NOVEL ONLINE FREE Chapter 19: Trust exercises 3
"BUt TaRoN I thOught The NexT ChapTeR Was On SatuRdaY"
Look. I usually write these chapters in a few sittings, like one to four at the max, so when I thought I could write a big chapter, I thought I could do it. BIG MISTAKE! I tried to write Angel Dust coming to the hotel, setting up Vaggie as a love interest, doing a short Adam and Lute interlude. I don't even know why, but I tried to write a sex scene between Charlie and James???
What the fuck was I cooking?
Anyway, I have found that I enjoy these short 1.5k-word chapters instead of the monolith I was trying to write.
Enjoy the show. :)
(Third Person POV)
"Demon Style, First Stance: Chop"
James charged forward at the first sinner with a dagger, his eyes widening in fear as the spear approached his head at speeds he could barely see. The spear was thrust at his chest, yet stopped right before it hit it.
He opened his eyes in shock, seeing the spear right before his chest before searing pain developed in his entire torso. He looked down and saw that despite the spear not hitting him, he had gained numerous deep gashes on his stomach.
'The first stance is all about swiftness. Quick kills that can incapacitate people in under a second and swiftly go on to the next,' James thought, quickly locking on to the other sinner and swinging his spear, making a wave of slashes hail down on the sinner. "It's also about misdirection; when I fight people, they might think that the cuts are from the spear when it's really just Shrine.'
He flips the spear in his hand, ridding it of blood and quickly switching it to his upper right hand. 'This stance is used for quick cuts and ending fights quickly; when I fully stab someone, I can use Shrine to destroy their insides… I'm never sharing this with Angel Dust.
He turned around to see a member of the group jump straight at his face, planning on hitting him square in the eye with his brass knuckles. Unfortunately for him, James just thrust his spear up, catching him midair and stabbing him through the heart, instantly killing him.
The last of the melee group stared at James in fear, his one eye covered up by the emblem glowing a dull green as he tripped on his feet and started crawling backward, trying to escape. "Code eyes anonymous, code eyes anonymous, 6616, fusion!" He screamed out in a panic.
James stared down at the flailing sinner in slight confusion, 'What the hell is he talking about? Oh well, I really don't want to find out,' he decided, taking his spear and throwing it like a javelin in the sinner's forehead. He looked up at the last three of the group, scared out of their minds, and decided to put them out of their misery, just a long cleave to their necks.
[Host, I didn't want to embarrass you, but it's not cleave, it's dismantle.]
'...What?'
[You need to touch people to use cleave; you've just been using dismantle this entire time.]
'... Why'd you let me go around saying cleave like a damn dumbass then!?'
[I wanted to have you figure it out on your own, sorry :( ]
James let out a long sigh. 'Whatever system, now I actually have to try out cleave.' He dropped the spear and crossed all of his arms, scanning the battlefield, looking for anything to do when he remembered that Angel Dust was still hiding.
He looked behind the rock where he last saw Angel Dust, and there he was, looking up at him with slight shock before quickly getting up and dusting himself off with his free hand not holding his Tommy guns, 'You know, I really didn't expect for you to survive that.'
James waved him off with a grin, putting his bottom hands on his hips while crossing his top one. What can I say? I'm just," he struck a pose reminiscent of Johnny Bravo, "built different." Angel Dust let out a small giggle, snorting a little bit, before pulling an extra gun out to occupy his fourth hand and letting it spray on the group of sinners in front of him, James taking his rear.
(AN: kinky) ;)
"Well, Darkside, I don't know why you're here, but thanks for the help.' He said, James being back-to-back with him, lazily sending out dismantles, heard his nickname and grinned even wider, "Darkside? That's got to be racist," he replies, looking on Angel's side and seeing the sinners getting equipped with heavy guns, assault rifles, and ARs; one of them even had a bolt-action sniper rifle. 'Whoever sells a random guy an assault rifle and a sniper has got to be classified as a domestic terrorist.'
He quickly picks Angel up by the back of his suit. 'Hey, I never said you could get touchy-feely with me, Mister!' His protests are quickly silenced when James drops him behind himself and prepares to just tank the bullets when he gets a mischievous thought, one related to the ancient art stemming from the Heian era.
Aurafarming
The bullets rained down upon him, shot after shot of projectiles that would normally disintegrate a normal person. It made a large dust cloud; Angel Dust covered his ears with both sets of arms before recognizing he wasn't dead yet and looked up.
James simply stood there, his four arms stretched out and balled into fists before his top set opened and shells upon shells dropped down, making small piles on the ground. 'What did a certain control devil say, again?' He put his two free fingers in the air, making finger guns.
"Bang"
A bullet hole appeared in the nearest sinner's head, shocking the others as they looked at him and James. His right bottom hand was smoking; he flicked the bullet so hard at the sinner, it seemed like he just shot a gun at him. They looked back to see James' bottom right arm smoking as his grin grew even wider.
(Vaggie POV)
My head has been pounding for about 12 minutes now, and I'm getting really damn sick of it. For some reason, when I was on the roof, it felt like I and James were sharing something. I got his memories of a letter, but I don't know what he got.
I clicked my teeth and focused back on the task at hand, Nifty was on the back of some sinner and was stabbing him a bunch… like a lot… I'll leave her to it. I turn around and see Amery getting jumped by four other sinners, yet she seems to be holding her own, bobbing and weaving out of the way and landing some quick hits in like that famous human boxer, Mike Tyson.
Yet something makes me simmer with anger. James. I look at him, and my heart skips a beat, seeing his black compression shirt barely hanging on and a cocky smirk on his face, somehow shooting the sinners in front of him without a care in the world… It pisses me off.
When I was in Heaven I was a top dog. I was the best spearwoman, part of the most highly regarded groups in Heaven from those who knew about us. I was known as the most efficient killer in the exterminations, only being beaten by Lute on occasions.
But now? Seeing somebody that I barely knew, who looked like he didn't even train, just mowing people down without a care in the world. For the first time in decades, it ignited a spark within me, a competitive spark that pushed me to train even harder than what I did back in the exorcists.
Yet it also made me flash with anger. Somebody who apparently could grow 3 feet and 2 extra arms could just mop the floor with me in an instant, especially with that cutting ability of his.
Sensing a presence, I quickly stuck my spear behind me, pushing through the head of a sinner that tried to get the jump on me. I pulled it back out with a vicious grin on my face, flicking the blood and brain matter off the spear as I looked intensely at James. 'I declare you, James, as my rival. I'm looking forward to seeing you being at my feet!'
(Third Person POV)
Yet unknown to Vaggie herself, her wings sprouted out a pitch-black wing alongside an invisible one. She got into her fighting stance, and her cursed energy started to passively reinforce her. The sinner, facing her, felt a wave of fear going through their senses, telling them that messing with the one-winged angel was a bad idea. But before that thought could process, her spear had already gone through their chests and went to the ones behind them.
(10 minutes later)
The crowd of thousands of sinners started to die out, multiple bodies littering the floor, so much so that others had started using them as meat shields before plain running away. Most of the crowd thinning out was primarily due to Vaggie's mad dog behavior, erratically splattering blood and dismembering sinner's with a flick of her spear, alongside James' wild west roleplay that still went on after he ran out of bullets by just shooting out dismantles.
James walked alongside Angel Dust as they surveyed; as they made small talk, nobody even looked in their direction, scared of the 4-armed demon and his porn star assistant. "Yo, Darkside, let me put my number in your phone; I'll give you some… service for free. You know, returning the favor and all that jazz,"
Angel Dust requested, happy to offer his services to his savior. You can say a bunch of things about Angel Dust but he always returns his favors… Yeah, most of them are sexual, but he still returns them!
James looked at him, his upper set of hands being folded around his neck, "I don't have a phone; I was never rich enough for that. But I do live at the Hazbin Hotel; it's just off of 69th and Diddy Street. Just look into the mountains and go towards the building."
Angel Dust looked at him with a testing grin, "Already giving your address for a hotel to boot? C'mon, if you want to get freaky in a hotel room, it's fine; I won't judge you." James let out a bark of laughter. "Nah, it's nothing like that. It's just that the hotel offers free room and board. The owner also took me while I was in a dark place. She's the nicest bit of sunshine you'll see in this part of hell."
Although James did feel guilty lying about his personal life, he knew that lying about his life in hell was way better than potentially letting Angel Dust stay in an abusive relationship with his pimp when he could just recruit him into the hotel.
Angel Dust looked at him with a genuinely perplexed expression, "Free room and board… Are you also whoring yourself out or something?" James stared back at him with the same confused expression, 'is there really no free stuff in hell… That was a really stupid question.' James facepalmed himself. "No, I'm not. The owner's just a genuinely nice person who believes in redemption. I personally don't believe in it, but hey, don't bite the hand that feeds you."
Angel Dust stares at him with that same confused expression, layered with a hint of curiosity and intelligence, trying to start the conversation up again before his phone vibrates. He pulls it out of his suit pocket, shedding his bright pink gloves covered in blood to unlock his phone when he freezes up.
Come to my office NOW.
-Valentino
Sent 13:47 Read: 16:25
'Oh shit, oh fuck! Why did I put my phone on silent? Why is he texting me now? Isn't it my day off? I knew he would pull some bullshit like this, that fucker!' Angel thought, fear racing through his mind, almost looking back at James but catching himself and steeling himself. Putting his emotions down and putting on the confident mask that he usually wears.
"S-sorry, Darkside, my boss just called me in for a shift; I'll stop by sometime, okay?" He didn't give James the chance to respond before booking it, leaving James with anger stewing in his gut, knowing that he knew about Angel's abuse, knowing that he could go on hands and feet right now and just kill Valentino with his new holy cursed energy. But he didn't, instead he stood there with a complex look on his face.
"Hey, are you okay?" James looked down at Vaggie, quickly swapping back into a casual smile and shrinking back down to his original 5'7 size, reassuring Vaggie that he was fine and walking back to the hotel with the others, yet missing the subtle hunger and longing in her gaze.