Mistia found herself paralyzed because of the fear while making incomprehensible noises as if wanting to say something but being unable to articulate any words, noises barely audible because of the battle taking place nearby.
Walking towards her is Torbagh, his face decorated with a smile and the mark left by the kick that had thrown him right into where Mistia was. He cracked his knuckles with impatience, he didn't know who kicked him but he wanted to get even with anything, and the fearful woman in front of him seemed to be the perfect victim.
"You're a pretty lady I must admit. Why are you even here?" He said as he chuckled "Did you come here to see how a bunch of strangers massacred each other? That's fucked up"
Torbagh couldn't hold his laughter, in his eyes, all he saw was a creep sadist who was now shaking in fear at being involved in the conflict. He continued walking towards her and she remained frozen in place. The demon continued to caress the spot on his face where he had been kicked with a hand as the other one clenched into a fist.
Mistia's eyes dilated as she saw the demon preparing to attack her, as soon as he was standing right before her, he threw a punch right into her face.
The demon would be left shocked, in his eyes, one moment his fist was about to hit Mistia's face and in the next one he had punched nothing but thin air. Torbagh was speechless, left in doubt on where she had gone, but his question would not be left unanswered for long once he looked down and saw that Mistia had ducked and rolled into the fetal position in the ground as she shaked in fear.
"A fast weakling but a weakling in the end!" He thought, annoyed as he prepared his fist again.
Once again, he threw a punch towards her, this time she wouldn't dodge, she just took it. Nothing happened.
"W-What?" He whispered in disbelief.
His punch had landed directly on her side, however, it had done nothing. Her clothes were intact, it didn't feel like she had any broken bones, she wasn't even bleeding. For Torbagh, it felt like hitting a wall, but not even that, he could easily punch through a wall, then why had he not been able to punch through this woman.
Tobargh was in complete and utter disbelief. He couldn't process what just happened, this woman could not be powerful at all, if she was she wouldn't be shaking the floor, she would've killed him by now!
Angered, Torbagh grabbed her by the neck and lifted her in the air with his right hand, she gasped upon being lifted. Mistia began to kick and scream for him to let her go, but the demon was not hearing her words, he was totally focused on strangling her, however, no matter how hard he squeezed her neck, he wasn't strangling her, he couldn't feel his fingers sinking on her flesh no matter how much he tried.
Torbagh could just not comprehend this.
Mistia was getting more and more desperate each second the demon held her in the air, oblivious to his incapacity to cause any harm to her. She put her hands on the arm Torbagh tried to use to strangle her, she began begging for him to let her go, her grip on his arm gave the demon a very strange feeling, like if she was trying her all to get him off her but at the same she wasn't.
Every second that passed only made Torbagh more annoyed, his mind could not process his incapacity to do any damage to someone, let alone a human. His gaze became more and more enraged as Mistia continued kicking and screaming.
Their eyes connected, Torbagh's furious gaze and Mistia's terrified look. Mistia kept her eyes fixed directly on the demon, before her eyes, everything went dark, she no longer was in the middle of a bunch of tents in a field next to a battlefield, she was in small room surrounded by cold stone and the clear figure of Torbagh in front of her, trying to choke her to death became a human shadowy figure that held her with a malicious smile on his eyes.
Suddenly, Mistia stopped screaming, she stopped kicking, but she kept her hands over Torbagh's arms. She began mumbling something that confused the demon, unable to understand her attempt of speaking.
And in just a moment, that mumbling became a loud and clear scream of desperation.
"NOT AGAIN!"
Mistia screamed her lungs out as her grip on Torbagh's arm intensified at the same time as she twisted it, causing it to get ripped off his body.
The demon could not hold back his scream of agony as he walked back because of the pain he felt. He put his remaining hand on the bleeding wound, trying desperately but uselessly to stop the bleed.
Meanwhile, Mistia stood in place, now on the ground after ripping off Torbagh's arm that she now held in her hands. Her head slowly moved down, darkening what was visible of her face. Her eyes were fixed on the arm, ignoring the demon's grunts of pain, her terror of moments ago had vanished, leaving behind no emotion at all. But that wouldn't last long, her unexpressive mouth would slowly begin to twist into a creepy smile as darkness began to emanate from her body.
Torbagh's pain would be interrupted by a sudden feeling, an exuberant pressure that almost made him fall to his knees, his breathing suddenly felt heavier and he could swear that the environment looked darker. His gaze drifted towards the woman who had taken away his arm, he saw the darkness pouring from her body like steam from a hot tub.
He saw her grip on his arm getting tighter and tighter, making it bleed, staining her hands and dress red before embedding the arm with darkness and disintegrating it.
Mistia put her hands on her face as blood continued to drip from them into the grass under her. Her head slowly began moving upwards as her feet slowly left the ground. Now it was Torbagh the one whose face was filled with fear.
"W-What-?! What are you?" Torbagh said as sweat dropped from his face.
His words however, didn't seem to reach Mistia, she had no reaction to them. She was now floating just slightly above the ground, generating a small breeze that moved the grass under her. She slowly moved her bloody hands away from her face, giving Torbagh an image that would be carved into his mind for the rest of his life.
Mistia's face was drenched with his blood, her mouth was shaped into a disturbing smile, her eyes, both of them, were completely blank, her hair, usually covering most of her face was being lifted by her power, giving a clear sight of her forehead, covered by numerous dark lines in a pattern that resembled to the roots of a tree.
No person or demon in the battlefield had noticed what was going on between Torbagh and Mistia, no one but one being noticed.
"What the hell is this power?" Ascalon said in his mind as he turned to look in the direction where Mistia was.
Ascalon freezed in place, astonished by the power emanating from Mistia, behind him, Stella pulled his sleeve and called him out, failing to make him recover his focus.
"This is Mistia's power, I am sure of that- but how? This sudden increase is- Wait a minute! Her power… it feels- awfully familiar… Hold on, she can't be, can she? Mistia… Mistia…" Something within Ascalon snapped. "Of course! How could I not notice before? It has to be her! She's-!"
His thoughts would be abruptly interrupted by the sound of a sword bouncing off Stella's shield right in front of his face.
"Concentrate you great imbecile!" Stella yelled at him with desperation.
Ascalon looked at the demon in front of him, off balance after hitting Stella's shield, an easy target that would not be killed off by Ascalon, but instead Terrac appeared from behind and snapped the demon's neck with a single movement. Not much after, Dante ran into the scene as well.
"What the hell was that?! Where did your mind go?!" Stella reclaimed to Ascalon.
"Sorry, I lost focus for a moment. I'm fine now" Ascalon said. "By the way, thanks Terrac"
"Hah! It wasn't an issue!" Terrac responded, flexing his muscles. Stella noticed the several scratches in his face and healed him, thing that he didn't notice being too busy flexing his muscles.
"Where is the rest of your team?" Ascalon asked.
"They couldn't keep up, they had to retreat" Dante answered. "What about yours?"
"We split up. We haven't been able to reunite" Ascalon responded.
"I believe the most prudent thing we can do is stick together. The more the merrier" Dante proposed.
"That's a great idea!" Stella said with a nervous smile.
"I don't have any problems with that" Ascalon said.
"Where should we head up next?" Terrac questioned as he turned around.
No words came out of any of them for a brief moment. Ascalon's gaze slowly moved towards the tower before speaking up.
"Towards the tower. We have to reach its top" He declared.
"Huh, why?" Dante questioned.
"Lyle is there" Ascalon responded with a plain voice.
Before anyone could say anything, Ascalon began moving towards the tower, so the rest decided to just go along with him. He seemed to know what he was doing.
Back with Torbagh and Mistia, the latter continued to float in the air, her blank gaze fixed on the demon staring at her, fearful. He didn't know what to do, talking was clearly not an option, neither was fighting, the only possibility he had of making it alive was to run, but he had seen enough to know that he was not going to make it very far. This assumption was made more clear when in less than Torbagh could react, Mistia was floating right in front of him, their faces inches from one another.
As if it wasn't enough, before Torbagh could even make a sound, Mistia hit him in the throat. The demon flinched as he led his remaining hand towards his neck, it hurted like hell. He tried to scream in pain but he could not, the only sounds that could come out of him were insignificant mumbles of pain.
Mistia began to chuckle as the smile on her face became more and more twisted, she leaned in and with a single finger she took down Torbagh, making him fall on his back, and quickly following up with a kick to his right ankle, crushing it, causing his right foot to be separated from his body. Once again, the demon tried to scream but he was unable to.
The expression on Mistia's face seemed to become more and more creepy, if that was possible. The demon stared at her and her disturbing smile, his breathing became more and more heavy while sweating like crazy.
"Told you! I saw someone being thrown over here!" A male voice was heard from behind Mistia.
Mistia turned around in a very creepy way, some of her bones even made sound. Behind her she spotted three demons, two male and one female, all of them wearing pretty standard plate armor, although it was of a dark gray color.
The first male had black skin and yellow eyes, he had a pair of horns coming out from each side of his head, he held a short sword, he was also the taller of the bunch, the same height as Mistia as far as she could tell. The second male was slightly shorter, he held a spear, his skin was purple, his eyes red, his horns were in his forehead, shaped on a curved form. The female was pretty much shorter than the other two, she held a mace, her skin was red, her eyes pitch black and her horns were located at each side of her head in a S like form.
"Hey, ain't that Torbagh?" The second male pointed out.
"Huh? Hey, it is. Ha! Seems like the almighty have fallen" The female chuckled.
Torbagh looked at the three of them with desperation, he wanted to yell at those three imbeciles to run, to run as fast as they can and to not look back, but as much as he tried, his capacities to speak remained disabled, only being able to make muffled noises.
"Since we are so kind, we are going to save you. But you'll owe us a big one!" The first male said as he and the others got into a battle stance.
"Fools!" Torbagh thought.
What happened next occurred very fast, not enough for none of the presents to notice, but enough for none of them to be able to react to it before it was over. Mistia lunged towards the female demon first, hitting her in the throat, causing her to be sent a few meters away. Next up she hit the first male on the throat, throwing him to the side right before hitting the second male also in the throat and throwing him in the opposite direction she threw the first male.
Torbagh looked with terror at his three comrades, holding their necks in pain. He couldn't understand what was Mistia's purpose by leaving them unable to speak, but whatever it was, didn't matter in comparison to what would come afterwards.
Mistia stood in the ground, turning to look at each of the demons until her gaze fixed on the female one. The demon noticed Mistia's stare, she noticed that she had let her mace fall into the ground and tried to reach it but before she could Mistia was already in front of her and lifted her in the air, holding her by the head.
The demon gasped as she got lifted in the ground, she felt Mistia's hands on each side of her head, slowly increasing the strength of her grip. Desperation began to win over the demon who moved erratically in a futile attempt to free herself.
As Mistia's grip became stronger with each passing second, the demon tried hitting Mistia with her fists. All of her attacks landed on Mistia's face and upper torso, doing no damage at all, instead, it was her the one who got hurt each time she hit Mistia.
The demon continued, the desperation in her eyes more and more clear as she destroyed her own hands trying to save herself. Mistia's grip on her head got so tight that the demon could feel how her eyes started to pop out of their sockets, she could feel her brain getting squeezed and her skull fracturing under Mistia's hands.
With a sudden movement, Mistia completely crushed the demon's skull, blood splattered all over her and the ground. The remains of her head, pieces of skull, chunks of brain, both of her horns and one of her eyes fell into the ground next to her beheaded corpse. From the opening of her neck blood spilled into the grass, creating a small pool of blood around the fallen eye.
The three other demons stared in shock at Mistia, whose hands dripped with their comrade's blood as her face showed a disturbing smile that she complemented with a chuckle that they could barely hear.
Soon after, Mistia's attention got drawn to the second male, whose eyes dilated upon noticing her gaze on him. He tried to crawl away but he barely moved a few centimeters before feeling Mistia's grip on his hair. She forced him to get on his knees, he didn't even bother to try to fight her, he just looked at her with an expression filled with fear that she seemed to enjoy.
Mistia's unoccupied hand slowly moved towards the demon's mouth, she slowly inserted some fingers inside of it. He tried to bite her but his teeth cracked when doing so, making Mistia chuckle. She slowly inserted more fingers inside his mouth with a malicious drag, and eventually she had inserted her entire hand, dislocating his jaw in the process. The demon began to choke and tried to pull off her hand, but the more he tried the more she deepened her hand inside his mouth until eventually she began inserting her arm.
Blood started leaking from the sides of the demon's mouth as Mistia's arm went deeper down his throat until it reached his esophagus that could not handle the width of her arm and slowly tore apart. Tears began to fall from the demon's reddened eyes as he felt Mistia's hand going through his flesh like if it was snow, he couldn't believe he hadn't died yet, as if she knew exactly how to move her hand in order to not touch any vital organs.
And then, he felt it, her hands going through his back as she grabbed his spine and with one swift motion, she pulled out, tearing apart his jaw, his neck and his upper torso. Several pieces of him including the leftovers of his lungs, heart, jaw and ribs fell into the ground in front of his kneeling corpse, getting tinted by his blood as all light vanished from his eyes.
Mistia held a piece of his spine on her bloody hands, she toyed a bit with it before drawing her attention to the first male demon, who had already stood up and looked at Mistia with an indescribable horror. Mistia began to spin the spine like some sort of whip as she tilted her head to the side.
The demon didn't think twice before turning around and beginning to run as far as he could from Mistia, constantly looking back to take notice of the distance between. She followed him floating and each time he turned to look at her she'd stop in place for no apparent reason, something the demon didn't get to notice as he ran away. He ran up a hill and managed to get to the top, it was then when Mistia rushed in faster than he could register and used his companion's spine to strangle him.
The first male uselessly tried to fight against Mistia as he slowly ran out of air and his eyes reddened. While strangling him, Mistia dragged him where the corpses of his comrades were. Mistia dropped him in between the bodies of the female demon and the second male alongside the spine. While he recovered the air, she slowly descended until being on top of him with an even wider smile on her face.
She softly caressed his cheek with her hand while guiding her head to his shoulder. He could feel her breath on his neck, making him feel both fearful and hot at the same time, but the latter feeling would disappear as soon as he felt her teeth on his neck, she attacked like a feral animal, tearing off flesh and bones as he tried to scream but only managing to make muffled sounds while she bit him, but she was not only biting, she was eating him. He could hear his bones cracking as she chewed his flesh and the gulping sound of her swallowing.
Fortunately for him, that torture only lasted for a few seconds until he finally bled out. It took Mistia a few moments to realize that he had stopped fighting back so she let his corpse go before standing up.
Blood dripped from Mistia's mouth, but she didn't bother to wipe it out, she only took off a small piece of bone that had gotten stuck between her teeth and tossed it aside. After that, her gaze fixed on Torbagh, the only one remaining, she took her time. She walked slowly, looking at him in the eyes at every moment with a big smile on her face.
Torbagh's eyes were fixed on Mistia's, completely paralyzed. He already knew it was over for him, the only thing he could wish was that she made it quick. It took a while but finally, she had reached him, he just laid there, looking at his executor with fear as she put a foot on his remaining ankle and slowly applied force as it fractured and eventually got crushed.
The demon let out a muffled scream, if his chances of running away were few before, now they were completely nonexistent. Mistia's next target was his hand. She kneeled next to him as she held his only hand in hers, she softly caressed it for a brief moment before gently grabbing the tip of his little finger and twisting it, making a muffled scream come out of his mouth again. She repeated the process with the other two parts of his little finger as slow as her patience allowed her before moving to his ring finger.
She made it simple with his ring finger, she just ripped off his fingernail. Next, she moved into his middle finger, she grabbed the tip of it and slowly moved it backwards beyond what Torbagh's flexibility could handle until it broke into three parts. Then it was the turn of his index finger, she seemed indecisive of what to do with this finger, so after a few seconds she just took it to her mouth and bit it off in one go.
Torbagh could feel the urge to vomit as he saw Mistia eating his finger, the sound of the bones cracking on her mouth and the noise that she made when chewing the flesh was utterly disgusting, even for a demon like him.
Mistia made sure to enjoy every single moment she chewed the finger, taking a while until she finally swallowed it, after that, she moved into the only finger Torbagh had intact, his thumb. She made it simple, she enveloped the finger on her hand and crushed it all at once. Another muffled scream came out of Torbagh's mouth, this one slightly louder than the previous ones, and one more after Mistia crushed his entire hand with her own.
Torbagh has barely any strength left, his arm fell to the ground while he continued to suffer, making as much noise as his damaged throat allowed him to. Following next, Mistia straddled his lap and put both of her hands in his chest as she looked down at him with her creepy smile.
The demon felt how Mistia slowly pushed down, applying increasingly more strength as she did so. He felt both his pelvis and his ribs succumbing to her strength, cracking as if they were insignificant sticks. Tears started to flow down his face, the pain was just too much to bear, he could not hold back his tears, not anymore.
Watching him cry caused Mistia to rejoy, she stopped making force over him and leaned in until they were face to face. It was difficult to tell what Mistia was exactly looking at, but it became clear as she leaned in even further until her mouth connected with one of his cheeks that was wet with his tears. She put her tongue on his cheek and moved it upwards, inchmealy.
It burned, more than hell. Her tongue felt like a sandpaper being put against his cheek. He could feel his cheek getting skinned by her sharp tongue. Blood started to drip from where her tongue was passing by, Torbagh could sense it as it went down his face, mixing with his tears and falling to the ground beneath him as one. His muffled screams could barely be heard, no one else but Mistia could hear his suffering. She continued licking his cheek until she reached the spot under his eye to then pull away.
Torbagh saw her licking her lips, despite all the blood covering her face he could recognize the blush decorating her cheeks, the dark lines in her forehead seemed to glow a bit. She stared down at him and lifted her right hand, she was holding something between her fingers, it was a ball, a small glowing dark ball made out of magic. Mistia forced the ball down the demon's throat, making him swallow it. Mistia's smile grew bigger.
She then lifted her hand again, clenched in a fist.
"Boom, boom, motherfucker" She whispered.
Mistia lifted her thumb. That action triggered the magic ball inside Torbagh, causing an explosion from his depths that completely destroyed his neck, his jaw and part of his upper torso, ending his life immediately. Flesh and bones spread all around his corpse as well as all over Mistia, who continued to smile creepily at his dead body.
After a few moments, Mistia stood up, slowly building up a laughter worth of a maniac, but before she went all out with the psychopathic laughter, she looked at her hands and how bloody they were, then she looked at Torbagh's corpse and back to her hands, they started to shake.
Suddenly, the world before Mistia changed, she looked up and she was no longer in a camp next to a battlefield, she was in the middle of a burning town, the only thing that could be heard was the fire. She was standing on what seemed to be the town square, there was a fountain next to her. She looked down again, at her hands, still bloody but much smaller, like the hands of a child. Mistia herself felt smaller, she began touching her body, her face was softer, her chest was flat, her hair was shorter and even her clothes seemed different, more elegant, but what wasn't different was the fact that she was all covered by blood.
Once again, she looked around and this time she noticed the countless corpses scattered around the place, men, women, elders, children, everyone had shared the same fate. Mistia began walking towards the fountain, unable to control her body, she looked at her reflection in the water, she saw herself, a mere child, covered in blood, her once elegant blue dress dyed red by the blood of the innocent, her mouth shaped in a creepy smile, blood that didn't belong to her, dripping from it. Her pupils were dilated as much as humanly possible, and the marks, those black marks in her forehead, a reminder of what she was, of what she is.
She leaned in and drank water from the fountain despite the body a few centimeters away bleeding on it. Her satiation of her thirst got interrupted by a grunt. She turned around to see a poor boy, barely into his teens, both of his legs broken and bleeding out, trying to crawl away from that horrible setting. She didn't want to, but she couldn't control her body, so she walked towards him and sat on his back, immobilizing him. She stared at his neck and lunged at it like a beast.
At that moment, Mistia snapped back into reality, she looked around and saw the corpses of the 4 demons she had just killed. She then looked at her own shaky hands, all covered in blood. The darkness surrounding her disappeared, her fringe went back in place, covering her face again and she was breathing heavy.
Mistia began to sweat, she led her hands to her head and crouched in front of Torbagh's body.
"No" She whispered, one time and again, and again.
She shaked her head in denial as her breathing got even heavier.
"I'm not…" She whispered, breaking into tears. "I'm not him…"
She began repeating herself, once and again, trying to convince herself as tears streamed down her face, she continued shaking.
Mistia stood up and began walking, away from the battlefield.