From the joy of narrowly escaping death to plunging straight into hell, like an ice pick driven down through the top of her skull, chilling her to the bone.
The tunnel wasn't narrow. The dirt walls were solid all around, clearly reinforced. The collapsed earth looked fresh.
A corpse lay trapped at the far end, the front half buried in soil with no signs of struggle. Probably killed instantly by falling rocks during the cave-in.
Sean half-crawled forward on his knees, leaving a trail in the dirt as he examined the body, speaking urgently. "Judging by the lividity, he's been dead for several days. Must've been during the shaman's magical bombardment; the ground shaking caused the tunnel to collapse and buried him."
"Poor bastard," Twila said, listening to the increasingly heavy footsteps approaching from behind, completely bewildered. "Get up and fight! Why are you looting the corpse?"
The tunnel was a bit narrow for the tall orcs; they couldn't spread out to fight. If the two of them worked together, they might be able to take down a few more and go out swinging.
After all, waiting to die wasn't really her style.
But Sean's hands kept moving, frantically searching the body. "There's still hope; I can't give up. What if I find some high-level scroll..."
An hour ago, he'd been ready to die with the outpost, hoping to buy more time for those in the rear.
But now, with a primal survival instinct to continue his bloodline kicking in, he just wanted to get this mercenary girl out.
"How high-level?" Twila was already laughing bitterly. "Powerful enough to wipe out the thousands upon thousands of orcs surrounding us?"
She didn't want to die either; who knew if she could even get back to her original world, her original body, after dying.
But the problem was, according to traditional fantasy logic, even if you busted out some forbidden spell, you'd only kill a few hundred enemies at best, right?
Plus, if it really had that much power, the first to die would be the two of them at the center of it all.
"Got it, got it!"
Sean actually did pull out a backpack buried in the dirt. When he opened it, his fingers were trembling.
All their hope rested on this.
Then Twila saw him pull out three grayish stones.
"Ha." She let out a short, mocking laugh.
Whatever those stones were, however valuable, however much money they could fetch, they couldn't save them.
The girl drew her dagger, flourished it, and spun it twice. "Get up. Let's get ready to fight."
Though the original body's consciousness was gone, muscle memory remained. The dagger spun between her fingers, the blade slicing through the air, producing sharp whistling sounds.
So this is what an otherworldly warrior feels like.
She bent her legs and figured if she went all out, she could probably jump at least two or three meters straight up.
Clearly had some training.
But there was no response from behind her. She glanced back and found Sean kneeling on the ground, holding those stones as if meditating.
Soon he opened his eyes and crawled toward her at an even more frantic pace.
"Hold these, kneel down, quick!" Sean somehow found the strength to yank the girl to the ground, explaining rapidly. "Pray to a demon for the power to escape!"
Twila didn't understand at all. "What are these? How do I use them!?"
She tried imitating Sean's posture from just now, but nothing happened. With no time to waste, she had to ask again.
Sean was already blocking in front of her, his staff lost somewhere, both hands clasped together, fingers radiating a fiery glow. Hearing her question, he hurried to answer. "These are philosopher's stones; you don't even know? Focus your attention on the sto—"
Though he was facing away from her, Twila bizarrely saw Sean's mouth opening and closing but couldn't hear a word he was saying.
Looking down, she could see a slender, tall, short-haired figure with horizontally elongated ears kneeling on the ground, hands clasped to her chest, eyelids lowered.
Was her soul leaving her body?
That boy... girl kneeling on the ground: was that herself?
Damn, looking that good and heroic. What a score for you!
Twila glanced at Sean again and found his mouth moving slower and slower until it froze completely.
The dim underground space turned fiery red, the crackling sound of burning wood filled her ears, the temperature rising rapidly, so hot she wanted to strip off her clothes.
The girl's face slowly lifted, her eyes opened: pupils vertical, purple in the center, red on the sides.
"Hisss... the matter... I have understood, hiss hiss hiss... interesting hisss..."
When she spoke, her voice was obscure, layered with sounds like a spider spinning silk, indistinguishable between male and female, nauseating.
Twila couldn't understand any of the individual sounds, but when they combined and entered her ears, she clearly grasped the meaning.
"Your soul... hiss, like a newborn's, pure and powerful... hiss hiss hiss," she seemed to be laughing with those hissing sounds, then her pupils narrowed again, her voice rising a pitch. "Become my apostle. I grant you power."
Countless other small voices appeared around them in agreement:
"Obey."
"Humble."
"Kneel."
"Apostle."
Twila was ready to agree.
Whatever this thing was, based on the current situation, accepting meant living; refusing meant certain death.
Better a live dog than a dead lion, right? As a modern person, she didn't have much of that self-sacrificing mentality, and this was another world. Just thinking with her toes, she could guess what she could do with that kind of power.
I'll straight up become a brigand, okay?
As if already knowing what the girl was thinking, the demon possessing Twila's body spoke again. "Sign the contract, hiss..."
A golden scroll appeared out of thin air before her eyes, soft light making the characters stand out. Though she didn't recognize them, one glance etched their meaning into her brain; each character carried many times more meaning than conventional writing, making reading efficiency incredibly high.
After quickly reading through it, she found it only stipulated that the other party would accept her as an apostle and grant her a gift of power, while she paid the price of the philosopher's stones in her hand. The apostle's duty was to deliver no fewer than twelve philosopher's stones annually, and for each one delivered, she'd receive additional power, a benefit of apostleship. But if she failed to meet the terms, the demon, as the sovereign, could dispose of her at will.
The rest was all about protecting both parties' rights, along with some supplementary clauses.
This lenient!?
Just as Twila felt a wave of shock, the possessing demon laughed strangely again. "Hiss hiss hiss hiss... demons are unlike humans. We... are creatures of contract. Fair trade."
"Then remove the second half." The girl knew this demon seemed able to read her thoughts, so she immediately started bargaining.
She just wanted a one-time deal, hit it and quit it, and didn't want to be tied down.
"Hiss hiss hiss... if so, the power granted to you may not be enough to leave this hisss—" The demon's mouth corners rose high in a bizarre smile.
The contract on the scroll changed its content along with the laughter.
"Then help us get through that collapsed section!" Twila changed her terms again. If this was a smuggling tunnel, it must lead straight into the city.
In every kind of story, demonic contracts were things that seemed wonderful but were actually full of traps. She needed to tip the scales as far in her favor as possible to avoid being crushed by unbearable pressure later.
...The demon paused for a moment, a flash of surprise crossing its brow, but it quickly vanished as the laughter continued. "Hiss... I will grant you a scroll of the sixth-circle Excavate spell, but hiss your hiss magical ability is insufficient to hiss use it, so, when he uses the scroll, you must still hold off the orcs mmm..."
Twila felt helpless. She knew the demon was telling the truth. Don't bite the hand that feeds you. Better to quit while ahead; if she pushed the demon too far and it refused to deal, then she really would become a breeding slave. "Also give me enough power to temporarily hold off the orcs."
Even so, she had to try to lighten the burden.
"Mmm... I do not make temporary deals." The demon's tone turned much colder. In the next instant, the girl felt herself slowly drifting back toward her body, the heavy sense of power beginning to fade. The demon was leaving.
She could only call out helplessly. "Wait! Then give me power to fight off the orcs!"
Being able to bargain with a demon was already satisfying enough; no need to screw herself over.
The demon paused again, calculating for a moment. "If so hiss... you only need to deliver six philosopher's stones annually. The rest of the content remains unchanged."
The contract's text changed accordingly and slowly floated before the girl.
"Fine, I'll sign." The burden cut directly in half, her goal achieved, Twila immediately agreed. Following the instructions, she bit her finger in this soul-separated state and smeared the silver liquid that flowed out onto the bottom right corner of the contract.
She knew philosopher's stones must be extremely precious, to the point where just three could compel a demon to help her escape a desperate situation.
But if she could find three just lying in this tunnel, obtaining them probably wasn't that difficult... at least you should be able to buy them with money.
No other choice anyway.
"Hiss hiss hiss... remember my name hiss, Silver Kiss Aldobeya. It must not be revealed to the outside world."
"Glory."
"Gratitude."
"Reciprocation."
"Memory."
Amid the laughter and chorus-like echoes, the surrounding firelight rapidly faded, and Twila returned to her body in a dizzy spell.
"...wizards rely on the Weave, so I can't trade knowledge with demons, but you're different. If you can really use the philosopher's stones to contact some demon lord in hell, use these three to trade for temporary power, enough to let you escape."
Sean's voice continued as if everything just now had been an illusion.
But the philosopher's stones in her hand had been replaced with a scroll edged in gold, tied with a thoughtful red ribbon.
Her body was also obviously much stronger than before, though the light, floating feeling would probably take some time to get used to.
Twila sprang up, grabbed Sean, and pushed him behind her, stuffing the scroll into his hands. "Cut the crap; use this thing now!"
Sean scrambled up from the ground, opened the scroll, and looked at it, turning back in delighted surprise. "Excavate, sixth-circle magic! Wow, my family doesn't even have many of these. You succeeded!?"
"Stop yapping and put that mouth to better use!"