As Azier and Mizonas continued their battle…
“……!”
Mizonas suddenly flinched and raised his head towards the ceiling.
“……?”
Azier’s sword momentarily paused. He could have taken advantage of this opening, but it was so obvious that it seemed like a deliberate trap.
“….So you’ve met!”
Mizonas exclaimed through gritted teeth. Azier couldn’t understand his words at that moment.
“You actually escaped that prison!”
However, those words alone were enough for him to guess.
Frondier had told him to ignore it even if the monster escaped. He would handle it himself.
So, what Mizonas just meant by ‘you’ve met’ was…
“…Did it encounter Frondier?”
“Hmph!”
Mizonas stepped back. Not only that, he completely turned his body around. He was trying to escape.
“I have no more business with the likes of you. Right away…”
Swish!
Mizonas’s words were cut short.
A chillingly powerful aura and bloodlust converged and surged towards Mizonas.
“Ugh!”
Mizonas barely managed to pull his body back, dodging the sword path.
Kwaaaang!
The sword strike, completely blocking Mizonas’s path, left a clear mark on the ground around him.
“Where do you think you’re going?”
Azier’s voice lowered, sending a chill down Mizonas’s spine.
‘What’s with this guy? The atmosphere is different from before.’
Mizonas had originally intended to escape while dodging Azier’s attacks. According to his calculations, it was possible.
His evasion abilities definitely surpassed Azier’s attacks, so if he focused on escaping, he could definitely get out of here.
The reason Mizonas’s calculations were wrong was simple.
He had only seen Azier’s ‘defense’ until now.
“You dare, a mere insect like you.”
Azier’s momentum swelled like a wave, engulfing the ground beneath Mizonas’s feet.
When he fought to defeat him, Azier felt like an impenetrable fortress, but now, Azier felt like a massive landslide falling from a high mountain.
“To harbor thoughts of harming my brother?”
A voice filled with bloodlust, and even a provocative tone. Mizonas wanted to retort as he had done before, but it wasn’t easy.
The battle with Azier was no longer like solving a difficult puzzle. Mizonas belatedly began to realize that he might actually die.
‘He’s preventing me from advancing or retreating from this position…!’
Mizonas gritted his teeth.
He had to admit it for sure. Azier had already surpassed his skills by a large margin.
The reason Mizonas was still alive was due to Azier’s cautious nature. He was wary of what might be behind this ‘demon,’ a being he had never seen before, which made it seem like their skills were similar.
‘He ordered me to never let the Calamity and Frondier meet…!’
Mizonas didn’t know the reason for this. He received an order, so he had to carry it out even if it cost him his life.
‘It can’t be helped. Even if I can’t leave this place!’
Crunch!
At that moment, Mizonas did a strange thing.
He bit his own forearm. Red blood flowed from the bitten forearm, dripping down. It was clearly not a light wound.
‘…Red blood.’
Seeing that, Azier recalled a fact that seemed both obvious and not.
Even these beings called demons had red blood. It was a new realization.
“All the power of a demon is bound by a contract.”
Mizonas spoke. The sight of his blood-stained lips turning redder with each word was a little gruesome.
“The blood I shed myself summons my minions through a contract.”
With those words…
Azier felt sinister energies approaching from the depths of the underground. Their numbers swelled beyond immediate count, spreading a tingling sensation of bloodlust throughout the Imperial Palace.
‘…Underground.’
That location, that direction, was a bit strange.
Come to think of it, if this guy was really a demon, someone from another world…
What method did he use, and where did he come from?
“Now, my countless minions will lead your brother to his death!”
Mizonas said with a smile.
The reason he was so openly bragging about his plan was because, given the situation, it would be best for Azier to leave this place.
Instead of fighting here alone, it would be much better for Mizonas to attack Frondier with his subordinates. Inside the Imperial Palace, there were many humans with far less skill than Azier, so using them was also an option.
“…You said your minions.”
However, Azier’s face became more relaxed than before. It was a bit strange, but Mizonas proudly declared anyway.
“That’s right! My powerful allies, too numerous to count, will…”
“That’s a relief.”
“What?”
Azier still didn’t relax his posture. He had no intention of moving from this place.
As Frondier had said, he would keep this guy here. He was convinced that this was the best strategy.
“If they’re your minions, they must be weaker than you.”
“……!”
“Summon a legion of such insignificant beings.”
Azier’s blade pointed towards Mizonas.
Even after being threatened with his brother’s life, the tip of his sword remained steady and clean as always.
“You’ll see what happens when insects meet insecticide.”
* * *
I had a thought about what the ‘Calamity of Metamorph’ had said.
‘Test subject.’
Certainly, the appearance of this monster when I first encountered it was quite bizarre.
At first, I thought it was because he was from another world, but according to Gregory’s report, the guy named Mizonas who was fighting Azier looked very similar to a human.
Was this guy so different because he was a test subject?
Experiments from another world…
“Ugh, uh, uhhh…!”
The monster was still writhing in pain. It seemed the backlash was severe as he tried to force open his closed memories.
However, after realizing that his memories were closed, he wouldn’t be able to bear it without opening them.
‘Did they learn how to seal memories during the experiment, or is it some kind of demonic ability?’
Whichever it was, the memory seal placed on it seemed to have worked well until just before. It wasn’t even aware that it had lost its memory.
“Ugh, ugh… Wings. Black wings…!”
I didn’t ask the monster anything. Nevertheless, it was spitting out what it was recalling from his memory. It was an act of self-defense to avoid losing its memories.
Of course, from the enemy’s perspective, it was close to ‘information leakage.’
“Black, bird wings, red eyes…!”
I could guess immediately from that description.
‘Satan.’
In the game Etius, among the demons corresponding to the Seven Deadly Sins, Satan had the most prominent physical description.
He had one major difference from other demons, which was that his wings resembled those of a bird. The wings of other demons were all similar to bat wings.
This was based on the setting that Satan was originally a ‘fallen angel’ and not a demon, but well, Satan in reality is depicted with bat-like wings like other demons, so it should be considered a unique setting of Etius.
“And in front of him, several humans…”