The moment Alex realised where he had landed, a wave of confusion mixed with embarrassment washed over him.
Sitting on the shoulders of the Red Demon, especially in such a... compromising position, was not part of his plan.
His body tensed, and for a brief second he considered teleporting out immediately — but then, Rothwind’s booming voice erupted, cutting through the awkward silence.
"WHAT IN THE NAME OF ALL THAT IS FORGED IS GOING ON OUT HERE. FOR THE LAST DAMN TIME I SAID FUCK OF—"
Rothwind’s voice trailed off as he noticed a naked Alex perched precariously on a strange looking fellow from a race he had never seen before.
His face mimicked Alex’s confusion, but there was also a hint of amusement in there as well.
The Red Demon himself seemed momentarily stunned, clearly not in a million years to be interrupted when he was about to start trashing the place and kill Rothwind when he was done.
His glowing yellow eyes shifted upward, locking onto Alex with a face of anger and rage that Alex had never quite seen before.
The Red Demons weren’t so different from humans, so he knew quite well about... reproductive organs...
Especially when they were 2 centimetres away from his face...
The tension in the room was thick, with Alex’s usual carefree smile frozen in place.
Rothwind’s shouting had ceased, leaving only the heavy breathing of the demon beneath Alex, and the creaking of the door as the shadowy figure of Mira appeared at the scene.
Things were starting to get really awkward for him...
"Um... hey?"
Alex awkwardly raised both his hands in awe, as if surrendering.
The Red Demon was on the verge of saying fuck it all and going on a rampage, but just the fact that he recognised this human and the other female human who had just stepped through the door was what held him back.
Those two had just defeated a King class beast...
So his anger was quietly suppressed despite how much he wanted to kill everyone in that room at the moment.
***
Mira stepped fully into the smithy, scanning the chaotic scene portrayed very vividly in front of her with her eyes.
The sight of Alex, naked and in quite a tough spot, perched atop a Red Demon’s shoulders was enough to make her sigh, though she barely had time to process it.
She had seen a lot of things in her life, but this right now took the cake.
Her gaze flicked around the room before meeting Alex’s, who held his hands up with a sheepish grin plastered on his face.
He glanced at the Red Demon, then back to Mira with a blooming smile on his face like the last 30 seconds had never happened.
"You sure know how to make an entrance."
Rothwind, who had been silently watching the whole thing with his arms crossed, let out a chuckle of amusement.
"You’re one to talk. Do you want to talk about the entrance you just made?"
His remark quickly shut Alex up.
He turned back to Mira and spoke.
"By the forge... You two are going to give an old man a heart attack one a’ these days."
Alex chuckled, rubbing the back of his head.
"Sorry about that, Rothwind. Didn’t exactly plan on teleporting onto a demon’s shoulders..."
Mira rolled her eyes but couldn’t suppress her small smirk.
"You never plan on anything, Alex. That’s the problem..."
Rothwind grunted, stepping forward to inspect the unconscious Red Demon.
"I can still detect a faint heartbeat, why might I ask, did you let him live?"
He scratched his chin, looking down and inspecting every inch of the Red Demon.
This was the first time he had encountered his race in his hundreds of years of life, after all.
Mira crossed her arms, speaking up.
"He could be holding some valuable information for all we know, especially since this is the first time we’ve encountered his kind in the Primordial Expanse. I suspect his presence here wasn’t a coincidence."
Rothwind listened with great interest, and couldn’t help but comment.
"Yer two races have history? What is his race called?"
Mira and Alex both let out a heavy sigh as they heard his question.
"Red Demons."
They gave him the short and simple answer.
And Rothwind could tell from their tone alone that his race probably had something to do with why they were trying to get back to the outside universe so quickly.