One month had passed, they were rebuilding the city. Victor was still missing, and Vanoth was like a walking dead. Idarin was trying to console him, but it wasn’t working. Unlike Vanoth, Salron was both sad and angry at Victor. He blamed Victor for what happened.

“Aaron, why don’t we look for Victor?”

Naomi said while trying to put her two-month-old babies to sleep.

“What even will happen if we find him? There is nothing we can do right now.”

“Celia was our friend too. We couldn’t even do a proper funeral for her...”

With sad eyes, Naomi hugged Aaron.

“Try to understand him. If I were in his place, I would be devastated too.”

He gently stroked her hair while tears were running down from her cheeks. A week later, Vanoth also disappeared without a word, just like Victor. At the outskirt of the Tedian Kingdom, Victor was sitting next to where he buried his wife, and he had a blank expression. Elius was in his arms, but he wasn’t crying. Since birth, he always smiled and tried to grab his father with his little hands. Maybe, he was the only reason stopping Victor from completely losing himself. The place he came was more like storage that Victor’s father was using. There was an empty house, and under that, the chest that Julius left behind was lying, waiting to be open. It was a safe place. Even if someone lost their way, the odds of ending up here were pretty low. But even so, someone was approaching Victor.

“Pathetic...”

Vanoth stood in front of him, but Victor kept looking into emptiness. The thing that made him raise his head was Vanoth’s attempt to take Elius from him. The Vanoth he saw was completely different from before. He looked tired, there were clearly visible circles around his eyes, and they were swollen.

“W-what?”

Victor asked in a low voice. Again, Vanoth reached his hands to take Elius without saying anything, but Victor didn’t let him.

“No.”

“Don’t worry. I’m not trying to take him away.”

He took Elius in his arms and smiled for the first time in 40 days.

“Hello, little one.”

Elius also answered with a smile and tried to grab his beard.

“One day, you’ll grow up, and I’ll come to see you again, okay?”

He put his finger on Elius’ chest, and a little magic circle appeared. Victor got up.

“What are you doing?!”

He raised his voice.

“I’m sealing the demonic mana flow inside him. Being a half-demon is not welcomed amongst the demons. It’s a sin.”

After the spell ended, he gave Elius back to Victor.

“And, don’t even try to raise your voice to me again. I want to blame you for everything, but you know... I’m the one to be blamed. I should’ve taken her back home as soon as I found her.”

Vanoth turned back and left. It was their last encounter. For the next six years, Victor changed his name tried to leave his old life behind. But despite all his efforts, he couldn’t find the courage to step out of here. That was until the day when Julius appeared.

* * *

Present time.

With thunder, a bolt of lightning fell onto Arkul, but it hit the empty ground. Arkul was already behind Wilbert, but Wilbert was aware of it. He stomped on the ground before Arkul could do anything. The ground crumbled and made Arkul lose balance. Wilbert quickly turned around and cut Arkul’s arm with a quick movement.

‘He is fast.’

His arm immediately grew back, but before taking a step back, Wilbert cut his arm again and hit Arkul in the chest with his palm. It wasn’t just a random strike. It contained lightning. Arkul felt a tingling sensation on his chest and suddenly flew back a few hundred meters. It took a while for him to get himself together. Even though he was radiating heat, the raindrops still reached him somehow. He was wet because of that, and that was amplifying the power of the electrocution. He got up slowly, his arm was already renewed, and the burn on his chest was slowly healing back.

‘I only healed myself a few times, but I’m already feeling tired.’

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Wilbert was walking towards him slowly. He didn’t seem to be attacking Arkul with the intention to kill. It was like he was playing with his food. Arkul wanted to take advantage of this and rushed towards Wilbert. He swung his sword with great force, but Wilbert just took a step back and made his attack go to waste. Arkul didn’t stop there, he kept attacking, but none reached Wilbert. Instead, the shockwaves of his attacks were destroying the ground behind Wilbert.

‘It’s like he is not even trying to dodge.’

Arkul was getting impatient because his energy was slowly depleting. It could look like they were simply exchanging blows from outside, but it wasn’t like that. Both of their attacks involved massive amounts of energy.

‘Tsk. I need more.’

He was about to put some distance between them, but Wilbert swung his katana. Arkul didn’t even see what happened. This time both of his arms fell onto the ground. Arkul frowned and focused his energy back on his arms. But as soon as they grew, Wilbert cut them again.

‘What the fuck is this speed?’

Arkul was panicking. He desperately tried to burn Wilbert. Flames were about to engulf him, but he was already behind Arkul. Suddenly flashes of lightning danced around Arkul and struck him in the blink of an eye, making him paralyzed for a second. Without hesitation, Wilbert stabbed him from behind, where his heart was located.

“Heal this.”

An electric surge flowed through his katana, filled Arkul’s body, and exploded. Arkul’s motionless body flew back.

“Wow…”

Elius was watching without blinking.

“I thought my dad was fast, but I didn’t expect him to dodge everything like that.”

“He is not dodging just because he is fast.”

Idarin said with a smile. Elius wasn’t the only one who was curious. Neil was also watching with wide eyes in disbelief.

“Then how is he doing it?”

“He can see.”

Idarin got up, thinking the fight was over.

“How?!”

Neil and Elius shouted at the same time.

“Let me explain like this. There is a natural flow of mana, and the human eye can’t see it without developing a spell. Even with a spell, it is limited. But your father, he can see it since birth. It is like a constantly open switch. The world he sees is entirely different from ours. He described it to me once. I don’t have time to tell you right now, but in short, he can see every mana flow in a human body, even before they begin to move. Naturally, in a fight, everyone tends to focus their mana before they start to move. Seeing the flow only one part of the story, the thing that made him dangerous was the combination of his magic and his eyes.”

He was about to say one more thing, but a sudden energy burst stopped him. All of the half-demon corpses around them began to float in the air. They weren’t aware of it yet, not just the demons there, but every half-demon around the empire was in the same situation right now. From their mouth, something came out like an energy ball. All of that gathered on top of the Lazor kingdom, creating a massive ball of energy. It got bigger and bigger. At the same time, Arkul’s body was radiating immense mana. Even Wilbert wasn’t able to get close to him. After all of it gathered, it began to shrink until it was a palm-size. Then suddenly, the energy ball got sucked into Arkul’s body. He slowly got up, but his appearance was changing. The human-like appearance was nowhere to be found now. He became taller, the horns on his head became larger. His complexion was dark red now, and he had a tail.

From his back, two large wings grew, making him look like a complete monster. Arkul roared. Even a single roar included an immense amount of mana. He saw Wilbert still standing there, and a greatsword made out of flames appeared in his hand. He appeared in front of Wilbert in the blink of an eye and swung his sword. Wilbert’s expression was still the same, he raised his katana, and their weapons collided. But the force was too great this time, even for Wilbert to completely block it. A large area behind Wilbert was destroyed, and he flew to the city walls. Wilbert casually got up under the debris as nothing had happened.

“Well, well.”

His body began to cover with lightning, and also, his eyes began to emit faint lightning. He entered the flow in the blink of an eye. For someone at the level of Wilbert, it wasn’t a big deal to enter flow. He took a step forward and rushed towards Arkul like a bullet, leaving behind a faint trail of lightning. But Arkul was also faster right now and blocked his attack. They began to exchange blows. The more their weapons collided, the more they destroyed everything around them. Flames and lightning were dancing around the city. Then finally, Wilbert succeeded in landing a blow because the only thing he used wasn’t his katana. He punched Arkul’s abdomen and sent him flying towards King Derek’s palace. He didn’t intend to let him get away with this and made flashes of lightning rain down on it. The palace entirely vaporized, but Arkul was fine. There was a barrier of flames around him. Arkul roared again and began to float in the air. He was radiating heat that was melting the ground around him. He raised both of his hands in the air, and a fireball began to form.

“Okay, I see.”

Wilbert began to focus before Arkul released that fireball. He focused all of his energy and cut the empty air vertically. Suddenly, another lightning fell onto Arkul, but this time it was bigger. It wasn’t just regular lightning. It was a pillar of lightning. In the middle of the pillar, he could see Arkul’s silhouette. After it dispersed, Arkul was on the ground. He was fine, but the barrier around him was gone, and minor burns were visible on his body. A fireball began to form again. He saw Wilbert getting into a position but didn’t care since he thought nothing could stop him right now. Arkul had a smirk on his face like he was mocking Wilbert. Then he felt a pain in his chest like a fly bite. When he took a look, he saw Wilbert’s katana deep in his body till the hilt. Arkul kept smirking and began to focus on the fireball again. But when he raised his head, Wilbert was in front of him, smiling.

“Abandoning his weapon? What is he thinking!”

Neil shouted.

“I advise you to cast any barrier spell you know.”

Idarin said with a terrified expression. That expression wasn’t out of fear. It was because he understood what Wilbert was about to do, but he didn’t understand his intentions.

‘Is he trying to suicide? Should I interfere?’

Since Arkul’s hands were in the air, he had no way to protect himself against Wilbert’s speed. That pillar of lightning damaged Arkul more than it looked. He cast a barrier again, but even its look was weak. Since he knew it wouldn’t protect him from anything, he tried to attack Wilbert with the giant fireball on top of his head. Wilbert took a deep breath.

“Endure this, bitch.”

Wilbert got into punching motion with a devilish smile.

“Mana…”

And before the fireball reached him, he punched the hilt of his katana that was buried in Arkul’s body as hard as he could.

“…Burst!”