“Well, well, well, don’t I have a burden on my back?” Ren said with a sigh as he was walking forward with unconscious Sirinke leaning on his back. Ren was not particularly strong, so it was rather burdensome to carry the large lizard demon.

“Sorry Sirinke, I need to catch my breath!” Ren put Sirinke down on the ground, while sitting down panting.

“We sure have gotten ourselves into a pinch, have we not buddy?” Sirinke was still unconscious, but he was breathing. “Well, at least we are ok, uhm, sort of?”

Ren tried to humor himself intending to fool himself into a false bravado, while he clearly was trying to stop himself from trembling all over. The fear he felt through his entire being was overwhelming. ‘I am separated from my clan, out here alone with an injured lizard demon, if anyone finds me, I am as good as dead!’ he couldn’t help but freak out a little. The gravity of the situation was not a pleasant feeling.

“Well, I am not completely alone, technically….Whaaat the heck?” Ren exclaimed as he saw Sirinke’s body glow, the scales of the lizard demon were glowing with yellowish green light covering him from head to tail.

Then, the light disappeared, along with the lizard demon, leaving only his clothing in his place.

“Sirinke! Sirinke!” Ren ruffled through the clothing of the lizard demon, trying to find the trace of him there, to no avail. “Don’t tell me he just passed away!”

Ren looked at all of the places in the clothing, desperately trying to find the any trace of his ally. Then, his eye caught a strange bump under the lower portion of the clothing. When he looked underneath the clothing, Ren discovered something surprising.

It was Sirinke all right, but not the way Ren remembered him. A large lizard demon towering at a height about a head taller than Ren, which was the way Ren remembered him. But now, in front of him, the same lizard demon was about the size of his palm, a tiny creature that looked more like a gecko than a lizard demon.

“What in the world?” Ren tried to poke the tiny lizard with his finger, gently, fearing he might hurt him.

The tiny lizard slowly opened its eyes.

“Oh, Master Ren. How do you do? Wow, you have gotten really big!” Sirinke said with awe.

“I have not! It is you who has gotten bite sized! What the heck happened to you?”

Sirinke looked at his body, at his clothes that now were too gigantic for him, and looked back at Ren.

“I see. So I have shrunk then. Don’t worry Master, it is only temporary.” Sirinke said with a smile.

“Explain why you are like that right now?” Ren said with a questioning look.

“Well, my tribe has a special spell” Sirinke turned with his back showing to Ren, there was a tattoo on it with a serpent biting its own tail. “Each lizard demon of my tribe is given a Ouroboros spell when they become recognized as adults. When our bodies take extensive damage, our body reverts back to the way it was when we were young, allowing us to conserve energy and regenerate our mana. In a sense it’s a way for us to cheat death, but it’s not without its flaws….”

“You can turn back time on your own body? That sounds awfully convenient! I wish I could do that!” Ren said with a smile.

“Master, the spell does not activate on command, it only activates when one is injured, and furthermore, the user is stuck in a weak little body until the mana is restored.”

“So how long will it take for you to grow back?”

“About a couple of days.” Sirinke replied.

“Wow, that’s a relief, having to relieve your entire childhood would be rather disastrous.”

“Yeah, but Master. In this tiny body I am of not much use to you, so … I wouldn’t blame you if you chose to abandon a subordinate as weak and useless as myself...”

“What are you talking about?” Ren quickly snatched Sirinke off the ground and put him on his left shoulder. “I am not going to abandon you just because you are weakened. We are going to forward together or we wouldn’t go forward at all!”

“But Master Ren!” Sirinke was about to protest, but Ren cut him off.

“I will not leave a subordinate behind. Protecting a subordinate is the duty of the Master, keep that in mind!” Ren said with a smile.

“Yes, Master Ren!” Sirinke bowed his head while sitting on Ren’s shoulder.

With Ren carrying Sirinke on top of his head (Ren asked Sirinke to climb on top of his head to make it easier to move without the risk of Sirinke falling off), they proceeded to walk forward inside the tunnel.

“You have to admit, this place is amazing!” Ren was looking at the walls; they were greenish in color, composed entirely of glowing crystals. Even if they were inside a cave, the light provided by the crystals made it easy to move forward.

“It indeed is beautiful!” Sirinke said, his voice betrayed his fascination.

“Strange, even if this place pretty much a rock canyon, there are still plants here” Ren gestured at the small plant, a barely blooming thing shaped like a flask.

“I do believe the plant is barely hanging on to life due to lack of sunlight and water, Master.”

“Huh, is that so? Then in that case, I might as well…” Ren proceeded to pick the seeds of the plant. He collected many seeds, enough to fill a small pouch, which he put inside Orin-Yakit crystal on his necklace. “I am going to try planting them when we get back” Ren explained to confused Sirinke.

“Oh, I see.” Sirinke obediently replied.

Ren kept collecting seeds from different plants, as far as he could tell. There weren’t very many plants, but the ones that did survive would be nice to collect since they would definitely grow well. A plant stubborn enough to survive under such conditions would surely bloom well. Aside from his obsession with cooking, Ren also had a hobby of gardening.

Then, Ren staggered upon a plant with red petals, not the entire petal was red, just the tip. Ren touched the petal and saw that the red was a liquid smeared on the flower.

“Master, I smell blood.” Sirinke said while sniffing the air.

Ren looked forward and saw that the plants and the ground ahead were covered in droplets of blood. Ren proceeded to follow the trail of blood.

“Uhm, Master, is it a good idea to follow the blood? Isn’t it wiser to go as far away from blood?”

“This is the only pathway ahead of us, if there is blood it means that this route was crossed before us, we might as well see for ourselves. Besides, we don’t have any other way to go.” Ren said calmly.

“I see, yes, Master.” Sirinke said with a downer expression.

The trail of blood led Ren to discover multiple bodies of demons, all dead, with stab wounds. All of the demons looked rather cat-like, complete with manes and tails.

“These are Aris clan demons! Who could be powerful enough to plough through them like this?” said Sirinke in terror.

“Aris clan?” Ren asked.

“They are Sun Lion demons, a clan that rivaled the Jou clan at their height in terms of strength. They are not weaklings, if there are enemies capable of doing this to them, then we are in big danger!”

“I see.” Ren readied one of the bottles given to him by Master Korgan, Ren pulled out the bottle containing fire magic out of his Orin-Yakit crystal. If anyone attacks them, Ren will at least will have a way to defend himself using his grandfather’s fire magic.

With the bottle in his right hand, Ren proceeded to walk forward, along the way examining the corpses to check if there were any survivors. All were dead, majority had stab wound to their hearts. The stabs looked like they were made with something blunt, approximately size of a hand.

“I suppose it was too much to hope that there were any survivors” Ren sighed.

“Whoever did this did a very thorough job, Master, you need to be very careful, the culprit might still be nearby!” Sirinke couldn’t help but be concerned for his master’s safety.

“Alright, but we still need to go forward!” said Ren.

As he kept going forward, Ren found himself at the entrance of a tunnel.

“We already are inside of a tunnel, why in the world there are tunnels inside the tunnels?” Ren rhetorically asked while looking at the ceiling, wondering whether the Great Ones had a strange taste in architecture.

“It is the trial of the Great Ones, so there really must a deeper meaning…”

“Never mind” Ren said, realizing his subordinate took the question too literally.

As he kept walking forwards the tunnel, Ren saw a sight of a body lying there in front of him.

“Another dead demon, I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised by now.” Ren bent down to examine the demon. She had similar appearance to the dead demons he saw earlier, she definitely was from Aris clan.

“To think she got this far before she was killed” Sirinke said with a sad voice.

“Uhm, Sirinke, she is alive.” Ren said after feeling for a pulse on the demon’s neck. Then, proceeded to drag the injured demon towards the space he chose as a resting spot.

Then, Ren took out some of the medical supplies from the Orin-Yakit crystal and proceeded to treat the injured demon.

“Master! What are you doing?” Sirinke asked in slightly panicked voice.

“What does it look like? I am patching her up.” Ren said while wrapping bandages on the demon’s body.

“But she could be a threat to you!”

“Not with those injuries.” Ren said in as a matter of factly manner.

“But Master…”

“There is no harm in lending a helping hand to a fellow demon, Sirinke. If this allows her to survive, then I might as well. Even if they are from different clan, they are still demons, our kind, Sirinke. I hope you understand.”

“As you wish, Master Karatengu” Sirinke reluctantly complied.

After Ren finished treating the demon with healing ointments and bandages, Ren proceeded to pull out the supplies he brought with him inside the Orin-Yakit crystal. The Orin-Yakit crystal had a storage space of ten by ten meter room, so it could hold many things within its pocket dimension.

Ren proceeded to pull out a bowl, some wood, and bricks. He set them up in such a way that the bowl would be placed on top of bricks while the wood would be lit on fire underneath them.

Ren had about ten days’ worth of food inside the Orin-Yakit crystal. He pulled out some vegetables and proceeded to cut them up and put them inside the bowl. Then he poured water on them. He was making soup.

“Master Ren, are you always this prepared?” Sirinke asked.

“Well, I thought this trip would take some time, so I packed enough to last at least two weeks, if rationed correctly…”

“As expected of Master Karatengu!” Sirinke bowed his head. He now was observing the soup being cooked, while Ren was mixing it with a spoon.

“Still, is it really ok to have her here, Master?”

“Don’t worry; having a larger company for a meal is usually for the best!” Ren said with a smile. Ren had put the Aris clan demon with back to a wall, she was still unconscious, and so she ended up falling on her side.

The smell of the boiling meat, vegetables, and the soup permeated the air, entering into the lungs of the sleeping Sun Lion demon. She slowly opened her eyes.

Aris Noi saw that her body, arms and legs were bandaged. ‘Someone has treated me, but who?’ she looked ahead and saw that she was in front of the camp fire. On top of the fire was a stove, most likely containing the content that had such a delicious smell. And there, meddling with the soup was someone with his back turned, sitting, crouched down on the ground, while talking to someone she couldn’t see.

‘I see, so he was the one who treated my wounds. At least I know he is not an enemy. But still, where did that demon go…’ she remembered the demon with one demon eye that attacked her and her clan, she memorized his face. He looked human-like but the way he fought was more akin to a professional killer. ‘I just hope the other members of my clan have escaped safely.’

Then, the individual making the soup turned around. She clearly saw his face.

“Oh, you’re awake! I am so glad you can join us for a meal!” said a human-like individual with a tiny lizard on top of his head.

The reality in Aris Noi’s perspective froze for a moment. The very face she remembered, the demon who massacred her clan members as if they were a cattle, was right in front of her. She felt terror in her heart but more prominently anger, hatred towards the one who caused the slaughter of so many and had left her to die.

Noi opened her eyes wide and tried to lunge at him with her right hand “YOU!!!!” she ended up falling over due to her injuries.

“Are you all right? You shouldn’t move so much, your injuries might open up again.” The very demon she wanted to kill was right in front of her, but she was powerless to do anything against him.

“Don’t touch me, you fiend…”

“You can insult me all you want later, for right now-sit down and stand still.” He lifted her up and put her in a sitting position leaning against a wall.

“There, now your wounds wouldn’t reopen.”

Aris Noi was confused. This demon, he single handedly massacred her clan members in front of her as if they were a cattle raised for slaughter. He was the one who gave her these injuries, then why in the world is he the one healing her right now?

“You have already bested all of us…and even beat me. Why did you treat my injuries?” Aris Noi asked with a hint of resentment. If he is her enemy he would have let her die, but what kind of enemy injures you and then treats you?

“I suppose by the virtue of being unhurt I did best the demons who died on the way here, but that would be rather insensitive of me to say.” He said casually. “As for why I have healed you…I don’t really have much of a reason, just lending a helping hand to a fellow demon.”

“Don’t screw around! You are the one who caused this in the first place!”

“Lady, I am not sure what you are talking ….”

“You killed all of them, didn’t you? The ones that escaped” She looked at him in the eyes.

He just shrugged and said. “They were already dead when I got there, so don’t blame me for that.”

“Such cruelty….Why did you do this to my clan?!! What have we ever done to hate us so?!!” Aris Noi was losing her cool. The emotion of having all of her group killed by the demon in front of her was overwhelming.

“I don’t hate you, in fact I didn’t even know much about your clan until today.” He said with a smile.

She shuddered. ‘He smiles like that while talking of the demons he so cruelly killed, he really is a one messed up demon. Curse it, my weapon is not on me, and even if I had my sword I wouldn’t be able to move in my condition.’ She saw his goofy grin. ‘This bastard, he has me dancing on the palm of his hand. He must have done this to torture me for information-That is not going to happen!’

“I will not tell you anything. Just get this over with.” She said with her slitted yellow eyes looking directly at his brown normal eyes.

“Alright then.” He said. She closed her eyes, expecting him to deliver a finishing blow. She accepted the fact that she was going to die, but she knew she would die with honor.

“Here you go.” He handed her a bowl filled to the brim with the soup.

She looked at him puzzled.

“I thought you might be hungry, I didn’t know you were so eager to eat. You really must be a glutton. Ha ha ha…” He said chuckling.

‘Could this be a poison?’ she resolved herself to her fate and drank the content of her bowl. What she felt was not the feeling of coldness of death but the warmth and taste of the soup. She was stunned and she unconsciously muttered “Delicious…”

“Really? I am glad you liked it! Hear that Sirinke? She said my soup is delicious~! Oh yeah!”

“Really, Master Ren, you are not exactly known for being a good cook, so I had my doubts….” The tiny lizard on his head muttered.

“Who cares? She said it’s delicious, so it must be true! All hail Demon Soup!”

Aris Noi heard the name of the soup she ate, and almost ended up choking from shock. “Did he just say Demon Soup? Don’t tell me…” she looked at the empty bowl in her hands. “Impossible, to think that he could have….And I just ate….”

“Seriously, Master Ren. That is a terrible name for a meat and vegetable soup!” tiny lizard said with a sigh.

“I will keep that name regardless!” he announced with one thumb up.

‘So it is not a soup made of remains of demons, huh, that’s a relief.’ She was glad she did not accidentally become a cannibal.

“Well, I suppose it is time for introductions. My name is Ren, Ren Karatengu. I am one of the Tengu clan group participating. And this is Sirinke, he is with me. Nice to meet ya!” Ren said with a wide grin.

“A Karatengu? That should be impossible, the Karatengu lineage has been killed entirely, there is only one member of that line left and he is on his way to death bed!”

“Ehm, I am pretty sure that Grandpa is ok.” Ren said with a sigh. “Regardless, what is your name?”

‘If he is going to kill me afterwards there is no harm in announcing my name to him.’ She thought.

“I am Aris Noi, of the Noi clan of Sun lions.”

“Very nice to meet you, Noi. I hope we can get along.”

Aris Noi found herself in a weird situation- sharing a soup over campfire with her enemy. She saw that he was full of openings, if she could move she would have stricken him, but she suspected that he was leaving so many openings in his defenses in order for her to let down her guard.

‘He is not an ordinary demon, he might be trying to manipulate me. I have to be careful. I have no idea what kind of devious scheme this demon could have in his mind. Just to check, I need to assess the strength of his group. He is very strong, so he must be the strongest.’

“In your group, I mean clan, are you by any chance the strongest?” She asked of Ren.

“Me, Strongest? Definitely not!” Ren said with a nervous laugh. “I mean, almost everyone is stronger than me and faster, and far more destructive…” his words were making him feel very depressed about his own lack of ability.

“No way?!! Your clan has members far stronger than you?! Tengu clans…what kind of terrifying demons are they?!” Noi found herself shuddering from fear. If what he is saying is true, that he is one of the weakest, then she couldn’t imagine the collective strength of the Tengu clan. If the weakest was able to completely demolish her entire group of ten demons single-handedly. If there were demons that strong, then she was sure that they would have the greatest chance at attaining the victory.

She thought of her next move, with someone this powerful as her enemy, and with a body injured like this, she wouldn’t stand a chance. She decided to wait for the perfect opportunity to strike. She found herself feeling sleepy and ended up closing her eyes. Ren and Sirinke too succumbed to exhaustion, and all three ended up sleeping there, regardless of whose side they were on.

Unknown to anyone, a tiny winged three headed serpent slithered and crawled into Ren’s clothing, sliding itself into the pocket of his pants, lodging itself there, enjoying the comfort and warmth of the unsuspecting demon’s body.