Chapter 384 - Asylum

Inhaltsverzeichnis

Chapter 381 - Complexity. 2

Chapter 382 – Undead Hunters. 5

Chapter 383 – Undead Girl 8

Chapter 381 - Complexity

Eiro left the Arena, watching Richard swiftly scurry away after their interaction just now. Nelli was floating next to Eiro's head and stared at him, "Was that really necessary? He's just a kid."

"I know that he's just a kid. But considering that he threatened to have the children killed, and genuinely, truthfully meant that. I'm not letting someone like that get away with nothing." Eiro pointed out, "I should still think about how exactly to deal with this, though..."

"Can't you just kill the kid like you would anyone else?" Sarius suggested, and Eiro turned his head toward the Salamander, "Do you even understand why I agreed to be a teacher here at this school? At all?"

"Eh... Cause you're bored?" 

"No, it's not because I'm bored. I'm wasting valuable time that I could use to train myself and push my plans further ahead. The reason I'm not doing that and am here instead is quite simple, really." Eiro started, and as he was about to continue, Gondos spoke his thoughts.

"It is because you wish to find new sides to yourself, is it not?" The Golem suggested, and Eiro immediately nodded his head, "That's exactly right, yes. From what I remember, when I saw the fragment of a 'human' in my soul, that boy was roughly the age of the kids here. Maybe a bit older, but not by much. Being around so many children, as emotional as they are, I might be able to learn something about that side of my soul, right? Most of the students here at Humans, after all."

"...Basically, you want to just expose yourself to as many vastly different humans, in the hope of becoming more human yourself?" Nelli asked, and Eiro nodded, "Mhm. I've already been trying, and it's working pretty well, I'd say. I helped that Rico kid just by talking to him about his worries, and I plan on helping Richard as well somehow. If I can fix others, then why not myself?"

Nelli turned her head to look at the other two spirits next to her, as Eiro let out a deep sigh and started to walk forward, away from the arena. He had to get to his next class now.

As he was walking over the campus, the Demon made sure to properly take notice of anything and everything that was happening around him. In particular, he wanted to make sure that there was no other sort of bullying going on right now. Because he knew that he wuld have to end up dealing with it, and he didn't want to be late for the next class.

Basically, Eiro just had a whole bunch of practical classes, and only a handful of theoretical classes. One of the theoretical classes was this morning, and now he had a practical magic class. And more specifically, it was a practical class for the magic-circle creation line of the Magic division.

Eiro swiftly made his way through the campus and reached the special room created for the actual magic practice, with strong barriers covering the walls so that nothing could go wrong. The students already gathered there, holding very basic wands in their hands.

As Eiro made his way inside, he already spotted most of his students in here. There were just a handful missing, but they also came just a minute or two after the bell was rung.

"Now, let's hope you won't be late for the next class, you three." The Demon sighed slightly, "So, just to make sure, but you all are second-year students, isn't that right?" Eiro asked, and the students quickly nodded their heads.

"Good, good. That means you already learned about the theory behind creating magic circles last year. For now, please create an 'Empty' Magic circle, please. Don't worry, nothing is going to happen with it for now, no pressure, I just want to see that you all are able to 'draw' magic into the air." The Demon explained, demonstrating exactly what he meant with an 'empty' magic circle. 

While the students, were doing this, Eiro slowly got a certain book out of his treasury and proceeded to flip it to a particular few pages.

"Perfect. You all seem to have the basic requirements down. You can draw magic in the air, and shape-wise, your empty magic circles all seem nearly perfect as well. Sure, some of you took longer than others, but that's totally fine. For now, activate those magic circles so that they won't bother us anymore." The Demon suggested, and all of the empty glowing circles quickly disappeared from in front of the students.

"From now on, since you can all already do the basics, it's all relatively simple. It's like writing. For now, you know the letters. Let's say, a letter is each individual aspect of a magic circle. Like a rune, that seems simple enough, right?"

Eiro slowly started to draw a magic circle into the air. For now, he just drew a basic 'air' rune into the air.

"Then, using multiple letters, you can create words." Eiro continued, drawing a circle around the rune, and connecting it to two other runes inside of circles, forming a triangle of sorts.

"From those words, you then head off into the territory of sentences." The Demon added three more runes and connected those to each other in a triangle, creating a simple hexagram.

"And here we have it. Using letters and words, you create a coherent sentence. It's like speaking. You want to convey specific information, and use the knowledge you gathered so far for it." Eiro smiled lightly, and then glanced at the Grimoire in his hand, "And some people use those individual sentences to write books, to convey even more information."

Just like that, Eiro started to wave his hand around, expanding upon this relatively simple 'Gust' spell in extreme ways. Its size doubled and tripled, and became extremely complex.

"Take a look at this magic circle. It seems complex, but at the end of the day, I didn't particularly use different techniques than you all already know. If you wanted to, you could create a magic circle like this yourself." Eiro explained to the students, who were all just staring back at him in complete shock at what they were seeing. This thing was made so easily in front of them, within just a few moments.

"Now, can one of you tell me what exactly this magic circle does?" Eiro asked with a smile. The students thought for a few moments, until one of them raised her hand, "It's a modified version of the 'Gust' spell, and there are a lot of 'strengthen' runes to increase the effect of a spell... So I'd guess it's 'Gust', just a lot stronger?"

Eiro smiled lightly, "Exactly. This is an extremely strong 'Gust' spell." The Demon activated it, away from the children of course, and as if all air where they stood was suddenly being pushed forward rapidly, the students could feel their bodies being pulled forward. Some of them even had their wands pulled right out of their hand, but Eiro quickly caught them.

"Now, of course I could have made it so that this spell does many other things, but I only made it do this one thing. Do you think making this spell in that exact way was worth it for this result?" Eiro inquired, and the students looked at each other and thought about it for a bit.

"It seems like it, yes." One of them replied, and Eiro just smiled as he created another magic circle to show off another principle. He was specifically asked to do something like this by the theory teacher.

Eiro quickly created a smaller magic circle. It was still quite complex, but at least it was far more simple than earlier. And then, Eiro activated the magic circle, and one of the students fell to the ground as an even stronger gust of air was pushed into the opposite direction.

"So, how can you explain this? This smaller, less complex magic circle is more powerful than the giant, complex one from before." The Demon asked the students, but none of them replied, since they were simply incredibly confused.

"You see, the reason is simple. Just because something is complex doesn't mean it's better. Something that you should always strive to do as a Mage that uses magic circles is to simplify any of your magic circles. This small one was a directly simpler version of the large one from before. That being the case, what if I turned this smaller version into the centerpiece of another huge magic circle? What would happen then?"

One of the students raised their hand after Eiro's explanation, trying to answer, "It would become weaker again...?" 

Eiro slowly shook his head, "Oh, no, no, that's not what I meant with 'complex doesn't mean better'. If you take a basic magic circle and add some other more complex parts onto it, with a specific thought-out plan, then it will make the magic circle stronger for sure. But it's not right to assume that any incredibly complex magic circle is incredibly strong as well. And it certainly doesn't mean your opponent is skilled. Rather than that... Can someone tell me why it could mean your opponent is less skilled than you?"

"Well, if you have two mages, and they cause the same exact effect through a magic circle, but one is simpler and the other is overly complex, then that means the one with the simpler magic circle is more skilled... Right?" 

"Yes, exactly." Eiro replied, "Because the other mage didn't have as high an understanding of the principles of magic circles as you did, they had to resort to unnecessarily complex methods. I think everyone here understands the principle now. Could all of you recreate the 'Gust' spell for me? And make it as simple as possible. Don't worry about the strength for now."

Eiro slowly turned around as he watched the students excitedly get to work, before he noticed something surprising. Through one of the windows, he could see a familiar figure flying through the Sky. At first Eiro had hoped that it was Lognir coming back from the trip to spread the 'Necromancer' rumor, but he apparently already got back from that a couple of days ago, so it most likely wasn't him. And the castle was in the whole other direction.

So, Eiro quickly focused his eyes a bit more than he normally would, being in such a small room, and quickly realized that it was the Nephilim Ariella, slowly approaching the Academy for some reason.

Eiro could barely see her expression from here, but judging from her body-language, she was actually rather angry. That probably wouldn't turn out too well for Eiro, then. 

Chapter 382 – Undead Hunters

"I have to step outside for a second. Until then, take a bit of a break and let your mana recover a little bit. I'll be right back." Eiro told his students, swiftly heading toward this room's exit. He made his way out of this building, and quickly waited for Ariella to land in front of him.

The Demon looked back at her with a light sigh, "Is something wrong, Ariella?"

"Are you seriously asking me that? Seriously?" She asked, crossing her arms and staring back at Eiro. The Demon thought about it for a moment, but didn't find any reason for her to be particularly mad.

"Wait, don't tell me you're somehow related to the Melachines..." 

"Melachines? What are you talking about? No, I mean the fact that you're leading numerous 'Undead Hunters' to the capital. I heard about those rumours that you're spreading, Eiro." Ariella pointed out, "Why would you do something like that?"

"Because I need a specific person to come here, that's why. And why are you bothered with those 'Undead Hunters' at all? You're a Nephilim, not a Lich or something like that." The Demon pointed out, and Ariella rubbed the bridge of her nose annoyed, "Because Undead Hunters are absolute bothers. They think they're above the law, they use their 'Life Golems' or whatever they call them to search a whole town for anything with even an ounce of 'Death' Magic, and they-"

"Don't mind slaughtering anyone who they believe to be 'heretics', I know. But again, why are you bothered at all? What do you have to do with Death Magic?"

"It's not about me, it's about people I'm close to. One of them is a young girl, she's a novice Necromancer. She would never think of using people for her undead, of course, but she does practice using insects and vermin. If those Undead Hunters coincidentally find one of those bugs, they'll be able to trace it back to her. That means I'll have to leave with her, and that obviously messes with all my plans." Ariella explained to Eiro, who slowly crossed his arms.

"Hm, alright, I think I've got a solution for you there. Wait until the end of the schoolday, it's another six or so hours, I'll have a way to deal with those Undead Hunters ready for you by then." Eiro pointed out, and Ariella seemed a bit taken aback, "What are you-"

"I'm going to lure them to me, obviously. Believe it or not, but I have an affinity for death magic myself. I can't use it yet because I didn't practice it at all, but I do have the affinity. I'll deal with them. Actually, that's going to help me even more." Eiro pointed out, "If numerous Undead Hunters come here just to disappear, that's going to intice the one I want to come just the more." 

Ariella stared back at Eiro, considering how lightly he seemed to take this situation. She groaned loudly, "If you don't give me a good plan by the end of the day, I'll have to think about leaving soon." 

"It won't come to that, don't worry. Just come meet me at that lake just outside of town. You know, the one where I was waiting for a bunch of people from the organization. We'll meet there at midnight tonight." The Demon suggested, and Ariella groaned slightly and nodded her head, "Fine. Now go back to your classes, I'll leave again." 

Eiro nodded his head, doing just as Ariella suggested as he watched her fly away again. And Eiro began to plot his plan out in his mind.

--- 

Eiro was standing at the edge of the small island in the center of the frozen lake, wearing his new armor with a cloak on top. He watched Ariella land on the snow-covered ice, slowly approaching Eiro.

"Alright, I'm here. What's your big plan, now?" She asked. The tone of her voice was a mixture of angry and hopeful, since she most likely didn't really want to leave yet.

"We're already in the middle of it, Ariella." The Demon pointed out, as he held one of his hands forward. From there, a small flower sprouted. Its stem seemed withered and nearly petrified, while its petals seemed to be made of bone. It was a flower that didn't really exist, created by combining Nature Magic with Death Magic. The Death Magic came from the small Death Magic stone that Eiro still had with him inside of his treasury.

"I spread these flowers in specific places in town and the nearby forest. It's going to definitely lead any 'Undead Hunter' here, I actually did already spot some of them heading into this direction when I came here. And of course, I'll take over a different role as well." The Demon pointed out, as he pressed the magic stone in his hand into the small slot in his chestplate.

He let his mana flow into it, then took the magic into his own body, quickly infusing himself with it. Soon, it was like Eiro's body began to rot, his armor turning into a bone-like substance. Eiro let his will flow into his mana to change the way that he would 'transform', and soon, his body changed like he wanted it to.

His horns lost their color and turned into bones, and the flesh seemed to disappear from his wings and tail as they turned into something skeletal.

Eiro's skin became pale and unhealthy. It really did look as if he was a walking corpse. As if he was a Lich.

"So, what do you say?" Eiro asked, his voice sounding raspy as if his throat was falling apart, "Do I look dead enough?"

The Demon wore a broad smile on his face, showing his yellow, rotting teeth as a smell reminiscent of a corpse escaped his throat.

Ariella took a step back and slowly nodded her head, "Y-Yes... You certainly do... But how..."

"Ah, I'll explain it later. Basically, I have the ability to infuse every part of my body with any sort of magic I want without any damage to my being. And not just magic, it's why I was able to fuse with that slime I introduced you to in the way that I did. Just through him was I able to look like a human." Eiro explained. His introduction was uncomfortable to listen to due to his voice, and he looked as if he was about to fall over dead any moment now.

"Either way, that's not important right now. I suggest you take a step back for now." The Demon said, as he concentrated on his Aura. He strengthened it, fusing some death magic into it. He made sure that anyone with the ability to sense 'death' would end up taking notice of him.

"Of course, I-" Eiro started, but quickly stopped when he noticed something approaching, "Ariella, take a step back. I'll show you that I can deal with any 'Undead Hunter' that comes by, no matter their numbers."

The Nephilim looked at Eiro, this Demon that looked like he was already dead, confidently stepping onto the ice. Eiro squatted down, and quickly caught something slithering through the thick snow. It was a white snake, flailing around in Eiro's hand.

He could tell that it was hurting his hand just by him holding it. It wasn't holy, of course, this was just because of the Death Magic Eiro was infused with. This was one of the 'Life Golems' that Ariella mentioned earlier today.

"Well, hello there. Which of these Hunters is your master, huh? The one hiding behind the large oak tree, the one that climbed the pine, or the one that hid behind the pile of snow?" The Demon asked with a broad grin on his face, before he proceeded to crush the snake's skull to kill it. But even then, it surprisingly still kept moving. It wasn't really alive in the first place, after all.

These people were just capable of using Life Magic, to an extent. And not particularly strongly either, as far as Eiro could tell. For now, he just had to make sure to threaten these Undead Hunters to lead even more here. 

The Demon got rid of the snow and cleaned up the ice, showing the many corpses frozen within the lake that Eiro hid here.

Seeing these corpses, one of the Undead Hunters chose to get to work immediately before Eiro could animate them. Of course, before he even crossed half the lake, Eiro pierced his skull with ice and killed him, making the ice swallow him.

They were only strong against Death Magic, any other kind would painfully overwhelm them. Clearly, that was the case. One of the others became rather shocked at this sight alone, and seemed ready to leave already. The other one was as confident as before, thinking that the one that was killed was nothing but a fool. That wasn't just a guess on Eiro's side either, he heard both of their muttering.

However, to Eiro's surprise, what came at the Demon next wasn't the next Undead Hunter, but rather an animated lump of snow and ice. Since it was 'alive' right now, Eiro couldn't manipulate it either, and it would obviously be unaffected by any attacks using ice-magic. 

It was a clever tactic, so Eiro chose to play along for now to make the Hunter more confident. The Demon used ice magic to try and get rid of the snow-creature, as more and more of them were created by the Hunter.

And using them as a cover, the hunter himself tried to approach Eiro, who kept acting like he was in trouble. Until the man was close enough, of course, which was when Eiro stopped his act. With a snap of his finger, flames appeared in the middle of the air and started to melt the snow-creatures, showing the shocked Undead Hunter.

"Sorry, but you'll become fodder for the Queen of Undeath as well." The Demon smiled, as he killed the second Undead Hunter. He exterted an aura that would scare most people off, as it did with the last Undead Hunter, who Eiro quickly let get away.

"Undead Hunters are rare, especially those that can actually use Life Magic. Most of them tend to use Holy Magic. Out of these three, just the second one could actually use it, I think. The snake was also his golem.

"Wait, three? So you're just letting one of them get away?" Ariella asked, "Why would you do that?"

"Because he's going to find the other Undead Hunters, who I know he already made contact with, to lead them here. I want to get rid of anyone with Life Magic that's here, for now. I don't care about the others, they're glorified Paladins, nothing else."

Chapter 383 – Undead Girl

Eiro sat down on a small throne of ice that he made for himself, while Ariella looked down at the corpses within the ice.

"You killed all of these people?" She asked, and Eiro quietly laughed in response, "I'd hope so. I would be surprised if they were still alive." The Demon pointed out. The Nephilim turned around with a light frown.

"You know exactly that wasn't where I'm going." Ariella groaned, "Why did you kill all of these people?"

"To ascend in the organization's rankings, of course. Oh, and to gather 'offerings' for someone." 

"The Necromancer that you want to come here?" Ariella replied. Eiro quickly nodded his head, "Exactly. I figured she would be happy to get some good materials out of coming here, at least. Considering that I don't have any direct plans to have her deal with the necromancer I'm hinting at in the rumors."

Ariella crossed her arms with a smirk, "Yeah, I'd be surprised if you wanted her to kill you."

Eiro raised his brows confused, "What? I'm not talking about myself, I'm talking about the actual incredibly powerful Necromancer that's hiding out here in town. I just know that I'd have to help her, and I don't want to bother with that. The Necromancer is currently in a location where he won't be able to mess with anyone for now, at least not at a grand level."

"...There's actually a powerful Necromancer here in town?" Ariella asked with a wry smile, and Eiro stared back at her, "Of course there is. I figured you'd know, having been Letter 'C' until not too long ago."

"I don't know everything about this town either. But wait, I don't get it, if there's already a powerful Necromancer here, then why are you luring another one to this place?" The Nephilim asked Eiro, while the Demon locked eyes with her.

"...Alright, why exactly do you think I need that Necromancer to come here?" Eiro asked, and Ariella tilted her head to the side, "Because you want to create an Undead army to take out 'The Devil'?"

Eiro slowly rubbed the bridge of his nose as he shook his head, "No, that's not why. I'm not going to use Undead, they won't be of much help anyway. 'The Devil' is probably amongst the weaker Royals, combat-wise, he's just an incredible plotter. A trickster, schemer. Idiotic Undead that won't be able to see through the slightest of tricks are just going to be useless."

"...So why am I here, if this isn't about 'The Devil'?" Ariella asked confused, and Eiro stared at her, slightly taken aback, "Ariella, you're the one that told me to deal with the 'Undead Hunters'. That's why you're here. So that you can rest assured that nothing will happen to that friend of yours. Why would you think this was about 'The Devil'?"

Eiro let out a deep sigh, "If you don't want to be here anymore, then you can head off. But don't bother me because of Undead Hunters anymore. And by the way, just to put this out there, you could easily take care of these guys yourself. You didn't even need my help." Eior pointed out, and Ariella turned away for a moment.

"I know I could. I already killed one of them earlier today. The reason why I came to you wasn't so that you would kill them all, but so that you could take responsibility for the problems you've caused. Which you're obviously not doing, because you don't think anything is wrong."

"Yeah, nothing is wrong because this was within my expectations. Rather, I wanted them to come here, so that I could give the Necromancer something fun to play around with. It's not my fault that your little friend is a novice Necromancer that doesn't know how to hide her magic." Eiro groaned, "If you're that worried about her, just give her your artifact. It can hide that kind of stuff, can't it?"

Ariella looked at Eiro with a deep glare, "You're a piece of shit, you know that?"

"Yes, of course I know that. But here I am, trying to deal with your shitty insecurities anyway. And again, I don't f.u.c.k.i.n.g know why you would be scared of these weak-ass Life Mages and Paladins. They're literally not the lightest threat to you. Just stay around your friend for a while, and deal with anything that comes up. It's not like the Undead Hunters are going to be a huge threat to her anyway with you around. Even if they fling Life Magic everywhere, your friend's going to be totally fine. Necromancers aren't injured by-" Eiro started to get slightly heated as he talked back at Ariella, and then finally realized.

He slumped down into his ice-throne and groaned loudly, "By Lady Winter, just f.u.c.k.i.n.g tell me that she's an undead next time, will you?"

"Wh-What? How do you..." Ariella took a step back, shocked, as she locked eyes with Eiro. The Demon rolled his eyes, "Simple. Because you wouldn't be afraid otherwise. You can kill any Undead Hunter you want, but if they use some form of Life Golem, which seemed to be your greatest concern anyway, to sneak past your perception, they can still be a threat. The only way that's possible is if your friend isn't just a Necromancer, but an Undead herself. Let me guess – she's some form of lich?"

"..." Ariella silently stared back at Eiro, and then slowly turned away, "She's not a lich, she's just a 'Skeleton Mage', according to her race... I met her a few months ago on my searches. She completely kept her memories from when she was alive. It's because of a skill of hers, it's a-"

"Unique skill. Figures. Those are honestly a pain. Alright, change of plans. I didn't want you to come there yet. Tomorrow at 8pm, come to my house with the girl." The Demon said, quickly writing the exact location down on a piece of paper that he then handed to Ariella, "It's a safe place for her to be, and we'll be able to figure something out. And I have someone to introduce you to. It's just that, if you don't behave when you meet them, I'll have to kill you." Eiro said bluntly, "Even though I clearly don't want to."

"I don't know if that's really as 'clear' as you want it to be." Ariella replied, "Fine, I'll trust you with this. But I swear, if this is some sort of trick, I'm not going to hesitate to try and kill you either."

Eiro quickly shrugged, "Yup, I know. Now, I don't think that they're going to come back tonight, so you can head off for now. I'm sure you're worried about the girl."

The Demon locked eyes with Ariella, who slowly nodded her head, "You're right, I'm incredibly worried. Thanks." The Nephilim replied, as she spread out her wings. She quickly lifted herself off the ground, and proceeded to fly off toward town.

Meanwhile, Eiro was sitting there, deep in thought, "Alright, I guess it's time for me to go on a hunt." The demon pointed out. He got rid of the Death Magic he was infused with, and stretched his body to get rid of this stuffy feeling that came with this sort of infusion. He took a deep breath as he took the first step forward, and buried his foot inside of the ice. With as much force as he could muster without cracking the ice, Eiro jumped forward and flapped his wings for the extra boost.

Luckily, the 'Undead Hunter' that ran away was still close enough for Eiro to catch up to him. It's only been a few minutes since he ran away, after all. Eiro made sure to move without making a sound, before proceeding to dive right into the Hunter's shadow without him noticing. Here, Eiro would simply hide out until this Undead Hunter met up with others of the same trade, so that he could jump out and kill them all at once.

That might make the whole process a bit easier than having to wait for them. Maybe Eiro could even catch one of them if they had access to Life Magic to study the element a bit more. And if they were alive, the Queen of Undeath would possibly appreciate them as a gift as well. Eiro just wanted to make sure that he could get on her good side as quickly as possible. A lot was depending on them getting along, now that Eiro already laid out everything to lure her to this capital city.

Luckily, it seemed like Eiro would soon get access to the perfect gifts for her.

--- 

Eiro sat inside of his study and kept note of the current progress of his plans, and what exactly he would have to do for everything to proceed properly.

"Alright, at this rate, I'm definitely going to have evolved one more time by the start of the tournament this summer. Except if this evolution happens in a completely different way, that is. Nelli, do you know anything about Monsters with Legendary skills?" 

The Naiad floated next to the Demon and hummed in thought, "Nope, I don't think so. Haven't heard of anything like that before. But I wouldn't imagine it to be too different from evolution through the cards?"

"But those are Unique Evolutions. This is going to be a Legendary Evolution. It's going to be on a whole other level. Maybe I should try and speed the process up a bit?" 

"Well, you could always spend your free-time to go hunt monsters. You know there's this 'Noble Alliance' that was recently found." Nelli pointed out, and Eiro crossed his arms in thought, "Maybe I should just wipe that place out, yeah. A couple of strong Noble monsters should push my level up by a handful. Or I could go for it and try to kill 'The Death' once the 'Queen' gets here. She can steal its techniques, I get the experience. Everyone would be happy, right?"

Just as Eiro was saying this, he slowly turned around. He noticed someone approaching this building from the distance.

"Well, I guess we should keep plotting all this sometime later. For now, we have a guest to entertain." Eiro slowly opened the window and jumped out of it, carefully landing on the area at the front of the manor.

Just a couple of meters in front of him, Ariella landed, while holding someone that was tightly wrapped in cloth. Eiro could see her form anyway. 

It was the skeletal girl that Ariella was speaking about. Ariella carefully set her down, and the girl looked around nervously. Her hollow eye-sockets seeming to pull in any bit of light around. Cracks were covering her skull in multiple parts, barely holding her together.

Eiro could tell that she had quite a bit of mana, a monstrous amount. However, something else was even weirder. She had something that no Undead should possess. This Undead girl possessed Life Force.

Chapter 384 - ???

Eiro glared at the girl. Just from her rough skeletal structure, she couldn't have been older than 13 or 14 when she passed. That is, if this was her first form as a monster. If she happened to have evolved already, Eiro had no proper way of knowing what she looked like when she was still alive.

She had scratches on her bones, cracks. In particular, her hands had been broken many times before. Slowly, the Demon grabbed his own left hand and started twisting and pulling on his fingers. The only way they could have been cracked in that form is if they were forcibly broken by another person.

Her ribs in particular were in a bad state as well. Clearly, she had been abused when she was alive. Undead monsters heal in other ways, such cracks wouldn't form after healing anymore. But then again, since she had Life Force within her, she wasn't any regular Undead anyway.

"Girl. Open your status for me." The Demon said in a clear voice, and confused, the skeletal girl turned toward Ariella, who didn't seem to know what this was about either.

But then, the girl looked straight back at Eiro and opened her status, like Eiro asked her to do.Find authorized novels in , faster updates, better experience, Please click #'s-virtue_15238973305579305/asylum_51283829180127834 for visiting.

"So she's really a Skeleton Mage, then..." Eiro muttered. He wasn't able to see the reflection of her status in her eyes, but he was able to see through the unnatural darkness of her hollow eyesockets, soon spotting something similar that he could read.

"Ah, that must be the skill... . It's the only one it could be, the others are just regular ones." Eiro pointed out with his arms crossed, "Just from the name, it would explain why she has that in her..."

"Wait, what are you talking about? How do you know the name of her skill already?" Ariella asked, and Eiro turned toward her. As if it was obvious, he said, "I probably have the greatest perception out of anyone in this world. I can see the system's reflection in others' eyes, and combined with some other abilities, I could see it even where there were no eyes."

"You believe me to expect th-" Without a moment's hesitation, Eiro pulled out two of his Divine Cards. The other ones were fused with him, after all, "I have four of these in total. The Five of Pentacles being one of them."

With a flick of his wrist, the cards quickly disappeared again, "Now, just come inside. We shouldn't talk out here about this business. And don't worry, there's no need to disguise yourself or anything." Eiro quickly turned around and walked up the steps to his door. Ariella and the skeletal girl followed him, although the Nephilim was clearly nervous.

"Are you sure it's safe here? There's no way you can squat in here for long... Once they notice you live in here, you'll have to-"

"What are you talking about exactly?" Eiro asked, "I'm not squatting here, this place belongs to me."

Eiro kept walking a bit, before realizing something else, "Hold on, did you think I was impersonating a teacher at the Academy? Or why did you think I was there?"

"...You weren't?" Ariella asked with a wry smile, and Eiro quickly rubbed the bridge of his nose, "Seems like I'll have to tell you a bit more about myself later."

Eiro swiftly walked into one of the nearby rooms, "Jess, what are you doing in here? I thought I told you to keep reading in the library."

"I know you did, but I'm still reading the book you gave me anyway... I just felt like changing my environment a bit, you know? I slept in the library for the past two days, I didn't even get to spend any time with-" Jess explained, and finally raised her head from the book she was reading. Immediately, she dropped it onto the table in front of her and jumped up from her seat.

"I-Is that an Angel? And an Undead? Alright, I'm definitely going to take a break for this story!" Jess exclaimed, and Eiro shrugged, "Close, Nephilim and an Undead that's not really an Undead. Didn't figure the latter one out yet, I'll keep you updated."

Eiro soon felt Ariella grab his arm in confusion, "Didn't you say there was nobody here?"

The Demon tilted his head to the side, "No? I said you would be safe here, which you are."

"But how could we trust some random girl like he-"

"Ariella. Jess is my friend and party member. I fully trust her with nearly all my secrets, and there's a lot more on the line than with any of yours. So just calm down. Also try not to react that way when you meet the others." 

Ariella was once again more than just confused, before all of a sudden a young man dropped through the ceiling. He managed to just barely catch himself.

"Hey Dad, Rudy said we're out of some veggies he wanted to use for tomorrow's dinner." Arc pointed out casually after just taking one of the many secret passages in the building, and quickly took notice of the two people standing behind his father, "Heh, neat. Anyway, want us to go grab them tomorrow after school?" 

"That's fine, I'll just head off to buy them myself tomorrow. You can just come straight home." Eiro pointed out, "Also, be more careful when using the passages. I'd prefer it if you didn't use the completely vertical ones. At least not when Clementine or I aren't around to check on you."

"Fine... Can you give me a boost upstairs though?" Arc asked with a light smirk, and Eiro sighed slightly. He stretched out his foot toward Arc, who quickly jumped onto it before being kicked back up through the secret passageway to get back upstairs.

"B-But, how- Who- What?" Ariella asked with a wry smile as she took a step back, "Is this some sort of asylum?!"

"That's kind of rude, isn't it?" Eiro replied bluntly, "For now, just be quiet and follow me."

The Demon walked through the room and soon accessed another one of the hidden passages, just that this time it was a set of stairs, "Where are we going now..?"

"We're meeting someone that can hopefully help you out a bit." The Demon pointed out a bit. As he walked down the stairs, he soon heard Bavet annoyingly yell in the distance in the place that Eiro was currently heading toward.

"You're abusing me!" The slime screeched, while the Elder Dwarf in front of him quietly grumbled into his own beard, "I'll show you what abuse feels like if ya don't shut the f.u.c.k up..."

Eiro rubbed the bridge of his nose, "Something wrong?"

Immediately, Bavet transformed from his regular, translucent slime-form into a hummingbird and started flying in front of the Demon's face, "Yes, something is wrong! This guy keeps ripping off parts of my body!"

"Bavet, that's what I asked him to do. I also explained the whole reason for it to you earlier, didn't I?" 

"Eh? You did?" Bavet asked surprised, and Eiro groaned loudly, "Yes, I did. Armodeus, how's it going so far?" 

"Alright. Could've gone quicker if this bastard hadn't kept complainin'. Tried liquifyin' it, so that ye can use Magic with it properly. Should be harder than normal, but I figured it'd work." 

"Perfect. Thanks. Ah, these two are the ones I told you about. This Nephilim is Ariella, this Undead girl is Hannah." Eiro pointed out. He had seen her name on her status before, and although that should be obvious, the two girls were still pretty surprised that Eiro knew the girl's name.

Armodeus smiled and walked up to the skeletal girl with a smile on his face, "Nice to meet ya, lil' missie. So you're the one that I have to put up with this bothersome slime for, eh?" He laughed slightly, while Ariella locked eyes with Eiro.

"Is nobody alright in the head here? Who reacts like this?" 

"I'm a Demon that's under full control of his monstrosity, possesses four divine cards, and has numerous absolutely ridiculous abilities. An Undead and a Nephilim aren't that big a deal, considering all that." Eiro pointed out bluntly, and Ariella let out a deep sigh, "Fine, if you say so. Explain to me what's going on then. Why was this... Human, working on something for Hannah?"

"First of all, he's not a Human, he's an Elder Dwarf. Second, try to be a bit more appreciative, not everyone can get something that the King of Craftsmen even just partially created." Eiro smirked lightly, but before Ariella could say anything else, the Demon grabbed the container filled with a liquid alchemically created by Armodeus using Bavet's slime.

"Armodeus, there's a bit of a change of plan. Before, I meant to make something to just disguise her. But now, I plan on making something a little different. The Girl has Life Force, so we can make her some special prosthetics." Eiro smirked.

"Life Force? In an Undead? Interestin'. D'ya need my help?" Armodeus asked curiously, and Eiro quickly nodded his head, "Yes, I need you to use the Artifact that Ariella has and make an artificial version of it. You do roughly know how to, right?"

"...Aye, been readin' all that stuff you gave me non-stop. And I think I roughly know what you want to do now." The Elder Dwarf smirked, "Let's bring this lil' missie back to life, eh?"