Tales of the Old World Demon Lord
Chapter 21 – Demon Lord
[Eternum Calendar 1971]
Several small pieces of rubble floated gently above ground as they emitted a faint blue tint. As the planets danced around the sun so too did these small blue stones, acting as both Morgant's shield and sword. Abandoning all notions of stealth and caution Morgant and Yvonne made a daring straight line through the forest. His plan was now to draw out the enemy controlling those goblins through force and he was prepared to over turn the entire forest if he found it necessary.
Several crystalline goblins showed up to contest his ceaseless violence through their sacred grounds. They drew their primitive stone clubs and charged towards him with every intent on giving up their own lives to stop Morgant. Yet in the end they could only accomplish half of what they had set out to do, that being that they were completely annihilated with a snap of a finger.
The stones glowing subtly with blue ceased orbiting around Morgant and threw themselves towards the charging goblins. At a speed so incomprehensible to them they weren't even able to register what hit them. However when the stones did collide, not only did it puncture through their soft skin but also exploded magnificently into a large fluorescent blue pyre. Violent lightning arced through the smoky aftermath of the great explosion and once everything was cleared not even a piece of the enemy remained.
Only a large crater was left behind.
"That's... not even magic anymore."
Yvonne commented from behind. It was the first time seeing such a display of pure overwhelming strength that she didn't even know how to support Morgant. When she had heard that the goblins could avoid detection she thought she could at least watch his back and keep him safe but seeing this she finally understood that Morgant was indeed going easy on her back then.
Hearing her comment Morgant stopped walking and turned back to her.
"You're right, this isn't magic so please stop comparing them."
"Not magic? Then what else could it possibly be?"
In the time of Eternis, magic was everything. From wars to day to day living, everything in this world had revolved around the art of magic. So to a pure bred denizen of Eternis, a power that was potentially even greater than magic was incomprehensible.
"A far greater and more ancient power than magic could ever hope to be. Tell me, have you ever though about the origins of the power you people use on a daily basis?"
Yvonne stopped to ponder on his question for a while. 'The origins of magic?' she asked herself, but no answer ever came to her. For her magic was the same as everything else natural in the world; just another law that existed in the universe. Like the air around her, or the ground beneath her feet, she didn't try to question them and simply accepted them as they were. In fact it was the first time she had ever heard anyone raise a question to that effect, but this small premise was big enough to occupy most of her head for the past few seconds.
"But magic... has always been, right?"
She answered, her voice clearly filled with uncertainty, the same kind small children would use when lying to their parents. To her Morgant was more than an enigmatic figure who's origins were shrouded in mystery; to her he was a being that tried to overturn everything she understood about her own life. It was this facet of the powerful yet fragile looking child that stopped her from truly even trying to connect to him. More so than the origins of magic or her own lineage, he was an entity she was unsure if she should even begin to question.
"Magic is not the original, in fact magic is just-"
Before Morgant could finish his thoughts they were interrupted by another batch of berserked crystalline goblins. However the quantity that slithered out of the woods were in far greater amounts than before. The number of goblins congregated was comparable to that of a small village. Or rather, judging from the varying shapes and sizes of these goblins it was very likely that an entire goblin village was forcibly turned into these monstrosity.
Goblins weren't particularly a friendly race of monsters, nor were they an intelligent one. However they were still trying their best to struggle in this world where power meant everything. To those creatures Morgant hadn't felt much but he did feel just enough to help liberate their bodies from the crystalline curse.
"These bastards just don't learn do they?"
Yvonne clicked her tongue in annoyance as she drew her sword ready to fight. However Morgant stopped her in the last second considering it to be both a waste of time and energy for her to cut all the enemy down.
"Wait."
With the snap of his fingers all of the floating stone rubble in his employ flew towards the amalgamated mass of goblins. Several series of large scale explosions went off all at once creating a marvelous chain of fluorescent mini mushroom clouds. For few seconds the darkened forest had become brighter than any day; not even the fury of sol itself could compare to the power that was Morgant's [psionic fission].
It took several minutes for all of the fallout and dust to settle down but once everything was cleared no trace of any goblins remained. Only dug up earth and the faint smell of burnt ashes could be noted from the aftermath. Yvonne's shoulders trembled at the thought that this small child was capable of causing so much devastation. 'Something far greater and more ancient...' she thought back to his words and shuddered at what this power was. The only thing she understood from all of this was that she was glad that she wasn't his enemy.
"Think that was the last of them?"
Asked Yvonne.
"Most likely, I possess no skill to detect life signs but they also have natural invisibility against detection which only only makes matters worse. Just keep your eyes straight and we should be able to avoid them."
"R-right."
As they were about to take another step they were stopped by a rustling of leaves from their left. With thinking it was the enemy Yvonne and Morgant got into position to retaliate as soon as they came out. From the sounds coming forth it appeared to only be one creature, ''did I miss one of them?' Morgant pondered if a goblin survived the bombing.
However, what crawled out was not a goblin but a horned dear; a stag, yet not entirely what Morgant had remembered of the animals from the old world. It was a given that many things would have changed since then but what he saw didn't even seem physically possible.
Standing just over two meters tall, a body made entirely of glass. With a single step forward it cast away the darkness with its noble blue aura. Far too dexterous to be made of actual glass but also far too transparent and sharp to be anything other than glass. Its long thorny horns protruded majestically and brightly in the night air, its hollow but hypnotic straight straight into the souls of the opponent, it opened its mouth to form a low echoing hum. Unlike any sound that could be produced from an organic being but a fragile melody that could soothe even coldest of hearts; an unfair sound.
Small glowing pieces of crystals hovered around it in a manner similar to Morgant's stones.
Yet to it Morgant felt no qualms about smashing the walking sculpture to tiny fragments. He let loose another batch of small stones that started to orbit around him once more in a menacing tint of royal blue.
"W- wait Morgant."
Yvonne stopped him by placing her hand on his small shoulders.
"What is it?"
"That thing is a [Horned Crystal Stag], it's a powerful but docile creature. Not to mention that it's also extremely rare, in any case I think we can leave it alone since it won't att-"
Before Yvonne could finish what she was trying to explain, one of Morgant's stones flew past her face and collided into the 'Horned Crystal Stag'. A large bright blue explosion ensued but so too did a painful and melodic sound that was most likely the pained cry of the stag.
"Oi! Why did you do that?!"
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Yvonne protested.
"Firstly Yvonne, all stags have horns. Secondly, that thing was in my way. And lastly, I know I said I had no skill to detect life signs but I couldn't feel anything from that walking piece of museum artwork."
"Are you saying that thing was cursed too? But it didn't have any of that golden aura or seemed particularly berserk to me."
Bursting through the dust cloud a golden light pierced through revealing the crystalline cursed version of the Horned Crystal Stag. Its once tranquil blue tone replaced now by a menacing glow of aureate, yet still somehow translucent. Even it's orbiting crystals now gave off the same tainted color and it's eyes no longer hypnotic but surged in bloodlust.
"I stand corrected."
Yvonne conceded.
It cried out once more in a melodic tone yet this time sounding considerably more angered than before. In a fit of rage of being attack it shot the crystal shards surrounding its body towards Morgant and Yvonne. With both Morgant's enhanced Kinetic Vision and Yvonne's temporary vampiric boost at night, dodging the crystal shards were easily accomplished.
However the Horned Crystal Stag wasn't finished with its turn and continued a series of bombardment with its crystal shards. While for Morgant who could perceive everything in slow motion, dodging continued to be easy, but for Yvonne who's speed only increased and had to react to everything in real time it was inevitable that she eventually got hit.
"Ugh!"
Screamed Yvonne as she fell and tumbled on the floor. Luckily she landed behind a rather large tree that blocked any continuous attack, giving her a little room to breathe. Observing the wound on her left thigh it wasn't anything too terrible, just a small graze to the left but the cut was in fairly deep. There was no risk of bleeding out or contracting any sort of infections but it was unlikely she could move for a few moments.
"Yvonne! Are you alright?!"
Morgant asked as he also entered the protection of the large tree.
"I'm fine it's just a small cut. But seriously how are we supposed to kill that thing? Even your attack didn't seem like it did as much as scratch that thing."
Yvonne commented as she applied pressure to her leg to stop the blood. She grimaced through the pain but it wasn't anything the Townguard captain couldn't handle. Taking into consideration her pride for both her position and race Morgant didn't speak of her injury after that.
"I wonder... tch, that thing looks like it'd break if it fell over but it's much stronger than even steel. Hmm... okay how about we try a heavier bullet?"
"Heavier bullet? What do you mean?"
"Just sit back and watch. I'll handle this thing."
Morgant closed his eyes to concentrate what little psychic power he had remaining on a single rock. He once again activated his telekinesis.
"Now, to see if I can actually do this."
The rock slowly rotated and carved itself into a perfect spherical design. Then one by one other pieces of stone rubble from nearby came to amass into a single point using the initial sphere stone as the center. However the clutch of this entire excise wasn't to make a bigger rock, in fact the size of the rock didn't change from the first spherical one. What was happening was that the rocks were forming into a much denser and heavier small rock.
It took about a minute or so to prepare but the stone bullet was done. From the outside, aside from being a bit darker it was relatively the same size which Yvonne didn't think much about. It didn't help that Morgant was floating because it made it look weightless as well but from the sweat dripping from his face it was obvious a tremendous amount of strength was being put into just lifting it.
"Is that it?"
Yvonne asked, unsure of what was really happening.
"Yeah... this is... it. Now just... give me a moment, I got this."
Morgant dashed out from the tree and pointed the ultra dense stone bullet towards the Horned Crystal Stag. The stag started again to fire shots towards Morgant but it was never really able to land a direct hit. Finding a suitable opening Morgant aimed and shot the stone bullet towards the center of its body. As it flew it was obstructed by crystal shards from the stag, having sensed its imminent danger it tried to shoot it down. However it was too heavy for the pieces of crystal to make so much as a dent on it and in the end it pierced through the extremely tough exterior and stopped dead center of the stag's body.
Nothing happened for a few seconds but Morgant still smirked.
"Bang..."
As if on cue the stone bullet exploded from within the Horned Crystal Stag, shattering it into a million different pieces. Raging blue pyres roared even higher than before, shooting past the forest's canopy and creating a semi flare in the night sky.
After that, silence.
Morgant fell to the floor in fatigue as his breathing became much more haggard. Sweat now pouring down from his reddened face all he could do was try to recover whatever energy he could. He dearly wished that no enemies would try to ambush them any time soon.
Yvonne slugged herself over towards him and pat his little back.
"G- good work. I don't think any more enemies are going to show itself."
"Yeah... I hope-"
However reality wasn't as forgiving as that. Not even being given a chance to finish his sentence the both of them heard more rustling through the trees. They tensed up at the pressure of anticipating if another horned crystal stag would show up, if that were the case then they would seriously be in trouble. Morgant wasn't sure if he could even conjure up that ultra dense stone bullet for a second time but perhaps there was no choice but to try if worse came to worst.
Yvonne drew her sword to fend off the enemy and give Morgant time to recover. She was even prepared to give up her life in this regard if it was for Morgant’s safety, after all, even though she was unable to fathom the being that was this child, she was also an alumnus of the town orphanage. As his senior it was her duty.
She stood up to defend but before she could react a robbed figure dropped from the sky and pushed her away. It was way quicker than anything she's seen before and she was hurled until she hit the same large tree that protected her. Now tag teaming with the enemy and smashing her back, incapacitating her.
"Yvonne!"
Morgant cried out but before he could do anything the robbed figure pushed him down head first onto the floor. With the [Gigandoll Power Frame] integrated into his body he thought it would be easy to push the figure away with sheer strength but that was not the case. While the robbed figure did express surprise in the fact that this small child could contest their strength, it was not enough to relinquish their grasp on him.
"Kuhh! Dammit, who are you?!"
Morgant shouted, demanding to know their identity. Since his head was pushed to the floor and his arms were bound he wasn't able to use his [analyze] ability due to the fact it needed direct line of sight with the intended target.
"It seems that the secrets of the mysterious boy at the local orphanage runs deeper than I initially thought; you were all Diana and Miko talked about after all. How intriguing."
Two more figures appeared from the shadows, though one of their identities weren't masked by a shadowy cloak. Struggling against the strength of the robbed figure on top of him Morgant barely managed to look up at the two. He was instantly able to recognize his face and voice, they were one of the special guests that the mayor had brought over to help solve this case.
"En... Enrich."
Enrich crouched down to meet eye to eye with Morgant. His long black hair swaying gently in the night's breeze, a cold enough grin that could chill any hardened warrior up to their bones and a cruel gaze as though he were looking at a mere rotten piece of meat. He smiled.
"I'm honored that you know of who I am, Morgant Fallon."