There was so much that a spear could do. It could cause a puncture. It could feint for a larger attack. It could become part of a wall.

  It could not make up for being a one-man Legion. Ludere had to keep moving around and around. The entire area was just a demonic campground, for what he could tell. He jumped on top of what he thought would be a solid tent.

  It was, regrettably, canvas, and the large supply tent bent to accommodate his weight, before threatening to divulge state secrets on the cheap. He kept moving. Instead of being one of many humans, he was now inside of their camp. Hundreds of arrows sought him out as he moved to behind another canvas tent.

  Will was the only thing saving him. In his haste to escape, he used as much as he could to jump up. He didn't have enough to spare to fly around.

  "Rek! Rek! REK!" No place was really safe to land. There were only bad places, and worse places. He aimed for a crowd of foot-soldiers.

  He could feel what little Will he had ready to be used. He pushed a bit ahead of him to clear his path. Instead of fighting it, he leaned into being surrounded.

  Ludere wasn't in the camp with them.

  They were in there with him.

  Thirty demons attempted to surround him. Dozens more watched, waiting for their chance to make a mark. Ludere's movement was now almost entirely due to the skills.

  He followed what it told him to do as he pierced another one clearly through the neck.

  Necks were such a nice, easy target. When available, he much preferred to separate them into two neat chunks.

  His Athletics held strong, as… Finding he had more enemies in front of him than behind, he managed to move forward that way.

  The only way he got breathing room was to push forward. Ludere pushed with a bit of Will to kick up some of the red sand. He only wished that it worked as well as the sand from home, but these demons seemed impervious to it. He got used to the sand at home. That didn't mean that he could fully disregard it.

  He never would or could forget the sand of the arena. This sand had some soul to it.

  He side-stepped away from an errant arrow.

  They were almost uniformly bad shots. If he hadn't been in constant motion, he wouldn't have noticed. His Will also helped him.

  He felt a presence. Roughly a dozen demons were suddenly… Different, as if they had been imbued with a large amount of Will.

  And then, every single demon stepped backwards. For the first time since entering the Demon World, he had a perimeter. And that was when he began to be just a little bit suspicious. Demons, by their nature, did not stop attacking. Well. Maybe the smart ones did. The dust settled a bit, and he could make out the form of four succubi.

  One of them looked familiar. It had been the first one that he tangled with. The first one that had brought him under her Will and given him such intense feedback."Human, why do you come to our world and fight us so much? Why not join forces with us?"

  "I don't think you understand. Or maybe it's me that doesn't understand."

  She stared him down. Yes he definitely knew those eyes. They haunted his daydreams.

  "Human. The demon Lords have gone to Great expense to invade this Arena. Is there a reason why you're standing in our way? We were invited."

  Ludere crossed his arms. He didn't see any house colors on any togas, or any sigils, or anything. In fact, the most that any of the demons wore was a loincloth, or in this case of succubi, a form-fitting tunic. There was no way to tell if they belonged to some human house, or some demon legion. He'd wish to see that kind of thing. But he could only tell which succubi had been the one to attach herself to him, because of the fact that she had part of a missing horn.

  He scanned her and found that her highest level skill was Spirit Magic.

  He began coughing. That had not been what he expected. He hadn't expected to see any demons with skills. Much less being able to see one with a skill at least greater than his, in a domain of magic he hadn't even known about. Or at least he'd only heard rumors about Spirit Magic.

  The exact cut of her horns made it clear that this was a succubi that did not like much at all. He took note of her tunic.

  "I don't think that you were invited at all. And if you were, I'd really like to know who that was and did that. I'm going to guess—you don't want to tell us."

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  "Us, human? You're the only one here. You came to our world. Rek, If I see another human trying to come through this portal, I might just lose a bet. But enough about us. We've seen you fight. How would you like to come work for the winning side?"

  "I don't know that I'm the one you want for this, but let's just say that I've got competing interests."

  The succubi crossed her arms. He would give so much to just be able to touch her for a moment and steal her Spirit Magic. He didn't know what he would be able to do with itm as he didn't know anyone inside the Empire that had Spirit Magic.

  But now that he knew that you could steal skills from demons, he wasn't going to hold back.

  "I've got a proposition for you."

  "Go ahead. I'm listening." She leaned forward as if actually taking him seriously.

  "All right. Well, I see that you've got a skill that I want, and I was just wondering if you would like to swap it out and gain one of mine, temporarily."

  The demonic grin she had on her face disappeared in an instant. She raised her arm and pointed it at him. Instantly, the sound became too much for him. He didn't want to deal with it. But it was so loud and cacophonous that he couldn't even deal with it himself.

  He decided to make his move, running out to the succubi and hitting her with as much Soul Magic as he could muster in one blow. At the same time, he tapped into his Skill Swap skill and swapped out Numeracy for Spirit Magic.

  Suddenly, he could feel the distance between himself and every single demon, within what felt like a large distance.

  Spirit Magic wanted him to do something, but he was overcome by it. It wasn't the same as Willpower. He could sense the Willpower of other people, but this? He could sense their whole Spirit, their whole Soul, all at once, and it was overwhelming. The only thing that kept him going was that he was already overwhelmed by the cacophonic sound.

  Something told him to pull. It was the Spirit Magic, the Soul Magic, or something, but he could feel the life force of the succubi in his hands. It felt like he was touching her soul. And he wanted to take that. Through the haze of feeling every demon around, and the sound of every demon yelling insults or something at him. He pushed through, trying to tear her soul from her. He didn't know why the skills were telling him to do that, but then he could feel it. He was almost completely out of Willpower, and touching her, he could feel her soul turn into his Will as he adopted it into himself.

  It felt electric, touching another being's soul and then using it for this might have been wise. Spirit Magic was either forbidden or not even talked about within the Empire. No one said he could do this, he realized that she had done a soul and spirit attack against them, and that had been what had caused him to have such terrible feedback on that loop. He could feel dozens of sharp claws and teeth tearing at his flesh as he used her soul to imbue his body, pardon his skin and muscles against attack. It would hold him for only a while. If he could pull another soul, it would do him so much good, and then he could survive a bit longer.

  It was skills like this that could turn the tide of battle. Forget Will Magic or Soul Magic. Stealing someone's Spirit and turning it into fuel for his other magics? This could quickly end the invasion.

  Really, all he had to do was level it up, but he knew that he wasn't going to be able to get enough in this loop. There were too many things trying to kill him, and he'd wasted too much time trying to figure out what this skill was.

  He embraced his own death.

  Instead of returning back to the place he'd returned to so many times, he found himself in the dark. It felt like he was in his soul space, but it was slightly skewed. He knew what his soul felt like. He knew how much Willpower he had. He couldn't bring up his status. There was something nefarious going on.

  Ahead of him, he felt a presence stronger than anything he'd ever fought with before. It just felt like a mountain of Willpower. He looked for it in the dark. The figure came closer, resolving into the shape of a poomaki. The feline didn't even come up to his shin. Its face was dark, half splotchy yellow colors, and split side by side. It regarded him with the calculated indifference of its kind.

  He knelt down to pet it, although 'down' was a relative term. There didn't really seem to be an 'up.'

  There just seemed to be a 'right here.'

  The feline glared. Clearly it was expecting some sort of consideration. He didn't have anything for it.

  He cleared his throat. Finding it suspiciously absent of sand, he rejoiced. "I'm so sorry, little guy. I don't have anything for you to eat."

  "That's okay. I think it's time for us to have a little chat."

  If Ludere hadn't been sitting down when the message came over, he probably would have collapsed. Seeing as how there were only two of them there, and he was in some sort of Soul realm, he had to believe it had come from the small feline. But felines didn't talk.

  "I'm so sorry. Did you just talk to me? Because I have been having the most interesting time thus far, and the fact that I think you talked to me means that I might need to be talking to the Medica. Which, by the way, I have no idea where we are, and if we're in my soul space, then I want you to know I am a dog person."

  "Duly noted. Understanding that I am here for your benefit, perhaps we should talk about how you are using your time. Or should I say, our time."

  "Our time?" Ludere stopped cold.

  The feline in front of him gave him the exact look every other feline had ever given him. The disdain dripped off his whiskers.

  "You wanted to know why we've been going through this. It's very simple. You were chosen."

  Ludere wanted to laugh. "Me? Of all the poor saps in this damn city?"

  The cat was not looking very pleased with him. In fact, he didn't know if it had ever looked pleased before. He certainly wasn't pleased with the situation.

  "Unfortunately, yes."

  "Is that all you're going to say?"

  "We don't have much time. Understand that these are supposed to help you stop what is to come. I know that you don't know me, but... I think we can come to an understanding."

  It wasn't clear whether they could ever be on the same page. It wasn't clear if they could ever speak the same language, as Ludere was not entirely sure that it was speaking to him or through him.

  "What do you need me to do? And why should I do it for you? I've seen my friends die enough times that I have stopped counting. In fact, I just ran into the demons' world."

  "Well, first. Stop being an idiot. You cannot do this forever. At some point in time, this magic will run out."

  That was his first clue that this was actual magic. If a strange cat was going to appear in front of him and try to explain everything, he would sit down and let the cat explain things.

  "Do you have a name?"

  "Palooza. But you can call me The Beast."