NOVEL NEXT Book 2 Chapter 18
With the shield up, I couldn't get close to Paimon, and neither could any of us. Nor could any of the ranged options we tried- a crossbow, a lightning wand, a gun- nothing. Light and sound were making it through, though, and I found myself wishing that Mom had actually taught me that Death Laser spell she mentioned.
"Come on, man," I said, reaching into my pocket and producing a pair of steel knuckles, which needed just a touch of dimensional magic to get them to fit over my magic rings, but then fit me absolutely perfectly. "You really think you can stall us out, here?"
"Stall, nothing," Paimon said from the center of a ten foot radius spherical shield bubble. "I just need a minute or two to recharge." As he spoke, he strode towards Emily, still bound to the altar, and my breath hitched. No, no. "Now, what I think would hit the spot right now is a willing sacrifice, don't you, little girl?"
His eyes glowed bright red, and for a few moments, Emily's did, too.
"That... sounds good..." Emily said, nodding slowly.
"I'm going to beat you into mincemeat," I growled, as Paimon snapped the chains holding Emily's wrists to the altar.
"Aw, that's cute, the little redhead thinks he's Lysander," Paimon said, smirking as he put the ritual dagger in Emily's hands. "Now, go ahead, little girl. Bleed for me."
"Okay," Emily said slowly, raising the knife in her right hand.
"You're running on empty, kid," Paimon said. "Maybe if you weren't so beat to shit, you'd stand a chance... or maybe not. But I am about to come back to my full, undiluted pow-"
The red light disappeared from Emily's eyes, and she plunged the blade deep into the center of Paimon's belly, likely striking all sorts of vital organs. Paimon howled in agony as he stumbled back, the shield dropped, and as I rushed forward, all I could think was... it worked, it fucking worked! Yeah, Paimon wasn't expecting it, and wasn't anywhere near the top of his game, but it still worked! Ohhh, I am so fucking glad I had that idea when I did.
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"So," I said, as Emily sat down in one of her room's folding chairs. "Given that it is possible for hypnosis and trance-induction to be done to people against their will... I suppose I should offer you an idea, which Volex will first confirm or deny as a good idea."
"Oh?" Volex and Emily said at the same time.
"So, I was going to do the induction the hard way, which requires the trust and consent of the subject," I continued. "Which, Emily, I am assuming I have from you, because you knew I was planning to hypnotize you when you followed me upstairs and had verbally agreed to be subjected to such?"
"Mhm," Emily said, nodding.
"So, I think I can, with your permission, implant a few triggers and routines in your subconscious slash entranced mind that will make you, effectively, very difficult to hypnotize by anyone other than me. Is that... something you'd be interested in, as a safety measure? Actually, Volex, would that-"
"That would work, and it's actually a very good idea," Volex said. "I say go for it, if Emily will let you."
Emily wore a look of (truly adorable) determination on her face, and nodded.
"Do it," Emily said firmly.
"Alright, let's begin. Take a deep breath and hold it. Good. Now, let it go with a long sigh, and close your eyes and relax..."
---
Of course, that idea wouldn't have occurred to me in the first place were it not for why Emily wanted to join the Adventurer's Guild in the first place...
---
"...Alright," Emily said quietly. "I'll tell you."
"I'm all ears," I said.
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"It's..." Emily trailed off, and then sighed. "...You see me as a shy, sweet girl, naive and innocent, pure in all ways, yet still undeniably and objectively beautiful. That's... that's intentional. I was always going to be at least a little like that, but... I decided that I would lean into it, on purpose."
"And... why would that be?"
"I'm a trophy," Emily said simply. "To so many people, I'm a thing, and a desirable thing at that. There's... There's no getting around that, not really. The elves talk about how they don't believe in gender roles, and how women are just as respected as men are, but the elves aren't in charge- humans are, and humans do believe in gender roles, and that isn't changing in my lifetime."
"So..." I began, "...the Adventurer's Guild is a way to reclaim your agency, and to prove that you're more than just an elaborately-accessorized pair of breasts to be won by some lucky little princeling?"
"It's... It's not just that," Emily said. "It's... I don't know. I think I could talk myself into being okay with being a trophy to some Lord on the Sunrise Strip, but Joseph, it's more than just that. There are a lot of people for whom the beautiful, innocent daughter of a powerful Duke isn't a trophy wife, but a material component. Bandits, demon cultists, blood mages, all sorts of villains who really do try this sort of thing. It's because of them that I want to join the Adventurer's Guild."
"So you can be strong enough to thwart their plans, and protect everyone like you?" I asked.
Emily shook her head. "That's what you're for. To be honest... I've wanted you as my Knight for a few years now, ever since I heard the name Napoleon Ironheart and learned he had a son my age. The reason I want to join the Adventurer's Guild is because I want to attract all these villains to myself... so that I can watch them die in agony as my brave, noble Knight, pure of heart, reduces their ambitions and complexities and cruelties to the simplicity of torn meat and broken bones, as he feeds them their own teeth."
I blinked a few times as I processed what Emily had just said. She was joining the Adventure's Guild as bait for storybook villains so that she could then watch me kill them. That was... Holy shit. There is something deeply wrong with this woman.
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If there was one thing I knew Emily wanted, that she had expressed to me with her own words out loud, it was this: she wanted to watch me beat this guy to death with my bare hands.
And with my steel knuckles on... well. I wasn't gonna be the one to deny her.
My first blow took Paimon right below the stab wound, spraying his profane ichor across my hand and forearm, and bending him over around my fist. My next blow took Paimon in the jaw, and he crumpled to the stone floor, his arms coming up to try and protect his head from my fists as he landed on his back.
So I punched him in the kidney instead, feeling his floating ribs splinter under my heavy fist, and relished the howl of pain that this wrenched out of him.
Faith came in beside me, but rather than trying to land her own blow, she simply grabbed him by the wrist, wrenching one of his arms to the side, and giving me a clearer shot at his head for my next blow. Talia caught on, and grabbed his other arm, and I simply straddled his chest, before beginning to rain down blows on him in earnest.
He struggled, bucking like a wild stallion and howling with pain, trying to throw us off, but... He was exhausted. He had been weakened greatly by opening the portal, and Emily's misdirection had taken even more out of him. There simply wasn't anything left to him that would change the fact that he was being pinned to the ground, both arms being restrained by women who knew enough martial arts to put him in a pair of matching arm-bars, and who were finally in a situation where they could do the move to completion and break their opponent's arms.
And sitting on top of him was an extremely angry young man who, while perhaps not the strongest even in peak condition- which he was not, right now- did still have a half pound of hard and heavy iron on the end of each fist, and enough stamina to put them to work.
Blow by blow, crunch by sickening crunch, Paimon was reduced, was degraded, from a proud Demon King, a Living God of the Cruel Wastes of Hell, to a howling, screaming, bawling, and whimpering bag of torn meat and broken bones.
There was a point where he stopped screaming, when I crushed his windpipe, tired of the sound of his voice, and there was a point where he stopped moving, but... Either that was when he simply gave up the fight and accepted death, or when he actually died, I did not know. Perhaps one day, I would know these things, but right now, I had yet to consciously draw on so much as a single mote of The Father's light, and I simply did not know at what point Paimon finally died.
I only knew that, whatever that time was, it happened before I decided the story was over, and I could finally, finally stop hitting him.
And at that point...
...it was finally, at long last, all fucking over.