Andrew

He parried the horns of a skeletal demon before side-flipping over its beam-like slash that cut down one of its own. Doubling back, Andrew cut through that first demon. Slicing through the exoskeleton and muscle, his sword left a black arc as he staggered forward and stabbed the second demon through its centre. He yanked his sword out just as a third one came crashing down upon him, crushing the demon he’d just killed. Leaping back, he saw several more demons racing towards him. Gritting his teeth.

As he blitzed the falling demons with a flurry of slashes, he still had the minds-eye to avoid a beam-like slash that came from a fourth demon behind it. Somersaulting in the air, he saw the slicing beam cut the demon he blitzed in two, spear sizes spikes barely grazed off his body, breaking his balance mid step and forced him to clumsily re-adjust his balance. Scraping along his side, Andrew kicked off the ground to get back on to his feet as his mind tried to understand what it was that almost struck him.

Four more demons already replace the three that he killed. Beyond them, Andrew’s attention was diverted to a fifth demon that flew above them, shaped like a giant, grotesque wasp with multiple wormlike tails replacing what should have been its body. Like the possesses head of a mop, the wormlike bodies all wriggled and writhed as if trying their best to be rid of each other. Some of them even looked to be fighting another as the giant steadily made its way towards them. With the writhing worms covered in spear like quills, the demon rose just below six more orbs of floating light in the sky right above him. Checking his shoulder by rolling it, the issue with the ankle had not bothered him yet. And although he felt a tad bruised on one side, there was nothing else bothering him. Thankful for his knight’s armour’s protection, he smiled to himself until he remembered the dilemma he was in.

There are way too many of them. The grounded demons began their assault. Gritting his teeth, Andrew retreated a little further towards the farmhouse. Dodging a twirling slash from one of the pursuing demons, Andrew was about to counterattack with the night slash until the demon simply fell dead before him. Taking advantage of the opening, Andrew doubled back and cleaved off the second demon that tripped over the first one in its hot pursuit. Glancing down at the first one, Andrew saw the arrow that killed it and smiled in relief.

Without tunning his eye from the battlefield, Andrew rose his sword skyward as a sign of acknowledgement and thanks.

“Don’t expect a timely bailout like that again, you hear?!” Gracie shouted back. Andrew shook his head and chuckled to himself before another barrage of spear size quills came raining down where he stood. Placing his sword before him face first, Andrew deflected most of them, but four of them struck him only to bounce off his knight’s armour. Looking up at the sky now, Andrew grumbled. The worm-like wasp was not only homing in on Andrew, but was now joined by two more demons identical to it. As more insectile demons appeared from the orbs of light that fell into the wheat fields, Andrew saw the tall crops overhead begin to sway as dozens of them rushed towards them. At this rate, he was going to lose more ground.

“ Come, Andrew! We’ll make our stand by the wheat field!” Flynn bellowed as he ran past him and towards the horde of incoming monstrosities. With a grumble, Andrew turned to Gracie standing on top of the farmhouse.

“We’ll hold the line down here! Just do something about those things above us!” he shouted.

“Don’t tell me how to do my job!” Gracie's words came out laboured as she shot back. Before picking up the pace to follow Flynn’s lead. Gracie’s arrow flew overhead towards the middle of the three demons that were flying steadily towards the farmhouse. Before Andrew registered why he could so easily see the arrow from this distance, he noted the stream of energy left upon the path it travelled.

An explosive shockwave tore through the air and vibrated through Andrew’s very core upon the arrow’s impact. As he struggled to keep from running from the deafening shockwave, Andrew saw the three flying demons were now falling out of the sky before him. They all got hit by Gracie’s attack. The sound-like explosion shattered their insect-like wings and ruptured their bodies. Trying to understand what Gracie did, Andrew looked down at his arms. It was shaking a little. His body felt numb from the shockwave she created and although he was quickly recovering, he had no doubt that if he was in the centre of that, he would be in a very bad position right now.

The sound of Flynn cutting down a demon pulled Andrew out of his thoughts. The demons Grace shot down fell before him, still moving. Seeing his opening, Andrew blitzed a group of demons with three consecutive slashes, cutting down the demon that was too focused on Flynn to see him coming. Andrew cleared a path to reach the western knight.  

“You took your time!” Flynn said from over his shoulder. He was smiling as he cleaved through a spider-like demon that tried to jump onto him. 

”What the hell were you thinking?!” Andrew shouted. He blocked an attack that came from another spider-like demon with insanely large front legs and a pincer-like mouth that oozed dripping acid.

“What are you talking about, kid?“ It ran around him and Flynn in a chaotic motion of blur as it flicked out spittles of poison everywhere, forcing them to scatter to avoid it.

“You just ran off all of a sudden. What if I didn’t follow you?!” The hiss of poison acid burning the earth sounded around them as he and Flynn charged in on the demon in unison and sliced off all its legs on either side with one sweeping slash. As Flynn cut its head clean off, another booming shockwave from Gracie’s arrows sounded beyond them. The arrow crashed into a demon a few metres away from where they stood, making it fall paralysed by the shock. Again the sound was deafening and again Andrew felt the power of the shockwave pass right through him. If he had not been protected by his knight’s armour. Cycles, if he’d been hit head on with such a blast… 

“Glad that she’s on our side,” Flynn said, resting his sword on his shoulder to look back at the farmhouse. Andrew agreed. 

“Incoming!” Andrew jumped just as three thick, bone-like spikes sliced the air where he stood. He heard a deep crashing of steel as two more whizzed through the space just beside him. Flynn deflected the spear-like projectiles with his sword. His warning saved him a lot of trouble. Two large demons walked out of the wheat field on four claw-like legs, with rows of sharp-bladed tassels running up their arms and walking out of the wheat field towards them with an uncanny unison.

The horde closed in on them. As more demons were making their way out of the wheat fields along with the two incoming demons, Andrew cursed to himself before getting back into stance. He counted at least three dozen demons now charging their location. At this rate, they will be overrun. Flynn charged at the two demons just as Andrew spotted something else just above them. Spikes were fired at them from one up high as two more wasp like worm demons ominously approached. He was about to avoid it until instincts kicked in, some part of him was keenly aware that there was something more important to do than avoiding the attack, in that split moment he planted his feet to increased the density of his knights armour as he deflected the projectile with the face of his sword. Only when blocking the barrage knocked him off his feet did his mind catch up with his actions. 

The house! It was directly behind him. Had he moved, the projectiles would have travelled onwards. With the amount of power that was behind it, it could have flown onwards until it tore through the house’s very foundation. Tumbling backwards, he scramble back onto his feet. Andrew winced, his arms rattled from the strike. Forcing himself back upright, Andrew was in time to see the spike that the twelve feet demon fired had already regrown along its arm. They approached, sending more spear-like bones flying towards them.

This time, Andrew moved himself out of the line of the farmhouse and avoided the attacks. Lucky the demon’s attention was still focused on him and not on the house. Gracie took down yet another pair of flying wasp demons with the worm bodies, allowing them once again to focus on what was beyond them. Seeing that Flynn had the attention of one of the larger demons, Andrew committed himself fully to closing the distance between him and his target as quickly as possible to finish it.

Denting the ground beneath him with his immense speed. He cleaved through the demon’s arm in a blink before skidding to a stop on its other side. As Andrew got up to continue fighting, he winced. Although it was a clean strike, its armour made it hard for Andrew to cut right through. He rolled to one side when he felt the demon approach. Avoid its overhead strike, the impact sent mud and grass bursting through the air. Putting more power behind his blade, Andrew rushed through the chaos of cover and with a leap, he cleaved through its neck with all the weight he could muster behind it.

The arc of his sword left a shadow like trail where it travelled. The demon fell back lifeless as he landed back on the ground. The moment of calm was broken by more demons rushing towards them, a lot more. Looking at the wheat field in worry, Andrew was about to prepare himself to be overrun until he heard the collapse of something big to his right. Flynn had dealt with the second large demon and before Andrew had time to warn him he stood before the tall wheat of grass, took a tight double handed grip of his sword as it became aglow with a prism like light. With his blade oozing with power, Flynn took a wide step as he pivoted around and swung his blade across the field. A diamond arc followed Flynns blade along its wide-sweeping travel, spreading itself twenty feet across the wheat field. As the demons charged out of the tall wheat to meet them, they were cut in two. Sliced from the torso down by the suspended diamond slash that Flynn had created.

Andrew thought that some of them would eventually notice what was happening and at least leap over, but none did. In one move, Flynn had killed over thirty demons. Wiping the sweat on his cheek, Flynn rested his sword back on his shoulder. 

“Cutting it close there,” he said. Andrew just gave him a blank look. 

Show off. 

“Well, don’t lose your edge just yet. We still got more incoming.” Andrew watched as more demon spawns began to fall before them, only to witness them fall to Gracie’s bow. Taking out a demon that was about to land directly above him, he blinked. Barely a heartbeat later, a spider like demon writhe with an arrow in its side barely a few paces from him. Stabbing it dead, Andrew shook his head to himself. He should have known from the warning shots at him when they first met. She could still cover them just fine from where she stood.

His point was proven once again when two more arrows fell into the wheat field beyond him, only to be followed by the sounds of demons crying and the fields falling still once again. One horn nose demon came rushing out of the field with an arrow in its eye and before Andrew could finish it, another arrow struck true. Passing through its throat, it fell lifeless to the ground. Just as three demons came charging towards him, Gracie fired a shockwave arrow that almost knocked Andrew onto his back from its sheer impact. That one was stronger than the others. Andrew shook away the ringing sound long enough to regain his bearings. He saw the two demons that were running alongside the one in the middle was blasted all across the earth like dried tumbleweed.

The one in the centre of the three that had simply vanished. Andrew looked at her now, kneeling atop the farmhouse roof in the distance. He gave a baffled are-you-trying-to-kill-me gesture. He hoped that his baffled frustration was noted by the huntress. Something told him that his message was delivered when he could make out her head turning to one side. Flynn was already dispatching the demon that was blasted aside by Gracie’s power and so Andrew made his way to the furthest of the remaining two. Staggering along the ground, they were too weak to be of any real threat. Cleaving its head, Andrew looked up at the sky once more. The demon spawn was thinning out. He counted only six floating orbs of light above them and, given how well they dispatched of the others, Andrew had little doubt that they could handle things. Cycles, he was confident that he could leave the job to these two. 

The show-off and the maniac. Between the both of them, he’d be hard-pressed to find anything to do. Doubly so if no new spawns show up. The last six demon spawns were far overhead. He estimated that it would take another minute for them to appear. Depending on the light, time, and size of a demonic orb that spawns the demons, you can make an educated guess on the strength of a demon. The longer it took to arrive implied the strength and distance the demon was travelling from to reach earth. It took power to cross the rift between here and whatever backwater hellscape they came from. The size of the light orbs was often relative to the size of the demon crossing over. The colour of light was said to be linked to where they came from. All these factors, however, could differ under one exception: power.

The sheer power of a demon can alter the forecast of a demon spawn to a certain degree. It’s a mixup that’s got many hunters killed. Luckily there were tell-tell signs of even tell them spawns apart. The erratic vibrating of the light spawn being the biggest one. Most powerful demons are said to come from realms that are further away from ours than the average ones. It’s not so much that they take longer to get here because the average demons are faster at travel, but rather the truly strong ones have a longer journey to get here.

According to his father, the strong demons being smarter always try to suppress its actual power. The six orbs in the air shone softly before the cloudy sky. Their orb-like surface was smooth; they looked about average in size. Although the fact that they took a while to arrive told Andrew that they were tough, but nothing to be worried about. With the three of them, they could end this.

“Andrew, look, we might have incoming.“ Flynn said, pointing his chin to the farmhouse. Andrew turned to see Gracie standing up. Knocking an arrow, she aimed up, held the shot for a moment before releasing it. Andrew frowned. It was not aimed at anything he could see. 

A message arrow? Confused, Andrew watched the arrow fly overhead. He knew that he had been a little petty earlier, but this was no time to waste an arrow over a-

“-Fire at the barn!” the shockwave of those words crashed over Andrew like an avalanche. Fire? The only way that could have happened now of all times is… 

He ran around the farmhouse to see the plume of black flames bellowing overhead like a leaning pillar of ink. It was like Lucas’ village all over again.

Cycles above. It was right where the barn should have been. Andrew recalled the old man Lawrence, who nodded to him barely hours ago. His competent looking hunters who came to his side. 

“-If the worst comes to pass, we’ll clean up shop here and swing on over to check up on you,” the woman said. Andrew froze… he did not even get either of their name. A flash of lightning flickered on by. Unconsciously, Andrew began counting. 

One…two…

“Get going, we can handle things here,” Andrew blinked, Flynn stood beside him also looking up at the sky. The echo of thunder rumbled in the distance as the rain began to fall. 

“But…” Andrew asked.

Six seconds… Andrew’s chest became tight. 

“Don’t worry, Natalie is fighting, but she’s doing just fine. Now go!” he said. Andrew nodded at him in thanks before making his way towards the fire.