As if we shared the same brain, Kelia and I jumped away from the impact area. Not long after an explosion deafened my ears.

 

*This demon is such a pyromaniac. Are they all like this or is this the only type of attack this one dispose of?

 

When the dust vanished, I saw that Kelia was fine too. On the other hand, the floor was not. There was a hole measuring at least ten meters in diameter. Through it, a lower floor could be seen as well as the charred corpses of some unlucky cultists.

 

*With the noise, this thing is making I don't have to worry about re-gathering with Chloe and the rest.

 

"Samsara, Focus. We will be fighting a battle of attrition. To be able to do that we need to remain alive. Well, I need to remain alive since you are impervious to death." The voice of Kelia came from the side.

 

I finally noticed her presence next to me.

 

*She is so stealthy, even for a vampire. I didn't even feel her move.

 

I thought to myself, but I answered affirmatively.

 

"I know. How do you want to do this?" I referred to her, for our game plan. She had more experience than me as a member of Chloe's tactical crew and a vampire more than a century old.

 

"As I am sure you would have deduced, having fought this creature until now, we aren't its match physically. Any demon even the lowliest one has a physical power far above a super of the same age. It's only my preliminary observations but I would say that this demon is more than 500 years old.

 

As such, we need to tie it down and avoid coming into physical contact with it. In terms people of your generation are familiar with, we need to use a kiting approach."

 

I rose my brow at her then shrugged.

 

"Roger that. I have some means of long-distance attack."

 

"Good then, let's get started. The demon is getting impatient." She remarked.

 

Indeed, though the beast was not as berserk as it was while chasing me, it released occasional growls. Kelia had surreptitiously conjured blood chains, a lot of them, to bind the ferocious demon while we were talking. Truly her means were exquisite.

 

The demon was still on fire from my attack. My previous stunt stuck to it like glue, impossible to rid itself of. Still, I gave kudos to the demon's adaptative capacity. It was already used to the pain and barely responded to it.

 

My attack damage was naturally not endless. As long as I stopped exerting my will, the flames would go out. That is to say since I attacked it, I had never stopped exerting my will to influence the property of its blood. This contributed to slow it during the subsequent maddened pursuit but also to my current mental exhaustion.

 

*Tch...what a drag. My willpower is not yet powerful enough to affect its targets permanently. In simpler terms, in the match between me and reality, I lose as long as I let off.

 

Now I could finally stop straining myself, I had an ally with me who could take care of the restraining while I focused exclusively on dealing damage and exhausting the demon.

 

I mobilized my will and gathered a massive quantity of air that I compressed in the shape of a huge lance. Kelia was pale from repairing the broken links of her chains each time the demon tried to breakthrough.

 

I flung it toward the heads of the demonic giant dog. The blade could only be made through the slight distortion it caused on its path.

 

ROAR!!!!

 

The demon seemed to have noticed my movements as he roared in outrage. Kelia was kneeling and perspiring heavily by now. Holding back this beast must have been extremely strenuous. Still, she affected the same disinterested expression as always.

 

Because of Kelia's effort, the demon was a sitting duck. Thus, the barely visible and gigantic lance bit its target.

 

BANG!

 

The lance poked through its chest and out of its stomach before hitting the floor. A massive amount of blood started to pour.

 

"Release," I muttered, then I stopped exerting my will on the air.

 

BOOM!!!

 

The highly compressed air regained its original volume. This phenomenon led to an explosion. The explosion was so strong that it managed to blast the bounded demon into bits of flesh and droplets of blood.

 

Kelia let out a breath. She looked exhausted as if she had just run a marathon.

 

"Impressive." When she regained her breath, she gave out a compliment while observing the remains of the demon. Remains, which were twitching and gathering in lumps of flesh.

 

I let out a sigh.

 

"I understand now how annoying it is to face an enemy that seems impossible to kill," I said to no one in particular. Annoyance appeared in my eyes.

 

"No matter, our goal is to exhaust the remaining energy allowing it to remain on this plane. The actions we just did, we should just repeat them until it leaves this plane." She had regained a normal complexion. Well, for a vampire at least.

 

"Ok. Let's do that." Though, I doubted that a creature able to cause such wariness in other supernatural beings would be disposed of that easily.

 

In a matter of seconds, the demon that had been blown to gory bits recovered its bestial appearance. It didn't immediately try to attack us upon its recovery, instead, it observed us in a puzzled manner.

 

"The human world is slightly different from the older demons' stories." The demon thought aloud.

 

After another bout of introspective silence, it spoke.

 

" This is unexpected. A human that is not a human and a vampire judging by the smell of blood managed to put me in this state. This is humiliating. If my liege learns of it, I will suffer a cruel beating for the disgrace.

 

No matter, I should go all out even if it's exhausting the energy anchoring me in this plane. I will let you understand the difference between us demons and you puny creatures." as he let out those last words, his form that had just recovered started shifting.

 

*Let me guess, it's the 'it's not even my final form' cliche

 

I thought inwardly. The following transformation proved me right. From a three-headed beast, it became a three-headed humanoid creature more than 2m tall. I would have thought he would appear completely naked but it seemed that whatever magic was responsible for its transformation, it operated on a different set of rules like that of a shifter.

 

The twins too, wouldn't appear naked if they were to leave their bestial form. Instead, they would appear in their pre-shifting clothes.

 

Getting back to the demon, 'he' was wearing beast's fur though judging by the color, I would say his own. He was incredibly muscular and his skin was slightly red. There was a tattoo on both sides of his neck showcasing a dog head.

 

The tattoos were quite alike to his heads in bestial form.

 

All in all, he could almost have been mistaken for a human were it not for the horns growing out of his temples.

 

"I amend my earlier supposition, this demon should be older than 1000 years. Because only a demon of that age can assume a humanoid form, that is, of course except for Succubi/Incubi and fallen angels. The rest of the demons are only divided into two types: flora/fauna and phenomenons. For the two types of demons, they can only take the form you see before us if they are older than a millennium."

 

Kelia explained quickly, her face somber.

 

"So concretely, what does it mean for us?" I asked after taking note of what she said.

 

"In humanoid form, the entire power of a demon is compressed. In simpler words, they are stronger and harder to deal with. For us, this means that our earlier plan just became wishful thinking. The only thing to do is to try not to die." She answered quickly.

 

"Ok, playtime is over. I will quickly devour the vampire and see what's the deal with you, human, that is not a human." He spoke, this time with his vocal cords.

 

He pressed on the ground creating a huge web of cracks and vanished from my senses. Kelia's eyes glowed crimson and she rose her arms, the blood mist that always seemed to follow her shifted into a cocoon that covered both of us.

 

Not long after there was a tremendous impact.

 

BANG!!!!!

 

A crack appeared on the cocoon before it turned into flakes. Before us, the demon had just retracted his foot. He reached with a hand toward Kelia at a speed I couldn't even follow.

 

Instinctively, I tried to push her away but he reached her first. As such, I saw his hand casually rip her head off.

 

"Get away fro-" I was too late whether in actions or words.

 

I could only stare dumbly at Kelia's headless body.