Weapons of Mass Destruction

Chapter 917: Demons?

POV Talon

Of course I recognize Guildmaster Gwyn. Even with the mask on, there isn't any other human who bears himself quite the way he does.

Accompanied by who I can only guess to be Tess Hansen, he makes his way down the stairs, approaching a group of five demons. I was one of the people ordered to gather information on them, so I can guess what’s about to happen, and it won't be nice.

His steps begin to sound louder, overwhelming every other sound from the gathered groups. The sound of each step down the stairs bounces off the walls and echoes through the halls, quickly causing all chatter to stop as the attention of everyone present focuses on him and the woman behind him.

Guildmaster Gwyn takes off his mask, as does Tess Hansen, and the effect of the array releases them. It reveals his calm expression, but his eyes are colder than I’ve ever seen before.

Even without using his skills, and without him saying anything, everyone present freezes. People know how quick he is when it comes to activating his skills, it counts for very little that they aren't active now.

“Jaxen, Caelum, Brennan, Zevra, Elowen.” He says, naming every demon he was searching for. “Remove your masks.”

He makes his way down, stopping just in front of the demons, who simply stand there frozen in fear. They obey, taking off their masks and revealing their faces for all to see. Three men and two women, pure demons, standing there, filled with hesitation in the face of this human. Meanwhile, Tess Hansen passes by, coming to a stop near the entrance.

“They killed Nox and Rexis,” one of the men says. A muscular demon, taller than the guildmaster, takes a step forward, towering over him.

“That is what I’ve heard,” Nathaniel agrees. “But it was you guys who started the fight, correct?”

“Yes. Nox noticed the woman using primordial energy. She was just a human, so he got annoyed with her. He never liked seeing anyone other than a demon with his Primordial lightning,” the muscular demon says.

“If we’d known they were from your group, we would have held ourselves back,” one of the demon women adds, taking a step forward.

The other demons begin to agree with her and spout excuses of their own. And even I recognise that none of them are being all too honest about themselves.

“But I saw the record,” Nathaniel says, after letting them speak for a while, and all of the demons fall silent.

From his tone, it becomes obvious where this will inevitably end. Each of the five prepares to fight, while Nathaniel doesn't even bother, continuing to speak almost softly as they do.

“You picked a fight with them, two of you died, Noelle died, and just before you killed Derick, one of you recognized him and left him barely alive. Maybe you hoped I would see it as an act of mercy, and forgive you, or maybe you hoped a monster would finish him off instead.”

“So what? We are demons! You might be powerful, but you will never understand what that means!” The tall, muscular demon shouts proudly, taking a step closer and almost bumping into Nathaniel as he does. “You think we are your toys, human? You think you will ever bear a connection to Primordial energies as powerful as we can? You think I fear death!?”

In that moment, a pin could have dropped, and everyone in the room would have heard it. And at least three dozen people currently in the room are now watching with intense curiosity.

Yet Nathaniel stands there, seemingly defenseless, looking down at the floor as he speaks.

“Demons? You?” he asks so quietly in comparison to the demon’s voice. “I have met many demons and half-demons, but they would rather challenge a Ruler than do what you did. And somehow you’re proud of that? You think that was a fight?”

He looks up and snickers. “Demons.”

The entire mansion shakes, and the lights and arrays flicker on and off. Even the specks of dust stop moving, and the air grows completely still.

His voice remains calm as he looks toward the group of demons. “I have one more question. Tell me, have you sensed that tiny, weak, second heartbeat Noelle carried inside herself? You had to, right?”

A high pitch fills the air, and I can't even identify where it is coming from. Once again, the mansion shakes, but it’s much more violent this time, and the lights flicker once more, staying dark for a moment. They hide his face in dark shadows, within which two golden circles are shining coldly.

Then the light comes back on, and Nathaniel touches the demon. “Here, a little bit of my kinetic energy that I’ve adapted to your wavelength. Show me how superior you are and handle it.”

That touch is almost gentle, but in the next second, the demon explodes. There isn't a single piece of him bigger than a droplet as what was once a tall, muscular man sprays itself across the floor, the wall, and the group of demons standing frozen nearby.

Nathaniel’s front gets drenched in blood, but he doesn't even seem to care as his eyes stare on, unblinking.

He then releases his hold, and the remaining four demons explode into movement.

Two of them charge Nathaniel, one covering themselves in golden flames and the other pulling a sword off his back, which he immediately coats in void.

The other two try to run away. One woman is especially fast, her edges turning to a green and blue blur as she reaches one of the windows. But someone else is faster. Tess Hansen reaches her with lightning flickering across her skin, forming a spear of lightning in her hand, which she stabs through the back of the demon woman and proceeds to lift her into the air effortlessly.

The demon screams, watching the lightning spear piercing through and coming out of the front of her chest. She tries to activate skills to fight back, but the lightning continues to strike her, stopping her from activating her skill. The bolts burn and sizzle across her skin, spreading further and slowing her regeneration in the process.

The second demon trying to escape stops as Tess swings her arm and the entire side of the mansion slides down, burying the exit. The demon doesn't hesitate for longer than a fraction of a second, and all the metal around him begins to move, shooting and snapping to his body, melting and forming itself into a suit of armor covered in glowing symbols. Lightning covers his arms, and he charges Tess, who lifts her arm towards him, and I see one of the rings on her finger start to shine. A projectile shoots out of it, too fast for me to track and too fast for me to believe anyone could possibly avoid it.

The demon attacking her takes a few more steps, sways, and then falls to the ground.

Nathaniel, meanwhile, takes a step that almost seems like a burst of teleportation, as he entirely ignores the demon with golden flames and bypasses her to reach the man with the greatsword covered in void. He simply lifts his forearm, blocking the sword and causing it to uselessly slam against his arm, stopping it entirely.

When kinetic energy explodes in a wild burst from the demon, it disappears the next moment, and the mana he was trying to use flickers and dies off. In a swift, confusing movement, Nathaniel avoids the burst of golden flames from the demon woman behind him. He spins around the sword of the demon man, and with a slash of his hand, he cuts off the hand that held the sword.

While the demon man pulls back, Nathaniel grabs the sword from the air, and his own mana coats its surface in place of the void, just as he moves again, reappearing behind the demon woman with the golden flames.

Flames explode into a sphere around her, melting into the mansion and the floor around her, as her shield meets the sword.

That sword cuts through with ease and severs her arm, but Nathaniel doesn't even bother to finish her. He teleports again, deflecting an incoming attack from the demon man, disrupting his mana and kinetic energy in their entirety, and grabs him by the back of the neck before slamming him into the wall nearby.

Before anyone else can react, a crushing presence floods the room, making the air heavy.

“What is happening here?” The voice reverberates with absolute authority as a sickening emerald light bleeds into the space. All the wood around us begins to creak, be it the furniture, the railings, or the doors, and roots begin to grow from within.

That presence is unmistakable. Having met a few Champions already, I know the terrifying weight they wield. This is the first time I’ve felt a presence press me down this heavily, and it isn't even fully released or directly aimed at me.

“Leave.” Only one voice breaks through that air-choking silence, Nathaniel’s.

The green colors surrounding us blink, and all of the colors are then drained from the area as everything turns black and white. Then, the place where the Champion’s voice spoke explodes in its entirety, taking most of the mansion’s upper floors and roof with it.

Nathaniel moves in a blur, tears the head off the demon he’s been holding with his bare hand, and, swinging the sword, he cuts apart the demon woman, while Tess finally kills the one she’s impaled.

That Handler returns, and the presence spreads through the mansion again, with the emerald green light fighting to mix into the black and white, and this time the pressure is even heavier.

That’s when I decide it might be smart to simply leave.

POV Nathaniel

Of course I know that killing these demons won't change much other than bringing some closure to Derick. It won't bring Noelle or the baby she carried back either.

I still remember meeting the two of them not long ago and seeing their happiness at the unexpected new addition to their family. I know my mother and father were in a similar situation when they got Victoria, and maybe that's why it hit close.

Things like this happen, I know, and it's not something I would usually lose sleep over, as cruel as that might sound. But I knew Noelle, and I vividly remember her joking about how she might name the baby Nathania if it turned out to be a girl or Victor if it was a boy.

And hearing that someone from my guild had done it... Demons I so often find cute with the way they throw themselves into fights. But this? These guys were no demons.

Nyssa, Weslin, Morwag, Vega, none of them would have ever attacked someone weaker than them with the sole intention of killing them without reason.

These people were trash, not demons.

Kinetic energy rises to a high pitch once more as I erase any proof these five ever existed. Their bodies, the blood on the floor, parts of the mostly evacuated mansion.

There is a Champion speaking to me, someone who might have been the owner of this mansion, and I can feel his domain trying to take over mine. Even as I look up and focus on him, his words only register as a hum in the back of my mind.

He is weak.

I let more of my mana flood out and support my domain so it pushes over his, and [Eclipse] begins to spread throughout Megacity. The roots pierce the ground, reaching toward me, but they halt mid-movement, only feeding me more kinetic energy, which I turn into more mana to strengthen my domain even further.

There are no signatures around us anymore, and I don't like his tone at all, so I just gather more mana and swing my hand down, flattening the entire mansion into the ground like it was struck by a giant’s hammer.

And then I do it again, compressing the soil and materials deep into the ground.

I glance toward Tess, relying on her to be more reasonable than me now. I don't trust myself, but what I find is her coldly smiling face. Her crown made of lightning spinning over her head, and the sky over the city full of increasingly dark clouds, from which her primordial lightning rains down, slamming into what remains of the mansion and the roots I’ve halted in their tracks.

We made sure the entire city knew we were hunting them, yet people still traded with them and helped them stay hidden.

Finally, I pierce through multiple fields, skills, and passives the Champion has been using to hide. My eyes activate fully as I follow the link, teleport through, and defend myself against all the traps.

When I appear in front of him, the human widens his eyes, surprised. I notice that he wears a beautiful white robe.

Dozens of mana based attacks, some of which I cannot even track, shoot and crash against me. Some of them hammer and temper the defensive layer I keep over myself. The others carve holes into it and pierce through to slam against my skin, only to become liquid mana that breaks down into pseudo weightless droplets that simply hang there in space.

I disrupt his teleportation, let his hand coated in green mana stab into my shoulder, burn the wooden roots trying to spread through my body from the point of contact, and then put my hand on his and "take".

His mana floods into me, and I channel it, redirecting it and aiding it until it’s caught up in my Mana Cycling, becoming part of that flood of mana that constantly rushes through my body.

He staggers back in horror as I release him, the hole in my shoulder sizzling as it heals in a blink. To burn the roots, I had to spike my body temperature, and now, the excess heat vents from the exhaust nodes on my back, like a cloud of pressurized steam.

A new attack slams right into my face with all the mana he’s managed to regenerate or pull from the air, but the moment it touches me, it turns into more liquid through [Jüdrajil] and sprays into the air behind me.

I stare him down until he stops attacking and turns to run, relying purely on his physical stats and whatever tiny bits of mana he can regenerate to hasten his escape.

[Eclipse] blinks and disappears as I gather all mana from the area into my body and put the manasol into the vial I’ve grown used to carrying.

Then I join Tess, and we leave.