“In one day?” Asmodeus frowned, it sounded too good to be true. “Didn’t you just say that it would be difficult? We need to be even luckier than Greed to pull that off.”

“Listen, we can save time and reduce the casualties with this method.” Theodore turned towards Rhys. “I’ll have him lead a small army to attack the front as a distraction, then your group will attack on the side once Rhys drags them out from behind the city walls.”

Asmodeus didn’t say anything for a moment as her gaze averted elsewhere as she thought about it. Eventually, she hummed in acknowledgement. “That city only has a single wall while the back is protected by a tall mountain…I guess that is possible.”

“As for me,” Theodore paused for a second. “I plan to go in from the back, it should be no problem to sneak in when you guys are distracting the others.”

“You’re going to climb that mountain?” Asmodeus tilted her head. “It’s about half as tall as the human world’s Everest, it would be impossible to scale it in less than a day, let alone a month.”

“Oh I’m not going to climb it.” Theodore shook his head as a light smile crept up his lips, he opened his attribute window and brought up the information on his Unique Magic: Demon Arts.

<

Lvl. 1

Type: Versatile Magic.

Requirement for Upgrade: Usage and increase proficiency.

Cooldown: Depends on spell (5 seconds to ???)

Description: A one of a kind magic created by Lucifer with the purpose of rebelling against the divine, it has a viarity of useful spells ranging from support to all-out attack and even a suicidal ritual which only the true demon king was able to use. Many of the demon race adapted to this magic, although none could bring out its full potential like the creator could. Now that you’ve inherited his title and magic, you’re now the master of the Demon Arts.

Spell List:

-Chains of Sin

-Hell Fire

-Dark Veil

[…]>>

He expanded the list of spells and looked for a specific one he’d once seen while absent-mindedly looking at his status window; it only took him a few seconds to find what he wanted. “Wouldn’t it be easier to just teleport in?”

[Shadow Warp]

<

Rank: A

Origin: Demon Arts

Type: Utility

Cost: 2 MP per Meter

Cast Time: 2 Seconds

Cooldown: 10 Seconds to 10 Minutes. Depends on Distance.

Description: A spell that can take you anywhere you wish, as long as the target is within your line of sight, no place can keep you out, not even magic-canceling devices or spells as long as Demon Arts is stronger than the opposing mage.>>

Asmodeus raised her eyebrows, surprised by Theodore’s words. “Can you teleport that far?”

“It’s possible with my spell, yes.” He nodded as he did some calculations in his head, the mountain should be about four thousand meters tall, and since he needed to see where he wanted to go first, teleporting to the top would be the best if he wanted to pull this off. “Just buy me around an hour, if things go our way, we should be able to win in only a single day.”

Asmodeus pursed her lips. “Will you be okay? Greed is not someone you should underestimate, sure he might be below me in rankings, but he’s just about as strong, maybe even stronger when it comes down to it.”

Despite his plan being a gamble, Theodore sounded confident. “Since I can beat you, I don’t think it would be too difficult to beat Greed either.”

Asmodeus worriedly frowned. “He doesn’t like it when his things get stolen, so he’ll definitely lost his cool when you flank them”

“It’s fine, if the opponent becomes irrational, wouldn’t that be best for us?”

Asmodeus shrugged. “Yeah I guess…Okay, fine…I trust you, so we just need to get ready now, right?”

Theodore nodded. “The quicker this ends, the better.”

.

.

.

Several days of preparation had passed, Asmodeus had gathered everyone at the surface of the Lake of Rage, there were around ten thousand soldiers standing in orderly lines, all looking at the demon king expectantly.

“So Your Majesty had finally decided to take action.” Cyrus was Asmodeus’ most royal aids, he was given to position of ‘General’ and had lead many of her armies during territorial wars, he had the very distinct features of a dragon, red scales partially covered his entire body and his golden eyes shone fiercely, he wore heavy black armor and wields a dark broadsword, his hair was pure white and he had a large stature.

Asmodeus laughed at her general’s comment. “Well, I finally saw a good opportunity, I still need to thank you for preparing things so well, it only took a few days for your troops to travel here.

Only five thousand of the demons were Asmodeus’, the other half was the Lake of Rage’s inhabitants, Theodore had hand-picked the stronger ones using the ‘True Dragons Eye’ skill, it didn’t take as long since he only needed to look at them once.

Cyrus glanced at Theodore with a questioning look. “…Your Majesty, who might he be?”

Asmodeus looked at Theo with a smile, as if urging him to introduce himself.

He’d hoped that she would just tell him outright, but over the past few days, she’d told him that he needed to establish his place as a demon king on his own or else the demons won’t take him seriously. He sighed, showing his annoyance before replying to the general. “I’m the new Demon King of Pride, me and Asmodeus are allies, we’ll be helping in this fight too.”

This tale has been pilfered from Royal Road. If found on Amazon, kindly file a report.

“Ah,” Cyrus unexpectedly gave him a bow. Theodore thought he would be doubtful like the other demons, but it seemed that he could tell the truth from lies. “We are thankful for your help, Your Majesty, apologies for my rudeness earlier.”

“It’s fine.” Theodore shrugged, turning his attention towards Rhys, who was decked out in his shiny armor and was talking to one of the mermaid-like demons.

Rhys had been very well-behaved thanks to the slave collar, since the Pearl Palace’s construction was completed, he now had to do all the nitty-gritty instead of Theodore, who would only look at the more important documents and sign anything that needed his signature.

Though in Rhys’ mind, doing work was way better than getting beaten up, at first he would try and resist the collar’s magic, and the result was Theodore punching him as a punishment.

While Theo still hated Rhys to his very core, after the days had passed, he calmed down a bit and now saw him more as a tool rather than utter trash.

He even did some interrogating and found out that Rhys had slaughtered almost fifty people over his lifespan on his father’s orders, which earned Rhys a kick in between his legs, but other than that, Theo felt disgusted that Gabriel would make his own son do something so horrible.

‘It was practically emotional manipulation,’ Theodore thought at the time as he watched Rhys crying on the ground. ‘From what he hold me, his mother commited suicide because of how poorly she was being treated, so of course a child would seek comfort from his other parent.’

It was unfortunate that despite having enough money to gain anything he could ever want, Rhys was raised to be used only as a means to an end.

‘It’s better that he does something productive rather than plotting a massacre.’

Rhys still has his skills as a leader, so he could easily manage a task like this one. Theo thought confining Rhys to this continuous labor was an appropriate form of punishment, especially since he'd used others as slaves before.

'But it's not just him that I need to get my revenge on…'

Theodore had also asked Rhys about the other people that’d taken part in his death, and there wasn’t much information on them since apparently he’d forgotten about those people completely.

‘I looked for people with potential and offered them money,’ Rhys had told him. ‘I could only remember the magic swordsman’s name…I think he was Miles?’

Theodore could recall clearly that there was a Spellblade, two Mages, a Tank, an Assassin, and a Berserker, a total of six other people that’d attacked him on that day if not counting Rhys.

He couldn’t remember much about his teammates either, they weren’t really close friends, so he needed to look at their faces first to know what their names were.

But luckily for him, Miles stood out a lot among the others, since much like Rhys, he was the only other magic swordsman on the team.

Miles was just as cocky as Rhys, maybe even worse, he always liked to compare himself to others, calling them weak and would even go as far as mocking their entire family line just to prove a point. But his own family was decently well-off and had a martial arts school even before the appearance of monsters.

‘He might even be qualified to become a member of the Lake of Rage since he’s so fixated on strength.’

“Hello? Hell to Theodore~” Asmodeus waved her hand in front of his face, getting his attention. “What are you thinking about? We’re about to move right now.”

“Ah, sorry.” Theodore didn’t realize that he was that deep in his own thoughts, a lot had happened in the past days and he was still processing them even until now. “Let's go then."

Asmodeus gave him a weird look, as if she was curious about what was on his mind, though she decided not to ask and turned towards the army. "Soldiers! Today, we bring glory to Baator!"

"For Baator's Glory!" The army shouted back fiercely as they raised their weapons high,

Now it was Rhys' turn, nervousness hinted in his gaze but he pushed through his fears and spoke to the demons. "Ragerians! Follow my lead!"

"Yes sir!" All five thousand amphibian humanoids screamed as they began marching forward.

Lily the sea serpent emerged from the waters and gave Rhys a blank stare, the blonde hesitantly climbed onto her back and he began leading the army.

Theodore glanced at Asmodeus and she caught his gaze, nodding back with a smile.

"Well then, let's see if your plan works." She gave him a wink before turning to her own soldiers, preparing to march onward after Rhys' group had disappeared.

Theodore didn't say anything at first and stared behind the merhumans. "Let's just hope that it does."

.

.

.

Lawrence stared at the long sword in his hand as he sat inside the make-shift shelter within one of Delphi Forest's cave, he could slightly see his own reflection on the eye-like gemstone that was embedded in between the sword's guard.

Merlin sat on the opposite side of him with a grim expression on his face, Eugene was lying on the bed, scrolling away nonchalantly at his phone. "Mister Varon…Do you think he's still alive?"

Lawrence was slightly startled by the sudden break in silence. "Of course, it's Theodore we're talking about here."

Merlin pursed his lips. "Well…It's a black hole…It would probably need to take a miracle for him to survive something like that."

"No, I can feel it," Lawrence narrowed his eyes at the sword in his grip. "He's still alive."

"..." Eugene peaked his head up from his phone. "Is the sword special? How can you tell that he's alive?"

"Eugene…!" Merlin glared at the brunet in a whispered scream, but Lawrence only chuckled at the two of them before speaking.

"Theo separated it from his staff…I just know that they're both connected in some way…But who knows, maybe I'm just a father hopelessly wishing for his son to still be alive…"

Eugene stared at Lawrence with pity and regret. "Ah…I shouldn't have said that, I'm sorry…"

"It's fine, you did tell me that I should just accept the worse case scenario first."

Merlin sighed. "Then we should start brainstorming about how we'll live from now on, it's hard for me to go back to the academy and Eugene is now unemployed."

"Being a slave wasn't a job in the first place." Eugene shrugged and went back to looking at his phone.

That caused Merlin to become annoyed. "What are you doing?"

"Trying to employ myself." Eugene turned the screen outwards, allowing them to see what he'd been looking at, it was a website called 'MonsterHunt.com', a famous site where many heroes who wanted to start making a living would go to, it's also the official website of the 'Hunters Guild'. "We can just go down the 'anomalous' path and do things from there."

"Easier said than done, the Griffins had every means to find us." Merlin spoke in a low down, like he was afraid someone might overhear him.

"If that's really the case, then we would've been caught long ago." Eugene sighed. "It shouldn't take them this long if they really want to catch us."

"Well, maybe they're incompetent." Lawrence tilted his head. "I managed to hide for two whole months, so maybe they needed more time?"

"Mister Varon, please don't say something like that." Eugene's eyebrows drew closer together. "It might really come true."

Lawrence laughed, still managing to find their situation quite funny. "C'mon kid, there's no point in being pessimistic about it, we should do what we can and survive until Theo gets back."

"...If he's still alive that is." Merlin sighed and stared at Eugene's phone. "Okay, at the very least we should at least get ourselves a proper job, we can't continue living off of Mister Varon's savings."

"Yes, of course—"

Lawrence's sword suddenly began to glow a soft green, causing all attention to shift towards it, the snake eye gemstone creepily blinking before its surface turned clear, revealing an image behind it.

"What…What did Theo give you?" Merlin looked visibly upset, an inanimate object suddenly acting as if it was alive would make anyone creeped out.

Lawrence stared at the image shown within the gemstone, it was blurry at first though it would slowly begin to focus, allowing him to finally see what it wanted to show him.

"That's…!"

'Is it working?' On the other side was a familiar face, staring straight at Lawrence with his emerald-green eyes, it was Theodore in his human form.

"You…! You're alive!"

'Ah great! It worked.' Theodore smiled with satisfaction as a loud explosion erupted from behind him, slightly shaking the camera.

Merlin and Eugene instantly got up from their seats and went straight to Lawrence's side, wanting to see what was going on. The ginger spoke up in a frantic voice. "What the hell was that? Are you on a battlefield or something!?"

'Yes?' Theodore replied as if the answer was already obvious. 'A lot had happened and I totally forgot that I could do this, sorry for not contacting earlier.'

"Where are you?" Lawrence asked worriedly, though his voice was also filled with relief, he was just about to give up all hope of his son but he was glad that he'd held onto it even if it all seemed hopeless.

'Um…Hell.'

"Hell?" Eugene frowned. "I was going to say that it's fitting for you but I don't think you would find that funny."

'I don't, but it was a nice try.' Theodore shrugged as another explosion rang out, he turned around and stared at something for a moment before looking back towards the camera. 'Anyway, I'll get back to you guys soon after I'm finished with this.'

'Theodore! Are you seriously on a call right now!?' A feminine voice shouted from behind, though Theodore ignored it and continued to speak to them.

'Don't worry, I'm fine, just hold on for a bit until I get there.' He paused for a bit before continuing. 'Dad, you can call me anytime with the sword, you just need to think about it.'

"Ah! Okay." Lawrence nodded eagerly, happy to know that he didn't need to wait for his son to contact him.

'Theodore!'

'Yes! I'm having a moment here!' Theodore turned around and shouted at someone before returning to the call. 'Yeah, I have to go now, bye!'

As soon as he finished his sentence, the gemstone flashed and the image disappeared, the snake-eye pattern blinked at them one last time before finally going still, as if nothing had ever happened.

Lawrence laughed as he put down his sword. "I knew he was still alive!"

Merlin chuckled, leaning back against the cave wall. "Damn, is he a snake or a cockroach?"

"It sounded like a warzone over there, what's he thinking making a call in the middle of the battlefield?" Eugene sighed with a shake of his head, not knowing whether to be impressed or confused.

"He's probably confident that he's strong." Merlin shrugged. "I mean, did you see the trail of bodies that he left when we raided Griffins' building?"

"Sure, but weren't those normal soldiers?"

"The upper levels had Heroes too, and yet he still wiped the floor with them."

"Still, he's currently fighting enemies on the other side of a black hole, so they're probably stronger than anything he'd faced before."

"Even Lucifer?"

Lawrence frowned at the mentioning of the fallen angel. "My son fought who?"

"Lucifer, though we didn't get to see the fight, Theodore wouldn't make up a stupid lie like that." Merlin explained to him, even though they didn't see it with their own eyes, lying about fighting a deity-like being was the unlikely scenario here.

Lawrence thought it would be best not to question anything, after all, his son had come back from the dead, as a snake no less. "There's no point in thinking about it, let's just pray that things will go well on his side."

Merlin raised an eyebrow at Eugene, as if to say that he was the right one here. "Yeah, but if it's Theodore, anything is possible, so we shouldn't even worry about it at all, now that we know he's alive, we should just stay put and wait."

Eugene was about to protest but decided against it, he just shrugged. "Okay, that's the plan then."