Matthew dove as the red sword of the demon came at his neck. He jumped to his feet facing the creature with some astonishment.
No creature had sensed him using Wandering spirit before, he surmises it must have been his spirit the creature sensed as he changed the protocol.
The Sword demon creeped forward slowly. its eyes were all green no white, but he could see flecks of red as the demon crept forward.
In the stubborn darkness of the cave, its red armor shone under the white light of the moss above them. It looked rather menacing as it stalked forward slowly.
Is it not going—
He stepped back quickly as a sharp lunge came for his neck, he swiped away one of its normal hands as it tried to grab him. He whipped his pike on the beast elbow to stop it from reversing the slash and stepped back again.
The creature had supreme confidence in its red armor so it didn't try blocking his puny stick. The slap the elbow killed its momentum though allowing him to escape.
Matthew's thoughts fired off rapidly as he considered three things.
It can sense my spirit.
It can also sense me thinking.
It waited until I was thinking of attacking.
The creature flinched forward to attack, but stopped. These weren't active thoughts, but rather immediate decisions.
The demon thought there was no point in waiting for him to lose focus, so it attacked. It was a flurry of movements, so quick he couldn't keep up.
Traditional sword styles go out the window when the bloke has four arms.
He struck occasionally to bat away its arms seeking to grab him, the creature drove him into a corner. Staying on defence was a horrible way to win a fight.
After blocking a reaching hand, the creature's sword arms raised over his head to decapitate.
He stared up at the two red blades coming for his head, even while attacking it's other two arms were still trying to grab him and hold him down.
He was trapped, forced to fight in two separate directions with a flimsy stick.
The demon let out a gleeful sound that resembled some inhuman laugh.
Then it stopped, turning to slash at his spirit which had been trying to ambush him.
The spirit floated away from the slash, while Matthew evaded the reaching hands. He smirked a little at the proud, sadistic beast.
"You aren't the only one that can attack from different directions," He said with a growing smile. "Hell, you're perfect for testing out my protocols. Your back, legs or even the back of your head. Let's see how you handle this."
The creature made a horrible noise that echoed in its throat like a chorus of gurgling screams. Its two arms lit up with a scorching red light. Matthew's smile fell a little.
Bounding off the creature's preferred line of attack he forced it to turn while attacking, leaving an opening for the wandering spirit. The creature wasn't foolish unfortunately.
It abandoned trying to send an X slash at his and instead sent the two red simmering lines of sword light in different directions.
One at him, the other for his spirit.
Too easy, he thought. Leaping over the path of the sword light and racing towards the demon. Predicting the line of such an attack was easy.
It was even easier for the spirit which wasn't limited in it's axis of movement, simply floating over the slash and waiting for the opening.
He attacked the gaps in the armor trying to draw attention away from the spirit. The creature tried to grab his pike and failed.
It had to turn to him as the pike stabbed into its unarmored sides, only using the sword on its right and the two arms to try and kill him.
He ducked under the devastating slash and slammed his foot into its knee. The strike fell off target, but still staggered the beast. He blocked the returning swing with his pike and his arm stung.
But the opening had been made, his spirit floated a bit closer and made the demon unwilling to strike with its other sword.
The creature thought it was safe since Matthew was using his pike to block the right sword.
It reached in to grab him with its other two arms. Matthew smiled again, pulling out his knife from his belt.
The knife dug into the gap between its armor and helmet, Matthew had a chance to rip open its neck—its cold black blood staining his hand.
The creature panicked and pushed him away hard, his spirit, however, didn't need him to act. It struck with lethal precision cutting into the small of its back where no armor protected it.
After it escaped the retaliatory slash of the demon, Matthew walked a bit closer forcing the demon to look at him.
It pulled out the knife and gave him a venomous glare. Matthew smiled cheerfully as the demon raised its sword as though the fight wasn't over.
"Put them away, you're already dead."
The creature hissed and lunged forward as Matthew replicated a stab.
There was a loud thud as the demon was pierced, it staggered stopping right in front of him. Matthew studied its alien eyes, the green space filled with red specks like stars.
The creature fell over as foot falls informed him that Parker and others were coming.
Seeing the dead monster they stopped, the Sword demon that they could barely kill without seven people and armament shields.
Matthew waved at them, "You took too long so I decided to have some fun."
——
The now easier battles had stoked the desires of the group, making them want to stay out longer and hunt more monsters.
Matthew led monsters into traps or uneven battles that ended quickly. He decided after observing the different habits of the beasts how to bait them.
Sword demons were easy, he drew them away from other threats with the spirit and led them into a pit trap they had been abusing to kill monsters.
Salamanders were a bit tricky as he quickly found out how powerful their sense of smell was. The pit trap was nice, but it could still shoot fireballs at them and he didn't want to use his meagre supply of Paralytic dust.
Parker eventually suggested they just hold it down with rope and then attack it from all sides. It was a good strategy for dealing with the different lizard types.
Like the Stoneheads and Carmia, who had powerful armor or telepathic abilities that could trick their senses respectively.
There were also monsters that hid in the shadows. Mirage worms were a stomach-turning mass of curling worms that created illusions, and hid in them or used them to soothe their prey's senses as they were eaten alive.
Ash hunters were bad too, they were scorpion monsters with three tails that shot explosive darts. The best counter they could find for them was attacking from distance Matthew, who after dodging an explosive dart could replicate the attack on the creature.
Most creature's here were armored making things hard, but a good shot with Jamie's spear or Parker's Jade axe would win them most fights.
Matthew clung to the deep shadows of the labyrinth cave system, he was covered in dirt and his mind was completely empty.
Not an easy trick, but he found that it was impossible to fully empty the mind so he simply focused on a continuous static noise in his head.
"When are we going to be done for today?" He complained quietly.
The river of sand could still be felt through the walls with a gentle hum, while he stalked forward he suddenly saw something that stopped him in his tracks.
There was something shining off the weak light of the white moss, he walked a bit closer smiling as he picked it up.
It was golden with rainbow light glistening off the body of the coin.
A wish coin.