Wolf of the Blood Moon: A Blood Magic

Book 1: Chapter 84.2: Teamwork in the Mall Part II

Scarlet

Scarlet Wolf? the guy says, his tone slightly gritty as he narrows his eyes at my shifted arm, then glances at the blood soaking my clothes that I very quickly remember to clean. Looks like your reputation proceeds you.

I blush at that comment as I realize hes talking about the people online who are calling me some sort of berserker. Which is a really unflattering thing to call a girl, but I mean I guess its not too far off the truth?

What do you mean I guess? Its perfectly true, Tar comments, making me frown. You go around not caring at all about small wounds and just letting them heal up on their own while burning your own blood like a maniac, and youre trying to convince yourself you arent some sort of berserker?

Okay, fine. So maybe I am.

And you are? I ask the guy, my internal conversation with the rude fae over with for now.

He looks surprised for a second, then turns grumpy the next as he answers, Warden.

No one says anything for a few seconds.

Right as the man looks like hes about to speak again, his partner cuts him off by saying, So can we go kill some more demons now? Because this talk is boring. All while still hopping from one foot to the other and repeatedly looking at a couple stores on the other end of the VIP section.

The man grunts before nodding his head at us and saying, Guess well meet again at the university? Then after seeing me nod my head in confirmation towards his words, he turns around and begins to leave with the girl running far ahead of him in the process.

And once theyre both out of earshot, Denise mutters, They didnt even seem to notice the rest of us

I glance at her to find the girl glaring at their backs, and even Michael seems to be a little annoyed by their utter disregard for him. Meanwhile Emily just seems glad to be away from the large groups of people.

Why didnt they talk to you? Arent your parents really important? I ask, genuinely curious as we begin to head in the direction of the main area of the mall.

While we run, Michael answers, Its because we havent really been in any unproctored combat with the demons till now. Except for our first Fractures, of course. So the other Guardians dont know or care about us much. If they even know who we are in the first place.

Doesnt change the fact that its just plain rude, Denise grumbles as we begin to near the end of the VIP section.

She has a point. Although I kind of wonder how that guy wouldve treated me if he knew I was an orphan?

Orphans are treated rather poorly for multiple reasons. For one, we are a constant reminder of the cities and people lost during Fractures. For two, we cause a large strain on the budgets that the cities have, making most of the Tier 2 cities and all of the Tier 1 cities basically kick all orphans to Tier 3 cities. A rather unfortunate development caused by the emergence of Demonic Assaults in the world.

People really dont like being reminded that even with their heroes the Guardians, they still arent absolutely safe. Even in a Tier 1 city, no one is absolutely safe.

But the main reason is of course the changelings, who are completely undetectable since they dont enter Earth through Fractures and only come through gates from the island known by some as old world Japan.

Its a pretty shitty world we live in nowadays, one where any random Joe could end up dead the next week due to a Fracture. And where orphans are treated as lower class citizens by a large majority of the populace. But its how things are.

Depressing.

I do wonder how the people would take finding out that I was an orphan though, since from my understanding, they either ignore that part entirely for a Guardian, or dislike them even more depending on how popular the Guardian is and how much they fight in the Fractures. Although Im pretty sure the government is also kind of censoring my status as an orphan, so theres that too. Otherwise the populace wouldve already figured it out by now.

My thoughts return to the present situation once we reach the edge of the balcony we passed by earlier overlooking the main area of the mall and find the place to be extremely chaotic. Demons everywhere, all fighting over half a dozen Guardians, with a few groups of humans gathered together in a few corners slowly being escorted by one Guardian each to bunkers.

|Demon Spawn Subspecies: Canine Level 51|

|Demon Spawn Subspecies: Canine Level 54|

|Demon Spawn Subspecies: Canine Level 56|

|Demon Huntsman Subspecies: N/A Level 51|

|Demon Huntsman Subspecies: N/A Level 61|

|Demon Huntsman Subspecies: N/A Level 60|

|Demon Knight Subspecies: N/A Level 70|

|Demon Knight Subspecies: N/A Level 74|

|Demon Breeder Subspecies: N/A Level 56|

|Demon Captain Subspecies: Salamander Level 100|

I cant help but shiver slightly from fear as the System plays out messages for each of the demons I look at until I ask Tar to turn the messages off for now, making them stop playing out every time I look at a different demon. But my eyes stay locked onto the last one that I had looked at anyways, making it unnecessary.

The demon captain has scales similar to armor, just like the demon knights. But the armor it has looks a lot fancier despite the captain being overall smaller than the knights. It has spiked shoulder plates, with no helmet, revealing the creatures scale covered head with slit crimson eyes that are looking across the battlefield with a gleam of intelligence, and a very dark lord type of armor that youd see in a video game.

And its also the only demon in a Class I Fracture that has sapience.

This one in particular seems to be a salamander, which is a type of demon that can breath fire. But all demon captains have a single weakness known to the people.

My eyes narrow in on its chest, where it has a random ring of cloth without any scaled armor there, showing a weak point that will lead directly to one of its three hearts that if destroyed will half its fighting capacity.

As if sensing the gaze of me and the others up here who had also started staring at him, the captain turns its head to stare at us, sending shivers down my spine in the process.

For some reason this creature frightens me even more than that Class II wraith did.

Is it because its sapient?

But then it turns its gaze onto a Class II Guardian that is approaching it. One that also happens to be wearing Lions Hearts uniform.