What stood before them was a young girl around the age of ten. She had on a simple white one-piece dress that came above her knee. Written across her chest were the words ``love me” in bold, black letters. Her cute brown sandals wrapped around her feet. The most specific part about her was the burly sack over her head, just like the boy they had met a while ago. A different drawing of a tired scowling face was drawn with a black marker.

A strange whump whump whump sound could be heard from behind her until finally, a black toy helicopter appeared above her head.

“I’m tired.” The little girl slumped her shoulder. She didn’t move from her position; Alexus could hear a bit of a slur of her voice, leaving behind a deep sigh. “I’m tired.” She repeated.

Her foot shuffled forward into a half limp half walk pace with her feet lazily dragged behind her, her hands swung side-to-side, brushing against her dress.

Jones tilted his head. He then walked towards the kid. His face slightly softened, bringing back the Jones that Alexus has known for the past few days that he has talked with. “Hey, kid. You should go back to your mother.” He tried to shuffle her on her way.

“Jones!” Alexus shouted. Instinctively, he felt a very similar feeling before with the boy. He saw a swirl of black energy dance around both her hands, covering them into soft black flames that only his eyes could see.

“What? She’s a lost kid, though I find the whole sack thing weird.” Jones half-heartedly chuckled as the toy helicopter danced around her. “She’s not going to hu-”

Boom!

An explosion sounded off in front of Jones as he flew and smacked his immense body against the wall. They all flew backward; their body skidded or clashed against the wall. Alexus was lucky enough to be the farthest one away from the explosion and saw what happened. He didn’t get injured because of the suit that took most of the impact away, and he only lost was air in his chest and the stinging pain in his shoulder.

A small toy tank had squeaked out from behind her and shot a tiny energy ball, completely missing Jones by a hair's breadth away. The force from the shot destroyed the opposite wall, leaving behind a gaping hole through five rooms.

“What kind of bullshit is this?!” Jones stumbled back up with half of his face bloodied. He was appalled at what just happened.“The toy blew up the wall!”

“Yes, Mr. Obvious. Don’t you ever learn?!” Timothy shouted, pissed off. He pushed himself off the ground while scrapes and cuts riddled his arm. “That’s a Child Demon!”

“I know a child Demon. That’s no Child Demon!” Jones shook his hand in front of him, flailing around in complete disbelief. “She has a miniature-sized tank!”

The toy tank squeaked and rolled forward. It aimed in between Timothy and Jones. Then, glowing with ghastly black swirls, it powered up.

“Oh, for crying out loud!” Timothy didn’t have the time to think. He dove forward into a roll towards the tank. His hand scooped up the toy in hand. It shocked him, causing the toy to flip towards the little girl. The tank shot forward past the girl’s head with a loud devastating boom and blew up the ceiling over her. Papers, debris, chairs, and even a table all fell from the ceiling and down towards her.

The toy helicopter whizzed around and shot upwards in a tatatatatata sound of a Gatling gun; the debris broke apart or the coarse altered, causing it to fall a couple of inches away from her.

“I’m tired.” She said again. This time she tilted her head and let out a deep sigh. It was as if saying that word itself was a pain; her body wavered like a willow, back and forth, until she froze.

Alexus then saw the well of black energy swirl around her hand, becoming brighter and stronger than before. But then, all she did was move her right fingers into a strange sign, and the toy helicopter zoomed past her and headed straight towards them.

“You gotta be kidding me!” Jones scrambled onto his feet. He ducked and ran, shooting towards the nearest cover he could find.

The others followed after, while both Crystal and Marcus fired back at the toy in the air. Then, swiveling around like a snake, the toy helicopter moved out of harm’s way without much effort, dodging most of the bullets.

Alexus dove towards the nearest doorway and pushed himself against the wall. He couldn’t believe how ridiculous these kids were. The first one was a boy who could use yo-yo like a deadly weapon that changed into different animal forms. These girls used toy helicopters and toy tanks to blow a hole through their heads.

His feet pushed hard onto his tippy toes, pushing him against the wall as flat as he possibly could in the hopes of staying hidden. A couple of times, he thought about running in and attacking. Alexus couldn’t help but wonder if he could even stay alive if one of those energy bullets hit him. The thought of finding out didn’t cross his mind.

“How is this possible?” said Timothy flabbergasted, “These things are not supposed to be fast!”

Marcus aimed and fired. A few of his shots were missed entirely by a small margin. But, even still, he didn’t stop and kept firing. Sometimes the bullets hit, while other times it didn’t miss but knocked it a couple of times off course.

With a loud tatatatata sound, the small machine gun, hoisted underneath its belly, shot small black energy bullets back at Marcus. It was as if it never had an end to its ammo. Marcus dove out of harm’s way just in time before the bullet left a large hole the size of his foot where he stood.

Crystal took cover at one of the open doorways, her back up against the wall as she shot towards the little girl without single remorse. The bullets flew through the air, straight at her chest.

The little girl’s right hand twitched, and black energy flames flared to life. Energy swirled with dense power around her like a whip. Suddenly, a handful of small robotic-looking dragonfly drones spilled out from underneath her dress. They were small and black, the eyes were red, and they zipped into action, blocking the bullet with their body. Every time a shot flew towards the little girl, the dragonfly was there, blocking the path before it could even hit her. They would crumble and fall to the ground uselessly.

“No way.” Timothy's mouth dropped, he ran for cover, diving behind Crystal.

“Marcus! I’m almost out!” Crystal yelled as more dragonfly drones fell onto the ground. “We need to get out of here fast!”

“I’m working on it!” Marcus ran and hid across from Crystal in another doorway.

Throughout the whole scuffle between Marcus and the helicopter, the dragonfly drones buzzed angrily around the little girl. But, then, swarms of them move fluidly like water.

“I’m tired.” The little girl replied. She cocked her head towards the side and just stood there motionlessly. The dragonfly drones swarmed around her like a locust, covering half of her body.

“Jones! This would be a great time to see you use that fire magic trick and blow them all away!” Timothy shouted, his head peeking from the side. He was looking around for anything that could help him but found nothing.

“I’m working on it!” Jones was hunched over. His hands in front of him, snapping his fingers in the hope of getting a spark. “Come on. Come on!” He desperately cried out, his eyebrows scrunched up while his body shriveled over his hand in the hopes of stopping any wind from possibly blowing it out.

With the third attempt of his finger-snapping, the flames on the tips of his fingers burst into small weak flames. “I got it!” He cried out in joy.

“Good, blast them away!” Timothy searched around the room that he hid himself in to find anything of use.

“I-I don’t know how!”

“Oh, for the love of god! Catch something on fire, throw a burning brick, I don’t know!”

Jones furrowed, he looked around frantically, opening cabinets and the closet. Then, out of the corner of his eyes, he saw an air freshener spray under the sink. Jones grabbed the spray in hand with his free hand with a desperate scramble. He got up on his feet and ran over towards the side of the doorway.

At that moment, Alexus’ eyes met with Jones. He knew instantly what Jones was going to do with the air freshener spray in his hand. When he saw his sword in his hand, he motioned his head towards the little girl. His small flames wavered as if it was about to go out.

Jones mouthed a couple of words Alexus didn’t quite understand, and he gave him a questioning look. Then, he pointed towards the sword in Alexus’ hand, followed by pointing towards the girl.

Alex's hand tightened around the hilt, not liking where this was going, but he nodded his head in understanding.

Pushing himself off the wall, Jones bolted towards the swarm of dragonflies that erratically buzzed around her body. Alexus followed right after, closely behind him. Jones lifted the can of spray and pressed downwards with a shout. “Die!”

A torrent of flames burst forward like an angry dragon breath, dousing the little girl completely. The dragonfly swirled around her like a tornado, pushing back the flames as best as it could. So many fell down, completely burnt and broken; Jones didn’t let go, allowing the spray to continue to burn.

Out of the corner of his eyes, Alexus saw the metallic sheen of the toy tank squeak forward and aim towards his head.

“Jones duck!” Alexus shouted.

Jones’ finger stopped pressing the button, and he ducked. A loud, sickening boom shot towards him, a large bolt of black energy flew over his head and left a large crater in the wall. Debris flew outwards, bouncing onto Jones's back. A loud gulp could be heard from Jones when he saw the hole in the wall.

Alexus was pushed back, stumbling backward from the blast. His shoulder hit against the wall, no pain was felt, and he pushed off. Then, with quick steps, Alexus ran towards the little girl. Both hands tightened around the hilt; he swung upwards with everything the moment he was right in front of her.

A couple of remaining dragonfly drones still alive zipped in front of him, blocking the attack. They crumbled onto the ground. Frustrated, Alexus rotated his body, ready to go into another swing. What he did notice was the tip of his blade nicked a bit of her neck, leaving behind a trail of blood.

Before he could go into a second swing, the little girl screamed a high pitch shrill. The sword clattered onto the ground. He fell down onto his knees, trying to dampen the deafening sound. He wanted her to stop, but he couldn’t move forward.

It took every ounce of strength he had to move his hands away from his ears and reach over towards the sword. A thin cut line appeared on the girl's throat with a diagonal swing, silencing her vocal cords. He couldn’t cut in deeply because of the shrill-like sound, but that slice did the trick, and his ears were safe.

Once again, Alexus swung his sword, aiming again to lop off her head. But, before he could finish the job, the little girl raised her hand and caught the blade with her hand. He pushed with all my strength in the hopes to cut off her hand, my muscles tensed, and even my arm started to shake from the power I put into the blade.

Alexus barely even budged forward; the strength of this little girl’s arm didn’t compare to what he could do. But unfortunately, his arm was tiring fast, and he was stuck in that one position, unable to do anything else.

“What are you doing?!” Jones cried out. He had finally got on his feet, spraying his makeshift fire sprayer at any nearby dragonfly drones. Then, ducking his head, he escaped from getting swarmed on, and instead, the dragonfly drones met a torrent of fire.

“Trying. To. Cut. Off. Her. Head!” Alexus gritted his teeth, accentuating every single word. All the muscles in his body were screaming in pain.

“Then push harder!”

“I AM!” Alexus roared through his teeth.

Blood continued to ooze out of the demon girl’s neck; her other free hand reached up in a panic, trying to stop the blood.

“Kill her now!” Timothy yelled. “Before she heals!” He found a makeshift metal bar that looked like he ripped off a table.

Crystal shook her head to clear her dazed mind. Then, she raised her rifle and shot off a couple of rounds. The first one hit the demon girl on the shoulder; she didn’t even flinch when the bullet hit her. Instead, she faltered backward a couple more times, swung forward like elastic bamboo, and started to stroll towards us like a zombie, even pushing him along with her.

The other bullets were stopped by the remaining dragonfly drones left; Crystal clicked a couple more times and drew down her gun.

“I’m all out!”

“Are you kidding me? We haven’t even killed her yet!” Timothy threw a tantrum. “She’s a freaking super zombie at the way she’s making her way over here!”

“Then why don’t you shut up and do something about it,” snapped Crystal, “because I don’t see you helping!”

“What do you want me to do? Run up to it and smack it!?” Timothy cried out in disbelief. “I could, you know, pick her up and smack her on the butt.” He said with sarcasm.

“That would be helpful.” Crystal replied with just as much sarcasm.

“Shut up, woman. It’s not like you're doing any damage.”

“What are you talking about? I at least did!” Crystal squashed her body against the wall, hiding away from the toys that were still out there.

“You guys! This is no time to fight amongst each other!” Marcus shouted angrily. “I’m running out of bullets, and this damn toy helicopter is not going down!” The continuous sound of the gunshot could be heard.

“I’m…..” The demon girl stuttered; the cut on her neck started to rapidly heal, leaving no trace of any damage left behind.

Alexus scrunched his eyes, horrified at what he was seeing. Her voice was healing, and this meant bad news. He knew he couldn’t continue to struggle with her in a strength fight between them. He was even being pushed backward, skidding across the ground from her strength.

“Tired!” the girl demon screamed into a shrill. Alexus’ strength wavered from the painful sound.

The girl demon just half-heartedly moved her arm that held his blade forward, throwing him. He flew across the hallway, hitting Marcus in the back. They both tumbled onto the ground until he hit the wall. He slid down on the floor flopped over, dazed. His head and ear were pounding from her shrill. Trying to blink, his vision was out of focus, trying his best to see what was around him.

“I’m Tired. I’m Tired. I’m Tired!” The demon girl stamped her feet in anger. She took in a deep breath and started to shake uncontrollably.

Suddenly, Alexus felt a surge of dark and malicious energy coming out of her body. He bolted upwards, stared at her for a moment, and froze. Even the others could tell that there was definitely something wrong; they could all feel the surge of power that screamed at their instincts to run.

Black energy seeped out of her hand like liquid water, pooling on the ground around her. A large puddle of black energy started to form, getting bigger and bigger. Jones stumbled and scuttled backward, pressing the can of spray until it finally went completely out.

Something was strange about the looming shadow. They could all hear the crunching sound of breaking. Blobs of small silhouettes started to form out of the shadow.

“I don’t know what this girl is playing at, but I don’t like this,” said Marcus wearily.

The silhouettes started to take shape, multiple toy tanks, helicopters, and robotic dragonfly drones emerged. Alexus couldn’t believe how many they were. Finally, he lost count after twenty and knew they were possibly over thousands of them.

“Why don’t you take a nap with me?” The little girl cocked her head, her hand rested on her hips. Her words made me shudder, making me feel that death was once again only a second away.

“You can sleep forever.”

“Don’t just stand there. Run!” Crystal shouted. She bolted towards the opposite direction of the girl demon. Everyone followed right behind her. They had nothing to go against the swarms of dragonfly drones that buzzed angrily towards them. A couple of times, he swung his blade in front of him, chopping a few dragonfly drones in half.

“This is crazy! How in the world can she do that?!” Jones cried out, completely stupefied. “What is this fantastical crap? I mean, can’t they just give us a ‘normal’ attack?”

“Don’t ask. You should know better than I what a child’s imagination can do.” Timothy replied, running ahead of him.

Crystal turned a sharp right, she skids and picked herself back up. Her feet rushed forward, the others followed pursuit closely behind.

Alexus ran as fast as his feet could carry him, and right now, he was the last one following after Crystal. Compared to the other four, they were a lot faster than him, making him wish he had the speed to run as fast as them.

In the distance, Alexus saw Crystal push open the doorway to the fire escape. She bolted in while Jones, Timothy, and Marcus followed closely behind her. He felt a sudden shiver from his back and instinctively moved towards the left. A swish of air blew past him as a dark energy bullet shot by. It hit against the wall with a devastating boom, disintegrating it in seconds.

Air slapped Alexus in the face, causing him to lurch backward slightly off balance. It took a moment to get his bearings. Then, he scrambled forward, his hand reached out towards the door, and slammed into it. The door flew open, and he faltered forward, catching himself just in time before he could fall down the stairs.

Alexus flew down, half jumping down a couple of flights to frantically running in between. They all headed straight downwards to the next floor. An explosive sound was heard overhead. He knew instantly the tank had possibly caused a hole through the door, he didn’t stop to look up, and he flew past the half-closing door. They continued to run through the dim hallway as fast as our feet could take them. Finally, crystal kicked open the cafeteria door and stormed through.

They all followed after, continuing to walk through without stopping. Alexus noticed a handful of other Ouroboros present in the Cafeteria, eating their lunch. Five were females, and only two were males. He wondered how the two males ended up on this floor, but he didn’t ask. They were completely surprised at their sudden entrance.

“Crystal?!” One of the blond girls shouted out towards Crystal. She and her group of four other varieties of mixed-race girls got up right after. “What’s going on?”

“No time to explain. We got demon infiltration and two possible Legendary or Myth Class Demons in the building.”

“What?! That’s impossible. You were the one who set up the protection. So how did it fail?” She asked, power walking next to her.

“I don’t exactly know, but the chances are it wasn’t strong enough to hold against either type of Demons.” Crystal pushed past a wooden door and into the kitchen. She made her way towards the back, where they were a second invisible door the size of a small cabinet next to the freezer.

“Hey, wait. Why didn’t you check them if they were demons or not?” Timothy asked, pointing at the girls.

“Because I just don’t like you.” She bluntly replied.

“Wow, that’s harsh.”

“I know, right?”She replied sarcastically.

Alexus had to wonder what Timothy did to get hated so much. From Jones, now to Crystal. He must’ve seriously messed up somewhere down the line to get a cold shoulder.

Leaning over, she adjusted her eyes towards the scanner, and a loud beeping sound could be heard. The door clicked to unlock and opened. She reached inside and drew out multiple handguns, magazines, and boxes of bullets.

Marcus came over and helped her bring everything to the nearest counter to the layout.

“So, that’s what it was? A weapon safe?” The blond girl asked in surprise.

“Yea.” Crystal continually took out a couple more handguns, and the rest were the bullets and magazines. “We need to make our way down to the basement. We can’t stay here too long.”

“How are you so sure that the demons haven’t infiltrated from the bottom floor?” Timothy asked. He leaned against the counter, staring at the boxes of bullets. “We just met one crazy little girl with insane toys. How are we sure that there’s not going to be twenty more below us?”

“We don’t.” Crystal spoke, “but it seems the two that they met came from the top, in which case, I don’t know how that’s possible. There might be grunts below, but I don’t want to tango with what we just went through.” She took out the last box of bullets and walked over with loads of small boxes in her arm. The boxes spilled out onto the table.

“Going blind is suicide.”

Crystal stopped loading the bullets into the magazine. She looked at Timothy. “For your information, right now, the security room for all the cameras is on the 1st floor. I don’t know about you, but there is no other way.”

“Yes, there is.” Timothy gave a crooked smile. “Give me a computer, and I’ll show you what I can do.”

“The nearest computer is a few doors down.”

“That’s good enough for me.”

“Before we go, take some ammo.”

“Already ahead of you.” Timothy's hand curled around the nearest gun and started to load the bullets into the magazine. Jones also took one, while the girl with the blond hair and a skinny-looking guy took another.

Alexus, on the other hand, was a bit more comfortable with what he had. This sword was the first weapon that actually passed through the demon’s defense, in which case they told him that this sword was a lot more efficient than a gun.

Suddenly, the door to the kitchen burst open. A young man in his early teen ran into the room frazzled. “Help! The demons are here!”

“Shit.” Jones cursed. “So soon?”

“Well then, ladies, are you ready for another fight for your life?” Marcus clicked in a magazine and slid back the slide.

“Whenever you are.” Timothy gave him a curt smile that told Alexus that he was excited about the fight ahead.

“No,” Alexus replied, knowing that he wasn’t. Diving headfirst into danger wasn’t what he wanted to do, and today was one of those dangerous days.