Silhouette

In the distance, James could see his ticket to the surface. A long elevator rose from yet another one of the numerous half-standing buildings of the Sunken City, some sort of bar, that went up to the top of the stone dome that covered it, leading to another station somewhere in the Sewer Network, one that lied beneath Zalcien proper, beyond the Black Border and its military surveillance. Through it, he could finally reach a proper civilized space, a place where he wouldn't have to worry about giant cockroaches or raiding thugs.

He didn't have any official ID or anything of the sort that was necessary to build a life up there, but that sort of thing could be figured out later. Right now, he needed to secure the last outpost between his base back at the orphanage and his safest way to a better world.

The last hostile bastion standing in his way was a regular house, though the one inhabiting it was anything but. According to Guy's newly founded underground network, this house - the inhabited building the closest to the elevator station James wished to reach - was the domain of a powerful creature, one intelligent enough not to antagonize the administration of the Sunken City but still far too bloodthirsty and violent to be reasoned with. A demon.

Which was why James had hired a very special someone for this one attack. A very special someone that was currently standing right next to James on the roof of some sort of library, studying the decrepit house and the various things about it that felt wrong, such as the way the structure appeared to bend and curve whenever it was almost out of sight.

"Yes, I see why you felt the need to call me. It is far beyond a mere imp, though thankfully for us it still is nowhere close to a major demon."

"How strong would you say this demon is then, Mesker?"

The old mage rubbed his long thin curly white wick-like goatee with his black hand as he hummed.

"I can't be sure. The strength and density of demonic energies is a good way to make a basic assumption, but in the end knowledge and experience can overcome pure might. It seems like either of us two could handle it alone, but that's exactly the sort of thing demons want you to think."

"Could you tell us anything else about it? What kind of power or elemental affinity it could have?"

"From what my scrying spell can discern, there is no particular concentration of energy of any sort besides demonic ones, so probably no elemental shenanigans to worry about. Whether this means we'll deal with a brute or a warlock is yet to be seen."

"Very well. I don't suppose the performance I paid for covered fighting the demon yourself, does it?"

"No, though I'll stick around for now. In case somehow you make it mad and it goes on a rampage I'll be ready to take it down before it causes too much damage."

"Why not help us directly and avoid a confrontation with an angry demon?"

"The administration has been fine with this demon because it stuck to this house and paid its taxes, and I sadly must stay true to my oath as a demonologist and not start a fight with a demon allowed to reside where it does without a bounty on its head."

"I could just hire you again."

"The bounty must be from a government of some sort, an entity or group of entities recognized as the ruling authority within a large enough area. And there's no loophole here, the oath was made with those in mind, so people like you or mafia lords don't count. The authority has to be legitimate and direct."

"That's a very specific oath. A very annoying one at that."

"Welcome to dealing with demons."

"Well, this is disappointing, though perfectly predictable. Which is why I had a little something prepared for this sort of scenario."

The wrinkled old mage raised an eyebrow at that before someone else quickly joined the duo on top of the roof. A teen carrying a black sports bag and wearing a black full-body suit with some strange bulky metallic attachments, though most of them seemed hastily finished, some halfway covered in paint while others were clearly made of scraps, and their repartition on the suit was hazardous at best. The suit covered even the head, though it was unclear whether it had holes for the mouth, eyes, nose, and ears because of the strange helmet covering it.

An hourglass-like shape at the front, the bottom half was made of metal and covered the mouth and nose, with the top half being a black tinted visor. A thin plate covered the top of the head, going from the visor to the back of the head, while a pair of thin metal straps went from the connecting points of the visor and mask and from the back of the head to where the ears would be, instead covered by speakers and their cushions, though it was obvious they had been modified from the way odd components were attached to them.

"Techlord, just the man I needed to see. Your new suit seems to be going well."

"If I had been given some more time, maybe it wouldn't look like a cheap ninja costume."

"Is it functional?"

"Somewhat. It is far from finished, but it should be as effective as my old suit. At least not that far off."

"If Barry and Larry's stories are to be believed, this is already impressive. Though, if all goes according to plan, you shouldn't need to use it."

Techlord grinned beneath his mask at that, patting the bag he was carrying.

"This bad boy has to be one of my greatest works. Securing the materials was hard and incredibly costly-"

"The Commando bought everything with instructions from Guy and my money, Techlord."

"-but it was definitely worth it. Not even a demon will be able to ignore that."

"Let's put that to the test, shall we? Techlord set up your... Ahhh, set up the Techzooka."

Why is he so horrible at naming stuff...

Mesker apparently wasn't expecting to hear the word Techzooka either, though probably for a different reason.

"The what now?"

Sam himself, on the other hand, was shaking like a gleeful child opening their presents on Christmas day.

Uh, I should check if Christmas is a thing here.

"You got it, boss!"

He knelt and reached inside the bag and pulled out piece after piece of black metal, quickly assembling them first into a tripod and then a glorified tube with a few odd ends here and there, handles and scopes to aim it, and a trigger to fire it. In other words, a mounted bazooka.

"Any specific place I should aim at?"

"Mesker?"

"Are you seriously going to use a rocket launcher against a demon? Are you insane?"

"Mesker."

"Sorry, it's just... I wasn't expecting this. The energies seem to be concentrated in the attic."

"Aim at the ground floor then. Either it's deceiving us to minimize damage or it's truly hidden there, in which case I'm certain the fall and debris from the explosion will do the trick."

"Got it."

Sam took hold of one of the bazooka's handles and carefully aimed it, taking into consideration the weight of the projectile and the curve it would follow to be sure to hit the house and cause as much destruction as possible.

"Techzooka aimed. Charging ammunition."

Techlord reached into the bag once more and this time pulled out a black orb before sliding it into the bazooka's rear entrance, the ball fitting perfectly into the weapon."

"Was that a Core? You're going to fire A CORE?"

"Better be safe than sorry. Besides, it would have taken too long to craft rockets specifically made with this weapon in mind. The... The Techzooka is custom-built, after all."

"Ready to fire. Step back and stick to the side, this bad boy should release a huge amount of energy behind me when it fires."

"Should? SHOULD? I'm sorry, I may not know much about modern weaponry but I'm certain you're supposed to test them beforehand."

"We tested a smaller model, with a smaller Core. This one is the only one of its size that we can afford to waste, the rest is too valuable."

"I doubt a miniature bazooka is a safe way to check the effectiveness of a normal-sized one..."

"Ease your worries, Mesker. Techlord is a genius, and I have yet to see any of his works fail."

Aside from the Tech Mech but that time it was Sunburn that blew it up, not a system failure or a design flaw.

"Very well. Mesker, let us go back down. We wouldn't want to disturb Techlord in his work."

"I'm already ready to fire, boss. You're not bothering me."

"Besides, we need to be ready to act as soon as possible in case the demon survives. At least I do."

"Boss, are you listening to me?"

Mesker nodded as he twirled his thin goatee around his finger.

"I can see the wisdom in your words. Yes, let us descend."

The mage simply stepped off the ledge of the roof as though he was walking on air before beginning to float down.

"Boss?"

"I'll tell you when to fire. I believe in you, Techlord."

"You're afraid it's going to explode, aren't you."

James was already done crawling halfway down the wall of the library when by the time he answered Sam.

"I believe in you!"

The genius inventor scoffed, but he quickly focused back on his latest toy. It would be embarrassing for his employer's concerns to be confirmed, probably deadly too but Sam had already survived an explosion once before, he would do it again. It wasn't like he had many more pain receptors left to feel anything anyway.

Back down on the ground, James joined the half of the Commando that had joined him here, all equipped with infused electroguns with infused batteries. He wouldn't be taking any chances. Their equipment had been improved as much as it could be in such a short timespan, they now all wore the same suit - infused, of course - which looked roughly similar to something an actual commando would wear, with padded clothes and resilient armor pieces in key areas, along with masked helmets with a breathing apparatus and goggles included.

"How is it going, everyone?"

"It feels weird, boss."

"Yes, I must admit that demonic energies have odd effects on my perception too. Rest assured, we-"

"I wasn't talking about that, boss. I was talking about how there's only half of us."

"Yeah, who cares about the spooky house. I don't like having only half the banter."

"It feels like I'm missing my twin."

"Didn't you all meet the same day I recruited you? Weren't you complete strangers before that? How did you all get so close so quickly?"

"Eh, life and death situations improve bonds and all that."

"Mama always said I was very quick at making friends!"

"There's also the fact that, no offense boss, but we're basically the only regular people around. We never see the four that went up, Guy is busy with his information stuff, Techlord is Techlord, and everyone else is either a ghost or a rat. No ghost rat yet thankfully."

"Yet, yet."

"Yes, well I do hope our latest mass takeover will improve the diversity of employees. Now, if you'll excuse me, I have to go to the front line to order the firing of an experimental weapon. Be on your guard, don't forget we're dealing with a demon here."

"Got it, boss!"

James left the Commando behind as he slid up to the house, taking care to put at least a hundred meters between the demon's home and himself. If the rumors were to be believed this was roughly how close entities were allowed to be before the demon dragged them inside to subject them to tortures beyond mortal imagination. This was likely a little exaggerated, humans were capable of doing and coming up with incredible horrendous acts themselves after all, but so far the distance part of the rumor appeared to be true.

James stared at the building that was desperately trying to sneakily break the laws of reality and began to form a black orb of swirling darkness. At its core, Shadow Ball was a simple spell, at least according to James' magic guide, but his unique physiology and his prominent affinity for everything related to darkness as well as the fact he had every Aspect known to man as far as he was aware turned the simple spell into a weapon even professional magic casters would be wary of, at least James assumed so considering Mesker's eyes were fixated on the slowly growing orb and sweat began to flow down the old man's wrinkly brow.

James waited for his Concentrated Shadow Ball - an improved version of the base spell that took longer to cast - to be at least the size of a beachball before even considering giving Sam the signal to fire, although he still waited a few more seconds for it to grow slightly bigger before forming a tentacle that rapidly slid its way onto the old library's roof and settled next to Sam and his Techzooka.

"Fire."

Sam pressed the trigger and in a resounding boom, the Techzooka blasted the infused Core it used as ammunition into the house, releasing a cloud of pressured darkness on the opposite side that twisted and broke and infused everything that stood behind Sam on the old library's roof.

The infused Core flew through the air, leaving a pure black trail of nothingness in its path that looked as though someone was actively erasing reality in a curved line, before it hit the front of the house, piercing through the wall as it began to crack.

And once it was inside and shattered, all hell broke loose.

In a great howl, a spinning pillar of darkness rose from the house, reaching high into the subterranean sky of the Sunken City as it grew thicker and thicker, the house disappearing within the ever-expanding column of screaming shadows. The air itself couldn't escape it as furious winds joined the pillar, the various people accompanying James having to fight against the pressure to avoid getting dragged into the maelstrom of power.

The shadows weren't the only things screaming, the noise they emitted was the howling of a tornado, the fury of a tsunami of power, but the yell that joined them was all too organic, like a hyena given the lungs of a whale, a thousand bats singing in sync, a titan's last breath - it was a demon's voice.

Somehow, through the darkness of the pillar, a figure began to appear. It was hard to distinguish, and frankly, James wouldn't have been surprised to be the only one able to perceive it, but it was there. It was humanoid, twice the size of a man, sickly thin and yet with an incredibly wide bulbous head, not unlike a jellyfish. What at first glance looked like wings emerging from its back were in truth bundles of tendrils or veins only pretending to be so, and even then they looked oversized for the tall figure they were attached to.

And slowly, though it struggled, it was walking out of the pillar.

"Thou who dares destroy my abode with an unworldly storm."

One step.

"Thou who defies a child of chaos born."

Another.

"Thou who shackles the darkness of the world to do thine biding"

And another.

"Thou who believes thyself mine opponent, grinning."

A laugh.

"Thou has earned my attention. Prepare thyself for retribution."

James threw his Shadow Ball, now twice his size, straight at the creature.