Life is strange and quick. I had actually thought more on time. Ignoring however long the stuff I couldn’t really remember took, but including the time I had been passed out for, and including the walk, it had been probably two hours. Two hours from being a normal human being in the twenty-first century, to being a demon in a fantasy world saving a village by preparing to murder fifteen people, one of which was extremely minor nobility.

Ah, while a naked elf stares at me with malicious hope.

Life is very strange.

“Help me with hmm?”

I considered actually taking a drink of tea, but it was probably poisoned.

“Yes! Yes! As you can see by our welcoming gift, which I do oh so hoped you liked, this small region practically comes pre-packed for you. The women have already been broken in, stripped, and are more than use to following orders. The villagers are already obedient and any with more fighting spirit than brains have been removed. Within moments, you may have a harem of women and be able to rule or slaughter the villagers as you see fit. We could even round them up for you, in order to prevent any from hiding or escaping you.”

My emotions must have come back in full, because I was utterly and completely shocked. If I hadn’t seen the two guards literally run away from the sight of me, I would have expected the Baron to have completely prepared the village for some different demon that I had just accidentally replaced.

Shockingly, plan B had actually been to negotiate. That was what I had thought of while walking here. The main crux of the issue I had been facing, was that the smart thing was to take the time to prepare a proper way to actually kill everyone, while my condition prevented me from having that time. The solution I had thought of was to scare them and make them surrender the women back to the village and stop raping or killing anyone.

I would still kill the baron and his men of course.

But this way, I could buy myself a few days, maybe find a weapon, heal my head, ambush them in the night, etc etc. All without causing a mental cascade from going against my own bottom line of morals. Plan A, was just in case I had to fight right now. If I had to, I needed them all together. Plan B was my actual goal. This played into that perfectly. If they gave me everyone and just stopped being evil for five god damn minutes, killing them would be so much easier.

Which is all to say that it’s a shame that despite my plan being right there, and working perfectly even, the words from the Baron nearly sent me into a catatonic rage.

‘Broken in’, ‘been removed’, ‘round them up for you’

These inhuman pieces of shit were treating the villagers like toys, at best. I was shocked that Selve hadn’t lept over the table and slaughtered the man with his bare hands. I couldn’t look back at what kind of face he was making now, but it had to be ugly.

“Really?” I said. I had to reply but I didn’t trust myself to say anything more.

“Of course! The prowess of demons has not escaped human ears. We bow down to your superiority. We merely wish to be allowed to leave with our lives. We will vacate the area and leave all its spoils to you. Of course, that alone would not be enough. As a final departing gift, we even have this beautiful elf ready to service you.”

I pointedly did not look at the elf. The main reason wasn’t to try and bluff, it was because something had just appeared. It started in what felt like my sternum but it had rapidly grown. It felt like, a pressure. But almost inversed. It was entirely confusing and not at all welcome as my body and mind had just started feeling stressed again.

The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.

I stayed quiet and focused harder. The last time I felt weird, I had some kind of magically morphing claws for fingers. Considering the feeling had started in the middle of my body, I was far more concerned. It felt like, a wave of pressure. Like one I had already been feeling but it had grown. It had, a very, very general direction. Pointed vaguely in front of me.

Towards the line of armed men.

What the fuck. Can I breathe fire or is this some kind of detector? The fact both were possible was going to give me a headache. I closed my eyes and fully focused, ignoring the situation I was in. Knowing whether I was going to explode or do something disastrous was a little more important than sharing words with an evil bastard right now.

It was pressure and it had direction. And that was, nearly it. Nearly. The first impression I had was ‘inversed’. Why? What startled me, is as I focused harder, I felt that same pressure behind me. Weaker, so, so much weaker. Infinitely weaker, so much so, that if I hadn’t thrown my whole focus into it, even now, I would never have noticed it. The area was massive but tilted, pointing me to…

Selve.

I tried to understand. Inverse, that was what I had been focusing on. Reversed. No, not, quite. I tried to imagine what a non inversed version would feel like.

Death.

I blinked my eyes open, looking at the Baron. Then I noticed the tension in the room. From the point of view of everyone else, the Baron had made me an offer, and then I had spent five minutes with my eyes closed, thinking about it. What was important to me was the pressure. It hadn’t gone away, in fact, now that I knew it was there I couldn’t forget it, like the weight of the tongue in your mouth. It would probably go away with time, but I still felt that weak pressure in front of me.

I remembered, trying to think about what the ‘normal’ version of this sense would feel like. It felt like I was going to die. Then this is… a danger sense? No, wait.

I think I got it.

“Elf. Stand behind me.”

The elf in question blinked, before hurriedly doing just that. I grimaced a little, once again realizing that she had a bandage over her fucking eye. It hadn’t escaped my notice the first time, but I had been far more concerned with the fourteen killers in front of me.

The tension in the room seemed to skyrocket once I did that, but I closed my eyes again. The pressure, it had changed. It had weakened in front of me and grown behind me. But in front was still far, far stronger.

That confirmed it.

Not a danger sense, a power gauge. Or maybe a danger gauge. Either way, it told me one very important thing. It was inversed both behind and in front of me for one very important reason.

I was stronger.

The next moments happened fast, too fast for even me. Because they did not go according to plan.

“What is-” The baron started and then looked down.

Where he saw my bloody claws in his heart.

The plan had been simple. It wasn’t because of this new sense I had decided to attack. It was because this was a golden opportunity to not have foreseeable problems and I thought I could do it. I was able to punch through a tree and slide through decently thick bark before encountering resistance, especially with my tail.

So I had planned to launch the table with my tail, spring forward, and kill the Baron. Then I’d throw his body at the armed men, and kill at least a few of them before they had time to react, preferably by slicing my tail at their heads and necks. I’d then pick up one of their swords and retreat. Either they’d chase after me through the tight corridors of the house or they’d run away screaming and I’d quickly reverse course and try to hunt a few more down. I didn’t actually expect to kill all of them right here and now, just some to make it easier to kill the rest later.

I had made it as far as launching the table, springing forward, and killing the baron.

Because that action seemed to be the trigger. As I felt my hand pierce his chest, his bones, and his heart, felt the life be crushed out of him as his heart stopped beating, as I pulled my hand out and saw my bloodied fingers, it was like a bomb had gone off inside me.

I was not simple logic mixed with a variety of disparate pieces anymore.

No. My mind was whole once again. For the first time in what felt like a week, I was Derek.

“Oh fuck.”

My mind immediately tried to crash as one of the men rushed me with a sword.