Now!

In a blur, the pixie shot up against the Vizier’s eyes, who, taken by surprise, moved his arm ineffectively.

Adrenaline kicked in.

I was about to see my gamble pay off, or die trying.

I hadn’t mentioned it before, because it was an unnecessary detail, but magic portals don’t disappear immediately. Instead they fray at the edges and shrink. I always wondered what would happen to something in between.

I was about to find out.

The portal was closing.

The Grand Vizier was distracted.

In a silent rage I launched myself against the demon, hitting him with my shoulder.

Because I had stood close to the portal, he hadn’t been able to distance himself.

He lost his balance, his head moving into the shrinking portal.

To his credit, I sensed an enormous magical power radiate over my spiritual body. Likely an offensive spell.

But it was too late.

His body collapsed on the ground, headless. His neck sported a diagonal clean cut, spurting blue blood all over the grass.

Whatever magic he had tried summoning dispersed as suddenly as it had been called up.

All of that must have happened in the time-span of two or three seconds.

The maddened beating of my heart was pounding on my head. Only then I realized I had been holding my breath. Finally, I let out a sigh of relief and admired my handiwork.

The demon girl, whose arm I had let go earlier, let out a small shriek and fell backward on her butt. She remained there staring with her mouth open as if paralyzed.

A naive good guy would never have come up with such a strategy. I smiled with satisfaction.

The odds had been low, but I had managed to stack my cards against those odds.

Without the pixie’s distraction, the right positioning, the strict timing, and the Mantle-powered order—which I had theorized would prevent the Vizier from reopening the portal—my plan would have failed.

I had witnessed it before, the strongest magicians appeared able to think faster and multiple things at once.

There had been probably also other factors that came to my aid. Like Feras wanting me alive, the Mantle being precious, and perhaps limiting other demons from using spiritual interference against their “Demon Lord”.

Another wave of pain brought me back to Earth. Or rather, Gaia.

I knelt down and grunted. This time it was lasting longer.

With my teeth gritted and black dots swimming in the corners of my vision, I took in my surroundings.

The small pixie was dancing over the Vizier’s corpse. The demon girl was now staring at me, likely afraid.

I considered leaving her behind, but my conscience poked daggers at me. I couldn’t abandon a defenseless child in a forest alone, even if it was a demon.

Eventually, the spiritual pain eased, and I could stand again. My limbs were a little twitchy, but that was expected from all the adrenaline.

I came with the grim realization that my spirit was weakening. I could feel it. The Mantle was not meant for me. It didn’t like my body. It didn’t like me.

One problem at a time, I told myself.

「Allen: Pixie!」

The pixie stopped dancing and blinked toward me. The moment he touched my skin I was aware of relief, joy, vengeance.

Can you bring me to a safe place? I asked him.

He responded with images of different kind of fairies. Kindred. Home. Safety. I even caught a glimpse of human-like fairies.

I decided to ask them for help. I didn’t know where I was, and despite my short military training, I was not confident in surviving all alone innawoods.

I had learned to cook and clean the meat. But hunting I had left to the ones who knew how to. My knowledge of edible herbs was also limited.

And worst of all…

My sense of direction is complete shit, when I don’t know where I am or where I am going.

I would likely walk back into Demon’s territory.

No. The Fae were my best bet. There still was a chance I’d stumble on a human village.

I turned to face the little demon girl. Her tears were glistening on her cheeks. By her confused looks from earlier I had surmised she didn’t understand Arstei.

Fortunately there was someone who could relay concepts which didn’t require words. I didn’t have to pantomime like when I first arrived in this world.

Tell her she can follow us, if she so wishes. I conveyed to the small spirit.

He seemed reluctant at first. Reticence, enemy. but when I projected a sense of protecting newborns and responsibility, he gave in and went to her.

The demon girl shied away, letting out a shrill and covering her head with her little arms. At least until she realized the pixie didn’t have bad intentions.

I saw her calming down as they communed telepathically, then she looked at me, and the forest around us. She nodded sullenly.

We were all on the same page.

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I scavenged the overcoat, the shoes, and whatever looked useful from the Dead Vizier, leaving behind the magical-looking stuff, fearing they could be used to track me. I was not going to walk into common blunders.

The orb he had used on the demon boy, I smashed with a rock. The demon girl, noticeably relaxed when she saw the think break into pieces. I hoped that was enough to show my good intentions.

Then as I was about to leave, I turned back a gave the corpse a good kick, as a symbolic gesture.

I was free. Free to get lost and starve to death.

A pixie, a cursed man, and a little demon girl walk into a forest…

It sounded like a promising start for a bad joke.

「Allen: Lead the way.」

I told the pixie.

----------------------------------------

We’d been walking for a while. The sun was ready to set and temperatures were going down.

I felt wise having had the sense to steal the overcoat. The clothing I had been left after my capture were only a light layer of protection, just not to offend the Vizier’s sight.

The pixie made me sweat cold several times, when it disappeared to look for directions. Only to return later with a grinning face and energetic fluttering.

Occasionally, the demon girl murmured things to herself in her sibilating demon tongue. Nothing I could make sense of. She was keeping the pace well.

The one having trouble keeping pace was me. My legs were a bit out of shape and I still couldn’t use mana. To add on that, every now and then the curse would send a debilitating jolt across my spirit, which sometimes stopped me dead in my tracks for a while.

These attacks, while still paced apart, were happening with increasing frequency, I thought grimly.

I didn’t feel good. I think I was also running a fever, but with the cold air it was hard to tell.

The lack of light forced us to camp. We found a rock formation near a river that offered an alcove for us to take shelter in.

I set to collect branches to set up a fire. I doubted anyone knew where we were, so I deemed the danger of our fire smoke being seen lesser than being devoured by wild beasts.

When I tried to lighten the fire, I found out how hard was to do so without magic.

The demon girl looked at first puzzled as to what I was trying to do, but then understood and showed off she could light up a fire.

I wish I had asked her before going through all the trouble of trying and failing like a dumbass.

I missed my magic. I missed my ring, which would have adjusted my body temperature automatically.

I missed my room in the inn. And I missed my friends.

The pixie had been chatty all the time, jumping left and right, chirping, pounding my poor mind with a shower of concepts and images.

So fast I was having an hard time following, I got the same vibe of watching someone skip game dialogues while I was trying to read them. He was giving me a greater headache than I already had.

That night I dared not sleep, following Violet’s approach of resting awake. Twice I endured the curse acting up.

Thankfully, the pixie had the sense to shut up and take a nap.

I bet Feras was seething. And yes, my brain had definitely not been working proper since my captivity, though I wasn’t sure if now with the curse and sickness I was any better.

I let the girl have the biggest share of the overcoat, which we were using as a blanket. The pixie slept on my head.

At that moment, I realized how glad I was of not being alone.

----------------------------------------

The next morning we resumed our march. I hoped that the pixie wasn’t just pretending to know where he was leading us. I still wasn’t sure if he was a it, a he or a she. He looked and acted boyish, so I settle for ‘he’. He didn’t seem to have any genitalia.

But maybe he’s got a cloaca. What even is a cloaca. I never bothered to search. It could have been important right now. Or not.

The demon girl was named Sonetzi, though I was not sure how many S were in the initial. When I asked the pixie for his, he didn’t offer any name but a puzzling disconnected sequence of concepts.

I was starting having second thoughts about putting my life in the hands of spirits of Nature. Alher, the Goddess of Nature, hadn’t been left with a good impression about me. Quite the opposite, actually.

Was I making a mistake?

We were starting to hunger. I picked up a few berries I recognized from having seen in Valarest’s market, but it was no proper sustenance.

Animals had been steering clear from us. And I didn’t know enough of herbs or fungi to discern the edibles ones.

I asked myself just how far the portal was from the damn Fae. The Vizier had to have flown, for this trek was getting longer than expected.

The little demon girl’s stomach rumbled as well, but she looked determined to keep going.

The pixie was inquiring about how I had gotten myself into this mess.

He was so damn overeager, already pushing impatiently for the next thought even before I finished conveying one.

I finished with a, want me to say all that again?

By habit and impatience he urged me so, falling into my trap. And I started again.

At first he looked confused then, amused. We both laughed out loud.

The demon girl looked at us puzzled, with her yellow reptilian eyes framed by black sclera.

It was then I decided a nickname for the little pixie.

「Allen: I’ll call you Skip.」

I announced, grinning.

The little spirit stared at me stared at me with his mouth open. Then he showered me with a feel of pride, happiness, winning.

It’s just a nickname, bruh. I didn’t understand his frantic enthusiasm.

I had grown tired of calling him “pixie”. And how would I call upon him later, if we met more of his kind?

「Skip: Skip. Skip!」

He chirped in his high pitched voice. I surmised he had liked the name.

After torturing us for a quarter hour by repeating his name with different intonations, he disappeared again.

I and the demon girl sat down and waited. By then we had gotten used to the pixie’s scouting disappearances.

We were still waiting in silence, sitting between two big trees, when we heard a hurried rustling of leaves.

The sound had been masked by a nearby stream. We tensed, holding our breath.

A predator would approach more silently, I thought.

Two humans appeared from the foliage. An archer and a fighter brandishing a sword. They were as surprised of us as we were of them.

Allies! I told myself.

I opened my mouth to greet them but I was drowned by their shouts.

「Fighter: Demon!」

The fighter ran at me, unsheathing his sword. What the fuck?

「Allen: Stop! I’m human!」

I yelled, scrambling upward. The demon girl scampered behind a tree.

「Fighter: Your poor disguise betrays you!」

What was this retard spouting? Just because I was in the company of a little demon girl?

「Allen: Wait-」

He closed the distance incredibly fast, reminding me of Namrick. I was unarmed and ill, but the situation was so similar to the fights I had dreamed against my friend Namrick, that without thinking I moved forward making him botch the timing for the swing.

I punched him sloppily at the face. I had wanted to make him reason.

His head exploded into gore, instead.

A bit of exposed spine from his severed neck hit my chin by pure momentum, jutting a spray of blood to my face the moment later.

What the fuck?!

I sputtered in shock, blinking away the blood in frozen confusion as his corpse slid down before my feet.

WHAT THE FUCK?!?!

[https://ashaiel.netlify.app/ch102_onepunch.jpg]

It was all so unexpected I forgot to swear out loud.

The archer behind him, looked shocked as well. He took a few steps back, getting his bow in hand, but realizing his quiver was empty he decided to run instead.

「Archer: Demons! Help me!」

His voice echoed in the forest.

The curse chose that moment to hit me hard. I fell at my knees, trying to fight the pain.

What the fuck was these guys problem?! How the fuck did I punch his head off?

I felt angry that fellow humans, who are allegedly capable of higher intellect would not only fail to save me, the main dude who finished off the Demon Lord, but even go as far as calling me a demon without even having the decency to stop and FUCKING LISTEN.

Fuck’em, I thought. I decided I did not feel sorry at all for decapitating that guy.

A blur in my periphery, and something touching my shoulder. Danger! Impressions of humans flashed in my mind.

I grunted pointing at the corpse before me. The pixie had been so frantic he failed to take in the scene.

「Skip: Ah.」

It was the first time the pixie had vocalized something understandable. Surprise was easily expressed in all tongues.

But the pixie had added one important detail. There were a lot of humans in the proximity. If they shared the same mental deficiency as these two guys, I was fucked. And knowing my luck I had no doubts on what to expect.

God… give me a fucking breath, I thought feeling drained out.

Where was Sone-

The spiritual pain overwhelmed me, and I passed out.