JUDICATOR JANE 6 - CHAPTER 37

Finding a Demonologist

Dyle adjusted the strap on his satchel, eyes narrowing as he studied the cave entrance perched at the top of the slope. A small house stood just outside it—if it could still be called that. The structure was in shambles: shutters missing, beams sagging, and more than a few holes in the walls. Still, this has to be the place. Tucked against a jagged ridge in the far northwestern reaches beyond the Free City of Boktcha, the remote dwelling matched the description he’d gotten from a local tavern just down the ridge. After parting ways with Anith and his band of slave-rescuers, Dyle had wandered from town to town, chasing whispers, piecing together fragments of rumors. Anything related to Demonologists. And now, perhaps, the trail had finally ended.

He stepped past a broken chest lying on its side, its contents strewn across the ground—clothing, torn parchment, a cracked mirror. The door to the house hung ajar, creaking gently in the wind. Both windows were shattered, glass dusting the floor like frost. Something happened here.

Activating Vanish, Dyle faded into the background, every step careful as he crossed the threshold. The interior was a single, cramped room. A narrow bed sat rumpled in the corner, the blanket twisted as if someone had left in a hurry—or just didn't care. Books littered the floor in disarray. He crouched, picking one up, brushing away a layer of dust, and examining it.

Rani Karkhali’s Compendium of Demonic Rituals: Third Edition

A collection of notes and examples of the use of the NULL class.

Null class? Dyle frowned, eyes scanning the description. What kind of class is that? He set the book down on a nearby table, its surface warped from a dripping ceiling, then reached for another. More of the same—demonology, summoning theory, and journals. Every book he touched circled the same subject.

Seem to be related to Demonologists at least... He flipped open a thick, leather-bound volume and paused, brushing away a few skittering mites. A passage caught his eye, scrawled in dense, careful script. He leaned in, reading carefully.

Binding a demon from the Netherrealm is an intricate process—equal parts skill, timing, and negotiation. The first, and perhaps most overlooked, consideration is the environment. Demons are creatures of shadow and darkness, more at ease beneath the ground than under open sky. Summoning one in a cave—or any enclosed subterranean space—not only provides a setting they find familiar, but also limits their escape routes should things go awry. Attempt such a ritual in the open wilds, and be prepared for your target to vanish before the portal finishes glowing.

The type of demon you summon, however, is largely a matter of Luck—capital L, as any seasoned NULL will tell you. Most commonly, you’ll attract a Hellguard. These are the footsoldiers of the Netherrealm: not especially clever, not particularly charming, but reliable. They’re often willing to accept a Soul Binding without too much fuss, making them a favorite among beginners.

Occasionally, though, something more... unruly arrives.

Tormentors, while rarer, are terrifying brutes. Towering in stature and brimming with raw malice, they require more than a well-drawn circle and a polite request. You’ll need to demonstrate power—preferably violent—to earn even a grudging acknowledgment from one of them. This is precisely why most NULLs strongly advise waiting until you’ve reached at least level twenty before attempting any summoning at all. Far too many fledgling NULLs have been torn apart by the very creatures they hoped to control, their names reduced to cautionary footnotes in tomes such as this.

Dyle closed the book with a shrug and placed it gently back on the table. At the very least, it confirmed he was in the right place. The tavern keeper in the nearby village had mentioned a young Demonologist living somewhere in the northern foothills—and this ruined little dwelling, buried in books about the Netherrealm and the demons within, certainly fit.

He stepped outside and turned his attention to the cave entrance beyond the house. Jagged, dark, and silent. Is all of this the result of a failed summoning? It was possible. Yet there were no scorch marks, no blood, no signs of struggle. If anything, the scene resembled the aftermath of a sudden storm—chaotic, but not violent.

Crossing the threshold, Dyle entered the cave. The air was damp and cool, with slick moss spreading like veins across the stone walls. A few crude torches had been pegged into the rock along the passage, but he ignored them—the noonday sun still spilled far enough inside to light his way. The path angled downward, a slow descent into shadow, but remained mostly straight.

Then, voices.

He froze, ears sharpening.

“Why? Why? What happened? This can’t be! What did I do wrong?”

Creeping forward, Dyle stayed as silent as possible. Vanish would shield him from sight, but not from sound—his footfalls still echoed if he wasn’t careful. Slipping into a hollow carved out of the cave wall, he peered through a crack into a crude chamber.

A young man paced the room in frantic loops, his black robe swirling around him with every step. His hair was disheveled, face pale and wild-eyed with worry. To his right stood a demon—broad-shouldered and imposing, its leathery armor stitched together like patchwork. A battered shovel hung loosely from one hand.

A Hellguard, Dyle thought. If I’m not mistaken.

“Surely you have some clue as to what has transpired?” the young man demanded. “Some answer?”

The demon stood motionless, silent, as if carved from basalt. It didn’t speak, nor did it seem expected to. The summoner resumed his pacing, muttering under his breath, hands trembling.

Dyle narrowed his eyes, focusing now. With a slow breath, he inspected them both.

Trip Vindali (Level 12)

Human

Rug’dug (Level 11)

Demon

Young indeed. With a quiet breath, Dyle deactivated his Vanish skill and stepped into the chamber. “Excuse me,” he said, his voice calm but firm.

The robed young man startled, stumbling back. “W–who are you?”

Dyle raised his hands in a nonthreatening gesture. “Just someone looking for a Demonologist. That’s what you are, isn’t it? Laxmi sent me—from the tavern down in the village at the base of the mountain.”

To his right, the Hellguard didn’t react. It gave a long, bored yawn, like a dog waiting for its master to stop talking.

“Laxmi sent you?” The tension in the man’s shoulders eased, and he slumped onto a rock jutting from the wall. “Well, if you’re looking for a Demonologist, you’ve come to the wrong place.”

Dyle’s eyes flicked between the slouched man and the hulking demon beside him. “You’ll forgive me if I don’t take that at face value—your companion suggests otherwise.”

The man just sighed, setting his head in his hands. Dyle took the moment to pace slowly around the chamber, taking in the surroundings. The furnishings were sparse: a rough table cluttered with open books, a few flickering torches casting amber light across the stone, and a stack of barrels crammed with a haphazard mix of ingredients—ashes, bones, and three cloudy jugs of something that smelled nothing like water. In the corner, a pile of hay had been spread as a crude sleeping mat.

“I was a Demonologist,” the man muttered eventually. “But not anymore. The System stripped me of the class.”

Dyle stopped mid-step, eyes narrowing. “Stripped? What do you mean by that?”

“Exactly how it sounds.” Trip raised his head and gave a bitter smile. “I was preparing for a summon, everything was in place. The ring, the glyphs, even the safety precautions. Then, without warning, the System just… revoked my class. It didn’t even say why. Just that ‘Demonologist’, or I suppose more specifically NULL, was now invalid.” He stood, moving to the table and flipping open a book. “And it gets worse—every mention of Demonologists is gone. The term’s been replaced. Look.”

He jabbed a finger at the page. “Where the heading once read Demonologist’s Seal, it now shows something entirely different: NULL’s Seal.”

Dyle brought a hand to his mouth, a chill creeping down his spine. He’d heard of something like this only once before—when Jane abolished the race-specific classes, such as Demon Slayer. This is what happened to Calhane and the other Menadeen… And now this? Has she done it again? Dyle had to admit, it sounded exactly like something Jane would do.

“My new options?” Trip continued with a hollow laugh. “Traveler. Groom. Sanitator. What do I know about taking care of horses? I may as well re-roll and test fate to see what I get.”

With a defeated sigh, Dyle lowered himself to the floor and leaned back against the wall. No portal. No summoner. And, from the sound of it, no more Demonologists. Was all of this a waste?

Trip moaned, rubbing his temples. “If only you had the answers, Rig’dug,” he said to the demon, who now sat idly, shovel resting on its shoulder. “All my training—for what? I can’t even cast a basic fire spell anymore.”

Dyle closed his eyes, tuning out the young man’s lamentations as they dwindled into muttering. Jane, he thought, was this your doing?

***

After bidding farewell to the former Demonologist, Dyle wandered north with no destination in mind. Each step felt aimless, his original purpose to find Jane was thinned to a single fraying thread. Out here, in this foreign land, she felt impossibly far away, and he was no closer than before. He had an answer, but no question any longer. Should I go back to Arcadia? The thought was folly. Even if he managed to find another Trader vessel, what would be waiting for him there?

Though he didn’t have Jane’s titanic Luck, his perfect score of ten had always served him well—until now. It had led him here, to a dead end and a dead class. This time, it had failed him completely.

He kicked a loose stone from the road, his jaw tight with frustration. The roads here were all dirt—dry, cracked, and uneven. Not a paved stone in sight. A far cry from Arcadia’s pristine King’s Road. Ahead, he spotted a wagon tilted awkwardly in a ditch. A family—father, mother, and three daughters—were struggling to pull it free with a fraying rope looped around the front axle. The wheel was lodged deep, and their efforts were going nowhere.

They hadn’t noticed him approaching.

Without a word, Dyle stepped forward, took hold of the rope, and gave it a solid pull. With over seventy Strength behind the effort, the wagon jolted out of the rut, the sudden shift sending the entire family stumbling backward in surprise.

He brushed his hands off and started walking again, not even breaking stride.

“Wait!” the man called after him. “Was that you, good sir?”

Dyle paused and turned slightly. “Seemed you could use a hand,” he said. “Hope I didn’t overstep.”

“No, no—much obliged,” the man replied, catching his breath. “You… you wouldn’t be heading north, would you?”

Dyle eyed the road. “Not sure. Seems like that’s the way I’m going—for now, at least.”

The man exchanged a look with his wife before removing his hat. “Then you’d do well to reconsider. We just came south from the Mandala of Courage. Doubt we’ll ever go back. There’s trouble brewing—real trouble.”

“I’ve heard of the war,” Dyle said. “Courage and Beauty, right?”

“There was a war between them,” the man replied, lowering his voice. “But that’s changed. They’re not fighting each other anymore. They’re working together. And at least in Courage, they’re enlisting everyone. Even the freemen.”

His wife stepped forward, voice sharp. “That they are. I'm not about to let our girls—or my husband—get caught up in that mess. We fled south the first chance we got.” Her eyes flicked over Dyle. “A strong-looking young man like you? If you keep north, they’ll snatch you for the army before you can blink.”

Dyle exhaled slowly. This land was no haven. Everywhere he turned, he found new conflict, fresh wars, fractured kingdoms. Even the so-called Free Cities in the south were skirmishing with each other. Arcadia’s four realms had their flaws, but at least they weren’t in a state of perpetual war.

“I heard they were fighting demons!” one of the younger girls piped up. “A whole army of ’em! That’s what Merchant Saravan said, didn’t he?”

Dyle’s attention sharpened. “Demons?”

The man waved her off. “Don’t be spreading that nonsense, Mei. It’s just…” He scratched the back of his neck. “I don’t rightly know. Never in my life have I heard of the Mandalas working together.”

He turned back to Dyle with a serious look. “Nevermind that. But something big is coming. If you’ve got any sense, you’ll steer clear. You hear?”

Dyle gave a distracted nod, his thoughts already elsewhere as the family climbed back onto their wagon and urged the tired donkey forward. Demons… Even if Jane had erased the Demonologist class, if demons were still surfacing in this land, that was a lead—one worth chasing.

And if there truly was an army of them gathering somewhere out there, it could mean only one thing: the Netherrealm was bleeding through.

Answers might lay at the heart of that force, and if so, he would find them. Even if it meant wetting his blade in the blood of battle once more.