Lilu just stood there, waiting. But for Melakios, the scene was completely different.

“HAHAHA!!! You cannot defeat me! I am an Incubus!”

In Melakios’ vision, Lilu was covered in demons and monsters as they started to converge towards Melakios. But he sensed something wasn’t right.

He didn’t feel the enemy. He felt Lilu, but these creatures he summoned felt as if they did not exist.

Maybe they didn’t?

Using one of the souls he took from a monstrous lizard, he found himself in the room with no monsters in sight. Well, save for the ten dumbfounded demons.

“How? How did you break out of my Dream Web?!”

Melakios just calmly lifted the lizard’s soul spirit that was still nibbling on his index finger.

“What?! What is that?!”

“A soul. Having it take on its previous shape makes it turn into a soul spirit. This helps me with all sorts of things.”

“How in the world-“

“Enough, brother. You have disgraced us too much.”

“-Eh…Yes sister.”

“You have shown adequate skill over your current powers, but what if we could give you better chances at mastering this power?”

“Sis, why are you giving this lowly human a choice?”

“Do not worry, brother. He will still come with us. However, since he defeated you, a sufficient reward is called for. I - I mean - We can grant you a wish within our power. Whether this is safety while at the Academy, easy access to training materials, free food, a specific item, or even if you want to bring someone along.”

“Sis-“

“Hush.”

“…Yes, sis.”

While the two were persuading and questioning, their maid just stood there. Her posture was stiff and proud, but whenever Melakios looked at her, she seemed to smile in a creepy way. Kind of like the way Culsans looked at him sometimes.

He shivered involuntarily.

“Is something the matter?”

“I’m sorry, Miss Lilitu, no. There’s no problem. Continue, please.”

“Hmm…good manners. I wonder where they were before, you little brat.”

Obviously Lilu was still ticked.

“People who treat me nice, I will treat them nicely in return. Otherwise…”

Melakios trailed off, gesturing towards Lilu while saying it. This only infuriated Lilu even more.

“Fine! Since you can nullify my illusions, let’s try actual combat!”

“Brother-“

“No, it’s okay. I need to see this myself.”

Melakios quickly calmed her down with a wave of his hand.

“Oh. Okay, then. Continue.”

“Hehehe. Now you can’t run away. Bring out your weapon!”

Melakios grabbed the lizard again, but this time it straightened. It's tail started to slim down to a fine point and an edge started to appear on the side of it. The lizard’s hind legs went perpendicular to the tail, looking like a hand guard on a sword.

In fact, the forearms of the lizard seemed to fuse with the head and elongated it. The hilt now appeared to be the lizard’s head poking out of the bottom of his grasp.

The lizard had morphed!

“What? He can do that?!”

“Hoooh, what a surprise! Maybe when he comes back, he can make us some spirit blades! Hahaha!”

The Four Corners were talking amongst themselves, amused by how far the young boy has grown. But none were more surprised than those who hadn’t talked to him frequently.

Eligor, Jones, the three Succubi, and even Cernunnos were all astonished by this new development.

“Heh…what can a little blade made from a lizard’s soul do?”

“Why not come find out?”

“Tch!”

Lilu rushed towards Melakios with his finely designed Rose Rapier, but still remained wary of Melakios.

Melakios never had any actual lessons from the demons on combat. But within him, he had a powerful soul.

His very own Father.

His Father, Alkelios, was a warrior who made it through the ranks and became a noble. Using his knowledge, Melakios was definitely capable of combat.

During these ten years, Alkelios became aware of how innocent his child was. He wasn’t evil, or a curse. He had let his superstitions get the better of him. Because of that, he died, his wife became a widow and supposed demon lover, and his son was being raised by demons.

With his remaining powers, he conversed with Melakios, who did not know who he was, and explained to him that what demons did was bad. But his stance on demons changed with the ten years as well.

Alkelios didn’t know what else to do after that, so once this predicament started, he jumped at the chance to help his son in combat. What father wouldn’t?

“Oh? Hello, Mr. Alkelios. Are you going to help again?”

“Yep. Just do your stuff. I will let you know if there is something wrong.”

“Okay, gotcha. Let’s do this!”

Melakios charged forward, catching Lilu off guard. Trying to right himself and block, the two swords…

Passed through each other.

“HAAH?!”

The spirit blade phased right through the rapier and stabbed Lilu in the gut. Immediately feeling a sharp pain, he backed off to heal his wounds.

“What? There’s no blood?”

“Enough, brother. Your soul has been damaged. Any more and you might never recover.”

“”””””WHAT?!””””””

Most of the people in the room were caught off guard by the information.

A direct attack on the soul? A demon deals in souls! The currency in the Demon Realm was actually souls, after all. If someone could manipulate souls like this, who knows what might happen?!

Everyone gave an incredulous stare at Melakios.