Chronicles of Eden - Act VI (41 page)

“I’m just trying to help you,” Rulo innocently said looking away.

Sasha groaned and lowered her head, the two girls falling silent while the sun was beginning to set over the horizon. Feeling as though they had talked enough Sasha looked around for anything else to see other than the same stone walls and view of a grassy hill further ahead. Suddenly her ear twitched at hearing something, a faint buzzing sound that quickly disappeared as the breeze picked up around them.

“Hey, Sasha?” Rulo asked looking up at the clouds. “What’s his name? Your master, I mean.”

“Daemon Warrick,” Sasha said while carefully searching for the sound that she could almost hear over the wind.

“Daemon Warrick. How come humans use two names? Isn’t one enough?” Rulo questioned with a puzzled smile. “I mean is it just to sound fancy or something? How come-”

“
Shh
,” Sasha quickly shushed her as the buzzing sound started to pick up behind the wind.

“Oh come on, I’m just trying to make conversation here. I’m bored.”

“Be quiet. Listen,” Sasha snapped, with Rulo then perking her ears up as the girls heard the breeze rolling by before the buzzing noise began to grow louder.

“What is that?” Rulo carefully asked.

Sasha looked around at the sky carefully before freezing with a sharp gasp, eyes widening as she saw what appeared to be a dark cloud passing by over the trees before it started descending towards them. As it did Rulo jumped with a squeal as they witnessed not a cloud flying down at the ruins but rather a swarm.

A swarm of swarm.

“No,” Rulo breathed out before she opened her mouth to scream, only for Sasha to quickly hold her hand over it and silence her with a stern hush as they saw the locust monsters buzzing and flying down towards the area. The two girls froze while trying to hold in their voices, watching as the swarm landed around and in the stone ruins. One of the ravenous monsters jumped down in front of the girls, facing away from them while its wings buzzed and rapidly fluttered before folding back along its body. Sasha held Rulo’s mouth tightly while hugging close to her, the two shutting their eyes and praying to go unnoticed by the swarm.

“Swarm?” Scay nervously squeaked before quickly wrapping her tail around herself again. She dropped to the ground in her defensive state with a shaky whine while Tabitha shuddered from hearing that name.

“I hate those things,” the neko cursed.

“You know of them as well?” Sasha questioned.

“Had a rather close encounter with them on my last job. Actually they cost me my last job. I was lucky to get out of there with my life.”

“You’re fortunate to survive an encounter with them,” Sasha admitted. “In great numbers they rival the danger of a Darker One by far. At least you were able to flee, we were not.”

“Did you manage to hide from them?” Tabitha asked curiously.

“We tried, but…”

Sasha opened her eye a peek and saw the swarm right in front of them clicking its teeth while slowly looking around the fallen stone hall. A few of the swarm crawled along on the walls and hissed at each other, some were heard walking around through the empty ruins near them, and more were flying around in the air overhead while buzzing and clicking loudly. The reptile girl tucked her tail back as much as she could while she and Rulo held their legs close together and prayed they weren’t visible to any of the swarm.

“Don’t make a sound,” Sasha quietly whispered to the orc.

As if on cue Rulo farted loudly, the sound echoing slightly on the other side of the rubble while all the swarm nearby froze and fell quiet. Slowly they turned towards the girls with their wide smiles and hungry eyes, seeing Sasha cringing before glaring at Rulo with fury as the orc whimpered with fright.

“
Why
?” Sasha demanded through gritted teeth.

“Sorry. I got really scared,” Rulo whined before going wide eyed as she saw the swarm moving closer to them. Sasha looked to them drawing near as they bared their teeth before holding Rulo close and ducking her head down with the orc.

“I’m sorry for everything, Sasha!” Rulo cried out with eyes shut tight.

“You’d better be! I still blame you for this!”

The swarm hissed loudly then raced towards the girls before the ruins shook with a loud explosion erupting nearby. A mere moment later a sharp bang sounded off followed by the girls feeling a heavy gust of wind and dust blowing by their feet while stone walls and pillars collapsed nearby. The swarm around the area started hissing even louder, with the ones before Sasha and Rulo snapping to attention at something off to the east before quickly rushing towards the source. A loud explosion echoed out then another, the walls nearby shaking while loose stones and dirt rolled down and dropped onto the ground near the two cowering monsters. The sounds of swarm screeching and hissing started to grow louder as Sasha slowly looked around and saw they were still alive. All the swarm in the air and those that ran by them raced towards something without even giving Sasha and Rulo a second glance, which they took notice of as Rulo opened one eye to see the monsters ignoring them now.

“What’s going on?” Sasha asked before another explosion erupted, a bright flash of white light flaring up nearby as one of the stone walls ahead of them collapsed onto a passing swarm. Although the monster was crushed with a loud screech all the others raced by and over it in haste and paid the fallen one no mind at all.

“Oh great, now what’s going to kill us?” Rulo whined before a swarm dropped on top of their rubble pile and rolled down it onto the ground in front of the girls, the monster having a stunned expression frozen on its face while its body had been slashed all the way through its chest. Sasha and Rulo stared with surprise at the monster whose wings were singed and withered while its hair was blackened with blood dripping from its head before another dead swarm crashed through the remaining stone wall in front of them. It collapsed onto the ground with debris falling on top of it, the body having been sliced and burned while it was missing half of its head.

“What in Eden?” Sasha said as a dust cloud started to build up around the area. The two girls watched as swarm quickly darted through the haze and flew towards something off to the side before several of them were thrown back into smoking tumbles while flashes of bright light and loud thunderous booms erupted where they were repelled from.

“Sasha, what’s happening?” Rulo nervously asked.

A swarm tumbled over onto the ground in front of them, hissing loudly with blood dripping from its mouth and shoulder where it was missing its arm. The monster screeched then scrambled towards them with a crazed look in her eye. Sasha and Rulo screamed before a sharp wave of bright light sliced through the haze and cleaved the swarm in two. The girls stared with wide eyes as the swarm dropped dead before them then looked over towards where the shadows of dozens of swarm were flying around close together within the haze were seen. The sounds of screeching, bones breaking, flesh ripping, magical blasts erupting, and booms of bright light came from the swirling dust and flying monsters as Sasha and Rulo watched with surprise.

“What’s doing this?” Rulo asked as Sasha started to feel as though she knew what it was.

Slowly and surely the swarm were killed one by one as they converged onto their target, bodies of the monsters flying off into bloody and smoking tumbles and collapsing all over the area while the sounds of their clicking and hissing began to die down. As another corpse of a swarm rolled across the ground and came to a stop against their blanket of rubble Sasha watched with wonder as she saw a blurry silhouette of a swordsman slashing a few more of the monsters with a blade that glowed softly in the haze.

“Master,” she breathed out.

“Master?” Rulo repeated as they watched the silhouette of the swordsman strike down a swarm that leapt at him before turning around and grabbing another by its face. He threw the monster over and down into the ground with a loud slam before he swung his hand back and grabbed the face of another swarm. With a fierce yank he ripped off the head, with Sasha and Rulo gasping as they saw the silhouette of the swarm’s body drop while the swordsman threw the head away.

“W-What the hell?” Rulo shakily said. “Did he just… did he just…”

Slowly the dust began to settle, revealing Daemon standing amidst a sea of dead swarm and rubble from the stone ruins that he had leveled during the fight. His cold blue eyes gazed around at the fallen monsters before seeing one of them slowly crawling away atop its slaughtered sisters. Sasha and Rulo watched as the wounded swarm weakly hissed while its wings tried to flutter, seeming to be unable to fly as it shakily continued to crawl over the bodies of its dead kin.

“Seriously?” Tabitha scoffed. “He fought and killed an entire swarm all by himself? You really expect us to believe that?”

“How could a single human do that?” Scay asked while hiding in her tail still.

“I told you, he’s no mere human,” Sasha reasoned.

“And that wasn’t the part that shocked us the most anyway,” Rulo mentioned.

“Are you kidding?” Tabitha retorted. “What could more unbelievable than him fighting an entire swarm all by himself and winning?”

Daemon walked behind the swarm with his sword in hand, watching the monster as it weakly tried to crawl away. It made it closer towards Sasha and Rulo before Daemon reached down and grabbed its leg. The monster looked back to him with a hiss and kept trying to scramble away from him before he pulled it back and turned it over. The swarm feebly kicked and clawed at him before he struck his sword into the ground through the body of another swarm then slowly got down over the wounded monster.

“What is he doing?” Rulo quietly asked. “Is he going to rape it or something?”

Sasha watched with wonder as Daemon held the swarm’s hands down over her head with one hand, the monster hoarsely screeching at him while her smile had become a look of terror as she appeared to want to get as far away from this male as possible rather than try to rape him.

“Master?” Sasha softly said.

Daemon watched the swarm trembling under him with his cold eyes, seeing the monster shaking with fear while Sasha and Rulo watched him with unblinking eyes. The two girls then gasped in horror as the swordsman viciously mauled the swarm, chewing apart its neck and ripping the flesh off as the monster screeched in agony. Blood splattered onto the ground around it as the swarm was then held tightly by the cambion that feasted upon it with a chilling look behind his eyes.

“He’s…
eating it
,” Rulo squeaked out as she turned pale.

Sasha stared with complete shock as she watched her master devouring the swarm. It didn’t take him long to strip the flesh and meat from her chest and torso, the bones he had broken off during his meal being piled up next to him while blood dripped from his mouth and chin.

“He truly is a monster,” Sasha quietly spoke while not knowing if she was more afraid or attracted to the swordsman.

“He WHAT?” Tabitha yelled out.

“He ate it, right in front of us,” Sasha recalled. “All I could do was watch while frozen in place, barely able to draw a breath as I saw him devouring that monster.”

“He ate a monster?” Scay gasped.

“Would a human do that?” Rulo sharply questioned Tabitha. “Would a human not only fight off a swarm but also eat one alive?”

“He did not do such a thing, that’s simply unbelievable!” Tabitha argued.

“Seeing is believing,” Sasha retorted. “And I saw it clear as day.”

After he finished feasting on the swarm Daemon ripped off a clump of the monster’s hair, using it to wipe the blood off his mouth and chin before he casually cleaned his fingers with his mouth. Sasha and Rulo watched him with wide eyes as the swordsman then stood up and pulled his blade out from the corpse it had been struck through. He gazed around the area and saw no other swarm moving or making a sound before he sheathed his blade and turned towards the two girls. Walking towards them the two monsters gulped while seeing the cold look behind his eyes, both shaking under the rubble as the swordsman’s steps across the dirt and blood was the only sound being heard. Daemon stood before the girls and watched as they stared up at him while rendered speechless, with Sasha’s lip quivering and Rulo’s eye twitching slightly.

“Having some trouble?” he plainly asked.

“M-M-Master,” Sasha shakily breathed out while trembling. “I… you… um… we…”

“Sasha.”

Sasha opened her mouth to correct herself before fainting along with Rulo, the two girls passing out under the rubble while Daemon eyed them with a raised eyebrow. He then sighed quietly and watched as the sun set behind the horizon, a glimmer of light flickering from it for a moment before night befell the land.

“I wonder if they fainted because of me, or that foul stench in the air.”

In the world of Eden there exist stories and myths of half-human half-demon hybrids known as cambions. These unique monsters weren’t born into the world as others were, but rather were created by turning a human into a creature of the darkness. Although it was known that some monsters may mutate or alter their prey in order to breed, those humans were always only female and became lustful monsters afterwards just as those before them. For cambions it was different as they were not complete conversions from human to monster, and were not exclusive to being women only.

They may have become monsters, but were under the control of no one but themselves.

*****

“Specca? You alright?” Falla asked as she walked under the starry night sky next to Daniel and Squeak. In the ant girl’s arms Specca was wearily looking up at the stars as she rested her head against Squeak’s shoulder, a faint blush still on her cheeks while she only murmured something in response to Falla’s question.

“She’ll be alright,” Daniel said looking to Luna who was being carried in his arms while she slept, the girl having remained unconscious during the majority of her ‘punishment’ that night alongside Specca after she passed out from the intense strain forced upon her, or rather
into
her.