. It didn’t slow him down any as he burst through the furniture and books.
Tessa was already gone, flashing toward the exit. A wall of light materialized a few feet in front of her and the demon smashed into it heavily with a thud, her and the box both falling to the ground. The demon wasn’t dazed, though, and rolled away with the chest.
Yolani flicked her second wand; a pole of metal dug its way down from the roof like a spear impaling the ground where Tessa had just vacated. More poles began to slice down, one after another, each one narrowly missing the evading demon. A manically laughter filled the room.
Elania turned and darted to chase after Tessa as well, but Anton had the same idea and they nearly collided. He swung at her without hesitation and Elania jumped over the sword and then kicked him. She bounced off him. His shell was like a mountain.
Forgetting about the mana shard chest, the paladin rushed her with a rapid flurry of swings and strikes that took all her attention to avoid. The sword was relentless, each swing carrying a force that felt like it could split the earth itself, much less her. The gusts of air that accompanied each swing blew at her hair and clothes like a hurricane.
There was a shout of pain from Yolani that burned her ears and forced her to glance over at the other fight. The demon was agile, dodging Yolani’s strikes, while tossing and throwing books, splinters of wood, and every sort of debris there was available in the room. Yolani’s defensive wand snapped at each projectile, deflecting each one with cool efficiency, but the rate was obviously wearing her down.
A shard of metal slashed Yolani’s cheek, leaving a red line of blood, which only seemed to fuel Tessa’s delight further; the maniacal laughter filled the room with a macabre horror.
Elania felt a surge of panic. Yolani needed help!
In the corner of her eye, blue flashed. The heavy paladin blade was streaking for her head, and Elania realized she’d made the mistake of getting distracted. No time to dodge.
Fine.
There wasn’t time anyway.
What had Yolani said about [Power] being exponential?
Fifty points was a normal attack, a hundred for a strong one. When she’d been desperate and created the incineration beam, it had been a hundred and fifty.
Time seemed to slow, and she swung her fist like a hammer for the flat of the massive blue blade. How about three hundred?
Her [Mana Manipulation] had become fairly precise. She didn’t even have to draw it from herself, the mana shard she had still had that much thanks to the previous battle on Artifice Row.
Her fist and forearm lit up like a yellow star as it impacted.
Physics seemed to break; there was a resounding gong that pulsed through everything that was felt more in her spirit than as sound. It felt like her entire being was warbling, but both she and the sword were anchored in place, like they had been freeze-framed while everything else erupted around them.
Instead of damaging the sword, the blast materialized in a coned shape on the other side of the metal, spreading out with sharp lines that shot ahead of the shockwave, blasting into the mansion’s wall and punching wide holes all the way through like armor-piercing bullets.
When the wave hit, the masonry crumbled and stretched until the entire side of the building blew out in a massive plume of debris straight into the city streets.
The vacuum of the blast sucked in all the air from the room, dragging books, debris, with it. The paladin was yanked to the side, his grip on the sword restraining him from being blasted away… until it slipped, and he went flying with the rest of the chaos.
Tessa flashed by, jumping from one piece of debris to the next, her cackles muted in the frozen moment. The mana shard chest was still in her arms as she disappeared.
[Connection Established. Profiling New User.]
They unfroze, and Elania clamped down on the sword’s hilt, stabbing it into the floor as the vacuum sucked her feet off the ground. Yolani somersaulted past her, and Elania reached out and grabbed the other girl’s ankle with an ethereal hand made of golden light.
The wind died down, and they both crumpled onto the floor. There was nothing but devastation around them.
“Yolani?” Elania croaked. No sound. Her eardrums must have shattered. Crawling forward, Elania found that her left hand was missing at the wrist from the blow, slowly beginning the re-knitting process.
But Yolani didn’t have [Regeneration]. Panic swelled inside Elania’s chest as she scrambled to the other girl, using her ruined limb anyway.
The other girl was unconscious. Elania pulled her onto her side, then her back, carefully looking for injuries. Nothing looked broken or bent wrong, but red was leaking from her ears and there was a large wooden splinter stuck in her upper right arm.
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck!
She could drop bombs with her fists, and regrow entire limbs and orangs, but she didn’t have a single fucking skill for helping someone else!
First aid. She’d taken a first aid course a million years ago. What was the first thing to do?
Elania’s eyes settled on a broken vial across the room, a memory slamming into her like a miracle.
Fucking. Red. Flags.
Her pack was missing, but she’d put it in her inner shirt pocket. Pulling out the small vial of red liquid, it seemed like it was too small to do anything, but, hey; it was magic, right?
Elania yanked the splinter out, then poured half the vial into the wound. It immediately lit up blue, little motes of light evaporating off of it. Right. Right. It was working. Tilting Yolani’s head to the side, she poured some drops into her ear, then repeated it for the other side. Then she poured the last bit into the girl’s mouth.
She was still repeating the other girl’s name when hearing slowly worked its way back from the incessant ringing. Yolani coughed and opened her eyes, looking at her with a dazed expression.
“We need to go. The Guard will be coming here!” Elania said.
Yolani didn’t respond with words, but tried to get to her feet, but a sharp look of pain appeared on her face and she fell back. Elania caught her.
“Shit,” Elania cursed. Yolani reached out and Elania’s eyes followed the gesture. It was to Yolani’s pack, which had somehow tangled on a fallen support beam and not blown away. Elania rushed over and brought it back, rummaging through the random assortment of things she didn’t understand while looking for more healing vials.
None there.
In the distance, the murmur of shouting men and women slowly drifted closer. They didn’t have time.
Slipping the pack over Yolani’s head, she lifted the girl up into her arms then turned and started to leave.
[Not without me. User.]
Elania froze, her gaze turning to settle on the blue sword.
[Yes. Take me.]
Cursed talking sword that sent [System] style messaged to her?
[Blessed. Blessed talking sword. One that saved your life twice. Take me.]
Elania frowned. Yolani was already hard to carry, not because she was heavy but because the other girl was the same size she was!
It was complicated, but she pinned the sword between a tightly hugged Yolani pressed against her chest.
Then she ran.
The only place Elania could think of going was the sewer entrance near the channel. The stealth cloak was tattered, and she did not know how effective it was, but she kept it wrapped around them while jumping from roof to roof. Her power levels were slowly dropping from the exertion and the mana shard in her boot barely gave off an anemic pulse.
That wasn’t good.
The area around the mansion glowed from a fire that had erupted. Many people were running toward the blast area. Thankfully, no one seemed to notice them going in the opposite direction along the roofs, or so she hoped.
Reaching the access way, the area was similarity deserted as when they had exited from it, and she pulled on the heavy door.
It was sealed.
[I can assist.]
Elania blinked. Well, what choice did she have? If she tried to force it, the [Power] cost was going to be high, the door would be obviously destroyed, and… how was the sword able to assist?
She set down Yolani gently, then wielded it with two hands. A glowing red area near where the lock bolt slid from the door into the wall was highlighted in her vision.
[Strike there.]
She did—the blade cleaved through the metal joint neatly, almost as if it adjusted the swing mid-air for her. There wasn’t even a visible scratch as she pulled the heavy door open.
Recollecting Yolani, she carried her two passengers into the tunnel. The first intersection reminded her of just how nasty the place was, and this time she didn’t have the disassociation of being a [Darkwalker] to combat the literal filth and smell.
“Fuck. I’m sorry this was the worst idea,” Elania mumbled. Maybe she should have broken into someone’s house. There were lots of run-down looking buildings in the district.
Not wanting to go very far into the mess, Elania picked the first cubby hole she spotted that was dry. Yolani was still mostly unresponsive, but when Elania shook, her dazed green eyes greeted her.
Did she have a concussion? If the healing potion didn’t heal her all the way, they were out of options. She’d have to find someone…or give Yolani up to a hospital…did they even have hospitals in this city? Fuck, she didn’t even know if they had places for injured!
There had to be something, maybe apothecaries? Elania opened up Yolani’s bag and started going through it. It had lost a lot of things since she’d packed it, and again, there were no more healing potions.
She took Yolani’s hand and squeezed it. She didn’t know what to do.
[I can assist.]
Elania blinked and rubbed an eye before glancing at the sword she’d set on the ground. Golden etched runs were worked into the blade along its entire length.
[I am Eziel, Arch-Seraph of Light, Judge of the Divine. Touch me to the girl’s head and I will pronounce my judgement of her worthiness.]
Elania reached down and picked up the sword, scrutinizing it.
“Does that mean you can heal her?” she asked pointedly.
[If I judge her worthy, I can.]
Elania let out a slow, shaky breath.
“Well, Eziel, Arch-Seraph of Light, Judge of the Divine, I am Elania Reyes, Human Girl from Earth, Recently Turned Eladu Demon. I’m going to touch you to her head. If you don’t heal her, I’m going to submerge you in sewer filth before casting you off the waterfall into the abyssal depths of wherever the fuck the city lake goes so you can rust down there for eternity or the next thousand years or whatever.”
There was a tense moment of silence.
[I will take it under consideration.]
Elania bit her lip. She didn’t know if this was a good idea. How did the sword judge anyone? Was it real? Yolani had killed her uncle not even a day ago. Did that make her friend evil? They’d both killed more people than Elania ever thought…no she’d never thought that she’d ever have to kill anyone. But she had, in order to survive.
How did the sword judge people?
Resignation filled her chest. There weren’t any good options.
But if the sword made things worse, Elania knew she’d figure out how to make magic talking swords suffer and do her best possible to make it happen. She was that vindictive.
Did that make her evil or bad, according to the sword?
[Not worse than the previous User.]
Elania shook her head. She knew nothing of the Paladin.
Yolani’s breathing came in stressed hitches. Elania placed the flat end of the blade against the other girl’s forehead gently.
The sewer chamber filled with golden white light.
Comments
TUSF
> The guests of air that accompanied each swing blew at her hair and clothes like a hurricane. guests → gusts
Jonathan Wint
I wonder if her Profession changes to Paladin?
M. Lampi
I think the problem is there was no time to even think of such a thing while the paladin was battling them.
dotAlice
I feel like there was a missed opportunity for our protagonists this chapter, where they probably could have made a deal with Tessa. We can make a couple of assumptions about what Relain wants, and ways they could be fufilled. First off, he likely had a hand in the smuggling of mana crystals to the cult, as it was mentioned that resolving a shortage would boost his chances in an upcoming election. His likely goal was to backstab the cult and "resolve the crisis" on his own, presenting him as a hero of the city. The paladin coming in likely was a roadblock in his plan, but when the paladin didn't go public with the raid, Relain probably shifted his plot to blame him instead. Given the information that the protagonists have, they could likely cut a deal to keep their info secret in exchange for resolving the debt they owe. Additionally, Relain probably has a secondary plot to get a master artificer under his exclusive thumb, hence supporting the plot of Yolani's uncle and then later Ranolf. She could probably factor this into the deal, getting him both the mana crystals and a master artificer. The only question is if they would be willing to actually make a deal like that.
