In the small sheepherding town of Panecasa, a [Builder] was pacing anxiously outside the stables. He and his fiancée had been settling in their [Donkey], when she collapsed, grasping her abdomen in extreme pain, her tail wrapping around her protectively, her red skin darkening with perspiration and the flush of blood. He had rushed back into the inn, grabbed three [Mages] and dragged them out to the stable. They immediately took to inspecting the health of their patient and promptly kicked the hovering man out. That was ten minutes ago, and each passing second was sheer agony to the man.
Finally, the tallest of the three—he hadn’t caught their names—came out. “My fiancée!” Yesuf the [Builder] cried. “How is she?”
“Peace, peace,” the [Mage] soothed. “She is fine. Incoherent, a little undernourished, but fine. Likely just some cramps from the baby. Tell me, how long has your fiancée been pregnant?”
“Pregnant?” Yesuf was puzzled. “She’s not pregnant. We have a sacred vow of chastity before our marriage in the spring to come.”
“Oh,” the [Mage] smirked at the man’s obvious cognitive dissonance. “And the swelling of her stomach was, what? Just her getting a little fat?”
“Her stomach is swelling?!” Yesuf cried in even greater alarm, “Why aren’t you treating that?!”
“Well, that is the normal course of pregnancy. How would you suggest we treat that?”
“She’s. Not. Pregnant!” the [Builder] screeched.
“Olaf!” another [Mage] called out, popping his head out the stables. “I think we have an instance of a virginal birth.”
Olaf scratched the base of his horn with a fingernail and muttered under his breath, “Who would have thought that a pervert who developed [Detect Virgin] would find a practical use for it.” Then addressing the other mage, “Well I hope you brought a gift. These things don’t exactly happen every day. We should check the recordhalls for any prophecies that may be relevant.”
“…Gold work?”
“That should be fine,” Olaf affirmed.
Suddenly the stables exploded, throwing Olaf and Yesuf to the ground. As Olaf scrambled off the ground to look, he saw his colleague had been thrown several meters and was sporting some nasty shrapnel wounds. The building itself had been torn asunder and large parts of it were now on fire, the temperature rapidly increasing from the hay and dried timber, urging Olaf to retreat from the heat.
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Olaf squinted into the fire as it crackled and snapped. Ballie was likely dead, as were the mother and child. Though what could have caused the explosion? Unsecured alchemical products perhaps?
Then, out of the flames crawled another figure. It seemed unaffected by the flames, but moved awkwardly, like a puppet on strings. And then it started floating a foot off the ground, but ragdolled. It glanced up at him, its face contorted in an expression of rage. Where had this man come from? Olaf wondered idly.
Suddenly, a lance of mana struck out at Olaf, who just barely managed to divert it with a [Mage’s Shield]. He was contemplating returning fire, when another three lances all struck the shield at once, two deflecting, but one punching through to burn his shoulder.
Battle instincts fully kicking in by now, Olaf threw up another shield as he started rapid casting [Mana Bolts] at the fiend. The spells were less to do any damage than they were to distract and delay while Olaf tested who and what this figure was.
A fairly decent mage from the look of it. And likely with very high fire and temperature resistance. So why is it just throwing raw mana?
Olaf and the devil continued to exchange fire as a swarm of adventures came rushing out the inn and from further into town. A few archers and slingers let loose their own projectiles, while a few speed melee builds rushed forwards, daggers and short swords drawn. Other mages threw up defense shields and otherwise prepared various buffing magics for the melee fighters to get in and kill the rogue mage.
No sooner had Olaf felt relief at backup arriving than the first melee fighter reached the figure and swung his mace. To everyone’s surprise, not only did the fiend not attempt to dodge, the mace tore through the fiend’s torso like wet paper, spraying blood and flesh across several meters of the battleground. The creature crumpled to the ground like a puppet whose strings were cut and laid there unmoving.
The mace-wielder gingerly crept closer and poked it with his armored toe. Then, he turned to address the crowd, several of who were also looking at their notifications for their contributions to the fight.
“It was a level zero [Demonkin]?”
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> Name: Demonkin #15 (L0)
>
> Race: [Demonkin] (R) (L0)
> Class:
> Unspent XP: 666,590
>
> HP: 0/6,039 (1,428 / hour)
> MP: 0/12,056 (1,162 / hour)
>
> CON: 19
> STR: 19
> DEX: 19
> INT: 64
> WIS: 64
> CHA: 19
> Free: 0
> v.1.21