“It’s very rare to gain a skill naturally,” Inara explained to James. “Normally you must unlock and then purchase a skill from your skill list.”

  Desiree grinned from ear to ear. Nobody really understood what went into gaining a skill naturally. Some people thought it was if you did something often enough, and others thought it was more to do with the significance of a moment. Maybe both were true, or maybe neither. It just didn’t happen often enough for anyone to know for sure.

  She reviewed her status sheet.

  Name: Desiree

  Race: Human

  Class: Demon Slayer

  Level: 11

  HP: 100/100

  MP: 100/100

  EXP: 14,010/25,000

  Stat Points Available: 0

  STR: 17

  AGI: 10

  INT: 10

  WIS: 10

  CON: 13

  Skill Points Available: 1

  Skills: Holy Imbuement

  The skill didn’t come with any kind of description. Available skills were always based on things a person had already learned and done, so they should understand what it was.

  And even though Desiree didn’t know what “imbuement” meant, exactly, she knew what the skill did. It was how she turned her Applewood Stave into a Holy Applewood Stave. She’d needed holy water then, but now she could do it through the use of her skill.

  “That’s an incredible skill,” James said when she explained it to him.

  Inara nodded, but her lips were pursed, like she was holding her thoughts back.

  Desiree knew that look. Her mother always wanted to protect her from the dangers of the world, and while she understood that, she did, she also knew that it wasn’t possible. The world was just too dangerous — even the trees fought back! The only way to be safe was not to experience it, and that was something Desiree could never agree to.

  The best way to be truly safe, Desiree was convinced, was to become stronger than everyone else. It meant throwing herself into danger, but if she could come out the other side, it would all be worth it.

  They’d had this conversation before, so Desiree just pursed her lips right back until Inara couldn’t help but smile and look away.

  Then, while her mother was distracted, Desiree put her one skill point into Holy Imbuement, raising it to level two.

  James rubbed his hands together, oblivious.

  “Excuse me!” one of the villagers called out. “Did that demon call you a Hero?”

  James looked up to see the villagers all crowded together, whispering and pointing at him and looking at him with far more reverence than he thought he deserved.

  Inara winced.

  He gulped. “Yes,” James said.

  The crowd surged forward, suddenly clamoring for more information. “Who summoned you?” “How did the demon know who you were?” “Thank you for coming to save us, Hero, thank you!”

  James backed away, his heart pounding with a different kind of fear. There were so many of them, and they were looking at him with so much hope in their eyes. Friends of theirs had just been killed before their eyes — their corpses still littered the ground — but they were more interested in him, and how he could save them all from a threat that he was in no way prepared for.

  This story has been stolen from Royal Road. If you read it on Amazon, please report it

  That Demon Lord could have killed him! It would have, if not for Desiree! That little girl was more of a Hero than he was.

  “I’m sorry, I— I can’t do this.” James turned and ran. He remembered the twists and turns of the small town just well enough to emerge on the side of the forest. He ran to the comfort of the nearest tree and fell to his knees. All the stress and fear and uncertainty of his situation bubbled up. He let out a frustrated shout, and tears poured from his eyes.

  He let them. He wanted to go home. He wanted to go back to Rosewood Hospital and have another Italian sub with Andre and yeah, he would even like to hear about Natalie’s latest crazy antics. He wanted to go back to a life where he wasn’t threatened every time he turned around, where he wasn’t that important, really.

  He was good at not being important. He’d had a whole life of not being important, and he was just now realizing how much he’d appreciated that.

  James buried his head between his knees and let it all out.

  Eventually, he felt a quiet presence at his side. He peeked just enough to see that it was Inara, then put his head back down. His shoulders continued to shake, but she said nothing. She didn’t try to comfort him or tell him that it would all be okay. She just sat there, and slowly, her presence helped him come back to himself.

  He cleared his throat. “Sorry about that.”

  She shrugged. “This must be difficult for you.”

  “You could say that.” James let out a harsh laugh. “My world is nothing like this. I haven’t been in a fight since I was a kid, and the worst that happened was a bloody nose.”

  Inara considered that. “That sounds peaceful.”

  James nodded. “It was. It is. I’m not— I’m not cut out for a place like this.”

  Inara sat silent for long enough, then, that the silence began to prickle. James started to look for something else to say. He’d been too honest, he should have said that he would figure it out, that it would all be okay. What was he thinking, baring his soul? He barely knew this woman, there was nothing— he shouldn’t have—

  “I think you were chosen for a reason,” she finally said.

  James shook his head. “Summon a different Hero,” he said. “I’m not the right guy for this.”

  Inara sighed. “That is not how the summoning works. Desiree…” She paused, then sighed again. “Desiree does not understand what she has done. Now that the wheels are in motion, and there is nothing we can do to extract ourselves from what must be done.”

  James wiped his eyes. That sounded ominous enough to pull him just far enough out of his well of self-pity that he was interested. “What does that mean?”

  Inara looked away. She gazed back at the town, which was still smoking in places where the fires hadn’t been put out yet.

  James let her think. He was starting to understand that she took her time. As impulsive as Desiree was, Inara was the opposite. She organized her thoughts, and when she was ready, she spoke.

  “Grimora constantly experiences these cycles. The rise of a dark lord, the appearance of a hero. The clash of good and evil, the restoration of peace for a time, until the cycle begins anew.” Her voice was calm, but when he looked into her eyes, James saw something more. There was tension there, something personal.

  Of course, wasn’t it personal for everyone? Each one of these villagers just had their life upended by the demons’ appearance. His intuition told him there was more to it than that, though. Of all of them, she was the only one who seemed willing to fight, and to have the power to back it up.

  “The cycles vary,” she continued. “Sometimes evil wins. Sometimes the people take longer to summon a hero; some generations tolerate more than others, before they’ll fight back. Sometimes it’s good, and peace lasts for generations.”

  She took a deep breath… then another. James waited patiently. He knew better than to interrupt.

  “It’s common knowledge how to summon a Hero. It’s not difficult, either. There is, however, a cost.”

  Her eyes met his, and the rest of the world seemed to fade away. James swallowed hard. “What cost?”

  “The summoner joins the Hero’s party. It always looks like a choice, but it never works out that way. Circumstances work out in such a way that joining the Hero is the only reasonable option, and if the summoner doesn’t see it through, the Hero will be doomed to fail.”

  James sucked in a breath. “That’s not a decision to make lightly.”

  “No,” Inara agreed. “But my daughter is impulsive.”

  The full weight of that hit him like a ton of bricks.

  Desiree had received a Demon Slayer class.

  Desiree had received an incredibly powerful skill.

  Desiree was the one who summoned him, and if he didn’t take that little girl with him into one deadly battle after another, he would be doomed to fail, and all of Grimora would suffer.

  “Oh,” he said. “I see.”