A Truly Fiendish Impponent

As the amber colored stone hit the ground, it burst into thousands of splinters, flying into every direction. From the point of impact rose a small, thin creature with horns bigger than its head. The creature was bloody red and had leathery wings on its back which slowly started to spread. The wingspan was about as wide as John would be with his arms extended, but the creature was a lot smaller than him. Looking at the beast, he immediately knew what it would be, but he cast Observe nonetheless to get some information about it.

Fire Imp
Lv. 6 Lesser Demon
75/75 HP
90/90 MP

Okay, that Imp would not be that much of a problem, two good hits and that thing would be down. There was no beginning shout like the last two times, so John simply charged forward, trying to pierce the demon, summoning a Mana Dagger in the process. The Imp dodged both attacks with apparent ease, taking to the sky, and then flung a small fireball at John.

John was barely able to dodge the ball by jumping backward with a Flash Step. Seeing as how the direct approach didn’t work, he tried to get around the little creature and strike it from a blind spot. Propelling himself into the air to the Imp, he rushed towards it, only to change his direction at the last second and to ascend over it. The demon seemed to be smarter than John had expected, as it actually flung another fireball directly into John’s stomach.

-7 HP (Fire Damage)
Pants of Elements activated, Fire Damage now reduced

Small hit, nothing John couldn’t bear, so he just went on with his attack. Once he was behind the beast, he Flash Stepped backward into the Imp again. The Imp flew up with incredible speed and flung another Fireball at John while cackling.

-5 HP (Fire Damage)

That thing was starting to get annoying… He tried to keep close to the thing, trying to strike again and again, with no success except that he received another three fireballs to the face and laughter from the fiend.

Thinking of another strategy, he tried to use Magic Rope to bind the Imp, but that also didn’t work because the rope was simply too slow to reach it. Mana Daggers was out as well because the thing seemed to have an uncanny focus on him and dodged everything he did. His close combat skills were useless if he couldn’t reach the thing. So there was a limit to the things he could try to get the bastard...

He needed something that could either bind that thing quick and without too much suspicion or something that made him a lot faster so he could catch up to the Imp… He could try Alchemy to get something, but he had no idea where to start there… Or, he could use the Skill that he got from Brun and that he hadn’t used yet. So he used Essence Aura to give himself some kind of buff:

Select Essence to use:
Currently usable Essences:
-****: Gain Deathtouch (25% Chance to kill an enemy with health below 20%)
-Life: Gain Regeneration (Regenerate 2 HP/min)
-Flight: Gain Flight
-Element: Gain Elemental Damage according to the Essence
-Rage: Gain Berserker's Rage (Deal 50% more Damage, Gain 50% more Damage)
-Energy: Gain Livewire (Heightened Reflexes, Increased movement speed)

The choice was pretty easy; Energy was exactly what he needed right now! The Imp apparently noticed that John was planning something, as he instantly flung two fireballs at John.

Energy Aura selected. One quality of Essence Available. Use ‘Essence of Energy’?
(Y/N)

Just before the fireballs made contact, John had hit ‘Yes’, and he instantly felt the difference. The fireballs seemed to slow down in their approach, matter of fact, everything around him slowed down. Easily dodging the fireballs, he then jumped up to the Imp who looked at him with panicked eyes.

Energy Aura Applied! Livewire active for 3 minutes.

John swung his spear around with a speed that he himself had never experienced before. But a second before the spearhead made contact with the Imp, the demon just grinned and disappeared in a bad smelling cloud of smoke, appearing at a point about a meter away from where he was before.

The fucking bastard was still toying with him! Apparently, he wasn’t even fast enough to get him with this increased speed… John had to think hard about what to do next…

He was running out of options… His skills didn’t work, his buff didn’t help, the thing was apparently way to quick for him in any capacity. But, what if John wasn’t fighting this thing alone? He wanted to slap himself in the face for being this stupid. No one ever said that he had to face that thing alone, it was just that the people standing there didn’t want to interfere, so John simply had to bring his own backup.

Quickly sending a mental command to Gary that he should wait at the entrance of the terminal room as soon as possible, John stabbed his spear into the wooden ground, creating a cut just big enough to fit a card into it. The Imp was curious as to what John did, but it also didn’t want him to do anything, so it just kept flinging fireballs at John. Thanks to the Livewire he could dodge all of them without any problem though.

After a moment of dodging the fireballs, he slammed the Nexus key card into the cut, and the total blackness of the Nexus doorway spread over the ground. Seconds later, two figures jumped out of that cut, Gary and… Thorn. John didn’t really want to put the little dragon into this kind of jeopardy yet, but apparently, the little beast was just too excited to not come along (and maybe it was a bit jealous of Gary?). Gary immediately ran away from both John and Thorn, hiding itself on some pillar. The mechanical spider knew what it had to do, and John knew what he had to do to provide the little guy with an opportunity.

The Imp was frantically looking between the now three opponents, trying to focus on a single one. John took that moment to jump up towards the demon again, bringing the attention to him and making sure that the Imp wouldn’t notice where Gary would position himself.

John kept pushing towards the Imp with his attacks and Flash Steps while occasionally jumping off a pillar or the ceiling to reset the Flash Step count. He kept attacking the demon, well aware that he wouldn’t be able to hit it. But hitting it wasn’t really his target right now, he just wanted to occupy the enemy.

And he did so to great success because the Imp was facing away from Gary’s position, so the spider could easily shoot two globs of web onto the wings of the fiend, sticking them to the body. The Imp immediately plummeted to the ground, obviously taking a lot of damage from the high fall.

67 DMG (Falling Damage, Frail Body)

The thing was down to 8 HP; now it was time to strike! As John was summoning a Mana Dagger to throw at the thing, Thorn was immediately on the demon, ripping into it with his sharp teeth and claws. The Imp was spasming uncontrollably, showing that the Zinogre’s electric Aura affected it. Then the demon disappeared, leaving a happy wolf dragon snapping at the air where it once was. John softly landed on the ground next to Thorn and gave him a big hug, “Good boy, soon you’ll hunt waay bigger things, and you’ll kill them all by yourself. I guess I should train you so you can attack better…” to which Thorn happily barked.

The silent clattering of feet behind John made him aware than Gary was down with them by now as well. As he turned around, he saw that the spider threw itself on its back, as if it was expecting belly rubs. This spider really was like a dog. Chuckling to himself, he gave the spider exactly what it wanted while they waited for the others to come down.

The first one down was Kaen, loudly squealing and running towards Thorn, who was quite unsure what to do. It surprised John that she was up again, but he was glad to see that she was okay. Once she got close enough, Thorn decided that he wanted none of that and decided to keep a certain distance by running away.

“Nooo, don’t run away little dragon, I just want to hold you and cuddle you!” That didn’t assure Thorn much as he kicked up a notch and ran a bit faster.

The scene provided amusement to all of the observers. Well, all except one. Kim was staring at the spider (that John was still giving belly rubs) and tried to keep as far away from it as possible. Gary felt that apparently, as he quickly got onto his legs again and slowly skittered towards her. Kim jumped back with a disgusted squeal as she summoned her new Mana Chains. The little robo-spider quickly got the message and returned to John with a sad grumble, clinging to his back.

Magoi and Hannah were meanwhile studying the dark square that was the entryway to the Nexus. They hushedly discussed among themselves, while Kwang and Wotan walked towards John, “You have done well, young one. That Imp might’ve not been that powerful, but it sure is a nuisance to fight, especially if you don’t have the speed to keep up with it. But it’s nice to see that you can not only rely on your own powers but also on the powers of special companions. Tell me, have you built that spider yourself? And what is that black hole back there?” Wotan asked with a lot of curiosity in his voice.

John proudly smiled at the praise of the older man, “Thank you, sir. And no, I didn’t build Gary myself, he was gifted to me by an… acquaintance. She built it. And that black hole is actually a door into what I’d describe as my little hideout. It’s my little secret place where my ‘companions’ can live without the fear of being found.” Wotan nodded, appreciative of the answer given.

Kwang looked towards the dragon... still running from the dragon, and then looked at John, “It is interesting to see that you, a late bloomer who only got his powers a couple of days ago, already have a dragon in your possession. You truly fascinate me, John Newman, and if you keep going like this, then I feel like you will have a lot of friends and a lot of enemies very soon. But I’m sure on which side I want to stand.”

As he said that last part, he extended his hand towards John, who shook it with much enthusiasm, “I hope you mean that you will stand on ‘my side’, if you want to call it that… but honestly, I just want to find my little place in this new, weird world. I have no big aspirations of control or anything… I just want to see what the Abyss has to offer…”

Their talk was then interrupted by Magoi and Hannah joining them. The goth chick was looking at John a bit more respectively by now, but it was still apparent in her eyes that she didn’t really think a lot of John. Magoi then spoke up, “Well, I guess that concludes the combat part of the evaluation then. Let’s get to the second part then, the evaluation of your Barriers. For that, let’s get out of this Barrier first.”

Knowing that the two weren't wanted outside of any Barrier, John called Thorn back to him and took him back to the Nexus. Gary simply crawled down John’s back and into the blackness of the entryway. Once Thorn had enough cuddles, he also jumped back into the door, which John then closed as he left the Barrier.