Reincarnated With The Van Helsing System

Chapter 749: Showdown Devil VS Demon (part 21)

It’s worth mentioning that the black lion armor was destroyed by Daimon a moment ago, the reason is simple, the "four heavenly kings", namely, that sole remaining wraith from the mind burning hell, the golden imp from the mountain hell, the leader of the royal devil guards from the throne hell and the black lion armor from the beast colosseum had all become a part of Marcus’s domain, therefore when Daimon destroyed the domain not only the castle went down but also those four in a single go.

That being said, they weren’t dead yet, based on the four different energy signs coming from Marcus’s gauntlets.

"Royal Black Devil Contract, Revocation!", while bleeding from basically all his body, Marcus casted a spell which resulted in one of the four energy signs disappeared.

In response to the previous all the wounds on Marcus’s body healed on the spot, even his mana reserves which had hit rock bottom due to the backslash caused by having his domain blasted away by Daimon, recovered by a fourth of its total amount.

"A spell that does the complete opposite of the one from earlier", said Daimon, making Marcus inwardly grit his teeth, in case you didn’t notice it unlike all the previous "contract" spells the devil ruler system user before, this one had the "royal" suffix added to it.

Because unlike the hellscapes, this spell contract was something Marcus could only do after ascending as royalty, not wanting others to know about it, Marcus had made it so the first of the sole two royal devil contract spells could be activated without calling its name out loud, of course not with training but thanks to the ascension ritual.

The first royal devil contract spell was the one Marcus used to turn those four proxies into special entities tied to the castle, which were supposed to stall Daimon for time, he granted them a higher status and power according to it turning them into devil nobles of his domain, unfortunately for Marcus, Daimon not only saw through this little petty trick of his, but he also didn’t even set a foot into the devil castle.

As for why the second royal devil contract spell had to be chanted, that’s because Marcus could only permanently choose one to not need to be called out loud with the help of the ascension ritual, he had to train using the other to reach that level which of course he didn’t, of course Marcus choose the one to empower the proxies because he didn’t expect to need to resort to the other which basically stripped one of the "four heavenly kings" of its noble status and killed it in exchange for saving Marcus’s life once.

"Who would have thought that your laziness would save your life, I guess even a dog has its day", said the ghost-like administrator girl whose eyes were glued to the black and white "halo" orbited by crystals that floated above Daimon’s head.

What she meant is that had Marcus not used his promise level treasure as the medium for the "Royal Black Devil Contract, Bestow" spell, which meant that those four were tied to this black gauntlets, the four proxies would have been completely destroyed by Daimon.

And had it not been by the existence of that bind, Marcus didn’t die on the spot, Daimon’s attack was devastating, in fact he was still going to die due to the wounds he suffered, this life-saving effect only spared him from immediately dying, the attack was that strong.

The only reason as to why Marcus still had clothes on after Daimon used Lyn’s energy and his version of her main technique, which were unlocked simultaneously after he obtained Badr’s main technique by the way, is because both they lacked special effects and their defensive power was useless, after all it was just a Lord ranked magic treasure.

The black gauntlets on the other hand were a promise level treasure which Daimon could damage but not destroy before killing its owner as of current, so since Daimon didn’t want to see Marcus naked with the exception of his hands that would have still been covered by the gauntlets, he spared his clothes earlier.

Without even hesitating, Marcus flashed away on the spot, he didn’t bother or more accurately he didn’t dare to waste a single second getting angry over Daimon’s words and directly ran away, what a joke he was basically "killed" once by the masked silver haired youth a moment ago.

With a "swoosh", Marcus appeared a few hundreds of meters away from his previous spot, a black shadow portal opened for him to enter, but just as he was about to cover a large distance with a spatial jump, he felt a familiar sensation of dread invading his body.

"Crack!", the black shadow portal crumbled apart on the spot and Marcus’s body which had just recovered followed right away.

"Aghhhh!", the pain forced a loud scream out of Marcus’s mouth alongside streams of blood which spurted out of all his body, however this time he didn’t need to call out the revocation contract spell, another one of the energy signs on the gauntlets disappeared and as if time had rewound, Marcus recovered to then be swallowed by a black shadow portal successfully this time.

’Fucking monstrous bastard, I was so far from him and yet that stupid technique reached me in less than a second before I could jump into the shadow portal!’, inwardly screamed Marcus as he travelled through space, Daimon didn’t move from his spot at all earlier, meaning that this technique he was using not only had a massive effective range but was insanely fast in reaching its target as well.

Just as Marcus emerged from the shadow portal, which took him a couple of kilometers away from his previous position, that familiar sensation of dread appeared once again.

"Crack!", the shadow portal which he had casted to continue escaping crumbled apart and wounds appeared all over Marcus’s body making him bleed like crazy once again.

’How, how is he at the exact same distance from me!’, this time Marcus managed to not scream and instead used the fractions of a second after Daimon had attacked him, to look in the direction from which that sensation of dread originated, just to see that the masked silver haired youth was floating at the exact same distance from him as before.

"You are not a hero, so escaping to come back later is not your forte", said Daimon to Marcus who once again sacrificed one of the "four heavenly kings" to instantly recover before jumping into a shadow portal, that was the last time he could do this, because he only had one more sacrifice and it was the black lion armor, which is what allowed him to use shadow portals to move through space.

"Hssss!", this time we get to see how Daimon followed Marcus though, a green energy mask covered his face while lightning covered his legs, with the first he could see Marcus’s trail as he moved through space, because unlike Rita, the shadow affinity of the lioness which is in what the black lion armor based its own, didn’t have stealth as its special property but defense instead, so its traces were easy to track down with the green energy mask.

Then with the second technique Daimon flashed a few times, reaching the exact same distance at which he originally was floating away from Marcus, right when he was forced to come out of the shadow portal, he couldn’t move without interruption through space within the blood prison realm and had to come out to create another portal every certain distance.

"Crack!", naturally the result was the same, the next portal crumbled apart and Marcus’s body exploded with wounds and blood on the spot.

"Damn it!", cursed Marcus, there was no new portal this time, as the last of those four energy signals coming from the gauntlets, died down meaning that the black lion armor was gone.

It healed Marcus and helped him recover his mana on the process though, so while there was no new portal, the devil ruler system user was in condition to continue his escape.

"Detonate!", just as the sensation of dread which signaled Daimon attacking him appeared once again, the devil grimoire which Marcus kept in his inventory and was the sole thing to which he had access while in the blood prison realm, appeared in front of him and then cracked.

"Master aghhhh!", the devil librarian screamed with disbelief, but couldn’t do anything but die at the order of his master, the book which exploded didn’t produce power nowhere near enough to clash with Daimon’s attack which had blasted his battle domain away like it was nothing.

"Booooom!", but the short-lived explosion actually sent Marcus’s flying at a distance large enough and a speed fast enough so that he wouldn’t get caught up in Daimon’s attack before it blasted the explosion away in its wake.

"Crack!", of course the resulting impact at basically point-blank wounded Marcus who crashed on the ground a few kilometers away from his previous position, however he wasn’t outright killed like it would have happened otherwise.

"I told you, you lack the ability to nonsensically survive to make a comeback", said Daimon who after flashing a couple of times appeared a dozen of meters away from Marcus who was battered on the ground after making that last second escape.

"I know that, devil kings don’t have that ability, however... they do become insanely stronger after stalling for time!", said Marcus as he saw Daimon appear not too far from himself instead of finishing him off from distance.

’You were so proud of being able to predict my every movement, but there is no need to study an opponent to know that they will lower their guard when they believe they had won!’, thought Marcus.

The pitch-black tear stream "devil tattoo" on his face shone and his black horns lit up with black flames which formed a crown above his head, all the mana he had recovered which was basically intact as he had used the mana of the black lion armor to make the shadow portals, was drained out of Marcus’s body alongside a whole bunch of vitality, his body thinned down, returning him to his original though not lanky, neither toned shape, he was still a battle mage as of current but just barely.

"Go to hell, Royal Devil Innate Ability, Instant Death Horn Call!", all the mana and vitality which Marcus had lost was condensed into a giant black flaming horn which resembled the ones on top of his head, but this one was clearly a musical instrument considering there was an aperture on its single pointy end.

"Crack!", however instead of the majestic deep sound that Marcus expected to hear from the horn, what reached Marcus’s ears were cracking sounds coming from the horn as it crumbled apart on the spot, followed by the tear stream pattern devil tattoo on Marcus’s face fading and disappearing, leaving behind a sepulchral silence which didn’t last long as Marcus suffering a meltdown on the spot, broke it.

"HOW!!!".

"My devil tattoo’s power can kill any target up to the limit of the Stellar rank, you are still at the early stage of the Arch rank, no matter how strong those energies are, they aren’t at that level at all and why the hell did my devil tattoo disappear, I’m still a royal devil!!!", he screamed from the bottom of his lungs, this attack is why Marcus took a thrashing, well, besides knowing full well that escaping was close to impossible under the current circumstances.

Aligning with the concept of a devil king’s power, the ability of his devil tattoo required time to be used, in this case the longer the fight continued the stronger the attack will be, at Marcus current limit, that horn was strong enough to kill a maximum stage Stellar rank.

"He didn’t use those energies, no, in fact he didn’t even try to defend himself", in a rare occasion, the ghost-like girl spoke with a serious voice, the reason is simple she who has been analyzing and understanding how Daimon has beat Marcus at every single move... had no idea of what happened earlier.

"Well, this time you were simply unlucky in terms of matchup, to think your "sure death" attack was a curse", casually said Daimon, solving Lezabel’s doubts without going into detail.

Techniques that used "mysterious" ways to harm their target, are the worst possible option against Daimon, because not only he has almost complete immunity against them, but anything that directly targets his life is countered back without Daimon having to do anything, this is an automatic process very much like breathing for him, which is why his black sea emblem couldn’t blame him, it’s not a power that can be turned off and on at will.

Besides those specific cases, Daimon has control over some retaliation ways for non-lethal instances, for example in Marlene’s case, when she tried to steal "luck" from him unconsciously, the angelfish princess only suffered an innocent setback and tripped while walking, her innate ability is not a curse though but it works in a "mysterious" way as well, there was also a time when an enemy tried to curse him before and he got a notification to retaliate and that was for the same reason, that curse wouldn’t have really done much to him even if it were to properly land.

"That being said, even if that wasn’t the case, the result would have been the same, because all that power you are using doesn’t "belong" to you", added Daimon as he pointed his left index finger at Marcus.

Let’s talk about the version of Lyn’s technique which Daimon obtained, first and formal, he couldn’t use any other energies at the same time, the entirety of his reserves had to be Lyn’s energy at the moment of using it, second, Lyn is the culmination of her race’s evolution, she is the first of her race that is absolutely unaffected by her own power’s recoil, so she can go wild with it without any care, that’s why she could confidently say that in her generation, there is no one that could hold a candle to her in a real life and death situation, besides Ophelia.

But Daimon’s version didn’t inherit that option, the stronger the effect of the technique, the stronger the backslash, however he also has his own advantages, Lyn basically clashes her "rhythm" against the one of the targets as a whole, if she is better overall then she destroys the target, Daimon on the other hand can handpick what he wants to compare, in this case he went with energy manipulation capacities for example.

The most iconic representation of the previous is Daimon’s capacity to use both mana and battle aura and since he was born a mage and later became a knight, the ring above his head is black representing his mana and has a white border representing his battle aura, then we have the second difference, those crystals orbiting the energy ring above Daimon’s head.

They each represent mastery over something related to the aspect Daimon is comparing with the enemy, since in this place Daimon is not using mana or battle aura, then the crystals took the color of the energies Daimon has mastery over, besides Lyn’s one which is what forms the ring, for a total of five because he has not obtained a technique for his own silver energy.

As to what those crystals mean, each one of them is a major realm of absolute effectiveness for the technique to be activated, which means that as of current enemies at the pre-mage, star realms, Lord realms, Arch realms and Stellar realms, can’t resist comparing energy manipulation capacities with Daimon.

If Lyn’s version is a canon, Daimon’s version is a scalpel, just think about it, if he faces an enemy that is stronger than himself overall, Daimon can just compare what the enemy sucks at the most against his strongest aspects, it doesn’t even need to be a battle-oriented thing, since "rhythm" is not limited to that, but let’s not get too sidetracked here.

"Crack!", the devil ruler system user’s eyes contracted like needles, that shattering sound came from the top of his head where his black horns cracked to then break apart on the spot.

"Aghhh!", naturally since they were a part of Marcus’s body, when the horns were destroyed, they left open wounds on his head which caused bleeding and a huge amount of pain to him, this wasn’t Daimon playing around with the enemy as well, to be honest besides the fact that Marcus tried to kill them, there was no personal grudges between the devil ruler system user and Daimon’s group, unlike in Adam’s case, therefore whether he suffered or not it was irrelevant, Daimon was going to kill him because he was their enemy and that was it.

"You still had a way to save yourself within those horns, I think you would have been much more annoying as a hero rather than a devil king", said Daimon as he pointed his index finger at Marcus’s head.

"Save me already you damn bitch!!!", Marcus who felt death coming his way directly shouted, an expression of disgust appeared on Lezabel’s pretty face as black chains which passed through many spots of her body became visible before she flashed to appear in front of Marcus.

"Sorry, but I have to save this trash from dying once if he is not up against a hero, it’s a command with one of the highest priority level so even I can’t do much about it... retreat, more than ten kilometers in less than a minute, I can tone down my power to "survivable" level if you do that", said the ghost-like girl to Daimon, which made Marcus lose it on the spot.

"Kill him, I want you to kill him, I won’t be "saved" if he is still alive!!!", he screamed to which Lezabel whose body was being pierced by those chains casually said.

"You can grow stronger than him with time, well, a lot of time and a lot of luck, thus you’ll be safe, so in the strictest meaning of the word "save", I only have to make sure your sorry ass doesn’t die right now, anything past that is not obligatory~", said Lezabel with a cunning smile, the chains which were glowing with a red tone a second ago returned to normal and then disappeared, her logic was approved by the system.

Like previously stated in Adam’s fight, you should try to get along with your administrator as besides fulfilling the obligatory functions of the system, there is room for extra support depending on interpretation.

"There is no need for that, I know of the command with the highest priority, one that surpasses even the survival of your host", but then a new participant suddenly appeared on the battlefield, it was the mostly silent angel girl, Ariel whose projection became visible after the crystal feather pendant which used to hang from Daimon’s neck in an invisible and intangible state, flew out.

White chains appeared on the young angel girl’s body while the black ones reappeared on Lezabel’s one.

"Oh my, you sure are full of surprises aren’t you~", said the ghost-like girl as she raised into the sky to then clash with Ariel who followed right away, leaving behind Marcus whose brain had suffered a shortcut.

’T-That pendant is Adam system’s proof, and though I had never seen his administrator in detail, she is an angel, don’t tell me... he killed Adam!!!’, thought the devil ruler system user.

"Well, looks like it’s "game over" for you, certainly you were stronger than Adam, not overwhelmingly but enough to be a devil king type enemy for him I guess", casually said Daimon.

"Go ahead and gloat, if we wouldn’t have been in this damn place you would have died at the late middle part of the fight!", Marcus who at this point had accepted he was dead not because he didn’t think of begging for his life, but because he knew it was futile, the masked silver haired youth had killed Adam after all, he wasn’t going down without spitting what he thought was the truth.

"If we would have fought outside of the blood prison realm, you would have died within the initial part of the fight, because you are not a hero type", said Daimon, he already knew that he couldn’t get intel from neither Adam nor Marcus so he didn’t bother with trying to interrogate him and directly blasted a pinky finger sized hole through Marcus’s head killing him on the spot.

[Ding]

Naturally that completed the mission he had gotten after truly getting rid of Adam, but before that, there was another situation at hands, because the moment Marcus died the chains on those two who were clashing on the sky disappeared and they descended landing not too far from Daimon, before the young angel girl... started crying.

"Sister!", exclaimed Ariel as she tightly hugged Lezabel, there are few situations that manage to take Daimon by surprise and this was actually one of them.

’I guess that explains why I felt hostility from Lezabel for the first time when Ariel appeared, though it faded as soon as I noticed it, it was not because of the possibility of me being a system user, but because of the possibility of me using Ariel against Marcus’, thought Daimon.