Dawn- An Age Of Darkness

I unsheathed my sword. 

I was weirdly excited to know demons were just as terrible as I remembered. 

"You want to play, halfling?" The demon general growled and so did his gator. 

The soldiers though, just stayed at a distance. 

"Play? Oh, no, no. That would be far too cruel for you. I'm just simply going to kill you and then destroy this army."

At this point even I wasn't sure if I was just bluffing or if I could actually pull it off. 

I probably could. 

"Are you seriously still going on about that!" Neira almost screamed as she whispered. 

She was freaking out. 

"Well, they'd go destroy your city anyway." And if left unchecked this whole army was headed off to war. 

"Huh, what do you mean?" Neria grabbed my robe and visibly paled. 

Wait, did she seriously not figure it out yet?

Their whole city was supposedly a nuisance to the empire. After all, if the people aren't loyal to the empire, then what's the point of having such people?

That was probably the emperor or whoever sent this army's reasoning. 

"Don't you see. What's the point of a whole army coming this place? You think they'd come all this way just for a poultry sum of three hundred men?"

To an army that was ten-twelve thousand strong, a unit of three hundred men was nothing. And yet, these people came through wastelands just to be here? While wasting rations and precious stamina no less?

The world wasn't so amazing and kind like that. 

The demon just looked straight at me. "Who are you?" 

"Daarc Green."

Whispers floated and turned into chaos. 

"SILENCE!" the demon roared. "He's dead. Lord Namcha killed him."

The whole army took some steps back and made enough space. The whispers stopped altogether. 

It was eerily quiet. 

"Are you sure?" I imbued the sword in holy mana and slowly moved ahead. "Cause last time I checked, I'm very much alive."

Well, kind off. 

Okay, maybe not. 

But still!

***

Swoosh!

The spiked ball soared through the air. The chains rattled. 

Dodging wasn't easy. And I was constantly on the edge, just defending. 

Let alone attacking. 

"What's wrong? Aren't you supposed to be the god killer or something?" The demon snickered. He had the head of a pig but he never oinked. 

He kept on swinging the damn thing like it didn't weigh a thing. It was a metal ball and the size of a yoga one too! 

"I've never claimed to be so."

And the sun was kind of going full throttle too.

But there was another reason for this sluggish performance. 

That being, sizing up my enemy. 

He was a general. There was no way he made it this far without having actual ability. 

Which meant, taking him on without any preparation, without gauging his skills first was stupid: Underestimating him was only going to cost me. 

"HHH!" he screamed in a weird way and started spinning the chains. The spiked ball spun over his head like a planet orbiting the sun, just very fast. "But playtime's over."

I grinned. If that thing hit me, it was going to be over. 

"HARRAH!" He threw it. 

The thing came straight for my head. 

Dodging wasn't an option as the girl was behind me. 

So- 'Focus.'

I imbued myself, I imbued my body and just held the sword firm. 

The old man once said something. 

If I could maintain focus adequately and believe, I could cut through anything. At the time I thought it was bullshit. But I'd been training for the entirety of the last year. I'd been through much.

Focus!

Yeah, I lacked it. But that was no excuse.

The whole thing about trying to cut through a literal tree was just to prove the geezer's point. 

So-

And yet, I could feel my breath going wild and heart pumping rapidly. 

Perfect. 'That's more like it!'

SLASH!

CLANG!

Sparks flew and the sword went straight through. 

I was shoved back two steps. 

'Yes!'

The metal spike got cut in two and separated, going straight past me, missing the girl. 

Both halves fell just behind. It was empty in the middle.

And- now the demon was just in the right position. 

My head lowered slightly and my body moved forward on its own.

Straight ahead. 

Nothing else mattered. 

A straight slash! 

The sword landed on his face, blazing through his chest towards the loins. 

One swift motion.

One strike. 

It was done. 

"ARGH!" He groaned, blood leaking from his face and body. But he didn't fall. Rather, he just hung there, something oozing from his body: passed out. That something wasn't blood.

Thump! A heartbeat.

I took a step back. 

I had a bad feeling about that gooey black substance he was leaking. He was also leaking blood, but the amount of black substance was definitely more. 

"Is it normal for demons to have that black stuff?" I said, not quite looking back.

"No, that's not normal." Neira's voice had urgency. "He's going to explode!"

Oh boy. 

"How big are we talking about?"

"The whole city." Neira fell on her knees. 

The whole city? Everything?

Which meant, the army was also done for. 

Thump!

Wait, then the purpose of this army- was sacrifice all along? It made sense, if this army was defeated and they were going to be killed regardless, self destruction did seem like the logical way. 

'But isn't there any way to stop-'

I vaguely remembered something. 

Moments before that tragedy, moments before I impaled Ve, everything was dark.

Everything was being hidden.

'Is it possible to envelop the explosion and consume it?' 

I remembered the way the emperor had consumed my holy magic. 

'Yes but, you'd require sacrifices.' The spirit answered immediately. 

'Such as?'

'Living demons as fuel for the magic in tens of thousands.'

Wouldn't that mean basically we'd be killing the army in exchange for saving the locals?

Then again, this army was supposedly a sacrifice from the start anyway.