“Is the summoning circle prepared?”

His greaves clanking against the stone floor of the hall. Servants and soldiers running every which way, but stopping to bow before him as he passed by. A pair of bull-like horns protruding out of his temples and extending upwards about 13 centimeters.

“Yes, your highness,” his attendant replied, “but is this truly our only option?”

The man’s attendant kept pace with a clipboard and pen in hand. His horns were held in a slight curl akin to that of a ram’s.

“We’ve lost our fourth Demon General and our people’s morale is quickly falling. It must be done.”

“But your Highness! Do we know for sure that whatever you summon can at least fend the heroes off long enough for us to recoup our losses?”

The Demon Lord paused for a moment before a section of the cobblestone hallway. Turning to face it, he raised one hand and watched as a magical circle revealed itself and reacted to his presence before quickly fading away.

“It will be.”

The stones began to turn in on themselves to reveal a passage that led deep under the castle. Magical torches that lit and extinguished themselves guided the way down a spiral staircase. Coming alive when they were close, and falling dark after walking further in.

However, not one for waiting longer than necessary, the Demon Lord put one foot atop the railing that guided the way down.

“I’ll see you at the bottom.”

His attendant sighed while watching the Demon Lord descend as quickly as possible. But given their circumstances, wasted time could mean lost lives. Following his sire, the attendant leapt over the edge. And just before the two hit the bottom, they both fast Feather Fall on themselves to break their fall.

Upon reaching the bottom, the two were in a small, circular chamber. A magical circle drawn in some kind of white paint or dust took up the majority of the floor. And aside from some torches lighting the area, there was only one other thing of note: A broken horn from the previous Demon Lord.

The attendant asked, “Would your predecessor approve of using his horn like this?”

“Given the dire state of our people, I believe so. But I think he’d take it one step further…”

“What do you mean, Your Highness?”

Without hesitation, the current Demon Lord reached up to his right horn. Gritting his teeth, he broke it off and offered it to the magic circle.

“What are you doing, sire?!”

“Our people are dying, and we’ve already sacrificed four of our greatest. A single horn is a small price to pay in this gamble.”

His attendant was about to speak, but bit his tongue. He knew the Demon Lord was prepared to do anything at this point, and no attempts to convince him otherwise would ever be successful. Taking a deep breath to calm himself, the attendant placed his faith in the Demon Lord as he’d done so many times before.

“Then I shall pray that this summoning succeeds.”

With that, the Demon Lord started the ritual. Raising his hands, palm facing outward, he sent a jolt of magic into the circle to start it while a trickle of blood fell from the side of his face. They needed a hero of their own. Something, anything to match those the humans had. Otherwise their war was going to come to an end very soon.

The two horns in the center spun around slowly, but quickly began moving faster and faster. They dissolved into particles of magic and began filling the summoning circle with an enormous amount of power. The overlapping shapes and runes that made the circle spun like the hands of a clock as a bright, white light began to form in the center and expand outward. Seconds passed and soon enough it was too bright for either the Demon Lord or his attendant to see properly, and they closed their eyes as the ritual completed.

And, a couple seconds later, it was over. They heard a crash like a sack of leather and metal hitting the ground and opened their eyes. Though, what lay on the ground before them, was a humanoid figure of some kind. It wore badly damaged armor and a beat up helmet, but nothing like what the humans wore. Whomever this knight was, it didn’t belong to either side of the war at present.

The attendant asked, “Did you summon a human, sir?”

“No. Something is off about this thing. Are you able to see any level on it?”

The Demon Lord’s attendant didn’t understand for a moment, but then quickly realized he couldn’t get any kind of reading on the knight.

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The attendant used one of his abilities, “Scan.”

A quick wave of magic shot across the room only the Demon Lord’s attendant could see. But as it ran over the knight’s body, there wasn’t any information coming up. Just a little text box that read: ??? And even then, the text fidgeted and didn’t stay still.

“No. I can’t even see what it is, let alone its strength.”

The Demon Lord narrowed his eyes and focused on the knight’s body, trying to get any reading he could on it. He may not be able to see levels or details like his attendant, but he could see magical power on demand. Blinking his eyes to change his sight, he looked at the knight and grew worried.

“Something isn’t right about this thing.”

“What do you mean?”

“Save the questions for later, just get me the collar.”

The Demon Lord’s attendant scrambled to get their bag open and began searching inside it. At the same time, the knight’s body began to rise. From lying down, it slowly got to its knees. Shaking its head for a moment as if just now waking up. Then the knight looked at them and an instinctive fear ran across their skin, hairs standing on end.

Where… am I? Who are… they? My head feels… fuzzy.

The knight was dazed and confused. This didn’t look like where he was supposed to be. And the last time he recalled seeing any other living people was long ago. Getting up onto his feet, he staggered for a moment. This place he was in felt different, but his vision was refocusing. Trying to understand what was going on, he watched the two in front of him and paid attention to their movements.

Are they real? No. No it must be an illusion or trick. People no longer exist.

The Demon Lord readied himself for a fight. Changing his stance to be ready for a brawl, he held his fists up. All the while his attendant was still looking for the collar in a seemingly bottomless bag.

“We need that collar! Now!”

“I know, sir! But this blasted bottomless bag ain’t exactly cooperating!”

The knight’s head cocked as he heard them speak, but couldn’t understand them. To him, it sounded like a jumble of consonants and vowels. A language foreign to him, but not alien like that of the Eldritch. Then the attendant found what he was looking for. It looked to be made of solid iron with a short chain dangling off the side.

“Found it!”

“Good. Now to make this thing sub-”

Before the Demon Lord could take action, he heard the sound of a sword being drawn and watched as time slowed around him. The knight was charging at them, blade in hand, and poised to strike down his attendant. There wasn’t much time to act, and a wrong move meant the death of his subordinate. Knowing the losses that would follow should his attendant die here, the Demon Lord quickly reached out to and shoved his attendant out of the way of the knight’s attack.

Unfortunately, this also meant putting himself at risk. As the sword swung downward, the Demon Lord’s wrist was now the new focal point of the blade’s edge. And as time began speeding up, the Demon Lord was now down a hand but didn’t have time to focus on his lost appendage. Quickly, he grabbed the knight by his arm and threw him across the room, but the knight was able to quickly regain a stable stance. Sliding backwards and poised to attack again.

Shedding his cloak and tearing a piece off to use as a makeshift bandage, the Demon Lord prepared for the knight’s next attack. He wouldn’t be caught off-guard like that again.

“Are you alright?”

His attendant answered, “Y-yes, but… your hand!”

The attendant watched as the knight flew across the room, but landed on his feet and was already running at them before suddenly appearing in front of the Demon Lord. The two clashed, but the broken horn and the blood loss from his hand were quickly taking a toll.

“Forget my hand! We’re in danger!”

The Demon Lord was fighting back, but wasn’t able to focus on casting spells. Each time he tried, the knight would interrupt the spell with endless attacks. And any time the Demon Lord used his physical strength, the knight dodged or parried. He needed to gain some distance and recover a bit, but he couldn’t in this small chamber. And if he did leave, the knight would likely turn on his attendant.

At the same time, the attendant wasn’t sure of what to do. The knight and Demon Lord were fighting tooth and nail against each other to the point they were crashing into and smashing attacks into the walls. He couldn’t help the Demon Lord, but doing nothing was even worse. All he could do was watch, for if he even tried to heal or empower his sire he may end up targeting the knight by accident.

The Demon Lord commanded, “Teleport! Now!”

His attendant confusedly asked, “What?”

“Teleport it! Now!”

“Where?!”

The Demon Lord clashed head on with the knight. His fist, magically reinforced, against the knight’s blade. But the blood from his opened wrist was taking a major toll on him now. He wasn’t sure how long he could keep up this fight here.

The Demon Lord shouted, “Anywhere!”

Gritting his teeth, the attendant followed orders and began casting a spell. He needed to designate some kind of destination however and began imagining a place as deep in the humans’ lands as he could. Concentrating his energy into his hands, he was ready to cast it.

“Ready, sire!”

The Demon King nodded before clashing again with the knight, but this time took a cut across his left cheek to move in and grab. Grasping the knight by the back of his armor’s collar, he flung the armored person at his attendant. At the same time, the attendant let his magic surge and hit the knight.

“Teleport, Human Kingdoms!”

A flash of light enveloped the knight and soon he was but a flare. Flying high into the sky before soaring across it like a falling meteor. And with the battle ended, at least for now, the Demon Lord was able to find a moment of rest. His attendant ran to his side and cast Heal over and over again to close his open wounds.

The Demon Lord asked, “Do you know where you sent it?”

“Unfortunately, no. Though I’ll ask the men stationed in the watchtowers to give us the general direction.”

“Good. We need to keep an eye on that thing. Dispatch a monitor imp to find and observe it as soon as possible. Its allegiances must be understood as quickly as possible.”