Agon held the sword in his hand, and his Ord grew corrupted in an instant. Violent waves burst out, startling not only the demons but even me, who was familiar with the sword's cursed Ord.

I took a step back, and a thousand thoughts rushed through my mind, none of them nice. He wasn’t going crazy yet, meaning that Orochi must have been suppressing the sword. Which was easy for someone at his level… though it still baffled me how Agon had managed to convince Yamata No Orochi to lend him power.

According to cliché tropes, Agon had probably been getting closer to Orochi and making friends. Or maybe the ultimate class demon was manipulating Agon. Whatever the case, one thing was certain - Yamata No Orochi didn't like me all that much, because of the hypnosis thing and reinforcing the seal back way back. If the ultimate class demon came out, he would kill me out of petty spite.

I got into a fighting stance, ready to handle anything thrown my way. Despite the cursed Ord pouring out of Agon, he seemed calm and walked closer to me, offering my sword. "Here's your weapon. It feels kinda weird to hold."

Just feels weird? This is one of the most dangerous cursed weapons around!

Taking back my sword, I felt its cursed energy pulse through my body. Agon was such a cheat. He wasn't even affected by the weapon's negative energy! I had to go through so much trouble to tame the weapon, but he did it like it was nothing!

I kept my complaints from leaking out. The last thing I wanted was to act cliché.

Before this whole thing, the world worked on 'normal' logic. But with Agon around… there was something strange about him. I had no idea what it was, but it seemed like the fate around him shifted into illogical nonsense. There had to be some kind of explanation for this, but a part of me was afraid that there might not be any logical explanation.

The demons around us were still in shock, no doubt sensing Yamata No Orochi's Ord. Even if he couldn't bring out his full power, most demons had an instinct about these things and knew that messing around with demons of higher rank than them was a road to death.

Without hesitation, I punched the sword demon that looked like a blade on legs. His steel-like body cracked under my fist and shattered into pieces. Despite its powerful special ability that seemed to deny all swords, it was still only a low-class demon.

"Kill him!" "Rip him apart!" The death of the sword demon seemed to bring the other demons back to their senses, and they resumed their assault. However, most demons were afraid of even approaching Agon, so I took the brunt of their attacks.

Suddenly, there was a loud screech, and all the demons backed off as Agon gathered an ungodly amount of Ord in his fist. "Hey!" I called out to him. "No explosions, or it will cause a cave-in!"

"Ah!" Agon's eyes widened, and he seemed to realize that he had almost killed us. Actually, knowing him, he probably would have survived while at the same time killing all the demons. The only one I was really worried about here was myself!

Even though I had the protagonist of this world by my side, I would have changed him for anyone else. At least then, the world would make sense and not everything would develop into a strange power of friendship moment!

BOOM!...

A loud explosion rocked the cave, and it seemed like the whole place was about to cave in. My first suspect for this was Agon, but he looked equally as confused as I was. So, it wasn't his fault directly.

Suddenly, rays of sun blinded my eyes. As my eyes adjusted to the light, the blurred figures of the assailants became clear. Uwabami was in her humanoid form, slapping and throwing demons around without a care in the world.

It wasn't her that drew my attention, but the other demon beside her. A long serpentine with dark scales and golden eyes, a black horn on his head was so dark that it seemed to absorb the light around it. Even without introduction or the contract within me, I could tell this was Carpy. He had changed quite a lot.

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As Carpy turned toward the demons who had been attacking me, they stopped in place and screeched in pain as spikes of blood burst out of their bodies. None of them could do anything to resist an attack like that. Ironically, Carpy was killing demons at a faster rate than Uwabami because he had better AOE attacks.

"Hey! Get rid of that snide smirk!" Uwabami bellowed, throwing a rock that barely missed my head and cracked the wall behind me.

She knew she looked less cool than Carpy in her demon form, so words weren't needed to tell her that. Facts didn't require anyone's permission to be true.

"Just so you know, despite his appearance, he isn't exactly high class. His evolution will be a continuous process that will take some time," Uwabami reminded me, trying to dampen my spirits.

But she was failing; nothing could bring down my mood, and Carpy would soon become a high-class demon. I was tempted to try fusion right now, but that might interfere with Carpy's evolution, and I wasn't going to risk that just for an ego boost. But damn, I was so tempted!

It didn't take long for them to kill all the demons, and for some reason, Uwabami was breathing heavily. I knew it wasn't because of the fight, as there was no ultimate class demon that would be tired even by fighting demons like these.

With two ultimate class demons, the Nekoshu and Uwabami, anyone with half a brain would think that from now on, it would be a safe return to the human camp.

Except looking at it from a shounen standpoint, this was clearly just building up Agon's side, meaning that he would face something that needed two ultimate class demons to handle. If I were to guess he was going to encounter a wild Shuten Doji-level threat.

"I think we should separate for now. I have something to look for in these parts. See you back at the camp!" I waved at Agon and turned away. The faster I got away from here, the less chance of getting involved in something that would kill both me and Carpy.

"Huh?" Uwabami was confused, and the two-tailed cat tilted her head.

"See you later," Agon waved nonchalantly. Nothing bothered him. He didn't even question my decision, and that was what I liked about him.

Uwabami would probably look at me with suspicion from now on, but whatever was going to happen here had nothing to do with me or Carpy.

Unlike before, where Carpy had to use minuscule amounts of water to make himself fly, he was flying on his own. Maybe manipulating the water inside his body?

"It seems like you will soon become a high class," I smiled as relief washed over my heart. We were thankfully on schedule, though it was nothing short of a freak accident that Carpy could reach high class so fast. Maybe being in Agon's vicinity caused that? Or perhaps it was just dumb luck after absorbing Ibaraki Doji.

Carpy sensed my relief and flew through the sky like a dragon as I rode on his back. Everything down there looked like bugs, and I was one step closer to having the power to casually blow up islands.

"Master, the frontlines are crawling with strong demons. It's like a wall of death," Carpy warned me.

"Then let's take a detour," I suggested. "We aren't in a rush, and the war isn't going anywhere."

Now, my main concern was figuring out when Shuten Doji would consider it safe enough to enter the battle himself. The only thing holding him back from just coming and ending this war was his fear of a human with a strange ability that could kill him regardless of his power. That paranoia was the only reason why we hadn't already perished.

Technically, we had The Magician to thank for that. If only he were still alive, humanity would have a significant advantage, and we would be able to seal all ultimate class demons and make human vessels out of them.

The only demon he had to use underhanded means to seal was Yamata No Orochi, but otherwise, no demon stood a chance against him.

If the Top 5 Exorcists decided to intervene, we might still have a chance if we catch Shuten Doji off guard. However, the top five exorcists also have the top five egos, and getting them to cooperate would be a challenge. In their egos, I doubted that 3 out of 5 even cared much about humanity in general. Ord rewarded self-centered people, and egos inevitably developed in the top echelons of power.

There was still the option of somehow forcing them to work together, but how in the world would I even go about doing that?

***

Delia stood still, keeping her mouth shut as her father and uncle looked over the latest reports from the battlefield with cold expressions. The kind that suggested many lives would be lost.

“Missing behind enemy lines…” her uncle said, covering his face as a bead of sweat rolled down his brow.

Delia wondered if he was panicking, but quickly dismissed the thought. She had known her uncle her whole life, and he had never panicked before.

“Who’s missing?” she asked, though she had been forbidden from reading any classified information since her princess deception was uncovered.

“Kon. He's stuck behind enemy lines,” her father said, sighing and rubbing his eyes. “This is bad.”