Chapter 10: The Contract & Knowledge 

"What is that and why are you so shocked, Old man?" Asks Menti while looking at the mark, Azure looks at both of them "You're not shocked because you don't know what's an equal contract and why it shouldn't be able to do it" these words confused Nie and Menti even further, then Nie asks "Why shouldn't it be able to do it? And what is so special about an equal contract? Why don't you just explain it to us Senior Azure?"

Azure nods and takes a deep breath to calm himself down "*sighs*… So let's first talk about what an equal contract is. An equal contract is a special kind of contract that demon beasts can only do once in their lifetime. This kind of contract will give the other person an increase in strength, stamina or other things, depending on the demon beast side" when Menti hears that his eyes begin to shine for excitement "NICE!! Old man, quickly tell me, do you know where I got an increase?"

Azure just smiles and points towards Menti's nose "Your nose got better, now you can now smell better" Menti touches his nose and then looks towards the pup "Why did you give me such a useless increase in my ability to smell?" the pup looks up to him and rubs his head against his chest as if he want to say sorry "Sigh... it's not your fault, I probably have just bad luck" He says while laughing a bit to cheer up the little pup.

While he does that, Azure and Nie are looking at him with a confused expression thinking the same thing //Is that the same person from before that wants to become a primordial demon// as if Menti sensed their thoughts his expression abruptly changes into a cold stare filled with killing intent "Continue this thought or spread what happened here and I will make both of you suffer" He looks towards Azure "And even if you can restrict me again, you probably can't do that for long if we take your current state that you are in consideration. A spirit body" He says while smiling madly and both Nie and Azure shiver for a moment.

While Azure shivers he thinks about these words //Why are the words of this kid scaring me, is it because he has the support of the plane and I'm trapped here?... No... I am probably just scared because of the connection that I share with the young Nie it influences my emotions a bit// Azure calms down and then continues "Now Menti calm down, I need to continue with my explanations if you both want to know more" Both Nie and Menti nod and Azure continues.

"So Menti as you know now you got an increase in your ability to smell better with your nose, but that is not all if your connection deepens and if it becomes stronger you will get even more benefits from it and the little one will get benefits from you too. But normally that shouldn't even be possible because of the state of this pup was in before the initiated equal contract. This pup was born too early and should have only a few days left of lifespan and that means that its internal power should be in an exhausted state and for an equal contract you need at least half of the energy that your body can hold in its peak state, and this cub was far away from it".

"So that's why it shouldn't have been able to do it, but it still did, how?" Nie asks and Azure shrugs "That's what I'm asking myself" He looks towards Menti and then closer on the mark of the pup "Young Menti, may I look closer in the connection between you and the pup" "First, Old man, it's not pup, it's Porridge and sure I have no problem with that. I even want to know more on how it was able to do it, not that it's bad for me or has some drawbacks" Menti says and changes his position so that he sits directly in front of Azure while holding Porridge in his arms and making him look towards Azure.

Azure comes closer and touches the mark on Porridge's head and begins to search the connection between him and Menti. After a while he takes his hand back and looks towards Nie. "Nie what did you say a while ago about a spirit wolf?" Nie looks confused at Azure" What do you mean? .. I don't think it will be helpful to you. I said that Porridge looks like Menti's spirit wolf in the video game that we played, just that Porridge looks the pup version of it"

Azure begins to grin and after he hears that "I see... I think now I understand" he begins to laugh madly which scares the others. 15 minutes pass and he starts to calm down "Senior Azure/Old man what do you understand?" both ask at the same time and Azure looks at them.

"I understand how Porridge initiated this contract... It never started, it was reawakened. I still don't understand everything but I can tell that Porridge already had a contract with Menti" Menti and Nie's mouth was open in shock when they heard it and Menti asked quickly "How old man?" and why did you think it's like that right after Nie told you that I had a spirit wolf in a … videogame" Menti looks shocked at Porridge "Wait no, that can't be; that was a game and the world where he was it was deleted so how?" Menti begins to tear up a bit while looking at the Porridge and remembering the past.

Porridge looks up to Menti and rubs its head against his and begins to pant. Azure smiles at Menti and touches his shoulder "Seems like you really have emotions *chuckle* and easy Menti, even if it was only a game, something unreal, and the data of it deleted, it still did exist as part of your plane. As let us say a secondary plane and this plane even after deleting it has its own underworld where the deleted data went. This deleted data and plane were connected to the main plane of where you lived"

Menti looks up in shock "But... Old man, our plane was destroyed so how? How is that possible that he's here, shouldn't that be impossible, I mean, you said it was a secondary plane connected to our plane, but our plane was destroyed"

Azure continues to smile "Because this plane, where we are now, is a fusion of thousands of planes and parts of your old plane are in this plane too and it seems that the parts that fused together had the secondary plane too, and because it all fused this plane turned everything that was unreal into real"

Nie and Menti can't stop to be shocked and Menti can't even stop his tears because this all means that he had at least something from his old life. Menti may want to be a demon but he still has a heart that is filled with wrath and the will for revenge. Menti looks up towards the sky and whips away his tears and Nie begins to say "It seems everything that Xerxes did to destroy the connection between the chosen and their plane did not only fail, somewhat... it backfired too" Nie says with a smile and then looks towards Menti. "Am I right?".

Menti only smiles madly and pats Porridge. After a few seconds he opened his mouth "He not only caused it to backfire, he even gave me a reliable and powerful partner back. Porridge may be weak right now, but even if he only reaches half of the power he had in the game, he'll be more than enough to help me.... no us"

Nie smiles at the words and gives Menti a clap on his back "Good that you say us. But before we can go straight at him we should understand more about what we will face. Azure, you said that you will tell me why our old plane was a trash plane and the difference between other planes.

"Yes, and it is quite important knowledge that you should memorize. So let's begin with what kinds of levels the planes exist, as far as I know there are 9 different levels for planes all 9 levels are even further divided into low, middle and high. But I will only tell you about some because in this plane even if it looks somewhat developed I don't think they know already of the outside world and even then, it should only be a few chosen and I don't want to fill your mind with knowledge that could be too dangerous.

So there are the Creation level (Commonly known as trash level) (low level planes(rank low): Planes that either were born with low energy and are still growing or planes that have a damaged core or where someone stole the plane's primordial seed. At that most of them have no signal of demon beasts.

The Wild level (low level planes (Rank middle): These planes are the most common seen planes. Planes like this not only have humans as dominant species, they have demon beasts and other kinds too.

And the Spirit level( Low level planes(Rank high): This plane awakens a second type of energy in it while its plane consciousness begins to evolve or is already a plane spirit.

These three are the low level planes and as you already know, you old plane was a creation level plane, but not a recently born one, but where its core was damaged and primordial seed stolen"

Both of them listen carefully and can't stop themselves from sighing when they hear that their plane had a damaged core and its primordial seed stolen "So senior Azure, if I understood right, should this plane be either a creation level plane or a wild level plane, right?" Azure nods

"Yes, it is even a special kind of Plane because of the event, the size it has is like a grand plane" Nie is surprised by this term when he heard it, but Menti begins to shine when he heard that "That means I can have a great and grand kingdom" he says while laughing madly and the other two just sigh while Porridge wiggles with his tail.

"Young Menti, you're right, this plane has a lot of land but that is not always beneficial when there are too many people without a proper ruler, it will only cause chaos and destruction" Menti looks at him and smiles "Chaos means fights and fights means progress, so why it's a problem? Ok, destruction isn't that good, but we can fix it"

"There you are, right and wrong at the same time young Menti" Menti looks confused and Nie looks at Azure and begins to think. He continues to think and an idea begins to appear in his head "Senior Azure, could it be because this plane is a low level grand plane it will cost more energy to repair damage and could that lead to damage for the core?" Nie says in a clear voice but with a hint of fear coming from it.

Azure only nods and Menti begins to cry out "WHAAAAAAT? No that can't be. I will not let that happen, I will not let stupid ants destroy my kingdom before I can rule it"

Nie touches his shoulder "Probably because of the high energy cost Menti, imagine what happens when you put too much pressure on a stick or better give too much electricity to a bulb? "Do you think I'm stupid Nie?" he gives him a friendly punch on the stomach "I know what happens, they both break. So old man, this grand plane thing is a double edged sword right now, but if I read correctly between the lines, the higher the plane's level, the more beneficial is to live in it.

Azure is shocked because Menti was right, it is exactly like that, in the low levels it may be a two edged sword, but in the higher levels it will be a great advantage to life or cultivation in the grand planes.

"Then old man" he stood up and put Porridge down next to him "I know what I need to do. I need to increase this plane's level so that I can turn this to edged sword into a one edged sword that I will lead and use to destroy all my enemies" he says while laughing madly and again both Nie and Azure sigh helplessly.

"Menti, I know that you have a God complex, but I think it will be good to be low profile for the moment, we need to focus on our foundations right now" Menti wants to object but he realized that what Nie said it's true "I know Nie. Now I think I'll go back first and then you. Oh and don't forget to finish those three tasks, I can only say it will only be beneficial for you"

Afterwards he begins to leave this place and goes back. Now is Nie again alone with Azure and Azure looks at Nie "So Nie I saw how you trained in the fight, and I must say it was an interesting way but don't try to stray too far away from the original path, it will only slow you down" While he says that he touches Nie's shoulder.

"35% of soul purification and mid stage of the minor success skin tempering.... I can't believe it.."