Twigs and dry leaves sound can be heard ambiently as they were crushed beneath furious running legs, the angry villagers and Xerves, neither is yet to give up, his legs which became heavier every second he took a step while enduring the torture of the cold night.
"Persistent, aren't they, damn it, exhausted to my very bones," he said amid heavy breathing, about a hundred more feet and they will catch up to him.
Xerves was already out of breath but luckily for him, the villagers were already retreating, their flaming torch becoming less and less visible as they move farther away from the forest to their nearby village, he stopped, shutting out all intruding noise, he filtered all the sound entering his ear except the ones made by the chirping of crickets, croaking of frogs and other natural wood-inhabiting creatures, having made sure no human footsteps were heard across the forest, his legs gave way, he fell on his butt with a heavy thud on the forest floor, although the bed of leaves acted as a cushion for his fall but the insects on and beneath the leave won't go unscathed as natural selection took place, some will survive by taking flight using their inherited wings while others will be crushed.
Although Xerves has the advantage as he is faster than an average human, well built with a keen sense of smell, touch, sight, and hearing, as expected of a teenager who has lived most of his life in the jungle and disciple to the great master Cornixae, but would you blame a teenager who just expended almost all his energy defeating one ultra demon and two infra demons?
In this world where molecular energy is the essence of one's being, this energy can be expended to manifest various extraordinary skills in humans, depending on how it is used, it can increase speed, and strength and activate various artifacts.
Artifacts that manifest in random ruins can be insignificant or great, there are three types of artifacts, the common type in the form of gems, the earthly type in the form of potions that heal, and the heavenly type, the rarest type in the form of weapons, one of which manifests in every decamillennium, the only one said to have existed was the counter-demon scythe which was manifested not in any ruins but by the breath of a dragon owned by Drago Lucius, the founder of the kingdom, Dragonicania.
This happened when his kingdom was on the verge of extinction a few millennia ago, he sacrificed himself by merging with his dragon to create poly molecular energy, after the merging, the dragon spewed breath of molecule in high density which in turn manifest the heavenly type artifact in form of a scythe, his trusted personal guard defeated the army of demons and their warlord, an ultra demon, with the scythe, using all of his molecular energy for its activation thereby passing into nothingness.
The scythe in all its glory has a long curved head of silver with a black gem embedded in its middle, a long handle is connected to the curved silver head, the black gem will glow when activated, a scythe having the power to kill an ultra demon and thousand infra demons in one slash, but ever since, none has been able to wield the ancient scythe, as it requires an endless amount of molecular energy for activation, one who has insufficient amount of molecular energy will shrivel on spot when in contact with it, the one who will wield it will be the one to end the endless reign of terror in the kingdom.