A Stray Assassin

Ch 21: A Stray Assassin

Suddenly, the summoning circle that the two devils had arrived in started to glow all on its own!

It started to glow brighter and brighter, and Misla looked on, concerned. There wasn't supposed to be anyone in their house besides them, so who could possibly be using their summoning circle to backtrace their teleportation and follow them? She felt like something wasn't right, which was confirmed once Luna spoke up.

"We all need to move to the main chamber right now," Luna said. "This room isn't large enough to fight in." Luna grabbed hold of Sairogs and started leading him out of Salazar's office towards the main chamber.

"What!?" Harry and Hermione exclaimed at the same time. "Who said anything about fighting?" Hermione asked. "And why are we fighting?!"

Harry just had a resigned look on his face; he went back down into the chamber and now he probably was going to be in another perilous situation! Harry figured this is what he got for tempting fate at this point in his life...

The now larger group quickly moved away from the glowing summoning circle and back through the destroyed statue to the main chamber, Ron's still unconscious body being levitated behind them by Hermione as they moved quickly.

"Okay then," Luna said, knowing that they'd be safe for the next minute or so. "Everybody get behind Jake, he'll handle this." She moved behind him and the whole group did as she asked. Harry sighed in relief that for once it wasn't him having to fight!

Jake just smiled at them and took the lead. "Um, thanks for believing in me, I guess?" He said in happy confusion. "But do you mind telling us what's coming, Luna?" Everyone was wondering that as well, especially Misla who knew that somebody had clearly broken into their home and was using their summoning circle to track them. She had an unpleasant hunch, but she hoped it wouldn't be true...

"It's an assassin," Luna said happily!

Harry and Hermione sputtered in shock. "An assassin, for real?" Harry exclaimed. "Well, who are they after?" he asked.

"I'm afraid they're after my son and I," Misla said, to the shock of her young son.

Sairog just looked down in sadness. "Mom, are they after us because I failed to use the power of des- is Dad trying to have me killed?" He had an absolutely dejected look on his face.

Misla was about to comfort her son, but Jake spoke up first. "Hey kid, don't worry about it. I promise that nothing's going to happen to you as long as I'm here! Some measly assassin targeting a 5-year-old is going to be no match for me." He smiled at Sairog as he gave him a thumbs-up.

Jake had now learned ice magic from Serafall and he also had his new spell circles, which cut his casting power requirement down by around 90%. He learned from his battle against the dragon that overconfidence could lead to his downfall, but in this situation, he felt like - no, he knew that he had everything under control.

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After waiting for another minute, whatever was being summoned had finally arrived. From the middle of the chamber, they all heard a grinding noise get steadily closer and closer towards them. Finally, from the busted statue emerged a grotesque creature with literal swords for its arms. The grinding noise was from its sword arm that had been dragging on the stone ground behind it menacingly. This monster had three eyes on each side of its head along with two sets of mouths to accompany those eyes. Its skin was a demented gray and where its legs were supposed to be, were instead replaced by what looked like horse legs, hooves and all. It was a Stray Devil!

The Stray's six eyes narrowed and its mouth curved into a delighted grin at seeing not only both of its targets but also a bunch of tasty other morsels. "Geh heh heh," even the stray's laugh had a demented tone to it. "Well, isn't it my lucky day? Not only are my two targets here but so are a bunch of other tasty snacks." The Stray giggled to itself as it held up its two blade arms and ground them together. Jake could hear Harry and Hermione gulp in fear at the sight of the evil stray behind him. Surprisingly, Misla looked fairly calm despite it being here for her and her son…

The Stray devil flared its demented magic power all around as it stepped forward towards the group, ready to eviscerate and feast on them. In response, Jake flared his own power around him as he too stepped forward to face the monster.

Misla, watching on, was somewhat surprised at first. The Stray devil actually had high class reserves. A height that their rotten ilk rarely reached. When it flared its aura, she could feel its power. But then, she was even more shocked when the red-headed teen not only also had demonic power but that his was even stronger than the Stray's! She'd been so focused on the girl making a deal with her son that, to her shame, she hadn't even noticed there was another devil in the room!

The Stray paused for a second, slight trepidation flickered as it felt Jake's power slightly eclipse its own. But then it just continued marching forward anyway. Power wasn't always the end-all in battle. And this Stray used to be a knight so it was incredibly fast and its blade arms were incredibly sharp. It was somewhat confident it could beat the kid in front of it.

"Geh heh. You've got some decent power there, brat. Allow me to introduce myself, as I'll be your executioner today. My name is Deloro and I used to be a knight of the Bune Clan. That is, before I killed my weak master and feasted on his flesh! Now I'm free to do whatever I want. And I just so happen to have been paid quite a bit of money to kill you all!" As it shouted that last part, the Stray immediately charged at near blinding speed, raising one of its arms for an overhead slash towards Jake.

From the spell circle in his hand, Jake quickly summoned an ice sword and raised it up to meet the blow coming in from the Stray fast. Their blades connected and both of them held strong as they each flared their power to the maximum, trying to overpower each other. Knight pieces weren't known for their strength and Jake, who naturally had more reserves, was actually managing to push the Stray devil back. However, the Stray devil had two sword arms for a reason as it raised its left hand and tried to swipe at Jake from the side.

Jake jumped back quickly to dodge the blow as it just barely managed to slice through his robes. "Not bad, kid," the Stray taunted, "but I could tell from that one clash you're clearly not a swordsman." Once again, the Stray charged forward head first, this time swinging both of its arms at once from the left and right, trying to bisect Jake as if with a giant pair of scissors.

Jake formed spell circles in both of his hands as he quickly fired multiple ice spears in rapid succession at the charging devil. The devil was fast though, and it reacted as it swung its arms up and started knocking the spears out of the air. Its momentum barely slowed down as it was almost on Jake, ready to swing at him again!

"Let's see if you're so fast when you're freezing," Jake said as he took a page right out of Sarah Fall's book and instead of firing spears from both of his magic circles, blasted an icy cold wind. The icy wind was impossible to block with his swords and the Stray devil was charging right into it! It tried to dodge out of the way but the freezing wave still temporarily engulfed its entire body. The Stray immediately started to slow down as its muscles seized up from the sudden near hypothermic state it found its body in!

"Geh! Damn you!" the Stray shouted out angrily as it was now shivering from the icy cold. "That's some pretty decent ice magic you have there, but it's not going to stop me from getting to my meal." The Stray knight, realizing that maybe Jake was too much for it to handle after all, tried to run around him to get to his initial targets… Misla and Sairog!

Seeing the Stray devil trying to slip past him angered Jake. He felt his power inside him rise up as he fired a blast of ice straight at the stone ground beneath him. The ground quickly froze over and the ice spread to cover almost the entire floor of the chamber! The Stray knight, moving at a high speed, now found that the ground underneath it had turned to ice. It immediately slipped and fell, sliding along the icy floor and slamming into a wall. Jake didn't give it any time to recover. His spell circles flared back to life once again and he immediately fired another barrage of ice spears at the now collapsed Stray devil slipping along on the floor. With its hooved feet, the Stray found that it couldn't form any traction on the icy ground at all, there was no way it could avoid the incoming spears.

Two spears immediately slammed through the upper thighs of the Stray, causing it to scream out in pain, while the third spear lodged right in its gut. The Stray was still alive but it wasn't moving anywhere anytime soon…

With the battle won, Jake vanished all the ice from the ground so he and everyone else could now move without slipping themselves.

"That was well fought, young man. Might I have your name?" Misla asked.

"No problem," Jake replied with a smile, "I'm Jake." He chose to withhold his last name. Not that it particularly mattered. The Gremory family's red hair was pretty iconic in the Underworld. Not that Misla chose to comment about it. She figured if Jake didn't want to say his last name then it wasn't her place to ask. He did just sort of risk his life to protect them after all, even if it wasn't necessary.

Misla walked over to the Stray devil collapsed on the floor with three ice spears lodged in it. She was extremely angry that someone was arrogant enough to send an assassin after her and her son! Her demonic power flared around her and Jake was actually shocked by how strong she really was. She easily felt like she was ten times stronger than him! "Now then, you and I are going to have a small chat," Misla declared to the Stray. And then she started furiously whispering to it, too quietly for anyone else to make out.

Jake was still reeling from how much power the seemingly docile woman had though. He wondered to himself if this is what ultimate class felt like?- And then he realized that she didn't actually need his help in the first place. He turned and gave Luna a small glare and she just winked at him in return. "You needed the combat experience, Jake. Plus doesn't it feel nice that you just defeated a being that was on the same power level as the dragon you lost to in the first challenge?"

When she said that last part, Jake suddenly felt elated. He really had gotten stronger! He wished he could fight that stupid dragon again and give it a solid thrashing!

There was a flare of magical power in the room and Jake turned to see that Misla had blasted the Stray to dust. She had apparently finished her interrogation with it. "Well then," she spoke up, "I have some urgent business to attend to back in the Underworld. Come along, Sairog, we have to go now." Sairog, who had had stars in his eyes the entire time as he witnessed an epic battle for the first time in his life, wanted to be that strong one day, just like Jake!

He ran up to his mother and took her hand as the two of them headed back to Salazar's office to return home via the summoning circle on the ground.

"Bye, Luna!" Sairog called with a wave. "I promise i'll get super strong and help out Jake in the future!"

When the two devils departed, Harry and Hermione, who had been silent throughout the entire fight in shock and fear, finally both exhaled. "Holy fuck, that was so scary," Harry exclaimed with Hermione nodding along rapidly. "What the hell, Jake? Seriously, what the bloody hell!?"

Hermione nodded her head. "That mother and son duo sure didn't look like devils but that scary sword-armed monster sure did," she added on. "You better tell us what the hell we just witnessed, mister," she said irately as she pointed at Jake.

Jake just held his hands up in surrender as he acquiesced and started telling the two of them all about the supernatural world and what he knew about devil's society. Needless to say, they were absolutely blown away at finding out that devils and angels were really a thing, along with all types of gods and monsters.

Ron, meanwhile, was still levitating behind them via Hermione's spell, unconscious the entire time and having missed pretty much the majority of the adventure…

The group of five eventually made it back up the slide as they exited the chamber, hopefully forever, Hermione and Harry thought to themselves. They dropped Ron's still unconscious body off with Madam Pomfrey, figuring she would sort him out, as Jake and Luna separated from the duo.

"Well, Luna," Jake spoke up, "that was some adventure… I guess. In the end, though, I'm definitely glad that I got a pretty good fight out of the ordeal. Now I know what types of magic I need to work on to make myself stronger. I'm still lacking in experience, but I'm going to get strong enough so that I'm going to sweep through the next two stages of this tournament and take the whole thing!" Jake declared proudly.

Luna gave Jake a dreamy smile as she, with Blaze in her arms, parted ways with him and they headed back to each of their common rooms for the night.

-end chapter-

What'd you all think? What will Sairog help Jake with in the future?

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