"Lad, I don't mean to be rude or anything, but we do need some proof that he is a demon worshipper before allowing you to do anything." The king said as he stared at Reign who was still holding the guard in his hands. Each guard that was stationed in the castle was amongst the most loyal and strongest amongst their peers, at least they were at one point. To believe that one was actually a demon worshiper wasn't hard, but the king and the others would need to see some evidence before they accused the man.
"Right, you guys can't feel the demonic energy in him, alright, just give me a second." Reign starched his head in embarrassment as he tried to think of how he could prove that the guard was a demon worshiper, unfortunately, nothing came to mind and he truly had no idea how he could prove it.
Torturing the guard and forcing him to use the demonic energy was impossible, not only would the king and the others not allow an act such as that one to be done without any proof, but even if he was allowed to do it, demon worshipers were incredibly cunning and cruel people, the guard might even sacrifice his own life in order to make Reign seem crazy. As Reign continued thinking hard about what to do, Aethion's sigh was heard inside of his head.
"You really need to think a bit more before doing things, boy." Reign's eyebrow twitched a bit after hearing the old man's words. They were true however, he had forgotten that only he was sensitive enough to demonic energy and that others couldn't sense a thing from the guard or any of the other demon worshipers that Reign had come across in the castle. But how would he prove that the guard was a demon worshiper?
"There is a way, well, there are a couple of ways, but this one is the only one that you can do right now, it's a bit tricky, but just let me control the flow of mana in your body and it will be fine." Aethion once again sighed before speaking to Reign, the latter's face brightening up with each word that Aethion said. Since the old man had a way to show everyone that the guard was a demon worshiper, the rest of his plan would go smoothly.
In fact, Reign already knew where the demon worshipers were, he could feel the demon energy seeping out from the ground, and locating their headquarters wasn't anything difficult, if the worshipers were stronger and knew more, or if the demon they worshiped was more powerful, it would definitely be many times harder to sense it, but it was obvious that this wasn't the case.
Perhaps the demon they worshipped wasn't even a Transcendent being, but whatever the case might be, Reign already knew where to find them, and with them, he could probably find Lios. Reign also had a much clearer grasp of what happened that night when Lios disappeared and how he was captured, of course, he couldn't tell that to anyone right now as they simply wouldn't believe his words.
"Alright, just be patient and let me show you." Reign suddenly said before shocking the guard once more, the guard's face showed an expression of pain as he couldn't move an inch from the powerful lightning that was coursing through his body. Right after that, Reign suddenly forced him to kneel down before putting his hand on the latter's back.
He infused his mana into the guard's body, of course, he wasn't doing anything, it was all Aethion. The mana moved through the body of the guard as it followed the same path the guard's mana did, one thing was weird however as the guard had less mana than he should have, in fact, it was much less mana.
"That's what demon worshipers do, they take demonic energy, but leave a bit of mana in their body so that they can show it during fights, all of the demon worshipers are bestowed with a way to mask the demonic energy from the demon they decided to follow," Aethion spoke as he controlled the mana to suddenly flow in the opposite direction compared to the guard's mana flow.
"That's why it's so tricky to catch them, even if someone was to do the same as I am doing right now, they would have no idea if the guard was truly a demon worshiper or if his mana was simply low right now after perhaps training or doing something else, not to mention that if the person's control over the mana wasn't good, the guard's mana flow would clash with the other person, which could lead to grave injuries."
"But don't worry, nothing of the sort will happen here, I've done this many times, even necromancers like me don't like those bastards very much." Aethion chuckled a bit as the flow of mana he was controlling sped up, it started passing through the body of the guard many times faster than what his own mana flow's speed was flowing at. Reign could sense that the man Aethion was controlling would also disappear at some spots while flowing through the body.
"The demonic energy that the worshipers had is quite different than that of demons or possessed like that gal in your party, they don't have any specific place where it's stored and it can be found almost everywhere in the body, hidden of course," Aethion spoke as more and more mana was flowing out of Reign to the guard, more and more spots where mana couldn't pass through were being shown inside the body as well.
"Because of how hidden the demonic energy inside the body is, one needs to try and find it with mana first, once you find enough hiding places, you attack it, with swift mana attacks you can break the hiding places and force the demonic energy to erupt and show itself, it damages the person a bit, but nobody will care if a demon worshiper gets injured after all."
Aethion did exactly what he said needed to be done, the flow of mana changed as it split into a couple of strains which focused on the spots inside the body where it couldn't pass through, the guard grunted from the pain but before the king and the others could do anything, the hidden demonic energy erupted as the guard's whole demeanor changed.
Sensing the power that was coming out of his body, the guard showed an expression of disbelief before it turned into anger and then fear. He knew that it was over for him, the king and the others were looking at him with disbelief as demonic energy flowed around him. Compared to Laura, the demonic energy that the guard had was wild, and it was obvious that he couldn't control it well, the power behind it was also many times weaker compared to Laura's.
"It's, it's true, he really is a demon worshipper." Someone from the crowd said as everyone stared at the guard who couldn't do a thing, even killing himself was impossible since Reign's lightning was still present, shocking him and making him unable to perform even the slightest action.
"So, shall we go?" Reign smiled at the people in front of him who simply nodded in agreement. Not only were they shocked to see that a guard of the castle was a demon worshiper, but many also had another thought in their head.
'We need to learn that!'
The technique that Reign performed to force the demonic energy to show itself was something that all kingdoms and empires would want, of course, the bigger kingdoms and empires all had their own ways of finding out if someone was a demon worshiper, but their ways were more difficult compared to what Reign had done right now.
Most of the other kingdoms on the planet had no way of finding out if somebody was a demon worshiper and that was the reason why it was so difficult to root them out. Reign suddenly started moving with the guard in his hands while the crowd followed after him.
"The reason why I took this guy was simply that I can use the demonic energy that's currently exiting his body as a guide, it's a lot easier for me to actually sense their headquarters like this." Reign suddenly said before anyone could ask anything, what he said was mostly a lie, he had no need for the guard and he only wanted to use him as an excuse to how he was able to sense and find the headquarters.
Simply saying that his sensitivity toward demonic energy was that high wouldn't cut it and some people might suspect that he was a worshiper as well, or perhaps a possessed.
As the crowd followed after him, they came to a shack in the city, one of the people in the crowd had taken a scroll before and used it, coating the whole group and making them invisible to the people that were walking around the capital.
"It's here." Reign stopped and stared at the shack.
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