Scarlet

Out of the corner of my eye, I find several of the Guardians outside of this store rushing over to the main floor of the mall, which is likely the most populated area and where the core emerged. At the same time, I hear screams echoing practically everywhere, making my ears ache ever so slightly.

Damnit, this place is a lot more populated and wide open than any of the other Fractures I’ve been to!

My thoughts are cut off when I see spawn appearing out of a strange red mist that emerges from the ground several meters in front of us, setting off another round of screams. And I can’t help but let out a sigh of relief when I see their levels.

|Demon Spawn – Subspecies: Canine – Level 21|

|Demon Spawn – Subspecies: Canine – Level 20|

|Demon Spawn – Subspecies: Canine – Level 24|

|Demon Spawn – Subspecies: Canine – Level 26|

Dogs? Much smaller ones than the hounds.

I immediately activate my partial shift skill, immensely grateful that I decided to wear a short sleeved shirt and pants on this outing as I watch my forearm and hand ripple with a wave of blood until it turns into the clawed hand of a werewolf. This seems to startle the guide near us who is already freaking out and hiding behind us, and many of the people and employees nearby take a cue from her and do the same.

Meanwhile I see the others activating their magi-tech armor pendants, making their armor spread out over their clothes to cover their bodies before they each begin to activate skills. And I can’t help but feel a tiny bit jealous since my jacket’s still not done yet.

Red energy begins to coat Denise while a thin fog spreads out from Emily and a summoning circle appears in front of Michael. And not wanting to be left out, I start using life drain and blood boil on the four demon spawn. Only for them all to stagger and show a much bigger reaction to it than I was expecting, reminding me that my level is over ten levels above most of them.

This seems to surprise the others as well, but they don’t wait as I already see the small black particles rising from the spawn’s skin and fur, which only seem to enhance the effect my blood boil skill has on them.

I share a surprised glance with Emily before we both grin and turn back to the demons. Then she throws several little needles of necrotic poison at the demons, exacerbating the effect our blood boil and other skills are doing on them at the same time until they all keel over and die before Denise can even reach them.

The girl turns around with a frown on her face to look at us, but I’m still grinning at Emily as I say, “Looks like our skills work well together.” And she nods, her grin turning slightly less fervent and a little more shy now that that bit of action is over with. Only to turn serious as we move our attention to the other demons appearing across the floor.

Michael sends his familiars out, the treants, as he calls them, moving to protect him and Emily, with the hawk going up and leaving the room to scout out the rest of the building for us and the fluffball floating up into the air with bolts of green lightning beginning to build up on it.

I focus my ears on the store we’re in, finding nearly two dozen spawn scattered throughout it, of which I quickly notify the others about. Then I open my eyes again and rush forwards with Denise following close behind me until we run into one of the spawn that’s currently chasing a couple down the aisle. I quickly tear my clawed hand straight through its body before using blood claws on my other hand and stabbing the claws straight into its neck before I rush off again, leaving the couple stumbling into the rack of jackets nearby from shock.

“Don’t worry, you’ll be safe,” I hear Michael comforting the two people as I continue rushing through the aisles of the store starting from one end and going to the other.

In a situation where the demons are all on average weaker than us, we planned to have me and Denise run around clearing them out while Michael and Emily handle keeping the people safe. And I’m all for this plan since it gives me and Denise the most EXP out of the group, Michael not really caring much about EXP and his sister being a softie and wanting to prioritize the peoples’ safety.

This process doesn’t take too long, and once we all finish, we find ourselves in a store empty of demons with nearly three dozen people gathered up in a group.

“There is a bunker in the mid-section of a store one store down from here,” Michael says, his eyes glowing green as he looks through his hawk’s senses. So we begin to lead the people out of the store into the lobby of the special VIP area, quickly dealing with any monsters that get near us as we do so. But at some point in the trip, a crossbow bolt flies by and strikes me in the arm as I’m dealing with another spawn, making me grimace but not doing anywhere near as much damage to me as the one that I was hit with a week ago did.

“Shit, I’m sorry!” I hear Denise shout, apparently seeing me take the hit. But I just wave her off while ripping the bolt out of my arm. It didn’t go very deep, just deep enough for the bolt head to get lodged in my arm.

Right as I’m about to focus on life draining a bunch of the demons without killing them as quickly as usual in order to heal it though, I feel a wave of relief from Michael’s magic, reminding me that I have a healer now. So I nod at him in appreciation before continuing to deal with any demons that get close.

Eventually we reach the bunker, which is still wide open with a dozen or so people inside, many of whom look relieved to see us, along with two Guardians standing at the entrance. The two Guardians look relieved as well. Which makes sense, considering what I overheard of their conversation on the way over here.

The two were stuck with guard duty until we arrived, with all of the other stores in this block on this side of the VIP section already having been cleared of people and demons. So we quickly stand guard at the entrance with them as the people all flood into the bunker, before one of the two Guardians asks the person who he was in a call with on his terminal if there are any more people left, and after getting a negative, he closes the bunker.

We all turn to look at each other for a moment, and I can tell rather quickly that these two are Class I judging by their mana. They’re also wearing Lion’s Heart uniforms, meaning they’ll be classmates starting tomorrow.

One of them is a girl around the same age as me by the looks of it, with long crimson hair and black irises. She’s wearing the pants version of the uniform, and is about the same height as myself as well, with an amount of mana near mine too.

But her personality couldn’t be any more different. The girl is practically a lump of joy in how she’s literally hopping from one foot to the other, a grin splitting her face as she hums to herself.

The other one of the two is a guy with long brown hair and a rather thick mustache. He appears to be a little bit older than us, likely in his mid-twenties, and appears rather annoyed by his companion’s actions.

A rather interesting duo to say the least.