Demon's Virtue

Eiro stood there, waiting for the emptiness of the forced removal of that much mana from within his body to disappear. It was really an uncomfortable feeling, but something that was quite worth it. This was the best chance that Eiro had to truly test out the limits of his magic. However, due to the sheer amount that he had lost, he was feeling quite dizzy at the moment. His pupils were dilating as well, and his body experienced cold shivers.

Trying not to let this fact be seen by others, Eiro looked at the man in front of him, who was simply staring back at him, baffled.

"That was..." Tin muttered, as he pressed the pillar he was holding onto into the ground, before a broad grin could be seen on his face, "...fuckin' amazing!" He yelled out, followed by a loud, annoying laugh. Eiro rolled his eyes as he took a few steps forward, pressing his hand onto Tin's arm. With the rest of the mana that he had leftover, he could heal a wound like this easily. It wasn't like it was one that was too tough to heal anyway, and Nelli was there to help him out as well.

Then, without another word, the Demon stepped away. He had calmed down after that fight as well. But Tin still had something to say to him, "Oi, wait a second! You said ya didn't want me to bother that friend of yours, and your kid anymore, right?"

"I remember my words quite well. What about it?"

"Why?"

Eiro looked back at Tin with a confused frown, "Why? Did you seriously just ask me that?" The Demon asked, getting somewhat annoyed, "We're talking about my family here. Why would I want a fucker like you to bother them? And the fact that you were so pissed off earlier shows me that you wouldn't have stopped bothering them either." Eiro said, clicking his tongue, "Truly, that's why I hate people like you."

Tin stared at Eiro with an angry frown, "What'd you mean, 'people like you'?"

"People like you, that don't bother to use the brain that they've been given at birth. There are so many people that can only think in black and white, in good and evil, in 'you' and 'me'. Why does heritage matter, huh? Would you kill the infant child of your enemy, huh?" Eiro asked, annoyed. He was quite easy to agitate because he wasn't feeling well, so he might have snapped a bit although he was trying to get closer to Tin. However, Eiro didn't have much time to calm down, as he was soon approached by the Baram warriors.

"That sword! Did you summon it from elsewhere? How were you able to turn it so giant?" They asked, while the little hero was still standing in their middle, staring at Eiro, basically as if he was able to see through his disguise and right into his soul, seeing the man that had caused his death in a former life. It was that kind of stare, but Eiro of course knew that this wasn't the case.

Still, kind of annoyed, the Demon let out a deep sigh, "No, I didn't summon it, I just made it." Eiro explained bluntly, "I summoned water, flames, and earth, and then compressed and shrunk it down with the help of a few different types of magic."

"What?! Don't joke with me! You say you summoned water and flames? The only spirit that was up there was that Golem!" One of the other mages exclaimed. If Eiro remembered correctly, he also formed a contract with some spirits. Two of them. A Sylph and a Golem, spirits of air and earth. But they were clearly the original sort of contract, not the kind that Eiro had formed with Nelli, Gondos, and Sarius.

"Yeah, so?" Eiro replied with a slight sigh, "Who says I need to use spirits in order to summon those things?" He said bluntly, and the mage stared at him confused, "H-Huh? What?"

Eiro snapped his finger, since he didn't want to bother explaining. His plan was to put his abilities out into the open in the first place at this point. They were rather impressive, after all, so that would just increase his standing amongst these people even more. In the future, Eiro needed their trust to the point where he would have the chance to steal the aspect that makes this kid the 'Hero', and for that he needed to get close. He needed to become the main person that they would have teach the hero in the future.

Beside him, his three contracted spirits appeared, and Nelli quickly began to explain, "You see, our dear Eiro has been blessed by multiple Spirit Monarchs over the years, and has later been appointed the guardian of two separate spirit gateways, allowing him to access those elemental planes without our interference." She explained with a slightly smug expression, before Sarius slightly raised his hand, "Ah, I'm the future Salamander King, by the way. Just wanted to put that out there. That makes it kinda more believable, right?"

"S-Salamander... king?" That spirit mage looked at Eiro with a confused expression while the Demon was simply tiredly yawning. Soon, the mage put mana into the air, and used it as a conduit to summon his spirits. However, he did something interesting.

"Oh Morganus, oh Gigantia, I summon thee." He said with a somewhat awkward expression, and two masses formed beside him. A female Golem and a male Sylph quickly appeared right beside him, "Huh? What is it?" The Golem asked somewhat annoyed, before she spotted Eiro. Her eyes opened wide in surprise, "Huh? This guy, what's with his affinity for the earth? You, won't you-"

Before the Golem, Gigantia, was able to finish speaking, Gondos quickly intervened and floated in front of her, "He already has entered a contract with a Golem. Please do not continue those words."

"Huh? What's that, you little kid? You tryna fight?" She replied immediately, but Gondos simply stayed floating there. Gigantia looked past him and stared at Eiro, "I'll even make you a good deal for a contract..."

"Better than an equality contract? I doubt it." Eiro scoffed slightly, and Gigantia immediately froze up, slightly turning toward the mage, who was trying to understand Eiro's words.

"An equality contract? What do you mean?" He asked, confused by what his contracted Golem was speaking about, and Eiro lightly smirked, "Oh, you see, the contracts that spirits usually enter with people is one set in extreme favor for themselves. Basically, you've been scammed." He explained, "Anyway, you heard it, right? They explained it."

The Baram warriors stared at Eiro, unsure what to say. Eiro didn't sense any particular spirit magic around these parts, so he doubted that they knew what to say exactly. But one of them did step forward and looked at Eiro, "Is it in any way possible to transfer the ownership of these 'spirit gateways' to others?"

The Demon looked back at the warrior, and locked eyes with him for a few seconds, before simply chuckling, "Nah, sorry, not possible. First of all, I'm not the 'owner' of these things anyway, I'm their guardian. Their protector. The one that 'owns' these gateways is this world itself, so if you want to have some, gotta ask them yourself. And beyond that, these ones are fused with my soul, so sorry about that."

"Huh? With your soul?" The warrior asked, "Why would you do something like that? Isn't that dangerous?"

"Well yeah, of course it is. If I'm not careful, my soul is going to be ripped apart when I die, but well, that's not that big a deal. I think." Eiro pointed out, "It's probably gonna be quite painful though. Anyway, yeah, that's how it is. Anything else you wanna know about all this?"

"Yeah..." The transmigrated boy, the one blessed by the god of magic, started to speak, "How much mana did it take to create that?"

The moment that he asked the question, everyone else stared at Eiro as well, since they wanted to know too. The two summoned spirits already had a rough idea of the sheer amount of mana that he had, but even they were only able to see the leftover mana that was spread out throughout his soul.

"Erm... In terms of mana points, two million, one-hundred-thirty-seven thousand, four hundred and eighty-nine." He said bluntly, "But don't worry, I'll have it recovered by tomorrow. Just need some potions and a nap."

"T-Two million... two million mana, you say...?" All the mages gathered here were completely baffled by what Eiro had told them. That number was absolutely ridiculous. It wasn't something believable in the slightest. But... that was the only explanation for the fact that Eiro had been able to create something like that all on his own.

"Anyway, shouldn't the next fight- erm, 'spar', begin now?" Eiro asked, slightly scratching the back of his head. The Baram warriors of course nodded their heads, but also stared at Eiro, "We will need you to accompany us further after this session is over, however. We have a few more questions."

"Ah... yeah, I figured so." The Demon replied quickly, "I'll reply to anything that I want to answer." He said bluntly, and proceeded to step past everyone, although he was of course quickly followed by plenty of the mages. In particular, that boy was quite interested in what Eiro could say to him. It seemed like this was the last straw that convinced him to work together with Eiro, something that he was quite glad about.

For now, Eiro answered a few more questions, simply being open about certain things, of course only limiting it to some certain details. There were plenty of things that Eiro didn't, and won't, give away to anyone anytime soon.