A Demon's Core

I am excited when I discover that Noctis has officially chosen Fire as her mate. I have been expecting it for a while now. The two of them have been sticking pretty close together recently and she has been more affectionate with him. It is a little amusing at first seeing Fire trying to mount the larger female, but I am sure they will figure it out. I am not inclined to watch though. But I am looking forward to seeing their pups in the future.

I am not the only one excited though. Calla saw what they were doing, since the hellhounds do not seem to care much for privacy. She did not understand it so she asked her parents about it. They did their best to explain and now she can not wait to see the ‘tiny hellhounds’.

Those are not the only offspring I foresee in the future. Calla’s parents, Lilly and Calyx, are still intimate quite regularly, though they have slowed down compared to those first few days after Calyx was summoned, so it would not surprise me at all to see impies from those two soon.

None of the other imps have reached that stage yet as far as I am aware, but I think I can see interest brewing between some of them. Violet’s sister goes out to the river every day, because apparently she really enjoys swimming, so much so that she decided on the name ‘River’ for herself. As far as names go, I think it is a good one. But I still do not want my imps going out alone, especially to the river, now that I know there might be something dangerous in the water. Luckily for her, one of the males, Aster, is always willing to go with her anytime she asks.

I suspect Coal may be interested in Violet, which I think might have scared the other males away from pursuing her. He enjoys fighting, but she is the only one willing to fight him. While he is steadily learning more of their language, he does not seem to want to talk to anyone else other than Violet and occasionally Rose. I am not sure if Violet has noticed his affection, but she does seem closer to him than any of the other males. I think she also enjoys their fights.

The two other males now spend a lot of time with the newest female, Jasmine. She enjoys their company and will probably choose one of them eventually. They both attempted to catch Rose’s attention before Jasmine arrived but Rose was not receptive to their advances so they moved on.

For all that Rose is the leader of these imps and they all look up to her, she does not socialize with others much. She takes her responsibilities as their leader seriously and performs the role well, but outside of that, she really only talks to Violet. She was always a little closed off from most others but I think it has gotten worse ever since the other imps died. She spends most of her free time in her room these days, she does not even go outside as often as she used to. Perhaps I should try talking to her about it.

Are you not interested in finding a mate or are you simply unsatisfied with the selection of males available? I ask in a tone that I hope sounds like friendly teasing to lighten the mood before getting into what might be a heavy topic.

“Honestly, I find their lack of intelligence a little off putting.” She says, then sighs. “Which is a horrible thing to say because I know they are actually quite typical of imps. I’m the one who is abnormal.”

So you find it hard to connect with them because you are different?

“I...Yes, I suppose you’re right.”

But that is not all there is to it, is it? You hardly talk to anyone at all other than Violet.

“That’s not true at all. I talk to everyone quite regularly.” She retorts.

Yes, when they ask you for help, or when I ask you to do something that involves others or when organizing them to do things that need to be done. You speak to them when performing your role as their leader, but that is not what I mean. I am talking about socializing. Other than Violet, how often do you talk to any of them as friends? She looks down with her shoulders slumped, but she does not say anything in response.

I am not trying to pressure you into anything. I am just worried about you. You are a great leader and the others are lucky to have you. But it is important to have actual friends too.

“I’m just afraid.” She says quietly. There are tears welling in her eyes now. “How can I get close to others if I am just going to keep losing everyone I care about?”

I honestly do not know how to respond to that. What can I even say? Clearly she is still affected by the deaths of the other imps. I am not over that myself, but there is more than that for her. She has experienced all the same loss that I have, but I have no idea what else she may have gone through before she came here. I do not know how much else she may have lost.

I am sorry. I do not have an answer for that. Please remember that you can always talk to me about anything. You are not going to lose me and I will always make time for you any time you want to talk.

“Thank you Magentam. I think I’d like to be alone for a while.” She says as a tear rolls down her cheek. As I leave the room she curls up on her bed and I can hear her quietly sobbing.

I made her sad again. I wish I did not keep doing that. I should ask Violet to spend more time with her. She is the only one Rose feels close to. They used to do everything together, but now Violet has more people to split her time between. That is certainly not a bad thing, but I do not think it is good for Rose to be alone so much.

I would like to know more about her past, since it is still affecting her to this degree. But I do not want to pressure her into talking about it. I know it is a sensitive topic. I hope she will talk to me about it when she is ready.

I decide to spend some time practicing and experimenting with mana. This is something I often do with Rose these days, but now is not a good time to ask her to practice with me. So far Rose is the only one of my imps that has shown any aptitude for magic. They can all do the basic exercises of extracting mana from mana crystals and then refilling them, with varying degrees of proficiency, but none have shown any ability beyond that.

They have gotten into a bit of a routine now where Violet leads combat training and Rose guides them through training their mana control. Though it seems all of them can take mana from my core if they are touching it directly, though not as easily as Violet can, and they can all give mana to others, albeit slowly, none besides Rose are capable of taking mana directly from others. Though most of them are able to put up at least a little bit of resistance to having their mana stolen.

I have even tested things with the hellhounds. I had already seen Noctis interacting with a mana crystal so I knew that was not going to be difficult for them, but even so, their level of mana control was impressive. Transferring their mana to others was easy for them. When it came to interacting directly with my core, the two males were a little stronger than Rose when trying to take mana from me and when resisting me taking it from them. Fuzzy was a little weaker, but that is likely because of her age.

Noctis stood out though. None of the others even compare to her. When she tried taking mana from me it was actually hard to hold onto it. I still managed but it took a lot more effort than I expected. When I took mana from her, her resistance was incredible, though not insurmountable. She could not stop me from taking her mana, but she knew she had made it difficult and she was smug about it.

When I told her to test her resistance against Rose I received a feeling of confusion in response, but she went along with it anyway. She did not resist at all at first and she suddenly backed up in surprise when Rose actually managed to take some mana from her. Her feeling of confusion redoubling as she stared down at the little imp in front of her. I do not think she expected Rose to be able to take anything at all. It seemed that even Noctis did not fully understand how special Rose was. When she did put up resistance though, Rose was not able to overcome it.

Despite their control, none of the hellhounds, not even Noctis, were able to forcibly take mana from others, even without resistance, not even a little bit. That finally gave me an idea of just how unusual of an ability it must be and brings the shocked reaction from Noctis into context. I had assumed that it was something that anyone who could control mana could potentially learn, but maybe that is not the case. Perhaps it is actually something quite rare, even more so coming from an imp.

But that meant Rose is even more special than I previously realized and further added to the ways in which she was different from the others.

Since I am going to be practicing alone today, it is a good opportunity for some more potentially dangerous experiments. I head down to the fourth floor meeting room. While it is not in use it is a good place to use as my ‘potentially dangerous experiments room’, at least for now.

I want to try something that I have been thinking about for a while now. I asked Violet to collect some small stones or pebbles for me the last time she went out in preparation for this. I head down the stairs carrying my rocks, I am still not over how great it is that I can actually carry things now. Though some of the imps who saw it watched in bewilderment as I passed. They can not see me so all they would have seen is a small pile of rocks floating through the air. It is actually a little amusing when I think about it.

What I want to test is using physical objects as projectiles. When I reach the experiment room, the first thing I try is simply throwing one of the rocks. The result is underwhelming. I can throw things, but moving the mana around in the way necessary to throw them like a flesh and blood creature is difficult. Maybe I could get better at it with more practice, but for now it is ineffective.

My next idea is to use mana like a sling shot to propel the rock forwards. I hold the pebble above my palm, then pull some of the mana back, aiming at the wall. When I let go of the mana...nothing happens. It turns out that when I stretch mana like that, it does not snap back into place when I let it go. So that idea is a failure.

Next I try compressing mana behind the rock and using the force of that release to propel it forwards. When I release one side of the compressed mana, the shock wave does send the rock flying forwards fast enough that it sticks in the wall. I am making progress, but that is still not quite what I am after. That was basically just a mana shock wave with a rock included.

I need to focus the shock wave into a smaller point. Like firing it through a narrow tube to ensure that all that force is focused on propelling the rock forwards towards the target. That is kind of like how a gun works. With that image in mind I compress the mana. I open a small hole in the side and picture all that force flowing out through a metaphorical gun barrel.

That achieves the desired effect. The rock is not even stuck in the wall. It punctured right through it and now there is a small hole in the wall through which I can see the small strip of the hallway that I have claimed and the void beyond that. I practice a few more time with the remaining stones and am satisfied with the array of holes I have made in the wall. I will have my imps gather more small stones when they go out and leave them in strategically placed piles so I will always have easy access to ammunition whenever I need it.

As I head back up I am getting irked by the tedium of these stairs. Obviously that was the point of them but it was supposed to be used against the humans, not myself. I need a way of getting up and down that bypasses the stairs. Maybe If I had an area that was not infested with my mana filaments I could just sink down through the floor? But even if that worked, I would not be able to float back up. Despite being nothing more than a mental projection of my consciousness constructed from mana, this body still seems to be affected by gravity for some reason.

Wait, if this body is a ‘mental projection’ maybe I can simply project it somewhere else. I close my eyes and focus on a spot to the side of my chair. Trying my best to imagine myself appearing there I send out a single pulse of mana which converges on my point of focus. When I open my eyes I am standing exactly where I wanted to be. I am genuinely surprised that worked on the first try.

I see Noctis sitting over in the corner by the ‘rock’ that is Igneous while Calla is attempting to climb to the top of that rock. Noctis seems to be looking in my direction. Did she sense the mana pulse? I would not put it past her. But I wonder if it might be more than that. Sometime when I speak to her she looks to where I am standing. I would understand if she were looking in the direction of my core, but she does not do that, she always looks towards me.

It makes me wonder if she can actually see me or at least sense my presence in some way. But it is hard to say because she does not do it all the time. Perhaps she is only sensing minor mana fluctuations.

I go in to check on Rose later. She seems to be feeling better after Violet came in to spend some time with her. She did not come out of her room for the rest of the day though, electing instead to stay in there and practice her magic. But Violet stayed with her the whole time so at least she was not alone.

That night, something unexpected occurs. A few hours before sunrise I sense humans coming up the stairs. But they go right past the fourth floor and continue moving up. This is the first time humans have come at night.

Everyone, we have got company and not the friendly kind. Get ready for a fight. Some of my imps were actually sleeping but they are all quickly up and gathering their weapons. Not that I actually plan to let these human reach the fifth floor, but it is always better to be prepared.