Am I Really the Hero? - Chapter 6 - Demon Forest

"After that three days had passed but nothing interesting had happened. I took the weapons I asked Kail's father to make me and then took some small quests from the guild to help Kail get stronger. Rune and Elias joined us in one of our quests too. Kail learns fast and got stronger. If he continues like this he will reach C rank this month."

"The city hasn't been attacked by demons since you arrived here, Aric. If they haven't attacked because you're here why don't you start living in Aegis?" Joked Kail.

"No, I'm good. Anyway you called me to come to the guild but we're not taking a quest?"

"Well later today I have to help my dad with the shop so I don't have time for quests today and while I wait for that I thought I'd call you to hang out." Said Kail.

"I'm here to get stronger not to hang out" murmured Aric.

"Anyway the last quest we took was awesome!" Kail smiled "We went near the mid-rank zone. The Demons there were stronger but we still killed them."

There are four different types of areas in the demon forest. The low-rank, mid-rank, high-rank and then comes the demon lord area. The deeper you go, the stronger the demons.

Suddenly Kails dad enter the guild in search of Kail. "Kail! We have a let of customers, come and help me."

"But you said you needed my help later today dad."

"No time to explain so just come!"

"Sorry Aric but I need to go. See you later." Kail waved.

"Hmm.. what should I do now? I'm dying of boredom and the one person who kills my boredom just left." thought Aric.

"Aric, hello there!" Said Rune entering the guild. "What are you doing here? Are you going on another quest with Kail?"

"No, he had to help his dad today at the shop, so not today." Replied Aric. "What about you Rune? Are you here for a quest?"

"No, I just got back from the demon forest and I don't plan on taking any more quests today. Why don't you take a quest alone?"

"Can I? I'm not a member of the guild. I've just been accompanying Kail for a bit. He as a member, was the one who took the quests."

The receptionist overheard them and said with a soft smile. "You're a hero Aric. You don't need to be a member to take quests."

"I don't? Then let me see what quests do we have today" As Aric was looking through the papers of requests, an A rank quest caught his eye. "I'll take this one"

"Okay, just let me verify your rank so I know that you're qualified to take it." said the receptionist.

"Here, this is my rank card."

Emma the receptionist looked shocked when she saw it. "SS rank?? I thought you were S rank. I have never seen a person reach this rank before!"

"Well I do train hard and I am a hero after all."

"I've verified your rank card. You can take the quest now."

"I was S rank but after fighting the Demon Lord I got SS rank. If I'm SS rank.. what rank is the demon lord then?" Thought Aric. "I need to get stronger fast."

The quest that Aric took was a request to kill a high ranking demon who came out of the forest time to time and attacked merchants and other people on the road.

"This is the place where the quest said the demon will appear. Now let's wait."

After a while some merchants were passing by the road and the demon appeared fast after that.

"So this is the high ranking demon, huh?" Sighted Aric. " He looks like he is from the high-rank area in the forest. Must have walked a long way to get here."

Aric decided to try and use a light magic spell.

"Light orb." Said Aric.

The demon was pushed away from the merchants and got badly injured. Then Aric took his sword and using wind magic he went near the demon in seconds and slashed his arm off.

"Get away, I got this!" Said Aric to the merchants as he was holding the demon's other arm with his sword from attacking him.

The merchants recognised him fast as the Crimson Hero and decided to leave the demon to him.

"Thank you brave hero for saving us. We're on our way to Aegis. We heard a rumour that you are staying there so we'll repay you when you get there. We don't want to stay in your way while you are fighting that demon."

After they left the hero used fire magic. The demon's arm caught fire. It spread through his body and the demon screamed from pain.

While the demon was distracted by the fire Aric cut off his head. "Got you!"

Then he took materials from the demon's body, which he intended to sell to the guild later. After that he burned the corpse.

"That was easy. I thought I had because weaker from fighting low ranking demons with Kail but now I see how much stronger I've gotten after the fight with the Demon Lord."

"While I'm here why don't I go at the demon forest for a bit. I don't have anything else better to do at the city anyways."

And so Aric went to the Demon Forest.

He passed the low and mid rank areas fast and killing every demon in sight. He struggled a bit in the high-rank area but still killed the demons.

"This is fun. Why didn't I do this before?"

Suddenly Aric senced something. "This dark mana I'm sencing, is it a demon from the Demon Lord's territory? Wait I'm sencing five of them!"

Then something jumped from the bushes. There appeared five demons and one of them was the demon from the Demon Lord's army Aric encountered when he first came to Aegis.

"We meet again hero. Let me introduce myself properly this time. I am Mortis, the strongest demon in the tenth commander's army." Said proudly the demon.

"The strongest, huh.." Sighted Aric. "This is gonna be interesting."

"And who are your friends there?" Asked Aric.

"Their a part of the army too. We were just checking the forest as per our commander orders but who would have thought we'd meet again here. Now I can kill you! The commander told us to kill any adventurer we encounter." Smiled Mortis.

Aric got his sword ready. "Well come at me! I'll take you all on at once!"

All five demons attacked Aric. They had weapons and used dark magic too.

Aric didn't hold anything back. He enchanted his sword with light and fire magic and attacked them back.

Two of the demons attacked him from the back but Aric quickly pushed the ones in front of him and turned twords the two demons and attacked.

"Wind slash!" Shouted Aric and slashed them with his wind sword magic. "That was close."

"Three left."

Mortis then used his dark magic. "Dark arrow." A black arrow formed and went straight to Aric.

Aric tried to dodge but he wasn't fast enough.

"Aagh" screamed he as the arrow injured his arm.

Aric fell on his knees to the ground. The demons approached him slowly.

"That all you have hero? Come on get up–"

Before Mortis could finish Aric threw some small knives twords him.

"Damn it you-, caught." caught up blood. "Kill him!!" Ordered Mortis the other two demons.

Aric got up from the ground struggling but managed to kill the two demons by using his fire magic at full force. The ground around him started burning and the demons caught fire.

"Now I'll finish you of Mortis." Said Aric as he slashed him with the sword.

Aric layed on the ground and looked around him.

" I haven't felt so tired in a long time." As Aric looked around him, he realised that there were only four corpses.

"Wait weren't there five of them? One of them must have run away. I should have cut him deeper."

It was getting late and Aric was injured bad, he couldn't go back to the city.He found a place to hide and spend the night there.

"I should drink a healing potion before sleeping so when I wake up I'll be as good as new."

In the middle of the night a sound woke Aric up.

"What was that?"

Then he hear someone speaking.

"Yes, it happened around here vice commander."

It was the demon that had escaped earlier and he had brought the vice commander of the 10th squad.

Aric panicked. "What do I do now?!"