DEMON'S VIRTUE

The Imp didn't know what he was supposed to do. He had to get the children back somehow, but he couldn't do it just like this. He was nearly killed by the Lord of Wrath, and it didn't seem to be very hard for him to do that either.

And obviously, the Imp was just dragging his body around right now. He didn't really hurt himself back there, but he had trouble breathing and he couldn't concentrate ever since then, simply because he was too tired.

There were a few thinks he did notice though, for example that his Air Magic leveled up five times just through that one thing that he did. Or that he lost his mask, and was now running around through this crowd of confused Demons.

The Imp knew what he had to do, he had to get stronger. Much, much stronger. But what if he was too late? What if the other Lords were like the lord of wrath, and would just end up killing them sooner or later? Maybe they already were dead since long ago.

But the Imp didn't want to think of that. First, he had to do something else. Somehow, the Imp had to replenish his heat, his 'mana'.

Was there any way of doing that described in his book? His... His book was still in the town... But the Imp didn't know where else but there he was supposed to start looking for ways to get stronger. The Imp wasn't strong, but he was smart. He somehow had to find ways to fight against these Lords, as weak as he was. He had to turn his smarts into his strength.

Dragging his body along, the Imp hurried back down the mountain and back toward the town, immediately rushing through the gate. Of course, he was stopped by the Gatekeepers as he was at it, though.

"What is your sin?" It asked, this being that was completely identical to the one from before. And the Imp just clicked his tongue and stared it deep into his eyes. "Wrath. Now... let me through, or before... you can be killed by the Lord of Wrath... for bringing me there, I... will take care of that." The Imp said in a quiet, angry voice while heaving for air, using a type of language that he himself didn't know he could use.

The Gatekeeper slightly flinched in response to the Imp, seemingly because he mentioned the Lord of Wrath, and the Imp simply rushed through the town back to the Inn, and back up the stairs toward his room, only slightly glancing into the room where the dead Succubus was still laying on the ground while another woman, seemingly also a succubus, was pleasuring a different man to the one that was laying on the bed before.

The Imp rushed into his room and locked the door behind himself, immediately grabbing the different books that he had.

Intensely, he stared at the first one, the one about magic, and read through it as quickly as he could. But no matter what he tried, the Imp couldn't concentrate on whatever the pages, the words, the letters, were trying to convey to him.

For just a moment, the Imp had to calm himself down to be able to learn whatever this book had to offer. Slowly, the Imp had to make sure there was nothing distracting his mind, and took a deep breath.

The Imp had to concentrate properly. If he was able to learn such a comparatively useless ability like wrapping his hand in some cloth, then he should be able to learn what was in this book as well.

Slowly, the Imp concentrated on the page in this book, and read through it as carefully as he could, of course still trying to do so with some speed.

Page by page, the Imp's knowledge increased, and what was in this book turned into part of himself. He couldn't use most of what all of this was describing just yet, but at the very least, he knew how to do it for when he would grow capable of it.

The book also described a little bit of basic information on the small orbs that the Imp found in the Pheasant's nest. They were supposed to be 'Magic Stones' of different elements, and each of them seemed to have a different effect to it.

It said that there were different ways to use them, and that they could be processed into other things as well, but the most basic use was to enable the use of effects that were like magic, without needing the Magic Skill. But even then, the higher your affinity was, the stronger the effect could be.

For now, the Imp tried to do all of this with a random one of the Magic Stones that he found, the light green one, which, according to the book, stood for the wind element. His Mana seemed to have slowly replenished as well, so he could do that.

Slowly, he placed his finger onto the Magic Stone and let his mana flow into it by leading it along through his blood, and he could swiftly feel a slight flow of air around his hand that wasn't there before.

With the 'activated' Magic Stone still in his hand, the Imp moved his hand to the side, and could notice that the flow of air suddenly got strong enough to flip the pages in the book around.

And then, he remembered that there were a few different things that some of the Magic Stones were embedded into. His Dagger, the golden stick that the Imp found in the nest, and the staff that the man in white from before seemingly attacked him with using holy energy. Especially the latter of the three seemed useful to the Imp right now, if he was able to somehow make use of it.

First, he tried out the one on the Dagger. Nothing really happened for a little while, but when he tried to touch the blade of the dagger to place it away, he soon noticed that it was hot enough to hurt his fingers even through the glove. This surely seemed to be useful, but not useful enough right now.

He had to use these white, slightly golden Magic Stones on the staff somehow. They seemed to be the ones that produced Holy Energy somehow, and if that was the case, then using these would end up helping the Imp out immensely.

The Imp wasn't sure how he should use the staff itself, but he was able to at the very least pop the Magic Stones out of it.

But when the Imp first tried one of them, the Magic Stone quickly started to make his fingers burn and even sizzle a little bit, and he ended up dropping it down onto the floor. The Imp didn't understand how, but the reaction seemed a lot stronger than what the Imp felt when attacked by that man using the staff.

Maybe it was exactly because he wasn't supposed to use it that the reaction was so strong, and the stone wanted to fight the Imp off somehow to scare him away, but to his luck, he didn't care about the pain. The cloth around his hand was hurting a fair bit more, but it seemed to let him properly attack the other demons, and maybe even made his 'Three of Swords' have holy energy. Just in case, he couldn't take the cloth off just yet.

Either way, for now, the Imp had to move on to one of the other books. The one about monsters that he bought didn't seem to have anything about demons inside of it, but the Imp read it anyway, just in case. He remembered everything as quickly as he could, but really did just end up finding information about highly dangerous monsters, some that were weak but highly venomous, and others that could only be killed through poison. It was just ridiculous what kind of monsters there were.

They were so different to the Imp that he wasn't even sure if he could call himself the same kind of creature as them, but in the end, he clearly was a monster, wasn't he? That was the little knowledge that the Imp had even before he was captured by Avalin, Thomas and James.

Either way, now that he had wasted his time reading through that book, the Imp threw it to the side and went to the next one, the one about the spirits... Maybe this mark on his chest was able to help him?

He learned a lot of different things about a lot of different spirits, and that only certain, high-tier spirits were able to give out blessings. A Blessing from a spirit apparently allowed you to summon one of its kin made up of your own mana when you reached 'Intermediate' Grade in the skill... Something that the Imp was still very far from achieving.

So while the information was useful for later, it was utterly useless right now.

Of course, the Imp slowly grew desperate. The basic techniques about magic and the things about Magic Stones that he learned seemed the most useful out of the things he learned from these books until now, but this still wouldn't be enough to kill the Lords, the Imp was sure of that.

Desperate to find anything that might be able to help him, the Imp slowly started to read through the other books that he had, and once more, there was nothing there that helped him beside knowing about some edible plants.

But then, the Imp remembered that there was another book laying around somewhere that also spoke about such things, and quickly rushed over toward the Cookbook that he bought for Rudy, immediately starting to flip through it.

He didn't care much about the different dishes, although he still read through whatever seemed like it could help him in any way possible, but the parts about poisonous plants and ways to prepare venomous animals properly was something that the Imp thought might be helpful somehow. In the future. Not now, not in this situation.

None of these books were helpful to him in the slightest!

Angrily, the Imp threw the book to the other side of the room, staring down at the floor underneath him. And just then, a slight glimmer stook out to the Imp, coming from inbetween the floorboards. Now that he thought about it, this was exactly where the Shadow died before, so maybe this was something that it dropped after being killed?

Carefully, the Imp picked it up, and looked at the small, deep black Magic stone that was now inbetween his fingers. Slowly, out of instinct, the Imp pushed his mana into the small orb, causing his fingers to be completely enveloped in darkness in the form of a thick black mist, just like the one that the Demonic Shadow was made up of.

It didn't seem to be able to get any further than his fingers right now, but at that point, the Imp realized something. If he just looked closely enough, he would be able to find useful things amongst what seemed to be completely useless.

And so, the Imp rushed out of the door toward the place that seemed the most useful to him inside of this useless town.

The bookstore.