《A Life's Journey》Chapter 2.5 - Bloody Mansion
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Berry was a jealous guy, so when Dayno, a mage, started to live on the village, with a beautiful wife and soon after a cute baby, he got real mad with jealousy. After many days of planning how to surpass Dayno, a minor demon offered him a deal and as the fool that he was, he actually accepted the deal.
No long after that he started to sacrifice blood of animals to the demon, but the demon wanted more, it wanted human blood. But sadly Berry was a coward never gathering enough courage to kill a villager, even with the madness of the demon slowly corroding his mind.
But as he never really provided enough blood to the demon he didn't truly gained powerful magic. Becoming only a Adept rank mage, a starting one too, Hannah had power around that same range too. In truth, if he had known mana manipulation he would have became a negative mage even stronger than he was now.
But of course, Dayno knew nothing about it, and no one truly know. Berry was really secretive about his hidden feelings as the only ones that knew about his demonic magic are the other cultists. But Berry was a irrational person so when he saw Dayno entering the room, with Aster on his arms no less, he raged like the barbarian on the outside.
Shouting with all his might, " Its you! Cursed mage! Why do you always appear at my path! My plan was almost complete!" As he spoke split flowed from his mouth like a river, his eyes red like he didn't sleep for some nights already, "The only thing that I was needing was the blood of a tier 3 beast and I would have unlimited powers! Why do you always appear at the worst moment?"
Dayno was confused by the screams of the butcher, he knew the man from sometimes in the village, but the man was screaming as if he was his worst rival. And even more what nonsense was this man saying?Why does this guy think he'll get unlimited powers by sacrificing a simple tier 3 monster ?If getting unlimited powers is that easy why does everyone train so hard to get stronger?And more where does this guy think he'll find a tier 3 monster ?He don't even have the necessary abilities to kill a tier 2.
The butcher said to many unreasonable things, more than Dayno was capable of understanding, so he did the rationale thing to do in these moments, he ignored it. And as he came here with intention of giving phis son a show, he started acting as a character of a heroic tale, " Barry, the butcher of the village! Your reign of terrors is over! I came today to get your head." His voice was in a theatrical tone, one that would made the mage blush if Rayssa was present. But as there are only Aster and a soon to be dead man on the room he could act unrestrained.
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Dayno didn't messed his name on purpose, but that still enraged the butcher the same. He was fuming in a bizarre way when he bellowed, "My name is Barry you trice dammed mage, I will kill you today!" The fifth rate villain tried to jump on Dayno his hands changing into claws.
But Dayno was not so slow as to let such a obvious move strike true, he easily dodged to the side with a gracious step. This time Dayno attacked the butcher, he simply shoot a flash of light at the chest of the cultist.
But that was enough, when Dayno's magic landed on the chest of the man he was immediately downed. Aster and Dayno waited for a few moments, thinking that it was a trap, but he never got up again. A very disappointing end to a very disappointing villain.
The silence reigned in the room for a few moments only breaking when Aster asked, "That is it?" He was expecting a incredible fight where his father would, after a unending show of magic, win in the end. But to his disappointment the opposition was so mediocre that only a shot was enough to kill him, even the little monkey on his shoulder was disappointed as he too wanted to see a epic fight between two mages.
Dayno was disappointed too, but because of a different thing, he wanted to appear cool to his son and look at his shining eyes during the fight. But there had no fight and all that he could see was a disheartened look where should be a radiant one.
After sometime tried to swallow the bitterness in his mouth Dayno finally said, "Let's go search your mother." In a attempt to switch the focus of the boy to something less pitiful and to someone that he loved, there has no away that Aster was going to reject search for his mother after all.
The group of downhearted people then began to search for Rayssa, which wasn't a really hard thing to do as there has a trail of bodies and the roaring of the barbarian could be heard until no too long ago.
When they finally found her she was in a open salon that was used to hold balls to the amusement of the nobles that resided on the place before the cultists. The salon while open and expansive, had beautiful pillars that survived even through the passage of the time. The place should been a awesome place at that times, but even if it survived the passage of time it couldn't remain intact after a barbarian raged through the place.
The wall, floor and even the ceiling were painted in red from all the blood that was splashed by the opponents of then barbarian. Instead of the lavish and extravagant things that decorated the place in the past, the only things that now decorated the salon are bodies of different kind of demonized animals, looking like islands on the sea of blood.
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In the middle of the room there had a body bigger than the others, different from the other bodies on the floor, this one was humanoid and had three horns poking out of its head an was almost the triple size of the demonized animals.
Resting above the the bigger body could be see the seated Rayssa, she was in a very bloody state, with injuries covering almost every piece of her body. The full body armor that was protecting her before was almost fully destroyed with only a few pieces of metal covering her upper legs and her right shoulder. One won't need to be a very perceptive fellow to see that the fight wasn't easy.
Looking at such sight Dayno was in disbelief, Rayssa was almost breaking to the Elite rank, How could something summoned by that useless fellow be strong enough to push her to this state? Though the mage, to allow a demon this strong to pass to this plane required that a enormous sacrifice was made, something that couldn't be possible.
After gathering his thoughts Dayno asked, " What happened inside this room?" He was having a hard time believing that something of that proportion was happening inside this village.
Rayssa, who was seated almost like a statue on the body, hearing the question jumped up like a released spring, laughing like a mad woman after having fought such a good battle, "The fools somehow get a demon, not a lesser one, a true demon! You should have seen their faces when they discovered that the thing come at its own will, It was hilarious!"
A true demon, that was how are called the demons who somehow get to achieve the Elite rank, losing the lesser and the minor on its name to signify the great difference on the power. And different from lesser demons, a demon can think like a sentient race amplifying even more the danger of such monster.
But what was more important on the moment was that the demon was a Elite. Rayssa while still having plenty of strength still only at the peak of the Adept rank and while it was possible for a Adept fight with a Elite for some time, it was almost impossible for the former defeat the latter with only some especial circumstances allowing it to happen.
Rayssa, as if reading all the thoughts that passed through the head of the mage, said while still laughing, " Don't think that only you have the potential to reach the Elite rank Dayno. From this day onward, I too can be called a Elite." She was very happy about the earnings of the day, not only she got to fight against a real foe, but she even advanced a rank in the end.
Dayno was surprised by the answer but that didn't mean that he was unhappy with advancement of his wife, in truth he was really happy about this development, " Congratulations! But don't forget that we still need to discover how the got sacrifices enough to summon it." These words had poured cold water on the laughing barbarian, but that didn't mean that they are untruthful.
In truth, to summon even a lesser demon in its true body was necessary to sacrifice enuresis lives to kill almos half the population of the village and even more If it was a true demon. Something that they would never discover later was that Berry was sacrificing all the blood from the animals butchered in the village for almost four years thinking that he had used all this blood to empower himself, if he had really accumulated all that power he would really been a match for Dayno. But all the sacrifices are hijacked by the demon to use it to open a back door to this plane, leaving him only with that mediocre level of power.
Rayssa ignored completely his words was there has no way that she, a barbarian, may know how to discover that kind of thing. The only form of acknowledgement that she did was to give him a mischievous smile and yell with all her might, " The last one to reach home was a looser!" Jumping like her life depended on that on the directionof the door to exit the mansion.
Dayno thought that it was a childish thing to do but soon he remembered that he did the exact same thing when he reached the Elite rank. But at that time Rayssa lost as there no away that she was going to be faster than a wind mage one rank above her, she must have been nurturing a grudge from that time.
But that didn't mean that Dayno was going to let her win the race. Using all the speed enhancing magics that he had, Daynos speeded like the wind in the direction of the house, he knew that if she won Rayssa wouldn't stop talking about it for a few weeks, if not months.
Aster who was still being carried by Dayno laughed out loud, he didn't get to see his father coolly fighting with a bad guy but the race was fun enough to make him forget about it.
When Dayno reached home, Rayssa was already waiting for him in the door, all the smugness of the world was being embodied by her when she spoke with a smile, "Looks like you are the loser this time." Dayno's face crumpled at these words but he chose to endure them for he knew that it was going to last for a really long time.
Raysaa, who was basking in the glory of the victory and the annoyance of her husband, opened the door and allowed Dayno to enter the house before her, she knew this action would only make him even more annoyed.
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