Since this morning, Bets felt out of it.
He had been careless and made a huge mistake. It was a critical mistake that could have cost their lives. His friends could have died!
His guilt became even heavier once he deduced they were already being observed. If only he hadn’t been careless!
‘Fucking damn it! Why am I such a useless bastard!’ He was running toward the village elder’s house, and tears stung his eyes. He was ashamed and embarrassed!
‘Putting people around me in danger! For what? Because I wanted to make breakfast for them?! What am I?! A fucking cook! I came here to be an exorcist, but acted like a fool!’
Bets arrived at the village elder’s house and hid. He observed from quite a distance, as Kon had told him to keep himself safe. If there were any demons in the vicinity, he had to activate the firework talisman as a signal.
While waiting for a couple of minutes, and with his mind off berating himself. Bets contemplated calmly for a split second, which was enough to realize why Kon had sent him to the village elder’s house and keep an eye on him.
‘Kon never trusted the village elder’s story to begin with.’
He started connecting the dots even more. Kon had gotten something related to the drowner demons and planned to draw them into land. But if the demons didn’t go to where the sheets were but instead came here. It meant that the village elder was a Beast Master!
Bets’ deductions were interrupted by a firework bursting in the distance.
***
A drowner demon walked out of the water like a stumbling zombie.
I immediately activated a firework talisman, signaling Bets to come back.
By this time, the world didn’t know specific things about demons. For example, high-class demons could order lower-class demons around; any exorcist worth something knew that.
But the higher-classed demons couldn’t deprive the lower-classed demons of their basic instincts. In contrast, Beast Masters could do that.
The drowner demon stumbled out of the water, showing his pale, wrinkled skin, rotting teeth, and hollow milky eyes. As it got closer, the smell of rotting fish permeated the air.
“Let’s kill this bastard and be done with it!” Agon was about to charge forward, but I put my arm in front of him.
“No, let’s wait,” right now would be the perfect chance to take out the drowner demon. It was almost midday, so it was at its weakest. Even normal humans could probably beat this thing down. But I needed the mastermind to come out. The same person who had dug out the graves!
But as the drowner demon got closer, I realized something.
This wasn't the same drowner demon that Carpy had seen!
Immediately I unsheathed my normal sword and kept the cursed sword ready to take out.
Four other creatures, an adult and three kids stepped out of the water.
The graves weren’t desecrated to cover the evidence! But it was to take out the corpses and turn them into drowner demons!
Agon grated his teeth next to me as he stared at the grotesque and bloated corpses of the three children.
“Whoever did this, I will kill them! Was it you, fishy bastard!” He walked past my arm and gathered Ord into his fist.
Fuck! Too late to stop him now! Damn hero syndrome protagonists! Letting emotions cloud their minds!
He approached the adult drowner demon closest to us.
Gathering a ton of Ord in his fist, Agon punched the drowner demon with his special ability.
“{Super Impact!}”
Half of the drowner demon's chest exploded in bits of gore and splattered on the sandy shore. The creature fell to the ground, and Agon stared hatefully at the only other adult drowner demon left. "Or was it you?"
With his emotions getting to his head. Agon didn't notice that the drowner, whose chest he had smashed to smithereens, was getting up.
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I sighed and walked past Agon, who finally noticed the creature.
But before the zombie could touch him, I cut the drowner demon's hands with one swift slash. Then with another slash, I decapitated it.
Even then, the undead creature's head kept opening and closing its mouth. I stabbed it through its eye, and it stopped moving.
The enemy probably wanted to cause us some mental damage by making us kill zombie kids. But I wasn’t going to play by their rules.
"Agon, while your attack is undoubtedly strong. Sometimes, you can't defeat everyone with just a punch." I turned toward Gem before Agon could say anything. "Can you take care of them?"
He nodded and summoned his shadow wolf. He enlarged the head of the dark beast, which swallowed all the drowners and munched them to a meaty paste.
There was a ruffling behind us, and we all immediately turned. Ready to attack, but it was Bets. "S -Sorry, everyone. Did I come back late?"
He sent us a look of despair. What was with that? He just came a bit late. Actually, he isn't late at all. What was he blaming himself for? "Don't blame yourself so much for something. Blame yourself once, and then move on."
Otherwise, small things will catch up. With a mindset like that, past mistakes will also cause mistakes in the present.
Bets’ body froze at that, and his eyes widened. Then he smiled and rubbed his bald head. Now that it was midday, the sun was above us, and his head shined like a lightbulb. "Thanks. I won't make mistakes again."
"Hahahahaha!" A growly laugh came from the lake, and bubbles formed around a large ripple. "You're quite ruthless for such young exorcists."
The creature that came out of the water was like a snake standing up. No, maybe not like a snake. but more like an eel. It had dark slimy skin and rows of teeth in its mouth. There was a yin-yang symbol on its forehead.
Bets, Gem, and I froze in place due to the overwhelmingly dark aura bursting out of the demon eel.
Without a doubt, it was a high-class demon!
Before we could react, the demon opened its mouth, and a lightning ball formed in half a second, and in less than a second, the attack was close to us. I didn’t even have time to activate my Special Ability.
Shit, I’m dead!
But while none of us could react, a shadow moved past me, and an enormous amount of Ord gathered once more.
Boom!
A large explosion rang out. It was like a missile had just blown up on our faces. A hot wind parched the skin on our faces.
When the dust cleared, Agon stood there with a charred right arm.
While none of us had been able to move, he had reacted before his mind could even comprehend what was happening.
“Ow! Ow! This hurts!”
“Using a punch to disperse my Heavenly Blast? Within hundreds of years of my life, this is the first time someone destroyed my attack like that!” The eel demon opened its mouth again and gathered its second ball of lightning. As he charged it up more, this one became stronger than the first.
But this time, I was no longer frozen in fear. Though the pressure was still there, I threw down my normal sword and grabbed my cursed sword. I was about to pull it out of its sheath when a dark wolf shot out from the water and hit the eel’s lower jaw. Causing the creature to close its mouth, and the lightning ball exploded right in its tongue.
A heavy amount of Ord swirled around Gem. He had his hands clasped, and a bead of sweat rolled down his face as the eel demon stood back up, with smoke coming out of its mouth.
“I think we just made it mad,” Gem’s voice shook.
A high-rank demon in our first mission?! What were the chances of it happening?
I glanced at Agon. The protagonist's halo was dangerous for the people around him. We might die so that Agon can have some character growth.
Yeah, fuck that!
“Bets! Come up with something!” I gave him a thumbs-up for encouragement.
He was smarter than me and had a better chance of coming up with something if we chose to escape.
The chances of that escaping against a high-class demon… close to zero. With how fast it can shoot those lightning balls, it would kill us all in less than two seconds if we turned our backs on it. But hopefully, that was just my dumb panicked brain speaking. “I will buy you all some time!”
{Perfect Me!}
[Order: Survive! Buy Time! If close to death, unsheathe the cursed sword! If possible, escape with the others!]
Once again, the out-of-body experience came. I looked at myself from a third-person point of view. I didn’t know if the cursed sword could affect my mind in this state, so unsheathing it was a last resort because I might kill my teammates before the eel could do it for me.
At the edge of my vision, my status screen appeared once more.
Name: Kon
Beast Master 65.9%
Creator 20.7%
Blaster 9.3%
Warrior 4.1%
Strength 13 -> 25/81
Stamina 14 -> 20/102
Agility 15 -> 22/99
Description: A transmigrated person, a relatively talented youngster, and a Junior Exorcist. Danger Rating: (D+)
My body was like a machine, analyzing anything and everything it could use in its favor. At least I still had a plan.
My plan was called: Power Of Friendship.
Meaning I couldn’t come up with anything. But hoped Agon would have a bullshit power-up in the middle of the fight.