355: Redhead

The whole arena trembled from the powerful explosion. A dozen demonlings were either blasted away from the Volcanic Rupture or consumed by the molten mass. Beatrice turned around and saw a familiar, slender freckled redhead with shoulder-length hair, wearing her blue robes.

“Ember!” Beatrice exclaimed upon seeing her bodyguard.

“We have to leave quickly,” the redhead said, getting straight to the point. “It won’t be long before this place is overrun by the Purple Capes.”

“This place is about to be overrun by demons!” Beatrice pointed out.

“Great, let them fight it out with Purple Capes and wipe each other out. We won’t win this fight.”

“Tch!” Beatrice had to think fast. They didn’t have time to argue. Beatrice certainly didn’t want any more of her followers to die. There was a risk of the demonlings simply scattering through the tunnels and eventually attack the defenseless citizens. And while nearly everyone in this place had proven to be reprehensible scum, Beatrice believed that there were still some people in this deplorable city worth saving.

A likely scenario was that Felicia would simply recall the demons back, even if she did claim to not have the power to do so. But whether Felicia did or didn’t have that power and simply used the demons as a last resort weapon no longer mattered, because she wouldn’t get to use it.

“We take the announcer and the princess with us,” Beatrice decided.

A slightly more wicked than necessary grin formed on Ember’s face. “You’ll be putting a giant target on your back if you kidnap a princess,” she said without even an inkling that she disapproved of such an action, and then added, “Where is she anyway?”

As the eunuchs switched from fire attacks to physical weapons, the arena fell into an increasing darkness. The eunuchs kept small fires around them to see their allies and foes around them. The demons seemed to have no issue with the dark.

Ember formed a sparkling fire in the palm of her hand that resembled a firework.

“Don’t look at it,” Ember said and threw that sparkling ball into the air above her. Within seconds it burst in a bright light, sending six more, smaller sparkling balls like flares in all directions, temporarily illuminating the arena.

“Oh!” Ember’s grin grew wider when she and Beatrice spotted princess Mary and Olivia. Some distance away from the nearest demonling, the two futa girls copulated like it was the last fuck of their world, not even acknowledging the fighting around them.

“Good, the princess is secure,” Beatrice said. “Everyone—GHARGH!!”

-80 HP

Beatrice was struck against the side of her waist by what felt like a giant baseball bat, with thrice the strength of a regular human. This force sent her tumbling across the arena, right into a group of demonlings.

Fuck! [Daze]! Beatrice cast the disorienting spell on the nearest demonling, then made eye contact with the second nearest demon and cast her remaining defensive spell, [Illusionary split].

“ARGH!” Beatrice screamed in pain when the demonling simply swiped across both Beatrices it saw with its long-reaching claws.

-150 HP

Health Points

354/600 (+1.08/sec)

However, the demon could still not tell which wounded Beatrice was the real Beatrice for four more seconds. Beatrice managed to use this advantage to get on her feet and deal with the double-vision demon first, followed by another, then the dazed one.

Still alive, Beatrice priority switched to a burning question: what the hell struck her in the first place. And she got her answer. Countless tentacles flailed and swirled across the arena, striking anything and everything in their path—humans, demons, without discrimination.

And these tentacles were attached to a different type of multi-legged creature. Much larger than the demonlings, in terms of size, a comparison to an elephant would be fair. Eight powerful legs held up a round mass that was the creature’s main body. Hard and reinforced at the bottom and from the sides, the top looked soft, with many festering “bubbles”. Without a discernible head, out of that mass it the demon swung its mighty tentacles, each no less than twenty yards in length.

The demon did not seem to strike to kill. It simply cleared a path for itself as it moved toward the center of the arena. And as it moved, a light mist formed in its path, seeping from the festering pores of its disgusting upper body.

Several enforcers attempted to approach the demon and strike it down. They were the ones knocked down instead. Not dead, the enforcers were for some reason in no hurry to get up. And as the enforcers laid in the mist that hung over the surface of the arena, one by one they started to touch themselves inappropriately.

Oh, shit… Beatrice had a bad feeling about what was coming.