[Mutya]

  There was something wrong with that fight. The dog didn’t die. I felt my sword hit vitals, I saw the health drop to near zero. But, there was something keeping it right on the verge of death, denying me my victory.

  I ground my teeth in fury when that blade of light crashed down on my head. I would serve the dog for as long as I had to.

  But, when I was done, he was going to wish he placed me into a deathloop instead.

  I woke up to a voice echoing in my ears. I was washed up on a warm beach. The sounds of the ocean crashed in the distance. Standing over top of me was a tanned, faceless figure.

  I scrambled to my feet and tried to draw my swords, but nothing materialized. No commands towards the system cooperated. It was only then that I noticed the difference in my appearance. I had been spared the grotesque changes that some of the other lost souls experienced. My skin was now bronzed by the sun instead of unnatural gold. I touched the tops of my ears to find that they were round instead of pointed.

  “What is your purpose?” The faceless figure asked. “Why are you choosing the path that you are taking?”

  “To hurt people.”

  The answer came as naturally as breathing. It hadn’t changed since the first time I plunged a sword in my husband’s neck and disappeared from society. It hadn’t changed after ambushing travelers camping in the night. It was what attracted Wrath to me and it was what allowed me to have gotten this far.

  I just wanted people to hurt.

  Mutya the Multiplying Violence was my new title. Water crept up the beaches and swallowed the island, removing me from my human past and into my demon present.

  A goat and a lizard greeted me on the other side. That damned lizard! Every time that I had faced him, he was with other people. The goat looked disinterested in helping. Are they not allies? If that was the case, I should take advantage of the situation and-

  As soon as I summoned my swords, his scaled hand gripped around my neck and squeezed with great force. It felt like my head was going to be ripped off of my body.

  “There she is. Are you ready to be my servant?”

  I pulled my sword back to stab him in the chest. But, instead, I received a notification that brought me pause.

  Notice

  Congratulations! The Aspect of Wrath noticed your treachery and has gifted you a final gift.

  Unlocked Passive Ability: Pheromones of the Enemy. Now, and Disciple of Wrath will instantly know that you are a traitor and may become immediately hostile!

  Traitor? This couldn’t be right. I was the last person fighting in that fort. I stood toe to toe with one of their leaders. I put my freedom up for barter in exchange of turning the tides of our favor. If it wasn’t for me, we would have had no chance. That incompetent Tauren was already long dead, unable to take out one lizard with four people. I was strong. I was loyal. I was worthy of your attention.

  And you did this to me?

  It wasn’t acceptable. I was cast aside as soon as I lost value. All of my achievements, meaningless.

  The grip on my throat released and I fell to my knees. I coughed up some blood as air came rushing back into my lungs. I looked up at the lizard who was the cause of all of this. If it weren’t for him, I would have never failed. One day, I would kill him.

  But not today.

  "Good. We have work to do,” the lizard informed.

  Both he and the goat began walking away, leaving me behind. They didn’t even bother to check if I was following them. I took a step in the opposite direction, seeing if they would react to me escaping and chase after me.

  But they didn’t.

  “How far away is this place?” The lizard asked.

  “We’re already on top of it,” the goat answered. “Magical camouflage that requires a key to breach it. Good thing I bought a copy from one of my higher contacts.”

  “How much do they charge for those?”

  “I had to sell a few deathloop hostages to make up the difference. Hope you don’t mind,” the goat replied without even the smallest amount of remorse.

  “Whatever, I said you could do what you wanted.”

  They hadn’t acknowledged that I had chosen to follow them. Was it what they expected me to do the entire time? Was there something implanted in me that would have killed me if I got too far away?

  After a couple minutes, the goat put his hand up and then kneeled down. A large key made of interlocking bones appeared in his right hand as he plunged it into the air in front of him. Suddenly, the air burned with mana and rippled, revealing a dome shape that collapsed from the top. A stone castle, built from the infernal rock that surrounded it, formed in front of us. I could hear a few shouts of surprise and hands pointing up at the collapsing dome.

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  The lizard stepped into the dome and marched directly towards the entrance of the castle. As soon as his foot touched rock, the demons guarding the fort descended upon him en masse. They landed in his path, blocking his way.

  “Halt, who do you think you are?”

  The lizard was bizarrely calm. The goat also looked unbothered by the confrontation. In fact, he looked bored. He pulled out a watch from his pocket and inspected the time.

  “Setting the time,” the goat announced. "Is this really necessary?"

  “What are you-“

  In the blink of an eye, the demon’s head disappeared into red mist. The body fell backwards onto the rock. A black void appeared beneath it, teeth jutting from the dark. The corpse was swallowed whole, leaving nothing behind.

  Wait, that couldn’t be right.

  We had only been in this place for a few minutes and couldn’t have been much above Level 50. Yet, he destroyed the demon with a single punch.

  The demons near them didn’t fare much better. They tried to create a formation to contain the lizard, but he didn’t seem fazed at all. With a sweeping attack, he struck them all with his tail, creating gaping bloody wounds. He pounced on the closest one, snapping its neck and slamming it into a new inky mouth that formed at the impact site.

  Each kill made him faster. His strikes were even more devastating. The attacks levied against him in response did nothing but place them in range to die.

  The mouths swallowed all the corpses.

  He briefly turned back towards us. A blood-red aura leaked off of his body. They formed countless eyes that covered his body. They all stared directly at me and my heart started beating quickly and my hands grew clammy. I was a child lost in the jungle and a tiger was stalking me. There was nothing I could do to save myself.

  I was going to die.

  Then, with an extension of his wings, he took to the air and flung himself at the castle. He blew the front doors with a tremendous explosion.

  “Come on, let’s go,” the goat ordered. “It’s time for your job.”

  “What’s my job?”

  “To be my personal army.”

  I was stunned by what I had seen, the sheer difference in our current power. I may have been close to killing him in the Inverted Tower, but now, it was impossible.

  I didn’t even notice that I was mindlessly following the goat into the castle. It was an unnatural sight. There were no bodies, but there was plenty of blood and remains spread in every direction of the hall. The rumbling of fighting shook the foundations

  “That idiot better not break this place. Come on. This way,” the goat commanded. “Open this door and lead.”

  I swung open the wooden door to see stone stairs descending down into the pitch black bowels of the castle. An orb of light left the goat’s hand and lazily floated down the stairs, illuminating it for me.

  As we descended, I could hear footsteps rushing up towards me. A pair of nocturnal eyes appeared in the darkness before a demon was illuminated in light.

  “Intruders!” It screeched as it charged upwards at me.

  I ran down upon it, ten arms with ten swords sprouted from my shoulder and stabbed forward in unison. The blades plunged into the target but with only a disappointing amount of damage. I stabbed again, parrying the attacks with the other hand.

  My advantages won me the fight. A narrow corridor allowed me to maximize all of my offense and defense in the same direction. The level difference was not high enough for it to overcome and I skewered it repeatedly before it started tumbling down the stairs, reaching the bottom with a wet splat.

  I stepped out into a prison. I could see figures behind bars looking at me with hopeful expressions. I didn’t care about them at all.

  Three more demons were waiting for me at the bottom. They were getting their equipment ready when they saw me. Without words, the three of them assaulted me and I barely managed to generate all of my clones before they could slash into me.

  My clones could control themselves with basic strategy, but I had to command them personally if I wanted to make coordinated attacks. For now, I tried to focus on surviving with basic counterattack patterns to take the damage that was given to me. In exchange for losing three clones, I only did a humble amount of damage in return.

  Sweat poured down my face as I focused on managing all of my clones while not taking a sword to the throat myself. This was worse than fighting three versions of the dog. Far worse.

  I looked over my shoulder to see if the goat was going to assist me, but he just stood there impassively. His shoe tapped impatiently on the ground.

  “Are you really having this much difficulty?” The goat asked me in near disgust. “When Ishmael scooped you out of the mud, insisting that you serve him, I assumed you more capable than some random thug that could duplicate herself.”

  He wanted me specifically? Why? He did want me as an ally the first time that we met when he wanted to get rid of that useless dog. Had he been thinking that way about me ever since? I wondered what exactly about me caught his attention. If it was the typical things that men seemed to crave, perhaps there was an opening.

  “I’m facing off against three of them,” I replied through gritted teeth.

  “Fine,” the goat replied with a sigh. “Take this to be a little more competent.”

  A pair of swords and a few hundred thousand XP entered my Inventory. I quickly equipped them and found a pair of gleaming short swords in my hands. They hummed with untold power. They transferred into the hands of my clones enhancing my power further.

  “You can duplicate artifacts?” The goat asked with interest coating his voice. “That’s something worth investing in. Now level up quickly and end this.”

  I did as I was commanded, immediately maximizing my level and attacking with everything that I had.

  It felt like I had been fighting in the dark with how easy the fighting now became. The sword strikes that barely scratched the skin now severed limbs from torso. My numerical advantage swelled to be overwhelming and there was nowhere the overrun demons could retreat to; no way to prevent the onslaught that came their way.

  I chopped them to pieces while Charles waltzed unbothered through the carnage. He approached a specific cell and shined the light inside. A gold-scaled dragon man hissed from the light and covered his eyes.

  “Charles! You bastard son of a dog! You set me up!” The golden dragon man screeched at the goat, spittle sprayed from his furious mouth.

  “I did no such thing,” Charles denied with a shrug. “I sold you passage to a safe parcel of land. The fact that it did not remain safe has nothing to do with me.”

  “Then why are you here?” He demanded. “I know it isn’t here to save me. You’ve already taken all of the XP I had. You were going to take this place from me, weren’t you? Weren’t you, you ignoble whore’s son? I’ll kill you for this! I swear I will do whatever it takes to destroy you!”

  “Kill him,” Charles commanded, motioning at me and then the dragon.

  I silently moved forward, now accepting of the fact that I obeyed a new master. But, it wasn’t so bad. I was given new swords and plenty of chances to kill. Why did it matter that it was no longer for Wrath? I was shown just how unappreciative they were to me.

  I plunged my sword into the dragon’s neck. With the ability-suppressing manacles on his wrists, there was nothing that he could do to resist me. He screamed in pain, stimulating a part of my brain. A smile crossed my face as I stabbed again, this time, twisting the blade for additional agony.

  “Enough,” Charles commanded, his hand placed firmly on my shoulder.

  A different void swallowed the dragon’s body, taking him to who knows where. Probably the same place I’d go to if I tried to fight him now.

  Above us, there was only quiet. The steady rumbling of combat ceased, leaving us in eerie quiet.

  “Three minutes," the goat said as he looked at his watch. "Ishmael must be done. Let’s go.”

  With one final glance at where the dragon used to be, I followed, hopeful that this new partnership would see me as strong as these two. It would be the only way that’d I be able to kill them in the future.