Devil's Business

Kudeluma

The driver’s scream of fear stirred the ruckus inside the wagon. Half-eyed royal woman, which was staring lifeless to the outside window, waken up as soon as the driver’s shout abrupted her piece of tranquility in the wagon’s cabin.

“Kyaa!”

Tears of red smeared her faces as she screamed over the haunting atrocity behind the carriage. Shrieking ghouls were emanating up front, with one of which taken away by the unidentified opponents and crunched flat upon the ground. As a result, the balance of their pull are disrupted and hauling them up immediately by the brisk of inequity over the front line.

(Swoosh! c***k-c***k)

The wagon turned upside-down and stumbled upon their dreadful menace. The passengers inside were tossed around and back by the tragedy. Many of their luggage hurled onto the air and scattered across the battered road to the city as much as the passengers of the wagon themselves. Being studious as he is, Juno controlled the momentum for his own disposal and landed safely upon the ground on battle position. He remembered about the warning from the driver of the hunter, as he closed both of his eyelid amidst the danger across their destroyed wagon.

“Roar!”

Juno deflected an incoming attack from his front with the guardsman’s sword that he had obtained within the chaos of their carriage. He could feel the zephyr of the assault and its both claws whose power being propelled against him in full force, hence creating his own chance to parry the impulse straight away without the need to look. However, he can’t escape the fate from his rear and gotten hit by the second pursuit of the opponents, thus pushing him forward consequently. The enemy that has laid its bare attack earlier, which stood still before Juno, immediately pinned him down and ready to launch its final attack towards the helpless mortal below its leg.

“Ough!”

In his desperation and measly defeat upon both of the attackers, Juno still adept enough to adjust his available cash for emergency stats way before they could lock him downwards. He chose to put a hundred million and converted it all to endure the damage taken after the impact from his enemy, slightly ahead of the brawn that were occurred to his head in a flash.

(Bam!)

The modified health points of his stats made him semi-invincible to the maul from the beast and could withstand the next in line of their attacks. As he noticed a slight second interval and gaps of the enemy’s lockdown upon his back, he immediately roll down forward to feint the third impact of their assault.

“Ugh, that surely hurt. I still can’t see you right here, though.” Stated Juno against the formidable attackers that he has to face in blindfold.

Because of the tweak over his stats, His defending speed also become much improved than what he could have earlier. His sense of danger is proliferated extensively that he could even carried a counter-attack to their impulse. The two of their attackers seemed a little bit in distress after its beating down were come to nothing in return, but reluctant to retreat against their hunt of the day. On the other way around, Juno appeared more confident with his own defense after it could push them all out of luck for feasting over their miserable destiny.

There are not a single following attacks from the attackers. After some time of standing guard, the two mischief-makers were fleeing away from the horrendous scene of their afternoon catch, giving Juno an opportunity to open his vision and viewing over the carriage and assessing how much have been lost after the assault.

“All of the ghouls were devoured, the driver was beaten to death... I am desolated here, huh. I wonder where the the royal demon and her guard went.” Said Juno after his investigation to the wrecked-down wagon,”Such a fluke for me to have all my provision intact, although some of them have been soaked with sand nonetheless.”

He retrieved any of his own belongings that were hidden inside the bashed-up wagon before striding down the road on foot. He follows the direction of their carriage to the west despite himself not knowing anything of their final destination. As he strides down the path, he saw several other wagon from afar also got attacked by the beasts. It has much bigger physique than the common ghoul and structured a lot alike to the brown bear of his world from where he stood. The distinction of their traits are all regarded to the protracted spine of their back along with the rest of dissimilar unseen attributes from its front side.

”At least I could grasp the reason for them to maul me. That paws looked so innocent to my mind somehow.” Commented Juno towards the sightings before phasing out to the road once more.

Several hours has passed and he is still treading down in peace over the runway. His path was controlled to travel, but are a distance to be done in a straight line. Juno is safe for now, thanks to his unimaginable switch over the stats and the brute strength that could be used  straight away in a pinch, but he is not really acquainted with how long would the numbers be living with him at the moment.

“Grrr......”

A familiar tone of the growling bear of hell has appeared from the east. Juno, as he being alerted by the short voice of its anger, turned away to their direction with his stance to counter any breakdown from their direction. His eyes were out of service for the time being, completely shuttered down as he relies upon the sense of danger that extended by the upscale effect of the increased attributes.

(Swoosh!)

The brute force of air were coming from their mouth and hitting Juno with unknown projectiles from where they were positioned. It has scorching heat of fire by the early touch of the blast, but turned colder than ice minutes later. Juno could not feint the ranged attacks from the two partners in crime due to his eyesight incapacity. Of course, no one would not wondering of what happened if his eyes unfolded and facing them in full force, but he can’t do it because of pure inquisitiveness alone.

However, the time’s not for bad decision. The driver has warned him of the problems if he tried to face them directly, but rather too poor in wisdom of its philosophical appliances. As far as he concerned, the bear might be running away from its victims if the expected dinner tried to conceal their fright by becoming bigger in size against the carnivorous beast.

The continuous blast from the bear of hell gave him chilling sensation after several times of successful strike. Juno were conscious of the tingling breeze and patting the affected areas to ensure nothing precarious is happening in the middle of the showered attacks,”Ugh, something surely changed, but I can’t perceive what they did over me-“

“Stop receiving that smack, sugar. Don’t give them a pass to your meat!” Screamed someone from the other flank of the two beasts and tossing something peculiar to his hand,”Take this to cover your eyes.” Said the foreign voices to Juno as they fend off the flare from the two creatures ahead of them. He failed to catch the item that they had requested, but then capable of catching it in mid-air before dropping down to the red sand of the road.

(Clang! Clang!)

After wearing the goods that they had passed over him, he could perceive two person that battling against the evil creatures of the path. They are both using swords and shield, complimented with the eyes-to-toe chunk of armor and slashing the bear swiftly with the flurry of swords.

“Hum—Ha! Double flunge!”

As they stand back-to-back against each other, the two foreign knights unleashed the combination attacks immediately to the side of their enemies. They coordinated their thrust towards the middle lane of the two beast’ standing ground that proceeding to push their luck over the two unidentified personality. At once, a blast of air are plunging strong explosions towards the two bears of hell in an instant, decimating them both by the piercing heat produced by the blaze.

---

The two knights of approaching sunset are closing-in towards Juno as they finished on inspecting the two bear’s carcass. Conversely, Juno was still stunned by the flash of their prowess, looking at them both with raised eyebrows as he tried to perceive what was happened earlier. For the essence of kudos from his side, Juno gave them an applause as they arrived close to where he stood,“Amazing, that was impressive.” Praised Juno over the two.

However, they are not amused to the abrupt claps from his side, rather concerned with his condition and rubbing the piled-up chunk of ice all over his stomach,”Don’t be pleased with what you see. That beast could gave you one painful death by those blast.” Warned the blue armored knight over him. Juno really wanted to overview their appearance, but they seemingly too shy to uncover the helmet off their face. All he could see is the blue and red tint of their armor to mark the difference of their style. 

”You’re lucky that we are in patrol. The Kudeluma aggression is somehow increasing these days.” Continued the red armored ones in following to its partner’s admonition,”You can keep those goggles around, if there’s any kudeluma invasion in your house, brother.”

”Anyway, are you not feeling weird with my appearance? Your tone are too gentle for me.” Questioned Juno to them both. The blue ones seemed buggered with the question as it slightly-backward movement of their body.

“Huh?” What do you mean?” Said the blue armored knight in confusion.

By the acknowledgement of the moniker from the red knight and speck of reaction from the second, Juno could lay his own thoughts over its identity. They did not feel the similar awkward interaction towards him as much as every other demon does, but one of them could be true demon and can be set aside from his prejudice.

“So, I need to go to Mooma city, can you show me where is it?” Asked Juno for the knowledge of his destination. The blue armored knight immediately pointed down towards the western side and bashing its fist-bump to his shoulder,”Practically just a few kilometers from here. Don’t be afraid, though, areas after this point are safe from Kudelumas.”