Little Demons (03)

Alban awoke from his meditation after a long time. He didn't know how many rounds he did it for, as he muted the system notifications for trivial things such as stat gains. He was gaining stats pretty fast after all, and the panels flooding his vision were getting pretty annoying. Rousing his mana to try and feel the increase, he felt as if his mana doubled. Satisfied with his gains, he looked towards where the imps were sleeping last night and was baffled at what he saw.

Nevus and Lady were in his exact pose, sitting down with crossed legs and judging by their chests, taking deep and slow breaths. That alone may have been surprising, but Alban's instincts were prickling his scalp. He could feel the mana swarming around the two, in a calm and steady stream. Due to his mana sensitivity becoming higher and higher from his fervent training, he could tell that although they seemed to be collecting it a bit sloppily they were indeed collecting it. There was only one imp that was acting like normal, which Alban found a little strange considering the situation. Surely he can feel the mana around him, right?

Teta was upset. He was the first to wake up and also the first among the three to see Alban meditating. He had no idea what his boss was doing, but he decided not to bother him. Teta was still a bit afraid of him, Alban's chase and diabolical smile etched permanently on his mind. But at the same time, he was happy. Teta hadn't eaten or danced that much in a long time...

Nevus was the second to wake up, his stirring waking Teta out of his recollection of the past. He instantly saw what Alban was doing, being a bit more sensitive to mana than what his body would suggest. He walked right up to Alban, sniffed him for a bit, then sat down and copied his form precisely. Teta had no idea what he was doing that for and impatiently poked Nevus in his face, attempting to get his attention. The commotion woke up Lady, who quickly copied Nevus.

This was really pissing Teta off. Have they become insubordinate just because they gotten names? Or better put in the imps' limited vocabulary, they big now cause names. He found this unacceptable! Boss was boss but these unfilial siblings of his were crossing his lines! He jabbed his claws onto Lady's cheek, attempting to bug her into listening to him. He didn't try it any more on Nevus because he knew that once Nevus decided something, it would just happen. Torturing Lady for the better part of the hour, he noticed Alban staring at them.

Their eyes met, and Alban didn't look very impressed. No, he had that scary smile on his face again! Alban walked up to Teta, grabbed him by the scruff of his neck, and walked out of the cave.

"Hey. You can't do what they're doing right?" A nod from Teta followed his prompt inquiry. Alban nodded, he was going to train up this imp himself. Well, he was technically training all of them, but he was going to specifically teach this one about improving his physique. He didn't have many physical skills per se, but he was very familiar with his body due to the intense fierce assaults on other creatures. His teeth were gleaming, his handsome face alluring under the moonlight. But to Teta, that sight looked a bit like hell.

Fast forward an hour later, and Alban finished his dailies, and Teta finished his dailies too. Of course, it was like a daily beat down compared to an actual training session. Alban made Teta run for 30 minutes straight, shooting fireballs at his feet in order to make him run even faster. Alban had no intentions to hurt him and carefully aimed, but Teta had no way of knowing that. The only choice he had was to bear it and hope that it would make him stronger like his boss promised. He bore the push-ups, the sit-ups, the long spar with Alban himself. Teta felt so drained at the end of that grueling hour, but he would be lying if he didn't feel a bit more muscle than normal. He may not be able to meditate but deeply breathing in a mana rich environment had its own benefits.

Nevus and Lady walked out and saw Teta face down on the sand, Lady desperately holding in her laughter. Even Nevus was grinning a bit, feeling like they got a one up on their little leader for once. That was until they saw the gaze leveled at the two of them.

"You two. Get to running and see if you can last as long as he did." Alban was pretty happy, he felt like one of those cliché drill sergeants in those dumb military movies. He chased after the two flinging fireballs faster than a fly landing on your food in a farmer's market. Sadly, the two didn't even last half as long, with Nevus clocking at a poor 20 minutes and Lady doing even worse, around 16 or so. Teta watched them intently, gloating at their misfortune. What's that fancy sitting done for you now huh??

After Nevus and Lady caught their breath after pushing a cloud bead into their mouths respectively, Alban was getting ready to announce what he had in store for today. "Teta, what's your level? You two as well.

"8 boss!" Nevus held up five fingers, while Lady sadly mumbled a three under her breath. Alban was a bit surprised at the disparity between the three, but felt a bit excited at the 8. He should be able to finish his evolution pretty quickly.

"Listen up. We're going to hunt again, just like yesterday. I'll be taking the opponents on this time, and Teta will finish them off until further notice." Alban was going to run a bus as quickly as possible, the speed leveling was a go!

The imps quickly took the lead, scouring for traces of suitable prey for their imposing boss. They clearly avoided the banshee's footprints, as Lady and Teta wanted nothing to do with that horrible screeching. Lady was pretty sure her ears were still ringing a bit...

They settled on another set of tracks Alban didn't find familiar. Swearing to milk the imps of their tracking skill after securing their sage and quick evolutions, he followed directly after them as they neared their target.

It was a while since Alban spotted the woods, and he was pleasantly surprised to realize they were technically still a part of the beach. He figured that whatever was in there would not be too much for him to handle, much unlike the start. The imps took their formation while Alban inspected the unknown creature in front of him.

{Young Lumber Jackal}

Walks on two legs and has a right arm that resembles an axe. A jackal's head sits atop its shoulders, and its a bit faster than the average human.

Estimated Speed: 11

Estimated Attack: 13~15

'Yeah, that's not something the imps can defeat. Looks pretty easy for me though...isn't this supposed to be where monsters get stronger?' Alban wasn't aware of how much of an advantage he was given from the start, possessing much higher thinking capabilities that most monsters around the beach. That allowed him to get a better grasp at what to do to be stronger, where babies as a majority just shambled about the place attacking whatever they laid their eyes on. Relatively smart monsters like the imps were a bit rare.

Alban didn't swing his vines at the lumber jackal, he had a hunch that they would probably be cut up pretty quick. Although coating them with mana would raise their defenses a bit, he was unsure if that alone would make them sturdy enough to defend against a blade. So instead, he quickly scaled a tree and then jumped down on the lumber jackal, landing directly on its shoulders. He grasped the jackal's neck with blazing palms, cooking the poor thing alive while choking it at the same time. The scent of rare steak faintly permeated the area for a bit, until he jumped down and threw the jackal towards Teta.

Teta quickly backed away, afraid that he was going to be burned if he let the beat up jackal touch him. Lady helped him out a bit by conjuring up a hand from the dirt and letting it disintegrate over the jackal. Teta propped up his finger as thanks and quickly slit the half dead jackals throat, his claws raking across its flesh. That's when he saw his own panels offering a decision before his eyes. Quickly picking a class, the fog gathered around his body and obscured him for a bit.

Alban wondered if this was what he looked like when he reached the threshold and picked a class, but he doubted it. Teta wasn't only picking a class, but also evolving. Alban felt regret for being a human for the first time, and felt that outlandish slipping sensation again. Except it didn't feel alien at all at this point, it felt a bit more comfortable than it had at first. Alban quickly pushed aside his thoughts as he was wont to do, and quickly looked back towards his faithful leader minion. The fog was fading.

Teta's skin remained red, but his body underwent a drastic change. His form took on a more human appearance, looking like a child around the ages of 7-10. His originally bald head sprouted hair, it being brown and arranged into a bob. Teta's face had a soft and kind look, appearing slightly like a naive boy you'd see as a model kindergarten student., The horn on the right side of his forehead, however, become a bit more domineering, being thicker and pronged at the tip. His eyelashes were a bit stubby, his eyebrows a thin line sitting atop his eyes, and the eyes themselves held black cornea with red irises. He was a little demon child.

"So what are you now? And what's your class?"

"Boss, I'm an Adjutant! Aren't I cool? Oh yeah, and I'm still a leader imp." Alban noted that his vocabulary had significantly improved, no longer sounding like cave-speech. And his voice was no longer like a hushed growl, sounding childish and cheerful. His tone was much lighter than it previously was, and it was easy to see that the other imps were a bit shocked at that, Lady's mouth dropped while Nevus' eyes bulged out of their sockets.

"Boss, me want that too! Get me, get me!" Lady had lost her mind at that point, jealous beyond belief at Teta's appearance. She wanted to look pretty too! She had to. If she couldn't be pretty, absolutely no one can.

"Don't worry I'm planning on doing this for all of you. I'm also going to make you some new clothes, your loincloths don't look like they'll fit..." Teta's rags were scattered all along the forest floor, barely counting as scraps. Alban pulled out the isoceles banshee's corpse, taking the skin off of the lower body and shaping them into shorts like his. He then used Assembly just to make sure they were a plausible item before making a shirt. He had no idea how and frankly he didn't have to. He just poured out his mana and begged it to be a shirt, and to his surprise, it worked!