Journey's End!?
//Warning: Gore//
There was a roaring fire where a wagon was in the middle of a plaza, small clay buildings surrounded it at a distance, as where the bigger clay building that I had seen at a distance was before the fire, it being illuminated under the night sky by the orange glow.
There was a group of men, human men, who were clad in silvery armor with a three-headed lion's symbol atop of their breastplates; they were all carrying identical looking swords made of presumably their armor's same material. Standing in front of them guarding the big clay building was the busty woman, she looked pretty hurt with her multiple cuts apparent on her famished yet athletic body, a large bleeding gash was on her upper-left thigh. She was pointing her rusty spear at the group of humans, they kept their distance from her but didn't at all seem alarmed whatsoever from her defiance, one began to speak.
"Disgusting imp trash." A man broke away from the group and slowly walked towards the busty woman, she grit her teeth and faced him with murder in her eyes; her spear affixed towards his every leisurely walk.
I hadn't made myself apparent just yet as I was surprised to learn that I could understand the man speak, it sounded like regular English to me- but with a medieval-ish tone to it, it was like I was watching a historical drama.
He unsheathed a sword from his scabbard, it slid out with a disgusting squelch from thick blood that adorned it's edge; it all too fresh.
I then noticed that just behind the busty woman, were too familiar looking silhouettes lying still on the grass. I didn't need to inspect them any further to know who they were. I could feel my chest writhe strangely as I glimpsed at them, and the busty woman's grit- I began slowly approaching from the side of the big buildings shadowed right wall, behind the busty woman.
"To be quite honest, doing this was akin to taking a detour." The man's face was backlit from the inferno over the wagon, his eyes gleaming with disgusting malice.
"Your deaths will bring glory to humanity, one small step to further our supremacy over the demonic races." He assumed a stance, his sword angled at a simple left- he was going to swing at a horizontal arc.
"Prepare to die imp." He spoke coldly and swung his sword emotionlessly as it wrung out a reverberating metallic shing.
But just as his sword was going to connect with the busty woman and her nearly broken spear, I sprang into action from the shadows-
"Eughaahgh" I shouted, I was stuck between saying a cool one-liner or a war shout and the result was just me giving an embarrassing yowl.
But, instead of the sword connecting with the busty woman's neck, instead it was cane-staff that took the contact; the blade dug deeply into it, nearly splitting it in two clean halves, nearly that is... thankfully not wholly.
"What the-" The man griped, he tried un-swinging his sword but to both of our surprises, I held his sword at my cane-staff easily- my strength the culprit.
He tried with both hands to retrieve his sword embedded into my cane-staff as I gave the busty woman a look, motioning her with my eyes to retreat to her fallen comrades behind us. She looked at me with a defeated, but thankful look as she limped away to the two bodies- her spear still pointing to the man before us.
"Blasted imp- wait, wait a minute." He gave up on his embedded sword, releasing his hands from the handle and unsheathed a small dagger from his waist, he looked at my face with confusion.
"You're no imp, what in Nimia's name are you- you blasted demon! DIE!" He rushed at me with his dagger, I was taken at surprise to his quick reflexes in his otherwise bulky armor as his dagger struck at my exposed chest with deadly accuracy.
I could feel the thud on my chest, and I winced in reflex- but to my surprise, I felt nothing as I opened my eyes to him flailing at me with an exasperated barrage of strikes.
"DIE! DIE! DIE DAMN YOU!" His flurry of pokes and swipes were concentrated to every inch of my body (minus below the belt, we men have standards) as I saw his dagger touch my skin with force but not make a single indent or scratch- even at my throat. In all honesty, it felt like a cool breeze, but that perhaps could be attributed to his arms swiping and disturbing the night air and not the actual tip of the blade itself.
I let him attack me as I stared at the whole bizarre scenario in confusion, even the other group of humans behind him onlooked at the whole thing with visible puzzlement. Some began preparing their swords, and a few approached- I think they're trying to help.
But enough was enough- my late father assmoldy or something, had told me that I had I had high physical resistance, but it wasn't total immunity. I can't rely on the logic that it's infinite, maybe it has a certain point? I wouldn't know.
"Sorry about this." I readied my other arm, holding the book- and lifted it high up into the air; I was going to swing it down in an arc, with the book acting as the blunt object. If it weren't for the severity of the situation, this could almost look like a comedy routine between a disgruntled teacher and an annoying student, even with the teacher using a textbook to give a playful smack on the student's head.
"Reflect on your actions." I even gave a teacher-like one liner as I swung down the book. But instead of the book moderately hurting the man enough to knocking him away from me, what happened instead shocked everyone to a stand-still- even me.
What came from the impact, mind you I swung without much speed- really just letting the heaviness of the book itself to fall instead of using most of my own strength- was an explosion of scattering red mist replacing where the man's head was a moment prior. It splatted outward in a cloud, it dyed my chest red and the book in my hand completely, with the man dropping to the floor still holding the dagger in his hand as blood began to spew out from the smothered lump of what would be his exposed neck.
The other men, of which I'll now presume to be knights as some of them had put on their helmets, stopped dead in their tracks just a few feet away from me- the ones without their helmets had their mouths-agape at me as if I had just made the knight attacking me head explode; oh wait, I just did that.
"The captain... the captain..." One of the men spoke, his finger trembling in stupefied awe at the headless corpse below my feet.
"ATTACK!" Some of them had regained their senses and began rushing towards me, their swords primed in unison.
I dropped the book to the floor in disgust from the blood and fixed my attention to the knights swarming at me, I needed a moment to take in what had just happened- so I reflexively extended my arms out to push them away but-
*Crrrunch*
Where one of my arms had been extended outwards, one of the knights who had been running towards me now had his torso embedded up to my elbow. My arm had carved a hole that punched through both his armor and body with ease; bits of viscera and other disgusting bits were scattered onto the grass, I could see my free hand from the other side from his back moving freely in glistening blood.
He didn't scream or let out any noise, but his face was stuck in a distorted befuddlement that eyed my arm with anguish. Then he went limp, his whole dead weight lying heavily on my elbow.
Maybe it really is a blessing that I'm able to take this as well as I am now, either my homunculus mind shares no deep emotion or deadens it- either way, it's preventing me from going crazy to what I'm currently witnessing.
His body slowly slides off from my arm, joining the other dead knight on the ground- the other knights stop their charge as they witness the bizarre death that had just occurred.
Their swords dangle from their limp hands, fear visible on their faces as they falter any kind of advance toward me.
I probably look like a horror show, with blood and guts splattered all over me- it not helping that I'm half-naked as well.
"It's him!" One of the helmeted knights cried, the terror from his voice shook the other knights.
"Ahriman has reincarnated; we must alert her highness!" The helmeted knight began to run from the advance of the troop, he threw away his sword as he gave a desperate sprint into the night away from the village.
"Come back here fool!" One of the un-helmeted knights cried, but his voice failed to catch the deserter as he was already gone from vision or earshot in the steppe.
There were now three knights left, one of them helmeted and the other two not. I could see that their boots were shaking, but they held onto a strange conviction with how they held their swords up high as they cautiously approached me.
The helmeted one whispered something to the other two and took some distance from them as they formed a kind of triangular position towards me- the ones facing me from the front giving a sinister grin.
"Ahriman or not, you won't survive this next attack Demon." the knight on the left, of which I take a closer look now I find out is actually a rather pretty woman (is everyone on this world beautiful!?), spat out her declaration with figurative venom dripping from her tongue at me.
I didn't know what to do, I've just been reacting to whatever they've thrown at me so far with the grace of a blind paraplegic. I threw down the cane-staff with the still embedded sword to the ground and readied myself with whatever they were going to do next- I stood where I was, fearing if I moved from where I was- busty woman would be caught in the crossfire behind me.
I braced myself, holding up my arms defensively in a splayed X-like shape with my wrists connecting at the swivel and my elbows jutting outwardly- the more area I cover, the less danger busty woman will be in.
"O' Highest Goddess Nimia of the World." the helmeted man who was at the tip of the triangular formation began to speak in a stilted chant, the air around him visibly distorting like how invisible gas does.
"Protector of Humanity, Defeater of Ahriman and his Demons." His chant was now being repeated by the other two knights, the distortion of the air expanded outward- but oddly enough, none of the air's distortion occurred around me.
"Hear my call, hear our plea, grant us mercy and smite the evil that plagues our world, our rightful home of Solaster." Their chant's reverberated in the distorted air like crackling lightning, the two knights forming the two other ends of the triangular formation then extended the arm that faces one another outwards to each other-
"Take this as our tithe..." Their extended arms began to glow a blinding light with the entirety of the helmeted man's body at the other end.
"And deliver penance." Their glowing arms disappeared into thin air with a fizzle, but they showed no sign of faltering as they braced through the pain and stared at me with a look of victory. The helmeted man disappeared as well, but I could still hear his voice.
"DEVASTATION MAGIC: WANING SMILE OF THE GODDESS!" His disembodied voice screamed in holy fervor; a blinding ray of light formed between the two knights- it shaped in the form of a a long spear.
I get it now; they formed a ballast- and I'm their target.
I guess this world wasn't meant for me to begin with huh? Guess this beats dying like how I did last time, at least it'll be kinda cool now.
I close my eyes and brace for what I presume to be the world's version of end-all-be-all holy magic, I doubt ol' pops' Faucet (I really should remember his name properly) made me able to withstand something of this measure.
I silently thank the old-timer for giving me this second chance at life as the holy spear blasts towards me, it warping the air around the vicinity of the village into a vorpal suction as the night sky is briefly illuminated by a false sun- a literal meteor shoots upon me.
Welp, I lasted a day this time around. Maybe I'll be reincarnated into something easier like a butterfly or something, or maybe even a tardigrade- those little guys are indestructible heh.
These thoughts linger in my mind as a second passes... then another, and another, then.... another.
Hm? Wait a second, why am I still thinking? Shouldn't I be waking up in another life right now?
I hazard the agonizing moment to open my eyes but give in to my curiosity as I peek at the awaiting landscape that I'll find myself in now.
Have you ever heard of the tragedy of the Tunguska impact? In Earth's history, we were lucky that for the majority of the time spent living out in the void of space, large impact meteors would largely be redirected and absorbed by our loveable gas-giants Jupiter and Saturn in outer space. But even though these two planets do the majority of acting as our safety net, a bit of space debris does slip through and manage to hit earth; a notable one being the Yucatan crater that spans 90 miles under the sea in the Gulf of Mexico, that of which is theorized to be responsible for wiping out the dinosaurs. The Tunguska Impact was a meteor that had managed to hit earth in 1908, Siberia, Russia, but thankfully dissolved just a few miles from the surface before impact. Yet even though it did dissolve, and it physically did not hit the earth- its kinetic energy dissipated in a blast of energy so great from its dissolvement that it released a nuclear-like devastating explosion that spanned a diameter of roughly more than 800 square miles in the Siberian taiga. In its destruction, it only managed to thankfully kill three people, people who living far from but within the diameter of the impact- but in all practicality, virtually disintegrate any and all living non-human life living in the Siberian wilderness in that burst of energy. This tragedy that I'm describing now can be likened to what I'm witnessing now, as to where I'm standing from- I see nothing but evaporated dust stretching seemingly-endlessly to the horizon in a cone-shape outwards from me.
A few feet from me, I see visible blackened marks burnt into the dust- the spots where the two knights had given up an arm to prime the magic spell meant to kill me. I then see from above me, a magic circle that I hadn't noticed from before due to the darkness of the night sky.
It's gigantic, it likely spanning several miles long in diameter, its inscriptions and runes being the size of literal clouds. But it was slowly crumbling away- fading away slowly.
I... I don't know what just happened.
I am at a loss of words; I really don't know what had just freaking happened.
I look behind me, expecting the worst compared to what was the dust-scape in front of me- but to my surprise, instead of an identical burnt landscape, the busty woman was lying unconscious with her dead comrades- her face peaceful, her chest rising slowly up and down from her light breathing.
The large clay building too was also untouched, but the other buildings and the wagon were gone- along with the bodies of the two I had accidentally killed just before.
But before all of this could sink in with the stillness of the night air, a game-like ping played in the air- it startling me.
//[Reflection] Skill Activated//
A small display like that of a game's appeared in front of my vision, it stating that a skill called [Reflection] had activated. Words began to scroll upwards from the display-
//[Absorption] skill over-exceeded 999%, [Reflection] skill used to disperse excess 1% remaining magic energy//
I felt a surge of heaviness overtake my knees, I fell onto the little bit of grass left underneath my feet from the wake of spell- a deep drowsiness was setting onto me, my eyes felt like sandpaper- if only I could just sleeeeepppp....
As I was just about to drift away to the deep sleep I was being forced into, my chest where the scar was began to burn as if molten lava was being poured there- but I couldn't scream, this forced deep sleep sapped me from any energy of doing so.
//Expend surplus magical energy on [Skills]?// //[Yes] or [No]?//
I eyed at the displayed option, my lips managing to mumble a barely audible yes.
//Commencing expending of surplus magical energy into [Skills]// //[Manual] or [Recommended] [Skill] Expenditure?//
I couldn't hold on anymore, I couldn't even speak as the lulling of the deep sleep forced my eyes closed- all I could do was think of the option before I completely gave in.
Recommended.
///
Gifts
-- Gift
received Weekly Power Status
-- Power
Ranking 
-- Power
stone