Octavia POV:

We left the Aenes kingdom from the western ports. We don’t plan to go directly through the war zones to the north. After a half-month boat ride, the old man and I arrived in Grekia. We plan to begin our search here and continue to the north.

It was on the boat trip that I turned 16 years old, I did not celebrate. I can hold off on festivities until my mission is accomplished.

We departed from the port city at the beginning of autumn, searching the major cities as well as the countryside as we traveled north. Now it is the beginning of winter, and we have reached the mountains with no sign of him.

I already knew it was unlikely for him to be this far south, so I was left undeterred by this. Today, I am going to the adventurers' guild, I plan to monitor the situations of surrounding villages wherever I go. I wouldn’t be surprised if I found him while investigating abnormalities.

“Hey, Flavia!” I call out to my friend I made at the guild.

It is pretty easy to get guild workers to like you when you’ve reached tier 4. I can solve a lot of their major problems for them after all.

“Octavia! Are you looking for work today?”

“Yeah, what do you have?”

“The volcano called Mount Rupes 3 kilometers to the north has been showing signs of activity. We need someone to investigate this immediately. Will you take the job?”

“What’s the pay?”

“2 silver coins.”

“Done.”

“Stay safe Octavia.”

“Of course. You don’t get into any trouble either.”

With sufficient parting words exchanged, I leave and find the old man waiting for me there. I inform him about the job and we depart. A simple investigation shouldn’t be too difficult, but this job is important.

If the volcano seems too unstable, an evacuation will be necessary. I will have to be extremely careful to make no errors.

There is no snow on the ground here. It doesn’t snow much in these parts, you have to go further south to see it, or into the mountains.

At the base of the mountain, I cast a spell on both myself and the old man. It is flight magic, my most recent breakthrough. The logic is relatively simple, I negate the downward force that normally keeps us on the ground, and then I use the magic-enhanced movements I used to see Cassius use.

I control both the old man’s and my own movements until we reach the top of the volcano. As long as I remain in contact with them, I can fly alongside one other person.

Over the edge of the volcano, I see magma firing into the sky. Smoke billowed into the air, and some magma even flowed out of the center. The volcano has not erupted yet, but it appeared as if it could any moment.

Something seems off though, there is abnormal mana in the air. The way that this disturbance is happening… it doesn’t seem natural. Not only that, there is someone else here.

I suppose I shouldn’t expect myself to be the only one investigating. I start walking toward the person there.

As I do, my heart sinks into my stomach. This mana, it’s coming from that person. The mana is ominous as if it is coming from a monster, not just any monster, an extremely powerful one.

I unconsciously stop in my tracks and begin to tremble. After reaching halfway to the person, I finally realize, there is no way that thing is a human.

Its hands, once extended toward the volcano’s magma, retract toward its body. With slow, controlled movements, it turned toward us.

Its body resembles that of a human perfectly, it is wearing human clothes, and it has human skin. What it does not have is a head. Where one’s head would normally lie, there is a non-descript shape, whatever that thing is, it is not of this world. A low screeching noise emanates from the mana head, giving me a headache.

I have never seen one before, despite this, I know for sure. What is standing in front of me, is a demon.

In a flash of movement, faster than I have ever seen, the demon leaps toward us with its hand extended.

I don’t react in time.

“Octavia!” the old man shouts as he kicks me out of the way.

Narrowly, we both escape the first attack. I use a wind spell to launch myself further backward, in doing so, I go over the edge and freefall toward the magma. This is not a problem.

I cast flight magic and stabilize myself. As I stay motionless within the air, heat creeps up my legs. Even from this height, the fire below presents a danger.

I fly upward, and once above the ledge from which I fell, I see a grim sight. The old man lay hundreds of feet back, blood seeping from his stomach. He has been hit with magic. From what I can tell, however, he is still alive.

This demon must be dealt with for any chance of his survival.

“Run, Octavia!” the old man advises me.

The demon looks backward toward me upon hearing this from the old man. It is an intelligent creature.

Now floating over the edge of the volcano, I cast wind magic to propel myself away as fast as possible. This demon is far superior to me physically, I need to create distance.

To the old man, it probably looks like I’m running away. I am not. Even if I had the will to abandon him, I can not let this demon live. If I allow it to activate this volcano, all the surrounding villages and cities will be destroyed. Who knows how many more lives it will take after that?

I have to defeat it.

The demon now gives chase. It is running after me faster than I can fly away. I circle the crater of the volcano searching for anything, anything in the environment that could provide me an advantage.

When the demon realizes I am leading it in circles, it stops. Raises its now disfigured, human resembling, hand. Then, a black light explodes from its palm. I barely cast a barrier in time.

The light crashes into my invisible mana barrier and splits off in different directions. Within the sky, a dozen different explosions occur. My ears are now ringing.

On opposing sides of the volcano, and threatened with ranged attacks, I have no choice but to face it.

I fire pillars of rock at the demon, 7 to be exact. Three were targeted at the demon specifically. Four were sent toward the ground at the monster's feet. All three that stuck the demon shattered on its skin.

Stolen from Royal Road, this story should be reported if encountered on Amazon.

The four that struck the ground did their job. The ledge the demon was standing on crumbled, and fell toward the magma.

The demon jumped back before he fell into the volcano. This attack failed, but it gave me an idea. Even if my attack magic is too weak to damage a demon directly, I can win.

Three more ranged mana attacks came from the demon. Floating in the air, I am able to dodge or deflect each attack in the optimal direction. Against this monster, I have no room for errors. When another beam of black light burns my hair, centimeters away from killing me, I am reminded of what I face.

This monster is remembered throughout history for besting the strongest warriors and destroying nations. Not just through its raw power, but its intellect. Do I really have a chance?

I don’t have some deep-rooted hatred pushing me forward. My number of tools in this fight is limited, and my most reliable ally has already been struck.

I am scared.

But I know that fear is an illusion. I know that the beast before me is far more mortal than it would seem.

I fire more pillars of earth and block more attacks. One after another, we exchange attacks.

With every missed attack the ground and air shake around me, the noon sun blinds those who look up above us, and magma continues to fire into the sky between us.

Remaining on the defensive forever is not an option. I fly around the edge of the volcano toward the beast. The demon matches my movement and approaches me in return.

Once the distance has been closed significantly, I unleash a flurry of spells.

First spell is a debuff spell, lock joint. I dull its movements temporarily. This fails to slow it down enough to gain an advantage, but every little thing can help.

Second spell brings about a fog. Within this large mist I have created, I can sense its movements more clearly using mana. It also blocks vision, in case this demon uses that sense.

I can feel the demon approaching ever closer through mana in the mist and the shaking of the ground beneath me.

I layer two magic barriers to block the movement of the demon, and with close proximity, prepare my strongest attack.

A grand flash of black and red light lights up the mist, and my barriers are crushed under one grand attack. The explosion that comes from the destruction of my barriers sends me flying backward in shock.

Propelled off the ledge of the volcano, I enter a freefall toward the magma. My consciousness fades in and out. It is not until I have fallen far enough to feel the heat on my skin that my mind focuses once more.

I cast my levitation magic just barely in time to avoid falling into the magma. My clothes start on fire, and I can feel my skin begin to burn. I fly back up a few meters and douse myself in water.

More beams of black light fire down toward me, the demon is trying to finish me off. I cast multiple barriers in front of me. The attack deflects and crashes below me. With an explosion, magma flies into the air all around me.

I build a barrier completely encircling myself. Magma crashes into the barrier beneath me, then rains onto me from above. The magma slowly flowed down all sides of the barrier, completely blocking the visibility of my surroundings.

I sense an attack coming from in front of me, without the ability to tell exactly where it is coming from, I have to guess. Because of the error in placement, I allow part of the barrier keeping magma out to break near the bottom.

Magma is now seeping into the bubble I enclosed myself in. If I am attacked again from a different angle, I will likely be cooked alive. I have to take action.

After a deep breath, I rapidly expand my bubble-shaped protective barrier. Magma is thrown in many different directions. With a barrier this massive, I won't be able to stop any concentrated attacks.

Anticipating what will come next, I fly as quickly as I can toward the edge of the cliff. As expected, my barrier shattered into pieces after two consecutive attacks from the demon.

The magma I flung into the air is now raining down on me once more. I take quick evasive maneuvers and narrowly avoid getting torched.

I fly toward the ledge and reclaim my position above solid ground. We stare each other down once more, the mist has thinned enough for me to lay my eyes upon him.

One more chance is all I will get to defeat this monster.

“Ah… fuck it, here we go,” I mumble under my breath.

I will bet it all on this one move, which has failed once before.

The demon charges at me, maximum speed once more. It hugs the edge tightly, so as not to waste even a microsecond as it approaches me. I thrust backward, feet hovering just centimeters above the ground.

The demon enters my range, and I make no attempts to weaken it this time. Building up all the mana I can within my body, I shout,

“Astral bind!”

Thick vines of condensed, raw mana wrap around every appendage the demon contains. It moves to rip these off, but I cast it three more times.

When it realizes how difficult these binds would be to pull off, it turns its attention toward me once more. It starts to lift its arms up once more for its attacks of black light.

I stop this in its tracks. I cast thin rectangular mana barriers above its shoulders, connecting to its neck. Then at many other spots, using leverage to make my weaker barriers lock its joints further.

After many barriers and binds, I manage to trap the demon in its place. It took over half of my mana to do just this, I am almost out. However, I still have enough for one more spell.

I walk toward the very edge of the volcano, where the demon is trapped. My clothes are singed, my skin burnt slightly in some places, and I am exhausted. The walk toward it feels like it’s taking minutes.

I lift my staff and place the tip at the demon's chest. My final spell,

“Gravity.”

I make the downward force on its body hundreds of times what it normally is. For an average person, this would literally tear their insides apart, but some monsters, and people, have durability beyond imagination.

As for this demon, the gravity spell was crippling in and of itself, made worse by it falling through the rocks at its feet, and plummeting toward the magma. My spell will wear off in a minute or two, but by then it will have submerged far into the magma. This demon can not survive the attack.

I breathe a sigh of relief before I gasp once more in shock. The old man!

I run toward his side and find him looking unwell, holding onto the hole in his stomach. I reach down and begin attending to the wound.

It is not fatal.

I spend a few minutes using the sliver of mana I have left to cast a basic healing spell to sew the wound shut, and then step backward.

Thinking I am done, I wipe my sweat and breathe, only for one final disturbance to emerge behind me.

I spin 180 degrees in a flash and point my staff toward the new disturbance.

To my shock, what stands before me is neither a monster nor a human, he is an elf. He is tall, probably 2 meters tall. He is also extremely old, skin wrinkled so that smooth skin is no longer visible whatsoever. He is thin, and walks with a hunch, leaning on his mages staff.

His eyes are staring at me, but they are completely white, and they are foggy. From a glance, I can tell he is blind. His robe is one that would have been worn in ancient times, long, long ago.

“Octavia Decimus, abandoned child of the Decimus family, and victim of the tragedy of the Scipios. It is an honor to make your acquaintance,” he tells me.

“How do you know who I am? Who are you?” I retort.

“Merely an old elf, in awe of the skill that our young demon slayer possesses.”

“Like I can believe that is the whole truth.”

“Hm… it would seem with the injuries of that man there, you are lacking the mood for chit-chat.”

He holds up his hand, and from a distance casts a spell. In a swift movement, he heals the old man far beyond what I could at the moment. Perhaps, that spell he has just cast is superior to my own healing magic.

“You have my attention,” I tell him.

“Good, then let me get on with my advice. Octavia, change course and head not toward the refugee lands surrounding Amidonia, but toward the Magic College in Enkantia. There is where you will find the boy named Cassius.”

“What?? Why is he going there??”

“You will have to ask him.”

“I see, how do you know this?”

“I have been keeping an eye on the two of you. Your mother bore the genes for a mana birth but did not experience such a thing. Cassius on the other hand… how could he not gain my attention?”

“Mana birth? What is that?”

“Learn for yourself,” he says bluntly. Maybe he doesn’t like explaining things?

“Why are you telling me this?”

“Because, within your lifetime, dramatic shifts in the winds of fate shall occur. I need him, that boy, Cassius. He can not continue to remain weak and broken, not with the years to come.

I need you, his old friend, to bring back his strength. If you fail to do this… if he fails to pick up his daggers once more. I fear humanity's greatest weapon could fail before it comes to fruition… and the results would be disastrous.”

“He’s broken? Shifts in fate? Humanity's greatest weapon? Hold on! You are throwing so much information at me without explanation! Tell me what’s going on!”

“You will come to know in time… until then, infer. I am out of time. It seems that if I don’t leave soon…

Cassius will die.”