Book 2: Chapter 17: Death and Children

Book 2: Chapter 17: Death and Children

Scarlet

Along the way, I cant help but think about the girl, the councilwoman, and changelings in general.

The creatures are brutally powerful, to put it in simple terms. The weakest changeling is at least Class III, and there is no way to tell them apart from other humans as their disguise is almost always perfect. In acting I mean. Their shapeshifting is perfect.

Thanks to this very, few changelings are caught until its too late, after theyve already killed who knows how many people and leveled up quite a bit from it.

I knew there was one way to identify a changeling, but until now, I didnt know what. But if what Tar said is true, then their scent is probably the way people manage to do it.

How does that work though? Because most Guardians have senses far stronger than the average human if what youve told me is true.

Changelings have a special skill that hides their scent from regular senses, making it so most humans Guardian or not cant smell them, Tar says, sounding kind of like hes picking his words incredibly carefully with how slowly hes speaking. Demons most of the time do not have mundane senses because one of the most common etched skills in the beginning are perception based skills, leading to most demons having magic enhanced senses.

Interesting. Although why would perception based skills be so often etched?

Tar answers this rather quickly, clearly no longer being careful about his words, There are a lot of demons on Tartarus, and there are little to no laws beyond the treatment of the royal family and whatever the Demon King says. So if you think Earth is a scary place to live these days, you should try living in Tartarus as a regular demon.

My eyebrows climb at that.

Really?

Yes, he quickly answers. Far more demons die on Tartarus on a yearly basis than on Earth. Several times as many, in fact.

Holy shit.Ñøv€l--ß1n hosted the premiere release of this chapter.

I continue walking through the hall, soon reaching the stairs where I first met the girl and beginning to make my way into the hall leading to where she is.

Thats brutal. But also, how can there be so many demons? From my understanding, the medication and healthcare on average for Earth has drastically increased thanks to magic, and a lot of the diseases were removed. But at the same time, far more people started dying since the Demonic Assaults due to demons. So if what I remember from class in high school is correct, over eighty million people die per year, with most of them being from Fractures.

This makes the tanuki actually break out into laughter for what must be the first time since Ive met him as he practically shouts in my head, And she can read you too! This is perfect! Absolutely perfect!

And now I cant tell if I should be mad at him or shocked by this development of an emotional outburst from him.

In the end though I decide on being mad at him.

Shut up.

Which just makes him laugh harder. So I ignore him to answer the girl, No. Then I walk further into the room, closing the door behind me and finding a chair to sit in for the moment.

The girl looks between me and the door before walking up to me and sitting on my lap? Wait, what?

Tar stops laughing as he says, Looks like she really is still like a kid in some ways.

Uh, what are you doing? I decide to ask out loud, but the girl just stares at me before lying down against me and seemingly trying to fall asleep. No, no, no, please dont do that. I cant exactly fight if youre like this, and I am going to have to fight whenever demons come around.

She cracks her eyes which were lazily closing open for a second and mutters, You can hear them from here and wake me up when you do Then she closes them again and somehow falls asleep in an instant while sitting on my lap and leaning against me.

What the fuck is going on? And she knows about my hearing too. I know its rather common knowledge by now on the internet that I can hear well, seeing as Ive never really bothered hiding it, but to use that against me just to let her sleep on my lap?

Youre dealing with a kid that doesnt apparently give a shit about how you feel. Thats whats going on. Tar answers my question rather bluntly. Just comfort her. You noticed that she relaxed when you came in, so she was probably frightened and just doesnt show it, or really any emotions well, judging by what we've seen of her so far. Kind of like a certain wolf eared girl I know.

I narrow my eyes at the air in front of me, hoping that the tanuki is there in the in between place he goes to.

Shut up.

But I put my hand on her back in what Im hoping is a comforting manner, just rubbing it back and forth as gently as I can.

I hope more demons reach this floor soon so I can wake her up without feeling bad