Chapter 18

  While I did not think for a second that I had seen everything this forest had to offer, I was expecting something familiar to show up next, like a Staring Hunter or a Prowling Devourer. If I was honest, I was really hoping for a Flamescythe, purely and simply because keeping my SAC clean at all times had been the first and most important thing I had learned during basic training, SAC training, then specialized rifleman training, then during a joint training course with marines, then throughout the medic training courses, and then from every commanding officer I’d ever had throughout my active service. Everything in this forest had plenty of blood to spill, except the weird, skeletal Flamescythe, and I wasn’t keen to stop and spend hours scrubbing the ferrocom plating of my SAC clean of demon-blood.

  The creature that decided to walk out of the woodwork and take a chance on us as its prey, was something new.

  ‘We are starting to attract somewhat stronger beasts,’ Tarashak commented nonchalantly, clearly dismissing the creature as a threat.

  ‘What even is this thing?’ I demanded from no-one in particular.

  Tarashak just scoffed at the sight, shaking his head as if saying “is this the best this place can muster?”. Flamey looked at me questioningly, and I could feel her Lost in the Fog aura starting to spread out, but I waved to her to stop it. Whatever this thing was, it was mine whether I liked it or not.

  ‘Huh! It’s one of those grabby-chompy things.’ Burning Darkness informed me of the no-doubt unofficial designation of the huge creature which boasted four stumpy legs like a hippo, four arms on each side so it could shovel food into the enormous, tooth-filled mouth it had instead of a head. It was quickly getting past the initial phase of appraising whether I’d be suitable prey or not, and judging by the roar it let out, the verdict was that I looked tasty.

  ‘Damn!’ I muttered.

  ‘Don’t worry, it doesn’t look much stronger than level 10. Just remember your training my young apprentice!’ my sword tried to encourage me as I fell into one of the offensive stances he’d taught me, lifting him high above my head.

  Level 10, huh? I probably would have been able to clobber it to death without a weapon, which would have been a clean solution to this nasty looking problem, but it was sword-time.

  The creature charged, and I moved. Using the techniques I’d learned not long ago I slowed my perception to a crawl and focused on controlling my unnaturally fast movements. I stepped to the side, causing the creature to barrel past me instead of knocking me over, while executing the slash-slash-stab combo I had been practicing for the past hour. All of that in a flash. I cleaved all four of its disgusting arms off with the two slashes, and drove Burning Darkness right through the thing’s side until the tip of the blade poked out on the other. The creature’s momentum was great, and I twisted the blade inside it, held it firm, and the poor, terrifying monster cleaved itself in half horizontally before it finally came to a dead halt. I almost couldn’t believe I could do all this in a second, and to a moving target.

  [You have defeated Hungering Flesh-snatcher, level 12. You receive EXP.]

  ‘You feel that?’ Burning Darkness asked, his voice filled with joy and wonder. ‘Do you feel as the air weeps at another soul departing? Do you smell the delicate scent of blood in your nostrils while the last breath of your foe’s life flickers out like candlelight in a storm?’

  ‘You know you don’t have a nose, right? Can you even smell?’ I asked him, wondering what the hell was wrong with this sword.

  ‘I know, that’s why I’m asking you,’ he said, his voice back to normal. ‘You’re lucky.’

  ‘Aren’t I just?’ I shook my head. ‘In any case, and if you must know, I feel satisfied. Not because I killed the horrid thing, but because I managed to use what I’d learned. It’s … an accomplishment.’

  ‘Yeah, well, you did alright.’ Burning Darkness admitted. ‘A few more kills like this using proper techniques — and me — and you’ll get a skill for it, my man. I guarantee it.’

  ‘Sounds good.’ I nodded.

  Then I muttered a curse as I looked down on my bloodstained SAC. Damn!

  ***

  It was Flamey who tired herself out first, and that was when I finally called for a proper break. So far it didn’t seem like this ring of Hell had days and nights — the sky was constantly burning above the forest, fire roiling in the black, smoke-like clouds, occasionally erupting then calming, then erupting again. That was it. No sun, no moons, no stars, just fire and smoke. I also didn’t know anything about how much sleep or rest a demon needed — if any — but when I saw Flamey starting to wobble and struggle to move properly, I finally asked Button. It turned out that demons indeed needed some sleep, but not too much and not that often. My daughter, being young and low level, did need slightly more sleep than a fully grown one, the recommended amount being 4-5 hours every two days, a day being a 26-hour period, surprisingly close to Earth-standard. Demons intuitively knew when it was day or night without using clocks or other such instruments. It hasn’t been two full days since she had last slept, but she had been working very hard, so she deserved some shuteye.

  Stolen story; please report.

  We set up camp for our arbitrarily designated night, Flamey pulling a surprising amount of leather blankets from her storage for us to lie down on right where we were. Throughout our sixteen-hour long trek today, we had not come across a single clearing, or anything even remotely resembling one. Of course, I was the only one shocked and disappointed – even Flamey knew that this was just how the Wilds were everywhere in the ring.

  The demon general took the first and only watch, claiming he didn’t need any sleep. I just shrugged, told him to suit himself, and with a bored look on his face he called on one of his skills to form the same fiery barrier around us he had used as our rear guard.

  Safely surrounded by searing hot hellfire, Flamey and I shared a couple of ration bars from my bag, some water, and a few bites of our respective Crunchymel bars. Tarashak just sneered at me when I offered him a ration bar and demonstrated how a real demon handled dinner. He created a gap in his burning barrier, let a Prowling Hunter through — the disgusting, dog-sized many-eyed thing — grabbed it with his bare hands, and squeezed the life out of it. He closed the gap in his barrier, pulled a long, dangerous looking knife from his robe, and began slicing the dead creature. Cooking the dark meat was a simple matter for him: a skill here a spell there, and Hell Mana did the job. Monster steak on the go. He offered me a slice, grinning ear to ear; I just sneered at him the same way he had at my ration bar. I was pretty sure it would have been safe for me to eat — my Live in Hell demonic trait was giving me that gut feeling — but there was no way in hell I’d eat something so disgusting and scary. Flamey looked tempted, but in the end she shook her head and stuck with her Crunchymel bar — an excellent choice in my opinion.

  ‘Flamey, sweetheart, you’ve killed a lot of critters today. Any progress?’ I asked the exhausted girl, wanting to know about her progress in terms of levels before I let her sleep and I could start cleaning my SAC.

  ‘I will get a level soon. I can feel it, Daddy! I can feel it,’ she perked up, declaring her progress happily.

  ‘Good girl. I’m proud of you,’ I said to her, giving her a smile. ‘Anything else?’

  ‘Oh! Yes, I got a new skill.’ She bobbed her head up and down.

  ‘For your dagger?’ Is it that Demonic Saerkhan Wielder skill the big guy mentioned?’

  ‘Uh … no. It’s not,’ Flamey deflated instantly, then looked at me with her big cat-eyes filled with worry. ‘Are you … are you angry, Daddy?’

  ‘No, why would I be,’ I reassured her. ‘Can I take a look at that skill, though?’

  ‘Yes.’ She nodded, her good mood returning.

  I touched her hand, and asked Button to do his thing and show me the skill she got, and some explanation if it was available.

  [Displaying skill: Dark Princess of the Saerkhan (Unique Skill)]

  Hm. It sounded more like a title than a skill. It also looked like there was a certain princess theme going on with my daughter, and for whatever reason The Genius was entertaining it. Why? I couldn’t say. Then Button provided some commentary on the skill.

  [Dark Princess of the Saerkhan is a new combat style associated with the Saerkhan and similar weapons. The Saerkhan is a curved dagger and popular choice of demons throughout the rings, and as such, a number of fighting styles and skills are established and available. Unlike the established skills that contain pre-existing knowledge, techniques and aiding mechanisms accumulated via numerous past users of the Saerkhan, the holder of this new and unique skill will only receive the bare minimum of knowledge and techniques, and through experimentation and innovation, she will build the skill herself.]

  ‘Alright, Dark Princess of the Saerkhan. It sounds nice, sweetheart, I think you did very well. It’s a unique skill, so it is only yours and no-one else has anything like it,’ I said to her, not entirely sure what to make of it. It did sound like she was going to have a hard time with this one.

  ‘Yay! I knew it!’ she cheered, and to celebrate her success, she finished the Crunchymel bar that was supposed to last at least another half a day. Oh well, she deserved it, and I still owed her five more, so it was fine.

  Button’s description had given me some insight into how skills worked, and probably how they were created or established in general, but I had questions. I looked at Tarashak, who seemed to have taken some interest in Flamey’s unique skill, as I had said its name out loud and he heard it, but the moment I opened my mouth to ask, he just turned away and kept eating his dark steak. I had no choice but to source the information I wanted from someone else.

  ‘Burning Darkness? You there?’

  ‘Where else would I be?’ his voice rang in my mind through the NeuroHUD’s audio function.

  ‘Right, right. Did you see Flamey’s new skill?’

  ‘Oh, I did! Exciting, isn’t it? A whole new unique skill. Shame it’s not for a sword, but hey, nobody’s perfect. Anyway, those kinds of skills don’t pop up often, so she can be proud of herself.’

  ‘Okay, that’s good I suppose, but if she needs to build the skill, won’t she have a hard time fighting? And how does building a skill work anyway?’

  ‘A unique skill has a lot of potential, more than normal skills, but it can be a disadvantage in the early stages,’ my sword explained. ‘Well, she’ll have most of the basics shared by all Saerkhan skills, if the skill works like the unique skills I know about, so she’ll be able to fight with it. But if she really wants to become an unstoppable dark princess with a dagger, then she’ll need to contribute some unique — and preferably effective — way of fighting with it. If she can do that, the skill will incorporate it into itself, amplify it, and take it to another level. Literally. As she levels the skill. Hehe!’

  ‘Sounds alright. At least she has me to look after her while she experiments with her new skill and comes up with something usable,’ I said.

  ‘My man, that’s all well and good, but if you start slacking off with our swordsmanship training just to babysit her, I’m going to be yelling in your head non-stop!’ Burning Darkness warned me. ‘Trust me, you will need a swordsman skill, maybe even two. They’re not far away, but they won’t come without work. And who knows? Maybe you’ll get a unique one too.’

  ‘Ah, no thanks. I already have some unique skills,’ I shook my head, thinking of the healing skills I had. ‘Or do you think I, of all people and demons, would be able to contribute new stuff to a sword skill?’

  ‘Eh, probably not,’ Burning Darkness conceded.

  ‘Yeah, probably not.’ I agreed.

  My demon daughter was struggling to keep her eyes open while being sprawled out on one of the blankets, looking at me and still smiling for some reason.

  ‘Are you okay? You should sleep already,’ I said to her.

  ‘Yes, Daddy. I … will … sleeeee …’

  And she fell asleep without finishing the sentence. How adorable.

  I took a glance at Tarashak and the flaming barrier around us keeping out the smarter of the wildlife and burning to death the less smart, at least two or three a minute. The general glanced back at me, grunted something, then turned his attention back to whatever it is he was keeping his attention on. It seemed there was nothing else to do, except to enjoy another night sleeping inside my SAC and with my helmet on.