the demon hunters regret their actions

"Told you," Lenna said,

"Yes," replied Mahieu, "We know. You're just mad because you missed anyway."

She punted him under the table.

Sinon was quiet, as usual. She cleaned her axe, as usual. She let the whipped cream melt on her strawberry milkshake before she drank it, as usual. Still, when it was her turn to toss a card onto the table, she did.

"To be fair," Mahieu continued, "We said it wasn't a real battle anyway. We just tested his strength."

To which the only one wearing a black cloak replied, "I wish I'd been there to see him wipe the floor with you losers."

"Shut up, Lev."

"Shut up, Lev."

"Hey, Lev," Mahieu said, "How's your plan going? How many people have you recruited? Yeah, that's what I thought."

"Shut up, Mahieu."

"Shut up, Mahieu."

"What—and why are you joining him?" He punted Lenna under the table, who broke out giggling.

This was Lev's life now, being surrounded by fools.

Then again, it was a good thing, because the alternative was to panic in a public bathroom all night. Of course there was the local demon lord casually toying with the laws of physics, but there had also been... him. 

"HA!" Lenna smacked her open palm onto the table. "I win!"

She took an extra cookie from the tray for herself. Lev had been the first to lose the card game, half due to cursed luck—literally—the other half because he couldn't care less when he'd been within a hair's distance from Demonsbane, an (in)famous gunslinger that did great honor to his nickname. With him around, neither his failed attempt at gathering a party nor the losers' practice match held any meaning anymore.

Another around of sugary drinks, another tray of cookies, another round of card games. This tavern had real bounty hunters, unlike the shitshow he'd gone to last time, which was closed today due to half the personnel being kidnapped (or so the bulletin board said). Most were gunslingers, though a few, like Sinon, had a blunt weapon uselessly resting beside them. 

Common sense dictated that a demon who seemed content with a nothing town in the middle of nowhere should've been weak as balls, so why had a strike from that guy made Demonsbane stagger at the tavern last night?  Even if demon territories weren't "official" anymore, to expand them within their own kind was kind of... their culture? So why didn't someone who'd lasted longer than two seconds against him own the entire region?

"...whoa, he hasn't noticed yet..."

That Mahieu had begun to pile cookies above his head? Yes he had. To scream at them would've just made them laugh, so Lev pretended as though this didn't infuriate him. 

In any case, he was brainstorming. Something very strange was going on. None of this made sense. 

"One more! One more! Hey, Sinon, you're next."

The three of them were piling cookies onto Lev's head now. Whoever made the tower tumble lost. Lev grit his teeth. Whatever. Someone had to be the mature one here and it clearly wouldn't be them. Someone had to come up with a solution.

Usually, those who got the mark of the black moon were killed off pretty quickly, which kind of made no sense since the curse would just move onto somebody else. The reason why this guy in particular was dangerous was because of his title as a lord. According to these losers, he had a certificate, and he constantly got into debt, so he couldn't have paid for it. 

The last demon king... queen... had been a nobody peasant according to the tale, but that didn't stop her from reshaping the other side of the continent. Some people said that only the strongest demons got the mark, but those people were stupid.

The cookie tower wobbled as Lenna placed hers. "Come on... please... please no please no please—Lev!" 

He shook his head; the tower collapsed.

"Ha!" Mahieu bellowed. "You lose!"

"Aww, come on... he moved his head... it's not fair..."

"Oh yeah? Last time you lost, you blamed it on an earthquake."

"Because there was one!"

There had been one. Lev took one of the leftover cookies from his makeshift hat. From the corners of his eyes, he glanced at Sinon, who'd gone back to her seat, to say and think and be nothing. Out of all of them, she was the tallest, and the sturdiest, and the only one with long hair the color of plums.

Lenna was the shortest and the least sturdy by far, which was why she had a horrible fucked up scar distorting the left side of her face. Like Lev, she seldom let her hood down. Whenever people asked about the origin story of her injury, she'd change the tale depending on mood. 

Mahieu's head looked like a hedgehog. Lev had once said this, but none of the others knew what hedgehogs were, for some reason. They were these spiky creatures that grazed on flowers, were two meters tall, and changed colors depending on what they ate. Mahieu's hair was a hedgehog that only ate cherries. 

As for Lev... he was.

He was a lot of things, really.

He had the palest skin out of the bunch—out of everyone in town, really, save for the demon—and the most noticeable dark circles around his eyes, which were red. His hair? Black. Fangs? Sharp. Hunger for human flesh? Relatively under control. Between wearing an eyepatch to hide his cursed left eye and a hood, the latter option was far preferable. "Instead of waffling around," Lev said, "You shitheads should get Elial on our side."

From what Lev understood, Elial was the sheriff's poster boy, and apparently when the demon lord chose a human ambassador, he chose Elial, since he was the only one who dared give the demon a handshake. Lev hated him for no reason. Lev had also never met him.

Mahieu ate cookies from the floor after picking them up. He didn't even dust them off or anything. "I mean... we've tried? Ask Lenna."

"Yes," Lenna said. "I try. He's too weird, though. And mean. Like you, Lev."

"Fuck off."

"Thing is..." She trailed off. "...he might be even weirder."

"Well, he's friends with the demon lord," Mahieu said.

Lenna shook her head. "He says he's pretending."

"Ha! And you believe him?" 

"I mean... yeah? It's not like he has an option. They basically forced him to live at the demon's castle. At least I would not want the experience to be more hostile than it already is. I'd also pretend to be his friend."

"Hypocrites," Sinon mumbled.

Lev would've punted her under the table, but they hadn't been in the best of terms since... well. Since he got the mark. The other two pretended not to care, but they probably plotted to kill him in secret or something. Lenna's biggest asset was her double face, pun intended. He'd said this to her face and she'd laughed, so it was all right to think so. 

"Point is," Lenna said. "It did not go well."

"Yeahh," was Mahieu's contribution.

"We'll have to come up with a better plan."

"Yeahhh. Hey, Lev. Why don't you try befriending him? You're both—"

"Half," Lev reminded.

"...I was gonna say marked, but that, too."

"I'd rather eat Lenna."

Speaking of which she said, "You guys take it too far sometimes," as though she weren't the worst offender. "Let's try befriending Elial for now. The last thing we want is for the demon to get killed before we can capture him."

With Demonsbane around, this would've been a futile endeavor, but... it wasn't? Lev would rather eat Lenna than commute with demons, but perhaps her plan to suck up to the demon's pet would work, especially if the demon lord that much stronger than they'd initially calculated.

He could hold up until then.

As for Lev, he would continue looking for allies across different taverns. And hiding his fucked up stupid demon eye. And hiding from Demonsbane, given their last encounter had involved the guy swearing he'd kill Lev the next time they met. But it was fine. It'd all be fiiine.