Calamity Upon This World

After a few long minutes, Maya's eyes twitched and opened.

As she looked around, she seemed confused about where she was, and soon her eyes fell on the handsome, black-haired young man standing near her.

Seeing him, she remembered everything that had happened and how she got kidnapped by evil-looking people.

She tried to resist, but she was too weak and ended up getting knocked out, after which she wasn't sure what happened or how long it had been.

"Where am I?" she asked in an almost inaudible tone.

But William was able to hear it clearly, so he replied.

"Don't worry, you're safe now," he reassured her.

"But what about the bad men?" she asked.

"I sent them to a place suitable for evil people. Stop worrying and get up. I promised your dad to reunite you with him," he explained.

Hearing his words, she didn't say anything and just got up quite quietly before saying.

"Thanks a lot."

"Don't worry about it; let's go."

As both William and Maya were about to leave the underground chamber, Maya stopped and asked.

"Are you not going to rescue the other kid?"

Hearing her, William was  confused by what she meant, so he asked.

"There shouldn't be any other kids here, so what do you mean?"

Before coming down, he had thoroughly scanned the whole building using [mana sense], and aside from the Maya, he sensed nothing.

William was confident in his own skills; he shouldn't have been unable to locate a child or two in case there were any.

"Nope, look behind you in the left corner of the room," Maya suggested.

With a sense of dread, he finally turned around.

And to his dismay,he saw a silver cage similar to the one Maya was trapped in earlier, sitting in plain sight.

'This shouldn't be possible'

Not only did he not sense the one trapped inside when he used his skill, but somehow he didn't even see such a big cage when he entered the chamber.

He had no problem seeing Maya's cage, so what was going on with that one?

'Maybe the cage is empty, and it's just Maya being confused'

While he thought this, he highly doubted it.

~Tring~

His [Danger Sense] skill was ringing inside his head the closer he walked towards it.

And to his dismay, once he got close enough, he saw a boy lying inside the cage, unconscious.

Almost instinctively, he moved back.

The thing William was feeling afraid of wasn't that his skill failed to notice a little kid, but rather that since his skill missed one thing, who's to say it can't miss someone else?

Someone with not-so-good intentions.

This realisation, paired with his [Danger Sense], was more than enough for his paranoid mind to form a small barrier around himself and Maya as he prepared to free the boy and run away while he still had a chance.

"Maya, we're le-" Before William could conclude his sentence, something really strong hit his barrier, and it was broken in the process.

Thankfully, the barrier was able to save him from the attack itself, but the force of the attack was enough to send him flying backward until his back was against the cage he had been scared of moments ago.

'What the fuck?' he thought, and as he looked at the place the attack came from, he was shocked by what he saw.

Maya was standing with her hand outstretched, her eyes completely black, almost like she didn't have a soul.

A disgusting black goo-like substance was falling from her face as it started cracking.

But the most disturbing part was the disgusting smile she had on her face, which didn't belong on the face of a child.

When paired with that smile and soulless eyes, she didn't even look human but rather something that had crawled out of hell itself.

However, before William could process what was happening, a hand came out of the cage behind him and grabbed him.

Before he could react, the boy inside the cage exploded.

BOOOOOMMM!!

William was sent flying and hit a wall.

'What the fuck is going on'  he thought as he barely opened his eyes and tried to stand up.

Sadly, that didn't work, as the leg that the boy had grabbed was gone.

He had lost his leg, and judging from the pain coming from his back, it was probably burned.

While William had a bad feeling and was expecting something to happen, he somehow managed to get caught off guard.

Everything happened too fast for him to react; even his spirits were currently sleeping inside his core so they wouldn't strain his body with the spirit energy that they emit at all times just by being awake.

As William lifted his gaze, what he saw terrified him.

Maya's body grew in size and bulked up; the black gooey stuff that was previously only on her face now covered her whole body.

Once her body had reached 7 feet in height and grown muscular, her skin and clothes started peeling off as the black liquid increased in quantity as it covered her body.

And before long, in place of a sweet 12-year-old girl stood a monstrosity that would send chills down the spines of the bravest men.

Greyish black skin, which doesn't seem human,pitch black voids in place of eyes, and horns sprouting from its forehead, which rolled around themselves almost like those of a ram except just bigger and more fearsome.

Arms long enough to touch the ground despite the beings towering height and gigantic muscles that would put most bodybuilders to shame.

And most disturbingly, there was this black smoke-like substance surrounding the entity.

As the entity looked at the crippled figure of William on the ground, it smiled, revealing its sharp yellow fang, the smile perfectly portraying a picture of pure demonic malevolence.

Seeing the entity, William felt his heart go cold from fear.

Not only because of its appearance but also because he had seen a similar entity before, back when he had first gotten the memoirs and got to see a glimpse at Zephyr's life.

That's right, the entity in front of William belonged to the race that 6,000 years ago declared war on the whole world.

And the race, which was popularly known as demons