Self-Summon [Demon Summoning/Evolution LitRPG]

The general vibe of the party in the basement was still one of disbelief, so it was time for Angelica to add a healthy dose of skepticism. Off to one side was a table sprawled with junk food for the slumber party, not a healthy option in sight. She grabbed one of the legs and began to shake the whole thing, until everything on top rattled. Eventually, a soda bottle fell over, and the sheer amount of fizz caused the top to pop off, sending the container flying from a stream of sticky liquid.

That was enough to get everyone’s attention. “Hey, [][][][][] it off.” One of the girls complained. “Going a bit too far with this, don’t you [][][][][]?

“It-It’s not me!” the assumed host stammered. “There’s a little Demon thing there, I swear. Look, it just jumped up onto the [][][][][], and now it’s eating our [][][][][][]!”

Well, the girl wasn’t lying. Angelica was up on the [][][][][], assumedly table, and eating their [][][][][][], probably snacks. It honestly felt good to give into her impish whims from time to time. She had eaten dinner before taking on this call, so she was honestly a bit full, but whisked that away with Starvation to make room for the treats. As she dumped a full bag of chips into her giant gullet, she wondered what those without Magic Proficiency were seeing. Did the bag vanish as soon as she grabbed it, or did each chip vanish into the void when they fell into her big mouth?

Gelic didn’t want to leave them entirely deprived of their anti-nourishment, so after trying most of everything—the homemade cookies were the best—she cleared her stomach once more and hopped down.

[Starvation Lv.2]

[Malice increased]

[Famine Attunement increased]

Was it really Malice when Angelica was doing it to herself? Maybe the DGS was telling her to care about herself more. So thoughtful. But she had to be selfless in this regard, taking herself out of the equation, and continue to terrorize the others present. The Demon waddled over to the captive in the chair and hopped up into her lap. This made the girl’s eyes go wide, like a cat at a party who had singled out the one person who doesn’t like cats.

To add to the torment, she stared deeply at the panicking girl while slowly opening her mouth wide, giving the helpless teen a glimpse at the toothy maw. “H-help!” the human cried out, beginning to shake in her seat, desperately trying to knock the Imp off her legs. “It’s on my [][][]. Help, it’s going to eat my heart!”

Some of the friends actually headed in her direction to provide assistance, one even flailing their arms in the direction of the girl’s lap. So Gelic did, indeed, hop off, and then ran around the room, giving each fellow “cultist” a light slap on their legs or back if she could reach, so they could feel her presence. And, just for funsies, she also applied a little bit of Frost Touch, to really send a shiver down their spines.

“[][][][][], do something!” After finishing the shriek, one of the party goers cried to the host. “You summoned it, right? Get rid of it, or make it listen to you!”

“Err, yes, okay.” The head of the cult squad, who will remain nameless, since Angelica couldn’t make out her name, just sounding like garbled letters, pointed to the Demon and demanded “Stop!”

So Gelic did. Stopped right in her tracks. But it had nothing to do with the command she’d received. No will was imposed, no obligation to listen. Instead, the Imp was humoring her, making the accidental Summoner believe she was in control. That was the easiest way to resolve this situation, and make all parties involved feel like they’d won out in the end. Complete a simple task and then poof into the night.

“Oh, it stopped!” her “master” was genuinely surprised. “Okay, erm, only some of us can see you, so reveal yourself to the rest, Demon!”

Reveal herself? Now how would she go about doing that? Obviously, turning human would do it, but would that break the magic, possibly traumatize them even more. Maybe they’d start distrusting anyone they saw. Yeah, that could be bad. She had a decent amount of MP stocked, so becoming an animal was a decent option. That’d be a better result, since the idea of a Demon turning into an animal would be easier to wrap their heads around. And Angelica could purposefully turn into something disfigured or not quite right, like the first time she became a cat. That would be her backup plan.

What she wanted to attempt now was seeing if altering herself as a Demon would make herself visible. Could she change her hair color, become a different Demon entirely? All of that went out the window when the dumbest idea came to her mind. The Imp called upon the mighty power of Transfiguration to… give herself a hat. But not just any hat. Since she was an artist, Gelic went with a beret, a very chic pretentious beret to really lean into the stereotype.

And apparently, that worked. Though it covered maybe five percent of her body, it was enough to make her wholly visible, or so the sudden batch of gazes all staring at the mystical creature told her. From now on, her powerful magical artifact, which was entirely a figment of her imagination, would be known as the “Beret of Visibility.”

“Wow, it’s so [][][][]!” One of the teens hollered.

Dang, what has been the missing word. Ugly? Cute? Surprising? Monstrous? Not terrifying whatsoever? Suddenly Gelic felt very self-conscious about how she looked as a Demon. Did the hat make her look too silly? No, she needed to have confidence in both the beret and in herself. Angelica had really come to terms with her situation. She’d honestly been a bit of an outcast as a human, but now she could be a proud Imp.

“So what should we tell it to do?” One of the girl’s raised. “Since it ate our [][][][][][], should we tell it to go get some more?”

“No way!” another argued. “It’s a freaking Demon! That’d be such a waste. We should get it to rob a bank for us, or something, so we can be rich forever!”

“Errr, yeah that’s a bit too far.” She was shot down. “Besides, if they got caught bringing the money to us, we’d be the ones getting in trouble. I don’t think they have a Demon jail. That said… since it can hide its [][][][][][][]. Maybe, have it sneak into the school and steal the answers for the upcoming [][][][].”

“You freaking [][][][].” Apparently, that suggestion was no good either. “It’d be such a waste just so you can cheat. No, we need to have this thing improve our lives, somehow. Maybe, erm.” The teen suddenly got a bit shy. “Follow [][][][][][] around and find out who he likes.”

That led to a collective groan from around the group, telling Angelica that her obsession with this boy was a common occurrence and popped up often in this clique. “Hang on. I Summoned it, so I should get to say,” the host insisted. “The Demon should, uhhh, well, we tied Wicca to the chair for this, so she should get to say.”

So kind. That definitely meant that the girl couldn’t think of anything good, so she quickly passed the buck. And, hey, a name Gelic could actually understand.

“Erm, I…” Wicca started and stopped a few times, struggling to get out her desire. “I want it to punish my [][][][][][]! He’s such a dick, always harassing me, [][][][][][] with my stuff, and he’s been even more aggressive lately. I just… want him to [][][][][][][][][][] what it’s like!” Now that she had gotten going, the captive really didn’t hold back from letting the scorn fly.

Sure, I’ll terrorize some jerk, Gelic replied internally. She wasn’t about to attempt speaking in broken… whatever language this was. So instead, she held up a hand and gave a thumbs-up in agreement, only now realizing how lucky she was now that her Imp form actually had opposable thumbs. Regardless of the culture, this should be a universal sign of acceptance. Then she shifted her hand into another common gesture, rubbing her fingers together, inquiring about the payment. While the DGS had compensated her with enough for this task, Angelica was honestly just curious what the teens would come up with.

“It… wants us to pay it?” One of them realized. “What do you pay a Demon?”

Another gasped, “Wait… don’t tell me it actually wants to eat Wicca’s heart?!”

In response, the Imp opened her mouth and let her tongue flop out, making a gagging noise in disgust before crossing her arms to make a big “X”. Then Gelic repeated the finger rubbing gesture, making her look even more greedy, just to get the emphasis across.

“Does it want money?”

Yes! The Demon nodded vigorously, which basically entailed rocking her whole body back and forth.

“I’ll pay it!” Wicca didn’t even hesitate. “Anything for that [][][][][][] to get an ounce of the [][][][][][][] he makes me [][][][][][] daily. But, uhh, my wallet is in my pocket. So could one of you guys untie me?”

While a few of the girls rushed to help the hostage out, the Summoner stepped up. “I’ll pay it for you. Sorry for tying you up, and stuff. Didn’t think this would all actually happen. Here, is this enough to do that for her?” She walked over to a nearby bag and pulled out some cash. The Demon didn’t even count or inspect the currency. She simply grabbed the thin stack and shoved it into Second Stomach. Whatever the amount, it was enough.

[Order accepted | Current Contract: Teach Wicca’s brother a lesson]

Oh, good, the Demon Growth System understood the mystery word, at least. It definitely would have been a conundrum if she was let loose on the world with no direction. Without further ado, Gelic removed the Beret of Visibility, bounced up to the basement window, and undid the latch. Before squeezing through the opening, she took one more glance at the fake cultists, a few of whom were now discussing whether or not this was a good idea. Well, it was too late for that. No takebacksies.

Out on the street, she knew immediately where to go, thanks to the Order. Turns out, when not resisting them at every turn, they were actually pretty helpful as a guideline for what she needed to do. Just a few hops and skips with Multi-Bounce, and she was in the back yard of her target. She took a quick look around the perimeter. No other Demons, no Summoners, no protective Runes of any kind. No one home, perhaps? This was definitely where she was meant to go, so the pest of a brother had to be there, but hopefully, he was all by himself.

And he was. A quick traipse through the otherwise abandoned house, and Angelica found her soon-to-be victim slumped in front of the computer in his bedroom, a young man slightly younger than her, maybe early college-aged. Old enough that he could certainly be living out on his own and should definitely know far better than bully his younger sister.

“Dude, I’m starving!” He suddenly spoke, clearly talking into the headset he was wearing. Given that he was playing some game that Angelica had never seen before—some shooty thing she definitely had no interest in—she could speculate that he was likely talking to someone he was playing with.

“Nah, she’s out [][][][][] now, at a [][][][][][][] house.” Was he talking about Wicca?

“I wouldn’t want to eat anything she [][][][][] anyways. Her cooking is [][][][]. Actually, hold on, I’ll be right back. Gonna get a snack.” The brother raised from his chair and headed out of his bedroom and to the kitchen with Angelica following in tow, unbeknownst to him. He began rummaging through the cupboards and mumbled to himself, “She’s [][][][][] she’s out, though, or I’d totally have her [][][][] food anyways and then dunk it in the [][][][][][] and [][][][][] her to eat it.”

Well that was already alarming, the sort of things he was rambling about when he thought no one was listening. It could just be random musings of something he wouldn’t actually follow through with, since siblings often messed with each other in over-the-line ways, but by his tone, it didn’t sound like he was joking. Then he apparently came up with another idea, and grabbed the litter box that was hiding in the corner.

They had a cat? She kind of wanted to go find it and pet it. No, focus, Gelic! she chastised herself.

“Now this will be [][][][][].” She followed the brother to another bedroom, assumedly Wicca’s, where he opened a dresser drawer and dumped the contents inside. He then returned the box to the kitchen, refilling it perfectly as it was, likely to instill doubt that he had anything to do with the act if she complained about it to someone. “Can’t wait to see the [][][][] on her [][][][][][] face.”

Okay, damn, there was definitely some kind of abuse going on here. And the bastard seemed to revel in it. Any reservations she had about fulfilling the Contract were gone. If this were her brother, she definitely wouldn’t be comfortable with him either. Sadly, it all was likely a bigger issue that she couldn’t really get involved with, but at the very least, she could fulfill Wicca’s request, and hopefully let her feel some reprisal. Maybe make him think twice about his actions going forward.

“Alright, I’m back.” He put his headset back on after returning to his bedroom, acting like he hadn’t just been a real bastard of a sibling, with his friends on the other side likely having no idea what sort of person he really was.

Gelic glanced around and found what looked like a sports stick. She didn’t know for what sport, but that was undoubtedly its purpose. Bet it hit the… ball…? puck…? wad of trash? real good. And him, it would hit him real good, too. She plucked it off the wall. And like a reaper looming in the darkness, she swung at him as if it were a scythe, ready to take his life.

[Active Skill: Bash Lv.1 unlocked]

That single hearty thwack was enough to down the brother from his chair. His attacker honestly didn’t know her strength anymore. All those Might increases, while they still labelled her as Weak, were more significant than she realized. The young man huffed and puffed, desperately trying to catch his breath, whipping his head around, trying to figure out what had happened.

Silly lad, you’ve been assaulted. And yet… despite the clear pain he was in, having sufficiently imposed the will bestowed by the Order, for some reason, it wasn’t enough. Her body wanted to keep going, to keep bashing him, to impart true retribution upon this fritsing scuff-sucker, cripple him until his hands were broken, beat him to near death so he could never raise a hand against Wicca again. Except, it had nothing to do with the girl. She just wanted to watch him suffer more.

Damn it, no! Angelica mentally shouted at her own brain. It had to be her growing Malice, the result of letting her Demon side run freely. She had to rein it in before she lost control entirely, of herself, of her humanity. Her body was priming for another pummeling, to really let loose into the brother, but she managed to pivot it. Instead, it only grazed his head and redirected to smashing the crooked headset off his body and pummeling it into the ground, bashing it to pieces. From there, she went on a rampage around the room, taking out her aggression on anything and everything in her path.

[Bash Lv.2]

[Bash Lv.3]

[Bash Lv.4]

[Bash Lv.5]

[Might considerably increased]

[Destruction Attunement considerably increased]

[Malice increased]

Very little escaped the carnage. The room was in tatters, with the destruction only coming to an end when she’d managed to convince herself that he’d been punished enough and her vicious whimsy had subsided. His computer had been destroyed with the sports stick ending up shoved into the monitor as a grand finale. Comparatively, her victim had gotten off easily, with just what would amount to minor injuries that would hurt for a few days to come. What had been inflicted more was mental damage, watching everything he cared about thrashed around him, clearly failing to understand why any of it was happening. And despite it all, the Contract still hadn't been completed. He had yet learned his lesson.

So what else could she do? Did she have to hit him more to drive the point home and fulfill the Order? Would that really teach him anything? Ah, that could work. Since he was struggling to get off the floor, his backside in too much pain, Gelic got up rather close to him, inches away from his face, and donned the Beret of Visibility once more. The moment he saw her, she made sure to greet him with a huge toothy grin that took up most of her body, and stared at him with crazed eyes.

“Be better!” She chose simple words on purpose, hoping they’d go through. “Or else!”

[Contract complete]

Yes, with the way he went to whimpering, he clearly understood. So Gelic quickly removed the beret while she was still seen as imposing, before he could process how adorable and fluffy she actually was, while also making her harder to describe, limiting the chance anyone would believe him. Since she was free of the Contract, she could just head back home now, but figured it best to return to her so-called masters. First, to prove that the job was done, and second, to maybe teach them a lesson about summoning Demons. As a memento to share with them, she grabbed the remains of the mangled headset and took it with her.

Getting back to the sleepover took a bit longer, since she had to retrace her steps with no Order to guide her. When she peered into the basement window, she found a much more peaceful scene. They were gathered around a boardgame, half of them really into it, half looking bored and gossiping to themselves about something unrelated in the background. While there was still some occultish decor around, they’d moved on as if nothing had ever happened. Ah, the flippantness of youth. Or maybe they’d decided it had been a mass hallucination and were forcing themselves to move forward. Time to disprove that.

After cracking open the window, before the two with Magical Proficiency could notice her, she Jumped Good into the middle of the boardgame, sending pieces, cards, and dice every which way while making herself visible once more, causing a frankly delightful jumpscare worth of suddenly seeing a Demon.

“It is done!” She garbled menacingly and chucked the headset toward Wicca, speaking slowly to make sure her words went through. Before she could leave, though, Angelica felt it important to impart a crucial lesson about Demons that would hopefully make them more careful in the future. They’d been lucky that she was willing to accept money as payment, otherwise they’d have bigger problems with someone else.

“Lucky, I [][] not hungry. Pay Essence next [][][][][] time. Or will eat [][][][] heart!” She actually had to change words a few times, doing her best to speak their language, but some came out as garbled. Wanting to leave them with as much impact as possible while not indulging in specific follow-ups, Angelica chose to flee the scene and Returned back to her apartment.

Alright, job well done. Bastard beaten, Essence and money gained, new Skill I don’t really care about, and some youths either scared off of or far more interested in Demon Summoning; a productive night. Since it was still early in the evening, she could honestly answer a few more summons. But now that the adrenaline from the beatdown and mass destruction was subsiding, she was ready for bed again.

Okay. Something a bit more… traditional tomorrow. Return!