Dark clouds of smoke billowed up in the sky. Flames licked furiously at the wooden buildings and spread wildly across open fields.

  Inara let out a choked gasp at the sight. She stumbled forward.

  Desiree pulled back, suddenly afraid to be running ahead on her own.

  “What happened?” James asked. “We weren’t even gone very long!”

  “Demons. Has to be.” Inara set her jaw. “I’ll go in and see what happened. See if I can find any survivors. Desiree, you stay here with James.”

  “No way!” Desiree put her hands on her hips. “I’m coming, too.”

  James held his tongue. The smart move was definitely to not go towards the demons, but he was a Hero in this world. If Inara and Desiree insisted on going toward danger, he’d stay at their side.

  Inara stared her daughter down for a long moment, assessing her and the situation. Likely thinking that if she insisted Desiree stay behind, the girl would come charging along anyway, only in more danger than if Inara had kept her close in the first place.

  “Fine,” she said curtly. “Let’s go.”

  A scream pierced the air, and Desiree took off running. All her fear vanished in the face of someone else being in danger.

  James could admire that, even as he chased her down and cursed her stupidity. The girl ran with all the energy of a child, whereas he — well, he hadn’t done much running since high school.

  To his surprise, though, he didn’t get the stitch in his side he’d been expecting. His breath continued to come evenly, and he barely broke a sweat.

  Inara followed in after him.

  It didn’t take long to find their first demon. To James it looked like someone had taken lava rocks, shaped them like a person, then injected their body with magma. The thing was huge, and it loomed over a villager James hadn’t met yet, but Inara and Desiree clearly recognized him.

  Desiree threw a rock at the demon. “You leave Billy alone!” she yelled.

  Your party has entered combat!

  The demon turned towards them, and its eyes blazed with sulfurous rage. The worst thing anyone could do, it seemed, was pull a demon from its prey.

  Inara attacked first. She ran quick as ever, her scythe low to the ground, and swept the blade through the creature’s leg.

  Her health bar took a hit as soon as she was within arm’s length of the thing and didn’t stop dropping until she was safely away again. In fact, it looked like she took even more damage than she inflicted.

  “Mana Bolt, Mana Bolt, Mana Bolt,” James fired off the attacks as quickly as he could. Thanks to his level ups, he had enough mana to use the attack ten times. It had felt like so much, but the attack was doing so little compared to the trees. Each Mana Bolt knocked off maybe ten percent of the demon’s health.

  Then it was Desiree’s turn. She took one look at the Demon — then ran.

  James stared after her. He hadn’t even known it was possible to flee combat, but maybe it made sense? How far did a person have to get before the combat ended? But she was the one who started this fight!

  Inara gazed after her daughter with a mix of relief and panic. Relief because Desiree would be safe from this fight, and panic because there could be another demon out there, and now Desiree was on her own.

  The author's tale has been misappropriated; report any instances of this story on Amazon.

  Enemy turn!

  The demon bellowed at the sky, then charged toward James with all the grace of a three-legged bull. Every step left charred indentations on the ground; it carried with it an aura of hellfire.

  When it got within a few feet, James felt the overpowering heat that had drained some of Inara’s life, and his own health bar began to drain.

  The beast was big and slow, and James felt that it was supremely unfair that he was unable to dodge. Maybe there was a skill for dodging that would free him during these moments? He’d have to find some time to go through the whole list. There were hundreds of skills, more than he could imagine on his own, but from what he’d seen they all seemed to at least loosely tie into skills he already possessed. As a kid he’d certainly played enough dodgeball that if an evasion skill didn’t exist, he’d be surprised.

  And a little pissed.

  The demon’s fist connected squarely with James’s face and sent him flying into a cottage. The thin wooden wall, already weakened from fire damage, crumbled beneath his weight.

  Critical hit!

  Fuck, that hurt. James’s health bar drained to a little less than half. Another direct strike like that would kill him.

  As the demon strode back to its original position, James considered his next move. Based on the damage he and Inara had already done, they wouldn’t kill it next turn even if he went all out. He ought to drink his last health potion, or he’d die in the next round.

  But if he didn’t attack, the demon might go after Inara instead. He still wasn’t sure if aggro was drawn to whoever did the most damage, or whoever attacked most recently — and if it was the latter, then it was doubly cruel of the system to make them attack in order of strongest to weakest. In either case, if he wasted his turn to drink a potion, Inara would most likely be targeted.

  Ironically, he would definitely survive, but that wasn’t a price he was willing to pay.

  Besides, he’d already knocked out about thirty percent of the thing’s health with his Mana Bolts. If he could land a critical hit or two, they might be able to kill the thing.

  Either way, he’d be rolling the dice. The only choice was whether he’d be gambling his own life, or Inara’s.

  Your turn!

  “Mana Bolt, Mana Bolt, Mana Bolt, Mana Bolt, Man—” James rattled off the attacks as quickly as he could and managed to get a fourth one in before his turn ended. He did his best to aim, but the demon didn’t seem to have a weak spot.

  He wanted to tell Inara not to attack. If his one stupid spell didn’t require his vocal cords, he would have.

  But as soon as it was her turn, she was moving. She swung her scythe through the demon’s leg and ran off.

  Again, she took more damage than she dealt, and James feared what would happen if the demon set its sights on her. The demon itself was close to dead. It had a little under twenty percent of its health bar remaining.

  For all the good that would do. It was going to make it to its next turn, and then either James or Inara would die.

  What a crappy magical world, James despaired. He’d only just met Inara, but he already cared about her. She’d taken him in and, outside a healthy amount of suspicion, was kind to him. It certainly didn’t hurt that she was exactly his type. They should have had a life together, starting with a slow-burn romance where he slowly earned her trust and encouraged her to open up.

  Instead, all he’d gotten was one hectic fight after another.

  Movement caught his eye. Someone was running down the street towards the demon.

  What? Who would—

  Desiree charged the demon. In her hands was a bucket of water, which she poured directly onto the demon’s head, quenching its hellfire eyes. Steam hissed and rose like a halo.

  Critical hit!

  The demon’s health plummeted.

  So that’s how you get a critical hit, James thought. He’d played enough Pokémon back in the day to understand super-effective types. If a creature didn’t have a clear physical weakness, it would likely have a clear type weakness. That was good to know, and it would mean specializing some of his spells so he had an array.

  Enemy turn!

  The damn creature didn’t die. It clung to life with one tiny sliver of health, which was enough for every inch of hellfire across its body to spring back into full strength — and Desiree was stuck close enough that her own health steadily drained from the proximity heat.

  If the demon wanted to kill her, it didn’t even have to move. Her health was dropping quickly enough that it could just stand there for five seconds and she would be done for.

  It either didn’t know that, or didn’t care. It raised one magma laced fist for the killing blow.

  A rock bounced off its bicep.

  Billy Smith has joined your party!

  If James could have laughed, he would have cried. The snot-nosed kid Desiree had rushed in to save was throwing rocks at the demon. It wasn’t much, but —

  —it was all they needed. That last tiny sliver of health dropped away, and the demon collapsed.

  Defeated Magma Demon lvl 15!

  EXP +10,000

  Level up!

  Level up!