DEMON'S VIRTUE

Chapter 632: Predictions

Shimour raised his brow and looked down at Eiro with a scoff, “If you say so. Anyway, are we doing this, or are we just standing around chatting all day?”

Krog looked at Eiro confused and curious, “What are you doing?”

“We’ll fight,” the demon said bluntly, as he turned his head to the side. His shadow grew a darker black as Mislan stepped out of it holding a set of armor. Just like Eiro himself, Mislan could easily travel through nearby shadows, so he could be basically wherever he needed to be in places like the manor in a matter of seconds.

Eiro quickly placed the dragon-scale armor onto his body, as Shimour sighed, “What, do you seriously want to go all-out?”

“…I won’t use large-scale magic or anything, but I figured we might as well go all-out in a physical fight.”

“You say you’ll hold back?” Shimour asked, “Do you really think you can afford that?”

James quickly intervened before Eiro could answer, doing so for him, “I think Eiro means large-scale magic as in… magic that will completely destroy this garden and manor.”

“Right,” Eiro agreed, “I won’t have the leisure to hold back, I know, I just want to make sure I don’t have to spend the rest of the day gardening.”

Shimour nodded in agreement, “I see, I’ll also keep that in mind.”

Somewhat curious, Eiro raised his brow. He didn’t know anything about Shimour’s style of combat, but if he said something like that, then it must mean that his powers were also quite destructive in some ways.

The two of them stepped into the center of the training area, as Eiro grabbed his two daggers. One of them, naturally eminating heat as the other had a flow of cold mist flowing off its metal. Shimour looked at them curiously, “…Want to make a bet out of this?”

Eiro scoffed and shook his head, “I know where you’re going, but sorry. If these get too far away from me, they’ll literally break down into scrap metal,” he explained. They were made with the help of a duplicate of the mountainbreaker after all, and since duplicates couldn’t get too far away from the user of the mirror, these would become literally completely useless quite quickly, if it came down to it.

After clicking his tongue, Shimour grumbled, “Fine, but at least tell me where you got that armor from later.”

“Sure. I actually think he’s around right now, I’ll introduce you to him,” Eiro said with a grin, glancing to the side. He quickly commanded one of his servants hidden in the wind to travel to the royal castle to get the Dragon of Truth and Justice, Lognir.

“In that case… let’s get this started,” Shimour said, and before Eiro knew it, Shimour’s existence simply faded away. He could tell that James and Krog were both growing confused at what they were seeing, and even Eiro was strained to not completely forget what was going on right now. But before long, something tiny did change. It wasn’t much, but Eiro had half a dozen mental duplicates busily analyzing everything that was going on around him right now. And more importantly, Eiro was wearing the armor made of the Dragon of Truth’s scales. He was perfectly attuned to the concept of ‘Truth’ right this very moment. His ability to see through the lies and that which was hidden was higher than it maybe ever was.

Slowly, Eiro thought about Shimour’s body. The way that his muscles twitched as he moved, the way his muscles were distributed in the first place. His scent, telling Eiro which races made up his being, including the monsters that were deep in his ancestry. Minotaurs… Argons… there was even some Demon blood in there. Ever since Eiro became ‘The World’, his body had absorbed the techniques of many people. He was confident that he knew how certain movements affected one’s muscles more than anyone else right now.

Shimour was strong, and if he fought, his abilities allowed him to take his enemies out instantly. He must have built habits over time, the perfect way for him to attack an enemy, habits that must have become ingrained in his body somehow.

Slowly, Eiro shifted his body, pulling his feet over the ground as he buried his left foot in the tight gravel underneath him, while crossing his two daggers with each other, forming an ‘x’ with their blades. Before he knew it, he could feel the impact. Shimour’s dagger was caught by Eiros’. The Demon could practically feel his confusion. But more importantly, this definitely gave him an opening. Eiro kicked up his foot and pulled up a bunch of dirt and gravel, which he was only turning into finer dust with the help of earth magic. Dust that quickly covered Shimour’s body. Of course, in no way was that enough for Eiro to see through Shimour’s stealth, but it was nonetheless a perfect opening.

Shimour’s blade was pulled away just an instant ago, when Eiro stabbed both of his daggers at the cloud of dust in front of him.

The first thing that happened was that a wave of flames spread from grain to grain, like cracks forming in the sky. The fires ignited, and a dust explosion quickly formed. But before this could happen, the ice from Eiro’s other dagger seemed to travel through the fire, freezing the flames itself.

Numerous branches of frozen flames now covered the area in front of Eiro, and he soon heard a loud laugh coming from behind him.

“That was incredible! You actually noticed my attack?!” Shimour asked, having finally revealed himself. The Demon turned around to look at him, but Eiro slowly shook his head, “I predicted it. I knew that I wouldn’t be able to notice you, but I could guess where you would attack me.”

“I don’t really get it, but clearly… you’re even more impressive than I already thought. Alright, I’ll give up on the highest tier stealth for now. You already beat me in that regard,” the Master of Stealth pointed out, glancing at that incredible structure currently falling apart behind Eiro’s back. It had appeared in an instant, and started disappearing just as quickly. If Shimour continued using stealth the whole time, then he wouldn’t be able to keep seeing attacks like that, or even more impressive ones than that.

Eiro laughed, “I do appreciate it… It already took all I had to figure out where your first attack would land. You didn’t really give me much to go off. Then show me what else you learned on your way to the top.”

Shimour pushed his hand into the pouch at his hip, and before Eiro knew it, dozens of tiny needles were shooting his way at incredible speed. He didn’t have the time to react physically to dodge them all, but they were covered in ridiculously potent poison. Somehow, Shimour had hidden their scent until just now, probably using his stealth or something, but Eiro could tell that if even one of these needles hit him, a large chunk of his flesh would just rot off in a matter of seconds.

Luckily, Eiro had a new trump-card. He could see all of the needles approaching, and using the mirror of duplication in his eye, duplicated each and every needle, pulling them just a little further in their path, while keeping them suspended mid-air.

A moment later, small sparks flew as the needles collided with their own duplicates that blinked out of existence the moment that Eiro, as well, blinked.

Eiro pushed his hand forward and twisted his wrist, creating a gust of wind that pulled together all of the needles, stopping them from hitting the ground. Eiro pushed them off the ground and flicked his wrist, shotting the clumped-together needles back at Shimour, even faster than they were thrown in the first place. However, instead of dodging them, Shimour simply took them with his body. Eiro noticed that the poison penetrated his skin, but seemingly not only did nothing, but was neutralized incredibly quickly as well.

Of course, someone that worked with poisons as potent as this must also have poison resistance to match up with that.

Eiro grinned lightly, as Shimour slightly shifted his weight, pushing himself forward as the two of them ran at each other to fight in an exchange of melee combat.