Chapter 74: Book 2, Chapter 16: The Hero and the Demon Face Off

“—And just who did you piss off to get stuffed into such a tiny body?”

Bob’s hackles went up and he growled, his ears flattened against his skull. “Like you don’t already know,” he barked. “This is my punishment for allowing your lot to snatch Jack out from under my nose!”

Chi allowed her smile to fade. “I’m sorry, little godling—”

“Bob,” he growled.

“I’m sorry Bob,” she corrected. “Like I keep telling people, I didn’t have a choice.”

“You could have malingered a little!” he accused.

She snorted out her nose at him. “You think I didn’t?” she smirked. “I could have taken him six months earlier if I’d wanted. I stalled for as long as I could without being recalled for punishment.

“And anyway,” she demanded. “Where were you all that time, huh? Bob? We searched high and low for his guardian, and couldn’t find squat! We knew there must be one, but, nope! Surely you weren’t a little orange fuzzball then, hmmm? Where were you, Bob?” she leaned in close.

Bob put his head against the floor and growled, his whole body vibrating.

“Will you two knock it off?” Jack’s plea had more than a little of its own growl in it.

Chi straightened. “Fine. We’ll settle this later, you,” she said, pointing a finger at the angry corgi. Turning to Jonkins, she asked him, “is there someplace I can change into something a little less torn to shreds?”

The guildmaster regarded her for a moment through half lidded eyes. You’re gonna be a right treat to have around, ain’tcha?” he observed laconically. Then, “down that hall,” he gestured. "Third door on the right. Door ain’t locked. I’ll fetch you a key if it’s decided you’ll be staying.”

She favored Jack with a smoldering glance before leaving. “Wanna come help?” she grinned. But she was only teasing, and vanished down the hallway without waiting for an answer.

Jack made his way to the bar, shaking his head.

“Ale?” Jonkins inquired.

“Oh,” Jack waved a hand. “I’m gonna need something way stronger than that.”

Jonkins chuckled and rummaged around beneath the bar, coming up with a dust covered bottle trailing cobwebs. Wiping his hand on his pants, he reached up and retrieved a shot glass of heavy, cut crystal from a shelf running along the back bar. The glass was also covered in dust, but had at least been placed open end down.

Jack eyed both bottle and shot glass dubiously as Jonkins set the former on the bar before him and wiped the latter more or less clean with a towel he’d produced from somewhere.

The cork came clear with a pop just short of an explosion, and a smoky mist rose from the mouth of the bottle. Jonkins paused, bottle raised, at Jack’s expression. “What?”

“You sure that won’t strike me dead on the spot?” Jack wondered. “I’m only a rank eleven, you know.”

Jonkins let go a genuine laugh. “Ah, don’t worry about it. Healer’s right down the street.”

He watched as Jack held the shot glass up, staring for a moment through the thick glass at the smoky amber liquid swirling within. “Hurry it up, he teased, “before it eats through the crystal.”

Jack shot him a smirk and tilted the glass back. His eyes closed, and he held the brew against his stinging tongue for a bit before swallowing. Without opening his eyes, he repeated the process with the remainder of the contents.

When he opened his eyes, he saw Jonkins regarding him with a raised eyebrow. In response, he held the empty glass out and gave a quick nod.

Jonkins whistled and refilled it.

“Tastes like single malt scotch laced with metheglin,” Jack wheezed after he’d finished this one, although he set the empty glass down without waving for another refill.

“You really...?” Jonkins wondered aloud after a few minutes. “With her?” He was putting up a good front for the sake of the hero and the Lady Rosaluna, but in Jonkins’ eyes, Chi was still a monster.

Jack was leaning his head against his hands with his elbows propped against the bar. “She wasn’t a devil then,” he explained. “I mean, she was, I suppose, but she didn’t look like one. She looked human. Same general features, same size and figure, but, y’know, not quite so red. And without the, ah, the rest.

“I thought we had something great going,” he cocked his head to eye the guildmaster. “And then, one night...poof! Gone. And I mean vanished. like a flame doused in water.”

“And you still—”

“No!” he spat. “No! Maybe... I dunno....

“You ever been in love, Bor?” he asked, reaching for the bottle.

“‘Course I have,” Jonkins didn’t hesitate.

“Married?”

Jonkins didn’t answer right away this time. Instead, he threw back the last of his own drink and moved to the ale barrel on the back bar, drawing a fresh one. After a bit of thought, he retrieved Bob’s bowl and refilled that, setting it on the bar before another stool. Bob leapt up and leaned forward, his paws on the bar, to have a lap or two before settling back on the seat..

“Yes,” Jonkins said after a strong pull at his mug. His face had lost all trace of humor.

Jack lowered his brows, wondering what was wrong. He hadn’t meant to walk into that obviously touchy subject. He decided he’d leave it alone.

“So what happened?” Bob filled a silence he really shouldn’t have.

Jack shot him a look, but Jonkins waved it off. “It's not that big a deal,” he assured Jack. “I married an adventuress. I mean, why wouldn’t I, right?”

Jack waited for him to continue, but Jonkins was just staring down into his mug, appearing lost in thought. “And?” he couldn’t help himself.

Jonkins looked up, as though he were startled. “Hmm?” he raised his eyebrows. “Oh,” he said. “I'm the guildmaster, you see?”

Jack poured himself another drink. Maybe that would help.

Seeing his confusion, Jonkins expounded. “Guildmaster is tied to the guild hall. This is one of the three bastions of shelter or defense within the town. Last functional one with the City Guard in the shape it’s in. The only place for the citizens to flee to in the event of an attack that breaches the town walls.

“That meant I couldn’t follow when that last sweep gathered everybody up. Nantela was under no such restriction, so they press ganged her and dragged her off to the west to fight the demon lord’s army.

“I got a letter sent just before they started the final push, but nothing since.” He paused. “I don’t know whether she’s alive or dead, and I can’t go looking unless or until I find somebody of sufficient rank to take my place.”

Jack’s eyes narrowed, and he poured some more of the fiery liquor over his tongue. “Y’know,” he observed in a raw whisper. “I’m really starting to dislike this new king of yours.”

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Chi reappeared awhile later, her wardrobe carefully reconstructed, to find them like this, all morose and mopey.

Jonkins was the first to see her, and his eyes went wide, his mouth sagging open. Seeing this, Jack spun around and understood instantly, both Jonkins’ expression, and what she was up to.

There were, Chi had decided, no impressionable young farm boys within eyeshot. So she’d left the billowy sleeved white blouse and tall boots in her bag, making do with the green suede bodice and split skirt. Even going so far as to split a few extra inches up the sides, nearly to her waist. A good deal of thigh and considerable cleavage were therefore on display.

Jonkins’ reaction she ignored, of course. Her orange-red lava eyes were only for Jack Grenell, and they flared with delight at his immediate reaction. She walked straight up to his stool, giving her hips an exaggerated sway. Squeezing in between his knees, she pressed up against him, cupped his cheeks in her hands and kissed him passionately and long. After a bit of hesitation, he wrapped his arms around her waist.

Jonkins and Bob exchanged glances before turning away from the couple and concentrating on their drinks. Truthfully, neither was particularly happy at this bizarre turn of events, and Jonkins, in particular, was more than a little repulsed. His only experience with demons or monsters heretofore, had universally been varying degrees of bad stretching to horrific.

Eventually, Jack’s twenty-nine year old brain, despite being trapped in an nineteen year old body, reasserted control. He shifted his hands from behind Chi’s back to her hips and pushed her away, his lips following her despite all he could do to stop them. Once he had room to stand, though, he did so, shifting one hand to Chi’s wrist and stalking off towards the hallway. “Third on the right, you said?” he called over his shoulder.

“Yeah,” Jonkins replied suppressing his gag reflex.

Chi, however, understood clearly that Jonkins’ fear was unwarranted. She’d seen the look in Jack’s eyes. He wasn’t dragging her off to be ravished. He was angry. She tried to pull her wrist free, but was unable. That surprised her. When had he gotten so strong? She cast one last distressed look at the two beings at the bar before she and Jack were in the hallway.

The moment they'd cleared the door to the room she’d changed in, Jack slammed it behind him and flung her clear, eyes blazing.

“What the hell are you doing?” he demanded.

She was confused. “I thought we’d—”

“We haven’t,” he spat. “Not yet. And what’s with this...?” he waved at her outfit. “What is this, D&D streetwalker cosplay? Don’t you think you’re laying it on kinda thick? What’s going on in your head?”

She heaved a great sigh, not failing to note the effect it had on him, but also not acting on it. “I’m being greedy,” she admitted in a defeated voice.

“Greedy?” his head canted and he narrowed his eyes. “How’s that?”

She sighed again, not so heroically this time, and sat on the bed. “You have no idea how old I am, do you Jack?” she asked him quietly, with a sort of detached calm.

“I dunno,” he ventured. “Twenty? Twenty-five?”

She chuckled deep in her throat, almost a grunt. Not a happy sound. “I’m somewhere in the neighborhood of three hundred and eighteen of your years old, Jack,” she told him. “Truthfully, I can’t remember exactly anymore, myself. My first years were more tumultuous than I care to dwell on.”

That shook him. He started a retort, but nothing came out.

“My people are very long lived,” she said. “Oh, not immortal or anything, but very long lived.

“I hadn’t planned to tell you,” she said. “I didn’t want it to be weird. I didn’t want to have to answer the questions, or think about my life before you....”

She was looking at her hands, clasped in her lap, now, not at him. Her voice had taken on a trembling note. “For the vast majority of that life, Jack,” she confessed. “I was a slave. For the past three hundred years and change, in fact.”

Now she did look up at him, her orange-red lava eyes tortured. “Three hundred years of misery, torture, and atrocity, Jack ” she murmured haltingly. “Built one horror atop the other. Each day worse than the last. Unrelenting, unremitting.

"With two notable exceptions, Jack,” her eyes were awash with tears. “Only two. The few short months I spent with you on earth, and my time here on Mund.

“I was happy with you, Jack,” she smiled forlornly. Blissfully, stupidly happy. Until they took that away. And I’ve been happy on Mund, since you brought me here.”

She stood and approached him. Slowly, tentatively. “And I want more, Jack,” her voice pleading. “I want more happiness. I crave it. Is that so wrong? Is it wrong that I want more of you because you make me happy?”

She was directly in front of him again. Close enough that he could feel the heat from her body. Close enough that he’d but to lean down and.... He took a step back and shook his head violently to clear it. Her scent was permeating his nostrils. His heart was thumping near out of his chest, racing along as though he’d been running a marathon.

“Would this help?” she asked, wiping her tears and sliding into her Chi the adventuress guise.

“NO!” he shouted. “Go back!”

Startled by the vehemence in his response, she jerked half a step back and her human persona sloughed off. “B-But...?”

“That’s not you, though, is it?” he demanded.

She rocked her head back. “Of course it’s me,” she insisted. “It’s no more than a change of clothes. Inside, I’m the same as—”

“When the demon trap caught you,” he stopped her. “You lost your ability to manipulate mana, didn’t you? That’s part of what it’s supposed to do, and the old man is very good at his craft.

“Yes,” she held herself very still. “Yes, I did. So what?”

“So what happened to your other self?” he demanded. “If that’s also you, why wasn’t that who I saw when I came charging in?”

She hadn’t an answer to that.

“If there’s going to be an ‘us’, Iktchi-Chi,” he told her seriously. “It’s going to be between me and you. Not between me and a pretty blonde suit of clothes.”

“Does that mean there’s going to be an ‘us’?” She asked cautiously.

He hesitated. “I don’t know,” he confessed. “I... I still feel... look, Chi,” he scrubbed a hand across his face. “This is an awful lot for you to expect me to take in all at once, y’know? Half an hour ago, you were the girl who abandoned me in the middle of the night. Now you’re a friggin’ devil? And the one who killed me into the bargain?

“Look,” his second hand went to work on his face for a few laps before he lowered them and reached out to take her arms above the elbows and bring her gently closer. “I’m told I’m quick to adjust to new situations,” he said, voice halting. “But even I have limits, okay? I can see that you’re still you. I can. But you’re also something... someone... completely different, and strange.”

Her breathing was coming a little easier at this point, her tears waning, and she reached up to stroke his cheek. “I think that you’re a little drunk,” she told him.

“I am,” he nodded.

“So I’m going to forgive you for calling me strange,” she sighed. “And I’ll try to restrain myself in hopes that you can eventually look past my beautiful red skin and remember that you love me. Can you kiss me now?”

“I can,” he was already leaning down.

Jack was red in the face when he reentered the main hall.

Jonkins raised an eyebrow and wondered for a second or two whether any comments regarding an earlier than expected return might get him a chair broken over his head before deciding to keep quiet.

Jack resumed his seat, and held his glass out again.

“Y’know,” Jonkins, pointed out, “too much of that stuff may well strike you dead on the spot.”

Jack waggled the glass, and Jonkins dutifully refilled it.

Bob, meanwhile, held his tongue. Dog noses being what they were, he already knew that nothing untoward had happened in the room. Well, nothing more untoward than heavy petting with a gods forsaken demon at least.

Chi followed Jack a few moments later, looking both flushed and contrite. She had mercifully donned her billowy sleeved blouse and tall boots. True, her skirt was still split along the sides nearly to her waist, but she was at least not in danger of falling out of that at the first incautious movement, and a thin white stripe of cloth, visible through the slits along her upper thighs, attested to the fact that she’d donned undergarments this time..

She took the stool next to Jack’s and rested an elbow on the bar, cupping her chin in her upraised hand. Jack held his half filled glass out to her without comment.

“I shouldn’t,” she said, holding up her free hand. “I want a clear head when I look through the window.”

“Oh,” Jack promised, voice light. “This’ll clear your head up just fine.”

She sighed and acquiesced. Unlike Jack, however, she didn’t savor it slowly. She tossed it down like a sailor. It hit her belly like a bomb, and she hiccuped, a tiny puff of flame escaping from her mouth. She blushed prettily, and covered her mouth with three fingers. “Oops. Pardon me.”

Jack goggled. That would take some getting used to.

“The window,” Jonkins heaved a heavy breath and gave the bar a rap with his fist. “Maybe it’s time we got around to that, eh?”

“Yes,” Chi nodded. “Before any other distractions pop up.”

Jack huffed a choked off chuckle into his drink, drawing a look from his companions.

This was Chi’s first experience with anything like Jehsha’s Window, and she didn’t quite know what to make of it. It looked more like a mirror than a window, but its glass cast no reflection. Honestly, it felt more like a portal than anything, and that made her nervous.

She’d watched some anime while studying Jack on earth, once they’d found out about his hobbies, but hadn’t really gotten all that into it. Isekai, in particular had brought back bad memories of world-hopping under the command of the demon king who would one day become the Dread Lord.

She looked to the guildmaster. “Okay,” she cocked her head quizzically. “What’s the form? Do I simply stare into that dark glass?”

Jonkins looked at Jack, who shrugged. “No,” he said while actively forcing himself to approach her and the window. In truth, he really, really didn’t want to do this. But it was too late to back down now.

“Stand directly in front of the window,” Jonkins ordered Chi. “Close enough you can lean your forehead against the glass without much effort. Okay,” he said when she’d moved into position. “Give me your hands, palms up.”

She held out both hands. Without warning her, he yanked a jeweled ornament free of the frame, revealing a long, thick pin. In rapid succession, he jabbed the pin into the balls of both hands and the center of her forehead.

“Now lean your head against the glass,” he ordered before she could lay into him. “And your hands as well, shoulder height, just clear of your body. Close your eyes and concentrate on opening yourself up to Jehsha.”

Biting back an epithet, she did as he instructed. There was none of the waiting around they’d had to do when Jack had gone through this. Things started happening the instant crimson flesh met dark glass.