Bryson found himself only able to stare at what used to be human. The hairs on his neck stood up as he stared at the creature in front of him. This thing was in a completely different league from the demon he had encountered before and the grin the demon had plastered on his face made Bryson sick.

“What are you?” Bryson finally uttered as a tense silence now filled the room. He noticed Kristel move up next to him.

“What do you think I am?” The demon said with a laugh his yellow eyes glowed as he did so, “So Lord Bryson, I am here to end your story.” He said as he snapped his fingers.

A torrent of flames erupted from him and filled the room. Instinctively Bryson put up a barrier to protect himself and Kristel, it did its job of stopping them from getting burned, but even then, the power from the attack sent the two crashing into the wall. Bryson winced as he felt the barrier, it was the first time that had happened before.

The first thing Bryson did once he shook off the pain was look for Florence. Thankfully though it had hit her natural resilience allowed her to ignore the flames, though with the lack of a proper barrier protecting her, she looked much more shaken than Bryson and Kristel.

Still she was better off than the others that had the misfortune of being in the room when the possessed man had attacked. Their now heavily charred corpses lay lifeless across the walls.

“Quick on your feet.” The demon commented as he raised a finger a crooked finger at him, “But not quick enough.”

As a small red ball began to form on the tip of his finger a knife came flying across the room and struck the demon right where his heart would be. The glowing red marble sputtered out as the demon looked down at the blade that had been inserted into him perplexed.

Half a breath later Lottie came from nowhere and leapt atop the demon embedding her other knife into the neck of the demon. At the same time she quickly pulled her other knife out and moved to stab it back into his skull before she was sent careening across the floor as the demon nonchalantly threw her off.

“That hurt brat.” The demon spat as it checked its wound, just as he turned his attention towards her. Only for Kristel to have recovered enough and move in and begin to strike at him.

“Tsk.” The demon clicked his tongue in annoyance as his body was getting further damaged. He bolted forward and grasped Kristel’s blade with his bare hand.

Kristel tried to pull her sword free to no avail as the demon tightened his grip on the blade, blood dripping on it. The demon then grinned as the blood that dripped onto the blade began to pour down it right to the hilt.

In a flash the blood ignited itself and Kristel was blown backwards, crying out in pain. She lay there writhing in pain as her palms were suffering from burns.

“Kristel!” Bryson shouted as he blasted the demon with a wave of mana sending him flying straight back into the wall behind him with a grunt. With a pulling gesture, he dragged Kristel back next to him as if she were tied by an invisible string.

Florence took no hesitation as she blasted her firearm into the demon at full power. A loud boom echoed through the room ringing the ears of everyone. The shockwave sent everything flying as a very deep crater now appeared in the wall.

“It’s still there.” Bryson whispered in disbelief staring down the newly formed tunnel. He couldn’t see in the darkness but he could feel the demon’s presence still.

Without another word Florence fired another shot down the tunnel and the room rumbled from the impact. Then another and then another. Each shot easily able to turn a normal man into a fine red mist. Yet Bryson could tell that the demon stood strong. As she prepared to fire a fourth shot something flew out of the hole and struck her in the midsection before she could react.

Bryson’s eyes widened in horror as he saw that jagged-looking javelin had pierced her midsection. Florence’s usually calm demeanour changed to silent shock as she crumpled to the floor one hand clutching at her gun and the other holding the protrusion.

“Florence!” Lottie shouted in panic as she ran over to Florence.

“Are you okay?” Kristel asked sounding scared as she ran over.

“I’m okay.” Florence said quietly, “Need my bag.”

Bryson quickly ran over and handed her medical equipment. Saying nothing as he stared at Florence in worry. With a grimace, Florence dug out a patch of medicine infused bandage as she looked down at the javelin and studied where it hit her.

This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.

“Missed my vitals, I’m alright.” Florence said looking up at Bryson momentarily before concentrating back on her wound. With a silent grimace she twisted and pulled the javelin out of her and quickly covered the wound with the bandage.

With a pained exhale closed her eyes to take a moment to collect herself. Their focus on the wounded Florence ceased when they heard something emerging from the hole.

Pulling himself out was the demon, now severely battered and covered with wounds. His hair now singed into a few tuffs that clung loosely on his torn-up scalp. His breath is ragged and he seemed visibly in pain, but more frighteningly was how angry he looked.

“You know… I’ll admit, I underestimated you. But that was a very stupid way to ask for me to kill you first.” He seethed as he extended out his hand.

Kristel rushed forward blade in hand and he redirected his fire at Kristel. She deftly dodged the plume of flame and slashed the thigh of the demon. Lottie moved in next and struck at his other side, neither were able to keep up their attack as very quickly the demon halted them.

Starting first with Kristel a power strike with a now very mangled hand collided with her, blade still out to defend herself. The sharp blade being completely ignored as he rammed his hand past it and into Kristel.

The force of the impact sent her smashing into the wall. But that left Lottie an opening, whipping behind him one slash across the Achilles tendon sent the demon down to one knee, the other went for his spine looking to paralyze the body of the demon. Before she was able to sink in the second blade the demon’s other hand shot out and grabbed her by the throat.

Lifting her in the air his hand glowed red as it began to heat up and Lottie gave a strangled scream of pain. She quickly stabbed her knives into his arms and while the demon winced in pain he refused to let go.

“Toys aren’t going to save you.” He taunted.

“Let her go.” Bryson said, his voice dropping low and cold.

“Aww, trying to play hero huh? How cute-” The demon’s sickly grin paused when he saw Bryson, he looked weird. His eyes were glowing, more than that his iris and pupil were gone, only the whites of his eyes remained, pure white.

Bryson lifted a hand up and the demon found himself uncurling his grip and letting Lottie drop. Lottie now free hit the floor in a coughing fit as the demon turned his attention to Bryson.

“You’re new.” He said with a chuckle, “Lord Szargosh intel was good. He said you had funny powers.”

Bryson said nothing as he began to walk forward and blue chains appeared in his hands. The only thing going through his head right now was to defeat this monster and make him pay for what he did.

These chains, he knows that they can stop them. He remembered, them being used on something similar before. He remembered that it was him that did it to that thing all those years back. Though it wasn’t a subconscious thing he was sure that he could do it.

“Interesting.” The demon said as he took a step backwards. Despite his horribly disfigured face the demon had enough facial muscles to express emotions still. On his face was a mixture of fear and more disturbingly excitement.

“You don’t know how to use that thing do you?” The demon said continuing to back away. In an instant the demon tried to blast Bryson with more fire only to find his spell had been countered. By Bryson.

With a look of frustration he tried again only for it to fail again, “Alright.” The demon snarled realizing that with the damage he had taken he was not going to be able to outdraw Bryson when it came to slinging spells.

“Let’s play this game. You think you have what it takes kid?” The demon taunted as Bryson wrapped the chains around him.

“I’m going to send you into a world of misery and pain.” Bryson growled out as the darkness began to envelope the two of them.

As Bryson concentrated he felt a terrible migraine start to occur. Gritting his teeth he kept focus and watched as the demon began to disappear.

“You don’t know do you?” The demon gave a nervous chuckle, “You mess up, you wind up getting consumed by the void, not me. You better know what you're doing.” He cackled as he noticed Bryson’s uncertainty as this duel continued.

Bryson’s breath started to become ragged as the pain began to increase. Then he felt himself begin to sink into the now inky black floor.

“Look out, you’re losing it.” The demon grinned as he noticed Bryson’s slow descent into the abyss as well.

“Would you shut up!” Bryson hissed out through clenched teeth. He was scared. He felt himself sinking down into the depths of gods knows where. He remembered vividly the panic and fear when that thing was dragged down here in the past.

If that monster was scared and this demon was scared, what lay in wait for him? Bryson wanted to run, he wanted to leave, be back home, be safe. He felt himself sinking deeper, he heard the demon laugh in victory. His head threatened to explode.

No. No. Bryson thought. No complaining. Not right now. There were other people waiting for him. More than that he needed to shut this stupid demon up. He was Bryson Coldwater and he was not going to disappear because of some idiotic demon who goes around begging for people to worship him by getting dumb tattoos.

Bryson steeled his resolve and the atmosphere changed. The demon no longer senses Bryson’s fear. Bryson didn’t even seem that bothered by his headache he seemed angry. The chains around the demon tightened and he felt himself begin to sink faster.

Bryson found himself no longer sunk into the ground and he made his way over to the demon and stood right before him. Now sunken down to the height of Bryson’s chest the demon could only look up at him in awe as he realized what was about to happen.

“You aren’t anything. What gave you the gall to try me?” Bryson said leaning in, his voice getting extraordinarily deep and echoey. Magic extruded Bryson as he placed a palm over his head, “Acknowledge your better.”

With that the demon could only scream out in panic as he completely submerged into the floor and vanished. A second later Bryson found himself returning back to the room prior to the darkness. Eyes glowing bright white as he turned to look at his friends, who looked at him wide-eyed in shock.

He opened his mouth to speak before coughing up blood and feeling really woozy. Shutting his eyes he fell to the floor and felt darkness consume him.