Heroes and a surprise attack (1/2)
Year 72 Month 12
The heroes arrive. Accompanied by an army of adventurers of three hundred. It is normal for heroes to have a huge group of tag-alongs, these people seek the glory and glamour of being associated with the heroes, but will probably be the first to flee should shit get out of hand.
The heroes themselves, five of them, are three boys and two girls, and they look no older than twenty. Or maybe slightly over twenty. The gods chose young teens for their demon killing tasks this time, and in a way, thats better than choosing high schoolers.
They ride into the makeshift camp, and one of them stops and stares in my direction. Though I cannot meet his eye, I could sense his probing gaze...
“Hmmm… I feel a familiar presence.” One of the heroes mutter, and rides his horse closer.
“You were here before, hero?” An adventurer accompanies him, and asks.
“No.” The armored hero places his hand on my bark, and I feel my body shiver a little. “Just... someone familiar... Hmmm…”
[Hero's sense]
The hideout shakes a little, and everyone freaks out. It seems this hero has some kind of magical touch, and my body reacts to it defensively.
The shaking causes Hendry to sigh, and he decides to goes out to talk to the hero.
“Hey hero.”
The hero’s eye widen and stares at Hendry. “Hendry!”
The adventurer next to the hero raise his sword at Hendry. “Eh? Who goes there.”
“It is fine. Lay down your arms. He is one of us.” The hero stares at Hendry. “Hendry. It’s been a while…”
“Yes it has. Anyway, take your hands off the tree, and I.. I might need your help.”
The hero takes his hand off. “Well, nice to see you, again.”
Hendry pauses. And sighs. “Nice to see me? I take that means you stopped blaming us for her death?”
The hero shakes his head. “I’d like to think we have come to terms with it.”
“Really?” Hendry takes a step back.
“We were all too eager. Too excited to be given this opportunity, this chance to make something of ourselves.” The hero walks closer to Hendry.
Hendry pauses. “Really? Just like that?”
The hero puts his hand on his shoulder. “Yes.”
And the hero punches him in the gut. Thud.
“Ugh! I knew it.” Hendry groans in pain, but he recovers, and throws a punch back at him. The hero dodges.
The adventurers stare, “Uh, hero, should we do something?”
The hero, yells. “No. This is between me and him.” They punch each other a few times, then it escalates, and they start throwing high speed punches into flashes, as both attack each other with their abilities. This cause the adventurers to stare at the high speed exchange of blows.
A few more heroes come over. “Max! Stop this.”
Two female heroines shout, and Max, the hero jumps a few steps back, and that ends the barrage of punches.
“Hendry!” One of the heroines seems to cry a little.
“Hey.” Hendry stops, and sits on one of my roots. The heroines runs over and gives Hendry a hug. “Been a while.”
“We’ve been looking for you guys...” The heroine smacks Hendry on his shoulder. ”Running off like that...”
At this point the adventurers ask, “Uh… who is he?”
Max laughs, “Ah yes, please ignore us. He is a friend. You guys go ahead, We’ll need to talk privately with our friend here and so, we’ll be fine.”
Max started by elaborating... ”You guys should not have left like that. We're angry, and we’re still sad. It still is a lump in our hearts. But we are willing to let it go, for on hindsight, we had a part to play too. We failed as well. We all did. I think a part of the way we acted is because we were angry at ourselves.”
At this point, I'm confused at what their conversation is about, perhaps there is some historical bad blood.
Hendry nods, his eyes a little teary. “Heh... Water under the bridge now. Well, Max, like I was saying, I need your help. Do you still have anti demonic powers?”
Max thinks for a while, “Huh? I still do, why?”
Alexis, right on cue, comes out with Meela, she’s asleep and supported by Alexis’s levitation. “It's actually for Meela. She’s received some kind of demonic rot or maybe demonic poison. She’s weak and battling that demonic rot internally, and currently supported by a whole lot of healing magic. It.. it seems to be some kind of magic meant for... us.”
The heroes gasp. “Meela...” Max runs over, looks at her, and holds her hand. He then proceeds to use some kind of magical ability on her, then their two bodies start to glow faintly.
The hero chants and mumbles a little, his palm glows like a monk trying to use some kind of mantra.
[Divine Touch]
The ability causes Meela’s body to glow in a faint light.
“Hmm.. I can’t remove it completely. It contains a strong taint of the demon king…. You are right. This is made to kill us, and this... this makes this demon king more dangerous than ever.” He sighs, and everyone else follows.
Alexis holds Meela’s hand, who’s gradually opening her eyes.
“But I can suppress and weaken the effect of the demon king's poison, such that it will stop hurting her.”
“Thank you.” Meela opens her eyes, and speaks.
Max smiles. “Nice to see you too, Meela.”
Reincarnators. These adventurers are reincarnators as well. Now that they are right next to me, I feel strange. Are these people from earth too? The kids, those few when I came so many years ago they have all died. These people, a similar fate probably awaits them.
What should I do?
Should I reveal myself as a reincarnator? But what good does that do, other than unnecessarily involving myself in the demon war.
There is also the question about the [Fires of Baal] that I had before, and how I can recover from it yet Meela fails to. Why? Is it because the fires are just generic demonking fires, whereas Meela's demonrot is a customised superweapon for reincarnators?
I have no answer to that, unfortunately.
At this point, I decide to wait and see. I mentally ping Alexis.
“So... may I ask what is happening? Are you going to leave with them?”
“Ah.. er.. right now there’s still three of us that is out there looking for a cure. 3 of us out there. Or maybe, there is no cure, and only killing the demon king will wipe away all traces of it. Oh, anyway, I think Meela’s in no condition to fight yet. Her demonic rot is still present but now weakened by a counteracting holy power that Max has, but until we know what that means in combat, we do not want to risk it. Meela's body seems to be fine, with no observable negative effects so far, but I think there is a high chance that whatever demon king magic it is, it will probably interfere with our divine gifts. So, attempting to assault the demons without being at full strength is folly, so we plan to stay back and attempt to regroup with our other 3 friends first.”
“Uh…” Alexis is a lot more technical when it comes to magic. ”Sorry can you repeat that in simpler terms?”
“So I think me and Meela will stay back. We will wait for the remaining 3, and then we will join up with Max and group. The fact that the demon king has a special weapon designed for us is... worrying.”
The next week
Year 72 Month 12 Week 2
News and reports of the demon champions come in. The heroes, adventurers and the soldiers move out, towards the rift.
Meela and Alexis remain, Alexis is playing the role of Meela’a observer, and monitors her body’s condition.
Meela would try use her abilities and they discover that with the demonic rot still present, her abilities are weakened by about 20% to 30%. Alexis's hypothesis is right after all.
The camp is now a lot quieter, about 1,000 soldiers remain. These are the communication mages, the logistics coordinators, and just some guards to keep the stray demonhounds at bay.
Year 72 Month 12 Week 4