The Jester of Apocalypse

Marven stared at the cave opening, gripping the brittle branch, unsure whether it would even serve him as a weapon. However, the qi of a platinum path cultivator was not to be underestimated.

Marven could pull every last bit of potential out of this branch. Judging by Neave’s description of the demons, this shouldn’t be too difficult for Marven to handle. Yet, he found himself sweating anyway.

His spirit powers had been removed by Neave. Granted, they weren’t the best spirit powers in the realm, but he heavily relied on the paralysis ability in crises. It was a power that instilled confidence, a trump card he could use when cornered. That ability alone had saved his life uncountable times. Now, it was gone.

He felt sweat trickle down his back with every step that thing took closer to them.

Marven noticed the others picking up branches, likely intending to fight, “Don’t bother. Go hide in a room and wall it off if you can! I will rush to face it outside. If I fight near you, you will all just become a liability! Hurry!”

Gabrias was already running before Marven finished his talk, while Harel hesitated the most. Eventually, Hunter ran to a room, and Harel followed.

Marven gripped the branch tighter.

An unknown enemy he wasn’t sure he was prepared to face…

Marven couldn’t help but grin a little.

Just like the good old days.

It was his youth's unwelcome return, but it was one he couldn't deny the excitement of. Rather than waiting for his opponent to appear, Marven rushed to face it first.

He blazed through the darkness, and the striding creature appeared within moments. It was a grey, rotting demon with tendrils of darkness wrapped around its limbs. It had no eyes, at least not where they were meant to be.

Teeth, eyeballs, and claws sporadically spread through its nasty skin. Marven noted all the critical details, and his sword lit up with a technique.

The branch shone blue, and Marven, gripping it in his left hand, thrust it straight at the demon. It stood frozen, not reacting to Marven’s attack until the last second.

It bent out of the way of the attack and kicked toward Marven's face.

Marven moved his head right and twisted the trajectory of the branch. The demon had committed a mistake, and now it was overextended and out of balance. Marven turned his body out of the way and gripped the back of the branch with his right hand.

He pushed with his right and pulled with his left hand, turning the branch and spinning his torso. Marven had a clear shot at the demon’s stomach but chose to graze its side instead, fearing losing his weapon if the branch got stuck.

The strike landed on the demon’s side, carving out its stomach and spilling guts everywhere. The demon tumbled through the air from the impact, but it twisted and stuck the landing.

Marven didn’t allow it to recover. Instead, he pressed the attack, landing a clean thrust on its chest and another through its mouth.

The demon ignored the thrusts and prepared to strike at him instead, but Marven had already primed his leg to kick the demon away. His foot lit up with blue mist as he landed a foot straight at the demon’s midsection, kicking it straight into the wall and impaling it on spikes.

Marven charged at it, but just as he was about to land another strike, a tentacle stretched from the demon's foot and wrapped around Marven’s leg. The demon pulled, trying to get Marven off balance, but the cultivator’s foot stood firmly planted in the ground, white mist shining around the soles of his sandals.

The demon couldn’t possibly compromise Marven’s footing with something so pathetic. A vertical slash landed on the demon’s torso, leaving a shallow but long gash over its body.

Its reaction, or rather the lack of a response to any injury, freaked Marven out, but that was far from the most unusual characteristic an enemy of his had had.

The demon continued trying to compromise Marven’s footing, but Marven used the technique again, keeping his foot firmly in place. The creature had expected him to do that, as it used the leverage to pull itself off the spikes and swing its body behind Marven.

It spun through the air, again landing gracefully and readying its weapons.

Marven clicked his tongue. This was his least favorite type of enemy, something that didn’t have any apparent weaknesses to exploit.

However, the damage was indeed piling up. Marven rushed at it, swinging his blade from the right. The demon bent its torso to avoid the strike while swinging a dagger at Marven’s head. Marven’s sword suddenly accelerated, passing inches from the demon’s body and releasing a flying strike.

The blue qi blade pushed deep into the demon’s torso, and Marven used the angular momentum to spin into another strike. His weapon arrived from the right yet again, aiming to cut the demon’s head off.

Just as the attack was about to connect, the demon raised its arms, putting the daggers between itself and Marven’s strike.

Useless! Those brittle daggers won’t…

The demon jumped, balling itself up in the air. As Marven’s attack landed, the knockback spun the demon sideways, and it moved the daggers to the other side. When it spun around, flying into the back of Marven’s weapon, it struck the branch, canceling the spin and sending Marven’s strike out of balance.

Marven immediately reacted by discarding his weapon and pulling back. The demon swung the daggers at him, and the tip of Marven’s middle finger was cut open.

The demon didn’t let Marven fetch another weapon, but it instead ran at him, readying the dagger in its left hand for a thrust.

Marven sank under the incoming blow, grabbing the demon's arm. However, that proved to be a mistake.

The demon’s tentacles extended, wrapping its left arm around Marven’s wrists as it kicked off the ground, moving its legs under and around Marven’s arms, wrapping the tentacles around and moving Marven off balance while it swung its right arm dagger at Marven’s torso, landing a reverse grip dagger strike, and knocking the air out Marven's chest.

The blade couldn’t penetrate deep into Marven’s body, but it still managed to pierce his lung.

Instantly, Marven regained his composure. He used a qi technique to strike the ground with his right foot, and once it came flying up, he used another technique, kneeing the demon in the head.

The strike sent a shockwave through the cavern and caved the demon’s skull in, yet Marven knew better than to assume that that had ended the fight, and he put his leg back down to prepare for another strike.

The demon bit Marven’s right arm and swung its body between his arms again. Once it passed back around, it used the momentum to twist Marven’s hand, keeping its teeth firmly planted in Marven’s flesh as it bent and twisted it out of shape.

Once its feet were facing away from Marven’s body, the demon shot a tentacle toward the ground, embedding it into the soil and pulling itself further down. Its feet touched the ground again, and it kicked off, using one foot to block Marven’s incoming kick and accelerate further, bending its legs and pushing them out as it perfectly landed a double-legged kick right at Marven’s jaw.

The world went dark in Marven’s eyes. He barely his composure and swung his left hand around the demon’s body. Its teeth were still planted in his right arm, and rather than free his hand, Marven pushed it further inside, gripping his fingers on the other side of the demon’s throat and planting them firmly on the demon's skull.

Marven jumped, swinging the demon's body away before it could wrap its tentacles around him, and spun into a front flip, pulling his legs back. As the demon swung away and under him, Marven landed, planting his feet firmly on the ground and throwing his arm over his head.

His right arm lit up with red mist as he swung the demon’s body, firmly smashing it into the ground. The impact left a crater on the floor, shaking the entire cave and crashing a part of the ceiling.

The force of the impact had pushed a ton of air and black liquid out of the demon’s mouth, allowing Marven to free his mangled hand.

Just as he was about to swing his leg down and finish the demon off…

ҾҾҾҾҾҾҾҾҾ

Marven groaned and gripped his hand. A strange influence was trying to penetrate his body through his mangled arm, seeping out of the black liquid and into his blood. However, his spirit wasn’t that straightforward to invade.

Within a second, Marven’s arm was gushing out a morphing black mist.

The process was a second too long, however. Before Marven could notice it, the demon had already gotten up. It pulled its hand back, stretching a tentacle to grab a large stone. Its other tentacles firmly gripped other parts of the wall and obsidian branches as it pulled back.

The massive boulder flew toward Marven, and he blocked it with his arms. It crashed against his body, crumbling to pieces without leaving even a scratch on Marven’s body.

“Shit!”

He had overreacted to that attack in panic! The demon bent beneath Marven, swinging an arm straight at his stomach. The nasty black dagger had nearly struck his torso already, and Marven could not avoid the strike.

Marven tightened his abs and pushed his arms down, hoping to disrupt the stab before it could do too much damage, hopefully avoiding disemboweling himself in the process.

Thunk.

The demon disappeared.

Marven blinked and frantically looked around, only to spot the demon firmly embedded into the side of the cave, unmoving.

Neave stood beside Marven, raising an eyebrow at him, “How the hell did you get your ass kicked by a regular demon, old man?”

“Re–!?” Marven couldn’t believe it. That was a regular corrupt demon! There was no damn way that was true!

The demon shifted in the wall, trying to crawl out.

Neave looked surprised, “Toughy, aren’t ya!? Whelp, it's sleepy time.”

Neave appeared next to the demon in a fraction of a second and swung a fist at its back. The impact caused a small flash of light purely from the force Neave could exert. The demon's body was crushed into a paste, and deep cracks spread throughout the side of the cave.

The demon stopped moving.

Marven was aware that Neave was powerful, but…

That was a simple punch. There was nothing special about it. Not a technique, true strike, or spirit power. Not even life force had been used.

Marven’s shoulders slumped. They had a long way to go if they wanted to be of any help to him.

***

Neave pulled his arm out of the crash site, turned to Marven, and frowned, “If you guys are going to be in trouble for every minor demon that appears, then I think I have to help you get sorted first.” Neave turned and ran back toward the cave, “Follow me.”

Once he had appeared back in the room, Neave looked around, “What are you guys doing?”

Gabrias appeared, peeking from inside a room, “Is–Is the thing dead!?”

Neave shot him a flat look, “Okay, everyone gather. It’s time for a meeting!”

Once they had all gathered, Neave observed them sitting around him.

Marven sat to the side, gripping his wounds and breathing slowly. He was on the platinum path, so he could easily use life force to recover from his injuries, he just had to be careful not to spend too much, or he would have problems. A bit of life force was already used in the fight.

As someone on the platinum path, however, he had plenty, and Neave asked him why he was taking so long.

Marven found the question absurd, “I can’t just infuse the wound and force it to heal! It’s much more complicated than that!”

Neave couldn’t believe it. He walked over to Marven, and a small tendril of liquid spirit appeared. He pushed the liquid spirit into Marven’s wound. His father winced as he felt the agency over his own flesh be overtaken by Neave.

Within seconds, the wound healed right back to normal. Soon enough, Marven’s hand was healed as well.

“You… You can do that with life force alone!?”

Neave stared at Marven incredulously. He rubbed his forehead and went back to the center of the room.

Harel sat to the side, away from everyone, gripping her knees. Dukean and Hunter sat close to one another, although Hunter seemed to awkwardly reposition himself from moment to moment, looking for the right distance. Gabrias stood close to the room he had barely convinced himself to leave, eyeing the cave the demon was defeated in.

Neave took a deep breath and asked, “Alright, first, can you explain what you’ve been doing since I've been gone?”