Defiance of the Fall

Some movement in the distance grabbed his attention . It was a solitary group that emanated a pressure a notch above the other demons . They were steadily pushing forward and was entering the valley at a furious pace . None of the magic shields were breaking and the monkeys could offer no resistance to their advance .

In the front a few demons in resplendent gear were personally reaping the lives of monkeys like they were harvesting wheat . Especially attention-grabbing was one male demon with shining white hair that was dancing in the wind . He held a sword in his hand and had another strapped to his back , and as he moved forward it almost looked like dancing rather than engaged in battle . The sword moved in graceful curves and moved around him in a mesmerizing pattern . But Zac knew it was no performance art , as that demon’s speed of reaping monkeys seemed to eclipse even his own .

It looked like he had located the general .

Satisfied with what he had found , he started to make his way down from the cliff . He had wrapped his head in rags to hide his features and covered as much skin as possible . Zac hoped that the demons would be too preoccupied with the monkeys to realize he lacked horns and wore shoes instead of having taloned paws .

He skirted around the main army and aimed to enter the valley from a slightly different direction . There were a few clumps of demons along the path but none thankfully reacted to him . It was lucky that the demon armies all used individual clothing and gear , making their composition look very chaotic .

As he walked around a bend he almost ran straight into a party of 6 demons . The one in the front snapped something in demonic as Zac passed , but Zac only waved his axe in response . His heartbeat quickened as he kept running , waiting for the demons to go their own way .

It seemed the proximity was too close , as an arrow came whizzing at his back . Sensing danger Zac whirled around and blocked the arrow with his axe head . Sighing he made a 180 and rushed into the demon group while he summoned Chop] . The man in the front held a sword , which by itself started burning as he swung it to intercept Zac’s chop . The demon hadn’t imagined the power contained in the axe , as the edge hit him like a truck and breaking most of his fingers as the sword was forced away . The swing continued onward as it chopped off his upper body , and continued to decapitate the unlucky demon who stood next to him with a short sword and shield .

Zac pushed on and made quick work of the last four demons , whose feeble attempts to stop him couldn’t even slow him down . After the blitz he was bleeding a bit from two small wounds , but it was nothing serious . A few of his old wounds had opened as well , but there was nothing to do about that for now . He was also drenched in demon blood , and could only hope that the smell wouldn’t attract any beasts .

He slowly kept moving forward , and after half an hour he reached the forest at the edge of the valley , taking twice the time compared if he had rushed straight in .

As he moved forward he saw that the orderly war at the slopes of the mountain was turned into a chaotic melee in the valley by now . There were clumps of demons fighting monkeys scattered all over the place . In most places , the demons still held an advantage , but at a few other they got overrun by sheer numbers .

He saw an unlucky group of 10 demons getting ripped to pieces by an angry horde of monkeys . They put up a valiant defense , but two fists couldn’t defend against ten , and in just moment they were mangled corpses strewn on the ground . A few of the monkeys had even ripped off a limb and contentedly chewed on it as it moved toward the next pack .

Zac tried to avoid battle as much as he could , not wanting to get any more experience until he seized a Fruit of Ascension . He stayed clear of any larger battles , zig-zagging forward in a careful manner . Of course , every now and then he got accosted by either a group of demons that figured out his identity or a group of enraged monkeys happy to target any humanoid .

The clashes resulted in furious melees as Zac wanted to finish the battles as quickly as possible . Unheeding of energy expenditure he ravaged any party that got close with great chops using his skills . When he ran low on cosmic energy took a sip from the lake water and let the burn quickly restore his deficit . He did avoid using the Dao of Heaviness though , as he didn’t have any means to restore his mental energy apart from sleeping .

Soon he arrived at the field of desolation , his body covered in a multitude of shallow wounds by now . Due to the consumption of the water he didn’t feel any pain though , and still felt he was in peak condition .

The vision the system showed earlier was accurate , and a huge area was now covered in dried out and dead trees . The once lush forest was gone and replaced with a dead space .