2036 Toying
Leonel's words sounded like a joke, but he was actually quite serious. He didn't believe anyone should be ahead of Aina, and that probably had little to do with how she actually looked. If he had seen a physical manifestation of the Queen Beauty list without Aina's name on it, he would have destroyed it on sight.
Luckily for the list and its voters, though, Leonel had never actually stumbled upon it. As such, they got away with a light scolding instead.
Despite this matter already being considered to be over, the rippling waves that it caused didn't seem intent on settling down anytime soon. But even beyond the existence of Aina herself, the Morales family and their speculation about Auran was a different matter entirely.
After Auran had regained his bearing, sitting up, and eventually standing up under his own power, he found that everyone was around him, their gazes questioning much of what they had seen. Leonel's voice was quite clear when he mentioned Third Nova. If both Orinik, a supposed subordinate of Xavnik, had this poison, and Auran had also fought a mysterious existence that poisoned him with the same thing, it was clear how these two things might be connected.
Although it was just a casual word on Leonel's part, even the Ancestors of the Morales hadn't realized that they had begun to subconsciously believe in even these casual words. Leonel himself had begun to hold a weight that he hadn't in the past, and the cascading effects of that matter were only growing more obvious by the day.
Auran, though, still didn't seem to have any intention in exposing anything. With a smile, he only said that it wasn't Xavnik's fault, after all, they were in battle. Considering his state of weakness, had Xavnik wanted to kill him, he would already be dead.
The Morales Ancestors seemed to accept this explanation as well. After all, Auran couldn't even move, and there weren't exactly rules against using poison in the Heir Wars, and it also wasn't like others hadn't had near-death experiences in the past as well.
Plus, Xavnik didn't have the same abilities Leonel had to communicate through the barriers and send things, so it made sense that he didn't send any antidote; he didn't have the capability in the first place. So with that, things seemed to have been concluded.
It was only Kira who stood in silence with a furrowed brow, her face still very much hidden behind a mask that only revealed the slits of her eyes. She knew that this failure weighed a lot heavier than Auran had led on. They had been preparing for this matter for a long while, and since this approach had failed, it meant that they would need to take the measures that Auran hadn't wanted to now.
…
While this matter was settling, the lives of Orinik and Rychard had seemingly been forgotten. With the distraction that Aina had provided, everyone was too enamored to realize that the flagships of the Eamon family and Viola family had a striking lack of their Patriarchs despite the fact they had been ejected long before Aina had sent out the Force Pill.
Now, there were three. Rychard, Orinik, and Montero were all chained, stranded in a foggy world of black that left them breathing hard. It felt like every time they tried to fill their lungs with air, a weight would be pressing down on their chest, slowing down their attempt. It made it exceptionally difficult for them to catch their breaths, and even worse than that, they had the uncomfortable feeling that they couldn't take a deep breath at all.
This matter left them unsettled, and their eyes continuously darted around as though they couldn't even see one another despite the fact they were sitting side by side.
At that moment, a beauty stepped out from the shadows and gazed upon them one after another. But what made their eyes widen was the absolute monstrosity standing by her side.
He must have been at least four meters tall, with skin as red as blood and muscles as tight as steel cords. He had four arms and a set of jet black horns that were almost impossible to pick out in the darkness. If not for the redness of the skin causing them to spot the abnormality, they might not have realized that this "creature" had horns at all.
Of them all, Orinik was the most shocked. That was because while Rychard and Montero only felt fear, Orinik felt not only fear but an understanding toward the kind of "creature" that was before him. There was no doubt in his mind, this was a demon, a true-blooded demon.
He almost fainted, flashbacks of a past he wanted to forget running through his mind with no regard for his peace or sanity. The hole in his stomach from where Leonel had ripped out his poison sack began to ooze with thick, black blood.
As a Seventh Dimensional existence, that sort of wound, especially since he hadn't lost any vital organs, shouldn't have left him so vulnerable. He could last for a long while even if it was never treated, weeks or months even. Even if he had to continue to battle, he could do so.
But given his state of agitation, he seemed to be making the situation far worse.
If others knew what he knew, they would likely be reacting like this as well. He felt as though he wasn't a chess piece on just a single board, but many of them, and it was suffocating him down to his very core as though several hands were wrapped around his heart.
Mordred raised an eyebrow and then waved a hand. An arm of darkness manifested and slapped Orinik across the face, snapping him out of his panic attack.
Orinik was many things, but weak-minded wasn't one of them. It was just that the current situation was a lot for him to bear given his past. After he had been shocked awake like this, he began to force himself to calm down, however even after a long while, the trembling of his hands gave himself away.
The demon to Mordred's back crossed his four arms over his chest, feeling a bit annoyed by the weakness being displayed here. If not for Mordred's orders, he wouldn't even be here.
"So you recognize this big one, huh?"
Orinik's lips trembled. "… How could I not recognize a True Blooded Demon?"
"Oh? A True Blooded Demon? Why don't you tell me what that is?"
"…"
Orinik had no choice but to reply.
Demons were an odd race. If they were to be described, they would be a lot like how many legends of Earth described Dragons to be. They were exceptionally promiscuous, they spread their seed everywhere, and the number of variations of their kind depending on the species and races they had mixed with were nigh infinite.
This was why Leonel had never run into two demons who looked identical, each one seemed to have a wide range of mutations they could or had undergone.
If the Demon Race were to be said to have one ability, it was that they could mesh well with most gene pools and the mutations that resulted from them were usually positive.
In this way, Demons and Humans were actually a lot alike… Both didn't have a set path or direction. It could even be said that they were two sides of the same coin as a result.
That said, the Demons were better off because of one class of them: True Blooded Demons.
True Blooded Demons were akin to Ancestors of a pool of Demon blood. If you took a family tree of all the Demons in existence, along with those with traces and portions of Demons blood, and you traced them all back, when you reached the starting line you would eventually find a True Blooded Demon.
These were Demons whose blood hadn't been mixed with any other races, a demon that was the purest in the truest of sense.
These Demons were known as True Blooded Demons in the Dimensional Verse.
In the Cataclysm Zone, these Demons were known as Chaos Demons.
This might be a shocking realization, especially since Leonel had already fought Fiend Class Demons and almost lost his life to one, while Chaos Demons were a Class even above that. But this wasn't the proper way to look at it.
It was less accurate to look at Chaos Demons as an almighty Class of Demons, and more accurate to look at them like blank slates without restrictions to their potential. It was very simple, when one looked at a Demon and couldn't immediately tell their grade or talent level at a glance… This was a Chaos Demon.
The strongest of Chaos Demons were the reason why the Cataclysm Zone held such fear toward the Race.
The weakest of them weren't even as good as Lower Demons.
However, even then, Chaos Demons were treasured existences in the Demon Race even if they were weak. That was because if they mated with a powerful existence, their child was guaranteed to be powerful as well, something even the most powerful of Spirituals couldn't guarantee.
This sort of Chaos of choice and possibility is exactly what the Demon Race embodied and it was where their strength came from.
And now, somehow, such an existence was before Orinik… Given what he knew, how could he not feel like he had been played for a fool?
From the very beginning, Xavnik had been toying with him, that had to be it...
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