Gacha Leveling

"Why did Celaeno kick you out?" Matthew asked, picking a place to sit among the chairs of the office he and Lenore went in.

"Celaeno is... A hard woman." Lenore dismissed him.

"And Malphas got to you and forced you to be his general again?" Matthew questioned her, looking at her bare flesh covered with fresh scars.

"No. He didn’t force me. I convinced him to let me command one of his legions again." Lenore corrected Matthew with a bit of pride.

"And the scars?" He asked.

"This was... Punishment. For leaving him." She revealed while caressing her belly where a large round scar was near her navel.

"And even being tortured you asked to be his general again?" Matthew found it odd.

"It was better than being dead." Lenore protested with anger in her eyes.

Matthew ate his own words. He became silent for a while, just looking at the Erinyes body language. Guarded, scared.

"So when did Malphas start to work with Samil?" Matthew asked.

"Samil?" Lenore questioned him.

"Fat blonde human. A powerful Warlock." Matthew described.

"Oh... That guy. Not long. A couple of months? I don’t know, I’m not exactly close to the Raven." She said, referring to Malphas.

"Do you at least know why you are attacking Earth?" Matthew questioned.

"No. Malphas just ordered me to take the tower." Lenore said.

"Only you? No other legion?" Matthew asked.

"Just mine." She said. "The fat man asked for another legion as well, but I don’t know what they were doing."

"I don’t suppose I could convince you to take your troops back." Matthew joked.

"As if I could. Have you ever tried to lead a bunch of dickheads? I can only point them in the direction I want them to go and hope for the best." She laughed. "I can influence the weaker ones, but the others... Well, you saw what just happened."

"So, what’s your plan? I’m defending the tower." Matthew warned her.

"I figured it out." Lenore shrugged. "I don’t really know. I’m just hoping for the best."

Matthew chuckled.

"I don’t want to kill you." Matthew declared.

"Thank you. I don’t want to die either." Lenore smiled.

"Just run away. Hide somewhere. Don’t mess with the humans. Can you do that?" Matthew proposed.

"You mean... Stay on Earth? That’s... I don’t know. And I can’t have any fun?" Lenore questioned him.

"Depends on your idea of fun. If you harm anyone, I’ll personally hunt you down. But if you mean drinking and partying. Be my guest." Matthew said.

"Why? Why would you risk allowing a greater demon loose around Earth?" Lenore asked him.

"I have my own scars." Matthew was succinct. "It would sour my day if I was forced to kill you. Given the circumstances. Also, you helped me out back in Violentia."

"I’m not stupid to say no to that." Lenore smiled.

"Before you go. What was the plan here? I mean, to take the tower." Matthew questioned.

"I told you. Send them all in at once and hope for the best. There’s no way to lead these idiots. I told the baalors to attack all at once, but they just do what they want." She sighed.

"And what about Samil? What is he doing?" Matthew asked.

"The fat man..." Lenore thought for a while. "He went to Cocytus after opening the portals for us to come to Earth."

"What the hell is he planning?" Matthew thought out loud.

"I don’t know." Lerone said while ordering the cyclops in the front to kill himself.

"What the hell are you doing?" Matthew questioned her after saying the Cyclop slash his own neck.

"I can’t possibly hide with that big lump of meat around, can I?" Lenore looked at him as if it was obvious.

Matthew got up and approached Lenore, intimidating her.

"Don’t pull these stunts on Earth. No killing, no stealing, no taking advantage of others. Do you understand?"

"Yeah." She said, recoiling from him. "I won’t do any of that with humans."

"Good. You can go now." Matthew said.

"Good luck, Matty." Lenore smiled at him. "I don’t understand any of this, but I know something big is happening. I mean. Usually Aym would have intervened with someone opening portals to Violentia. But he’s oddly silent with the fat man."

"The fat man works with Paimon." Matthew explained. "I don’t quite understand what is going on either. But I know that, if Samil succeeds, Earth itself is in danger."

Lenore looked at Matthew with wide eyes, studying him and thinking about what was said. After a while, she took flight and went away.

Matthew sneaked back to the Tower’s lobby where he found KAzan and Catherine resting with the others while the demon attack gave a pause.

"Where have you been?" Catherine asked him.

"I had a talk with their general." Matthew explained sitting down with them. "It was someone I knew from when I was in hell."

"I... See." Catherine said, surprised.

"And?" Kazan urged him to continue.

"She ran away. Their forces are without leadership now."

True to that, the demon legion was now in disarray. The unorganized army who attacked according to the whims of their own troops, now wasn’t an army anymore. Without Lenore constantly using her spells and charm to compel and convince the demons to attack the tower, each one of them decided to do what they wanted.

Free on Earth, they could now roam to wherever they wanted and do whatever they wanted.

Most demons formed smaller groups and started to terrorize the city, destroying everything they could find and searching for humans to have "fun" with.

But the city center was empty. The army got them out in time and made a defensive perimeter around where most of the gates were.

Meanwhile, at Obongo Park, another legion congregated, led by a Baalor named Brob. Their function was to keep the main forces of the army away from the Tower of Ryvylin while Lenore’s legion took the building.

But with Lenore’s defection and her legion terrorizing the empty city center. Brob was ordered to rally all the demons and attack the tower through the army who sieged the Park where he was.

"It did get quite quieter." Kleb, Catherine’s husband, said while drinking a mana potion.

"One thing doesn’t make sense though." Matthew said, wanting the input of the others to help him figure things out. "They organized this big invasion to take the Harp. Set up different battlefields to divide our forces. And yet, Samil, their leader, is nowhere to be seen. Lenore, the demon general, said he went to Cocytus instead of coming with their army."

"What is it that doesn’t make sense?" Catherine questioned.

"Why didn’t Samil come to the Tower?" Matthew asked. "He’s not only their leader. He’s extremely powerful."

"And he went to Cocytus?" Kazan asked.

"Yes. He serves Paimon, and Paimon rules Cocytus. Last time we fought he summoned demons from the frozen hell, instead of demons from Violentia. But this time he went to Violentia for help." Matthew explained.

"Perhaps he’s a coward like Claudio?" Catherine shrugged.

"And where is Claudio?" Matthew asked.

"He’s downstairs at the safe with the other researchers and the Harp himself." Kleb answered.

"The safe?" Matthew questioned.

"Yeah. Where we put our most valuable artifacts. We even built a sanctuary for the Harp as well." Catherine said and pointed to the cait sith behind them who had his eyes glued outside looking for enemies. "Cathbad even instructed how it should be built."

"This safe of yours. How good is it?" Kazan asked.

"The best we could make. Thick walls, teleportation dampers, gate dampers and anything else you can think of." Catherine said proudly.

Then suddenly came to Matthew’s mind.

Every sensitive location in the country, such as shopping malls and hospitals, had to have gate dampers. Somehow those dampers failed when he was at Saint Helen’s Hospital.

They never found out who opened the gate to Violentia back then. At first he thought it was the Howling Spear guild, but Beleth himself said it wasn’t them that opened that gate.

If Samil was the one who did it, this meant he had a way to bypass the dampers.

Matthew stood up fast, scaring those around him.

"We need to go to the safe, now!" He urged Catherine.

She thought about protesting, but decided to indulge Matthew in the odd chance something really did happen at the safe.

Kazan stayed upstairs to help with the defense if any greater demon appeared. Kleb, Cathbad, Catherine, Matthew and Ffyr went downstairs to the safe.

When the thick doors opened, freezing air hit them like a wall. And then they smelled the blood.

"My god." Catherine exclaimed, running inside only to find everyone dead.

The sight was grim. The researchers inside were all torn apart as if attacked by rabid animals. There was ice covering everything and a lot of their blood was frozen on the ground.

The only exception was Claudio. His glasses were broken on the floor and his once perfect suit was burned around him mixing with his own skin.

"He put up a hell of a fight." Cathbad praised the man who was surrounded by 4 bodies of Wechuges, greater demons from the Ninith Hell.

"You bloody stupid man!" Catherine shed tears for him. "Why didn’t you run away? You always run away!" She admonished his body.

"Because he knew what was on stake here." Cathbad said, gently closing his eyes.

"I really didn’t expect him to die fighting for the Harp." Matthew said, looking at Claudio. "We were wrong about him." His eyes filled with tears.

Nothing else was taken or destroyed. Just Uaithne’s body was missing.

Matthew closed his fists in anger. He failed. If Claudio was right, one of the Earth’s shields against the other realms was taken by Samil. And he had no idea what he was going to do with it.