The Final Battle
The slaughter of the possessed men by the sentinels continued on throughout the night. Under the enchantment of the full moon, tainted individuals instantly succumbed to madness. Those who were not inflicted with the curse were guided to safety. As for the females that turned into frenzy, there was an explicit instruction to only capture them alive.
Yuria and Filia, after issuing orders to handle the chaos that erupted in the town, quickly made their way to the interrogation cell. They barged in without knocking and looked urgently at Leo while ignoring the female agent that hung on his massive rod.
"Is it already time for the ritual?" No news came to the boy while he was disciplining the woman; the gravity of the situation was out of everyone's expectation.
"Young master! There is an emergency! We must go see madam at once." The twins hastily explained the crisis at hand as they led him towards the audience room, leaving the poor wasted lady twitching blissfully on a puddle of white cheese.
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Before the pedestal that was usually covered in a white veil, now revealed a peculiar figure shackled in chains similar to the demon in the cave. Upon a closer inspection, the figure looked like a young little girl with a pair of adorable fox ears and a massive set of long furry golden tails behind her rear. She appeared to be struggling against a certain influence; the erratic panting from her childish face looked strangely alluring.
"Grandmother?!?" Leo was bewildered; this was the first time he saw her in person.
"Child, the name is Ayaka. This is probably a little different from the old granny you imagined, but I am quite ancient, heh." The madam still had the energy left for a chuckle.
"Madam was Miko's first contracted spirit and a close friend during eons past. She alone witnessed the birth of our family and survived until the present" - Yuria
"However, madam is also one of the main pillars to the seal of the demon. This is why she is forever bound to this place." - Filia
The fox spirit had been Miko's most loyal and trusted companion, bonded by a sacred oath to service the priestess. She volunteered herself to be the seal that suppresses the demon while Miko entrusted her with guiding the family after death. With her master gone, the contract automatically ended and Ayaka could have freed herself anytime; but she chose to endure due to an unknown reason of her own.
"Come over here, child. Time is of the essence. The seal is weakening and I can't hold on much longer." Ayaka urged.
With a confused mind, Leo obediently climbed up the steps to reach the pedestal. Standing in front of the fox spirit, she looked comparatively petite before his tall figure. The boy had to bend on his knee to level their eyes.
"Child, move your head forward... closer... even closer... there."
As his face was almost a few centimeters away from the fox spirit, a soft and erotic kiss was stolen on his lips amidst the stunning suspension of his surprised face. He can feel a small succulent tongue trying to dig into his mouth as a pink stream of Anima flowed into his body. The contact of their tongues lasted more than a few minutes; the wet exchange of saliva sounded lewdly appetizing.
"You should now have both of the sigils in your body. Go forth and make haste! To the forbidden ground and consume the demon's curse!" Despite the urgency, Ayaka did not forget to lick her lips and savored the taste of the boy.
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After the party left for the demon subjugation, the door slowly cracked open within the silent and dark audience chamber. Another figure had entered the room to pay respect to the madam; she carried with her an aura of melancholy.
"Maria, regardless of all the surprises, everything is as you have predicted, hasn't it?" Ayaka slowly opened her eyes.
The doll mother had a softened demeanor over her blank expression, but she would only idly gaze at the fox spirit without uttering a sound.
"That child is really amazing. With that brief kiss, my spirit core has already been stabilized with his Anima. He was a pretty good kisser as well, but don't tell me you even trained him on that. Ku ku." Some level of satire was always necessary; Ayaka was near the end of her existence until Leo generously delivered his Anima.
"..."
"I suppose I underestimated the Shuzens, but they still played wonderfully into your hands."
Maria remained silent and continued to gaze at the fox spirit. The twinkling of her opulent eyes seemed to have already conveyed a thousand words.
"Regardless, my time for slumber draws near... I will entrust you with the family and the guidance of that child once more..."
Faint light began to glow around the fox spirit and the figure gradually reduced into a sphere. As the light dissipated, a small crystal orb was left on the futon, replacing the spirit that was originally chained to this spot.
Surprisingly, Maria deeply bowed towards the pedestal before picking up the crystal orb.
"Rest well, Ayaka. The demon is doomed to fall into our trap. It cannot resist, Leo's existence is simply too tempting for its kind." Spoken in monologue with the orb in her hand, she carefully placed it inside her breast pocket and exited the room.
The plan to weaken the curse by engaging the holy deed with Leo was just a feign; the real trump card was the boy himself. His body was a pristine vessel brimming with the potential to reach divine hood, a corporeal flesh any demon or any high tier entities will wager everything on the line to be sought after.
However, Leo was not someone those lowly beings could put their hands on, as many of them shall and had to find out the hard way. The boy was an existence that even his prodigy mother would lay down her body and soul just to become his personal sex doll. The prospect Maria saw in her son was beyond normal human imagination.
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Arriving at the entrance to the demon's lair, the group noticed the overwhelming amount of black miasma leaking out into the air. Lines of crack were spotted in the sealing monument and the gate into the cave was slowly rotting. The festering evil within the town gave the demon plenty of power to resist the seal. Leo swallowed down his saliva for the impending horror he was about to face.
"Young master, we will assist you in combat." The twins stripped their robes and activated the runes on their bodies.
While the twin's overbearing dynamite figure was very appealing to the boy, he couldn't help but to wonder if it was necessary to go bare naked every time they used their skills.
Numerous blessings and enhancement were added onto the boy while the power of the runes flowed into him; he could feel his senses heightened and his strength increased. As an array of Anima in the form of many colors flashed onto him, Leo felt like he was preparing to challenge a raid boss by applying every known buff in existence.
"Where is the demon??"
Within the cave, the corpse of the demon had disappeared from the shackles. What was left splattered on the ground were dense puddles of boiling blood. In reaction to the appearance of a certain presence, the blood began to flow ominously towards the boy and submerged his figure at a frightening speed.
"Young master!" The circumstance was not what the twins expected; they shouted in panic, not knowing what to do.
As the blood tried to forcibly enter his body, the sigils hidden in his core activated and his spirit was pulled into a spiritual realm within the void. As a tiny sprite still emerging into this realm, he saw the full figure of the menacing malice. While he morphed into the form of his physical appearance and gradually expanded, the gigantic colossal figure of the archdemon stood with overwhelming power.
The space of this dimension was tainted in deep red due to its aura, the ground was a barren land cracked under the heat of surging flames. A volcano stood behind the demon spewing out lavas and smoke. The boy won't be surprised if this place is a reimagining of hell.
"Long… have I awaited thee, accursed soul, wallowing in sins." The demon spoke in an alien tongue.
The foul creature had been lusting after the boy the moment it had known of his existence. His body had been tainted by its power, ready to become the new host to its soul. Ever since the failed attempt to lure the Shuzen family into breaking the seal, it had turned gravely impatient.
"Thy flesh is what I desire, hand it over, along with thine soul. For I will..." It continued to speak as a large shadow slowly casted over, not paying any heed to the tiny sprite that had been growing in size.
At the same time, in the outside world, large quantities of evil spirits on the island that had yet to find a host to possess were being sucked into the cave at a terrifying speed. The twins braced themselves against the torrenting gale of spiritual energies converging on the boy's body.
A minute later...
"Uhm... why are you suddenly so small?" The full might of Leo's growing spirit became so enormous that it took him a while to fully emerge into this space. By the time the demon was done with his confident speech, the boy was squatting on his legs and looking down on the foul creature like a tiny insect from meters above.
"Waaagh! Impossible! What trickery is this?!" Despite being an all powerful arch demon from the abyss, the creature had a hot temper.
Baffled by the brutal class difference, the demon flew into rage and charged mindlessly forward at a certain gigantic limp mass that happened to be laying in front. It realized it had already lost before the battle even began; the creature felt its power was waning at an visible rate. It succumbed to madness and rammed its head against an unbreakable wall as its last stand.
Needlessly to say, the soul of the demon was accidentally squashed like an ant within the realm of spirits. The arch nemesis that had been haunting the Halfmoon family for millennia was vanquished in an anti-climactic manner.
However, the real reason that led to its demise was the two sigils of runes passed down by the family and perfected by the boy's mother. The difference of spiritual energies between Leo and the demon was gravely exaggerated due to the sigils subtly siphoning its power. Most of the dark Anima it invested into possessing the boy were all secretly converted. It was like assaulting into an enemy position thinking there is a foothold inside, but only to find out all of its allies had switched sides.
Leo's body has yet to fully develop, only capable of wielding a small fraction of power from his soul. If the demon had chosen a head on physical fight, the story could have ended differently; hence, it was Maria's ultimate plan to misguide the demon into possessing the boy.
His ceaseless appetite for Anima had been for the purpose of nurturing the body, but in the process, it can't be helped there will be some excess that needed to be regularly unloaded. Especially right now, after the boy just mercilessly devoured a supersized buffet with an enormously thick amount of energy from the demon.