Encounter with a Daemon

Mira and I stood facing each other on the beach, both wearing the combat clothing I created for the two of us, both in our human forms.

Due to Mira's challenge, upon reaching land, which would later be known as "El Dorado", we decided to start the battle.

In order to work on my control over my human form, which I had not fought with until then, I decided to use it to start. Mira, for her part, made the same decision. We stood facing each other without anyone taking the initiative.

Until...

Mira, with a quick movement, she disappeared from her spot and arrived right in front of me. With all her strength she gave me a right hook towards my face, which I dodged easily. For my part, I counterattacked with a hook to her stomach, which she dodged by rolling to her right and creating distance between us.

The first exchange had ended, with no one touching the opponent. Although we both had thought acceleration as an aid in combat, my ability, thanks to my continuous unrestrained uses, pushing myself to the limit with it, had surpassed Mira's in its capabilities. Still, she had an advantage over me, I may be able to react faster than her, but it is my body that limits my actions due to my speed and agility, aspects in which Mira surpasses me.

As the fight began, we both lunged at each other. An intricate exchange of punches and kicks ensued, ignoring the damage, looking for opportunities to hurt the other. With each blow we delivered, gusts of wind kicked up the sand around us. With each push we made with our feet forward, craters were created on the beach. Close combat allowed me to create an advantage for myself, due to my greater strength.

Adding to my resistance to physical damage, I put Mira at a huge disadvantage, where she could only dodge my attacks. Even if she managed to connect hers on me and overcome my resistance, it meant nothing due to my always-on regeneration. Jumping back, the two of us created distance.

"I won the warm-up, point for me" I said with a smile.

"Just because of your annoying resistance to physical damage and your regeneration" she said with a pout.

"My skills are part of my strength," I replied condescendingly.

"If you are as smart as you claim to be, why don't you help me acquire those skills?" she said with a seductive face.

I raised an eyebrow at his actions.

"Oh, and what could you give me in exchange for helping you acquire them?" I asked with a smile.

"I could use that outfit you called cosplay, which I heard you mention secretly, that you would like to dress your partner in," Mira told me with a mocking face.

'Hmph... so she listened to me that time. It's not a bad deal, I already had it on the agenda to help her with that anyway. With those skills I could better ensure her safety. Also, I'd like to see Mira in a bunny suit.'

"It's a deal, but I'll do it after the holidays," I said casually.

"That's what I wanted to hear, now it's time to get serious" she said with a playful smile and serious eyes.

In a moment, she returned to his black panther form. Following his example, I returned to my snake form. Once the transformations were over, we resumed the fight. The serious Mira quickly reinforced her claws with shadows and entered his shadow. For my part, I quickly created a dozen high-pressure water orbs around me.

Sensing a disturbance in my magic sense at seven o'clock, I fired five high-pressure jets from the orbs towards the ground. The jets wove through the air creating a web to stop the aggressor, but my opponent knew of my tricks. With agile movements, she gracefully dodged each one and quickly approached me.

With a mighty leap, she jumped on my head and with his shadow-coated claws she cut my scales, leaving shallow cuts. But it was something she had allowed on purpose. The rest of the orbs had fixed their position and with a thought they all fired piercing jets towards Mira's limbs. I didn't want to hurt her seriously.

But, when all the jets hit, the Mira in front of me turned into a shadow. It was a shadow clone, one with combat capability.

'When I suggested the idea of Naruto's shadow clones to him, I didn't think she would take it to such an extreme so soon,' I thought fleetingly.

Taking advantage of the fact that his distraction was successful, from a completely new direction, several projectiles formed by shadows headed towards me. Seeing them, I smiled disdainfully. With a simple movement of my tail, which I covered with water magic, I intercepted all the projectiles coming my way.

Without warning, a shadow blade struck my body, creating a small wound on my body. Although I was able to catch it when it appeared, I didn't have time to dodge or block it.

"So you didn't tell me you had already gotten the stealth skill," I said to the air.

"Surprise," Mira replied in an amused tone.

"I hope you know you won't get such a good chance again, you should have ended the fight with that move" I said with a smile.

"As if it were that easy. With your stupid defenses, even an attack aimed at your head would heal in a matter of seconds" she said within the shadows with an irritated tone.

"Thank you, I haven't been a masochist for so long for nothing, darling."

Not wanting to be surprised again, I began to use ultrasonic perception along with magic perception.

Using my water manipulation ability, I drew a massive amount of water from the sea towards me. Using my control over it and mixing my magicules in the process, I created a high-speed water tornado around me as my defense, while simultaneously creating floating icicles on the perimeter, which I shot in the direction of where I sensed Mira. Although they wouldn't do anything to her in the shadow space, it would be the signal to resume combat.

Which she did. With the water tornado completely attached to my body, I prevented her from appearing from my shadow or being harmed by the sharp currents. For someone like her, a typical assassin, facing a turtle-shell opponent was the worst situation.

He had to constantly make use of his shadow blades to try and create cracks in my defense from long range, while dodging my constant attacks of water cannons and ice icicles. She had to make use of his agility and the constant use of shadow movement. Even when she made a dozen shadow whips emerge from my shadow to control my movements, it was just a matter of using my great physical strength to break free from them.

Losing his stealth and facing me, who has both defense, regen, perception, attack, support, and area control, she was at a complete disadvantage.

"You know, Mira, I don't mean to brag, but after investing so much time in training and researching magic and skills, I can boldly say that there is almost no one beneath the strength of a Demon Lord seed who can defeat me, and that's just defeating me. If I want to escape, they have no chance of catching me," I said proudly.

My comment irritated her, because it was true.

Unless Mira became an all-rounder like me, or surpassed me in raw power, she had no chance of defeating me.

That made Mira reach her limits of patience.

Several clones of Mira emerged from the shadows, and from all directions around me they rushed towards my water tornado. I tried to intercept them with icicles, but something surprising happened. Holes of darkness were created in front of the clones, which absorbed the attacks directed towards them.

A smile appeared on my face.

'So you got it,' I thought, but I didn't let up one bit. I tried to make my attacks dodge the holes and hit the clones.

But, like a mass, these were deformed, protecting them like armor.

Bored, I decided to give Mira a chance. I loosened my grip on the water tornado, and with it I created a towering wave, which spread out with me as the center. The wave quickly intercepted all the clones, destroying them.

Taking the opportunity, Mira stepped out of my shadow and using most of her magicules enveloped us both in a sphere of darkness, where there was no light inside.

The next instant, sharp shadow spikes emerged from all sides, aiming to impale me.

A few seconds later, the dome burst like a bubble, disappearing, as if it had never been there.

With her disappearance, the end result was fully visible. With chains of water trapping all of her limbs, preventing her from moving, Mira was still, while sharp ice spikes hovered just millimeters from her neck and heart. For his part, Kai had his entire body protected by a shell of highly dense ice. It was this shell that protected him from being impaled by Mira's movement.

"You lost," I said with a smile.

"I admit it, you are stronger than me, can you let me go now?" Mira said, upset at losing.

"Of course"

Releasing my control over the water, all the restrictions on Mira disappeared into mere puddles of water, the humans couldn't believe that that simple water had defeated an A-rank monster.

We both returned to our human forms and I recreated our beachwear outfits.

'Since I'm going to help her gain regeneration and physical endurance, I might as well try to get her to gain material creation, or she might find herself in some awkward situations when she transforms,' I thought as I gave Mira her bikini.

Seeing that she finished getting dressed, I gave her a big hug from behind.

"I won, so you won't object to me trying to get other girls?" I said playfully.

"Yes, I won't object, but remember the condition, we must both agree on the girl you try to win over, and it must not affect the harmony of our relationship," she said with a sigh of resignation.

Seeing her condition, I hugged her tighter.

"Don't worry, even if I wanted Luminous, the question is whether she agrees, although I would like that to be the case, I lack the strength to impose my will on her, plus she has access to one of the most dangerous powers for me at the moment," I said casually.

"And what is that power?" she asked as she snuggled into my arms.

"Holy power, which is ironic being a Demon Lord. Plus, she's almost two hundred times stronger than me in raw power. A blast of holy power from her would pierce through my barriers, my defenses, severely injure me, and prevent my regeneration from working, killing me completely," I said regretfully.

It's not that I didn't try to create measures to prevent the holy power, but in the end it all comes down to my weak raw power compared to hers.

I could only hope to acquire holy resistance, but only members of their church have access to that power and those who do are few and far between. If I were to kidnap them, it would surely damage their impression of me, plus acquiring that resistance will be more dangerous than others, because it will disable my regeneration, leaving me vulnerable whenever I take damage.

Seeing my depressed expression, Mira patted my head.

"Relax, you'll surely figure it out. You've only been in this world for a year, and in that time you've gone from being nearly killed by a horned rabbit to what you are today. Just give yourself a few more decades and you'll surely become a Demon Lord seed or even a full one."

"I know, but let's leave that for another time. How about we explore a little?"

"Okay, lead the way," she said.

Together we went deeper and deeper into this uncharted land. Like any continent, it had forests, plains, hills, nothing I had ever seen before, apart from a different diversity of monsters. The most relevant thing was the high concentration of ambient magicules; I was sure that normal humans would die if they set foot on this continent. I could feel the traces of a not-so-pleasant acquaintance.

"You're sorry, right?" Mira asked me.

To which I nodded.

"Yes, it's Veldora's aura, and it's very intense. According to what I heard when we first left the forest, Veldora was chased by Velgrynd in this direction. Later, several tsunamis swept through the southern coastal countries, they must have fought here, or rather Veldora was brutally beaten here. If I remember correctly, that should be the event that created the largest volcano in the world, one that would remain active for millennia, just from the remnants of Velgrynd's aura."

'I was wondering why this continent, supposedly as big as Australia, is so small. It's because the volcano was active for so long, destroying everything that exists today and eventually expanding the land exponentially.'

'If I had Veldora get hit by Velgrynd somewhere else in the ocean, could I create another continent?' I shook my head at this stupid idea.

'True Dragons are not to be trifled with or it will end very badly, especially Velgrynd, she is very volatile,' I reminded myself.

Continuing our journey towards the volcano, we could see how the density of magicules was increasing. In a few years, this place would be completely filled with fire monsters.

'It seems Velgrynd took the beating very seriously.'

In front of me, I could see completely scorched earth, craters everywhere, places where the ground had crystallized from the heat, a gigantic wasteland completely burned. In the distance, an imposing volcano rose, so large that it seemed to reach the sky. Above it, a gigantic cloud of ash rose and covered a large area of the sky; along its sides, large rivers of lava flowed to its base and beyond, creating lava pools where monstrous salamanders could be seen enjoying a comfortable bath.

The sight was spectacular; if I didn't know it was caused by Velgrynd, I would say it was a wonder of nature.

But like any good time, it had to be ruined.

A lightning magic was targeting us.

I let out a snort of disdain at such an attack. With a simple wave of my hand, a wind barrier materialized in front of us, countering the lightning.

Although I like to play with water, it doesn't mean that I neglect my practice on the wind element.

After blocking the attack, I saw the attacker.

His appearance was similar to that of an adult human male, with a pair of bat wings on his back, ram-like horns on his head, he wore an aristocratic noble-style outfit, but what stood out most about him was his long yellow hair, as well as his eyes with a sclera of the same color.

'From the look of it and the strength of its aura, I'd say it's an ArchDaemon of Jaune's bloodline, but one that barely qualifies as such. Coupled with the fact that it's not embodied in a physical body, I'd say it's not much of a threat.'

But her appearance put me on alert. Using my magic sense to the max, covering almost a kilometer around, I tried to sense the presence of other Daemons. It wouldn't be fun if I ran into other ArchDaemons or Jaune herself.

Luckily for me, I couldn't sense any others besides the one in front of me. Those of Jaune's bloodline weren't known for being discreet, so they didn't hide their presence.

Without saying a word, he continued his attack. He continuously released magic and I simply neutralized it in flight. Every now and then, I counterattacked with my own magic, creating highly concentrated wind blades, which he dodged or simply ignored. Although I couldn't deal much damage to him due to his magic resistance and immunity to physical damage, as he was a projection completely made of magicules, I was no slouch in terms of firepower.

'To deal with daemons, magic is one of the worst options. To deal with these guys, it's necessary to use battle aura, spirit magic, light magic, or holy power, all of which I can't use right now. It would be best to make him spend more magicules so that the world's repulsion can get him out of here.'

And with that thought, I continued our battle of attrition, even though I knew it was not a solution.

I needed to inflict more damage on his projection, so that he would expend more energy quickly to maintain it and not be expelled into the world. Our battle lasted for several minutes, which irritated him. Annoyed at not being able to kill me as he wanted, he began to create a black orb in his hands, which set off my warning alarms to the highest level. It was an abyss core, an incredibly dense ball of dark flames capable of interfering with spiritrons.

'Damn bastard, you're the one who started the conflict and just because I don't die, you go and pull out nuclear magic. Damn all the daemons of Jaune's bloodline, they're worse than those of Rouge's bloodline.'

Not wanting to risk the possibility that this daemon knew of the most potent nuclear magic, I had to stop him.

[Mira, stop that bastard from completing the magic or we're screwed] I sent a message to Mira, who, since the fight began, had been hiding in the shadows waiting for an opportunity.

Receiving my message, he appeared behind the bastard and, using his shadow sphere, attacked him from all directions, which interrupted the magic before it was fully formed, causing an explosion of black flames where the demon was.

After attacking him, Mira had hidden herself in the shadows again and appeared next to me.

Knowing that wouldn't be enough to finish him off, I quickly concentrated most of the magicules into a powerful hydraulic cannon mixed with lightning magic several meters thick and with immense pressure. When the flames disappeared, I aimed where I felt his energy signature and fired the cannon at full power.

In milliseconds, the cannon hit the bastard, sending him flying and dismembering his projection.

After waiting a while in case that wasn't enough and seeing no trace of him, I nodded in satisfaction.

"Damn bastard, you fucked up our sweet atmosphere. If I ever see you again, I will catch you, put you in my fucking lab and make you my experiment rat. The project will be called: How to mentally destroy a spiritual life form" I screamed into the wind.

Mira just patted me on the back to relax me.

After letting out a tired sigh, I composed myself.

"We should go, that guy might not be able to come back for a while, but he can send other daemons to bother us. There is a door to his world near the volcano."

Without wasting any time, we used shadow movement and returned to our beach house in the Trident Kingdom.

When we got back, I was in a bad mood for a while.

'Not only did I not get a chance to check out the volcano's mineral deposits, but now I might have a damn ArchDaemon out for revenge. To top it off, he's from Jaune's bloodline, so next time he'll probably start with nuclear magic.

'Looks like that visit to Ramiris will have to be put on the agenda. Not only might I be in trouble for killing the dragons with Milim, I now also need the means to deal with the demons, be it spirit magic, battle aura control, or various summoning rituals. She should be able to help me with that. All in all, I'm sure Guy already knows about me; the fact that he hasn't come or sent his sequences means he wants to have some fun with me.'

'At least if I get to know Ramiris and establish a good relationship with her, surely Milim and Guy won't go to the extremes of killing me so as not to make Ramiris sad. Although that sounds low on my part, I would actually like to establish a sincere friendship with her. If there's anyone who deserves my respect, it's her. Not only has she always helped those in need, she was also the one who stopped Milim's rampage and prevented this world from being destroyed. Everyone in this world owes their life to her. She may seem weak, she may be annoying, but she's one of the purest beings in this world and deserves respect.