In the outskirts of the Darknar forest – towards the Red River

Hemei Sakaguchi stared at Citrus for the first time with a different expression on his face. He had maintained his casual smile up into this point but the information she just told him had completely thrown him off balance.

He had spent over a hundred years in this world slowly biding his time as he made plans on how he would conquer the demon continent. Sure most of that time was spent recording new skills and learning spells while he trained to reach his potential and attain godhood but to suddenly find out that the barrier he had spent so long searching for how to break was bow easily accessed had no doubt threw him for a loop.

“Oh my~ m I’m surprised someone like you that can move around unhindered is yet to find out. What, have you been stuck in a cave somewhere.”

Citrus words snapped him out of his daze as he immediately composed himself and answered her:

“You could say that I had some pressing matters to attend to so I originally had my subordinates keep an eye on the pawns in the forest for me but up until recently, that Ferlis bastard had also been moving around here making it hard for my subordinate to move.”

“Ferlis? Oh the Vampire Lord. I thought he was dead, so he was just hiding here Huh. Must’ve been running away from Silver, that broad is way too stuck up~ Hehe.”

“Whatever the case, his presence here for the last 10 years had set my plans back a lot so I had to come here in person. So who are these people that are able to live in my— the castle?”

“Not too sure about them myself~ They say not knowing is half the fun right? Hehe.”

“Perhaps. Still, what’s the brimstone— no, what’s your plan here?”

“Pwaaah~ I’m strictly running errands for my baby sis this time I swear. She was just sent to capture a man in the castle, dead or alive. Whatever happens to the castle is not my problem. Here, I’ll give you this.”

Citrus suddenly reached inside her robes mid-sentence to fetch something. “With this and the item I know you have, you should be able to break through at least 3 to 4 layers of the barrier easily right?~”

“That is? Huh, for you to provide me with your family’s secret for this. I suppose it’s normal that these people are very important to the Brimstones Huh.”

“Seems that way, although there are a few people I’m interested in, I still don’t like to fight dangerous people you know, so I want you to handle the guy for me. You can kill him or capture him as long as his body is intact, it’s fine. The two girls I’m also interested in have already left the castle so you can do whatever you want in there without worry.”

••

“And who is this guy? What does he look like?”

“Not sure should be one of the strongest people in there. Probably wants to be the demon king like you. I’m sure you have a skill that can help you with that right?”

“Wants to be the demon king Huh.” Hemei’s eyes narrowed as he heard those words but he tried to control himself in front of Citrus, it wasn’t wise to show such an unpredictable person smile any weakness from you. “Do what do your family want with his body?”

“I don’t know. Does it matter? You get to enter the castle and achieve your goal as long as you kill one man. Isn’t that a steal?”

Hemei thought about the matter for a while as he stared at the item Citrus had presented him with, it was just a simple pair of black gloves but his discerning eyes could tell they were valuable artifacts.

Each of the Great Five had one such artifact that served a single purpose. To break through the barrier that protected the castle from them. They had spent centuries trying to find a way in and after trying several ritualistic spells and curses they then choose to slowly find and gather artifacts that would completely destroy the barrier.

Unfortunately, Magic Artifacts were insanely rare and the ones that could break barriers were even rarer and as the five-layer barrier that protected the castle was the first of its kind, it was almost impossible to find one such artifact. However, the Great Five were relentless and thus were each able to find one item each that could break at least two layers of the barrier.

Or at least those were the information the Great Five had allowed to secretly circulate. Only God knew how many of such items they secretly had. However, these types of items had limited use and thus were still incredibly precious to the family.

Hemei stared at the gloves for a while before accepting them and his previous smile finally returned to his face. It didn’t really matter what the Brimstones were planning. As long as he entered the castle, he now had the right skill to bypass the other layers of the barrier from within and thus, he would claim the secret treasures of the demon king as while as his throne, gaining the Monarch Authority.

Citrus may have helped him in the past out of similar interests, but he always knew she was still a Noble at heart and thus he never trusted her with his complete plans. Without knowing it, she had just provided him with a lot more valuable information than she thought.

The fact that there was someone besides the Great Five that dared think they could become the next Demon King and were already a step ahead of him, was a grave sin in his sight. It was the sin he could not forgive and would have to punish as soon as possible.

He needed to eliminate said person before they lay claims to that which was rightfully his. With the orb of death in the possession of Zerahut, the monster should be able to create 20,000 undead within the next two days and with the help of the Lamia Queen, he should be able to seize control over the Darknar region pretty easily making the Great Five hesitate before making a move, thereby providing him enough time to grow his forces while increasing his own personal strength.

“How many are in the castle?”

“Not sure~ from what we gathered, he went in with the survivors of a settlement so maybe 200-300, I don’t know. But they are all trash and the only one you need to worry about is the man.

“Really.”

“Yup, not sure if he’s still in there though. But I’m sure once you get in and kill a few trash he’ll come running back. He did wast his time to save them after all.”

“I see. Fine then, I’ll handle this.”

“Awesome.”

“However, I’ll need some more answers before I’ll hand over the corpse of this man to you.”

“Hmm… sure why not.”

Hemei smiled at her willing response. The reason he got along so well with this girl was her willingness to do anything she wanted without any considerations for her status. Sure, she wasn’t dumb and he considered her to be pretty smart for a mere pawn as her unpredictable nature made her harder to control but she was very useful in his quest to destroy the Great Five and conquer this world.

At least for now.

“Alright, I’ll be off now. My preparations should be done in a day so feel free to move by tomorrow.”

“Sure but—”

Before Citrus could voice put what she wanted to say, Hemei’s figure had already disappeared from her view as she could no longer feel his presence.

“Did he teleport away? And here I thought we were gonna go somewhere private. Oh well~”

She quickly put the matter at the back of her mind as she thought of more important things.

“I wonder if he’ll be ok. He might really die if he’s not careful, that would be a shame. Then again, it would be ideal if the both of them just killed themselves though. Mmm… A simpleton acting like a genius, how unfortunate.”

Citrus then walked back the way she came as she began whistling to herself before suddenly coming to a halt.

“Why do I feel like I’m forgetting something very important I’m supposed to be doing right now?”

Thinking about it for a while she shook her head and continued on her merry way only to stop short of entering the forest yet again.

“Shit, I’m supposed to meet up with Izzy ain’t I?”

••••••••••

••••••••••

—Back in the Darkin mountain range a day later.

Liz and Rain suddenly felt a presence— well, they felt several presences around them having surrounded them, and before they could do anything about it. They felt their energy slowly began to drain from their bodies and a barrier was erected around them.

“Huh, oops, looks like we’ve fallen into a trap.”

“You think.”

“You know Liz, if I didn’t know any better, I’ll think you were jealous.”

“Huh, now why would I be jealous?”

“I don’t know, you’re jealous I’m so in love.”

“I think your head is in the cloud.”

“Maybe you should fall in love as well, you feel so much lighter.”

“Then both our heads will be in the clouds, and we’ll definitely get ourselves killed.”

“Ahh don’t sweat the small stuff.”

“I don’t think dying is considered small stuff.”

Kazko seemed to be caught in the middle of the girls bickering and he could hardly find the chance to getaway. The sky seemed to have changed color but that was just an effect of them being in a barrier. The best thing for them right now was to figure out what this barrier was truly meant for.

Was it to strictly prevent their escape or was it meant for something else. With the girls still taking this too lightly, he needed to be the adult in the group. He quickly armed himself with his new weapon. It was a blade that looked more like a machete than a sword.

He would test the barrier to see how resilient it actually was before whoever was setting it up would be done. However, as he was just about to lunge at the barrier, Rain suddenly called out to him.

“I wouldn’t do that.”

Kazko’s momentum was cut short before it had even begun and he almost tripped and fell. He turned a questioning gaze at Rain wanting to know why she had stopped him.

“Look forward, our opponent is already here. There’s no need to worry about things we can’t control right now. You just have to focus on what’s in front of you because If you make any careless actions, you’ll die.”

Kazko was stunned. He turned to face the direction Rain was staring at and, truly he saw someone there. He saw a slender figure walking slowly towards them. He had sensed more than six presences around them so the fact that only a single demoness was approaching them told him of how confident she must’ve been in her strength.

Taking a better look at the figure walking towards them, they could see that it was a young girl that seemed to be in her late teens or so. She had light brown hair styled in a twin tail, her oval face and soft facial features made her look like an adorable child, she wore skin-tight leather armor with gold-colored metal vambraces and greaves that glistened in the sun.

Her aura spread wildly across the barrier and they could tell that she wasn’t someone that could be easily handled. With no other weapons with her, one could not tell what she was specialized in. However, those were not what had gotten Rain’s attention.

The girl had an intricate silver amulet that hung by her neck running down to her childlike chest. It gave off a faint glow and had an ominous aura around it, making Rain feel anxious about its purpose.

“Hi there. I don’t suppose you guys would just surrender quietly would you?”