The demon was hunched, a slender, shadowy form. I could tell it was huge even from where we stood. And that this was going to be a hard fight.
My hand was sweaty around the sword I held, blade already formed and magic glowing. It was a staring contest as we and the thing watched each other closely. Who would move first?
I thought about how it had sensed us. Did that mean it could perceive our fear? Did that immediately put us at a disadvantage? I rolled my shoulders back to appear less afraid, though I doubted that actually helped.
"Lilly. Lilly," I whispered.
"Yeah?"
"Slowly," I said, moving forward and away from her. "Get the machine out of your bag slowly."
She didn't reply but I heard her move, doing as I instructed.
I watched the demon with an unsteady gaze. My hands were shaking. I ignored it. My body was trembling. I ignored it too. I had one job right now, and it was to keep Lilly safe until she could do what she had to do.
There! My gaze caught a movement. The demon had slid its leg back, subtle. It was rearing to attack.
"Hero, I need just a minute." Lilly's voice, too, trembled. "Can you keep it still for a minute?"
I nodded even though she wasn't looking at me. My mouth was too dry to speak.
I thought it was going to be easy. The demon seemed strangely non-violent, and I thought if we didn't make any sudden movements, we could do this without too much hassle. But the demon pulled back all of a sudden and flung itself forward, and my mind went blank.
Obviously, I was no match for it. In a single second it disappeared and appeared right in front of my eyes, an arm raised to strike with quick black claws that had appeared out of nowhere. I caught the movement even with that speed and swung my sword with all of my might but as I'd suspected, my blade went right through its cloudy form. Terror gripped me at this. My attack had failed and I was not going to get another chance. Yet, to my surprise, it flickered back some feet away, a hole opening in its face to let out a shriek.
I'd actually landed a hit…
I hadn't exerted much physical strength but still my breath sawed painfully in and out of my chest, as if I'd just executed some kind of complicated move. My eyes flitted over the gasping creature trying to see how it was possible to cut through literal formlessness. The air smelled burnt, like some kind of poisonous gas was ignited and when I looked at where I hit on the demon's arm, the shadowy limb had dissipated, struggling to reform.
The sword, I realized. It wasn't just a piece of metal, it was a magic weapon and so it didn't matter if the demon had been made of just air. If I could manage a hit, it was going to take damage.
Slowly, like something sliding perfectly into a slot it was made for, my muscles relaxed. I'd let fear take over my rationality. Seeing that I was able to get some damage in took away some of the hopelessness I was drowning in. We had a chance of coming out of this alive.
The demon was close enough that I could see its form clearly. It seemed like was it completely constituted of a fog of murky, flickering black, but I could see that it was solid in some places. It would have been easy to glance over, but its chest was completely solid, as well as its arms and legs. In what I supposed was its head, those purple hazes glinted terrifyingly.
Seeing that I could damage it now, its movement went back to hesitant. But I wasn't going to give it a chance to breathe. I ran towards it, hair flying in the wind and twisted around, feeling like doing so was going to give my attack more damage. The demon and I fought like this, with me not giving it a chance to use its speed as an advantage and landing as many choppy attacks as I could, while also trying to move the fight toward Lilly so we could capture it.
Sweat ran down my body as I squinted my eyes, breathing heavily. The place we were was so difficult to maneuver around, with stumps and roots and tree trunks everywhere. I wished I was Alice who could clear a level battlefield for herself if needed but I wasn't though, and this fight was getting bad.
I'd already gotten an energy warning and could actually feel myself start to get tired. The demon was rapidly gaining strength over me once more and I gritted my teeth calling to Lilly, "I thought you said a minute! It's been at least two hours now, come on!"
"I'm almost done, move out of the way!" I swung out just to force the demon to dodge and used the chance to get away from it, but it screeched and started to attack again. Lilly was just in time because before it could do anything, out of the metal box she had set up shot a beam of light, bright green and shaped like a diamond prism. As if she'd aimed it, it encased the demon, turning solid and containing it perfectly.
Immediately, it began constricting, growing smaller and smaller, and the demon roared and thrashed against the walls of the opaque containment. It dragged its claws down on it and I flinched.
My heart was in my throat again, although it never really left, and I turned to Lilly wide-eyed, "Can these things be broken??"
"I've never heard of such a case! Holy shit, this creature is too strong."
"Make it go faster!"
"I can't!"
The prism containment was moving rapidly but the demon had managed to get a crack in. I gripped my sword tighter, just in case I had to go another round, but thankfully, I didn't.
In the span of a few seconds, the prism shrunk into something so tiny when it fell, it was concealed in the grass.
For a moment, it was as if I couldn't hear anything. Blood pounded so hard in my ears it rang. I looked over at Lilly, my face frozen for a few seconds before I exhaled a laugh, and she did too. Soon, we were both laughing from lingering fear, and excitement as well as relief. My heart pounded madly in my chest.
Lilly got up from where she was crouched and ran over to meet me. I stared at her, feeling that sense of awe at her I'd felt sometime before wash over me again. She refused to back down from this and here we were successful. I grinned at her and she grinned back.
"A week searching?" She said as she bent to pick the prism, "Talk about half a day."
The next few moments that happened, they happened because I wasn't fast enough. I should've been suspicious instead of celebrating. The demon seemed too strong to be held down by whatever that machine's magic was.
Lilly's finger hadn't even touched the small item when it broke open, and everything that happened in front of me did so like time was slowed down. Our eyes met, wide with identical shock, and then her body was sent flying until it hit a tree and she slid down and slumped over. I felt like I could have done something in this time window—grabbed at her, anything—but in reality, it was impossible. Everything happened in the blink of an eye.
In some way, I should have been too shocked to move. I should've gotten hit like she did and maybe the two of us would have died that day, but somehow, without conscious control over my body and with a speed I attributed to nothing less than desperation, I drew back my sword and drove it through the demon's unguarded chest. Right at the center where it was most solid. The demon's screech would have been pleasant to my ears but all I felt was rage and I didn't let go even as it writhed in its position pinned to the ground with my blade.
I was breathing heavily, unseeing as its life finally ended and it dissipated into XP balls of light that sunk into my body. A bunch of system notifications dropped in but I did not give a shit, curses leaving my mouth as I raced to where Lilly lay, her body limp and covered in blood.
"Shit. Shit shit shit shit," I spat uncontrollably. What should I do??
Her stomach! There were deep claw marks there, tearing right through her clothes that were now blood-soaked. I ripped open the torn side of her dress so the material didn't stick to wounds. The bastard thing had actually punched with claws. Blood poured out of the gashes and I felt like I was going to go insane because she was about to bleed out in my arms.
"Help!" I yelled out into the forest. "Is there a healer nearby! Help!"
I was about to call out again but the words got stuck in my throat as right in front of me, the blood on her body started to turn black. Or rather, out of those claw marks, something black and ink-like flowed out as well, mixing with the blood and staining her clothes even more.
"Help," I said, weakly.