Path of the Cambion: Kurou's Rising, Chapter 19

Getting closer, I saw Xenona leaning against the door of my house. I looked at her, confused as to why she was even there in the first place, "What do you want?" I asked in a somewhat annoyed tone upon making it back. I wasn't exactly sure whether to trust her or not, considering Edakura thought of her as an enemy, plus it was kind of strange that she would be waiting for me near my own home.

She smirked at me, as if mocking me before she reached out and patted my head, messing up my hair. "You have a lot of demons with you. So weak," she whispered into my ear, leaning in closer against me. "Relying on those types of demons will get you nowhere. If you become mine, I'll grant you power beyond your imagination." She smirked, tilting my head up, and I was too shocked to do anything about it. "Just submit to me."

I had to admit, Xenona's offer was tempting, but how would I know if she was just lying about her offer for power or not, power that would take me one step closer to defeating Hellzone Corps. However, there was a drawback, she was basically telling me to become her servant, I would have no free will the moment I accepted her offer, forced to be a puppet at her disposal. I would look up at Xenona before pulling my head away, fixing my hair "What happens if I accept your offer?" I asked, still considering the factors that could occur had I said yes or no.

Xenona smirked as she leaned in, her lips almost against mine before she moved to my ear, whispering into it. "I'm the princess of the succubi. Can you guess what happens if you become mine?" she asked me seductively. I would start blushing as I thought about just what kind of things would happen if I became her servant. Right now, however, it didn't seem like I had a choice, and at my level, I doubted I would be able to get out of a scuffle with Xenona if I refused, so I sighed, deciding to swallow my pride.

"Fine, I accept." I told her.

Xenona chuckled and smirked down at me, pulling me close, suddenly kissing me. "Wise choice," she said against the kiss as my eyes widened. My entire body was practically redder than flames as I wondered why in the hell Xenona was kissing me. It had taken quite a while until Xenona had finally let go from the kiss, leaving me to try and regain my breath, my body still a burning red from embarrassment of such a sudden kiss. And all Xenona did was drag me behind her where the torment continued.

I groaned as I woke up, my body sore from the night before. Turning in the bed, I expected to come face to face with Xenona, but she wasn't in the bed for some reason. Sitting up slowly, I looked around for her, confused as to why she wasn't there until she came into the room, a smirk on her face. "Hey sleepyhead. Couldn't handle it, huh?" she asked as she chuckled, obviously referring to the night before. It turned out that she had overheard my conversation with Edakura and tried to teach me how to change her into an armor, but because of how strong Xenona was, the armor ended up crushing me over and over.

I would just scowl at Xenona "If you mean that I couldn't handle being crushed by overwhelmingly powerful armor, then yeah, I couldn't handle it." I said with a disappointed look on my face. No matter which way you spelled it, Xenona was a royal demon while I was a cambion, and because of our different power levels, using Xenona as armor had only hurt me more than it helped. "Just how else are we supposed to make this work without me getting my ass kicked in the process?" I asked as I sat up while in bed, rubbing my head.

"It's not my fault you're weaker than me," Xenona said, chuckling at me, mocking me once again. It really annoyed me when she did that, but there was nothing I could do to stop her. I just scowled at Xenona as she mocked me.

"If I'm so much weaker, then why even do this in the first place? As far as I'm concerned, you have nothing to gain from it." I asked her.

"Because it's fun to see you squirm underneath me," Xenona said in a teasing voice, smirking and kissing me again. My face turned a bright red, and I immediately went quiet, too embarrassed to say anything. Xenona eventually pulled away, but spread her wings and wrapped them around us both. "The darkness can hide a lot of secrets," she whispered to me, and I closed my eyes, scared of what she was going to do. She chuckled softly, holding me close. "How can a cambion be so cute?"

"I'm not cute…" I told her with somewhat of a scowl on my face, trying to fight my blush back, however, I would suddenly find myself in pain when she turned into and formed around me again as armor, I tried to control it, trying to force my power to match hers, but it was no use. Soon, Xenona would go back into her demon form, and I sighed as I got out from the bed

"Where are you going?" she asked as she watched me walk away

"Home, this isn't gonna work no matter how many times we do it." I told Xenona simply as I walked off, not even looking back. I was a fool, I didn't know what went through my head to make me think that I could actually trust an enemy of Edakura, I would master this ability, and I would master it myself.

Soon, I would manage to make it home and I would get into the backyard, sitting down and connecting to my inner world, where my demons were "Kagrasia, I need you to become armor for me, can you manage that?" I mentally asked him. I could hear a scoff come from Kagrasia

"Easily." he would answer, and suddenly, black energy would begin to form around my body until becoming bulky, onyx black armor around my body, unlike Xenona, it wasn't so heavy, and I could feel in control. I would take a deep breath in, and then out, Kagrasia releasing himself from my body, next I would try Rados, yellow armor would form over me, and just like Kagrasia, I had complete control over it, I then tried Rheasio and Xhanaru, and just like the others, I had control over them as well.

I didn't get it, if it was so easy to control my demons as armor, why wasn't it the same with Xenona, did it really have to do with the difference in our power, that's the only thing that seemed logical to me. If it didn't have to do with power, then what else could it mean, before I could try to ponder this more, I heard the door to my house open, and Saniki was there, "Saniki, what are you doing here?" I asked her. Saniki would sigh as she plopped herself onto one of the couches in the house.

"There's a demon horde heading straight toward Kagura Village, my father wants us to deal with it." says Saniki, soon getting up and walking out of the house, I'd follow after her.

"Just how strong are they?" I asked, Saniki looked back at me as we walked.

"One is an S class, another is an A class, and we're assuming the rest are B to C class demons." she answered as we walked, another S class… that sounded like it would be troublesome, though somehow, I sensed slight excitement from Saniki, maybe she was hoping to collect one of them. I would just smirk, after all, this was an opportunity for me as well, however, I wondered about something

"Where's Saika?" I asked.

"Waiting for us at the village entrance." said Saniki, I sighed, glad she was coming along. Soon, after a while of walking, we made it to Saika's location, as soon as we got there, she tackled me with a hug, holding me close. Soon, when that was over, we would head out, I'd slowly unsheathe Rhienzan as we walked, sensing demonic energy all around us, we were surrounded, and to me, that was just perfect. In a swift motion, I would unsheathe Rhienzan and swing it forward, releasing a large ark of purple electricity, and upon making impact, there would be a large explosion, followed by loud screams in the bushes they were fired at, and sending the sources of them flying out of the bushes.

There were three of them in front of us, and all of them were B-class demons, covering Rhienzan in purple energy, I would rush at one and slash down, the blade clashing hard with the spear of the demon. The force of my slash would knock the demon back far, and it'd watch as I went to rush back at it again before holding out its hand and sending multiple dark red blasts of energy at me, I'd jump out of the way of most of them before cutting the last blast in half with Rhienzan. I would then look up with a grin as sparks of purple began to crackle violently around Rhienzan, energy forming all around the blade in myself before finally, I swung it, Rhienzan releasing a titanic blast of purple energy when I had. The blast would tackle into the demon, sending it far back through the trees until finally exploding in a large burst.

I wasn't able to sense anything in the spot of the destruction, it was clear that the demon had perished within my attack, however, I was able to sense a soul core where it was destroyed, I would walk toward the area, seeing the soul core, the core red with black energy traveling around it. I would reach toward the soul core and would grab it, squeezing it into the shape of a hilt, then widening my hand and extending its shape until finally forming it into a greatsword, the demon markings of the name "Cadandrias" appearing on the blade of it. I would look over at Saniki and Saika to see that they'd already finished off their respective opponents, sucking up their soul cores into their weapons, I had to admit, those two really seemed unstoppable when you paired them up.

Soon, we would continue walking, with me holding Cadandrias propped to my shoulder, as we walked, an even larger group of B class demons would show up, I'd sigh, taking Cadandrias from my shoulder and rearing it back like a baseball bat, the blade igniting with dark red energy before I'd swing it down, releasing a destructive wave of crimson raika. Just the blast from the swing alone destroyed a large amount of the B class demons, leaving only two of them left, one of them would rush at me, covering their entire bodies with dark green raika and slashed at me with their sword, only for me to block the slash easily, despite the energy burst that followed. I would then slash at them across their chest, killing them, Saika didn't think twice about killing the other demon as in a red streak, she'd instantly appear in front of the demon before smashing her spear completely through their chest and igniting them in her energy, disintegrating them, nothing but soul cores were now left in our wake.

Assuming that this was the last of the B-classes, then there were only two demons left now, the A class, and the S-class, I looked at Saniki and Saika "We should all split up, I'll go look for the S-class, you guys find the A-class." I suggested. Although, Saniki gave me a distrustful look.

"You just want the S-class for yourself don't you?" she asked, I couldn't deny that another S-class soul weapon would indeed be nice, however, the reason was mainly because I've already fought an S-class demon on my own before, as strong as Saniki and Saika may be, there's no telling if they'd be able to handle one of them. Eventually, we came to an agreement that if I didn't finish off the S-class demon already, they have the rights to take it, it was fair enough, however, there was no way I was gonna let an S-class demon go so easily.

Soon, me, Saniki and Saika had finally split up, and I'd begin searching for the S-class, though I had to admit, the demon was hard to track, maybe it was hiding its energy signature, but it was too soon to tell. Suddenly, I would sense a quick spike and power and would rush toward where I sensed it, however, it disappeared as quick as it came, and I ended up losing track of it. As I walked, I suddenly saw what looked like a figure in the distance, strangely, it seemed reminiscent to… Xenona, not sure, I would run over to go and check. "Hey Xenona! What are you-"

"Xenona? Don't you dare compare me to that damned false royal," the female that looked like Xenona said, and that was when I noticed her wings. They weren't the warm, feathery, black and red wings that Xenona had, but rather they were scaley and dragon-like wings. "She committed treason and stole my rightful spot next to the throne," the demoness said, her red eyes boring into mine with anger, and I could feel the hatred seething from her. She sneered at me with a look that was obvious: she was going to attack and try to kill me. And from her words, I knew that there was more to Xenona than some perverted, yet powerful, princess of the succubi.

I would grip the hilt of Rhienzan while summoning Nagatsu in my right hand, I would whisper the name "Rheasio." and it would begin to form over my body. I didn't know just who the hell this girl was, but clearly she had some kind of relation to Xenona, what kind, I had no clue, but assuming she was going to attack Xenona, I couldn't let her off. Covering Nagatsu in emerald green hellfire, I would fire a large inferno of flames blasting toward the demoness, adding electricity from Rhienzan to the flames as they rushed forward.

Her wings were fierce and strong, and I watched in slight horror as the wingbeats of her dragon-like wings put out the flames that I had sent towards her. Her strength was on par with Xenona, and I felt a slight regret when I thought about how I had given up on her instead. The demoness brought out a sword and flew towards me, her slashes telling me that she wasn't very powerful when it came to hand to hand combat, I could tell just from blocking them. In fact, her movements were a very big sign that she wasn't used to fighting with the sword, and I decided to use it to my advantage.

I would rush towards her and would begin to slash at her with my flame covered spirit weapon, using Rhienzan as well to my advantage. The demoness would start to let up until suddenly disappearing in a burst of flames, then I turned around, seeing the demon girl appear behind me, I blocked her incoming slash just in time, but due to the power she put in it, I was knocked back, she rushed at me and was about to slash at me again until suddenly, Xenona appeared out of nowhere, shielding me and getting cut across the chest. My eyes would widen, how did Xenona know I was here, could she have sensed the raika of the demoness from afar?

I watched as Xenona turned around and wrapped her arms around me, pushing me to the ground her beautiful gold wings shielding me as they embraced me. "I love a submissive man," she whispered into my ear, but I could still see the pain in her eyes that she was probably trying to hide. The demoness outside the little barrier she was making with her wings was screaming at Xenona to come out. A thick liquid rolled down Xenona's wing and hit my face. Blood. I looked at her with worry, but she kept a calm face as she stayed there, hugging me, protecting me from the sword. "Just stay quiet and be a good boy. Close your eyes and don't move."

I would nod at Xenona, then closed my eyes like she told me to, I could feel Xenona suddenly leaned down and kissed me after that "You're a good boy." Xenona would say before I suddenly felt her being pushed off of me. All I could hear was suddenly the sound of blades clashing for a while before finally coming to a stop, after that things went silent. I would open my eyes to see what happened, and the next thing I knew, Xenona… was gone. All that was left was a single crimson feather from Xenona's wings.

I picked it up, beginning slowly before the situation finally hit me and I realized that Xenona had been taken away by the other demoness. I couldn't believe that she had lost, but the wounds she got from protecting me would explain it, and I couldn't help but feel like it was all my fault. "Xenona… XENONA!" I yelled, starting to run in order to catch up to her, but with no luck. There was no trace of her other than the single feather left behind. I had a feeling like the other demoness was mocking me by leaving the feather behind.