Unfortunately for Hal what he thought would have been his lucky charm, in other words the fact that he hasn't participated in deals with flesh eating demons directly, was actually a death sentence for him.
He couldn't be blamed though, with the lack of strong people at the towns on the borders, under normal circumstances and since he didn't send people to Jeremy for butchering, but just didn't inquire in what he did.
The adjudicator would make him sign a blood contract to recruit him, and then he'll be freed after earning some merits.
It's a shame that let alone caring about the things Jeremy did, Daimon isn't an adjudicator to begin with, and since all the information regarding flesh eating demons is in Jeremy's head, then Hal had no need to keep his over his shoulders.
Feeling Daimon's murderous gaze, Hal's body trembled, he crawled backwards in fear as he shouted.
"W-Wait I already surrendered you can't kill me, I didn't do anything!".
"Well, that seems to be the problem, you knew what was happening inside the walls of the brothel, and feigned ignorance, but don't worry I'm not killing you due to such a noble reason, your idiot son tried to kill us and that is why he was turned into a melted pile of meat a few minutes earlier, as for you, you are in my way, that's it".
Hal's eyes widened, he in fact felt aggrieved because it was his stupid son the one who brought this calamity towards him, on the other hand he was also angry now that he heard what happened to Alan.
He actually gritted his teeth as a spear with a core embedded into its shaft, appeared on his hand, the spear lit up in green lines of light as Hal's body released a large amount of wind becoming a small hurricane, as he thrusted his spear frontwards from below.
Kneeling down as he did previously is a disadvantageous position to dodge or escape, but for surprise attacks is actually quite good, since it's hard to fend off from attacks that come from low angles.
"Crack!", a glass shattering sound echoed through the area, at the same time the hurricane suddenly disappeared, revealing a baffling scene, at least for Hal.
Hal had used practically all his mana into this surprise attack, while his physical strength was really low since he was a mage, wind has a really high sharp property rivaling that of metal but being way lighter, though lacking in defense in exchange of course.
And the entirety of his mana reinforcing his spear amounted to nothing, as the scene of the tip of his spear exploding as it clashed against the black sword of the enemy, which was somehow floating by itself in front of the masked man, suggested.
Hal's surprise attack might catch others off guard, but even if he would have been somehow able to trick Daimon, Narasha took her role of being Daimon's battle companion pretty seriously, even from the inventory she was always looking at Daimon fights, so that she could interfere.
There wasn't really a need to, but Daimon was wielding her even if this was a low ranked battle, because he could tell she wanted to participate too, Narasha was his soulmate so for Daimon it was easy to notice how she felt.
And that's how he could notice she was in a really good mood right now, so much that the black red bordered energy of Disaster came out of the sword and engulfed both the spear and Hal, reducing them to ashes.
'Who knew that the usually calm Nasha could be so wild, must be Daimon's influence~', playfully said Evangeline, making Narasha softly laugh, but she didn't deny it.
She was forced to be emotionless since she came to existence, otherwise Disaster which was quote unstable would have gone berserk, the very first time she allowed herself to show some emotions, was when Daimon had counter-stolen energy from Disaster, weakening it.
In part that's why she still had trouble understanding emotions, but she has progressed a lot in the past years, at least now she understood love, affection, protectiveness, bloodlust and recently enthusiasm has been her focus, it's not like she didn't feel other things, as she has shown some jealousy towards other girls.
But she was unable to understand why, it's not like she was dense or anything, as she knew it was related to Daimon, unfortunately it's not something she could explain with words, so that others could help her, it was something she had to do by herself, since it could be part of the requirements needed for her to obtain a body, Daimon didn't press on the subject and supported her from the sides, if she needed his help she will tell him after all.
With Hall dead, Disaster returned to Daimon's hand which brought Narasha peace of mind, being wielded by Daimon was something she enjoyed, also she was careful enough to not destroy Hal's ring which was the only thing on him that survived Disaster's attack.
Daimon beckoned and the ring flew towards him, now that the battle was over it was time to loot of course, so using his infinity eyes he looked for Hal's treasury, which had been buried by the debris but remained firm in its place.
Daimon suddenly had an idea; he waved his hand and to his surprise the debris was tossed aside like it was nothing, Sarah's eyes sparkled, she tried it to and a boulder of thirty meters of size was ripped of the ground and send flying a few dozens of meters, making her smile.
"Will Manipulation…", mumbled Daimon, leaving aside the fact that Sarah just used Will Manipulation, which should be the case as she is a Knight Lord, she shouldn't be able to as the curse placed on her is still there, and she had to comprehend it too.
On the other hand, he also shouldn't be able to use it, to this extent, as the most he could currently do was fixate things according to his desires, like how he carried all the girls during the three-art tournament.
And what he did just know is an advanced application of Will Manipulation, for mages entering the Lord realm means becoming closer to the world, hence they gain a Manifestation Phenomenon that increase their affinity with whichever element they are skilled in.
Knights on the other hand, entering the Lord realm means becoming able to affect the world, which results in Will Manipulation, the ability to extend their "existence" to other things than themselves, through their battle aura, it has an infinite number of applications which depend on each person.
But one of the though generic, advanced applications is manipulating non-animated objects with battle aura, as that is one of the bases for their future Battle Avatar.
Daimon's eyes glowed behind his mask, the boosting effect of this place's night, was incredible, originally, he thought that it was granting them abilities one major realm above their battle prowess, like flying.
But was more than that, as it made Sarah, a native of Neptune, "complete", as she was now able to use Will Manipulation, which no native of Neptune has obtained, as they directly skipped to Battle Avatar at the Arch rank in the case of talented people and half Stellar rank for the less talented ones.
Hal's treasury was quite large, but it had less things than Jeremy's one, as one would expect of illicit business, it was quite profitable, but in exchange Hal had double the amount of mana crystals, which were the jackpot for Daimon.
Besides that, the other stuff was mainly crappy equipment without cores embedded, and he had a rack of beast cores which were taken away of course, as well as some potions and a single Arch rank sword with an Arch rank core, like the weapons Daimon got from Ismael, but this one was in perfect state, not having been used before, which was the surprise of the night.
The rest of the stuff ended in Ender's ring, or more accurately in a few rings Ender got from the enemies he had killed tonight, as for the town granary and storage, they were located below Hal's mansion, so while the crazy girl used Will Manipulation to remove all the debris, in a good mood as she was enjoying playing with this new toy, Ender turned to see Daimon and then said.
"All the targets have been captured, I stationed my subordinates outside of Ismael and Alguil's treasuries… will you mind meeting the chief?".
Ender was worried about the fate of Brown Wind town, as far as he understood Daimon was leaving as soon as he could, and with the forces of the town reduced a lot, it was going to be harder for them to survive.
To his surprise, Daimon actually nodded, agreeing to that, but he also added.
"Sure, that was the next step, in fact tell him to summon all the important people that is left, to show up in the chief's mansion within twenty minutes", he said, making Ender bitterly smile but he still nodded as he took some distance to make a call to the chief and the important people he knew off, which survived.
Seeing Ender leaving for a moment, while Tila was busy coordinating the rescue of the slaves kept by the other hunting teams and other things, Sarah who had finished playing with Will Manipulation stretched her tall body, clearly accentuating her curves, just to be ignored by Daimon, which still was up to her liking as her smiling face suggested, approached him.
"So, what now?", she asked.
"We wrap things up here and then move to a bigger stage, also we have to arrange a meeting with the flesh eating demons, since we have some "questions" to ask them", answered Daimon.
He previously didn't think that was the case, but now that he learned that the missions of this place were some stupid hero crap, there was a big chance that Jasmine would be in the territory of the flesh eating demons, waiting to be "recued" by the hero, as that was most likely the script prepared for this farse.
Sarah immediately connected the points, because she could see the fake notifications that Daimon received from this place, the crazy girl could be strange but she didn't have an ounce of foolishness in her, when she was serious at least, so her expression immediately became serious as she said.
"The humans of this place are already scum, if Jas is trapped in those guy's territory why don't we break in directly, instead of going to another city…".
Even if she wasn't a fool, Jasmine's safety was a delicate matter for Sarah, though she trusted Daimon and actively threw herself at him, she couldn't help but ask what was in her mind, precisely because that's how much Jasmine meant to her, and that is one of the few things Daimon could respect of her.
"We are already in human territory, the flesh eating demons obviously live separated from humans, so it's better to narrow our options regarding human territory first, before going into theirs, being fast doesn't mean to be in a hurry, we'll use the most efficient way to reach her".
Daimon had already read all the information that the merchant with the largest coverage, could provide, and there was nothing that could be even remotely related to Jasmine.
With how far was the wasteland from the central territory of humans, Daimon was sure there would be no really important information arriving soon, so he wanted to go to a much more "civilized" place, one with connections to the central territory, to see if there was any hint.
Even if he could feel Jasmine's relative position, which was the northeast, the area was too big to just guide himself with that, he had to narrow the search, as a wrong turn might cost them a lot of time.
As for why Daimon went through the hassle of dealing with the scum of this town, which could be considered a waste of time, there was a reason to it as well.
They were brought here as part of the test for the inheritance of the hero, and the missions were related to that, he wanted to complete at least one, maybe the reward could help them find Jasmine.
And he chose the first mission he got as the test to that, because systems followed a game-like set up, triggered missions often followed a turn order within a certain area, in other words the first mission he got by reaching Brown Wind town, should give him the bet reward.
In any case, eliminating all those guys didn't take him even an hour, and now he just needed to solve the root of the problem of this town, and he'll be finished, which will happen in the next twenty minutes, at the same time he'll get his ticket to a better located town, or maybe even a city.
"Mm, sorry I got a bit heated… as an apology you can have me tonight~", as always once Sarah stopped thinking on Jasmine's well-being she returned to her crazy self, making Daimon sigh.
Ender returned just in time, with positive news for a chance.
"It seems that all the important people that is left has already gathered in the chief's mansion, the situation is quite tense though and the chief can't control them for too long so…".
"Let's go, you two are enough", said Daimon.
Ender nodded, he called Tila and then they led the way to the mansion of the chief, which was also in the central are of the town, but surprisingly at the outer part of it, while Hal literally lived at the most inner part of the center, a clear sign that the chief had lost a lot of his authority.
On the way, Daimon observed the town, it surprised him to see that all the people stayed in their houses, because while most would do that, there is always opportunists wo take advantage if chaos and yet no one was trying to rob small stores, or causing troubles, instead they were all cowering in fear in their houses or even on the streets, sitting waiting for their deaths to come.
"Why bother in building a town in such a far away place, if you don't have the strength to keep it running", said Daimon.
He could understand that the current people lived here, they were born here and were too weak to go to better towns, as travelling through the wasteland was practically a death sentence for them.
But the ones who stablished the town, must have been strong enough to defend against the dangers here, even without a proper refuge as the town surely took some time before it was built properly.
To Daimon's surprise, Ender answered with a bitter voice.
"In the past, the wasteland used to be a large and calm green area, where there weren't even dangerous magic beasts, but the first time that the blood moon week happened, the landscape changed, and the magic beasts that we have to fight in order to survive nowadays, appeared".
"My great-grandfather once told me that we were being punished for something, I didn't believe it, until I saw a person eat his own child after being driven mad by hunger, perhaps we did something really bad which resulted in our world being turned into such a rotten place", he said.
Daimon remained silent, he still wasn't sure of what was the backstory of this place, the only thing he knew is that a hero system user should have come here in the past.
With Ender leading the way they soon reached the mansion of the chief, which was actually quite an old looking building, it was taller than Hal's mansion, but it wasn't as well-maintained.
Daimon could hear the many voices arguing inside of the mansion, and there were some mana agitations too, caused by many people using mana pressure at the same time.
Updated from fr𝒆ewebnov𝒆l.(c)om