242: The Realm of Demons (Patreon)

Note: Monday is Martin Luther King day in the US, so the next chapter will be on Tuesday.

“Maiya? Maiya can you hear me? Please, say something!” Vir said for what must have been the hundredth time.

“Might be these orbs don’t function across realms, lad,” Cirayus said, resting a hand upon Vir’s shoulder. “You can’t know.”

He put the orb back into his rucksack.

Vir ground his teeth in frustration. That was exactly the problem. He couldn’t know. He couldn’t know if Maiya was alive and simply unable to communicate, or…

No! No, I refuse to believe that. I won’t. Not until I have proof.

The demon had laid out all of their gear, and was going over everything to inventory their stock. Vir had brought his white, untearable pack from Mahādi, though he’d hardly used it for anything. With Balancer of Scales, it’d always made sense for Cirayus to carry all of their gear. At least, in the Ashen Realm.

“We’ll be needing to resupply soon. Plants don’t grow well, here in the Demon Realm. Especially this far east. Away from the Ash Boundary.”

Vir only half heard him as he stared blankly at the sunset-dyed desert, feeling empty. It was always sunset here, which meant the Demon Realm was perpetually cast in shades of red, orange, and yellow near the sun, and the blues of dusk on the other end of the sky.

Good for Dance of the Shadow Demon. Not so good for one’s mental health.

Vir never knew how something that so pretty when it occurred only a few minutes a day could look so warped when it became permanent.

The Demon Realm was… not right, though it was broken in a different manner than the Ashen Realm'. The sun hung eternally in the same position, half of it hidden, half peeking just over the horizon. Never quite day, though never quite night, either.

At first glance, the Human Realm appeared the least broken of them all… until Vir recalled it lacked the moon that was supposed to hang in the sky at night.

They’d been here only a day, and already, Vir felt out of place. The near-total lack of prana only made it worse. Having grown used to the Ashen Realm, Vir felt like a fish out of water.

Having grown so used to Micro Leaping everywhere, it took real discipline to walk normally. It felt awful. Like he’d just lost his legs, and was hobbling around on crutches.

This despite his muscles absolutely ripping with power. Far more than they ever had throughout his life. He had to put in effort to explosively jump via his muscles. Prana, however, was effortless.

Once again, he had to conserve his prana usage, and once again, he had to wear face paint to disguise himself. The only difference was that the color was now red instead of cream, and that he no longer had to change his eye color. Most demons had red eyes.

And yet, all of those paled next to his worry for Maiya.

“We need to go back,” Vir said at last. “I need to know if Maiya’s safe.”

Cirayus, who was on all sixes packing the gear back into his oversized rucksack, paused to regard Vir.

“I know how you feel, lad. You’re in a foreign land. Natural to miss the lass. You’re worried. But going back will take as long as it took to come here. You know these communication orbs do not function in the Ashen Realm. What if she’s simply away from her orb? What if she tries to get in touch with you while you’re in the Ash?”

Vir was sure the demon would scold him for even thinking of going back. He thought Cirayus would blame Vir for turning his back on the Demon Realm. But he did none of that. He used something far more potent—reason.

“That’s… actually a good point,” Vir conceded. “You’re… right. Going back won’t solve anything, would it?”

Like Ashani, Maiya’s fate was something that would linger in Vir’s thoughts—except this was much worse. Could he even be functional without knowing she was safe?

“Based on the Chitran activity, I think it’s safe to say we’re in Chit lands. Or more accurately, Gargan lands. And, judging from the ambient prana levels, I’d say in the far eastern reaches of the territory, at that. Samar Patag ought to be to our west. Which is both lucky and unfortunate.”

“How is that unfortunate? Didn’t you hope we’d end up in Garga?” Vir asked, darkening at the thought of the monkey people.

He’d assumed the command the Chitran had over him had been a Chakra ability, but it wasn’t. It was one of the Chitran Bloodline Arts—Coercion. The ability to subtly influence the thoughts of others.

The worst part was how insidious it was. By the time one detected they were under the influence, it was usually too late.

I’ll have to keep an eye out for the prana signature of their tattoo, Vir thought, regarding the miserable landscape around him.

He found it hard to believe people really lived here, in these infertile, prana-starved lands. It made him wonder how any culture could prosper in such a barren climate.

“Aye, though I’d hoped we would start anywhere else. This is hostile territory for us. We’ll have to keep a low profile wherever we go, but we’ll have to be extra cautious here. At least, in Baira, I could’ve shown myself.”

“So, what’s the plan?” Vir asked.

“The plan is for you to get us some supplies. And I think I’ve found just the place.”

— —

Vir grew up in a village. He thought he knew better than most what a village was. One or two main roads—usually dirt—with dozens of smaller streets surrounding them. A temple, a dozen or so shops, and a few hundred homes.

As Vir walked through the deserted roads—calling them roads was too generous, for they were no different from the cracked clay outside the village—Vir understood what an actual village looked like.

Thatched yurts—some round, some rectangular, sat haphazardly around a circular ‘plaza’, though there was nothing within the plaza to indicate it as such. There were about a dozen of these yurts comprising the whole village. Not more than sixty or seventy people could’ve lived here. It was as though demons built a village with the criteria it be finished in a single day, using as little effort as possible.

As he walked, the familiar scents of the village assaulted his nostrils. Not the least of which was dung, though whether it was Ash’va or demonic, he couldn’t say. Rag-clad barefoot demon children ran around, shrieking and shouting, happily frolicking without a care in the world.

Vir kept looking for anything that might resemble a trader or provisioner’s shop, though in a village as small as this one, he didn’t hold out much hope.

He set down his pack and rummaged around. Perhaps he had some offering he could give as a gift to someone to earn their favor. That was always the custom back at Brij.

Am I really gonna find supplies here, though? He asked, half to himself, half to the orb he fondled in his pocket. It was foolish, but he constantly imagined the orb lighting up and Maiya’s voice suddenly coming through. Vir had insisted on taking it with him, despite Cirayus’ warnings.

While the demon had precharged the orb, as deficient as the surroundings were, Vir could visibly see the charge dissipate. It’d only be a few hours before Cirayus had to top it off again. Though it was of another tier entirely, it was, at its core, a utility orb like Magic Lamp and Magic Lock. Which meant Vir couldn’t power it with his Ash prana.

Vir gave up looking for offerings—precious little in the Ash could be used as a gift, and gift-giving wasn’t high on Vir’s mind.

The deficient prana hit Vir almost as much as the dry heat as he walked. Earlier, he’d tested out several of his abilities. The results, while unsurprising, weren’t easy to stomach.

With Prana Current cycling as quickly as he could manage, it took a minute to restore all the prana Leap consumed. That was both not very long, and an eternity, depending on whether or not Vir was in a battle. Luckily, he could easily bank a hundred or more Leaps in his body, so that wasn’t an immediate worry.

Dance of the Shadow Demon consumed about five times the prana, and thus took five minutes to recover from. Not that he could use that ability without compromising his identity, so the point was moot.

The core issue lay in Blade Launch and Launch Barrage. Those consumed prana with reckless abandon. He could only manage a handful of those. The exact number varied depending on whether he was firing Chakram Launch, Katar Launch, or Chakri Launch. Chakri Launch used by far the least prana of them all, while Katar Launch used the most.

As for Prana Blade, Vir found he could sustain about thirty seconds of continuous usage at full power before he ran out, and once his body had been fully drained of prana, he suspected it’d take a day or more for him to recover. The issue was he had to keep moving to new areas to sustain the recharge rate, or it’d drop to a trickle.

Still, Vir had tested using his Talents without Prana Current, and found he could barely invoke a single Leap before depleting the prana in the area. Current allowed him to pull prana from a much wider area—he genuinely pitied the demons here who lacked it. It was why the Chitrans had seemed so weak to him before.

The other major downside of the Demon Realm was that Prana Armor now took forever to form. Previously, it’d taken a few minutes for it to coalesce back to its original strength. Now, Vir doubted very much he could ever get it to the same density as he had before, and when lost, it’d take days, if not a week, to reform. His armor directly competed with his body for the scarce prana. He’d either have to prioritize armor or his own pranic reserves.

It was ironic. When Vir had first entered the Ash, he felt like he was drowning from the oppressive density. Now, he felt like he was suffocating from the lack of it.

Despite all of this, Vir felt he held an overwhelming advantage over his fellow demons. An advantage that ought to scale to more prana-dense regions as well. The only unknown was the effect of tattoos, but after seeing how much less potent Balancer of Scales had become, Vir wasn’t overly worried. At least, not against unaffiliated tattoos. Weakened though it may be, Cirayus’ Ultimate was still extremely formidable.

Vir approached a yurt, hesitated, and finally called out.

“Um, hello? Is anybody home?” Other than the dozen demonic kids, who all gave him suspicious looks, he hadn’t spotted a single person outside.

At least the face paint is working. Vir had never disguised himself as a red demon before, but reds were far more common than grays, and so it made sense. It helped that Shan wasn’t around, either. The wolf, though small compared to his brothers and sisters, was still larger than any prana wolf Vir had ever seen. He also attracted attention, though unlike Neel, Shan was quite proficient at remaining out of sight when he wanted to.

Prana Vision clearly showed that most of the yurts were in fact filled to the brim with people—and he occasionally heard chatter and sounds of shuffling, but no one had come outside until now.

Vir waited a long moment. He began to wonder if the three individuals inside were ignoring him when one rose from a chair and trundled over to the entrance. All their prana signatures were incredibly dim, but Vir saw enough to see she walked with a limp.

“We don’t get many outsiders here. Whatdya want?” the middle-aged woman snapped, a look of suspicion on her face.

“I, uh…” Vir stared at her for a moment, before deciding to take a gamble. “I’m Gargan. Looking for some supplies.”

The woman’s eyes narrowed. “You with the rebellion?”

“And if I am?”

The woman burst out grinning. “Well, why didn’tchya say so! Come in, come in! You’ll be needing food and shelter, ye?”

“Uh, no, actually I’d just appreciate it if you could tell me where to find some supplies,” Vir said in relief.

“Ash dung!” the woman barked.

Does she mean Ash’va dung?

“Yer stayin’ with us. Warrior like you’s gotta eat. Keep those mean muscles you got packed on, yeah? Where’d you bulk up so much, anyway? You’ve got the arms and legs of an Ash’va!”

Vir flushed at her comment. He wasn’t that big. Next to Cirayus, he was nothing. Rather, his body contained not even an ounce of fat. It made his dense, toned muscles look more prominent than they really were.

“I…”

“I won’t take no for an answer, young man! You’re comin’ in and that’s that.”

The woman grabbed his wrist and pulled him along with more force than Vir had thought possible.

Resigning himself, he allowed the woman to pull him along.

Maiya… What have I gotten myself into?