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Chapter 13

Do you know the time when you've messed up big and you want to make up to it? Well, the first rule for doing that is explanation. It's hard to think that this rule actually extended to some obvious things, and in my case, an almost fatal obvious thing.

What do you expect, huh? Okay, first off, gambling is bad, but in my case, gambling with your life. I had a near-death experience that somehow made me reunited with my old friend, which is nice. The problem was, I wasn't ready to die yet so I came back looking badass with a new orange-colored sword (or sort of), extinguish the fire with my words, and practically saved the day. That is, until I actually got into trouble with my comrades. Both me and Azgal, to tell you the truth.

After that small 'sparring' incident, Azgal miraculously survived from being forcefully pulled into his own circle (in this case, being locked up in prison) when I put out the overwhelmingly hot flame. While he did make sure that his fire didn't go too wild, the demonic aura was felt by those who were aware, and a small panic ensued. Luckily, our ever-charismatic leader Karkos helped them calmed a bit, that is, until they saw the goat. Well, he didn't look like a normal satyr for me (which he doesn't. He's a goat demon), but Azgal was out of most demonic goat's portrayal in books. Let me tell you something. Most goat demons looked muscular and fleshy, like they wanted to tear you apart with their claws. Azgal, while looking finely built himself, didn't cut for being a fine infamous demon. He looked more like a gigolo in that. Goddamn, he's so lean and girlish he looked more like a female goat than a proper anthropomorphic goats. Fortunately, that was just appearances, since I got the first taste of proper hell from him.

Because of that incident, Azgal was put in chains until further actions, which were currently being held on by the more mature and more level-headed hellhounds. To avoid further incident, he was tied up inside a cage near the meeting room. Knowing Azgal's potential, these kinds of restrains wasn't enough to hold him, but he willingly did so.

At night, during a rather silent evening after the incident, both me and Rhynsa, being the only ones who were close to Azgal, were sent to guard him. The only illogical thing to do in this world is to put your trusted friends to guard you and they did just that. Both of us didn't object, though, since Anenka was too sick to guard him, Miza was too hot-headed, Mitchel was a human with no demonic protection (except souls, which was the thinnest shield to demonic powers), Thotha being a Lycan magician (yes, he's in the council, but barely heard of before), and Anarim with the same reason with Anenka.

We talked a lot during that night. It's a weird irony in the three of us, actually. These two demons were once my enemies, but then we were talking to each other like buddies, which drowned the tension.

We went to talk nonsense stuff at first, but gradually become comfortable enough to talk about serious stuffs, including...

"Uh, just asking you for a bit, Azgal. Why is your, uh, body so...lean and streamed. You looked just like a girl like that."

This is so fucking out of topic, but Azgal, while he may not taking that lightly, just said, "It's...just a secret you don't want to know. Now that I'm half-naked, you saw what I really like beneath that young human's body. I'm not all that muscly like Sheldon's body. Because of my fighting style, I need a lighter body. I was born like this too, so...it's kinda stuck with me now."

"I'm not trying to be a jerk here, Azgal, but...do you ever actually..."

"You're so lucky that I'm not a fucking pride demon, Ifrit Schelkz.... Goddamn it, I'm so embarrassed. Okay, don't tell others about this, but I...like males."

"Well, that's surprising enough," said Rhynsa calmly, which struck me like a lightning. How could he be a sturdy ass-kicking hellhound in a moment of confession like this while I recoiled a little?

Azgal took it in surprise, too, seeing that he said, "Uh...you don't look surprised."

"I knew someone who has the same thing as you, and believe me, he is a very good hound. Aside from looking like a girl and being a homosexual, you're okay to me."

Azgal made a small smile that I took it as a fake one, since I knew he was lying for being content. He then said, "You know the fact that wrath demons are pure hatred and pure vengeance?"

"Yeah?"

"Though it seems like I'm a pure killing machine, I...found these feelings...long before you know it. Around 50 years ago, I was summoned by a man before Sheldon and became his servant for 40 years. I possessed his young servant, but unlike this case, his feelings and emotions leaked into mine. I didn't know that until many years later when I somehow got sympathetic with a dying man. Me, being a wrath demon, got sad when a man died in front of me? Then I realized that the summoning wasn't perfect, and I confronted my master in a manner out of myself. He didn't know that either, but, in the last moments before his soul was taken, he admitted to me that he wanted me to know human's feeling, so as to prove that a demon also have suppressed feelings. My answer to that was from Sheldon. After he tried to take over my body, which he failed..."

"You said you two swapped when we first met," I said.

"I never told you he swapped bodies with me, right? I still have his brain in me right now, so if you ask why I still remember you is because of that. At first, discarding that body is to test whether my human self is still intact. I guess it is."

Hoping that the conversation eventually reached the point where they talked about my newfound power, I actually hoped a little bit too fast.

"So, Ifrit...can I call you that more often."

I nodded, then he continued. "I now understand why your ability doesn't work. You have one critical point that you've not fulfilled. You're not a wrath demon, which is having this body. You did find an alternative method, though. There is a belief that after a demon is more human than their nature, they can unleash something different from its original. In your case, your survival sense extended to your soul, giving you the ability to imagine any weapon you could think of. Try making a sword."

"Whoa, mate, I appreciate you asking me to test my abilities but I'm not very keen around sharp objects."

"First thing's first. No user of your own weapon got hurt. Your blade won't hurt you a bit. Try conjuring a sword."

Well, there goes it. My blade phobia came to an end when I conjured up that sword. At first, it looked unsettling, but while shaking, I slowly tried to put the blade to my hand and tried cutting it. It turned out he's right. The blade was comfortable on his hand. It almost even felt like feather.

My mind somehow made a silly idea. Imagining how a dagger looks like, I tried to make the sword turned into a dagger, and it did just that. Next, I tried to imagine a hand shield, and it changed to the one I actually imagined, although it looked very much transparent.

"Holy shit, dog, that kind of conjuring is not a wrath demon's style," said Azgal, somehow surprised. "With your kind of ability and your imagination, you'll make one hell of a warrior, Ifrit."

"Yeah, seeing so many weapons for survival does have that kind of knack to my own survivability, huh?"

We slept with Azgal that night, knowing that he would feel lonely when they knew his true form was a goat demon. The decision came tomorrow morning. In the dead morning, the hellhounds decided to release the demon, saying that yesterday's event was 'contained', seeing that no other citizens knew that a demonic fight was on and the panic was because of seeing a humanoid goat walking around since there was no living satyrs on the surface (I know satyr well enough).

With no time to rest, Azgal was given a new set of clothes (which looked more or less minimalistic), and rejoined the group meeting on what to do next. The other hellhounds looked at him in curiosity, which was easy to say. Karkos diverted their attention to the matter at hand with a simple throat clearing.

"Okay, now, this is Azgal. Yes, you might have known him in his human possessed form, but certain circumstances put him back into his true form. If you don't mind, he don't mean you any harm. Well, except a charred wooden platform and..."

"Why does he look like a girl?"

"Eh? Uh...is that even a..."

"I thought wrath demons are bigger in size and muscular. This one looks like he's being snatched out of a whore house," said a hellhound. "Is that really the same demon that took care of the attack on that district?"

Okay...maybe taking Azgal into a meeting with a new body wasn't good enough. To be frank, he didn't look like a normal goat at all. His fur was too smooth and yes...he really looked more like a nanny than a billy (that's what they say about female and male goats, if I'm not mistaken. How do I even come up with that?). And with those clothes he would certainly come out as a girl than a boy, despite of that deep voice he got.

This somehow got in toll with Azgal. Instead of fighting back, Azgal somehow got embarrassed, and this caused another awkward moment when the hellhounds just got dumbfounded by his actions. Goddamn it, Azgal, what the hell were you doing? That was my thoughts, exactly.

"(Azgal, what the hell are you doing? Is that how wrath demons do? Losing their prides just because you're being told that you look like a female goat?)"

"(Stop talking with your own language, Ifrit)," he said while whispering. Oh man, he was clearly red right now. "(This is my real self, okay? The part where I act cool is because of me possessing Sheldon)."

"(You struck them up like a fucking killing machine and this is how you normally behave? I could just strung you up into a group of not-straights and see what they react with your girlish personality!)"

"(I can still fight!)"

"(So? Keep your head up!)"

I could see Rhynsa coming and whispered something to Azgal before taking him away. Azgal looked like he was going into a trouble, which made me anxious on knowing who the hell he was now. Maybe taking the 'born to feel' suggestion wasn't a good way to make a girlish demon be more human.

The meeting commenced without Rhynsa and Azgal. The next part of our journey was not as treacherous as the previous one, thanks to the use of Mitchel's car and a group of able ragtag team of mercenaries, former soldiers, mages, and assassins being the main stay of the group. I've known some of them. Mitchel, Anenka, Rhynsa, Azgal, and Miza were in this group, alongside some new guys like Thotha and Jo Weatherby (I prefer calling her Jo, by the way). One very certain thing that I got was that because this group was very diverse and consisted of three (or four, now with Azgal's true form) main races, and we were hand-picked by Karkos in the same mission as before: to find more allies.

To be certain, at that time, I didn't know if this was a war preparation since we were hauling in more and more refugees with their hometowns being ravaged by the hellhounds and other demons. Some of the demons were dangerous for us, and despite of the help from the wrath demon, I felt it wasn't enough.

A day passed, and with Mitchel's help, I recovered from the injuries quite fast. Our group mostly made a camp out in the open since cramping inside the necromancer's car was not an option. To be certain, though, that car was designed for one person living, max 2 persons. Of course a group of ragtag mercenaries and hunters wouldn't fit.

It was the second night since we travelled from Tanah. I saw the group's activities for a while. Both Rhynsa and Anenka were talking normally, which didn't look very normal to me given their history together (I knew about their relationships a while ago, and hell did it feel awkward), Thotha, being the talkative one, tried to coax Azgal to talk more. Jo was making explosives since she was our demolition expert (demo girl, I might say).

In case I forgot, Anarim WAS in our group, volunteering to follow us during our first day out of Tanah region. Goddamn, he was such a sneaker if it came for stalking us. Nevertheless, his involvement was advantageous since he knew many contacts, both legal and illegal.

In the end, I went to talk to Rhynsa, who somehow needed more friend than others. Years of running away from hellhounds hunting him, vengeance to me, and becoming a vigilante might gave a hell of loneliness, since he wanted to talk me more than Anenka, thinking of me as a family. Our days of travelling together, though, had made us closer, and the animosity before had gone. He might done this to let Eshdar's memories go, which I had been doing since I've moved on. With Anarim and Sammael, we all accepted he had gone.

"(Hey, kid, calm night, right?)" said Rhynsa while offering me a cup of coffee. His smile became more and more sincere around me. "(I just wish we can settle down nicely, have a Lycan or a hellhound girl, and live until the end of our lives. It's hard, yes, but...I wish we can)."

"(Sometimes...I miss Lilac.... You know her, right? That female Lycan?)"

Rhynsa stared at me for a moment. He got something like a lost of words for a moment. We kept silent for a moment before Rhynsa shifted his body so he could cover me with his wing. It felt warm, like the body and the skin of a young human, yet it felt strange to be wrapped in a leathery cover instead of a softer one, but this one was full of emotion.

"(Hey, kid, we can find them during this travel. Just wish your luck is good enough that you can reunite with them. You still have old debts with them, right?)"

"(I...want to go back to them, with Sammael. The five of us were a great group of traders, and I wanted to stay that way. After everything is over, Rhynsa, I want to return to that life once more)."

"(Becoming a trader? You do love travelling, huh, Ifrit?)"

"(I wish you knew it beforehand)."

We took guard that night, leaving me and Azgal on the second shift. We exchanged glances to each other, but otherwise, we were silent. The goat demon wasn't even looking at me, and he wasn't all that talkative either. I didn't blame him, though. He was looking a lot more bestial than his brethren. Poor demon. He might be the only one out of his Circle in his true form.

The night went on without anything going on, which was normal for the first day out of the region. Azgal still wouldn't talk to us, yet his body attracted the group, which, of course, looked girlish.

"He looked younger than his age, man," said Thotha to me. "Kind of pretty for my standard."

"That body might've given him many troubles back in hell," I replied his comment. "Just...leave him be for now, alright?"

"Because of you talking about him in front of all of us? Dude...he's the only herbivore race in our group. That might've set him out."

"I think demonic goats aren't the kind of grass-eating type...so you know."

"No...how about if he's a prey about predators?"

"Look, Thotha...just, leave Azgal be. He may be a demon, but...he had feelings, too, like some of us."

And after that, we were attacked again, right now in an open view. Unlike before, though, this one was far deadlier than we had ever encountered before, for this was an ambush by some high-circle demons.

Fortunately, what happened next left us in such way that we had no way to react.