Demons, they are demons!

Just past six in the afternoon.

The sun slowly sank toward the west.

The colors of dusk painted the hem of the sky, evening clouds drifting lazily, bringing a sense of leisure.

Jiang Yuan returned home from school, rolled comfortably on his bed for a while, then got up to prepare something to eat.

Opening the fridge, there were only a few eggs and some potatoes inside—not even noodles.

Only then did Jiang Yuan remember he'd said he needed to buy groceries two days ago, but had completely forgotten.

No choice but to head downstairs.

The grocery store wasn't far.

Just as Jiang Yuan was passing a sewer manhole cover in the neighborhood, a distinct clanging sound of metal striking stone came from inside the sewer.

Jiang Yuan stopped, his gaze landing on the slightly trembling manhole cover.

The clanging reached the opening and fell silent.

Jiang Yuan squinted, intending to take a closer look, when suddenly a chill shot from the soles of his feet up his spine straight to the crown of his head.

With a bang, the manhole cover was sent flying by a mass of shadow.

A thick, rancid stench hit him in the face. Jiang Yuan's eyes went wide.

It was a Giant-eyed Stinky Rat!

Even though this Giant-eyed Stinky Rat was very thin, much smaller than its kin, he could tell at a glance—this was definitely a Giant-eyed Stinky Rat!

To prepare for the future Bocheng disaster, he had long ago looked up all the demon species around Bocheng in the library.

"Demon! It's a demon!!!" a passerby shouted.

Chaos erupted instantly as people fled like mad.

The more chaotic it got, the more it stirred the Giant-eyed Stinky Rat's ferocity. Its basketball-sized blue eyeballs, covered in nauseating tumors, spun wildly.

"Grrr..." A strange growl rumbled from the Giant-eyed Stinky Rat's chest, and the next moment it lunged forward.

A passerby who couldn't dodge in time was tackled to the ground. The Giant-eyed Stinky Rat's claws stabbed straight into their thigh.

"Ah!" A scream accompanied by blood spraying.

Jiang Yuan froze. Everything happened too fast—he hadn't even reacted before blood splattered onto his face.

The Giant-eyed Stinky Rat didn't seem intent on killing the human wailing beneath it immediately. It let them slowly bleed out on the ground while its vicious gaze began searching for the next victim.

Jiang Yuan finally snapped out of it. Without a second thought, he turned and bolted.

He could use magic, sure, but he didn't think he could walk away unscathed from his first encounter with a Servant-level demon.

One mistake, and he'd lose his life!

Yet Jiang Yuan's sudden movement made the Giant-eyed Stinky Rat target him first. It howled and charged.

Feeling the stench and roars getting closer behind him, Jiang Yuan cursed under his breath. Of all people, it had to pick him—what rotten luck.

Demon ranks were Servant, Warrior, Commander, Monarch, Emperor.

Corresponding to mage ranks: Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced, Super, Forbidden.

Though they corresponded, at the same rank, it usually took a whole squad of mages to handle a single demon.

Jiang Yuan didn't have destructive magic like the Lightning Fire element. He had no intention of turning around to fight back. He could only stall for time, drag it out until the City Demon Hunting Squad arrived.

The Giant-eyed Stinky Rat was extremely fast. There was less than a meter between Jiang Yuan and it now. The stench wafting off it felt like it was burrowing straight into his lungs.

Jiang Yuan knew he couldn't outrun it. He suddenly twisted aside, making the Giant-eyed Stinky Rat miss, while simultaneously tracing a star trail in his mental space.

But the intense mental agitation made the star trail collapse almost immediately.

His first time facing a demon, and he couldn't even release a single spell!

"Damn it!" Jiang Yuan growled. The Giant-eyed Stinky Rat was already lunging again. He could only keep dodging.

Stardust strengthened a mage's physique; otherwise, Jiang Yuan would have already died under the Giant-eyed Stinky Rat's claws.

But as his stamina drained, his clothes were already torn to shreds. Through the rips, several horrifying wounds could be seen, streaming hot blood.

Strangely, the bleeding and pain made him calmer.

Jiang Yuan realized the beast behind him wasn't unable to catch him—it was enjoying the hunt, toying with him like prey!

If he kept dragging this out, he'd either be torn apart or bleed to death.

Jiang Yuan grasped the severity of the situation. His mind became clearer than ever before. In the span of a single breath, a dazzling star trail arced gracefully through his mental space.

On the brink of death, he finally cast aside all external distractions and completed the star trail with extraordinary speed.

"Water Shield!"

In the air, a stream of water materialized, drifting around Jiang Yuan like a silk ribbon.

Jiang Yuan turned, leaped backward with force, putting some distance between himself and the Giant-eyed Stinky Rat.

Seeing its prey show signs of resistance, a flicker of mockery passed through the Giant-eyed Stinky Rat's eyes. Its enormous eyeballs began to glow with a bloody red light.

The scarlet penetrating light shot forth, intent on claiming the human's life before it.

Yet the moment this beam touched Water Flow, its lethality plummeted; the light that passed through only left Jiang Yuan with an uncomfortable burning sensation.

The Giant-eyed Stinky Rat, enraged that its toy had blocked its scarlet ray, swung its sharp beast claws in fury.

The distance between man and beast closed once more.

Jiang Yuan was no longer as panicked as before, calmly thinking through his counter-strategies.

His eyes flickered as he risked being torn apart, twisting his body slightly—the vicious claws grazed past his chest by a hair's breadth.

The chance to counterattack had come!

Jiang Yuan's mind stirred, chill air rising as water flow condensed into an ice crystal spear that shot forth.

"Ice Control!"

"Skree!" The Giant-eyed Stinky Rat howled in pain.

The ice spear had stabbed directly into its weakest point—the abdomen—and foul, bloody fluid gushed out.

The counterattack was effective. Jiang Yuan gave the Giant-eyed Stinky Rat no time to catch its breath, once again channeling Stardust's magic energy to form an ice crystal spear and thrust it at the beast.

The Giant-eyed Stinky Rat did not sit idly by either, its eyes continuously firing scarlet rays as it charged with a roar.

Facing a Giant-eyed Stinky Rat that had lost its reason and was fighting for its life, Jiang Yuan instead found it not so difficult to handle.

He constantly wove through the gaps between the rays and claws, and every chance he had to counter, he left a deep bloody hole in the Giant-eyed Stinky Rat's abdomen.

Some of its internal organs even spilled out from the wounds.

The Giant-eyed Stinky Rat's aura grew weaker and weaker, its movements sluggish. It was clearly at the end of its rope, its life hanging by a thread, on the verge of death at any moment!

By now, Jiang Yuan's magic energy was completely spent, and his physical strength was nearly at its limit. The only reason he had held out this long was the surge of human potential.

He pulled back for the last time, watching from a distance as the Giant-eyed Stinky Rat slowly died.

Just then, several figures rushed over.

The City Demon Hunting Squad had arrived.

"Fire Seed—Explosion!" The leading captain barked, and a fiery red energy shot into the Giant-eyed Stinky Rat's body.

In an instant, flames burst forth from within the beast.

The Giant-eyed Stinky Rat finally met its end in bitterness, never imagining it would be pushed to such extremes by its own prey.

After the Giant-eyed Stinky Rat died, a sliver of light invisible to anyone flew out from its body, vanishing to an unknown destination.

They looked at the wounds on the Giant-eyed Stinky Rat and realized that the mage from earlier had already been on the verge of finishing the fight.

Unfortunately, when they arrived at the scene, they only caught a blurry figure disappearing around a corner, not its face.

The captain scanned the surroundings; he had indeed seen that mage's silhouette, but the most important task now was cleanup—no time to track down which mage it was.

Maybe just some passing mage.