[Fiction] Ask a mercenary Anything.

[Edgedancer]

You have a problem, we solve it, you pay us and everyone is happy… or dead but that’s not our problem, is it?

 

Here we have two magical mercenaries ready for hiring. Of course no one expects you to pay the cat in the bag, so feel free to ask any question you like beforehand.

 

To give some introductions these two are Nora the more forward of the team, please don’t feel disturbed by the section of her head replaced by eldritch goo, it won’t hurt you unprovoked, and her partner Sen. Naturally, the demon Nora made a contract with is also here but you cannot sense it, so asking it questions may be a bit more difficult. Lastly, feel free to ignore the children running around in the background.

[Kobold King]

Why should we pay you two instead of non-magical mercenaries? What powers and advantages do you have?

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles]

What was the most memorable job you've taken? 

[lookingglass]

Did the goo come with the contract or was it just one of Nora's "quirks"?

[DreamEternal]

Why are there children running around in the background?

[Edgedancer]

Why should we pay you two instead of non-magical mercenaries? What powers and advantages do you have?

The advantages the two of have over ordinary folks, apart from an expertise on the area of magic and a demon at my hands that can understand most of the rules attached any given piece of magic, are the following.

For one, and this applies to both of us, there’s a basic increase in physical properties, strength, dexterity, toughness, that kind of things.  

Now for me specifically, you can see the black and red goo in my face, right? That is essentially the result part of my life being metabolized into magic, which I can produce more of to form constructs, nothing too elaborate mind you but enough to get most jobs done.

This is probably a good to bring up the affinity of the demon I’m bonded with, namely the ability to impart my will on other things.

One handy trick with that infusing an order into a construct to make it capable of operating somewhat on its own, it could however not do any complicated mental tasks on its own. Although, in the case that I do need something to operate independently in another location I do have the option of letting my demon take control over it. Of course, said ability is not entirely limited to what I created myself and does allow limited manipulation of objects, for example making a bullet curve its path in flight.

 

Sen here is another beast entirely. I think I already threw in enough technical details talking about myself, so I’ll keep myself short. His body or what’s left of it at least can repair itself from any amount of physical damage in a matter of seconds. His limbs on the other hand I had to replace with the same kind of magic goo I reconstructed part of my head with. That by the way is what his gloves are for, they act mostly as a seal to actually keep it in the shape of actual limbs.

 

What was the most memorable job you've taken? 

Most memorable, huh? Well, it wasn’t my hardest job by a long shoot but I would have to say it was the time I was paid to kill Sen, which it being a job I naturally did.

 

In her defense, we did not know each other at the time.

 

Not to bore you with the details of how I hunted him down, it was more a matter of him being rather tenacious and resourceful in drawing out the inevitable than him actually putting up a fight. Still, for someone that did not have any magic to draw from he was fairly entertaining, so I decided to keep him around… or bring him back to be more precise.

 

Against my will, in case anyone cares.

 

Oh shush, things turned out for the better, didn’t they? Not that bringing someone back from the dead, even if they’ve been dead only shortly, is an easy task to achieve, effectively costed me the key to immortality. Although, that’s another story entirely.   

 

 

Did the goo come with the contract or was it just one of Nora's "quirks"?

The best way to answer that, I suppose, is both. Demons with the intent to form a contract only seem to appear when a person is on death’s door, whether they necessarily need a person to be in such a near fatal state to actually form a contract or if they want to make sure the other party is desperate I can only guess and their kind treats that question as a secret of trade, so I am afraid I won’t learn the answer anytime soon.

To return to the actual question, upon the completion of the contract they replace or fix whatever was about to kill their host with their own essence. As for myself, I had my head smashed in and thus here I am with a hole in my face. In theory it could have been any other lethal condition and from what I have seen another demon may have replaced my skull and brain with something different than black and red goo.

 

Why are there children running around in the background?

Because children don’t like standing around doing nothing?

 

To answer your actual question, they are a group of orphans that at the time of Nora killing me I was taking care of and now that she forcefully recruited me here they are as well.

Edited January 15, 2016 by Edgedancer

[Datan Nomlibash]

What time period are you in? Are you magical mercenaries with swords or magical mercenaries with guns?

When you form constructs from your face goo can you reabsorb them later?

Question for the author: How did you come up with the idea of magical face goo?

[Edgedancer]

What time period are you in? Are you magical mercenaries with swords or magical mercenaries with guns?

When you form constructs from your face goo can you reabsorb them later?

Question for the author: How did you come up with the idea of magical face goo?

We are in a time period that would most fit to your Wild West 19th century kind of deal, so yes, we do have guns.

 

Pretty much, yes.

 

I just kind of did. I could guess at what influenced me subconsiously but I never really set out to add something like that to her, It just happened

[ChickenPlague]

another demon may have replaced my skull and brain with something different than black and red goo.

 

What are some variations you have seen?

[Edgedancer]

What are some variations you have seen?

Polka dots, apparently the fellow got thrown into some kind of iron maiden, which riddled him with holes. Said holes were filled up with what actually kind of reminds me of cotton candy that's slightly molten at points.

Another one had an arm and a section of his chest turned into what's best described as a graphite hatching in the air.

The third I can think of on the top on my head didn't really have a clear injury, my best bet would be that she was either poisoned, suffocated, died of thirst or something along those lines, instead she looked pretty much as if her blood was replaced with ink.

[Datan Nomlibash]

What is your next job going to be?

Are there any jobs that you refuse to take?

(Directed at the demon) What was you existance like before the contract compared to after?

[ChickenPlague]

(To demon) Is there a world the demons call home? Ir do you simply wander our world unseen?

[Edgedancer]

What is your next job going to be?

Are there any jobs that you refuse to take?

Pretty hard to say with not having been hired for it yet. We were asked to stay at our current location until the guy we braught in actually gets executed, so if he manages to escape from prision we'll bring him in again, if he does get properly executed than we'll have to search for something somewhere else.

 

Charities, working towards the end of the world and I generally prefer not to murder innocent that can't defend themselves.

 

(Directed at the demon) What was you existance like before the contract compared to after?

(To demon) Is there a world the demons call home? Ir do you simply wander our world unseen?

 

They can't hear me, can he?

 

I don't think they can.

 

Then why are they asking me?

 

Beats me, maybe they have figured something out?

 

I doubt it.

 

They still are customer questions.

 

As you wish, I suppose I can answer both questions together. Our kind ultimately are nothing more than minds that have formed around a bit of magic, giving it more of a nature than a stringent set of rules. We do however lack the ability to take in any other magic apart from the spark that gave birth to us. That is where you humans come into play. We can take your life and turn it into more magic, which grantes you power and us life. So no neither do we have any place to return to nor is there much we could do without a contract with a human, except slowly withering away. As for my current terms of employment, I can say that Nora's lifestyle does leave me with plenty of activity to keep myself entertained. It is a nice change of pace.

[ChickenPlague]

Are demons imortal?

[Edgedancer]

Are demons imortal?

No. As I said before, without a contract we slowly wither away, using up whatever amount of life we gathered. Some of us ammased enough to survive decades on their own, others might fade away within a week. Apart from that there isn't anything that could kill us.

 

At least not conventionally.

 

If we have to be tecnical, then yes, it is in theory possible to forcibly take the life we have gathered from us but that isn't something any human or whatever other creature you might find crawling around could perform the mental tasks necessary within their life time. That's all I will say on the matter.

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles]

No. As I said before, without a contract we slowly wither away, using up whatever amount of life we gathered. Some of us ammased enough to survive decades on their own, others might fade away within a week. Apart from that there isn't anything that could kill us.

 

At least not conventionally.

 

If we have to be tecnical, then yes, it is in theory possible to forcibly take the life we have gathered from us but that isn't something any human or whatever other creature you might find crawling around could perform the mental tasks necessary within their life time. That's all I will say on the matter.

 

Do you find it rude when people ask how to kill you? 

[Edgedancer]

Do you find it rude when people ask how to kill you? 

Would you consider it rude if I asked you to explain in detail how to go about cracking open your skull so too better eat your brain? Granted, as I said before, none of you asking me this could actually do so, meaning that even if I were to give you a detailed explanation, there would not be any risk to my well being. I can understand a certain amount of curiosity but it is not a topic I enjoy. Said curiosity on the topic is simply macabre and utterly disgusting to me.

[TwiLyghtSansSparkles]

Would you consider it rude if I asked you to explain in detail how to go about cracking open your skull so too better eat your brain? Granted, as I said before, none of you asking me this could actually do so, meaning that even if I were to give you a detailed explanation, there would not be any risk to my well being. I can understand a certain amount of curiosity but it is not a topic I enjoy. Said curiosity on the topic is simply macabre and utterly disgusting to me.

 

That's definitely understandable. In that case, what would a human have to do, or how would they have to behave, for you to consider them polite and pleasant to be around? 

[Edgedancer]

That's definitely understandable. In that case, what would a human have to do, or how would they have to behave, for you to consider them polite and pleasant to be around? 

That is not a question I ask myself regulary, given that my interactions with your kind is rather limited and I usually don't feel like taking the steps that would be required to circumvent the limits of your perception. Thus, my interest in your people is almost entirely buisness related. Now, if you were to pin me down on something, then I had to say that I prefer people that have the guts to make their own decisions and stand with them.

 

It also has a fondness for people that hire us to hunt down and kill dangerous individuals.

 

That is more a general fondness for work than taking a liking to whoever hires us.

[DreamEternal]

Nora, why did you "recruit" Sen?

Sen, how did you end up with someone like Nora chasing you in first place?

If any of you don't want to tell me, or would have to kill me if you did, don't answer.

[Edgedancer]

 

 

Nora, why did you "recruit" Sen?

Sen, how did you end up with someone like Nora chasing you in first place?

If any of you don't want to tell me, or would have to kill me if you did, don't answer.

 

Over the long run I figured that that having a foreseeable span of life with good company would ultimately beat out having one nearing immortality but spending it alone or worse yet watching whatever company I do get passing away over and over. As I mentioned before, I've taken somewhat of a liking to him during the job and he seened competend enough to keep up with my lifestyle, so I figured he would do nicely, worst case I could have killed him permanently, luckily I had no reason to.

 

The place of my childhood was not a peacful one. It was certainly not a place were anyone would give charity to a group of orphans. Thus the means we ended up taking to keep us feed were all but lawful, nor were they paticulary peacful. Leading to people wanting us gone. Why they hired Nora of all people I can only guess, although if I would I imagine that it had more to do with her skills in tracking our group down, than her capability to actually kill us.

Edited January 17, 2016 by Edgedancer

[Ookla the Absent]

So, just making sure I've got this right, Nora, you sacrificed your mortality to save Sen? So now you are both (loosely) mortal but magical?

Also, do daemons get names?