A Tale of One Deviant (Book One)

Chapter 17: Ruckus

I uninterestedly looked at the disgusting corpse on the mangled floor, sliced to many jagged pieces from my wind wire trap. It had launched itself into the air at a high speed and force as I knew it would, and sliced itself up like meat through a grinder. From there, it was kind of easy to imagine what would've happened.

     I let the maid down from the ceiling and laid her very far away from the monster, who's edges were dissipating into wisps of black malevolence. Seeing that, I made stakes of holy magic and fired them into the many broken places in the thing, pinning it down. They were four sided and had a metal head on top of them, giving off the impression to me that they were long square screws, or nails. They seemed to make it let out a ghostly shriek, but since I had let go of my enhanced hearing I didn't pick it up very well. It stopped dissipating and never moved again, as if just by being near the stakes or touching them made the monster immobile.

     Moments later, the opened door was swung back into the wall with such force that the old upper half shattered.

     Thérèse came through battle ready with her little knives between her fingers like cat's claws, and saw the monster sliced up on the floor. She paused for second, taking in the situation with a brief look.

     Then, she launched herself forward while sweeping the surroundings, checking to see if the maid was alright before scooping Boss off the floor. Boss had been crying like a-well, I guess she was crying like a baby, since she was one. Her cries were incessant and intolerant from being left on the hard and cold floor. Thérèse paid no attention to her as she looked around desperately for me, who was on the other side of the cradle facing the window. I had used five hundred MP in total from giving out large amounts for no reason, so I wasn't feeling too good. I thought you weren't supposed to feel exhausted until you were in the dregs of your mana reserve?

     To me, using this amount out of everything I have was like a commoner woman filling up a bucket.

     Nothing. To. Me.

     So why was I this tired?

    I was picked up by my worried maid when she rounded the wooden crib and found me silent and melancholic, pondering seriously.

     She breathed out a sigh of relief when she saw there was nothing wrong with me while bouncing both of us to assure us we were safe, so calm down and rest.

     The maid that was foaming out the mouth was completely ignored, laying only a few feet away from the thing. It was staring at her with its mouth opening and closing weirdly, as if wanting to eat her.

     I stared at her like I didn't care, then looked at the one holding me. Her knives had gone back into their sheaths when I wasn't looking, and her eyebrows were creased downwards as she tried to hush the frantic one. It seriously never ended, the crying.

     More footsteps came down the hall, a little too late.

     "Monster!" A guard exclaimed while ripping out his sword from his sheath. He was only half dressed, probably because he had just woken up. "Call the lady! There's a curse wraith here!"

     "Roger that!" I heard from another voice in the hallway. It went pounding off the way it came, echoing everywhere and waking up more people with its warning call.

     "Hey you!" The man, an oji-san somewhere in his forties, called out to Thérèse. "Did you do this?" He gestured to the stakes I had made, quizzical while he approached it with his sword in a ready position. The thing never moved and only looked up at him to snarl slightly.

     Uninterested, Thérèse simply shook her head to answer him out of courtesy. She ignored him afterwards to show exactly that, and the man knew he wouldn't get much more out of her.