Yifomiet

The massive head of the minotaur demon tilted to one side. He did not attack immediately.

He seemed hesitant.

"My title while walking the human world... Where did you learn it?"

A bat demon nearby darted out from the demonic horde and rushed over. "Grand Duke Asmodeus..."

"Mmph—"

A sound like rolling boulders rumbled from Yifomiet's throat as he raised a sharp finger—the finger was as large as the rune pillars in the arena chamber.

With a low whistle-like hum, an invisible wall of air appeared before the bat demon's face.

Bang!

The low-ranking demon dropped straight down like a bird that had flown into glass.

No demon dared approach again.

"Grand Duke..."

Yicha's lips twitched, though he was not smiling at all.

He had heard that title.

Asmodeus was likely Yifomiet's true demon name, while Grand Duke was a rank second only to Beelzebub, the King of All Demons. There were only a handful of them in all Chaos Hell.

Only those whose strength or contributions had reached the level of a "king," yet who for some reason could not be granted the title of prince, could receive a special rank such as "Grand Duke."

His gaze fell upon the crimson spear—the black mark he had slashed into it had somehow vanished, leaving the shaft smooth and unmarked.

This weapon...

Yicha turned his gaze back to Yifomiet and studied him.

His dark gray bull horns, burning with undying flames, spread as wide as his shoulders and curved powerfully forward. That was how Yicha had recognized him.

Endless smoke rose from every muscle in his body. Near his skin, faint distortions could be seen in the air, clearly caused by energy concentrated to an extreme degree.

Beelzebub had not lied. This fellow was indeed likely the strongest combatant under her command.

But that was not all he faced.

The hell broadcast, as invasive as a disease, had gathered together. Like an orchestra, every instrument blared around his ears, bringing him unending mental pressure.

Even from thousands of miles away, the King of All Demons could easily suppress every remaining demonic part within his body. The disorderly, black-cloud-like energy around him had now shrunk back into the core, trembling, no longer available to him.

Even against a civilian Grand Duke like him, the Queen of Hell had not let down her guard.

Ruthless, preferring excess over omission—such was Beelzebub's style.

"Ah... darling... Why must you oppose me... why why why why... Think of all those good days we had..." The flies in his mind sighed regretfully.

Yicha ignored Beelzebub's nonsense.

Every demon knew one truth: when Beelzebub began clinging to you, that was the end of the good days.

"I have only heard of a wandering demon named Asmodeus. I never expected that in just four hundred and fifty years, you would rise from the lowest-ranked wandering demon to Grand Duke... Congratulations..." he said, staring into one of Yifomiet's bloodshot white eyes.

At the same time, Yifomiet's bulging eye shifted.

The words seemed to have angered him.

Though more likely, he had decided there was no need to hesitate any longer.

The pair of human arms on the shoulders of Yifomiet, the "Hand of Destruction," tensed with knotted muscle.

The crimson spear stirred up a heatwave as it slashed down like lightning.

A dense rain of chaotic fire sprang into being in midair. Seven hundred exploding flames trailed blazing tails as they struck toward Yicha.

"Hah."

Yicha vanished, reappearing thirty feet behind him—the furthest distance he could move without delay in his current state.

Even so, the sharp spearhead, reeking of gunpowder, barely grazed the tip of his nose, while the rain of fire scorched several marks into his beloved robe.

There was no time to mourn it. Yicha pressed down with both wings and beat them, flying in the opposite direction of the spear's slash.

He spun through the air and landed atop Yifomiet's massive bull head, speaking into the ear covered in barbed mane.

"For a wandering demon without any backing to rise to baron takes at least a thousand years. From baron to viscount takes another eight hundred at minimum. From viscount to marquis to duke takes another fifteen hundred years, and from duke to Grand Duke—"

Black smoke erupted from Yifomiet's entire body.

The demon legions on the ground, the exploding sparks everywhere, the twisted night sky—all vanished from sight.

In an instant, the air became so thick that visible ripples could nearly be carved into it.

Dense smoke drifted and churned in chaos.

Then, suddenly, a large-knuckled claw thrust out from within—

Yicha raised one wing, swept sideways, and avoided Yifomiet's strike.

"—I forgot. There are only three Grand Dukes, while dukes are plentiful. Take me, for example. I spent sixteen hundred years tutoring nearly one-third of all the demons in Hell, almost lowering my own intelligence in the process, yet all I got was a choice between the rank of Grand Duke and one other thing..."

Yicha glided nimbly forward in an arc, drawing close to Yifomiet's broad forehead, wide enough to serve as an altar, by relying on his memory of their previous positions.

This caused the minotaur demon's other claw, which had tried to seize him, to close on empty air.

Yifomiet's steel-like forehead and his oily black forelock, sharp as spears, appeared before him.

He had chosen correctly.

He grabbed one of Yifomiet's thick, hooked bristles with one hand, then extended his other hand, wrapped in horn chains. Focusing his mind, he tried to draw upon the unfamiliar power of order from the angelic part of his body.

Fortunately, flickering white light swiftly gathered into a ball. Hanging from Yifomiet's forehead, he pressed the cloud-like mass lightly against Yifomiet's brow.

"So, what did you do during those four hundred and fifty years in the human world?"

Yifomiet suddenly withdrew his hands and stopped attacking.

Steam hot enough to melt metal blasted from his upturned nostrils, each as large as a well. Under the bombardment of that steam, the white light of order blurred and dimmed.

"Hehehehehehe—"

His hammer-like laughter rang across the entire floating island.

Yicha said nothing.

His body swayed. One hand reached to grip Yifomiet's brow as he desperately tried to maintain his balance in the searing heat—then Yifomiet violently shook his head, nearly flinging him off.

The laughter stopped.

"You sure talk a lot," Yifomiet said.

The minotaur demon suddenly leaned backward.

Yicha flapped his wings, trying to follow.

As long as he stayed between Yifomiet's eyes and nostrils, Yifomiet's spear and giant claws could not be used effectively.

But he quickly realized that Yifomiet was not like those simple-minded demons.

Yifomiet raised his spear with both human arms, pointed the tip forward, and turned his body sixty degrees in midair—

At the same time, the edges of his black silhouette began to tremble and contract—

He was shrinking.

Ink splashed onto Yicha's face. Realizing what was happening, he immediately lowered his head and retreated.

The spearhead sliced across his forehead, leaving a wound neither shallow nor deep.

Just an ordinary wound.

Yet in an instant, it corroded deep into his flesh, becoming so deep that bone showed.

Without hesitation, Yicha skillfully stirred the life energy in his other hand, intending to use a Vine Spirit Spell to heal himself.

Sizzle—

Instead of healing as usual, the wound flared with pain, giving off a burnt stench.

Yicha pressed one hand to his forehead, dizziness clouding his mind as he stared fixedly at the spear in Yifomiet's hand.

"Darling... you're hurt!!! You should have listened to me... Next time, you'll listen to me, okay... okay?"

The orchestra of flies in his mind conveyed Beelzebub's will.

They let out aggrieved sighs.

The next instant, a tone as cold as wind scraped across his skull.

"That's right. There won't be a next time."

Yicha wanted to vomit.

He really wanted to vomit.

Stifling.

It was too stifling.

The foulness Yifomiet emitted had already choked his mouth and nose, while Beelzebub's mental pollution stood ready to exploit any opening and drive him mad.

Blood like molten gold flowed from the wound on his forehead, running down the bridge of his nose to his lips.

In that brief instant, he had already switched between two healing methods: Vine Spirit life spells and human law spells.

Yet the wound did not budge, burrowing deeper like a maggot.

Yicha stared hard at the crimson spear.

He recalled how Andras's Enforcer's Sword had broken against his chest. Yet this spear could wound him as easily as cutting cake.

Material vision, energy vision—

Two overlapping scenes appeared before his eyes.

In his material vision, the four-armed minotaur demon, now nearly eighty percent smaller, had already turned over. The crimson spear swept out a rain of fire and thrust toward his abdomen.

In his energy vision, however, the spear's place was occupied by thousands of scattered crimson fragments.

In Yifomiet's hand was what seemed to be a cluster of solidified, dried blood rain, with a sharp bone rod at its center. The blood rain mixed with a rain of fire trailing black smoke and shot toward him.

Yifomiet himself looked entirely different from what he saw through material vision.

His body seemed refracted through countless prisms, each prism showing only a small piece of him from a different angle—a burning bull horn tip, bloodshot veins on an eyeball, gleaming black joints, a slender snake tail, abrupt feline fangs.

Yicha knew what he was seeing.

Destruction energy.

The manifestation of destruction energy.

Yifomiet, the Hand of Destruction in the human world; Grand Duke Asmodeus of Hell.

That crimson spear of his was the condensed essence of destruction energy.

Extermination Destruction Cone!