Mutagen

Day ▋▋ - ▋▋:37 PM - Spire Tree Castle, Kingdom of Black Duendes, Spirit Dimension

The battle between the intruder and the Demons were entirely one-sided. Everyone in the town was now paying attention, and they all could see how the dead bodies of Winged Demons fall from the sky one by one.

Everyone under the area of the battle fled far as blood and body parts rained from above. A lot of decapitated heads crash on the roofs far from their bodies. Sometimes, it would be sliced off wings, at times, limbs. In the worst scenes, internal organs as they fell out of bodies sliced in half.

Imagine a body that was cut on its abdomen, flipping in the air as it fell from the sky, splattering its intestines everywhere. It was definitely not a pleasant sight.

It was still better for the bodies that turned to dust after hitting the ground. However, not every Demon had a body that was made of magical energy, especially those with mixed bloodlines. And thus, those dead bodies were left on the streets, the roofs of the houses, and even on people.

At this unpleasant sight, however, a certain class of people was delighted.

It was the human slaves.

The Duendes were known to take humans away from the mortal world. However, it was limited to either those that they liked or those that offended them. However, due to the influence of the Demons, slavery of humans and other races became common in this place. It caused some of the unexplainable missing cases of people from the past until the present.

It was all because of these accursed Demons.

Even now, most of the operations involving slavery in this place were supervised by these Demons. The slave's pain, ill-treatment, and broken minds were all because of these Demons.

And now, they were all watching the battle in the sky with their lifeless eyes.

They did not know who their enemy was.

They were not making any unnecessary noise out of fear.

However, they all rooted for the being that was killing all those Demons.

'Kill them all! Kill them all!'

Their hearts shouted. Unfortunately, their minds had been deeply scarred that their bodies remained unmoved.

***

At the highest balcony of the Spire Tree Castle, Luserio was smiling at the sight of the Demons falling from the sky.

That smile, however, made Il'vella very uncomfortable.

"Your Majesty. Shouldn't we need to help them?"

Il'vella could not hold it anymore and asked Luserio. Those Demons, after all, was their soldiers. Furthermore, she was a Demon herself.

Luserio glanced at her and spoke.

"My dear Il'vella. Do you remember the orders I gave them?"

"Safely secure Lumeria and kill the intruder."

Il'vella replied without any hesitation. She remembered the orders clearly as she was together with Luserio in her chambers when Dregor received the orders.

"You remembered my exact words." Luserio nodded and turned his head back to the ongoing battle. "Then tell me, is there any sign of them following the orders I gave?"

Il'vella could not reply. There was no way to defend the Demon soldiers. The way they attacked relentlessly and fired off their magic towards the intruder was not safe at all. If the enemy was any weaker, those attacks were enough to harm Lumeria. The only thing in their mind at this point was to kill the intruder.

"I don't need soldiers that did not know how to follow orders correctly." Luserio continued. "This is a good opportunity to get rid of them without dirtying my hands."

Luserio's eyes then fell on the only Demon that was not doing anything in the battle, taking command of his subordinates.

"Especially that Dregor. He is being too ambitious as of late. I just gave him a bit of freedom to act, but he had already done many things to hinder the competency of his peers while being incompetent himself. It was his idea to relocate the nest of Daellum's pet spider, and now, it is dead. I would have turned a blind eye on that if he showed any value. But with his current display, I better choose a new general to manage the Demon soldiers soon."

Those were some harsh words from the heartless King. He might have worded it differently, but those words had already put Dregor and his subordinates unto the execution block.

Luserio just declared that they better died here.

That, however, did not sit well with Il'vella.

"But Your Majesty, won't their deaths anger the Lord? These soldiers were sent by him."

Finishing her words, however, Il'vella realized that she messed up.

Luserio grabbed her chin as he closed his face to hers. It was not in a romantic way, however, as he was exuding a suffocating killing intent. The Playful Tyrant was not playing this time.

The kind of expression Luserio had made the succubus fear for her life.

"My dear Il'vella... I value you as one of my Queens. You have the beauty, the body, and you are quite obedient. However, it seemed that you have yet to understand who you should please."

Luserio then grabbed her waist, puller her body towards him in a violent manner.

"The moment I laid my eyes on you, you are mine. That Three-headed Lord of yours already gave you to me as a tie for the alliance they wanted. You should worry about serving me and not anyone else being something that I own. Do you understand my words?"

"Y-yes... M-my apologies."

Il'vella replied, stuttering in fear.

"Then, good. I will expect more from you," Luserio let go of Il'vella. "I really like you, my dear Il'vella. Please don't force me to add another gravestone in the Royal Burial Ground."

Il'vella bowed while shaking. The pressure that accompanied Luserio's killing intent was too hard for her to endure. When he mentioned the burial grounds, she became even more afraid.

The Royal Burial Grounds was different from the Ancestral Grounds, where the latter had the empty tombs of former members of the Royal Family of Black Duendes rested in peace. It was a graveyard that was built under Luserio's orders. In this burial ground laid the gravestones of the women that dared to defy Luserio's orders. The former supposed Queens that died by his own hands.

Il'vella never wanted to be among those women.

"It looks like the time for me to step out is coming soon."

Luserio said, making Il'vella turn her head towards the battle once more.

There, barely around twenty of the Winged Demons were left, along with the heavily injured Dregor.

***

Mark flapped his wings while smiling under his mask. Around him, only eighteen and a half Demons were left to surround him.

Why was there a half? It was because Dregor was there, only left with one arm and one leg. His wings were missing too. He had to rely on the large bat that the female spy was riding on in order to stay on the battlefield.

"You bastard, you think you already won?"

Dregor grunted in pain.

Splat! Splat!

Dregor's wounds made disgusting sounds as his missing limbs and wings suddenly grew back, splattering his greenish-black blood everywhere like a certain green alien species.

With his new limbs and wings, Dregor flew once more, returning the number of enemies back to nineteen.

Mark only stared at him incredulously, though. His ability was quite absurd considering that lizards could only regenerate an inferior tail after it was cut off. Well, not like Mark was someone who could complain.

Even so, Mark was not really amused. Dregor was the leader of these soldiers, but he was definitely dumb. He could have feigned his injury and let himself fall before regenerating his limbs and make his escape. Instead, however, this Lizard Demon decided to show off his regeneration to Mark. As if it could change anything, consider that...

SLASH! SLASH!

Mark could overwhelm him in terms of speed and slice off his limbs without any effort.

"AAAAAAARGH!!!"

Dregor cried out in pain as he watched his newly grown arm fall to the ground once again. In the least, he retreated from Mark, who appeared behind him.

"RAAARGH!!!"

Dregor cried out as he regrew his arm. However, it was obvious that every time that he regrew a missing part of his body, it was consuming his energy. He already lost. However, he did not want to admit it. And thus, continued to fight, despite their imminent death.

It was the same for the remaining Demons around Mark. The only exception was the female spy that was already hesitating whether to continue supporting Dregor or flee.

"DIE!"

Dregor roared, charging towards Mark together with the other Demons.

But then, they all froze without even closing onto Mark.

"Dregor, that's enough." Luserio's voice echoed in everyone's ears. "Don't disgrace yourself any further."

At this point, a visage of a person suddenly appeared standing in front of Dregor.

It was no other than Luserio himself.

Mark stared at this King of Black Duendes. Different from the illusion that he saw earlier, the King was now wearing a fancy robe with metallic armor-like pieces.

This time, Mark was sure that it was not an illusion. Luserio was here himself. And to say, seeing a Duende capable of hovering mid-air was a bit surreal.

"Your Majesty, I-!"

Facing Luserio's back, Dregor tried to reason. However, he was met with his King's glare over his shoulder.

"I thought of giving you another chance. However, it seemed that you are really unfit to serve me. Your service is not needed any longer."

BADUMP!

At Luserio's glare, Dregor's eyes widened.

"URK!"

Dregor tried to resist. However, his right hand started to approach his chest.

SPLURT!

Unable to resist Luserio's power, Dregor pulled out his own heart. With Luserio as the last image in his mind, Dregor's lifeless body plummeted to the ground.

Everyone that witnessed was surprised, not to mention that almost the entire town was watching. However, the surprise was a bit lackluster that it did not amount to their shock from watching Mark fight a hundred Demons alone.

After all, it was not the first time for them to witness Luserio killing a subordinate.

Just recently, during the time that the infected came into the Spirit Dimension, one of Luserio's previous generals made a mistake. It was still not known that the infected could turn others into one of their kind. The general brought back an injured soldier that already got bitten.

In the end, that soldier, along with other injured soldiers and civilians in the healing facility, became infected. It caused chaos to the southwest part of the town.

The general had to hold responsibility and was executed for incompetence.

There were also other cases before. That was why Dregor's death was not that much of a surprise considering what happened.

The other Demons retreated after Dregor's death. Their general was killed mercilessly, not to mention them, who were mere soldiers.

At this point, only Luserio and Mark were left in the sky of the town. Well, Teremillio and Lumeria were also present, but there were hidden.

"I commend you for being able to last this long, Demon. Now, hand over Lumeria, and I might consider you to replace Dregor as my new general." Luserio proposed while scrutinizing Mark. But then, the King noticed. "Though I am puzzled. How can a Miasma Demon like you have a physical body to hold a sword or even hide Lumeria inside your body?"

Mark, who was disguised as a Miasma Demon surely intrigued the tyrant King. And to say, he was interested in turning Mark unto his subordinate.

To all the King's words, however, no reply came. Not a single word.

Mark only flapped his wings while observing the King in Black Duendes in front of him. Not even a sign that he would reply could be seen.

This made the King of Black Duendes frown.

Not only Luserio. Even Teremillio and Lumeria were looking at Mark from his pocket since he was not uttering a single word since earlier.

"Boss, have you gone mute? Why are you not replying?"

Teremillio whispered.

And then, the reply came to Teremillio's question.

"What should I reply? I don't understand what they are saying."

Teremillio almost fell from Mark's pocket.

It was no wonder why Mark was silent until now.

He was disguised as a Demon and had an aura of a Demon. That was why Luserio and Dregor spoke to him in Demonic Language.

And Mark, who grew up in the Mortal World, had absolutely no way of understanding their words.