With a thought, and a small wave of his hand, a circle of Solomon appeared on the ground before him. Even with this step he knew it would work, but the Demon he would call upon would be useful beyond proving whether or not he could summon it. Once the runes that encompassed the border of the circle finished burning themselves into the ground, a tear in space appeared within the circle’s confines with a POP. Inky shadow began to leak from the tear, and with an increase of his mana powering it, the leak became a deluge. It spilled out with gusto, crashing upon the circle’s borders but not able to move past and once it had filled the circle into a pillar of shadow that touched the ceiling, it folded in upon itself, condensing into a humanoid shape. The shape was tall, standing roughly 6’5” and it was immediately apparent it was not human. Before even revealing itself, the triangular ears atop it and the long snout growing out implied lycanthropic features, an implication made real when the shadow faded and in its place stood something that could be mistaken for a werewolf.

The gangly body would have been skeletally thin if not for the corded muscles that clothed it. From the neck down it looked human, other than the grey-blue skin, and its fingers that were unnaturally long, tipped with metallic claws seemingly sharp enough to poke a hole in you from the mere act of looking at them. The wolfish head was true to its appearance, ferocious and snarly, displaying an impressive accoutrement of large fangs that almost looked too big to fit. The eyes were mismatched in colour, one filled with black and rimmed with what looked like blood, the other was the milky white of the blind, save for the golden rim in place of the blood of its fellow. Leathery wings sprouted from its back but were folded neatly behind and its skin was bare of clothes save the leather leggings that ended mid shin. It grinned savagely at Ammanas as it stepped out of the circle that he had just waved away. The growl of its voice came forth in an amused tone. “Master”.

“Orobas”, Ammanas greeted with a slight nod of his head.

“You’re finally in need of a sneak?” Orobas replied with an even wider grin.

“Of a sort. You’ll be scouting the area for me; it appears we’ve found ourselves in an entirely different world.” Ammanas didn’t really have much need for Orobas once he got to the higher levelled areas and became familiar with them. This strange demon was known as a Baikou demon. Its type was well known for their superior abilities in all manner of shadowy activities, sneaking and spying, assassinations and espionage and so on. They were frail in a straight up fight compared to others of their level but their overwhelming speed, wickedly sharp claws and a wide range of abilities allowing for escape from tight spots meant they were hard to kill even in an ambush. Implying, of course, you managed to catch one in the first place. Whilst the softness of the ground and cave he was in told him he was in an area of low danger, the fact that he was not in fact within the game also informed him that that idea might not carry across in the same way that his avatar seems to have. It was prudent to play at caution until he had a general understanding of the power of the local lifeforms.

The unnaturally wide grin seemed to return to more normal proportions when he heard there wouldn’t be any action beyond some sightseeing and cartography on his master’s behalf. A chance to stretch his long legs didn’t come too often, though, so it was not an opportunity to miss or complain about too hard. With an underwhelmed grunt of understanding, he turned and loped to the outside before stretching out his leathery wings and snapping them down. The whoomph of displaced air announced his departure. Ammanas didn’t spare him a glance however, as he was already working on calling forth one of his pets. He also wouldn’t have seen him anyway, for as soon as Orobas took off he had already thrown the notorious invisibility of the Baikou about himself.

Instead, he was debating on whether to call forth an animal companion, an elemental or one of his lesser familiars. He decided to go with a mix between two and opened a portal into the realm his pets were kept in. Out of the purply void flew a large, black bird. The raven circled around the cave as much as able before turning back and landing upon its usual perch. Its usual perch was a staff that Ammanas had removed from his inventory, a gnarled and slightly warped branch from an unusual silver wooded tree that had an offshoot towards the top. The almost perpendicular offshoot served well as a resting place for Edgar, one of his familiars. He always enjoyed raven’s as pets, especially with the unique nature of the companions he could call forth and train, as they just suited his look as a warlock and mage of the darker arts in addition to their quite impressive intellect and personalities. He leaned the silvery wooden staff towards him and reached to scratch the back of the raven’s head. Edgar nuzzled into his hand before cawing at him softly, his form of a greeting. Ammanas smiled at him, revealing surprisingly regular teeth.

The vampire teeth were actually a full second set that snapped down in front of the normal ones at will. The front four were more like hollow needles that had an outlet for the blood to flow through when puncturing prey. The rest were very solid and sharp, more for tearing and ripping than chewing. Not that he really needed to bite or drink from anybody anymore, once he got his race upgrade, he could essentially suck the blood essence out in a beam of blood red mist similar to some of the drain spells of his warlock class. But they were another weapon at his disposal and they didn’t get in the way, so he was actually quite happy with the setup. With his demon, pet and magic systems all working perfectly he had a pretty strong inkling that his mount system would work as it should too, as it was essentially an extension of the pet system. However, any big and flashy mounts, especially flying mounts would be awfully eye-catching and although he was confident in his ability to take on pretty much anything, pride goeth before the fall after all, so caution was advisable.

Deciding to put a hold on any mounted movements for now, especially since he could move much faster on his own through a forest than on any ground mount, he headed finally to the exit of the cave and into open air for the first time. Before crossing the threshold, he withdrew another mask from his inventory and equipped it. This one was for changing appearance, in case the locals didn’t take kindly to other races, however without any knowledge on what the locals were, he left it blank.

The mask was based on a doppelganger’s appearance and so the default look was of a doppelgangers appearance. His normal dark blue skin, high cheekbones and handsome jawline as well as the rest of his quite attractive face melted away. In its place, pasty, chalk white skin that looked bled of any and all colour covered a round, smooth face with black holes in place of eyes and an absence of any other features. Two thin lines crossed each other in the middle of the face, what would be an actual doppelgangers lips for their entire face opened out to form the mouth. Not being an actual doppelganger, these lines were merely decoration.

He decided not to tone down the armour however, despite its frightening appearance. It was of exceptional high quality and gave ridiculously high stat bonuses and boosts to spell power and his mastery of chaotic and dark energies. Perhaps the slightly unholy and frankly demonic appearance would help him intimidate his way into some information. He just hoped the local life was sapient and humanoid.

Walking with the help of his staff, Edgar still perched atop it quietly, he stepped outside and beheld the world stretched out before him. It was trees. Trees as far as he could see from horizon to horizon, though the trees did get taller and denser further in so maybe something was hidden beyond his sight. Orobas would let him know once he found something however, so he walked further out into the clearing between the cave and the tree line and turned to look at his present shelter. The cave was formed within the base of what looked to be a volcano. It was possibly a lava chute that had met surface air and the inside had been eroded or dug out further. He couldn’t see any smoke coming from the peak, figuring the cave would be warmer if lava was still flowing within the mountain, so he took it to be dormant.

A rustling and creak of trees in the forest snagged his attention away from the volcano and cave, turning towards the sound to see an absolutely massive boar. It looked to be 7 feet at the shoulder, though for boars that was pretty much head height too, and tusks the length of his arm sprouted from its lower jaw. He tried to appraise it with the game system, but nothing happened. Edgar, too, looked intensely at it momentarily before losing interest, perhaps thinking this was still the game. How the AI governing his personality still functioned outside of the game baffled him but the snorting and huffing of the boar as its piggish eyes locked onto him brought him back to the situation at hand.

It charged at him, the ground shaking with its stride, but compared to his reaction speed it was practically running in slow motion. He was slightly disappointed at the lack of threat and was preparing to dispatch it with a shadow bolt of a much weaker level than his previous when it exploded. His vision was disrupted as its head turned into mist an instant before a cloud of dust exploded from the ground and spread through the area. Ammanas watched expectantly, already having an idea of what happened. An idea that was confirmed a moment later as the dust cleared and in place of the headless boar, whose body was slightly driven into the ground, stood Orobas who stared down at his kill with amusement. Apparently, he had finished scouting and decided to dive bomb the poor beast with invisibility active as it charged at his master. The sense Ammanas had of Orobas had told him he was nearby moments before the boar was killed though he wasn’t really focused on the sensation.

“Report”, he commanded as he stared at his summon. Despite his frankness so far with the demon, he actually got on quite well with him, with all of his summons and companions actually, a result of his ability to evolve the AI that governed them and as an extension to develop their personalities too.

Orobas grinned at him again then spoke in his growly voice. “You’ll be interested to know that the forest basically doesn’t end within the short time I had to fly it. Except to the right of your magnificent home here which faces south, so you’ll be wanting to head west for 10km.”

“Anything of interest beyond or within the forest?” Ammanas couldn’t be sure that there wasn’t sapient life living within the forest, such as a stereotypical elven or fae community, so it was possibly a good idea to head further into the forest instead.

Orobas nodded. “A couple of villages are relatively close to the edge, with a town I could see probably 10km north-west of one of the villages. Humans from what I could see in the ones I flew over. I stayed away from the town for now ‘cause I wasn’t sure how good they are at detection or if it was warded. It seems to be a major town.”

Ammanas tilted his head down and touched his chin with one hand. “So it was fortified then?”

A grunt of assent followed that question. “I’m thinking there’s something that threatens them in the forest, but all the beasties I saw were steering well clear of you, so I’d say you’ve let your aura slip and it was more than enough for these lambs.”

“Yes, I was unconscious for a while it seems, I wouldn’t have had control over it then. Well, might as well hit one of the villages first to get a clue before heading to town. I’m getting a medieval feeling from what you’ve suggested so far, so if they have minor settlements near the forest then there should be a city further west, and hopefully a library. Let’s head out whilst the sun is still rising. would you prefer to stay invisible or do you want to glamour yourself?”

“I’ll glamour myself, I haven’t interacted with any fresh meat in a while.” The grin went back to its sickeningly wide proportions again, before his demonic face changed into that of a human. A tall and handsome human, with suntanned, leathery skin. His face was angular and sharp, with an aquiline nose and a smattering of sandy hair atop his head. Smile creases formed crow’s feet next to his eyes, which were similar to the eyes of his natural self. One milky white, one with a dark, almost black iris but they lacked the colourful rims.

He was suitably toned, like he’d been working a field all of his life and looked to be somewhere in his 40s. Dark leather clothes of a fine make materialised about him, shoes, pants and a vest with a white, cloth, short sleeved shirt beneath. The glamour was complete. If Ammanas wanted to, he could focus his eyes slightly to see beyond most illusions, his high willpower preventing others making him see what he didn’t want to when he willed it but he was content with interacting with a human face for now. It made him feel slightly less lonely, despite not interacting much with others anyway back home on Earth. At least he had the option then. Ammanas set his own mask to a human appearance that made him look like Orobas’ son with the same hair and similarly sharp features. He figured if Orobas chose this look then it was likely that the locals were fair haired and fair skinned when they weren’t tanned from hard work in the sun all day.

Ammanas then indicated for Orobas to lead the way and hitched his robes slightly to keep the dirt off them, despite it being unnecessary. They kept themselves pristine through the magic of their making. With long strides from their tall frames, and the help of his staff with the quiet and watchful Edgar perched upon it, they strode away from the cave and turned right to head west into the forest, the sun shining now on their backs as it rose. With a slight turn back, Ammanas flicked his finger and a green spark flew away from him to land on the headless corpse of the boar that still sat there. No need to give animals reason to come skulking about his cave.

The spark landed on the bristles of the boars hide and immediately brought forth a blaze of green fire. The immolate quickly melted the entire corpse into ash within the small crater of Orobas’ landing. Satisfied, he nodded his head before facing forward again and following after his demonic servant who had not even paused for the commotion. So it was that he began his short walk to civilisation.