You know, this is a little worse then I expected. Though, from what I was told before doing it. Not as bad as it could've been.
Once Leo had classed up his first choice was to immediately get out of dodge. He didn't particularly enjoy having to follow the orders of his betters, which was only emphasized by his new aspect. Pride. Pretty simple to explain what exactly it did. Increased self confidence, like, a lot. That was the pro and the con. So of course, leaving the city was his top priority.
He'd been warned of the dangers by some of the demons who at least seemed to have... Not terrible interests for him in mind, but he just wanted to leave. Leave he did, leading him to his current predicament. Leo laid on the ground, slowly bleeding out in the aftermath of a fight that he'd just barely survived. A particularly nasty creature that he'd learned of before leaving, a little something called a "distortion beast".
Leo breathed in, then he breathed out. He knew what he had to do if he wanted to live. High, Flame, Area, Palm. Oh god this is gonna suck, alright, count yourself down. On three, one... Two... Three-"RRGhhh!"
Leo fought the urge to scream in pain as he held the flame to his torso, cauterizing the terrible gashes in his side. His other fist clenched in an effort to take his mind off the pain, squeezing so hard that his tanned skin turned into a raw white. Tears began to stream down his face as the heat died away and his fist unclenched, not tears of sadness mind you, no, this had been what he'd asked for. GOD does this hurt though. Damn monsters..
Leo shook his hand out, getting blood flowing through it again. He took a quick glance at the cauterized wound before judging it as sufficiently recovered, then pulled his hideskin shirt back down, with leather armor following suit. No, suits did not count as protective material, as much as some demons would seem to love the idea. While Leo could've left without armor it wouldn't have been a good idea, and he probably would've been dead just about now if he had done so.
Distortion beast, guess I should've taken the warnings on the quick briefing I'd gotten a bit more seriously. Holy hell that still stings, he thought to himself as he shifted around slowly. Jeeze, it was only a lesser as well? The grown ones have gotta be a pain in the ass. But, eh, I'd manage to pull through somehow. I'm me, after all.
In truth, that was probably the pride speaking. The lesser distortion beast had already been a fight he'd barely managed to escape from. They were apex predators on the third layer, which was where he'd been sent to after he requested to leave the city by the way. The excuse he used to be let out was that he wanted to go support the fourth layers allies by culling parts of prospective monster hordes. Argos knew better, but he didn't really care either.
Back to the distortion beast however, it was a sleek and powerful beast of a monster. having high base stats with flame and light magic proficiency inbuilt into the species. The only limiting factor to the terrifying predators being their lack of spawning from mana veins. They could only naturally reproduce, which heavily limited their presence in fluxes. Mercifully so, if there were hordes of them Leo had no doubt that they could probably take over the world with enough time and intelligence.
Leo as previously stated, was unfortunate enough to run into one of these monsters. It was a fierce battle, a battle isn't quite right actually. It was an assault, a fierce assault. Leo had been caught unawares by the distortion beast at first and took the nasty wound that he had just cauterized right off the bat. It had managed to sneak up on him with the tactic that they were named after. Light distortions, hiding it from the naked eye utterly. With a blast of fire he had managed to scare the beast off a bit, but it had continued it's hunt regardless.
Right when Leo thought he saw god himself from the lack of blood, he turned the corner right into a horde of Wildahis, odd boar like things that were distinctively aggressive. Turning their focus onto one thing that came into their view. Luckily, they were quite individually weak, making up for it in their sheer aggression and numbers. Which fortunately, was absolutely perfect for Leo.
For the first time, Leo got to use his skill "Air of menace". And, oh boy, it was certainly a rush of power. It was a rare skill that very few imps were born with, although it could be learned by some more physical focused classes that demons turned into later. But back to the skill itself, it projected exactly what it said it did. An Air of menace. Normally, this wouldn't work very well and it's why he hadn't used it until then. Because Air of menace compares your stats to your targets, and attempts to frighten them based on the difference.
Pack monsters, terrifying may they be, are generally lower level creatures because of the spread experience from their kills. Their strength is in quantity, not quality. So Air of menace just so happened to be the perfect skill here. It's not wrong to say that it was, literally, life saving. When it was activated, a fair majority of the Wildahis had immediately tried to turn away from Leo and run, but those who stayed unintimidated had reeled them in. Shortly after, the seeming leaders attempted to force their horde to attack. But instead of going after Leo, once they caught sight of the Distortion beast, switched targets to it instead. Leading an entire horde of Wildahis onto it.
In the confusion and chaos, Leo who had still been projecting Air of menace, which had begun taking quite the toll on his capacity stat as it used mana to work properly. Slipped away and after making a good amount of distance slumped to the ground, before cauterizing the wound.
Level up!
+1 strength, +2 dexterity, +2 constitution, +4 wisdom, +5 capacity, +4 intelligence, +2 charisma, +3 manipulation.
You know what? If there's one positive to this shitstorm, it's that. Magic in high stakes situations! More experience for me. Leo hadn't effectively run away JUST to get away from Argos. No, he wasn't an idiot, not enough of one to give up on getting experience and leveling just to get away from something he didn't like. His new class, mage imp, leveled up by using magic. He could level up just fine by casting in the city for awhile, though he'd still have to work for Argos. But no, the real way to power level was this. His class gained MUCH more experience if he was casting during high stakes scenarios. Thus, that was what he chose.
Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
Hah, alright. What's my information look like now? Status.
Leo, Demon.
Level 13
Strength 11
Dexterity 26
Constitution 27
Wisdom 38
Capacity 71
Intelligence 53
Charisma 29
Manipulation 71
Abilities, Riftwalker, Demonic obsession:Pride.
Alright, only the best for me, hah! I'll be able to take something like that distortion beast in no time. Did my magic skills level up yet? Class.
Leo, Lesser Mage Imp
Level 4
Class skills, Low magic proficiency II, Low Fire magic proficiency I, Air of menace.
Skills,
Stat gain, +1 strength, +2 dexterity, +2 constitution, +4 wisdom, +5 capacity, +4 intelligence, +2 charisma, +3 manipulation
Proficiency up, but no fire magic upgrade... I do need that upgraded pretty soon, the extra runes should be pretty helpful. Especially for dealing with stronger monsters. I could take a distortion beast if it didn't get the jump on me, a lesser one anyways, but I'm not sure about monsters that are just simply higher level then me. Fire gets some utility at higher proficiency, or so I've been told, so it could be helpful for fights like that. Alright, time to get up. "Hup!"
Leo huffed a bit as he pulled himself to his feet, the cauterized flesh in his side still hurt like a bitch but he could deal with it for now. The demon city of the third wasn't too far away anyways. If things got really dire, he was sure they wouldn't just turn him away, that'd be like declaring they no longer cared about their alliance. Especially since he was the imp of a great demon. Respect and honor were surprisingly fairly common place among demons. Well, maybe it wasn't to surprising.
Honestly? "demon" is such a negative thing to call ourselves, we're really just people ruled by desire... Well, ok, maybe demon isn't too much of a stretch. But we're really not demons in the way that you'd think of a demon, you know? We're surprisingly reasonable creatures and we've got a pretty distinct culture. Sure we can be nasty depending on our aspects, but a fair amount of us are fairly... Chill. I mean it doesn't really matter, who's gonna be down here to judge us anyways? Certainly not any humans during these rapid fire fluxes.
Leo conjured up two runes that he had manually learned, not ones from a proficiency skill, but manual work. He was told it was something of a worthless venture, as you could probably end up leveling up and getting the skill faster that way then learning one manually. But he actually managed to pick them up within a week, so that point was effectively moot. Though... With the way that he advanced, it wouldn't have mattered anyways.
"So, why should I not pick this 'EGO class' when it's such an obviously better choice?"
"I'M GOING TO TAKE A GUESS, LITTLE IMP, AND ASK YOU THIS QUESTION. DOES THE DESCRIPTION OF THAT CLASS HAVE SOMETHING TO DO WITH FREEDOM?"
"...Yes. Unchained Imp, with a freedom aspect. 'a class born of your desire to be free of that which binds you'. Why, what does it matter?"
"IT IS ONLY NATURAL TO THINK THAT YOU SHOULD TAKE THE OPTION, I SUPPOSE. BUT TAKE A MOMENT TO CONSIDER WHAT YOU'VE LEARNED OF EGO CLASSES. THEY ARE BUILT OFF YOUR DESIRES AND MOTIVATION. YET, IF ONE WERE TO LOSE THAT WHICH DRIVES THEM. WHAT DO YOU THINK WOULD HAPPEN TO THAT INDIVIDUAL?"
"Then... Their class would get weaker?"
"NOT QUITE, BUT NOT FAR OFF EITHER. IT WOULD COMPLETELY STUNT THE GROWTH OF THE INDIVIDUAL WHO TOOK THAT CLASS UNTIL THEY FIND A NEW PASSION OF EQUAL OR HIGHER DESIRE. I ALREADY KNOW YOU DESIRE TO BE FREE OF ME WHELP, YET IT IS BUT A FLEETING DESIRE. ONCE YOU ARE OUT ON YOUR OWN, WHAT THEN? THE DESIRE THAT DROVE YOU OUT DRIVE YOU INTO YOUR GRAVE ALL THE SAME FOOLISH IMP. YOU WOULD DO WELL TO PICK SOMETHING ELSE UNTIL YOU FIND WHAT YOU TRULY WANT."
Leo did have the option to pick an EGO class, but as was pointed out to him, the desire that had opened that path up to him in the first place was a weak one. Once he left the city, what then? What freedom would he seek that he did not already have? It was better to wait until he found something that he really wanted, something he could pursue with all his heart. Then to pick an option that he only somewhat cared about which would screw him over in the long run.
So in the end, he had picked his current class, Mage Imp, instead of the prospective Unbound Imp. This had lead to him not having any skill points to use, but it wasn't all bad. Magic proficiency skills and upgrades to skills both costed skill points, especially the proficiencies. So he probably got more out of it skills wise then the EGO class would've given him. He may have ended up being a little weaker in the short term, but eventually, as long as he found something that gave him a purpose. He'd be better for it.
Leo had finished projecting one of the two runes that he'd learned, "Spatial, Pocket." Which, was a pretty self explanatory name. He plucked out a canteen of water, took a long drink of it (gotta stay hydrated, especially after losing that much blood.) and then chucked it back into the spatial pocket. It was small, very small. Literally only enough to hold like a square foot of items. But it served it's purpose well enough.
Now, I'm going to find that purpose for myself. I had to leave that city, I couldn't bare to be ordered around for a second longer. I got reincarnated into a new world? Busy body in the old one, and I'm not repeating it again. I will not be some secretary for some figure above me, regardless of if they're in the flesh or not. I will be my own person, I will find, me. So, shall I get going? Monsters aren't gonna clear themselves out, and magic won't level up all on it's own.