《Demonforged: After the War》
Awake
Up until yesterday, Mark would have been truthfully able to say that he never had been arrested, but sadly, today that statement would make him a liar. He wondered if an extra-terrestrial arrest would go his record, if he was ever able to go back home?
After all, not everyone could claim to have woken up in a whole new world. Panic was appropriate response to waking up in alien body, and he had ended up accosting a guard in a bid to get his bearings, which had predictably ended with him in a holding cell, apparently until the guy-in-charge came back from wherever he was.
He had calmed down enough to keep the panic internal by now, but his situation was not helping.
Mark had gone to sleep as a bog-standard human, thirty years of age. It had been an ordinary Thursday night, and Mark had been a boring Indian guy, brown eyes, black hair, slight paunch from a lack of exercise.
He certainly had not expected to wake up as a six-foot tool, orange skinned dude with a tail and wings of all things. The scream had been legendary. The crying and weeping was better left unmentioned.
He had woken up in a small village look-alike, the roads were paved in an oily-gray stone, and the buildings were all painted blue. Not a single one was more than three-storey tall. This was certainly not where he had gone sleep, and most certainly not his body. A bit of panicky running around had eventually lead him to a bakery, where he had gotten a large, fluffy bread-thing to eat, and found out that the place was called Maidenstone, on account of the statue of a maiden on a castle some distance away from the village.
He was eventually lead to the guardhouse - where having failed to produce proof of his residence, or his reason for being in the village - he was thrown in the jail-house to wait for the superintendant after screaming at the gate-guard that the did not know where he was or why he was red and orange.
"Mark! Come lets get you out of here!"
"Coming!" Mark got up walked to the front of the cell, where he again saw the gate-guard unlatching his cell. "Viktor is back from wherever he was, walk quick, the sooner we find out why you are here, the better it will be for you.", said the gate guard.
Soon enough he was walked to Viktor, a tall brown man sitting and reading something on his desk.
"So, what is your name? Why are you here, in our small village, demon-forged?"
Demon-Forged? Must be whatever I am. Doesn''t sound very comforting, to be honest, Mark thought to himself. Asking Viktor what a demon-forged was seemed like a bad idea, especially when it seemed like his being here was unexpected
"I am Mark, don''t know why I am here but I woke up face down in the dirt a bit outside the village-bounds. Walked here to find out where I was, and get something to eat."
"Strange name for a demon-forged, Mark. Whatever it is, not my problem. We will get you the castle in the evening, and lord there will find out what a strange demon-forged is doing here in a system-less village."
"Why can I not be here? Look, Viktor, I was lost is all. Just wanted to get some food and a direction is all, I do not want to deal with any lords just yet!"
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"And Why not? From what I know, she might be the only one able and willing to help your kind. Look Mark, we all know about what you all did for the empire in the war, and appreciate it, but Maidenstone is a small place, and people are unused to strange things. I don''t want any panic, and you won''t be able to get much help here. We will go to Maidenwatch castle in the evening, and there you can sort yourself out."
"I will be letting you out of the cell for now Mark, you''ve been nice and quiet. Go get something to eat and come back here. It will be a while before we can leave but I can''t have you wandering about un-escorted too much, and there''s only two of us here today"
Mark thought there wasn''t much to say to that vaguely hostile rant, so he just nodded and agreed, at the very least he could take a walk and get a bite to eat while he came to terms with his new reality. Initial panic aside, it seemed like the demon-forged were a known entity here, and while guardsman Viktor seemed wary, he wasn''t hostile.
He walked to the same bakery he already had, and got himself another loaf of bread, with what looked like some spiced meatballs. Whoever this guy had been before Mark woke up in his body, he seemed to have a some amout of coins in his cloth-pouch, and Mark figured 10 copper coins weren''t really a big ask for a decent meal, not when he had plenty more with him.
The baker was a little apprehensive, and watched him all the while he ate, but Mark eventually learned that the man was called Elric, and that he was a hundred-and-two years old. It was a bit of a struggle to keep his expression steady after hearing that, especially when dear Mr. Elric looked no older than a crisp forty.
Mark quickly chowed his food down, wanting to not tick off the only person willing to talk to him for longer than a minute. While he walked back to the guardhouse, much calmer, he noticed that the sun was now properly out, and from its position in the sky it looked to be early morning, around ten in the morning, if head to compare to the skies back home. There was no guarantee that the day would be as long as it was back home, but it was a good bet, since everyone except him looked human, and not like a biblical freak-of-nature.
There was some traffic in the street, a couple of carts every now and then, but mostly people just walked around greeting each other, presumably getting ready for the day. Mark reached the guardhouse a bit later, it having been about an hour since he had left to eat, and greeted the gate-gaurd with a nod on his way in.
Viktor nodded towards him, and lead him back to the cell, where he was locked back in and told that it would be a while before they left for the castle, since it was only two hours away on horse.
It seemed a bit unfair to be have been locked in again for no fault of his but he was still settling his thoughts and did not want to make a fuss while he did not have a grip on the overall situation.
Viktor was done locking his cell, and told him to sit down, or take nap while he dealt with work. They would leave for Maidenwatch castle in the evening, and there, Mark would have his chance to clear stuff up with whoever the lady of the castle was.
1. Settling In
It had been a year since Mark woke up in Maidenstone. A year since he had last seen his little sister and his mother. It still ached horribly to think about his family at night, but it had gotten a tiny bit more tolerable with every night he went to sleep without seeing their faces.
He was not sure if the family he saw in his dreams was accurate to reality any longer, but he was still sure that he could recognise them on sight. There was not much use dwelling on melancholy for too long in the day, but every morning when he woke up and walked to work, his mind inevitably wandered, wondering how they were doing.
It wasn''t like his family was dependent on him, but it was still nice to be able to see familiar faces after work in the evening.
Now, all he saw was strangers.
His meeting with Viktor, the head guardsman was still crisp in his mind. After Viktor had been the only person in the village not wanting to run away from the terrifying alien, he had hoped he would be able to get some small help from him while he was still figuring out his place in this world.
Viktor and he had rode to Maidenwatch castle in what was a painful but uneventful journey. Horse riding was a cruel and unusual punishment. On the way to the castle, Viktor told him that the woods in the way were generally safe since they had been cleared of almost all wildlife during the great war, and now Maidenwatch kept a small watch to keep the surroundings clear of stray demons and mutated wildlife.
When they had reached the castle, Viktor had handed off the "stray demon-forged" to a friend of his, who now owned a small inn in the town outside the castle. Mark had to negotiate for a room and information with a majority of his remaining coin.
Over the course of three months staying at the inn, Mark had slowly figured out that Maidenwatch sat close to the northern border of the Empire, close to the coast where the invading demons had first landed.
The war had apparently lasted for five years, and there were only a few remaining signs of the war in castle-town itself. It was a short but intense period of war before the mages of the Empire had apparently come up with some way to enhance the citizens of the Empire a great deal, allowing the general populace access to magic and a greater ability to grow strong.
Mark had eventually found work as a lumberjack and a small trip to the woods outside the town was a now daily ritual. He had spent half a day chopping and collecting iron-wood for an order and was just walking back home after having delivered the order.
There was at least some benefit to being reborn as a walking nightmare, one of which was greatly increased physical strength and stamina. With a large enough cart, Mark could do the work of four or five human lumberjacks in a day. It was a hard living, but he could not complain, since he had no other skills, and convincing Carl to introduce him to the woodcutting guild had been a chore.
"Good evening, Carl!", he greeted the barman and owner of the creatively named Carl''s as he walked back into the inn. "Could you please send some bread and meat to my room? I am famished today, and the evening crowd is about to come in, so best to get going before things get awkward."
Mark had never been introduced to the lord of the castle by Viktor, and he had eventually figured out that Viktor could have never really done so. It was slightly off-putting to realise that he was simply not wanted in the village of Maidenstone, but he eventually realised that Maidenwatch town had been much better for him.
He had not been able to make any friends here, but there were not many awkward stares, and he had eventually figured out that he could avoid most of the trouble by avoiding drunk people.
He had finally saved enough money to hire a Speaker at a local library since he was illiterate in the local script. It was already a miracle that he understood the spoken word but he had not given much thought as to why - there was too much other stuff to get through first.
Tomorrow morning he had no pending obligations, and he would finally go to the castle to find the library and hire a Speaker.
It was time to figure out where and what he was, properly.
Mark was woken up by a steady knocking on his door when it was still a little dark out, the next morning. There was some stuff he wanted to do, before he got to the library, mostly the breakfast and a small chat with Carl the barkeeper to get some basic information before he headed out to find a Speaker.
The Golden Hedgehog was a three-storey building built mostly out of wood and stone. It was quite nicely insulated, and chill and noise from outside the room rarely ever intruded on sleep. When Mark got downstairs, he found that Carl was already preparing a vegetable stew for breakfast, but that the meat was not done cooking yet.
"Good Morning! Hey Carl, mind If I disturb you for a bit while the meat roasts? Also, can I have a bowl of stew and some bread to dip, thank you!"
"I don''t have much time before people start walking in, but I suppose I can spare a few minutes. Better be quick, though, I have work to do."
"Yes, yes, I wanted to find you before there were too many people around, It will only be a few quick questions, I promise!"
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Carl walked to his stool with a bowl of stew and a plate of bread and oil, and Mark thought it was best to rip the band-aid right off. "What am I, Carl? What are the demon-spawn? The people don''t like to walk around me I see, but not one person has bothered me a bit in the time I have been here. It is a bit strange"
"I don''t rightly know, but shouldn''t you already know, you know, what with having to fight the demons and all for a good year and a half?"
"I don''t remember much, just that my name is Mark, and I woke up in woods near Maidenstone with only my robes on me!"
After a bit of needling, Carl eventually told him that he didn''t know much it was best to ask the speaker - but from what he did know, the mages in the capital figured out how to control dying demons, to make them fight against the invading legions.
It didn''t truly seem necessary, said Carl, since the Magineers of Magnolia or some such thing had figured out a way to make people strong about half a year into the war, and while the war was intense, most people thought it was won at that point.
"Most people think it was heretical", said Carl about the matter. "No one knows if the cleansing is going to last forever they say, and many think there was no need to raise dead demons to fight a war that was already won."
"Then why do people not run us out of here?" Mark had rarely seen other demon-forged in the town, but he did know they existed.
"The lord says you fought in the war, and you get to stay. So you get to stay. Don''t think about it too much, everyone can earn their place that way. No one will want to be friends with you, but it is your right to live here if you have fought for it."
Mark wondered what he would say if he knew Mark had never fought for a single thing in his entire life.
He was done eating, and it was time to go to the library anyway.
The town around the castle of Maidenwatch wasn''t too large, but it was big enough that the walk from the outskirts of the town where he lived, to the castle itself was about an hour. During the day, the traffic from the town to the castle passed freely. There was a throng of people already moving to and from the castle.
Maidenwatch itself was less of a castle and more of a large watchtower with walls around it. The town of Maidenwatch was outside of the castle walls, separated from the castle by a moat and two walls.
Citizens of the town were allowed to pass freely into the castle walls, as long as they checked in at the proper gates. It was necessary since all of the town''s administration was inside the wall boundary. So were the Library, where he was headed, and apparently a hospital, although Mark had never seen it.
"I have an appointment with speaker Loran at the library", Mark said to the guards manning the gate.
"Put your finger to the tablet, and be back out before the night falls. If we have to find you it won''t be pretty. The entry is 90 coppers"
Mark sighed and paid the fee, not knowing if it was a fee for the guards or not. Arguing would not help anyway, and the queue behind him was only growing larger.
Immediately inside of the castle walls was farmland, a lot of farmland. Mark did not understand why there was so much farmland inside the walls when grain could be transported just well from the outside, but it was hardly his problem.
He kept walking, it would be a while before he got to the library. Inside the castle was basically another town. He wondered if it was also called Maidenwatch. Hah!
The town was arranged in rings, with farmland and barracks outside the middle ring, where the library and the hospital were. There were also a lot of residential villas inside the middle ring.
There were hardly any proper addresses, and places were mostly identified by landmarks. It was how Mark knew where the library was. It was next to the small statue of the maiden, after taking the third left from Central Street after one entered the middle ring.
By the time Mark reached the library it had already been an hour and a half, and the sun was properly out. It was for the best, as it meant the library was open already.
It was a modestly tall building, about four storeys, made of the same oily stone as all the roads he had ever seen here. The library was painted in a shade of blue, with small artworks depicting books and scrolls as highlights. Although Mark couldn''t yet read the text, he assumed the large Mural in purple next to a picture of a woman with her hands clasped either said "Library" or the name of the building.
Mark nodded to the guard at the entrance and walked into the library. Straight ahead was a small hall, and then stairways to the upper floors where there were rooms to talk, so you would not disturb others. He walked to the receptionist and asked for speaker Loran, and was directed to room 103, the 3rd room on the first floor.
The library reminded him a lot of the one at his university, even though the architecture was so starkly different, the organisation was strangely familiar. Mark walked into the room and found that the Speaker was already there, waiting for him.
Between them, they had arranged for an entire half-day to chat, and it had cost him a pretty penny, about three months of his savings from chopping iron-wood.
He supposed now was the time to make use of it.
Negotiations and Agreements
Four months ago, when Loran received a request for an audience from some person outside the castle walls, he almost rejected it out of reflex. People who needed the library and lived outside town walls tended to be both literate and hard to deal with, in his experience. It was only when the receptionist had told him that the seeker was a Demon-Forged, that he had agreed to meet with Mark.
Loran was aware that there were some other demon-forged in the town, but they were brutes under the direct supervision of the castle''s administration. Dim-witted, but quite physically resourceful, those poor people were living out the last of their lives under the care, and in service of the Lord of Maidenwatch, Ser Joanna Lightblade. It was her duty, and those of others like her to take care of the small number of the demon-forged that were still alive after the war had been won, so a small number of the demon-forged could be found in every castle in the northern regions of the Empire.
During the war, Loran had served as an assistant to a mage under the employ of the Imperial Academy of Magic in Dagestov, the capital of the Empire. It was in the academy, where the project that would finally result in the Demon-Forged was first ideated.
Loran shook his head to clear his thoughts and started to write down what he remembered about the curious creations. His meeting with Mark was due in two days, and it was best to summarise what he knew of the experiments. He would have other things to do when Mark arrived than just to re-iterate what he already knew to Mark.
As far as he learned in his time as a student at the Academy, the Demon-Forged were just human souls, sealed in the undead bodies of freshly slain demons. How this process was achieved or worked was beyond his knowledge, but he was given a short lesson on how to care for such individuals when he was sent here to serve under the castle''s Lord.
The Demonforged were undead, but no amateur would be able to tell at a glance, since they shared no attributes in common with lesser variations. From what he knew, each demon-forged inherited their physical strength from the body of the slain demon - the greater the demon, the stronger the child would be. Even if they were born from lesser demons, however - effort and exercise would yield much greater awards for the demon-forged than they would for fellow humans.
However, there were disadvantages to being abhorrent crimes against nature.
They were born with no memories, and the process to create them would artificially implant enough skills for them to fight and speak but left them mentally suggestible, and often with impaired mental development later in life.
The Breath of the World would reject their bodies, refusing to enter them, and provided them with no nourishment, or strength. Evidently, once the demons had been thrown back, and the environmental corruption caused by their presence started to clear, the strongest of the demon-forged had visibly grown weaker. Once no longer protected from the ravages of the Breath by the presence of demonic corruption, their bodies would be visibly eroded over time by their existence in this very world, hastening the collapse of their physical forms, and rapidly freeing the trapped souls inside.
It had only been two and half years since the demons were driven back, and most of the demon-forged had already passed from bodily weaknesses. Only the weakest of demonic bodies, those exuding the least corruption had lasted for a significant time after the war.
With even the oldest of the demon-forged being at most six years old, Mark was a curiosity - in both that he appeared more intelligent than most other demon-forged, and was decently strong too. He appeared to not suffer from any visible signs of Breath Sickness - which was often only the case for the weakest demon-forged.
Loran put his pen down and collected his written notes. There was nothing more to be done until he could properly meet Mark. Only then would he be able to determine if there was anything more to be studied, or if it would be a short meeting.
When Mark had finally sat across the Speaker, he felt an indescribable sense of relief. He would finally be able to get some answers regarding his bizarre situation, and existence. Waking up in an alien body every day of the week for the last year had slowly worn on his nerves.
The sensation felt profoundly wrong, like something itchy was stuck under his skin, or a small piece of food stuck under his throat, waiting to be swallowed fully. After an entire year, it was not like was struggling with the shape of his body, or its weight and existence, but if he were to wake up in a human body tomorrow - he would be nothing but thankful.This text was taken from Royal Road. Help the author by reading the original version there.
As soon as he nodded to the speaker, Loran started speaking, telling him about the creation of the demon-forged and the short war against demons, leaving him no space to put a word in edgewise.
"The Demon-Forged were first created in the latter half of the second year of the Invasion", Mark was told. The speaker continued speaking, although he seemed in no hurry, and Mark was told quite a lot about his new existence.
At the very least, he was now able to place the reason for his super-human strength, although he had been satisfied even without the explanation since he did look quite devilish. Of course, he would be much stronger than an average human. It was nice for some expectations to be met.
He was then told that while that was true for the general citizenry, most people in the castle guard would be able to match him pound for pound and that the true elite would effortlessly be able to contain several demon-forged by themselves. This was apparently because demons drew their strength from physical might, and mystical corruption that their presence exuded.
A group of demons was, therefore, much stronger than an individual one. A horde was almost a disaster if there wasn''t a strong enough person present nearby to slaughter them before the corruption set in the environment. But, this corruption was the same place that the demon-forged drew their strength from, and so Mark learned that he would most likely grow weaker as time passed.
Learning that Loran expected all demon-forged to eventually pass from Breath Sickness had sent Mark into almost the same intense panic he felt when he had first woken up in this world, and head desperately begged Loran to see if there was any way to live past the near future.
"Likely not her", he was told. Maidenwatch was only a tiny town set against the watch tower of the same name, and there wasn''t much more knowledge available locally. This place was a reluctant castle, and aside from the military infrastructure, not much else was out of infancy just yet.
Eventually, the talk died down, and Loran and Mark both sat in silence. There was still a good portion of time until mid-day, however, and that was when his time with the speaker was supposed to officially end.
"Waking up with no memories, and nothing on my back but a robe was a terrifying experience, but by now I have made my peace with it. A year ago, when I was stranded and afraid, this news might not have mattered much to me, but now? Now I want to live. Please, tell me all you know about the Breath", Mark told the speaker.
Over another short lecture, Mark learned that no one really knew or completely understood what the Breath of the World was, but everyone knew of its existence. There was tangible proof of its existence all over the place, with ordinary humans being able to perform mythical feats of physical prowess, or magical might.
The creation of the Demonforged themselves, was an example after all. The Breath was known by many different names in the many different kingdoms under the Empire.
"They call it Qi in the western provinces, and at the Academy where I studied, we called it magic itself. The islands of Paatal to the south call it Chi, and believe that through the understanding of chi, they will eventually achieve permanence. However, all agree that the demons and the demon-forged are not capable of utilising it. The very energy is an anathema to your material existence."
"How so?", asked Mark.
"The most dramatic example is of the demon-lord Andhaka, exploding from the inside out as he attempted to harness our magic."
"Oh"
He felt like wanted to cry. Mark had only just come to terms with his new existence, and now he was told that he would likely not live for too much longer was devastating. However, he did not have the luxury.
It had taken him three months of earnings and a stroke of good luck to arrange a meeting at the library, and he didn''t know if he would get a chance again. It was best to ask if he could somehow arrange long-term access to the library. Since he did not have the ability to read the books himself, this meant asking for a longer arrangement with Speaker Loran himself.
"I don''t think I want to die just yet, Loran. Even if there is no known way for me to learn magic, it seems the only way I can continue living is to either learn how to harness it or isolate myself from it. Do you have any ideas?"
"Isolation is something impossible, the Breaths suffuses the entirety of the world, even places damaged by demonic occupation. We could make an honest attempt to teach you magic, but besides the danger, I have already told you about, it is exceedingly hard to learn, and I would have to arrange permission from the castle''s administration to do this."
Mark asked him what it would take for him to do this, and was predictably told that his meagre earnings from his work as a lumberjack would not suffice. On further prodding, Loran suggested that he should come back tomorrow, and Loran would teach him to recognise some valuable herbs and beast parts. If Mark were to somehow be able to arrange a total of five gold in such things, he would be able to at least start learning magic, and pay for Loran''s time in the duration.
It did sound expensive but not unreasonably so, therefore Mark agreed. He figured there was not much room for him to negotiate either way, owing to his severe lack of knowledge.
There was still about half an hour left until it was midday, and Mark would have to leave the speaker to his own devices. Mark decided to ask him how humans learnt magic, and what changes did Loran expect to make in his own attempt to learn.
"I can not really say," Loran told him.
"Before we can see how you react to Breath exposure, it is hard to say anything about how to go about learning magic, but I would suggest that you eat and exercise well. It is well-known that demons can get stronger much easier than humans can, so it is best to make sure that you are as healthy as you can be before we start. The rest of it is unknown territory, so we will both find out as we go. Hopefully, you do not explode into giblets as well."
Loran told him that he would spend some time looking for more methods to use magic as an aid to physically enhance the body, and perhaps some text on how demonic enhancements worked, if there were any present.
If there were not, the only option was to pray and walk in blind.
Announcement
Hi, I have not posted for a couple of days, and that is because I think it is better for the story if I sit down and finish writing
at least the first arc, before I post the entire book. I have the general story arcs in mind, but I am struggling with the tone of
story. When I planned it out, I wanted to write the quirky but comedic adventures of an everyday guy isekai''d into a dying,The tale has been taken without authorization; if you see it on Amazon, report the incident.
alien body,
The story turned out much more serious as I typed it out. I don''t dislike it, but I hadn''t planned it out so I do not know where to
go with it just yet. I will take this week off to plan, and the next week to write it out. If I can write consistently for a full week, hopefully
you and I will come back to a full novel :)
Thank you!