Road Less Taken

"Have all of you wondered why we're choosing poles to be decorated? Like, it's so whacky, just what kind of cultural event is this?"

"I couldn't care less, Jessy. My job is to bring the ladder, climb the ladder, and put the ornaments on the pole."

"Lucky for you two, demons of the past actually used a whole tree instead of metal or wooden poles."

"Imagine all of the bugs hiding beneath the leaves, urgh."

"Just please not the trees from the northern forest…"

"Why?"

"They have teeth."

"GYAAAAA! Who threw a crimson flame at the X-mas pole!??"

Within the Magus Academy ground was a moment of peace.

Jolly laughter erupted amongst one to another, although many of them were derisive.

Snowballs were thrown from one point to another, along with a wide array of dangerously destructive projectiles of elements.

And there were chimes of bells in the air as more snow got sprinkled by the sky like a chef spreading the spice for the next phase of cooking.

Not to mention, many demons were actually gone outside for once. To see the satisfyingly grotesque scenery. To challenge the cold of winter to see if they were fit to be the next generation of demons within their minds.

It was a moment of peace.

A demonic peace.

And then in one fell swoop, 1,287 demons in the academy had their upper half disappeared completely, letting their colorful blood bursted out from the leftover lower body.

127 demons had their heads decapitated by the winds.

100 meters of random architectural roof were lifted to the sky.

100 meters of random ground disappeared into a hole of abyss.

100 meters of random patches of flame combined had razed the majority of busy infrastructure into inferno.

356 demons had their heads smashed by the falling debris.

703 demons fell into the abyss, with around 126 of them having their throats slit before they noticed the disappearing platform.

196 died by being burned alive, 427 were still burning. 272 tried to put away the flame with their magic, 67 of them killed before they were able, 104 of them writhed in pain as their regeneration kept them alive through the pain, 101 of them committed suicide to end the pain.

468 demons were impaled by giant, pitch-black thorns. 280 of them were killed instantly, 56 of them was struck by lightnings, 24 of them tried to drag their body out of the thorns to survive, 36 of them cried their heart out, 68 of them screamed for help, and 40 of them tried their best to keep their mind conscious with a newly carves hole in their skull.

15 demons had their hearts crushed due to unknown phenomena.

9 demons had their whole body twisted due to unknown phenomena.

26 demons immediately exploded due to unknown phenomena.

367 demons were killed by other demons.

128 of them were killed in retaliation for the assault

294 pieces of ornaments were left behind.

And 24 giant poles for X-mas were left forgotten within the ensuing chaos.

"Oh wow, you're scary." Lothair flinched, wondering if this was the right choice for him to make.

The grand library had a massive hole in the middle of it. From that hole, sprung a 72 meters tall humanoid giant made out of ethereal pitch-black material. Its jaws were wide open, vertically, revealing a gargantuan red eye that sat in-between each jaw.

Floating beside it, was a demon with a pair of ram horns and, surrounded with gleaming, watery-textured, dark and wooly hair. It was Terma, donning his usual playful smirk as he descended from the desolate sky upon this sinful land.

"My friend Lothair, give me a sitrep."

"Only five seconds have passed since you cast your Overclock."

As both of the perpetrators to this chaos were casually conversing to one another, the gargantuan humanoid immediately went on a rampage.

Steels and structures that were supposed to resist meteorites were flung into chunks of debris. It moved as fast as an athletic champion in contrast to its massive size.

A couple of survivors from the early phase of massacre began to line up and cast various spells to face the almighty abyssal warrior, with the majority of them being the faculty members as most of the students were running with their lives on the line.

Projectiles of all kinds of flavor for destruction were sent into delivery, with the prominent giant eye as the destination.

"Attack with all of your might!"

The humanoid monstrosity speedily dodged all of the projectiles that were launched at its head like a boxer with clairvoyance. It then hunched with arms as guards to the front, and then landed a quick series of jabs to the attackers at the ground.

Spluttering of flesh and blood was the main performance of this homicidal theater. Those who saw how disturbing movements and eerily fast action made by the giant were frozen in utter shock and despair.

"That's an overkill." Lothair wryly chuckled. "Can you make more than one?"

Terma tilted his head with faltering expectations. "Sadly, no. That being is one of the lower 'gods' within its pantheon. Apparently, it wants to have fun for a while in this plane of reality in exchange of giving me a portion of its power."

"Lucky you, you get a free contract for no demerit whatsoever."

"The best of it all." Terma raised his left hand as he graciously fluttered his fingers. A creeping shadow began to wrap the surface of his sleeves and gloves as a new layer of 'color', adding a couple of flair and sharp edges. Ominous aura could be strongly felt when gazing at it. "They gave me an independent form of power. Meaning, that there won't be any ongoing connection with their existence and mine."

He then raised his otherworldly fingers. 17 boxes of compressed materials were perfectly extracted from the surrounding ground as it became suspended in the air. Another finger was raised, and all of the squares became the shape of triangles.

"They probably don't want to get the repercussions when you're suddenly being hunted by the whole continent."

"Say, what do we do next?"

Both of them sat on a single table surrounded by the remains of a classroom, observing the loose outer god that wanted to play fetch with the souls of demons within its vicinity.

For a split second, there was a sign cracking like that of a surface of glass on the sky, the rampaging outer god. And for the latter split second, a disastrous force of impact pierced through the upper body of the outer god. It soared so fast, that a large sonic boom reverberated throughout the whole territory of Magus Academy.

But a second after the roaring impact, the outer god regenerated all of its lost body parts as if nothing had happened.

"You probably want to dip out." Lothair prodded Terma with his elbow. "They will use clairvoyance spells with the essence of this place as a catalyst, with yours and that outer god being the prominent subject. Not to mention, I did hear that there will be a couple of Overlords that were appointed to the supervision of this academy. It will be really, really bad if you were to face them, even with your newfound power.

"As for me, I haven't used any spells all that much. If they asked, I can just say that it's the result of being within the vicinity of the event."

"You're staying?"

"Nah, I'll be leaving. Right after something was done."

"Aight." Terma immediately disappeared, and then reappeared again in his usual fashion on top of the floating material that he extracted. "Seeing how the Chaos Embassy will be coming at my wool, we won't be meeting for a long while, huh."

"Hmm? You missed me already?"

"I do admit." Terma scratched his nose, hiding an awkward smile. "That hundred years of learning within an isolated, hyper-accelerated time was enough to make me desire for companionship."

"200 years then." Lothair raised two of his fingers. "Within that time frame, I will also try to hone my spellcasting, enough for both of us to casually spar in the future."

"Quite the cheeky promise you have there."

"A spoonful of confidence is all I need to achieve anything I want."

"Well then. I'll be seeing you after 200 years." He waved his goodbye with a wide joyful grin.

Terma didn't waste his time. In just a blink of an eye, all evidence of his existence within the Magus Academy was erased — or to be specific, utterly transported in an extremely accelerated point of time.

"Well then." Lothair cracked his knuckles as he jumped from the table. "Maybe I should sing a couple of verse~"

He pranced and strode onward with an overwhelming enthusiasm, yet hummed a distinctive melody filled with suspenseful sorrow. With every step that he took, his smile, his malicious intent, all began to arc more sinisterly than before.

Like a hunter searching for a prey, he playfully darted his eyes left and right. Unlike a real predator, however, he exposed his impending existence with his eerie hums. As if he knew that somewhere, his prey was waiting for him.

Or it might be that he was just messing around. There weren't many occasions where Lothair would be the one who hunts. It might be a rather childish of him, but for someone who had always been laying low in his entire life — it was a chance in a lifetime.