Assassination

Given that he had almost no possessions on him, it wasn't hard to quietly make his way to the small stone throne. He formed his hand in an open palm with his fingers straight and rigid. The claws that adorned the tips of his fingers led to his hand resembling a crude jagged blade, one he was hoping was enough to take care of the imp quickly. His breath came slow and shallow, trying to conceal his presence as much as possible. The granite colored imp ironically seemed to be having an intense dream as it was twitching with rapid eye movements.

Not wanted to give the creature a chance to defend itself, he quickly struck out away from his body in a harsh slash. He aimed for the creatures small neck, wanted to cleave its heads from its shoulders in one strike. Right as his hand flew out, the imp's eyes shot open in alarm while it started to move away from his claws. Kantan could feel his hardened nails pierce and drag through the throat of the creature in a way he could never have imagined. While he mentally cringed at the brutal nature of the act, he also recognized that his new body was made for this. The skin parted before his claws like butter parts before a knife.

The imp jumped out of the throne with a chi empowered leap, dashing away while clutching its throat in pain. Kantan moved to follow almost immediately, wanting to prevent its ability to heal and counter attack. While he had indeed been able to strike the neck of the demon, he hadn't been able to strike deep enough to make it immediately fatal. Kantan's leg muscles bunched rapidly with each step, propelling him toward the small demon at a preternatural pace. Adrenaline fueled his movements as his body primed him fully for combat.

The imp turned and tried to jump to the side to gain more distance, but Kantan intercepted him with another slash to the creatures back. He ended up connecting with the imp's right hamstring, this time severing the muscles that were hidden beneath it's skin. The demon let out a choked roar, his head turned to watch him with fire in its eyes as it fell to the ground. Kantan was used to chasing opponents who wished to get out of close range with him, his proficiency with grappling and mixed martial arts were out in full force.

Due to his empowered physical body, he felt light on his feet while each strike was more devastating than he normally could have managed. The more he used his new claws, the more he came to appreciate them. Normally he stuck to punches and kicks for dealing real damage, but having the option to switch at a moments notice to a blade would be invaluable in the future.

Since Kantan didn't have to fully anchor himself to generate the power he would normally need for his martial arts, each swipe allowed him to continuously move and follow the imp. Once the demon was hobbled though, it only took a few more strikes before he swiftly overpowered it. It had tried to use its own claws to fight his, but that was when it made its fatal mistake. Kantan leveraged his longer reach, superior training, and higher strength to intercept a wild and desperate swipe. He followed the batting away of the imp's hand with a blurred thrust towards its chest. The bones of the imp crunched in opposition to his claws, which dug straight into the creature's tiny heart.

The heart tried to beat around his fingers, but he was swift to rip his hand down the imp's torso. Blood sprayed from the destroyed chest a few times before it began to pool underneath the lifeless body. As Kantan righted himself, he was surprised to find that despite exerting himself he was not winded. The more he used his body, the more he found that it wanted to be used. Even now he could feel the urge to keep fighting, yet there were no more enemies to face.

His ears heard a soft sound of coins clink behind the throne that imp had been inhabiting, alerting him to the creation of his loot. This also verified that the room had been passed, as the dungeon only provided loot at the end of a room. "Looks like money this time, not that it is overly useful for us right now." He still went and collected it, setting it down on the side of the imp.

"Coins are always useful, as long as you know how to use them. At least, that is what some of the dungeon divers have said." Veri seemed to enjoy quoting the people who had dived within her dungeon, much to Kantan's chagrin. "Our body did well this time, looks like the only demon that should trouble us is the first floor guardian. Thats only because it has natural armor."

Kantan gave that some thought, but decided that it likely wouldn't be too much trouble. He estimated that when he used his chi, on top of his physical strength, that he could at least keep up with a freshly rebirthed stone soul. It wasn't sustainable, as his burned through chi to quickly with his current body, but atleast for a few seconds he could manage. "Since the floor guardian is still a rank 1 demon, it shouldn't be too much of a challenge. As long as I use my training my physical body should hold up. On top of that, we are intending to meet up with Lyra at some point. Between the two of us, we should be able to manage just fine."

Veri seemed satisfied with his response, though her curiosity made him pause. "Are you sure that she will not turn on us? What if she acts like you say your clan will, and she tries to kill you now that you are a demon?" He words did not carry any malice, but the thought of that happening did not feel good in his gut. If she really did take the clan's side than not only would he lose his closest friend, he would also have to potentially fight her to the death. That was not something he thought he could do, not after all of the years that had been friends.

A small part of him in the back of his mind moved to tell him that they had never been as close has he thought, and that she was waiting for any excuse to drop him. He had always struggled with this aspect of his thoughts, which made him second guess himself. Despite all of the positive reinforcements he received from others, there was always a part of him that questioned if it was all real or if it was part of some grand lie that everyone else was in on.

He could feel his anxiety beginning to spike, so he clamped down on that part of his mind with a vice like mental grip. Kantan would not let himself doubt his friendship with Lyra, the one person who had saved him from himself all those years ago.

Veri seemed to sense his struggle, which prompted her poor attempt at soothing. "There there, even if she tries to kill us we are sure to be stronger." Kantan instinctively moved to yell at her, but he controlled his emotions with an iron grip. It took a few moments for him to collect himself enough to continue the conversation.

"No matter what it is, we always have each others backs." He ended that part of the conversation with the tone of his voice, letting her know that it was not something that was up for debate. Then he redirected his attention to the imp corpse by his feet, sending curiosity through to veri. "We should absorb this imp to help evolve our body. Since you designed all the puzzles and traps in the dungeon, we will progress significantly faster than Lyra will. As long as we don't stop for an extended period of time in every room, we can afford to absorb a few demons on the way."

Veri switched gears without hesitation, and began to send a series of sensations through their connection. Each one was a different usage of chi that he would need to do on his part to facilitate the process. "So, you'll need to move your chi like this in order to project it out of your body. Normally I have only seen stone ranks pull this off, but your chi channels should be able to handle the throughput."

Before Kantan started the process, he wanted to figure out how to ensure his core wouldn't die on him half way through. "What do I need to do so you don't die from being chi depleted? If enough of our chi is outside of our body, won't you start to power down?"

This seemed to have already been accounted for from her perspective apparently. "As long as we maintain a connection to our chi, my consciousness will spread throughout it. Its part of why I can, or could, see all parts of my dungeon at the same time. Wherever my chi is, so am I. Its also through this that I will be able to break down the body of the imp and collect the right genes to enhance us with."

Kantan found that despite her sometimes quirky personality, that she really did know what she was doing most of the time. She was generally so childlike and immature that he often forgot that she used to have relatively unimaginable power. If she had been a human with an emerald core, she could have flattened the continent with a simple palm thrust. Dungeon's were bound by certain rules that were regulated by the universe though, so most of their power was actually in the materials and monsters they made.

"Alright, lets get to it then." Kantan prepared himself for the challenge of externalizing his chi. Pushing past the skin barrier would be harder since humans were not good conductors of chi in their early stages. His once evolved body had been infused with a small amount of chi when he became a demon, but it was not remotely close to that of the difference between the awoken and stone ranks.