Salos, Fairy Fire the demon! Cass said.

  The purple flames around her went out, reappearing around the demon.

  Every eye fell on it.

  The fleeing paladins faltered, all turning and hesitantly approaching. The ones that had already been running to their captain’s aid ran faster, the whisper of Fairy Fire egging them on.

  They all barely avoided the rush of the dragon. He slammed into the demon, his head striking the demon like a hammer, driving the creature into the shield of the captain. Crushing him between dragon scale and steel.

  The demon went down.

  The captain stumbled back under the impact, still disoriented from the pain radiating through his soul.

  The dragon was on top of the demon, his claws raking into the demon’s writhing flesh. Blood pooled around it.

  But the demon didn’t go quietly. It stabbed up at the larger beast, its lightning blade slicing through dragon scales like a laser through paper.

  The dragon roared in pain, his claws digging deeper.

  The paladins drew closer, their shields and swords raised, forming a wall between the dragon-demon fight and their still kneeling captain. His screaming had fallen to pained panting. Sweat beaded on his forehead.

  Maybe this would work exactly like she’d hoped.

  The demon was unexpected, but if the dragon could kill it on his own, Cass could return to plan A without worry. Alyx and Salos’s fears were unwarranted. The demon was just another monster.

  Plenty killable by force. Just like anything else.

  Not worth putting extra consideration into.

  Things were going according to plan—

  A Fortitude’s Protection flickered into existence between demon and dragon. Dragon claws slammed into the green force field.

  The demon staggered back to its feet, long ribbons of flesh hanging from its body. Its right arm was mangled, broken in at least three places, each break twisted like a new and unnatural joint. It stood unsteady, its left leg similarly broken, the bones twisted to look more like a dog’s digitigrade leg with an extra bend halfway down the shin.

  What was left of its flesh rippled. Maroon splotches flared over the tattered skin.

  Cass’s stomach twisted. How could it still be standing? How could it still be alive?

  She could see its organs, pierced and torn, hanging from its open stomach. She could see the white of its bone. Atmospheric Sense could feel air against the outsides of its lungs and around its heart.

  It should be dead.

  The air buzzed. Lightning flickered up and down the demon’s body, buzzing like nerves across torn flesh.

  The dragon slammed another claw into the demon’s shield. Demon and shield were knocked back under the dragon’s Strength. Back into the line of paladins and their shields.

  The demon turned on them as he fell, landing sword first in one of the paladins. The lightning blade sank up to the hilt in the man’s chest.

  The paladin gasped. It didn’t seem to matter to the demon or the force behind the demon’s blade that the sword was supported by his three-times broken arm.

  Simultaneously, the demon’s free hand made an arcane gesture. Three orbs of electricity materialized around it, rotating around its body in a slow and widening arch. They each struck an unprepared paladin, electricity exploding into wide storms of lightning, striking everything and everyone nearby, sending lightning coursing through metal armor and the bodies within. Paladins dropped to the ground—not dead yet, Atmospheric Sense informed her, but definitely paralyzed.

  The remaining paladins broke, their line splitting, each man trying to put as much distance between themselves and the demon and its electric attacks as possible.

  The paladins distracted, the demon’s phantom hand snapped out, crushing the soul of its first victim. The paladin screamed in pain as shards broke from his soul. As the demon devoured the pieces. Until the little remains of his core disintegrated.

  Only then did the demon let the corpse fall, finally silent, from its sword.

  Its soul surged in Cass’s vision, like a fire with gasoline poured over the open flames.

  Another soul broken. Another soul eaten.

  She could do that too, a voice whispered from the far side of Soul Guard. She could effortlessly take down paladins many levels above her, too.

  She shook the thoughts away. This was wrong. She could see the pain.

  The demon bent down, pulling a paralyzed paladin up from the floor. Their phantom hand reached out to the man’s core.

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  But they deserved it, didn’t they? She was willing to kill them. She was willing to let their deaths be experience which nourished her level and her skills. Why not feast on their living souls?

  No. No. No.

  Cass’s hand clenched around her dagger. This was different. She wasn’t a demon. She didn’t want to hurt anything like that.

  Soul Guard has increased to level 10.

  And she couldn’t let this monster do so either.

  She threw a Tempest Blade at the demon, a blade of invisible wind racing across the cathedral. It sliced across the demon’s tattered wrist. Blood spurted from the wound, a paper cut amid the grotesque wounds it had already accumulated. The demon did not release his prey.

  The dragon rammed into the demon and paladin, body checking the pair across the room. Paladin and demon bounced over the floor, the paladin sprawling amid the others, the demon slamming into the central altar.

  The dragon roared and charged after it, the purple Fairy Fire the only thing in the dragon’s eyes.

  On the ground, the demon clawed itself into a sitting position, its back to the altar, the fallen priestess’s corpse beside it. It held a hand over her chest, its long fingers twisting in arcane gestures.

  Blood rose from her torn viscera. It pooled in the air, growing and glowing with crimson promise.

  Call of Blood

  [A skill for accumulating the fallen life force of foes for use in further skills.]

  Oh, that couldn’t be good.

  Cass leapt forward, a Tempest Blade whirling to her dagger’s edge, sparking with electricity. She threw it, sending it flying for the creature’s neck.

  Its dominate hand was busy. Its offhand was broken. It should have been helpless.

  Instead, that crimson phantom hand appeared from its chest, a summoned Fortitude’s Protection springing to life between lightning blade and writhing flesh.

  Salos jumped from her shoulder, darting for the blood ball even as she threw another pair of blades at different angles.

  The blood ball grew. The priestess’s corpse dried up before their eyes.

  The demon’s index finger beckoned the ball to it, and the ball flew.

  Salos swiped at it as it flew past, his claws trailing through the blood’s surface. It oozed the last stretch, leaking a trail of crimson but not stopping. Not breaking.

  Its hand grabbed the ball from the air as the phantom hand blocked each of Cass’s Tempest Blades.

  It brought the blood to its lips and swallowed the thing.

  Cass’s stomach turned.

  Mana pulsed through the creature’s body.

  Unknown Blood Technique

  [Purpose: Recovery]

  Before her eyes, the demon twitched. Already writhing flesh knit back together before her eyes, the newly joined skin now vibrating like bees had been released beneath. Its broken arm twisted around, the bone resetting itself with a sickening snap into place. Its body jerked up, its crushed leg inflating like sausage pressed into a new casing to support its weight.

  The dragon lunged, jaws wide.

  The lightning blade appeared in the demon’s hand. With a twist of its now whole wrist, it slashed across the dragon’s snout.

  The dragon grunted, its head turning from the pain as the demon stepped out of the way.

  The demon was uninjured. Like neither the captain nor the dragon had ever touched it.

  Abyss and blood. Salos slunk back to her side. It has blood skills, too? A demon with blood skills. He shook his head. This is going to be messy.

  Is it going to be able to recover like that again? Cass asked. Surely a skill as powerful as that had to have a long cooldown or significant costs of other resources, right?

  Depends, Salos muttered.

  Depends?

  He shot her a frustrated glare. On whether the limit is Health or time. If we are lucky, it has a long cooldown. Skills like that usually have multi-day cooldowns if that is their limiting factor.

  And if it’s not time? Cass asked.

  Then you should assume it will do that every time the spilt blood is greater than the injuries it has sustained. Salos glared at the demon, unbridled hatred radiating off him. Because every time it devours a soul, it tops off its internal Health. Skills like that combine stolen blood and the user’s Health to instantly heal wounds.

  So, in order to kill it—

  And we need to kill it, Salos interjected.

  I would need to do so without letting it kill anything else it can draw blood or steal souls from? Cass finished like he hadn’t interrupted her.

  Salos nodded. Or kill it so fast it does not have time to draw off blood for its recovery skill. Probably best not to let it eat more souls either way. Every one it gets will be another spike in power.

  Cass ran a hand through her hair.

  The demon was unhurt. The dragon chased it, claws swinging and maw snapping. Paladins flittered around the two, swords swinging after the demon, their shields blocking lightning.

  The demon wove through the onslaught, lightning blade lashing out at everyone and everything, cutting through steel and scale with abandon, snatching souls from bodies and cramming the shards down its throat. The dragon’s attacks caught more paladins than the demon in its sweeping claws.

  Across the room, the captain shoved himself to his feet. He raised his sword, his aura glowing around him in vibrant green. “Order of the Copper Crescent! To me!”

  His voice echoed through the building in an undeniable rallying cry. A surging wave of mana accompanied it, grabbing at the priests and paladins cowering in the corners of the room. Like a shot of adrenaline, they stood straighter. They hurried to their captain’s side, forming ranks of shields and swords.

  Behind him, more paladins ran into the room, summoned at their captain’s call. They reinforced the growing line between the captain and the rest of the room.

  The captain stood tall behind them, looking every bit unaffected by the still bleeding gash in his side. If not for the pulsing, jagged soul in his chest, Cass might have thought he too was as invincible as the demon.

  “Kill every last one of them! The demons, the Veldor brats. All of them. Send their broken souls to be judged by our Lady!” The captain leveled his sword at the demon and dragon, sweeping it across the room.

  Either end of his line of paladins surged forward. Half ran at the demon and dragon, formalizing the attack around the two into an encirclement, locking them in a tightening space together.

  The other half charged across the room. Toward Ahryn.