"Seth," Celia scolded, her disapproval eyes on him.
Seth shut his mouth and shrugged. He was only returning what they had done to them.
Ryu looked at his fallen party members and glared at the people in front of him in resentment. He picked up the Soul Devourer on the ground and staggered as he tried to stand up.
“You… you hurt my friends. I won’t forgive you.”
“You don’t have to,” Seth said.
Seth thought of something. ‘If this were a story about Ryu, wouldn't this be the standard scene where the hero ‘awakens’ his power and eliminates the mini villains?’
Seth was not someone stupid who would allow them to get used as cannon fodders.
“Isaac, knock him out.”
Isaac was not pleased getting told what to do but he nevertheless followed Seth’s instructions and came up to Ryu. He knew that there would be no point dragging this fight any longer.
Ryu tightened his grip on the Soul Devourer and frantically swung it at Isaac. “Don’t come any closer!”
Isaac deftly dodged the swing and hit him on the back of his head with the hill of his own plain sword.
“Ryu!”
As Ryu crumpled to the ground, Betsy embraced him tightly and gave them a fierce look, as if she was defending her own cub.
“Now, should we kill the demon?” Seth questioned, his eyes locked on the wounded demon.
Morne struggled to her feet, gasping in pain. Blood streamed from her back, yet despite the agony, she positioned herself in front of her party members. "Gresiel, take everyone away from here. I’ll stall for some time for you guys to leave this place."
The demon stared at her emotionlessly.
“You can’t fight,” she stated firmly.
“I know I won’t be able to hold out long but…”
“At most, you can only buy time for five minutes. They’ll still come after me.”
“Are you worried about me, Gresiel?” Morne asked in an emotional voice. She turned towards her opponents. “See, you humans. Gresiel is more human than you all.”
However, the next words that came out of the demon’s mouth caused the beastwoman to freeze in cold shock.
"Then instead of dying uselessly like that, you should lend your strength to me.”
“What do you mean?”
Without a word, Gresiel thrust her arm inside Morne's body, ripping out her insides. Horror struck us as Gresiel callously started to chew on them.
‘What the…’ Seth was speechless.
“Gresiel?” The beastwoman Morne exclaimed in disbelief before collapsing to the ground.
Everyone was horrified as a macabre scene unfolded in front of them.
Seth regained his composure he stepped away from the demon. “You're finally revealing your true nature.”
‘As much as I want to fight her, she isn't my opponent that I can take on. My head will fly off before I can make the first move.’ That was the reason he moved away from her.
Gresiel glanced at Betsy and spoke with a bloodied mouth. “Mmmm… yes this is it. Nothing compares to innocent human flesh. It’s far more delicious than the green hummingbird that I had to sneakily eat."
Betsy was on the verge of tears as she gave her a terrified expression. “Gresiel, you were the one who killed Kiwi?”
The demon grinned with a malevolent expression that sent shivers down her spine. She enjoyed the look on the faces of the humans who were in despair.
“It's only because you people won't stop bothering me that I have to sneakily hunt for prey.”
“No, this isn’t happening!” Betsy yelled while shaking her head. “Gresiel, you always helped me during my magic practice and we helped people together. You’ve saved us plenty of time! Why did you change now?!”
“Oh, you foolish humans. You never learn from mistakes, do you?” The demon Gresiel laughed. “It's always the funniest when I see the faces of realization and betrayal when you humans realize that you’ve been keeping your own enemy amongst yourselves.”
“Betsy, move away from her!” Sera choked out.
The demon’s lost body part grew back after consuming the meat, and due to their ability to regenerate, her body seemed completely intact as if she had never lost any parts in the first place.
There were several methods for the demon to become stronger, and consuming raw meat allowed one to absorb the owner's power such as strength, speed, and features.
As the demon extended her claws towards Betsy, Isaac slashed his sword at the demon's neck, which she avoided by craning her neck inhumanely.
“An Earl-rank demon?” Isaac remarked, his eyes narrowing with recognition.
Seth also thought the same thing. An Earl-rank demon could only get beaten up by B-rank adventurers or above. However, there was only one among them. It was Isaac.
There was a hierarchy among the demons, starting with the lowest titles; Baron, Count/Earl, Marquess, Duke, Prince, and lastly, the Demon King as the final boss of this story.
‘The scene where the demon devoured all of Ryu’s party members should have happened in the later part of The Summoned Hero, but the scene currently happened much earlier. Ryu was unable to kill her; as a result, he developed an obsession with getting revenge on her.’ Seth did not grab his sword, as he thought that it was useless. He would rather use magic.
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Her claws, canines, and the horn on her forehead became larger and sharper, and she no longer resembled a human.
“It seems like you’re the strongest one here.”
She moved quickly and swung her leg at Isaac, causing the plain sword he was using to stop her strike to crack a little.
Seth was not confident that Isaac would be able to win a fight with an Earl-rank demon.
Demons were much stronger than humans in general. It was the reality of this world.
They continued exchanging blows with each other. They were too fast, and Seth could not assist Isaac directly with explosive magic attacks for fear of injuring him.
Isaac stood firm against the Earl-rank demon with determination visible on his face. As they clashed, the sound echoed across the tense environment.
“Morne! Morne, please wake up!”
Betsy shook the body of the beastwoman. Blood pooled down on the ground beneath her, and she wasn't sure whether the beastwoman was alive or not.
Seth hesitated, caught between the chaos of the ongoing battle and the wounded figure at his feet. He was not a saint who would help people who attacked him first. Before he could come to a decision, someone passed by him.
Celia pulled out healing potions from the bag she carried and then said, “We can help you.”
“Don't come any closer!” Betsy cried out. “It's because of you. Because of you guys…”
Despite the mistrust directed at her, Celia maintained a determined expression.
“Whether you believe it or not, we also didn't want this to happen,” Celia explained with an unwavering voice. “But we can’t be fighting each other right now. Let me help her. It's the least we can do now.”
Betsy glanced from the unconscious Morne to Celia, torn between her anger and the reality of the situation.
"If we weren't here, the demon would've killed you guys sooner or later," Seth said.
Of course, he only made her cry more.
"Please help us." Sera was the one who spoke up, her voice dripping with desperation. She walked towards them weakly.
Seth remained by Celia's side as she took the beastwoman's pulse.
“She's still alive, but her condition is deteriorating.”
Morne lay pale with a gruesome hole in her flesh. The impact of a demon attack also caused the flesh to corrode. Sera took the healing potions from Celia and assisted Morne in drinking the potions; however, she was not in a state where she was able to consume them as she was unconscious.
“It's not working.”
“I’ll heal her.”
Celia placed her hands above the wound, and a comforting green glow radiated from them. She was fighting the corrosion spreading on the wound and also stopping the bleeding.
“Ugh!”
Seth paid back his attention to Isaac and found his arm getting scratched by the demon.
“Isaac, take it!” Seth interrupted, tossing his sword towards him.
It was an A-grade sword known as the Heartstriker. In a one-on-one duel, it could hit the opponent's heart with better accuracy.
But, to his surprise, Isaac let it fall to the ground without catching it.
“I don’t need it.”
“For God's sake, why are you being stubborn now?”
“I can still fight with this sword.”
‘That low-grade sword? I bet it’s an E-grade though.’ Seth was getting worried.
Isaac shifted abruptly, concentrating and furrowing his brows.
‘Is he doing what I’m thinking? His signature move was used against a hundred army members when he sided with the demons in the future. Ironically, though, he is using it right now to kill a demon.’ Seth thought as he paid attention to the battle.
As Isaac executed the move, the air seemed to ripple with energy. The demon hesitated, sensing the imminent danger.
“Howling Wind.”
Swoosh.
The plain sword moved, and each swing of his blade was like a howling, swift and elusive, leaving a trail of afterimages behind. The repeated crosses on the demon's torso were like a storm ripping through her defenses.
“Kyaaaah!”
Even if she had been confident before, the demon's shape faltered with every cut, her regeneration unable to keep up with the force of the blow.
The cave shook, and some of the mana stones fell.
Despite the severe attack, the demon could regenerate herself again.
The relentless assault of Howling Wind seemed to momentarily stagger her, but then the wounds on her body began to close, and the eerie glow of regeneration enveloped her form.
‘Damn, that's not enough?’ Seth prepared a ball of light in his palm.
The air in the cavern crackled with a sense of urgency.
"It looks like it would be a lot of work to kill you," Gresiel said abruptly.
As the demon prepared herself for yet another round, Seth felt a sense of ominous premonition.
His spine tingled as the demon met his gaze with her intensely crimson eyes. She shifted her focus toward them, her predatory gaze fixating on a new target. Reacting quickly, he shot her with a magic attack. However, she was faster than him, moving his arm. It was a futile attempt to stop her advance.
Seth felt a surge of panic as time seemed to slow and the razor-sharp tips of her claws neared his face.
“Seth!”
He could hear the distant voice of Celia screaming his name and his heart thumping wildly in the rib cage. From his peripheral view, Isaac reached out to him.
‘Is this the end? It hasn’t even been a month since I reincarnated, and yet my death is already here. Isn't this really a deserving cannon fodder life?’ Seth had not reached his goal of getting revenge yet.
As the demon's claws closed in, time seemed to stretch. A flood of thoughts and regrets filled his mind.
Until the gears in his head spin...
“Krytys!!!” He yelled.
Just as the claws were about to make contact, a humongous jaw chomped on the demon’s head from behind. Seth’s cheek was pricked by her nails, causing a burning sensation. The demon’s leftover body erupted in a torrent of blood and then collapsed motionless to the earth.
Seth blinks in disbelief at the sudden turn of events. The source of the one killing the demon became apparent as he saw a small cat, its jaws still clamped around the severed head of the demon. There was a sound of shattering bones as it crunched on its feast.
"Blergh."
Suddenly, the cat "vomited" out a clump of meat. Specifically, Seth could make out the demon's eyeball rolling on the ground and hitting the corner of his boot.
‘What's up with this Deus ex machina situation?’
Affected by the gruesome sight, Celia covered her mouth with her hands and then threw up on the ground.
Seth remembered that Isaac said the dragon had been following them for the past several days, but he was not sure whether he was in this dungeon or not.
‘Luckily, he was here when I called out his name.’ Seth sighed in relief.
Dark brown fur with light ones on the sides, horns protruding from the back of his ears, and a pair of red eyes with a vertical slit in the middle.
‘Transforming again?’
The dragon transformed into a cat.
Dragons could learn magic, so it was easy for them to shapeshift. Just as Krytys can transform himself into smaller, he can also transform into other creatures.
As the feline finished his peculiar act, he fixed his gaze on Seth.
“How did you know my name?” the cat asked.
Seth lied smoothly. “I heard from the Demon King Worshipers saying your name.”
Krytys. In The Summoned Hero, during the Mad Dragon arc, that was the name he said to Im Haeseong during his last moments.
Krytys narrowed his eyes at him and the atmosphere in the air seemed to chill for a moment. In front of this small creature, Seth felt his back sweating from the overwhelming aura.
Then Krytys reluctantly accepted his answer.
"Now we are equal," he said. “I'm no longer in debt to you."
His red eyes continued to stare at Seth as he stretched his four legs.
Seth was familiar with that movement. After all, he had raised plenty of cats before this life.
“Seth!”
“Krytys!”
And then the creature pounced on him until he knocked his head and fainted.
“You lied.”