... I have to admit, out of all the possible ways things could get worse for us, I didn't expect this to be one.

Thanks to my allies, the forest in front of me is lighting up as if there is a live concert going on inside of it. What I didn't expect to see, however, is a human-shaped specter tailing them. Far off to the left just barely out of range of their spheres of light, I can see someone jumping through the trees perpendicular to them. At first I thought it was because of the lack of light, but nope, it really is just a shadow, not a person. Is that their ability? To turn into a shadow...?

I knew someone in Xelba who could create shadows, but I've never seen someone literally turn into one. It's rather suspicious that the Demon can ambush people through their own shadows, and now I'm seeing a person using a shadow-based ability or spell. Obviously they're connected, but there's no way to know how till this person is captured and... Questioned.

Of course, it could all be a big coincidence and that's actually a knight tailing the group entirely for the purpose of protecting them. Unfortunately, there isn't a single bit of me that believes that nonsense. Real coincidences are far too rare for me to consider it a possibility in this situation... But I guess it is possible.

Hmm... How am I going to handle this? The only way to contact the others is by getting as close to them as I can and then drop my shadow to yell at them or walk up to them. The last, and probably best option, is to take out the shadow person on my own.

I pivot to the left and run toward the mountains in the distance until I'm far enough left to flank the shadow. I stare at the forest for a while until I finally see it move.

There you are... Damn, even I can't see it until it leaps between trees and is hit by the light from my companions.

While jogging into the trees I continue staring at the last spot I saw the shadow. Once I'm within about fifty feet I slow to a crawl, sneaking up to a nearby tree where I can still see where the Shadow is. About a minute later it leaps to another tree, keeping itself around one hundred yards back from my allies. Same as before, I sneak forward while keeping an eye on where it landed.

Leaping up there won't do any good. This thing is leaping between trees at a very fast speed, so it must be slightly enhanced at all times. By the time I land on the branch it's on, it'll either have attacked me or leaped far far away. I could try climbing the tree by making my blood or armor sticky, but I can only dull sound with my feet...

... I'll just keep tailing it for now. If this shadow is only scouting, then I'll follow it back to where it came from, but if it attacks my allies after they engage the Satyr, then that's the perfect time to hit it.

----------------------------------------

I'm currently at the last of the trees before the dilapidated village ahead, and whatever I'm tailing is on a nearby tree. We're both watching my allies skulk around a church that's at least three times bigger than the ones I've seen in other villages here.

Were the people here much more pious in the past? Or it could be because this village appears to be absolutely massive. A hell of a lot of people must've lived here in the past. But now it's just...

Alicia turns toward the forest, "Uh, Rei?! You might want to come look at this!!"

Unmoving, I stare at the shadow's location, expecting some form of movement, but nothing happens.

Shit... I wasn't expecting someone to yell for me. This shadow person has to know someone else is here now. That's assuming he or she wasn't tracking us from the start. If that's the case then they would have noticed the disappearance of a white-haired girl right away.

... Do they know I'm tracking them? Bah, this line of thinking is pointless. More importantly, something must have happened for her to be yelling at me instead of fighting the damn Satyr. Is it gone? That means the grinning fucker warned it we were coming.

"Are you there?! Aresa is saying, 'Hurry up!'" Alicia yelled.

Ugh... Well, I can't just walk to them and leave this thing here. All I can do at this point is try and capture it... Honestly, I'll be shocked if this actually works out.

Removing my aura, I pour as much mana as I can into enhancing my whole body. Barely a second passes by before the shadow leaps further into the forest. Fortunately for me, it was jumping to the exact same tree it was on before. On top of enhancing myself, I had created that sonar ball I stole from the knights and was firing it at the same spot the shadow was currently retreating to.

"?!"

The shadow clearly reacted to the ball of light flying towards the same spot it was going, but it was unable to stop itself in midair. Unfortunately, it landed on the branch and leaped away before my ability reached it.

Heh, well done, but that's still not good enough asshole.

The ball released a blast of sonar, pinging the shadow for me. I tried activating the Chimera's tracking ability as a just in case, but I couldn't get a lock on the shadow.

It must be veiled like I am. I've only known one other person like that, the shadow caster in Xelba... But it can't be him?

The shadow continues leaping from tree to tree in a vain attempt to escape me.

The sonar lasted about two minutes in my soul realm when I tested it on humanoid beings. Not exactly a large amount of time, but I won't even need one minute at the rate I'm catching up to the shadow. Unless of course, it has more abilities that'll help it escape.

The shadow, realizing that I'm moments away from being close enough to intercept it in midair, removes its shadow aura and leaps directly at me with both his feet pulled back. Right before the person reaches me he kicks his feet forward. Shimmying to the side, I direct most of my enhancements to my left fist and drive it into the man's stomach as he passes by where I was moments before, sending him flying deeper into the woods. Upon hitting the ground he begins sliding through the snow. The man then slams his left arm into the ground and uses the momentum to do a single backroll onto his feet.

... Nice moves. It's making me even more suspicious.

The man appears to be quite old, maybe even in his seventies. He has scars all over his face, and not a single ounce of hair can be seen anywhere. Not on his head, eyebrows, or face.

He looks nothing like the man I remember, but it has been a long time...

As the man enters a fighting stance, that highly resembles the warriors of Xelba, I yell a single word at him.

"Fin?"

The man freezes up. It's extremely dark here so it's hard to tell, but it almost looks like his eyes are finally focusing on the world around him. He stares at me with a look of pure confusion on his face, and even begins to look around at the forest around him with the same exact look, as if he can't even comprehend where he is.

"Is that you Fin? You look... Different."

"... R... R... Aaaa...?" The man asked, his voice so hoarse and gravelly I could barely make it out.

Before I could respond, Fin shook his head left and right as if fighting off something from within his head, until eventually he looked at me again with the same impassive face he originally had. Unsheathing two daggers at his waist, he launches himself at me, swinging both weapons at my throat. I lean backward and swat the attack away with the back of my right hand and immediately pull myself up, smashing my head into Fin's chest.

He rocks backward a little but is on top of me again in no time. He swings at me time and again, all aimed at my throat with extreme precision. One by one I parry them away with the back of my hands, waiting for him to use his signature ability I saw several times before in Xelba.

There really is something messing with his head! Fin should know better than to attack my throat. It's been a long time so maybe he forgot, but that's obviously not the case here.

Keeping up the attack with the dagger in his left hand, he puts his pointer finger and middle finger together and aims them at the ground under my feet. I do a short leap to his right side just as his shadow-capture ability forms under my feet. Before he can pull his right hand back, I over-enhance my right foot and kick the side of his elbow. A large cracking sound pops out as Fin slides back through the snow several feet.

"FIN, CAN YOU UNDERSTAND ANYTHING I'M SAYING?!"

Stolen from its rightful author, this tale is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

Fin doesn't respond, instead taking something from his left pocket and jamming it into his now-broken right elbow. A few more bone-cracking sounds could be heard shortly after and within a matter of seconds he began bending his arm again to make sure it worked.

... Unbelievable. There's a reason nobody uses those. Emergency repair shots are for when you have no other option or know with absolutely certainty that someone can heal you afterward. Those shots mess up your soul's connection to the affected area, and if someone highly skilled in soul magic doesn't fix it within at least half a day, that part of your body is gone forever.

We never used them in Xelba; both Viktor and the other main faction forbid it. There was a small period of time when units were allowed to use them, and we ended up with a ridiculous amount of crippled veterans as a result. Where the fuck did he even get that from? I obviously suspected he was still working with Viktor, but that man was against emergency repair shots from the start. He only allowed them to prove to the nobles that they were basically cursed objects. There's no way in hell he'd give them to Fin if they were working together.

The sound of lightning, explosions, and yelling erupts from behind me at almost the same exact time.

The Satyr? Or are they fighting the grinning Demon? The worst-case scenario is both... I need to end this now.

"... Sorry Fin, but I've wasted enough time here. It would be nice if you surrendered, but I assume you're not going to do that."

With his right arm temporarily repaired, Fin launches himself at me again, but this time he's much faster than before.

He's over-enhancing his whole body?!

Same as before, I parry the daggers with my enhanced palms, but this time I'm barely keeping up. It wasn't long before I missed one of the attacks and it cut deep into where my artery should be. Black blood begins spilling out but unlike the hundred wounds I was inflicted with when the Xerath punched me, this wound is small enough that my body begins repairing it right away. Blood continues to trickle out, but it's nothing more than an inconvenience.

The zombified Fin stops attacking and stares at me, waiting for me to fall down or clutch at my throat, but when that doesn't happen he looks back and forth between his dagger and my throat, trying to confirm whether he really did cut me deep enough or not. Yeah... There is obviously something wrong with him. Fin should know that's not enough to kill me.

I stare at him, waiting for him to make the next move.

After over-enhancing himself that much he'll be feeling the brunt of it soon. My right foot is already hurting and feels like it's been crushed. So it should be any minute now that he...

Fin pivots and attempts to leap away but I grab his ankle mid-air and whip him into the tree nearby. Apparently he had greatly lowered his enhancements after his 'killing blow' so he could minimize his self-damage, but it backfired. The damage from being slammed into the tree was quite visible as he tried to scream in pain as the wind was knocked out of him. Before he falls off the tree I leap at him and kick his stomach hard with my left foot.

Yep... He wasn't enhanced or just barely was. My foot went right into his stomach and I even felt something explode in his stomach.

Fin falls to the ground lifelessly. He begins choking for air, which leads to him coughing up blood not long after that. His eyes slowly regain their focus as he looks right at me. He pats the right side of his chest while weakly smiling at me.

"Th... Ke... U..." Fin said. He choked one last time before finally going silent.

Thank you...?

... I might have been able to capture him, but it was too risky. Even if I broke his legs and arms right there, who's to say he couldn't still capture me with his shadow ability? And if I broke one leg it might have given him time to re-enhance the rest of his body.

Looking at Fin's scarred-up face I almost feel like crying.

I don't know what you went through old friend, but I'm sorry I couldn't save you...

Never having absorbed an ally before, I hesitantly reach out for him and try pulling his soul out.

Huh...? It won't move?

Yanking, tearing, and even trying to move it just a little, proves fruitless.

The fuck is going on? I've pulled the souls out of powerful Eldritch before, but Fin's is stuck inside him???

The more I grasped at the soul, the more I noticed something odd about it.

It almost feels... Demonic? The grinning Demon does have an ability rather similar to Fin's... Does that mean he made a pact with it? The only Demonic Pact I know is the one Satyr offer people. It's actually rather fair, which is annoying to admit. But they definitely don't gain the abilities of those they contract with... I wonder what he got out of forming a pact with the grinning one? Unfortunately, I can't read his memories like this...

Unbuttoning his leather vest, I reach in and feel around the inside right-hand side of his vest and quickly find what he was patting. Grabbing something small made of rugged leather, I pull it out and see it's a small journal. The battle rages on behind me so for now I punch out a small hole in the ground and bury it there. After covering it up with dirt and snow I run toward the village behind me.

Upon reaching the village I find what I feared the most, albeit it's not quite what I was expecting. The Satyr is swinging away at the knights with two large axes, and the grinning Demon is here too, but...

Now this is weird... The Satyr should be dead. It has a hole in its chest the size of a small cannonball. The grinning fucker is on top of the temple playing with... A heart? Is that the Satyr's heart?

Shana's clones, Ishar, Alicia, and Tyra are on top of the roof trying to engage the grinning Demon from behind but they are unable to break the barrier around it. Far off to the right in an abandoned warehouse(that's completely devoid of a roof) I can see Cera and Aresa fighting seven imps in close combat. And the knights are trying to spread out so some of them can attack while the Satyr is attacking one or two of them, but it's at least two times faster than any Satyr I've ever seen. I can hear the torrent of air from here every time it swings one of those axes.

Well, it's obvious who I should be helping here.

Sprinting to the right I leap up onto the warehouse's second floor. The imp closest to where I land tries to spear me but I grab the tip of the spear and begin smashing the imp into the wooden flooring. After being smashed five times the imp either wisened up and let go, or it had lost the strength to keep holding on, as it had let go as I was raising the spear again. Seeing this, I flip the spear around and throw it at the unmoving imp, impaling it into the wall.

The other imp nearby freaks out and tries to run away, but I grab the back of its head and push it into the floorboards. Enhancing both my arms and hands I crush it into the wood until its skull caves in.

{R-Rei!!}

Aresa, apparently only good at defense, is struggling against three imps. They're focusing their mana at the tips of their spears and pushing hard into three different points of her barrier. Even from here I can see the barrier cracking under the constant directed attack.

Dashing forward I kick the imp on the left up into the air and immediately punch it back down with my right fist. It bounces off the floorboards and goes rolling off the side of the warehouse. The other two look at me with shocked expressions but I was already on top of them. Grabbing both of their faces with each hand, I push them into the floorboards like the imp earlier until their skulls explode. Off to the side I can see Cera finishing off the last imp near her as well.

Aresa runs up and hugs me.

{T-Thank you!!}

"I understand why you'd want her here with you, but shouldn't you have someone guarding the two of you so you can shoot?"

Cera picks her gun up and begins aiming at the grinning Demon again. "We did. The fucker warped them over there. Ishar yelled at us saying something is on his soul and he can't move away from the Demon."

Ahh... The same mark it put on the Chimera.

Down below Tyrell finishes channeling a spell and throws his hands forward with apparently nothing in them. Soon after that though, a large pair of metal bolas go flying out and wrap around the Satyr's legs, forcing the creature to hit the ground hard. The rest of the knights take that moment to pounce on the creature and manage to chop one of its legs and arms off in no time at all.

Even from here I can see the grinning Demon's grin turn into a frown again. It begins channeling onto the heart, making it grow brighter in intensity at an alarming rate. The knights immediately retreat from the Satyr as its body is also growing brighter at the same rate. But instead of the Satyr exploding, a large explosion occurs from inside the forest. Everyone looked there in surprise but quickly turned to look at the grinning Demon next as it began screaming in pain.

{The barrier! It had multiple layers but there is only one now!}

Wait... Did Fin's soul explode? I know most Demon's souls explode when they die, I just didn't know that it could also work like that when you form a contract. The Satyr contract definitely doesn't do that, but it makes sense that the grinning Demon's would since he was also borrowing Fin's abilities and mashing them with its' own.

A boom so loud I thought thunder struck us erupts from my left. A large ball of energy fires out from Cera's gun and strikes what remains of the Demon's barrier, shattering it completely. The Demon, clearly in a panic for the first time yet, tries warping away but only manages to fall over onto the roof instead. It looks down at the scars on its chest in confusion.

They're full... But they shouldn't be? Did having its contract severed so violently mess its soul up to the point that its abilities became temporarily unavailable? Even the Demon wasn't expecting that apparently... As it's currently looking around in a panic trying to figure out how to escape.

"Heh, look at that... It has a very pathetic look on its face right now. Not grinning anymore, are you asshole?" Cera said.

It looks like a cornered animal that knows it's finished...

Ishar approaches the Demon, causing it to flip around and try to attack him. The Demon takes one quick swipe at Ishar, and while it was a surprisingly fast attack, it wasn't anything Ishar couldn't handle. He leaped back a little and arced his spear up in the most simple attack motion I've ever seen, but it was all he needed. From the elbow up, the Demon's arm fell onto the roof lifelessly. The Demon stupidly tried jumping backward and went right off the roof, falling to the knights waiting below, who quickly cut the Demon into a dozen pieces before it even hit the ground.

Once the Demon was dead, the knights scattered and created a blue shield in front of themselves, waiting for the impending explosion which came soon afterward.

While it's not a devastating explosion by any means, it's still nothing you want to be close to when it goes off.

"What the...? Do you see that, Aresa?"

Aresa nods, {Yes! Isn't that great?!}

Huh? It is?

{... Why are you confused right now? All of the souls the Demon had absorbed up until now are free! With Teifa we can make them enter the cycle of rebirth. I might even be able to do it now too. She's been showing me how in what little free time we've had.}

Oh right, that is a possibility now. I'm not used to having someone around who can save people's souls like that... In this world you try not to think about it since the queen bitch takes them all.

{Oh wait! If it keeps all the souls around and doesn't absorb any of them, maybe Keith's sister is in there? Rei, can you check souls and learn anything about them without absorbing them?}

"No, sorry. I'll only be able to tell if they're Human or Crotia, etc. However..." I stopped and pondered a certain god before continuing, "Arkaios would know but I'm not quite sure how to make that work. Once we leave the area engulfed by these black clouds, Meizha'thul is going to take all those souls for herself."

Cera's gun vanished into thin air as she looked at me, "What if Alicia warps back with them and immediately runs over to Arkaios' temple?"

I shrugged, "It's worth a shot. I assume Meizha'thul can't touch them if they're within Arkaios' domain."

Whether she'll take them before Alicia can reach the temple, however, that's a question nobody will have the answer to. The best we can do is try and pray it'll work out.