Demon Lord - (New World Book 1)

by K R Zax

  “I am fine, Felisy. Just tired.” The woman looked at the document again.

  Alex Miller. How strong was he? Enough to take out a D rank party, maybe even a C rank one? His rank was raised to F after only one day, that in itself wasn’t uncommon. G, F, E, the difference in strength between them wasn’t big. Anyone starts at G. If that person kills a lone goblin or weak monster, or something of that level while doing a quest, he or she will rise to the next rank.

  It is almost the same from F to E. To reach D you have to be able to do a huge amount of quests.

  Reaching higher ranks is harder the further you go. A person needs to have a great amount of strength and ability to go up.

  If Alex Miller is able to take out a D rank party, and kill that many monsters, then his average rank must be at least B. That in itself is unbelievable. B rank at the age of 18?

  Being a D rank at that age was praiseworthy, it would be an indicator of his dedicated training. Roughly a quarter of the adventurers around that age are D rank, and almost all of them received training from someone experienced in battle. Of course, for those that couldn’t afford a tutor, there were the Guild’s free classes.

  C rank at that age? There are a few. It is possible to reach that stage if one has the fighting ability and magic skills. One would need to train with a sword or spear and then practice their magic skills until their mana runs out. That type of person would be exhausted at the end of the day, and we are talking about young people. Not many would be willing to go through such a thing when they can go and play, or enjoy their free time as they liked.

  B rank? Maybe even A rank? At 18? If someone said that, he’d be called a liar. The butt of all jokes. An object of mockery. Everyone knows that those are people of legends, tales of Heroes and Demons and Dragons.

  The other part of the letter stated that he brought 31 corpses to the guild: goblins, orcs and Twin-Tail Wolves. He does have a D rank party member, making his party average be barely E rank at the moment. If they were both C rank, it is quite possible to hunt that many in a day. They would have to pick their battles, avoiding groups larger than 5 or 6, and hunting down the smaller numbers. But monsters stick together, for the most part, they know that bigger numbers mean more prey.

  This confirms it. Alex Miller is at least a B rank.

  There was another knock on the door and a servant come rushing, he bowed to the woman and extended his hands.

  “I have a message, Your Grace.”

  Felisy approached the man and took the letter he was holding. After a close inspection, she handed it to the woman.

  The letter had a seal from the church, it must be information about the High Priestess. I just hope it wasn’t more bad news.

  She broke the seal and started reading.

  “Is this real?” The woman asked the servant who brought the letter and looked at it again. No matter how many times she read it, the words stayed the same. Was the Patriarch making a joke? Is he going senile? “This is madness.”

  ‘High Priestess Saril ordered for a tailor today, one that was good at making wedding dresses. She also expelled all the male clerks from the Saint’s Palace, saying that: “I don’t want to be looked at by any man, other than my future husband.”

  When her attendees reminded her that she was the High Priestess of the Praslovia Church, the Holy Maiden of the Rasik Empire and that she didn’t even have a fiancee, she answered: “My sweet Demon Lord will come for me one night, carried by the wings of Darkness. He will be bathed in the blood of his enemies and the souls of the dead will dance around him. He will look at me with beautiful, radiant blue eyes and take me in his hands - like I am his property.”

  And then she giggled like a young girl in love.

  We are unsure if she should address the people on UsKriss, if something vital changes I will inform You.

  Kirilin III Aseliev.’

  Chapter 9.

  Something hit my face. Was it morning already, so Lina decided to slap me awake? When I opened my eyes and moved away, I saw her sleeping soundly. She was smiling, while her right ear twitched joyfully.

  I got up and decided to let her sleep a bit longer, she had a rough day, and I wanted to go to the forest again.

  When the bell announced that it was 6 in the morning, I was already deep into magic practice. Now I was able to make a Fire Ball, Fire Arrow, Fire Knife. Basically, I manipulated fire to the extent of my Element's rank. It was one thing having a lot of mana and a different one having a low Element rank. My current mana capacity was S rank, but my Fire Magic's rank was F.

  Fire Ball and Fire arrow were F grade Fire Skills. Just because I ranked my Fire Magic to F doesn't mean that I suddenly knew how to activate those skills. Sure, some of the knowledge came from the orc mage, and I was able to create a Fire Ball from the second try.

  Fire arrow took me some more time since the orc didn’t have that knowledge. I had to create a Ball first, and then manipulate the flames into the shape I wanted. And once I got the gist of it, Fire Arrow became a skill I could activate with a thought. Or should I call it a spell? It was confusing, as far as I could tell, they were the same thing. The only difference was how some people preferred to call it. Mages liked the term ‘Spell’, while everyone else used ‘Skill’. Since some warriors can use magic to an extent, they classify their magic attacks as skills. And the Mages, who saw it as a form of art, didn’t like that. What a waste of free time, bickering with each other over a name.

  There was a knock on the door, and Sashka entered the room. She was wearing her usual black dress with a white apron, and a tray with food.

  “Last night you mentioned that you wanted to have breakfast in your room, my lord.” She put the tray with sausages, cheese, and eggs on the table and bowed. “You can tell me if you need anything else.”

  She was surprised when I smiled and handed her some coins. “My lord, this is too much. I haven’t done anything special. Bringing breakfast to the residents of the Inn, if they wish for it, is already included in the fees.”

  It was only 10 copper coins. “Don’t mind me, I just like tipping good, pretty girls.”

  “T-thank you, m’lord.” Sashka took the coins and rushed away.

  A blushing dark elf, so cute.

  “As expected from a Demon, one woman is not enough to satisfy your evil needs.” Lina yawned as she got off the bed and following the smell, she sat at the table. “Hmm, boar sausages.”

  After she had a few bites of her food, I asked the question that has been bothering me since she got up: “Are you going to put some clothes on?”

  Lina blushed furiously, her face was almost the same color as her hair. But she then strengthened her shoulders and looked me in the eye.

  “I am your woman. A-and you can look as much as you want.”

  “But nothing happened between us.” Was she jealous because she thought that I was flirting with Sashka?

  “Do you… We could...” She kept glancing at the bed timidly. “Can you be gentle?”

  “Calm down, we will go hunting today as well. So, maybe tonight.”

  “Humph. Darling, are monsters the only thing that you like?” She started chewing a sausage with a dejected expression. “Monsters, monsters. Why would you care about your first wife when there are so many monsters out there?”

  “First wife?”

  “Well, I know we’re not married,” she said sheepishly and tried to look away. “But. But if you don’t have some other girl you like, I wouldn’t mind being your first wife. If I stay as an ordinary slave, the other girls might look down on me.”

  “Other girls?” What was she talking about? I haven’t met many girls since I came here, and nothing was going on with the ones I knew.

  “Your other wives,” she said as I should know about it. “You don’t know? Wait, how many wives can a man have in your country?”

  “One? Wasn’t that the case everywhere?” How much has this world changed? More than one wife? Really?


  “As much as you like if you can provide for them. Not every woman will marry a poor guy. But you don’t have to worry about that since you can earn lots of money and... Darling? Darling, are you alright? Darling! Darling, are you hurt?!”

  I am almost immortal. I can use magic. I am in a fantasy world. And I can even have a harem? A real harem? And it is legal?

  What a fool I am! I thought of buying a house! With how many women can I live in an ordinary house? Two? Three?

  I need more. A bigger place. A castle! And the girls… There is slavery here. What if I buy ten… No! A hundred!

  “Darling, why are you laughing now? Did you go crazy?”

  “I need money,” I told Lina when my heart calmed down a bit. The laws and common sense I knew of, died with the Old World. This is my new life in the New World. I should adapt to it.

  “You already have money. You earned 33 silver coins yesterday! Most D rank adventurers can’t earn that much in a month. If it was that easy, I wouldn’t have to become a slave.”

  “Silver? I’m talking about gold here. I need lots and lots of gold.”

  ***

  I was in high spirits when we stepped out of the Inn and onto Tsarigrad's tiled streets. The air was a tad bit chilly, but the sun was doing a great job, warming everything with his light. We walked through the crowded streets, stopping only to buy a few things as we headed for the Adventurers Guild.

  “There he is.”

  “The Dark Mage. Did he really kill… Hmhh.”

  “Shush!”

  “Don’t look him in the eye!”

  “Scary!”

  The Guild was abuzz when we got there, people were giving me a weird look and stepping out of my way. Did I do something? Was it because of all the monsters I submitted yesterday?

  “Darling, could you stop smiling? You look evil. Handsome, but evil.”

  “Oh, sorry. I was just thinking of something.”

  With a sigh, Lina went to the board and returned with several pieces of paper. Isn’t that too much? Can we even find that many monsters?

  “Yesterday there weren’t many quests left so we could only get a decent reward, considering how many monster corpses we had,” she explained, and I couldn’t help but agree with her. We brought 31 bodies but only got a bonus for 20 of them.

  “So, if we fulfill these quests, we’ll get much more. Their time limit is one week, we can definitely do it.” She waived the pieces of paper in front of my face, before going to the counter to get the Guild's stamp on them.

  “Good morning, do you want to get approval for a quest? Oh, my.” The girl at the reception had to confirm with Lina a few times, asking her if she was serious. After a while, she gave up and stamped the quest papers, and then recorded them in our files.

  “Next time, we will go to Elyn’s desk.” Lina was frustrated, having to explain over and over again to the receptionist that we were able to meet the quotas. “That woman was almost making fun of your abilities, Darling.”

  She took me all the way to the eastern gate. It was the same in looks as the one we used regularly. But unlike the western gate, there were fewer people at this one, and most of them seemed to be adventurers and soldiers.

  After we went outside, Lina headed for a group of people that were camping near the road.

  “Darling, prepare 20 copper coins,” she said and talked to one of the guys. After a while, three more people paid the man, and he started preparing the carriage. It looked almost like the ones you’d see in a movie, with cowboys and Indians.

  “Where are we going?”

  “North-east, the good hunting grounds are there. The forests west and south of Tsarigrad are good for beginners because there are not too many monsters. But north and east are a different story, only adventurers of D rank and above, go there.”

  When we entered the carriage, the three other adventurers were already sitting and chatting. We greeted them and sat on the opposite bench.

  The road leading north was relatively flat, I guess they used magic to reinforce the stone. Roads are vital for a country, especially the ones leading to an Imperial capital. I bet it was the same thing with the Roman Empire.

  “Haven’t seen you before.” Said one of the adventurers. He was a wolf-kin, wearing leather armor and had a spear beside him.

  “This is the first time we’re going to Jolek.” Lina hugged my arm, smiling. “I’m showing Darling where he can find a lot of monsters.”

  The woman who was part of the trio giggled. “Darling? Is that your name?” She was human, holding a wooden staff with a crystal on top. Her gear was made of leather, and she had chainmail over a brown jacket.

  “I am Alex Miller.” I introduce myself. “Only she calls me ‘Darling’.”

  “You’re the Dark Mage, right?” The third member, a human guy, asked. Sword, shield, breastplate, helmet, he almost looked like a knight. “I’ve seen you at the Guild, last night you got a lot of corpses from that magic storage thing.”

  “That’s right! I heard that not many Dark Mages could use that spell!” The woman said excitedly, she was also a Mage and was interested in useful magic.

  As we went further and further away from Tsarigrad, we talked about various things. Monsters, skills, hunting grounds, or popular gossip topics.

  The trio’s names were: Aler, Velira and Bjorsal. They were in their mid-twenties, and the only members of ‘Three Wolf Fangs’.

  They were all born in Tsarigrad and decided to become adventurers because it was possible to make good money that way. They trained a lot, and only picked the battles they knew they could win, because money is worthless if you’re dead.

  It was a little past noon when we reached Jolek. The town wasn’t too big, and it had a simple wooden wall. As Velira told me, the town was located a few kilometers off the main road. It was a place that adventurers used as a base when hunting, and in doing so, kept many monsters from reaching the main road, on which merchants and civilians traveled.

  As Lina and I didn’t have any business inside the town, we said our goodbyes and went for the forest. The members of the ‘Three Wolf Fangs’ asked us to consider joining some party or at least find one more member, but I refused. It would be bad if other people saw the zombies.

  We didn’t walk for half an hour when we found some goblins. It was just five of them, so I killed the vermin quickly, and we went deeper into the forest.

  Boars, birds, lizard-like monsters. Almost all of them were D rank, and only a couple were C rank, but thanks to my Domain they weren’t that tough to kill.

  There was only one that was a bit of a pain, a bear-like monster. It had big fangs and claws, when he saw us, it charged out of the bushes. I told Lina to run before I took Trinity axe and moved to intercept it. I threw a Darkness Ball from the tip of my fingers and backed away from him. My attack made the bear pause, and that was enough for me to deploy my Shadow Domain.

  I struck his arm and barely cut its flesh. The thick fur and skin were hard. I underestimated him and took a sweep from one of his claws. My protective coat resisted the attack, but it felt like a boulder hit my side. My Domain shuttered when my concentration broke.

  Lina threw a rock at him, when the bear was about to jump. His eyes caught sight of the girl, and she screamed when the monster turned his massive body in her direction. He probably thought that I was unable to move after his attack, so he didn’t pay too much attention to me.

  I used the chance to pour mana in Trinity axe and activate the Domain again. This time, I used the Dark Element like never before, abruptly turning this part of the forest into a Dark Bubble. It appeared like night came earlier than expected.

  There was no playing around with this guy anymore. Trinity’s crystal gave off an ominous blue light, and the magic weapon felt cold in my hands. The bear was confused at the sudden change of light when a gust of wind tugged at his right arm, and it fell off.

  It growled in pain and stood on his hind legs, gathering Wind
on the claws of his left arm. It released a flying attack and charged at me again.

  After losing his limb, it was easier to avoid him. I spent most of the time defending from the crazed monster, waiting for him to run out of strength, or blood. I pierced him with Trinity spear every time I saw an opening, and eventually, he died.

  Aside from that bear, we haven’t met anything of that level of power.

  “Take out some food, I’m starving,” Lina said when we reached the top of a hill. The view was great, perfect for a picknick. I took out cheese and some vegetables we bought this morning, along with some fried sausages.

  “Huh? They are still hot! Shit!” I then took out the orc meet I baked yesterday, it was also hot. “Shit! I totally forgot! Time and space. Time! Oh, I’m such a moron.”

  “What happened now, Darling?”

  “I forgot that things would retain the same temperature inside the Shadow Storage, no matter how much time has passed since they were put inside.”

  “Convenient,” she munched down on another sausage, vegetables weren’t her thing. “We could always eat fried meat, and stew, and bacon.”

  “I have to think of the best ways to use the Storage. Maybe I should start writing down any possible use I could think of, even if it seems crazy.”

  Great, I don’t even have a pen. Or paper. OK, once I buy those, I need to make a shopping list.

  “But Darling, your speed is as amazing as ever. I barely saw anything, it’s so frustrating sometimes.”

  “Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa! Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!”

  A blood-chilling scream erupted somewhere in the north-west. Judging by the voice, it belonged to a woman – probably an adventurer. I didn’t want to rush in unwanted trouble, but Lina was looking at me with such eyes that I couldn’t refuse. And if I did refuse, I’d feel regret.