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[Influence check failed.]

Fear struck his heart, but his expression didn’t waver. As the clearing came into view, Zeth saw the demon sitting atop a pile of humans by his ritual circles wrapped up in their restraints, with chains strewn across the grass.

He’d made it.

He fell to his knees in the grass, breathing so heavily his lungs burned, and slammed his fist into the ground. “Fuck! Yes!”

Still gasping for breath, Zeth looked up to the sky, where the moon peeked through the treetops. It was beautiful. Everything in the world was beautiful.

“Holy fucking shit,” he muttered through smiling lips. “I did it. I got them.”

Hearing a groan of disappointment, he looked over at the demon, where it sat on its throne of prisoners.

“Don’t sound so happy to see me,” he said through ragged breaths. But even this thing’s attitude couldn’t get him down—not with the addictive sense of elation coursing through his veins right now.

“After a command like the one you gave me, you’ll understand that I was hoping you would not return.”

“Ah, right. I guess you were probably hoping I’d stay gone for twelve more hours so you could kill them all. Well too bad, motherfucker. I’m back.” He chuckled. “Not that me being here means anything good for those pieces of shit.”

“The bargain was that I would receive the lives of two prisoners in exchange for my help in obtaining them.”

“Yeah, yeah.” He stood up, trying to calm himself down at least a little bit. He thought about his plans for the future for a moment before continuing. “Pick out the two from among them that you think are the strongest. Highest Level.”

With jackets restraining their movements and gags in their mouths, the only thing the prisoners could do in response was widen their eyes and wriggle back and forth in protest, which they did profusely as the demon bent over to examine each one.

Zeth had no idea what Rank each of their Wicked Skills were at—how much of their minds they still had available to them. Would those with a maxed out Wicked Skill even fear death at all? Maybe some. After all, how could you continue to cause human suffering if you were dead? But he didn’t care one way or another whether these people were afraid. They’d killed his dad. They’d killed his fucking dad. And there was no earning mercy after that.

As the demon poked around the pile, it glanced over at Zeth, wearing a strange expression. “You do not seem to be as afraid as you once were. Do you have a high enough Influence Stat to resist my Skill?”

“No, it’s affecting me,” he said, staring at the terrified faces of the thralls. “I’m just too excited to feel it.”

It frowned, turning away and continuing to move the prisoners around, laying them side by side as he examined them. Eventually, it said, “Why did you send me ahead of you? Would it not have been more logical for me to protect you from your enemies?”

“Why do you ask?”

“I am curious.”

“I thought you said earlier you didn’t understand why someone would ask random questions just to satiate their curiosity.”

“Indulge me.”

He shrugged. “Well, I wanted to make sure you got them. These guys getting locked back up and put out of my reach was the worst-case scenario.”

“Would your death not be the worst-case scenario?”

“Hmm…No. No, I don’t think so. Second worst, sure. But not number one.”

Once again, it frowned, saying nothing as it absent-mindedly poked and prodded at the skin of the different prisoners.

“Hey, how were those people able to hurt you, by the way?” Zeth asked. “I thought you were strong enough to be basically invulnerable to humans.”

It sighed. “While you slugs are all pathetic and worthless as a species, the System unfortunately grants a few of you the power to touch the mighty form of a demon. There are some cheap tricks offered to the higher Levels in a select few Classes available to your species that frequently get in our way. That was one of them.”

“What was the Skill? And the Class?”

“I have no idea. I do not waste my time learning the intricacies of feeble human resistance. I simply identify the problematic slugs among you and eliminate them. Unfortunately, my ignoramus of a summoner forbade me from doing such a thing, and so I was unable to fight back in that particular moment.”

Zeth rolled his eyes. “Are all demons this eager to insult the person that summons them?”

“If by that you mean to ask whether all demons have an accurate assessment of the slug they are forced to work alongside, the answer is no. Some demons have an even lower opinion of your species, refusing to ever answer any summons whatsoever so as to avoid being in your presence. However, I prefer to look at things from a more logical standpoint. No matter how mind-numbingly pathetic it feels to take orders from one of you slugs, I am willing to endure that feeling in order to gain my Levels. Speaking of which,” it grabbed two of the thralls and held them up in the air, “I have finished selecting who are likely the two strongest humans from among these. May I kill them now?”

“In just a few minutes. First, put them down in front of me. I want to speak with them.”

It tossed the two prisoners on the ground, where they tumbled to a stop in front of them. A man and a woman, looking up at Zeth with wide eyes as they wriggled back and forth.

He stepped forward and bent down, pulling the gag out of the mouth of the man.

“So,” Zeth said, “do you remember, about a month ago, ambushing a man while he—“

“Yes,” the man interrupted. “Yes, I did it. I killed someone. The one you love. It was—you said a man? It was your husband. I killed him. He screamed and cried and begged for his life, but I tortured him anyway. He died on his knees. A worthless, pathetic testament to human weakness and the—“

Zeth pushed the gag back into the man’s mouth, frowning. Seemed like they’d confess to whatever he asked if they thought it’d upset him.

The man shouted muffled words, trying to spit the gag back out of his mouth, but Zeth ignored him. Was there any way he could get an honest answer out of these people?

Though, he supposed the real question was, did he care?

They were all monsters. And some number of them had killed his father. All of them deserved to die, though. So then, he supposed he would simply kill them all. He didn’t care which ones specifically were responsible.

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Though, there was the question of the five individuals that had been missing. The ones that had ‘X’ marks next to their names on that one list Pombus had showed him. If the ones that had killed his dad were the ones missing, he’d have to find them next.

Not that any of that meant these people were getting spared. These were his sacrifices. His blood bags. And the two in front of him would be first.

For posterity’s sake, he undid the gag of the woman, just to see what she had to say.

“Alright,” he said as she spat fibers from her mouth, “I’m going to kill you in just a few seconds. Do you have anything to say before that happens?”

“I have a lower Wicked Rank than the others here,” she said with a cough. “Please, you can join our group. C-cull the others if you want; they’re unreliable anyway. But I’m knowledgeable. And y-you clearly have the power to change the way this town is run—the way this world is run! Join us; I know the trade routes of all the merchants in a ten mile radius. All the caravans you could ever dream of raiding, and with your demon, you can kill off their bodyguards for extra Levels!”

He stared at her blankly.

Her words became more desperate. “Please! I’d be a valuable teammate. A-a valuable servant! Yes, I’d serve you. I’d do anything you want! S-surely you can’t resist what I can offer? I’ve tortured and killed dozens of people for countless scraps of information that can help with any raiding you might do. I\'m a Level 12 Assassin—a-an illegal Class, high Rarity, y-you won’t see anyone else like me! I have a stash of coin I can lead you to, if you just let me out of my restraints…P-please! A-and I’ve even worked with Blood Mages in the past, so I know—”

“What?” he interrupted. “Who?”

She furrowed her brows. “I-I thought you were working together. Do you not know about…?”

“Just tell me everything you know about them,” Zeth said, voice low.

Seeming to sense danger in his tone, she shook her head with wide eyes. “I-I didn’t know you were rivals, I swear! I never even saw who it was! I-I just got messages—notes and payments telling me to do things.”

“And those things were?”

“Mainly just odd jobs. Killing specific people, ambushing certain incoming caravans. That sort of thing.”

Zeth frowned. “What, so you were going and collecting money and corpses for the Blood Mage to use?”

“No, no, we didn’t hand anything over. If we stole any money, it was ours to do with as we pleased. B-but the deal can change with you! We can give you everything we take, if you want!”

“I am growing impatient,” the demon said from behind the two people.

The woman glanced at it with wide eyes, then back at Zeth. “I swear I can be useful! I promise! J-just untie my bonds, and I can lead you to a stash of money further out in the forest. More coin than you can dream of. Then you can tie me back up, kill me, it doesn’t matter. Just let me show you first, please!”

Zeth ignored her repeated attempts to coax him into a trap. “So you don’t know their identity? Hm. Do you remember who you killed?”

“I-it was a lot of people.”

“What were the last ones you did before you got caught, then?”

“Summoner,” the demon said, “I completed the task for you, and as per our deal, am now allowed to take the lives of these two prisoners. You cannot delay further; we laid out the conditions in advance. Regardless of your requests for me to wait, I will soon be allowed to move freely.”

“I-I really don’t remember much,” she pleaded. “B-but if you just give me a little more time, I promise I can remember! J-just take off these restraints for a moment. I need to move around t-to get my mind going. Yes, please, just let me move around for a little while before you kill me, that way I can remember! G-get my blood flowing.”

The demon began walking toward her, the deal apparently automatically going into effect as it’d said.

Zeth stared at her. “I guess it would be nice for your blood to flow.”

Her eyes widened in relief as she misinterpreted his words, and Zeth looked up from her to meet the eyes of the demon and nodded.

As it approached them from behind, the woman’s relieved expression quickly transformed into one of horror. “No, please, don’t! I’ll do anythi—”

She was cut off as Zeth secured the gag back around her mouth. The man next to her flailed wildly, but was unable to move more than a couple feet wiggling his body back and forth.

Zeth looked between the two of them, his breathing growing heavier and heavier from anticipation. He felt the corners of his lips tugging, begging to spread into a grin. Neither of these people had technically given him reason to believe that they, specifically, had been the ones to kill his dad, but it didn’t matter. They were clearly both connected to his death, and apparently to the Blood Mage, as well. He unconsciously leaned forward, closer to the pair as the demon knelt to the ground between them.

“Don’t waste any blood,” Zeth said. “I want to use their corpses after they’re dead. But, y’know. Feel free to make it slow and painful.”

It chuckled.

“What’s so funny?”

“You know, human, you have done quite a bit of moral grandstanding about my species being worthless scum that will only help you if we get to take a life. But I do not believe even I have been as excited to kill as you are to see these two humans die.”

“...No, I think it’s different.”

“How might that be?”

Zeth broke eye contact with the woman, her eyes begging for her life when her mouth couldn’t. He shifted his gaze to the demon, who was looking at him curiously. “Well, you’re killing these two people for power. You’d kill anyone if it meant getting your next Level. It’s so impersonal.”

“As opposed to?”

He chuckled softly, a gleeful breath that pushed life into the silent clearing. Perhaps it was delirium from lack of sleep that made him feel this way right now, but in this moment, he didn’t care. “You don’t see it? I’m doing this because it makes me happy.”

After a moment’s silence as it stared at him, the demon looked down and grabbed the necks of the two prisoners, pushing their faces into the dirt as they continued to let out muffled shouts and screams. As it calmly went through these motions, it spoke slowly, “Despite your oddities—or, no, perhaps because of them—you have been an…interesting summoner. So, I will grant you a moment of honesty before I leave.”

Zeth looked at the demon curiously.

It met his eyes for a moment, then looked back at the prisoners. “I have had a number of memorable summoners. Many were far more powerful than you. I have had summoners that commanded armies, and ones whose lairs spanned the underground of entire cities. I have been handed items to use during my missions that turned thousands to dust in a mere second. But you are the first human I have ever met that has made me feel afraid.” It paused, letting out a laugh. “I get the sense that even when I am back in my realm, unable to ever be reached by you again, I may still occasionally be struck with a mood that forces me to check underneath my bed to ensure you are not lying in wait for me to fall asleep.”

Zeth furrowed his brows . “What are you talking about? Why is that?”

It shook its head, laughing again like Zeth had just told a joke. “Goodbye, human.”

With that, it held out a single clawed finger from each hand, gently resting them on the backs of the necks of each of the two people. And then, with a single movement, it pushed downward, piercing the spot right where their spines met their skulls. After a momentary jolt of movement, the man and woman fell still.

The moment they died, the demon disappeared, simply blipping out of existence like it had never existed at all.

Zeth stared at the two corpses, breathing heavily. He’d done it. The two of them were dead. A breathless laugh escaped his throat, low at first but slowly gaining intensity. As his cackling echoed across the clearing, the rest of the prisoners—nine remaining now—shifted around in their restraints.

He looked over at them, all lying next to each other in the dirt. A part of him wanted to go and slaughter each and every one of them right now, running on the high coursing through his brain. But he closed his eyes, doing his best to re-center himself.

C’mon, c’mon. Calm down. Count backward from one hundred in increments of seven.

Taking a deep breath with each number he counted down, he eventually finished and opened his eyes. He was calmer; the demon leaving at least let the artificial fear flow out of his brain. But his mind was not totally quiet.

This was a big, big win. And not just because he’d completed one of his main goals.

Each and every one of those prisoners was worth one favor from a demon. And judging by what he’d been able to accomplish with just a single one working for him for just a couple hours, he couldn’t imagine what nine more would be capable of.

The demons weren’t omnipotent or invincible, of course—especially not with that woman with the shining light running around—but they were stronger than the vast majority of people in this town. And, after working for so long totally alone, having any sort of a helping hand was more than welcome at this point. His mind raced with the possibilities.

Now wasn’t the time for daydreaming, though. Now was the time for action. Even now, those two bodies were leaking perfectly good blood.

His gaze shifted over to the ritual site. Seemed like it would be yet another sleepless night for him. He’d lost track of how many straight hours of continued consciousness he was on now, but with his heart pounding in his chest the way it was, he pushed it back just a few hours more. He could sleep after this. But not yet.

He looked between the two bodies, then over at the nine more people waiting to be killed. “Lotta blood at my disposal, huh? Better get to work.”