Qing twirled the glaive as he paced back and forth, glancing between the Alchemancer, the surrounding demon horde, and the massive alchemical vat.

Acrid fumes wafted from it, and together with the creaking of the twisted organic machinery, Qing just wanted out.

Give my blood to this... thing? Are you fucking kidding me? But if I don't... No, there's gotta be another way. Think, Qing, think! Maybe I can outsmart it. Yeah, that's it. Buy some time, look for a weakness. It's not like I haven't faced worse, right?

He gave a fake smile to the Alchemancer, its grotesque form looming over him, smiling back.

The horde of lesser demons circling them glared at Qing with hungry eyes.

Ah, who am I kidding? This is bad. Really bad. The demons, maybe I can take them, but the Alchemancer? It's level is way higher than mine. I can't even tell what it is. What's the point of every instinct telling me to run when I know I can't. I have to shut of the energy drain.

"Well?" the Alchemancer asked.

"I'm thinking," Qing said, holding up a finger.

"And your friends are dying. Just something to keep in mind… friend."

Fuck, fuck, fuck!

"Thank you for that. Its just that I've never made a blood deal with a demon before."

"A demon lord."

"Thanks a lot. That is helpful."

Ok. So if I can't defeat it. What's the harm in just giving it what it wants? I've faced worse than a needle. Worst case, I get bound here in hell forever, the devil is freed and destroys Elrydisan, my friends are captured and tortured to death, and Earth is either cleansed of all life or someone like Blaine takes it over. Best case, I doom another world.

He sighed.

But, maybe... what if I have him shut off the energy, buy myself some time, and I’ll strike when he least expects it. Even if I can't kill it, I'll see how it shuts of the energy and then knock out enough of the cavern that it won’t get it back online before we rescue Cleo and get out.

Qing turned and smiled. "Ok. Let's do it."

"Brilliant! I knew you'd-"

"On one condition." Qing squared his shoulders. "I'll give you my blood, but I want to watch you use it. All of it, with nothing remaining. And you pause the demon production now, halting the drain."

The creature's handsome features twisted into a mixture of surprise and suspicion, its plump lips pursing as it considered Qing's counter-offer.

"You wish to... watch?" the Alchemancer asked.

Qing nodded, maintaining his composure despite the churning in his gut. "That's right. I want to see exactly what you do with my blood. No tricks, no hidden vials. And the energy drain stops now."

The Alchemancer's eyes narrowed.

Qing prepared for a fight. Maybe the demon would refuse, and it'd try to take his blood by force.

But the alchemancer splayed its many arms wide and grinned.

"Wonderful, Champion. An audience. How unique. No-one have watched me work my art for so long."

With a theatrical flourish, the Alchemancer snapped its fingers. The effect was instantaneous and unsettling. The constant thrumming of machinery, the bubbling of viscous fluids, and the distant screams of tormented souls, all ceased in an instant.

The sudden silence was deafening. Qing's ears rang in the absence of the cacophony he'd grown accustomed to. The stillness felt unnatural, wrong somehow.

The quietude seemed to amplify every small sound - the shift of Qing's feet, the rustle of the Alchemancer's robes, the faint drip of some unknown liquid in the distance.

"Eh… wonderful?" Qing said, unease creeping up his spine as he realised the full weight of what he'd done. He'd silenced a portion of Hell itself, if only temporarily. The implications were staggering, and he couldn't shake the feeling that he'd set something irreversible in motion.

"With that done," the Alchemancer said, raising its eyebrows and smiling, lifting the vial and the needle, wagging them in the air.

"Oh, yes, of course. Throw them here and I'll pull it out. You get started on your… art, and I will hand you the blood when needed."

"Excellent," the demon said, tossing them over.

Why does this feel too simple?

"Not to shoot myself in the foot, but, you seem far to calm about this," Qing said.

"Oh, I am far from calm," the demon said as he hurried through the cave, Qing in tow, demonic horde splitting for them like Moses and the sea. "This is the most agitated I have been in five centuries! While I could have taken the blood by force, I am unsure whether it would work. Blood given freely has a completely different power."

Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

"Not afraid I'd kill you?"

"Kill me?" The monster turned and looked at him incredulously. "How ever would you have managed such a thing?"

Qing couldn't help himself, and he shifted a bit uncomfortably. "Not to rub salt in wounds, but you aren't exactly the first elite demon I'd have slain."

The Alchemancer smiled like a teacher when a favourite student sets up the perfect teaching moment. "That is so cute," the demon said. "As a gift to cement our friendship, let me show you a fraction of my power."

Before Qing could reply…

Before Qing could reply, reality itself seemed to warp around the Alchemancer. The demon's form shimmered, splitting into a dozen identical copies that surrounded Qing in an instant. Each version spoke in perfect unison, their voices resonating with otherworldly power.

"You speak of slaying elite demons, Champion?" they said, their tone amused yet menacing. "Allow me to educate you on true power."

With a casual wave of its hand, the Alchemancer suspended Qing in mid-air, the complete opposite of a level-up. Qing felt his very atoms being pulled apart and reassembled. Pain beyond anything he had ever experienced coursed through him, only to vanish a heartbeat later, leaving him whole but shaken.

"With my abilities, I could remove your soul and rewrite you on a molecular level. Turn you into anything. Would you like horns? A forth arm? A spider's ability to lay eggs?" the demon continued, its multiple forms converging back into one. "Or maybe you'd like to experience a millennia as a mountain of flesh or a sea of screaming souls…."

The Alchemancer snapped its fingers, and the world around them changed.

"But such crude displays are beneath me. Gaze instead upon my creation."

They stood atop a massive spire overlooking an infinite hellscape. It was completely flat, like a part of a server where the devs hadn't put any assets. As far as his eye could see, it was all black ground, and on top stood an army of demons. They bowed in unison to the Alchemancer.

"For five hundred years I have stockpiled troops for my…'lord', preparing for the invasion of Elrydisan. But, what is the fun. We have done it before, so many times. No. Your blood, freely given, offers far more intriguing possibilities."

It snapped its fingers, and they returned to the cave. "Your blood, friend, is a key to unlock potentials you cannot begin to fathom. It will be fun!"

Qing struggled to find his voice, his mind reeling from what he'd just experienced. "I... I understand," was all he managed.

The Alchemancer smiled, its perfect features radiating a perverse beauty "Excellent. Shall we proceed, then?"

Qing stumbled, his legs weak. He realised with growing dread that he had catastrophically underestimated the Alchemancer. Whatever plans he had were useless now. He needed a new strategy, and fast.

* * *

Qing swallowed as he stared at the ritualistic circle the Alchemancer had expertly prepared over the last two hours, all while keeping up a running commentary about interdimensional travel. It turned out this was no new dream for the demon, but a lifelong obsession to escape Hell. And Qing couldn’t fault him for it. Hell was not the place you wanted to be stuck, even as a lord.

“So, how exactly do you know where you’ll come out with this ritual?”

“That is easy, friend. I know where we are and I know where I want to go. All that is required is to make a tunnel to bridge the gap, and, as your central countries say, voila.”

“How would you even know that?”

“My eyes see across dimensions. Earth and Elrydisan are nearly overlapping, separated by a thin slice of reality.” It held up a hand, forestalling my objection. “Though worry not, this portal will not lead to your Earth. With a near infinite realities, there are so many to wonderful places to chose from.”

That must be how Seraphina the angel managed to send me home for a moment. And why Quaxinor’ay isekais us so easily. And…

Qing realised he had missed its next statement. “Sorry, what was that?”

“I said, my army will enjoy conquering these new worlds,” the Alchemancer said, one of its arms ending in a pickaxe carving a symbol into the ground while two other arms held up a book with notes in.”

“Oh. Yes. Wait, what? Army?”

“Yes, of course. You met them just a few hours ago? No point leaving home without bringing my family. They have waited so patiently. And as they say, home is where your overwhelming force of murder-happy demons lay the decapitated heads of their enemies to rest.”

Qing scratched at his forehead. “Oh yes. That is a normal thing to say.”

How am I supposed to stop it? The damn demon will crush me like a bug, but I can’t send a demon lord into the universe with an unstoppable force of undead. I’ll be dooming worlds, or if not universes. Think, god damnit, think!

“Now would be a good time for you to draw the blood,” the Alchemancer said, magical energy swirling along the ritualistic circle.

Qing looked around. Maybe he could blink fast enough, but, no. He wouldn’t make it out. He’d seen the demon’s true speed. So he lined up the needly, and gently pushes, pressing the tip through the flesh of his arm, wiggling around until he found a vein.

Suddenly, the Alchemancer was there, looming over him, its demeanour completely changed. The demon’s eight arms surrounded him, nearly, but not quite, touching him. It moaned deep in its throat. “Devil, yes. Pull that sweet innocent liquid out. Untainted, yet so potent.” As the demon shivered, it was all Qing could do not to flinch away.

The vial neared full, the red liquid swirling around, and Qing pulled the needly out and cast Healing Breeze on himself.

With a snap, the demon removed the vial from Qing’s hands and held it to its chest, dancing around the diagram. “Finally! After all this time I will flee! My children, we will be free! See how your trust was correctly placed in me!”

Qing held up a finger, but before he could say a word, the Alchemancer crushed the vial between his hands. But before the blood dripped to the floor, magic swirled from the demons hands and the blood floated over to overlay the diagram, spreading thin like paper.

Qing's nose filled with the stench of ozone, his skin prickling like he was caught in an electric storm. The sheer power radiating from the diagram made his teeth ache as the Alchemancer seemed to dance around.

Lesser demons were gathered like vultures around the edges of the chamber, their eyes glowing with greed. Qing's stomach churned. He could practically taste their hunger to be part of something bigger, conquest, subjugation. And he had handed them the key.

The Alchemancer started chanting in some fucked-up language that made Qing's ears want to bleed. "Kth'narak vos'thul mog'roth..." Each word felt like nails on a chalkboard inside Qing's skull.

Qing's blood, now part of that freaky diagram, started moving like it had a mind of its own. It swirled and pulsed, forming patterns making Qing want to hurl.

A portal began to form, starting as a barely-there shimmer before twisting into a full-on vortex. Reality bent around it like a pretzel. Qing felt a tug towards the thing, like it was trying to suck him in.

Qing's brain went into overdrive. He had to do something, but what? The mana gathered around the portal was so thick he could practically chew it. He thought about fucking up the diagram, but quickly realised it would either do nothing, or the Alchemancer would turn him into demon feed.

As the demon walked towards the portal, Qing called out, "How can I find you again?", trying to buy some time.

The Alchemancer turned and grinned like a kid on Christmas morning. "Just look for worlds where nightmares bloom like flowers, my friend. And if we meet again, fear not. I will remember this favour you have done me!"

Fuck. That doesn't help at all.

Qing steeled himself. He was out of time. If only there was a way to screw up the casting...

"Good luck with the devil," the Alchemancer said, reaching out to touch the portal.

Suddenly, Qing's eyes went wide as an idea hit him like a ton of bricks.

In the split moment when the demon touched the portal, Qing cast Spell Interrupt.