Demon in the Snow by Heather Fledderus (cat reading book .TXT) 📖

figure out what kind of type it was. Judging by its steady lope, it wasn't a speedster- no way this girl would want to drag out a fight with him- he already had a reputation. It was running, so flight was a possibility, but that was normally accompanied by wings, and this guy didn't have any.

Nate idly scratched his arm as he watched the demon's mouth snap open, but no ball of energy formed. The itching persisted, and Nate glanced down to see with horror that his skin was turning purple, with blue lumps rising all over the place.

He looked back at the demon, saw how its symbol was missing the bottom half of the top diamond on it's Mark. Sonuvabitch. A poison-type.

 

vvvvvvvvvv

 

The demon under his feet shifted it's weight suddenly. Unprepared, Nate lost his balance and started to fall off. Tzuchizimati tossed it's head, sending Nate flying up into the air. His body tilted so that he was facing the ground when he started to fall. He watched helplessly as his own demon's mouth snapped open wide directly below him. There was no time to react.

Nate plunged into the demon's mouth, the jaw snapping shut above his head before he even hit the demon's black tongue. Inside, it was dark and moist, and stank like the cooked broccoli he had discovered in the back of his fridge when he hadn't eaten broccoli in over a month. He gagged in the darkness, trying to think through the stench. He had to get out.

Some of the saliva dripped onto his skin, stinging the already itching layers. He stifled the cry of pain when he realized that the pain was quick to disappear, the itching gone with it. It took him a moment to realize what was going on, even as the jaw cracked open slightly so that he could see.

His demon was helping him. The program was designed to reflect the natures of the demons, their individual tendencies towards their masters. His demons all hated him. So why the change of heart?

The demon shifted under his feet again, and Nate had to grab a slippery tooth as the demon dropped its head to open its mouth. It rumbled, like it was trying to tell him something, but the vibrations shook right through Nate. He let go of the tooth only when the mouth was open enough that he could make it out before it changed its mind to help him and snapped him in two instead.

Landing on the ground, Nate's eyes immediately saw why the demon had let him go. Angel's demon had secreted a poison into the air, which had then bonded to the water molecules that Nate's demon had created as a mist. The result was a poisonous mist that began eating away at anything carrying an energy signature, including Tzuchizimati's thick hide.

Nate watched as the demon began to disintegrate, stunned. What was he going to do? He watched as a puff of the poisoned air reached his own skin- and bounced right off.

Nate grinned. His demon had given him immunity, time to finish the job. Angel couldn't see a thing, all she could see was a poisonous mist.

Unless she could see through the eyes of her demon.

In that case, he thought, the monster just can't see it coming.

He jumped up, and started running, faster than humanly possible, but not full out. He gave the demon a wide berth, opting instead to swing around and hit it from behind. The demon was still focused on its prey, the other demon that was disintegrating at a rapid rate.

Nate summoned all the power in his legs for one single leap, launching himself high up in the air, balling up a fist and raising it over his head as he began his descent.

It was over in a ball of an explosion. The demon cracked into two, dissolving into the mist that quickly returned to normal. The explosion carried Nate far enough away that he could say that he summoned another demon to do the work. The mist dissipated.

And then the world faded, and Nate could tell that he was back in the control room. He slipped his visor off, keeping the headphones on for kicks. He saw Angel on the far side of the room, shifting slightly in her seat, her visor still in place.

In spite of himself, Nate grinned. He had won. He hadn't laid a punch on her, and he had won.

16. Luck Grows On Leaves

For all of the fights after that, Nate carefully used only the demons that he knew could provide cover. Sometimes, it worked, sometimes it didn't. All that mattered, and what happened every time, was that it was too difficult to see if it was Nate or his demon who had defeated the other person in the end.

Not all were easy knock-downs like Angel- who only had the one demon, and he had to actually knock out his opponent a couple of times, but it was unique every time, and before long, Nate found himself enjoying the fights. Except for a few hard heads, everyone seemed to be alright with the fact that he had beaten them. See what Hannah had to say about all of that. Every time, he made it look completely legit, and it was working.

His last opponent had been a rather fat guy named Chad, having no relation to Chad the Pyro (Nate had never bothered to ask Chad's last name. He would have to remember to do that). He had had absolutely no skill whatsoever it seemed. Nate had taken him out almost immediately after the guy had summoned a Class E Flight-demon. Nate made a mental note as he sat up to never use such a useless demon, ever.

Cain was waiting for him. Cain grinned as Nate removed his headphones, “Lunch time.”

He unstrapped Nate's visor for him and dumped it on the chair, “Don't want to lose your spot,” Cain explained as they exited the control room and left the classroom far behind. Other Pyros joined them, including a blonde version of Cain, his hair just as messy.

Cain slung an arm around the new-comer's shoulders, “This is my brother Seth. And that,” he said, pointing at a mow-hawk sticking up amongst the relatively simple hairstyles, “Is our other brother Abel.”

Nate couldn't help it- he burst out laughing.

“What's so funny?” Hannah asked, joining them.

Nate jerked a thumb at Cain, “Cain's got a brother named Abel.”

“Yeah? So?” Hannah raised an eyebrow at him as if he were nuts.

Nate's eyes widened as he stared at her, “You're kidding right? Cain and Abel, the Bible, ring any bells?”

Hannah shook her head, but Cain grinned, “I was hoping that at least you would get it, seeing as how you're from Misd.”

“Don't you feel insulted that they named you Cain? He's the very first murderer, killed his own brother.”

“We all have our roles to play.”

Nate shrugged, “I guess, but still, that's pretty weird.”

“Hannah!” Sora called from up ahead. He dodged his way through the torrent of oncoming students. He looked out of breath, like he had been running around for a while, “Dad said that you've got to go talk to him.”

Hannah pulled a quick face of annoyance. She turned sheepishly to Nate, “Sorry. I know I said that we'd eat lunch together...-”

“Don't worry, he can eat lunch with me,” Cain cut in, “He caught onto the Bible joke my family has, so he's earned it.”

Hannah flashed them both a quick smile before taking off after Sora. Cain grabbed Nate's arm and steered him into a large room, with a ceiling far above, and the room big enough to need pillars to support the roof. They joined a line-up in front of one of the counters that lined the one side of the room.

Surprisingly, there was no real jostling. They were given their trays already filled with bowls of a lumpy brown mass and greens. A solitary yellow cube was placed on a small plate in one corner of a plate, and a drink was quickly added. Nate's nose wrinkled as he tried to smell the food, but there was nothing that even his advanced olfactory senses could pick up on.

“You guys eat this stuff?” Nate asked. He had a feeling that it was just as replicated as the other food. Meaning that it had absolutely no flavor to speak of.

Cain shrugged, “We survive. But I really want to try some of that crazy cuisine they have in Misd. People say it's way too spicy, but they're all wusses.” They made their way over to one of the long tables, where people shoved over to make room for them. Cain hopped over the table so that he sat across from Nate.

“Somebody activate the bubble!” Cain called, “Astrid, you're closest, would you be a dear?”

Astrid, her dyed-pink hair curled into thick ringlets, turned and pressed something on the pillar by her. Immediately, the conversations from other tables were cut off.

“Everyone, I'd like to introduce you all to a very important new friend of mine. He got the Bible joke.” Laughter erupted at this moment, but Nate could tell that some of them didn't know what a Bible was. “I want you all to be absolute pains to him so that he gets used to the asses of the other groups.” More people laughed, and Nate could tell that Cain was joking.

“Here's my question,” Cain said, sliding closer, leaning over his tray, “How'd you do it? Every single person you went up against, no matter what strength of a demon they used, you took it down- Bam!- like it was nothing.”

“You guys were watching?”

Almost everybody listening nodded their heads. “Thos fights were epic,” a scrawny kid on the end said in awe.

The others all turned their attention to Nate, eager to hear. He grimaced, “Well, my control over the demons that I've got isn't the greatest.”

“You're telling me,” Astrid chuckled from a little further down. The others laughed at that.

“But that's because I've never really depended on my demons in a fight.”

“Look at him go,” another Pyro piped up, “'My demons'. He's good if he thinks that he can keep the as long as he wants.”

“Shut up, Jake,” Astrid snorted, “As if you're one to talk. You still can't tell the difference between an F-class sensory type and a Triple A white demon.”

“Triple A?” Nate asked. He had never come across the term in his escapades.

Astrid nodded, “They're extremely powerful demons. They eat anything and everything that they deem worth the effort, so mainly they stay within in their own realm, or come here, which is why you would never have seen one before. White demons are the kings of them, rule over all the other demons. Nobody's seen one in over a hundred years, but they're extremely powerful and the last one encountered required fiveveteran teams, and even then there were casualties.”

“Sounds crazy.”

Cain nodded, “It is, but you were on the topic of how you managed to defeat everyone else in the Summoning rounds.”

“Well, back home, I didn't know squat about all this,” Nate gestured all of Ko-ha with a sweep of his hand. “I kind of just assumed that I was the only one who could see the demons. And even