Blain looked over at the woman in front of him, he instantly recognized her uniform, the style of her hat to be more precise. It was the hat that all witches used. A special division of the human kingdom composed of immortal mages.

These immortal women had no soul, and thus, didn’t interest Blain, after all, eating a soulless human was a hollow act that would only satisfy carnal hunger.

“No thanks, I’m looking for the little prince.”, Blain said, and he pointed straight towards the Earl’s office.

Ember could feel cold sweat running down her back. This monster knew exactly of the prince’s location, if she wasn’t able to stop him here, the Earl’s office would soon become a battlefield.

“Sorry bud, but I can’t allow you to go there, the prince may be able to handle himself, but he happens to be with our innocent little boy”, concerned for Rodderick, she stood between the abyssal and the office. “You will have to go through me first, the greatest guardian dog. Woof woof”, Ember barked at the enemy.

In response, Blain jumped towards Ember, his massive claws extended. Ember dodged to her side by creating a bubble of air under her feet, once it exploded, she pushed herself with it’s burst, narrowly avoiding the attack. In midair, she rose her staff and aimed it towards the demon.

“Guardian dog lightning attack!”,

A bolt of lightning shot from it, striking Blain in the chest.

Taking the full burnt of the attack, Blain roared in pain as the electricity dispersed through his body, however, he quickly recovered, swinging at the witch with his claws again. Using the same method again and again, Ember darted and weaved, managing to keep out of the claw’s way. She was weak against powerful warriors who boasted of high speed. But unlike her last fight with the insectoid demon, where she couldn’t react fast enough to his attacks, Ember was able to read Blain’s movement, keeping herself out of harms way.

[If it’s like this, I may be able to win]

Gaining confidence, Ember baited Blain into an attack and jumped backwards. What expected him in her previous location was a magical ball of air that blew up, creating a powerful gust of wind that knocked him backwards. This gave Ember enough time to chant her next spell.

Ember rose her staff towards the sky. She began to recite the ancient incantation, her voice echoing through the air.

"By the power of the flame, I call upon the fire to obey this dog!", she shouted. "Fire, come forth and burn my enemy to cinders!"

As she spoke the final words of the spell, six balls of fire appeared in the air above the demon. They hovered for a moment, glowing with an intense heat, before hurtling towards the abyssal.

Unable to avoid them. Blain roared in pain as the fireballs struck him in a fiery explosion, setting his body ablaze. He thrashed about, trying to extinguish the flames, but it was no use. The fire was too powerful, consuming his flesh every second it burned.

“WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH”, he let out another deafening roar, its eyes glowing with a sinister light. The fire kept burning him, however, his flesh kept regenerating.

No matter how much damage he took, he seemed to heal almost instantly. Without respite, he charged at the witch, its claws extended once again.

Ember jumped, lifting herself to the air. It was dangerous to fly up in the air in the middle of the battlefield, someone from another fight could hit her and knock her down, however, against this monster, she had little choice, eventually she would grow tired of evading.

Blain, however, did not pursue her, instead he began running towards the Earl’s office.

“Shit! Wait!”, Ember desperately flew ahead. As she flew by, she casted another spell, raining one more barrage of explosions towards Blain, however, no matter how many impacted him directly, he was not slow down in the slightest.

Without any other option left, Ember landed in front of the abyssal. She growled at the demon, her eyes filled with determination. She needed a more physical attack to stop the enemy’s advance.

"By the power of the earth, I call upon the ground to obey this dog!" she shouted. "Fuck him up!", the ground in front of her began to tremble. It rose up, forming a massive wall of earth and stone that hurtled towards the demon, however he clawed its way through the wall of earth unimpeded, its eyes glowing with a fierce light. It let out a deafening roar as it charged at the witch, its claws extended.

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

“Damn it!”, she did not expect him to be able to cut through so easily. Unable to evade, Ember summoned a shield of energy to protect herself, but Blain was too powerful. It smashed through the shield and knocked the witch to the ground, its claws inches from her face. Ember’s body flew away by the sheer force of the impact, bouncing a few times on the ground before finally landing against the wall of a nearby house with a loud thump.

“Hmph, what a waste of time, I don’t even get a meal out of this fight”, Blain complained. He was about to start running towards the Earl’s office once again when another figure landed on the battlefield. A dark skinned harpy with silver hair and wings was now standing in front of the abyssal.

“Oho, you must be Athena, the previous queen of the harpies. So it was true that you were captured by a human, what a sad fate”, Blain shook his head, the thought of one day becoming a human’s pet was truly scary.

“If you know about my situation then hurry up and save me”, Athena complained. And extended her wing towards the Earl’s office.

“That place where you are going is also where the jailer is, if you kill him, you will set me free”.

“Oh, that so? Can’t say I really care for that, but if he’s that powerful a mage then his soul must be truly delicious.”, Blain’s bony mouth started drooling. “Well then, get out of the way, will you?”

“Sadly, I can’t do that, after all, I was commanded to distract you and make some time”, Athena stated after sighing. She didn’t wish to do it, however, she had to.

“Make time? For what?”, Blain asked, confused. For wanting to be rescued the harpy wasn’t very cooperative. Was it a result of being chained down by the human? It seemed that she wasn’t simply under supervision, but some spell was manipulating her actions. Blain was no mage, and didn’t have a deep understanding of magic, so he could only theorize on the possibilities.

“For him to get here”, She nodded towards another figure joining the battlefield. An old mage with a long white beard and gray robes. Edeus, who after seeing Blain point directly towards the prince, he had no choice but to join the battle himself once he realized Ember was outmatched. If he did not stop him here, the office would become a battlefield, putting the prince’s life in danger.

“My name is Edeus, lately I’ve been taking the role as a teacher, so allow me to keep it up and teach you a lesson, little abyssal, a lesson on mortality.”, Edeus stated, staff aimed towards the demon.

….

Rodderick and the Prince were still watching over the battlefield from the office. Edeus had to leave them behind to confront the abyssal, but left the Earl to look over them.

“Alright, Rick, let’s go”, Adrian stated only second after Edeus had left.

“Eh?! W-We can’t, it’s too dangerous! He’s coming straight for you!”, Rodderick tried to reason with the prince. Now that the enemy was closer, he could see the fight with the demon and Ember with his own eyes. His lack of magical understanding didn’t allow him to grasp the true power of the monster, however, the fact that it was able to fight with Ember and push her around, meant that it was incredibly dangerous.

“Well, you can stay here if you want, I guess you are still too young”, Adrian ruffled Rodderick’s hair. He didn’t want to put his teacher’s new apprentice into unnecessary danger if he wasn’t willing.

“Waaaaaait!”, The earl ran in front of the prince and stopped his advance. “Prince Adrian, I can’t allow you to go down there, sir Edeus put me in your care, and I will do anything in my power to st-“. His voice suddenly stopped when Adrian kicked the Earl in the nuts. Without a shred of mercy, his kick contained magical power in the form of electricity that dispersed from the Earl’s testicles to his entire body, knocking him unconscious in an instant.

“Geh!”, Rodderick recoiled at the cruelty of the act.

“Hmph! That’s what you get for getting my sis killed”, Adrian stated without remorse, and opened the window.

He used his eyes to scan the battlefield, he needed to look for the commander. Thankfully, he was able to easily spot him in the same position, it seemed the man hadn’t moved at all since the start of the fight. However, something had changed.

“….”, Adrian’s eyes were wide open with shock as he witnessed the contents of the box next to the demon commander that now laid open.

Inside, was the corpse of a woman being paraded on the cart. Spears were impaled in the rotting corpse to make her stand, revealing as much of her body as possible, a spear in particular pierced through her jaw, to make her face stand high.

An unnecessary act, for her face was already decaying, her teeth were failing and her flesh started liquefying, making it impossible for her to be recognized by merely looking at it. However, there was one trait that could unmistakably be used to identify the corpse. Her long red hair.