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'Sup people? Part number three in my series. After this story I will introduce the main protagonist. There still isn't much yiff, so you will likely have to fantasize about what happens, if you want to get anything sexual out of this.

I will of course still appreciate any critique and advice, the more I get, the better the story will get. I can listen to advice.

The Saldean War, Chapter 2

Unnatural legacy

The Blood War, north-eastern part of Saldea

The trees were whizzing past her, the autumn-ground was soft beneath her boots, soft leaves cushoning her every step. Her chest was constricting her, the pure efffort of running so far and so fast was taking its toll on her. Yet she plowed on. There was no choice really, that which they were fleeing was not a thing she wanted to see, much less meet.

She stumbled in weariness and unfortunately her foot was snagged by a tree-root. She fell, but was standing and running a second later, thanking the spirits that she hadn't sprained her ankle.

"Come on, Joline! We need to move, now!" The speaker, a middle-aged doberman, was panting hard. His left arm was twisted in a way that told her that it was broken. But he still held his axe steady in his right hand. The axe was a magnificent thing; it had been crafted by the shamans, and red runes covered the head. Cabable of bursting into fire made it a powerful weapon, but against the enemy they were fleeing it was naught.

She redoubled her efforts and was soon catching up with the others.

John, the doberman with the enchanted axe. Axel, the other fighter in their party, a cocker-spaniel who, despite his harmless appearence was a deadly fighter, still armed with his trident. And Jonathan, their tracker and marksman, who had lost his fighting daggers against the goblins, but was still equipped with his longbow, which could easily double as a makeshift quarterstaff should the need arise.

She took a moment to admire the graceful movements of her lover. His thin, well-trained beagle body, still pretty even when covered with blood, both green and red, and despite his green clothes of a forester being torn to threads by the thorns of the bushes they had run through in their haste. She had always admired his foresting skills, and his skill with his bow.

He noticed her as she ran up besides him. He turned his oak-brown eyes towards her and gave her a look of pained love.

"Joline, babe," his breathing was tattered, they had been running for the last twenty minutes, "I don't think we'll make it this time." He took a long gasping breath. "That thing which is chasing us," he huffed again, "is unlike anything I have encountered. I doubt we will be able to kill it."

Before the chase even began, Jonathan had climbed a tree to see their new enemy in advance, after they had seen the look in his eyes when he came down, they did not ask any questions, they ran.

She didn't even have the strength to argue with him, she just felt like lying down. It had been a long day, and all their carefully made plans had been disrupted.

The four had been supposed to infiltrate a camp of goblins close to their village. They were the most proven warriors still in the city. The rest of the combat-worthy men and women were either at the Kanaran front, or out in small warbands trying to protect their village against the goblin intrusion.

The shamans had divined that a powerful Kanaran demon-summoner had his residence in the goblin camp, and that he was going to gate in a Tanar'ri. What kind, they did not know. But even the weakest demon could rain death and destruction upon their village.

So the four had been sent out to assassinate the summoner. However, when they arrived, the Kanaran was already engaged in the summoning ritual. They didn't even get the chance to kill him; they had found the camp in a clearing and had hid in the outskirts of the forest, but before Jonathan could fire a killing arrow they had been beset upon by goblins. Appearently the goblins had shamans too, for magic was definately thrown against them, breaking John's arm. Then they had been forced into close-combat with the goblins. Normally a goblin wouldn't be a problem, not even for her, but in overwhelming numbers they had this nasty habit of flanking you. However, the party was able to fight themselves out into the forest. After running for more than half an hour, they had settled down atop of a hill covered with trees, so they had tactical advantage. They had rested and she had used her spiritual powers to staunch her companions' wounds and deflect the scrying powers of the goblin shamans.

Alas, suddenly they had all felt a terrible evil emnating from the direction of the goblin camp.

"By the good spirits!" She had said. "It's one of the big ones. We need to warn the elders." Unfortunately, she had disposed of all her spiritual energy healing the others and deflecting the scrying, so she wasn't able to send a message with the winds.

Soon they could hear a rumbling in the forest, heavy footsteps, and they had decided to break camp.

And now they were running through the forest, with an angry demon on their trail. They knew no goblins were with it, for the goblins were slow creatures, and could not run nearly as fast as a Saldean. Or a demon.

She looked backwards, and noticed the strained expression in John's face. He was older than the rest of them, and he had also taken the brunt of the damage they had sustained; Besides having a broken arm, he had several puncture wounds from the goblin spears, including two in his left calf, and a couple more in his abdomen Her restricted healing abilities hadn't really been able to do anything about the arm, and most goblin weapons were treated with a substance that made blood flow quicker, a thing she wasn't able to counter. He was getting slower, and the frantic expression on his face showed it. He noticed her worried look and slowe to a halt.

"Run on!" He yelled. "I will delay it for you. It should be possible to outrun it if I damage it."

Now they had all stopped. The heavy footsteps were getting closer and closer. The tension was tangible in the air.

"Abandon you?" Yelled Axel, swinging around with his trident. "Are you insane? We are a group, a team, we can't just abondon each other, what would the point of being a team be then?"

"Aye," said Jonathan, "we are one. That was the wow we took before we even fought our first mortal battle."

"So what?" Yelled John, while throwing glances backwards, "There's no point in being a team if we are all dead. It would be better if I sacrifice myself to buy you time."

"No." She surprised herself by talking. "We all stay, and we all fight. Between the four of us, it might be possible to defeat it. I was chosen by the elders as the formal leader of the group. We stay!"

They all threw her glances, from the incredulous one from John, to the admiring one from Jonathan.

"Ah, Babe, it's your courage I have always admired." Said Jonathan. He walked up to her, the heavy footsteps coming closer and closer, leaned in and gave her a deep kiss. He broke free of the kiss first, and said; "Know this, my love, whether in this life or the next, we shall always be together."

He took out two arrows from his quiver, now there were only five left, and knocked them both.

John took a few trying swipes with his axe, and it was clear that there was not the power to cut goblins in half like there was only a day ago. He was truly weakened.

Axel readied his trident and crouched down in a battle-stance, left foot first.

While she herself twirled her quarterstaff experimentally and assumed the same stance as Axel.

"Here it comes!" Yelled John, and at that moment it broke free from some thick bushes into visibility.

It was a monstrosity.

By the amount of evil power it radiated, she guessed it to be a Baalor, but it was unlike any Baalor she had ever heard of. It towered above them, perhaps as much as four metres tall. It was a twisted charicature of a normal, living being. Its head was a mix between a bull and a wolf, its body was covered with coarse, brown-red hair. From the back of its neck, it seemed, dozens of tentacles were attached. Green, teantactes that ended in mouths filled with need-sharp teeth. Its one arm ended in three massive claws, while the other resembled a normal arm, except for the fact that it grew nails about 20 centimetres long. But the worst thing was its eyes; there were no pupils, no irises, they were purely blood-red. And these blood-red eyes were settled upon the four Saldeans, and the eyes were filled with malice and murderous intent.

She noticed another thing, the nearer its hair got to its groin, the coarser it got. Also, it was not covered by any clothes, and she could clearly see the sheath, which was now being filled up by a nasty-looking red thing. Then it charged.

The first one to stand in its way was John. He ran towards it, as if they were two deers fighting for the same female, and swung his axe, which burst into flames halfway towards its intended target. It didn't reach, though. The demon's left, long, clawed arm took hold of his arm by the wrist an instant before it would have hit home. Its features twisted into a savage smile, which an instant later turned into a grimace of pain as the two arrows Jonathan had fired hit home into its upper arm. The pain forced it to let go of John, who promptly lashed out again with his axe, this time hitting home with a nasty crunch on its ankle. The demon lashed out with a retalitory swipe that took John cleanly off the ground and flung him several metres back. He hit a tree square on, and they could all hear the sound of his spine snapping.

"No! John!" She screamed. But there was nothing to do, and now she was the closest to the demon, which promptly charged, appearently uncaring about injuries that would have crippled a mere mortal. She braced herself for the attack, planting her staff solidly into the hard ground, like when she had been attacked by Saldean cavalry. The earth thundered as the demon charged in, she didn't really rate her chances of standing against its charge very high, but she was determined to try nonetheless. Just before it rammed into her, two arrows in row struck it in the throat. This slowed it down a bit, which gave Axel the upportunity to make his own charge and and ram his trident into the abdomen of the abyss-spawn.

An un-earthly roar emitted from its throat, before it made a massive double swipe against Axel, which he evaded by quickstepping backwards. An arrow more struck it, this one on the left side of its snout. It roared again, but kept its attention on Axel. This gave her the opening she had been waiting for, she circled around it from the opposite side, then took a running run-up and jumped. She hefted her staff as a sword and used her momentum plus the added reach of her staff to land a punishing blow on back of the demon's head, where all the tentacles had their roots. She hoped that it would be a weak spot.

It wasn't. The tentacles sensed her attack, and grasped the staff.

The staff broke, and she made a rolling fall past the demon. But the demon was faster than she had anticipated, and one of its talons caught her in the back of her head. The last thing she heard was Jonathan screaming her name, then everything went black.

She awoke with a splitting headache. For a moment she didn't know where she was, then she remembered. She sat up quickly and yelled;

"Jonathan? Axel! Joh-"

A voice from behind interrupted her:

"I doubt they will respond." It was an otherworldly voice, not suitable for the air of the mortal realms. "The old man's spine cracked. I ran the other fighter through with his own trident, and I gutted the archer slowly." She could hear a pleased smile in the voice now. "It was actually quite pleasant really, he gave a good scream."

This was what she gave it as well. She turned around, ready to beat it to death with her fists, uncaring of how futile it might be. But she didn't lay a hand on it. It was about five metres away from her, and was squatting over the remains of Axel. His head had been smashed open, an grey fluid had leaked out, although most of it seemed to be smeared around the demon's muzzle. It gave her a wicked grin.

"You want a fight, eh? I'll give you reason for it, too. It has been long since a summoner has given me such free reins. He gave me three days to track you down. And I can tell you darlin', it's been ages since the last time I forced myself upon a mortal. And you will do just nice.

She noticed its erection between it legs. It stood up, towering three-and-a-half metres above her, its massive phallus standing out from its body.

"And you know what? You are pregnant, you reek of it. So I want to try a thing another demon named Nergal suggested to me. I will let you live. My seed will interfere with the child, without turning it into a half-demon. You will have demon-blood in your bloodline. And at one time or another it will resurface, causing one of your blood to become more than a mortal. Havoc insured."

The demon chuckled evily as it bore down on her, it's talons ripping away the remnants of her clothes, its massive erection seeking entry.

She screamed.

Present day, five years after the ascension of King Byron.

He woke up gasping, covered in sweat. He felt the need to puke as a physical urge, but held it in check. He could still see the completely red eyes, with no iris or anything, staring into his. He could feel a tearing pain in his fingers and toes, and his teeth seemed to be bursting out of their sockets.

What the Hell was happening!?!