Chapter 23: Chapter 023

Henry pushed the Kivu Princess aside just as the Demon’s barbed tendrils shot toward them. The tendrils pierced right into the firm rocky ground where they had been standing on. Henry shivered at that sight. If those things could easily pierce through rock, it would hurt a lot even if it couldn’t pierce through his hide.

The Demon screeched after it failed to hit its target. It retracted its tendril and took into a sprint, rushing towards the Kivu Princess. 

Henry moved into the Demon’s path and unleashed his fire breath.

The Demon came to a sudden halt in its sprint and leapt to the air, trying to jump over the flames. The stream of flames chased after the Demon as Henry veered his head. The Demon landed on the ceiling and proceeded to crawl on it, running away from the fire stream. Eventually, Henry ran out of breath. Once the fire was gone, the Demon snarled and pounced at the Princess.

You really want the Princess, huh.

Henry clicked his tongue and moved in between the Princess and the Demon once again. Before he could unleash his blazing roar, the Demon unleashed its own roar. It was faster in terms of casting and projection speed. A stream of dark purplish energy was shot out in less than two seconds after it opened its mouth. Henry dove to the side, sweeping the Princess along with him. The ground hit by the dark energy melted as if it went through intense and rapid corrosion. Henry steeled his nerves after taking a glimpse of such a sight. He immediately countered with aura blades. The Demon moved like a stuttering motion picture, dodging the aura blades.

Okay… that’s unnerving.

The Demon paused its relentless assault and stared at Henry, seemingly appraising him.

Henry didn’t know why the Demon stopped but he didn’t care. It was giving him the opportunity to catch his breath and think up a plan. Before he could hatch one, he was slowly and subtly walking backwards to the exit while keeping an eye on the Demon and hooking the Princess’s arm with a single claw.

“Mister Dragon,” the Princess called.

“My name’s Henry and drop the mister,” Henry retorted without taking his eyes off the Demon.

“H-Henry… we can’t leave,” the Princess said.

“Why the hell not?” Henry wanted to shout but he kept his voice to avoid startling the staring Demon.

“We can’t let a Demon roam free. It will bring about an unimaginable catastrophe.”

“Then what do you propose we do?”

“W-we have to vanquish it…”

“We? Can you fight?”

“I-I can help.”

Before Henry could reply further, the Demon was moving again. It was sprinting straight at them.

“Run,” Henry said and sprinted toward the Demon in response.

“What?”

“Run!” Henry shouted without glancing behind as he clashed with the Demon head-on, quite literally. The Demon went staggering, losing out to Henry in terms of mass and weight. The horns on Henry’s head seemed to have jabbed a few holes onto the Demon’s body but those wounds quickly healed up.

High-speed regeneration?! You motherf—

Henry couldn’t even finish his thoughts as the Demon lunged at him after its wounds were healed. Henry had more than enough time to roll aside but that would just let the Demon chase the Princess down easily. And so, he stood his ground and caught the Demon with his forelimbs. Tendrils began wrapping him but he tossed the Demon to the ground, tearing the tendrils off. He stomped the Demon but it moved out of the way before he could. Henry reached out hurriedly and grabbed one of the Demon’s limbs before it could chase down the Princess. Swinging the Demon overhead, Henry slammed it to the ground. The Demon bounced right back up immediately, seemingly unhurt by the act. It opened its mouth and Henry moved in instantly. The Demon closed its mouth and shot out barbed tendrils at him.

Clever bastard!

Henry gritted his teeth and moved against the assault. The tendrils hit him hard but it did not pierce through his hide, though it did hurt like a bitch when the tendrils hit him. Henry grabbed the Demon’s head and slammed it to the ground once again. This time, he didn’t let go and stomped on its body with his hindlimbs. With his other forelimb gripping the Demon around the shoulder, he tore its head off its body while it was trying to stab him with its tendrils.

Henry was closing his eyes and lips tight, in anticipation of the probability the Demon’s blood came spouting out. 

Blood did not gush out of its headless stump of a wound. Henry didn’t know if a Demon even bleed in the first place. But that wasn’t the concern here.

The Demon neither writhed nor floundered with its head torn from its body. The head in Henry’s grip simply evaporated into steam and a new head was already growing from the stump.

Give me a fucking break…

Henry held the Demon tight in his arms, his forelimbs, and unleashed his fire breath on it. The flames spread rapidly and consumed Henry himself too, not that it was an issue since he was impervious to fire.

The Demon still did not flail or thrash about as the flames slowly melted its body. It was then a sharp violet glint caught Henry’s eyes as the flames were reducing the Demon to goo. Upon a closer inspection, Henry knew that glint couldn’t be anything but the Demon’s Murux Heart. As he tried to grab it, the Demon’s body shifted in its form and blew Henry away with a large barbed tendril comprising of small tendrils.

Henry went tumbling across the ground but using his claws, he did not tumble far before he regained his bearings. When he had gotten back on his feet, the Demon had also completely regenerated its whole body. It had somehow cast off the burning parts and grew a new unburnt body in the former body’s place.

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Tenacious fuck!

The fight had returned to square one but not wholly. The Demon had a Murux Heart and it struck Henry away with its full force the moment he tried to take it. Henry knew what he had to do now but doing it in actuality was another story. The Demon opened its mouth and Henry immediately prepared to dodge. However, the Demon screeched instead and it screeched loudly, loud enough to make Henry wince due to his heightened sense of hearing as a Dragon. The Demon rushed toward him without stopping its screech.

Real clever… but not clever enough!

Though Henry was disordered by the Demon’s continuous screech, he wasn’t completely incapacitated. The Demon was no longer ignoring him in order to pursue the Princess. It seemed to be holding a grudge against Henry for aiming for its Murux Heart. But this worked in Henry’s favour. 

As the Demon was screeching, it could not use its energy breath. It could use its tendrils but it deemed its tendrils useless as they couldn’t draw Henry’s blood. Its right forelimb morphed into a shape of a scythe. The shape alone gave Henry goosebumps. It reminded him of the only thing that could easily cut through his tough hide, the centipede’s sickle claws. Somehow, he knew this scythe-claw of the Demon would be capable of the same feat.

Henry got his answers when the Demon lunged at him and slashed its claw in a wide arc. A drop of blood trickled down Henry’s cheek, or at least he think that part was his cheek.

F…uck!

The Demon immediately morphed its other forelimb into a scythe-claw and thrust itself at Henry. For the first time since his reincarnation, he was moving his body at such a rapid pace but with small movements, trying to dodge the Demon’s claws. The Demon was quicker than his eyes could follow. He was only dodging the Demon’s attacks through the beckoning of his instincts and it wasn’t perfect. He was slowly accumulating scratches and small cuts all over his body as the Demon pressed its assault.

Aside from the fact that a Demon could make him bleed, there was something else Henry learned. The Demon’s attacks were laced with some kind of harmful substance. He felt numb at the places the Demon cut. However, the numbness lasted only a while. Peeking at his scratch wounds briefly, he saw some kind of black mist trickling off of his wounds. When no more black mist was trickling out, his wounds no longer felt numb. 

Miasma, Henry gave this name to the black mist oozing out of his wounds.

Judging by the Demon’s frown, Henry easily guessed that the Demon had expected the Miasma’s effect to kick in already. It did not know the Miasma was having no effect on Henry. The Demon did find out eventually when at some point in its relentless assault. It noticed its Miasma was leaking out of Henry’s wounds. It stopped screeching and increased the ferocity of its slashes, shifting its tactic into a full-on physical assault instead of relying on its Miasma. Even though the Demon could cut through Henry’s hide, the cuts weren’t deep. His flesh itself was also tough, packed with dense muscles.

Thank god for having high defence.

The Demon’s scythe-claw eventually came breaking off of its arm. Not because Henry had launched a counterattack. He could barely follow the Demon’s movements, let alone touch the Demon. The Demon’s scythe-claw had broken off from wear and tear. Apparently, Demon’s claws had low durability in spite of their sharpness. Perhaps it was the Demon’s first time witnessing its own claw coming off, it was staring curiously and intensely at its broken-off claw. Henry seized this moment and counterattacked. He grabbed the broken-off claw and tossed it into the dazed Demon’s face. The Demon flinched and stumbled backwards but it didn’t screech nor cry. It wasn’t capable of feeling pain.

Henry lunged at the Demon while it was still stumbling around. He hindered the Demon’s recovery from its incapacity with a huge fire breath and dove into the inferno he himself set ablaze. The flames did not hinder the Demon’s recovery at all. The Demon was melting but the blaze made it easier for its claws to come out of its face, just in time to see Henry rushing at it. The Demon launched tendrils towards the charging Henry. Half of the tendrils melted in the fire before they came anywhere close to Henry. Those that did reach Henry had lost all shape and force by that point. Henry simply charged right through those debilitated tendrils.

Your ass is mine!

The Demon tried moving but the flames had severely impaired its bodily functions. It could cast all the burning flesh off and grew a new body but that would take time, something it didn’t have with Henry charging straight at it. The Demon sent out a large tendril just like before but Henry responded with a quick spit of firebolt. A small explosion ensued but strong enough to turn the tendril into bits and pieces that went scattering everywhere.

At its wits’ end, the Demon cast off the burning flesh and tossed it at Henry before running off. Henry swatted the burning flesh thrown at his way aside and chased down the palm-sized unburnt flesh that was the Demon, which had grown spider-like legs and was skittering away.

Oh, no, you fucking don’t!

Due to the Demon’s enfeebled state, Henry easily caught up to it. The Demon shot out spikes but they barely even felt painful to Henry. The Demon had already begun regenerating its body but before it could regenerate into any significant state, it was instantly reduced back into a tiny clump of flesh. The Murux Heart was the only part of the Demon that the flames did not burn for long. It caught the flames but the flame died out pretty quickly. Without the flames, the Murux Heart was constantly sprouting new flesh.

Henry kept burning and burning until the violet Murux Heart stopped sprouting any more new flesh. He kept a close watch and sharp gaze on the Murux Heart. After minutes of not showing any signs of sprouting new flesh, he drew in a deep breath before scooping it into his hands, his forelimbs, and bringing it close to his eyes. 

A black mass of tendrils burst fort abruptly from the Murux Heart but Henry had already predicted this. The black mass was instantly reduced to putty by the close-range fire breath. 

Here goes nothing.

Before the flames died out, Henry tossed the Murux Heart into his mouth. It took some time but the violet crystal clump that was the Demon’s core melted in his mouth and he swallowed the essence down his throat. He didn’t want to do this but he didn’t see another way that was as assured as this one. There was the possibility of him being corrupted or possessed by the Demonic energy he consumed but seeing as how his body practically segregated the Miasma and discharged it from his body, he figured that would not likely happen. 

Aside from the reinvigorating effects, he didn’t feel any other special effects.

While he waited for whatever effects to take place, he glanced around his surroundings. He didn’t see the Princess anywhere. However, he could still smell her. She was close. She did not run far. He didn’t think she would as there was no way she could just run all the way back to her home by herself. He trusted that she wasn’t that foolish and naive as she was smart enough to call out for help without being found out by the haggard man. 

Speaking of the accursed haggard man, he was as dead as one could be. His body was literally torn apart when the Demon climbed out of him. The crude-looking rusty dagger was still lodged in the haggard man’s corpse but the dark energy was no longer present. It was just a crude rusty dagger now. No matter how Henry looked at it, the dagger wasn’t anything special. It wasn’t made of something special metal as Henry was able to easily snap the blade in half. Deeming it a useless and harmless object now, he tossed the dagger out of his sight, far away enough to not accidentally step on it.

As Henry began walking to the exit, an intense throbbing pain suddenly spread throughout his body and he lost his balance despite walking on fours. Despite how acute the pain was, Henry wasn’t perturbed nor freaking out. This wasn’t some ominous or foreboding pain he was experiencing. It was quite similar to the time he consumed those Mana Crystals in the bottom of the chasm. The Demon’s Murux Heart contained too much life force for what his body could handle, at least that was how Henry was interpreting it.

He felt like he was on the verge of exploding but he kept his calm and let the pain run its course. His veins were glowing purplish, much like the Demon, but only for a while as the reddish-golden glow retook its place. Black mists began evaporating from his body like puffs of steam.

The pain was only increasing instead of receding. It reached the point where the pain turned into numbness. His body went limp as the numbness engulfed his body.

Right before his consciousness left him, he saw a pink figure slowly approaching him.

 

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