Almost simultaneously as the Demon appeared, Chancellor Otto gave the command to attack. Sebastion’s light crashed down on the site first, followed by ice, fire, and even an oversized halberd. I could not see if our strikes hit through the thick blood mist. I could only throw my flames in the general direction and pray the Demon was still there.

I closed my eyes as the sounds of screaming briefly rang out before being cut short. Human screams, the men and women we sacrificed for a chance of victory. The soldiers we betrayed.

For a brief moment, I felt regret at my decision. This was our plan, our choice. Even waiting thirteen minutes into the attack was decided ahead of time, in hopes that the Demon would have already exhausted most of his energy when our counterstrike came. We even knew that we would have to attack a rather large area since we could not see exactly where the Demon was. Thousands of men and women would die because of our decisions. Suicide battalion or not, these were still our people. They had trusted us with their lives and we threw them away.

However, no matter how much regret I felt, I knew I could not afford to hold back. I put everything I could into launching a pillar of flames at the Demon. We would not get a second chance at catching the teleporter. We had to make their sacrifice worth it.

As soon as the sounds of repeated explosions began to fade, I rushed towards the location. I could feel the energy in my body running thin. Even maintaining flight was difficult for me now. If the Demon was still alive, there would be nothing more I could do but I had to know. I needed to see the body with my own eyes.

The impact of so many abilities had actually managed to blow away the blood mist in the area slightly. In the brief window of visibility, I could see the carnage we inflicted. Burned and frozen corpses littered the ground like a carpet. whimpers of pain could still be heard from those unlucky enough to be at the edge of the blast zone. Those men were beyond healing. All they got was a slower, more painful death.

I tried not to look at the corpses below as I moved to the center of the impact crater our attacks left behind. However, anywhere else I looked was the blood mist and the myriad of faces that constantly drifted in and out of view. Their accusatory gazes made my skin shiver but I knew better than to let my thoughts linger on them.

I hurried to the center of the impact site, looking for any sign of the Demon. I could not see him, but as I got closer, I knew he was not dead. I could feel the predatory bloodlust that radiated out from the creature at all times. It was weak but it was still there.

Others quickly arrived at the impact sight as well. Sebastion and Svend were the fastest as they reached the center of the crater. Their stern gazes looked down at the ground below.

Rocks tumbled out of the way as a figure emerged. It crawled out of the dirt with slow shuddering movements. Its skin was charred black and the entire left side of its body was simply gone. What remained was little more than a ruined husk barely hanging onto life.

Sebastion did not hesitate as he saw the figure emerge. He pointed a single finger at the creature and several thin beams of light stuck out faster than the eyes could see. Each beam hit precisely, striking the locations Irene had pointed out to prevent the Demon from self-destructing.

The Demon fell still as the light pierced straight through its body. I let out a sigh of relief when I saw one of Sebastion’s beams leave a large hole right through the its skull but my relief quickly turned into trepidation as I noticed the red glow of the Demon’s red eyes was still as bright as ever.

Despite what should have been fatal injuries for even the strongest of Demons, the charred body began to twitch. It moved almost like a puppet on strings as its head turned a full one hundred eighty degrees to look at Sebastion.

With a burnt and broken mouth, the Demon spoke. Each word was drawn out as it struggled with the words. “Your… attacks… That pitiful human dares betray us?”

I narrowed my eyes at what I was seeing. The Demon was too calm for a creature on the edge of death. “Sebastion, vaporize the body,” I said coldly.

Before Sebastien could act, the Demon began to laugh. “Not even death can catch me!”

His entire body shuddered as if it was hit by a seizure and began to bloat up. His blood boiled and popped. The flesh of the Demon’s body began to melt as if it was liquid but rather than flow into a puddle, it formed into a new shape. Burnt skin flaked away to reveal the coiling muscles and organs underneath. Raw sinew wrapped around itself to form the missing left half of the Demon’s body.

The entire process happened so fast that few people had time to react to what was happening. Within seconds, a charred and broken corpse into a skinless beast of flesh. The new abomination vaguely resembled a large feline like a cheetah or leopard but the grotesque nature of seeing organs and bones exposed to the open air made any resemblance nauseating.

Svend was the quickest to react to the transformation, probably because other than me, he was the only one that was likely to have ever seen such an inexplicable transformation from what should have been a dead corpse. His halberd sliced down into the body of the Demon with the sound of a wet squelch. The halberd had buried itself deep into the body of the Demon, nearly bisecting it in half but it seemed to have little effect. The demon’s body was a gelatinous mess of liquids and solids. There were no vital organs to target and no weak points to exploit.

Svend cursed with intense frustration as he pulled his halberd out of the wet mass of muscle and flesh. “Why is one of Gluttony’s Teeth working for Envy?”

“Worry about that later, just attack! He can’t maintain that form forever.” I shouted back.

Red eyes locked onto me as a creepy human smile spread across the squirming flesh. In a blink, the Demon vanished. I felt a chill down my back as the Demon teleported away. Acting purely on instinct honed from countless deaths I fell flat to the ground. I felt the wind catch my hair as a fleshy tentacle stabbed through where I had been standing only a moment before. My eyes caught the sight of broken bits of bone at the tip of the tentacle, turning it into a spear. I felt a twinge of fear as I realized how close I had just come to dying. There was no way I could have survived that strike if it had hit.

Running purely on adrenaline, I forced my already strained body to the max. Without even looking back, I created an explosion of golden flames behind me. The force of the blast sent me flying away from the Demon. I tumbled through the dirt before sliding to a stop.

I didn’t even have time to catch my bearings before the flesh monster blinked into existence directly on top of me. The world seemed to slow as I saw a claw made from broken bone slash down towards my head. I saw Sebastion, Svend, and Vissna, all launching attacks at the Demon. I heard Dom shouting my name. I felt the sickening pressure of the Demon bearing down on me but above all, I smelt the putrid scent of blood all around me.

I was going to die here. I was sure of it. I had experienced it too many times to mistake this feeling. My only hope was that I could use my death to fuel the last of my domain and lock the Demon in place long enough that everyone else could kill it.

In my final thoughts at that moment, I worried for Mom, Dad, and Charly. I prayed that I could find them again the next time I am reborn.

The Demon’s claw was a blur as it smashed down towards my head. I maneuvered my domain, prepared to make my last stand when a sudden burst of purple light surrounded me. The Demon’s claw tore into the translucent barrier, leaving three deep gouges on its surface but could not reach me.

The Demon widened his eyes in surprise. He did not even care to dodge as nearly half a dozen attacks slammed into his body, shredding, freezing, and piercing his already mangled flesh.

I felt a cold sweat on my skin as I realized I was still alive. The sound of my heart beating in my ears was louder than the explosions ringing out around me. My focus only returned when I saw a blur of purple fall out of the sky and land on the Demon’s head. Both her feet stomped the shattered remains of the skull into the ground.

Mare grinned down at me as she stood on the Demon’s head. “You owe me one this time.”

I nodded numbly, still reeling from my near-death experience. The flesh of the Demon once again turned liquid as its body once again stitched itself together. Before anyone could stop it, the Demon vanished again.

Mare did not even look as her left hand punched towards the empty air to her left. At the same moment, the Demon reappeared. He did not even have time to move before the small fist exploded into his body.

Mare shook the goo off her hand in disgust as she glanced at the Demon. “You are ten thousand years too early if you want to teleport in front of me.”

The Demon’s body reformed slightly further back this time. Its red eyes glared at Mare with undisguised fury. It looked as if it wanted nothing more than to rip out her throat right then and there but when the Demon took a step forward, a large slab of flesh slid off his leg. The Demon’s body shook slightly as more pieces of bone and muscle looked ready to fall apart at any moment. I knew from experience that the Demon had reached his limit. He could not maintain his body much longer.

The Demon narrowed his eyes as he shifted his gaze to me. “You were lucky this time, Aurielle. We will see how long that lucky streak last next time we meet.” Leaving behind chunks of quickly rotting flesh, the Demon vanished, teleporting away before anyone could stop it.

My head plopped to the dirt as sprawled out on the ground, too tired to move. I let out a long breath to calm my nerves. I could barely even believe I was still alive. I had been so sure I was about to die.

I glanced over at Mare curiously. She had really saved me this time. For all her annoyances, she had been the only one that moved quick enough to stop the Demon. This was a debt I would not forget and if I got the opportunity, I would be sure to return the favor one day.

Sighing, I looked up into the blood mist with regret. The myriad of faces were mocking me now. It was as if they knew they were getting in the way. If not for the blood mist, we could have pursued the Demon. I knew for a fact he would be weaker than a newborn baby for the next several days. That power it used to turn liquid was not its own. It was borrowed from a greater entity.

The question was, is this an isolated incident we stumbled upon or a sign of something worse to come?