“Yare yare...”

Rafi’s sigh rolled like a low tide. She shouldered through the crowd and stepped into the road, blocking the prison cart.

“Stop!”

Her shout cracked like thunder. The noisy street froze; heads turned to her like compass needles finding north.

Calm, almost bored, Rafi ignored their stares. She had once helped the Demon King speak before ten thousand Daemons—her knees only shook for a minute. A mere hundred faces couldn’t ruffle her now.

The soldier leading the cart spotted her. His grip tightened, knuckles pale as bone. Someone standing there for no reason was likely here to snatch a prisoner. He couldn’t let the tribute behind him be taken; otherwise his head would find a new home.

He leveled his spear at Rafi. The blade flashed cold, like a sliver of winter moon.

“Please cooperate and clear the road.”

Rafi had no intention of moving. Her purpose was to save.

She stepped closer. His heart jolted, a bird panicking in a cage. So his fear was right.

“Please cooperate… or we’ll use extreme measures!”

Rafi kept walking toward the cart, steady as flowing water.

Sweat slid from his fingers down the haft, hot as rain in summer. His words didn’t move her, which meant two things:

One, she could ignore his threat.

Two, she was a fool.

But silk and subtle gold edged her clothes—nobility humming like a faint bell. Fools didn’t dress like that. So it had to be the first.

“Last warning… please cooperate…”

Rafi finally stopped and lifted her gaze. Her eyes pinned him like a hawk fixing a hare.

As a fellow Daemon, he felt it—the pressure of a higher caste, a mountain on his shoulders, the weight of blood and rank.

That weight told him her intent was iron. She wasn’t leaving. Her target was the girl caged behind him.

By rights, he was lower and should obey an upper like Rafi. But the girl was tribute to the Demon King. If he let her go, trouble would chain his neck.

So—

“Daemon Thrust!”

His spear tore the air with a whoosh, driving straight for Rafi’s knee.

Rafi didn’t flinch. Her body was still healing; full strength was sealed, mana limited, and harsh motion might tear fresh wounds. But blocking one soldier was a breeze through reeds.

She lifted her leg high. The strike hissed past and hit nothing. She didn’t let him withdraw—her raised foot stamped down, smashing the spear tip like a hammer on glass.

He hadn’t expected that. He hadn’t set his grip hard. The stomp knocked the spear from his hands; it clattered like a dropped bell.

“Dammit! Daemon Iron Fist!”

A plain skill, something any Daemon could use; it just stacked power on a punch. To Rafi, it was children brawling with sticks.

She slid aside from his straight shot. A press of her toes and she sprang, landing above him like a shadowed moon.

“Kid, watch close. This is how a Daemon fights.”

Light flared under her sole, same hue as a Daemon Fist. But he felt mana and pressure surge severalfold, a storm bearing down. Fear crawled his spine; his feet rooted like trees.

I’m dead, I’m dead, I’m dead! I’m just a guy dragged in to haul prisoners. I thought no rescuers would show inside the city. Why today, of all days?

On the brink, he wailed in his head about a curse worse than any tribal hex, his luck a pit with no bottom.

Thud!

Rafi dropped with gravity’s pull. Her mana cracked the street; dust boiled up like steam from new earth.

So this is death? Turns out, death doesn’t hurt at all…

In a literary daemon’s melodramatic voice, the daemon soldier “left the world.” He “went peacefully.”

“Hey! Stop playing dead. I measured my strength just fine. Get up!”

Rafi stared down at the sprawled soldier. His face wore a sage’s calm, the look of a monk who’d seen through worldly dust.

Her shout snapped him awake. His eyes flew open. First thing he saw was a beautiful long leg beside him. Second was the floor pierced by that same leg.

All right. I’m not dead. She wasn’t aiming at me. Great news. Also—those legs are absurdly pale.

Bang!

A heavy shock slammed him. The earth-mother hugged him, then shoved him away; he bounced and kissed the dirt again, face-first.

“Any last words? I spared you out of kindness. Didn’t expect you to be a parasite on society. If I’d known, I wouldn’t have bothered.”

She set her long leg on his back and ground it down, hard—twice, for emphasis.

Pain bloomed in his spine and rippled through his body. A blush of pleasure crept across his face.