Demon Slayer Book 1, Chapter 1

DEMON SLAYER, BOOK ONE:
EARTH AND A POWERFUL FREINDSHIP!
BY: The Dark One

PROLOGUE

A dark alleyway, in the middle of a plagued town, present day, summer 2005. On one side the light shines like a safe haven for anyone who doesn't want trouble. The other shrouded in darkness, the only light coming from the blood-red full moon. In the middle of the alleyway stands a young, handsome, foreboding figure, dressed all in black. He wears a black hat and carries many vials, under his cloak. He is heavily armed as is evident from the sawed-off shotgun tucked into his belt. He hears the swishing noise of a cape and, knowing there was nowhere to run, looks up to see the lone figure that haunts his dreams.
He is the Demon Slayer; he is Torsion Far'un (The Twisted Flame.) He is the true hero of the ages, and he is one of the four Guardians of the Elements... he just doesn't know it yet. But what he does know is that he has sworn to rid the world of all demons, and he has fulfilled that promise for years, since he first saw what his father had created. His father was a mad scientist with an idiot for a lackey. His father was Dr. Frankenstein. If you know the true story of Frankenstein’s Monster you know that he set himself adrift on a floating iceberg. But he came back, and no one ever knew that he had killed the monster that night; it had yet again become evil.
The battle was fierce, solely because the monster refused to die and Torsion refused to use his experimental weapon. He had created the first version of a sawed-off shotgun and didn't know if it would kill him, the monster, or even both of them. But in the end Torsion finally ran out of acidic chemicals and was forced to draw and fire, or die. The shot sent the young 15 year old flying into a stone wall, the shot reverberated around the city, waking all the occupants... but it had also done its job. The monster lay, with its head missing, 10 feet away from Torsion.
When Torsion woke up enough to run he did, thinking that the townsfolk would not believe his story and try to kill him. He retreated to seclusion, silently protecting the townspeople from monsters, until the day he became 25. That was the day he made his biggest discovery, the discovery of immortality, he was also smart enough to make an antidote, which he locked away intending only to open it once he had truly rid the world of all demons. The only flaw in this potion he had created was that someone he loved could kill him, but he did not fear this because the only person he had ever loved was his mother, and she had been killed by his father’s monster.




CHAPTER 1: THE PAIN OF AN IMMORTAL

The monster stood looming over Torsion, on the building was the vampire whose name when alive was Vlaud "Tepish" Drac’ula, the Impaler. He was a prince till once, in a battle, he was driven mad by the death of his wife and, almost single handedly, slaughtered the enemy, shoved stakes through their stomachs and let them hang till all the blood in their bodies had drained into cups sat on the ground, then he drank the blood, repeating "All the blood in your unholy body would not be enough to match that of my love... but it will have to suffice!" He drank the blood of so many that it was all he wanted to drink. He even pulled random people from villages and towns that he ruled after the battle to impale and drink their blood! He soon found that by sharpening his canine teeth he could pierce the jugular vein and suck all the blood from his victims without having a drop spilled on the ground and wasted, a tactic which was useful when you wanted to stay hidden and still have your drink of choice.
The monster was again on the prowl, looking for someone to drain. It was looking for a helpless victim... instead it found Torsion. It sized up Torsion, and, knowing itself the faster, leapt at him. In an instant the monster was on him, Torsion cried out as the fangs caught in his left hand as he moved to block his neck. He was able to hit the creature, however, with his right hand, sending it flying down the alleyway in a furious rage.
Torsion drew his weapons of choice, the two titanium half-staffs, which had a trick or five of their own. Torsion quickly pointed the bottom end of one at the monster, bent the staff in half, launching a trigger, and fired a chain around its neck before it had time to register he had drawn his weapons. He then proceeded to pull the trigger again to reel the monster in. The whole time he is doing this with his left hand his right hand has the other staff bent the same way but has the top pointing at the creature, he pulls the other side of the straight trigger and a sword blade attached to a chain flies out at the creatures heart.
The monstrosity that is Dracula was smarter than most of the others, finding the one way out of Torsions trap; he leapt into the air and flew at Torsion before he had the chance to fire again. But Torsion had the time to draw the chain in and snap the staff back into place. He slammed Dracula in the face with the butt of his half-staff. Stunning the creature and giving Torsion the time to twist the rim of the blade end of the staff in his right hand, the same sword came out of the end, only this time it stayed there, a deadly sharp blade that could slice through any and all other metals with relative ease.
Dracula had now gotten out of the chains hold so he ran at the sight of the blade but Torsion pursued, while pulling the blade out of his other staff and connecting them together by putting the back ends of the staffs together and twisting the rims to the left, exposing powerful magnets that immediately caught. The creature ran through alleys and leapt on top of buildings but Torsion was hot on its trail, using the grappling hook he loaded into his modified shotgun to reach rooftops.
He hadn't counted on Dracula being ready for a surprise attack however. So when Dracula started summoning his minions to attack Torsion, he wasn't ready. He was forced to think fast, he did the first thing that came to mind; Bring out the chains and go long range. He, yet again, grabbed his staff and this time he twisted the connected rims to the right, First putting up the magnets and then connecting two chains, one in each staff. Now he had two half staffs with swords coming out of the ends, that were connected with chains (sort of like nun chucks with blades on either end.)
He started swinging his most complicated weapon setup around, over his head; holding the vampires at bay while building momentum. Then, in a sudden burst of energy he snapped the chain to the left in a low sweep, slicing two unprepared vampires across the chest as he brought the chain back up. He spun and twirled, swung and pulled, yanked and threw the chain, killing more than half the vampires in a deadly dance. The rest turned tail, hoping to live to fight another day, but Torsion had other plans. He started moving in motion with his deadly blades, chasing and slaughtering the largest of the vampire groups in turn. When he was done he turned them back into a staff and leapt to the building that Torsion had seen him escape from.
Torsion had decided that this time he wanted to finish the job, any other time he would have left for home, but this time he wanted Dracula dead! He tracked him by following the line of vampires Dracula left behind, a simple trail crossing rooftops, really. Dracula, however, apparently believed that Torsion had turned home again, because Torsion soon had him in his sights, and he was walking across the roof of an old abandoned building! An easy target for an experienced Demon Slayer… that is until Dracula apparently dropped through a hole in the buildings roof, an amateur mistake that Torsion knew Dracula would never make. Dracula wanted to be followed, that or he didn’t know he was still being followed and led him right to his hideout!
Torsion quickly followed, morphing his blades into their final trick, he locked the magnets in place, connecting the chain, but then he snapped the ends down, this time however they came off! He exposed the blade on one end and left the other bare, he then grabbed the blade by its sides and snapped it sideways! He was now holding a weapon that had a scythe on one end, a counterweight on the other and a sliding handle as big as one of his half-staffs!
This was one of his most recent additions to his staff’s line of tricks, he could throw the scythe and use it like a bladed nun-chuck, but the counterweight could be used to help keep the scythe end under control, or as its own weapon, the handle allowed him to control how far each end was thrown or he could slide it to one end, use it as a handled weapon and the other as a projectile, a very confusing, yet very cool and tricky weapon. He found the hole, after this morphing of his weapon, and leapt inside, ready for a trap.
He was right to be suspicious of Dracula’s movements, for the second his feet touched the floor he was surrounded by vampires, and the hole overhead had been sealed shut! He slid the handle of his weapon to the end with the scythe and decided to use the counterweight as a blunt projectile. He started out by knocking out the three vampires closest to him. By throwing the weight at one vampire and jerking hard once it landed a blow, then jerking again once another had been knocked out, after his third fractured skull however a smart vampire caught his weight and the fight was on!
Torsion slashed the head off of the vampire holding the weight and sun around, swinging it behind him, taking five more down at the knees, he then caught the chain, and spun it around smashing as many as he could on the head, and those that dodged, or he had just plain overlooked before, found the receiving end of his scythe! He continued smashing and slashing for three more minutes, until a voice in the back boomed “ENOUGH! We have lost too many, we must retreat, I want three to cover our escape!”
His command was immediately carried out by the strongest of his vampires; these had dodged his weight and stayed out of range of his scythe since the beginning of the battle! Torsion heard the voice once more; “I’ll have your head mounted on my wall one day Torsion Far’un! When I finally do decide to kill you I will do it myself, just to make sure that you die with a tortured look on your face!” At this laughter filled the room and faded swiftly, almost as swiftly and deftly as Torsion dispatched the three guards in his way!
Then he was finished he was tired so he decided to retire to his base, the woods outside of town. Where he kept all of his inventions and potions; the exact place that he had used more than 1000 years ago, only now it was under ground. Once there he decided to re-inspect one of his latest inventions; The handguns that could stop any monster he came up against in their tracks... or, rather, they should if he ever got them running properly, as of then the only thing they were good for was hitting werewolves with (they were made of pure silver.) He took them apart again to find the problem when the door burst in. There, where the door once stood, was a 6" 7' giant named Tsuichi Ga'ron.
He was carrying a young woman named Sceran Kaizagen and behind them came "the kid;" Radom Sewaegen. They were the other three members of Torsions assembled team. "Each to his own," as the saying goes this was true enough of the rag-tag team of Demon Slayers. Tsuichi with his immense size and muscular prowess was the strong one of the group. Sceran never missed a shot, and with her deadly accuracy the team needn't worry about long-range opponents. Radom took pride in being the teams fool, the funny one, and, most importantly, the cocky one, who took risks, based on whatever happened into his little brain. Torsion being just the opposite was the leader of the group and always thought rationally during a crisis, and maybe he was a little cocky on the side.
Like it or not this was the team Torsion had assembled and he was stuck with them. The problems with today's return was that no one was smiling, Sceran was being carried by Tsuichi, and Radom didn't make his usual remark about the battle being too easy that day. Torsion didn't waste any time in asking, "What happened? Who did this and where are they?"
Radom answered, quite unnecessarily "Slow down T, one question at a time! In order, we attacked a camp of werewolves. We were winning until a pack that had been out hunting came back. I don't know which one it was, but one of them sent poor Sceran here over the edge of the cliff, she tumbled down, but the big guy caught her before she hit the ground, at the cost of a claw to the back. We were surrounded until Tsuichi knocked a hole through a 2’ wall of granite, and then sent the wall tumbling down on the ones unlucky enough to follow us. We managed to stay pretty far ahead of them for the run back but they still may have sent a few to catch us... or at least find out where we were running to. The rest, from the slowly decreasing howls we heard, probably went back to the camp. That what you wanted to hear T?"
Torsion half-heartedly replied "No! I wanted to hear that you had gotten them all back for even touching her... Idiot." At this final word Radom walked away to the hidden window to see whether any more demons had followed them. During the lively conversation, Tsuichi had laid Sceran on the operating table and had begun inspecting her wounds. When Torsion walked over Tsuichi told him "she got hurt pretty bad. If I hadn't caught her she would probably be dead, and if I had been ready she wouldn't have been hurt at all!"
"It isn't your fault Tsuichi! The last thing we need is to have another team member incapacitated. We're gonna need all the help we can get if they decide to attack tomorrow."
"You're right, of course, but... but...” At the end of this incomplete sentence he bawled like a baby. This was a startling sight for Torsion who had never seen the big man cry, even when he had been captured and tortured (by having his stomach split open,) he had held his tears in and hadn't shown the slightest hint of pain... he had even talked all the way home after they had been saved by the kid and Sceran. Torsion had no idea what to do so he started to place medicinal chemicals and herbs on all of Scerans wounds.
After a five hour session, during which Torsion had helped Sceran as much as he could and gone back to working on his newest toys (the guns.) He was almost finished with his new modifications and was about to test the guns again when Radom yelled from his post at the window "Here they come, get ready, we can't leave one alive. If we do they may never stop coming until we are dead, once word leaks about where our headquarters is located-"
"Everyone is gonna want a piece of us." Torsion interrupted. They all got ready for a fierce battle, and without Sceran it was sure to be all the rougher on the remaining three. They all grabbed their weapons, including the guns Torsion had been working on, hastily assembled. Tsuichi slung his 25 lb war axe onto his back and gathered his throwing axes. While Radom pulled his staff and the semi-automatic filled with lead bullets, the collapsing tips of which were filled with garlic juice and silver shards, made by Torsion. Torsion, of course, chose his favored weapons, the half-staffs, and a pack of home-made bombs covered in buckshot, the bombs themselves, being made of silver, they were sure to cause devastation among the enemy ranks.
They used a pulley system to lift Sceran towards the ceiling; she was still unconscious. Then they all took their places in the rafters, Tsuichi closest to the door, then Torsion, then Radom, Sceran would have been at the back of the room in the highest rafters on any other day. They all pulled out their long range weapons (guns and throwing utensils,) and braced for the battle soon to come, as evident by the growing number of howls and the scratching moving closer to the main entrance. No more than a minute after they were all ready for battle the beasts burst through the door.
These were not inexperienced Lykens, but rather a breed that had learned to control their transformations, they called themselves the Cardass Breed (after their leader, the first of the Lykens ever to learn how to control his transformations.) The Cardass Breed were not ready for the immediate attacks, guns and axes, so before they even knew where the Demon Slayers were they had lost over 20 of their original 50 (estimated). They came down in the order of how close they were to the door, Tsuichi came down first, drawing his big axe on the way down so that he landed on two of them, on under each foot, and cleaved another in half! He immediately took a fighting stance and began dismembering more brutes.
Torsion and Radom held off the Cardass for as long as they could but eventually they reached the beam Torsion was standing on and he came down, weapons drawn in staff-and-blade mode, and a glare on his face that paralyzed the creatures for more than a minute. Tsuichi and Torsion fought vigorously for about three more minutes before Radom even entered the battle on the ground! They all took their fighting positions, planned out by Torsion while they were fixing Scerans safe place in the rafters. They formed a triangle in the middle of the room, clearing out all creatures in the triangle they moved in, forming a tight-knit werewolf-slaughtering group in the center of the room. Before the battle they had completely sealed off all other rooms and when Tsuichi dropped he had landed on the locking mechanism for the front door, barring any escape routes the Lykens may have tried. They were determined to kill them all or die trying!
Over an hour later they were still fighting, there were only five left but they were the strongest that they had faced in a long time. They wouldn't just charge into a one-on-three battle like this without a plan first, but they didn't have time to form one so they just stayed away from the group and its deadly weapons. The group knew it had to split up to even the odds, or get a chance to fight these remaining werewolves... at least they thought they had to, until Sceran woke up and gleaned off two shots at once, dead on aim yet again, killing two of the five! Sceran was finally back, and she hadn't lost her aim!