Chapter XIV: The Job

A Chapter by Oran

A Blood Well is a reserved dimensional pocket and practically a Greater Demon's domain. It's very dangerous to go head on against one, especially if you go alone, unless you do it for a living, of course.

"Smells like cum", Lina remarks inside the dark chamber where Issei keeps his victims. Try not to search or ask what that word means.

"Don't... say that word", says Credo, trying to figure out what kind of Blood Well they've been transported into.

He looks around the place. The ground would make some kind of squishy sound when he stepped on it. When you take a closer look, the walls and the floors were made of flesh from cardiac muscles. It's almost like the place was inside a colossal heart because the whole thing seemed like it was beating. Gross, considering what you were walking on sticks to your shoes.

"You hiding from me, Issei?", he implies to provoke his enemy.

"Over here!"

A red light shines on what looks like a king sitting on his throne. Behind the throne, however, was a background of the most beautiful women that Issei has ever "conquered" stuck to the fleshy walls.

"So. What do you think?", says Issei, arrogantly looking down on his opponent from his throne.

"You're telling me...", Credo unsheathes his Gunblade, "... you banged all one-hundred of these hot girls?"

"What? No!", he rises from where he's seated, "I'm collecting them; and when I get all the women in the world, I'm gonna bang them all at the same time!"

"How shameless can you be!"

Credo charges toward him while dragging his heavy blade from the ground. A swing of his blade from the charge was about to hit Issei, but then he effortlessly blocks it with his bare hands.

"You really think that's gonna-", a blast form Credo's Gunblade interrupts his cocky remark.

Once the smoke clears out from the shot, his enemy wasn't in front of him anymore. Issei was behind him, and it looks like he's sprouted wings and grew horns like when [1]Jin turns into [1]Devil Jin.

"Do you have any idea who you're dealing with!", Issei taunts him.

"Lina!"

With that command, she jumps off her partner's shoulder and does something awesome. I didn't really discuss what kind of powers Lina possessed, did I? Well, she can summon a pillar of flames with a radius of up to... I don't know... 3 ft? Now she's blasting Issei with a lot of those flames but he keeps dodging them with his flight.

He flies to the highest point of the chamber, and a red ray of lightning envelops his body. Then, at the right time, he shifts all the power to his hands and fires right at Credo. Before that brisk amount of magical energy could hit him, he summons a butt-load of frost on his arms and throws it right at what's coming to him. As a result, the two energies collide at each other, bombarding the Blood Well with bits of ice.

"Why do you keep hunting us, Credo?", he drops himself from flight and lands at the center of the chamber. "Is it because you hate us? Is it because you want to feel a sense of glory? Or is it because your pathetic sense of justice as an Elemental urges you to do so?"

"I'd be lying if I said none of that was true", he points his gunblade at him, "Why don't you come over here and I'll give you a fair answer?"

"That's more I like it!"

Issei covers himself with red lightning once again, and quickly tries to ram Credo with his arm. Luckily Credo was able to block it with his sword, but it still throws him of his footing, causing him to hit the wall. He goes down, then Issei follows it up with another bolt of energy, this time causing a direct hit on him. As a retaliation, Lina creates an even larger pillar of flames on where Issei was standing. It didn't do much damage since he was able to protect himself with his not-so-angelic wings.

He was about to crush Lina with a bolt of lightning to make it even, but it explodes in his hand when a patch of ice froze him in place. He uses another burst of energy to free himself from it as he finds his enemy getting back up.

Credo strafes toward him and thrusts his sword towards his chest, but he merely dodges it to the side and slams Credo's nape with his elbow. Credo turns around tries to cut him off his pace with one slash. But instead, his Gunblade gets flung into the air before it even hits and sticks itself to the ground when it falls because Issei's right arm punches it upward. Now that I mentioned it, his right arm actually looks stronger than his left arm. I guess that happens when you 'whack it' every... never mind.

Now that his opponent is disarmed, Issei beats the living crap out of him with his fists. Lina was doing her best trying to throw flames at him but he keeps brushing them off at the same time with his wings. Credo couldn't catch a break from the flurry of knuckles beating him to a pulp. After a series of blows to the midsection, Issei finishes him off with a blast of lightning from his right arm that punches through his chest. Credo goes down on his back from that last one. Down, but is he out?

"Well, well, well, I guess you'll have to die too", Issei says, convinced that his enemy's out while setting his sights on Lina.

As a reply, Lina sticks her tongue out at him.

Before he could go and break the little cat's neck, he sees Credo was halfway on his feet.

"That really hurt...", Credo acknowledges as he tries to stand and reach for his Gunblade, [2]"... I'd even go as far as to say I underestimated your...", he pulls off his weapon from the ground, [2]"... abilities...."

"What are you?", says Issei, surprised that his enemy is still alive after all that.

"Just the guy who's gonna send you back to Hell..."

As soon as he gets back up, a surge of energy pulsates violently within his Elemental body. This phenomenon is what I'd like to call [3]Awakening. An Elemental has a lot of unstable, unusable, and excessive mana; however, they can also force their bodies to use said mana to increase their magical energy. That's when Awakening occurs. They can use all that dormant energy stored as a power source for... oh... I don't know... killing Demons. It will also change their appearance and personality depending on their Element. For Credo, it looks like his blue hair's turned silver and his skin is crystallized into ice, but don't worry, he can still move like he does. His personality doesn't look like it's changed though.

"Still up for another round?", Credo taunts him.

Issei tried his best not to be intimidated by him, so he takes up his offer and taps into his own powers as well. An even more intense shard of lightning empowers him to match what power Credo has.

"Why not?", he says as a rebuttal, "After all, you did break my streak in my conquest. I never expected it to be broken more than once."

"I'm just getting warmed-up", he says.

I'll tell you this now. Credo could have easily taken down The Desert's Embrace if he were to Awaken, but he wanted to see if the new allies he's gained had some fight in them. He would've made it hail in that Blood Well and drowned Buhangin in a blizzard. So let's just say, his power is a whole lot more than it looks like....

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

You guys wanna see what Mea and Solis are up to? Of course you do! It's not like the writer's giving us a choice anyway.

"So let me get this straight...", says Mea while sitting on her chair inside what appears to be an oriental cafe' in Xenovia, "...There's two Elementals in the Lower Kingdom located in Sentinel's Canyon but before you get there you'll most likely get killed by the wild animals from the surrounding area...."

"Uh-huh!", Nash confirms, also sitting down and drinking tea, "There were sightings of [4]Tigerex, Rathalos, Yian Garuga, Daimiyo Hermitaur, and sometimes, even a White Fatalis."

Solis was also there. His eyes were sparkling after hearing about a few monsters he has rarely slain; he basically started to drool when he heard about the [4]Fatalis.

"...You don't know any other information about them apart from the fact that they have an Elemental Affinity in synergy with each other...", Mea continues, "... and that they're also looking for other Elementals like us to join with. However, in trade for this information, you want to come with us in our journey."

"Exactly", Nash answers.

"May I ask why you're coming with us?", Mea takes a sip from her cup.

"Well... I'm kinda in love with him."

"Who?"

"Credo."

His name almost caused an unnecessary spit-take from Mea, but instead she coughs the drink that went down the wrong pipe.

"That's barely..." *cough*... acceptable."

"Aw... come on....", she begs with an adorable frown on her face.

"What you're... feeling doesn't justify your reason", she explains.

"I agree", says Solis, "Not that you'd slow us down, but it would be a bad idea to bring someone who'd get dragged along."

"Haven't you two ever been in love?", Nash says, trying to convince them.

"No", the two answer at the same time.

"Oh...", she thinks of something to say, "Well, you guys at least feel the need to protect someone important to you, right?"

"Y...Yes", they answer together again.

"That's exactly how I feel about him!", she says with an enthusiastic look on her face as she leans from the chair. "He's always wandering around, risking his life like he doesn't care about his own safety anymore."

"I think the guy can handle himself", says Mea.

"But what if he overexerts himself?", says Nash, still not giving up.

"There's, like, four of us now; I think we can manage."

A long pause came about then suddenly...

"Alright...", she implies, as if having another way to convince them. She takes something from the bag that happened to be under her chair. It was filled with Draconian books where the story goes from the right to the leftmost page of the book. It appears to be comic books published for the sake of erotica (I never thought I'd ever say a statement like that). Specifically, the book is called manga by most Humans since it was published in Draconia.

"What's that?", says Mea peering through the black and white illustrations.

Nash drops it all on the table to be used for negotiation. "All thirty chapters of [5]AkiSora and a few volumes of [6]Minamoto-kun Monogatari."

Acting on impulse, Mea immediately takes one of the books.

"This is...", she flips through the pages, "This is amazing!"

"Of course!", Nash tells her with a proud smirk on her face.

"Kyaaaaa!!! Sora-kun, kawaii!!!!!" I, uh... I don't even know what language Mea is speaking right now. That look on her face, though, tells me that she's impressed with the book-comic thing she's reading.

"If you let me come with you, I'm bringing all of that with me and I'll let you read when it's your turn since I just got them-"

"You're definitely coming with us!" And that, dear readers, is how you negotiate with a woman who likes shouta-con genre for her erotica. Don't even think about asking me what that means. I just said a lot of things I never thought I would say in my entire life. This isn't worth what the writer presented to me anymore.

"Success!", Nash pumps her fists.

"I don't really know what happened...", yeah, same here, Solis, "... but if you're okay with bringing her along, it's all on you."

After skimming through the book for 23 seconds and drinking a cup-full of tea, Mea finally calms down.

She clears her throat. "...Now, about going to the Lower Kingdom..."

"We'll have to start moving after Credo finishes his job", Solis says, thinking rationally. "It's a pretty long way from here to the Lower Kingdom."

"Nope", she puts down her cup, "You need to get a more suitable weapon for yourself if you expect to survive with Demons coming after us."

"Why can't I just use this?", he brings out Kirin as he complains, "My friend gave this to me and he says it's magically enchanted or something."

"Yeah...", she points at the blue sword, "But does that weapon match your Elemental Affinity?"

"Element... what?"

"I mean, is that weapon the same Element as you?"

"Oh. How was I supposed to know?", he takes a sip of tea but immediately spits it out because of the unusual taste. "Besides, where are we even gonna get a weapon?"

"I know a place...."

=====================================================================

1. Playable character from the Tekken series.

2. Quoted from Dante on Devil May Cry 4.

3. Similar to how Dante's Devil Trigger works, except, you know, not like a Demon.

4. All of them are monsters from Monster Hunter.

5. Older sister x Younger brother, incest, ecchi manga(R-18)

6. Harem, ecchi manga, but the main character is younger(R-18)

prev chapter