Chapter 71: Change

"Oh, ~ is that so? So you want to make an enemy out of me? That would be pretty stupid of you." Camilla's voice could touch his nerves, but Alex kept a straight face through the whole ordeal. 

Unlike the Lightning Sage who relied on instincts to sense unseen danger, Camilla was purely logical. She knew that certain things could escape pure instincts, no matter how refined the instincts were, even at the level of precognition, instincts were still a biological reaction that can be fooled. 

Her eyes wandered to Alex's side. There was only space there, but Camilla narrowed her eyes. "Disease?"

"Yep," Alex confirmed it, "Instincts aren't built to react against things like disease. Poison? Yea. But not a disease. At this dosage and fast reaction usually, it would classify as poison and the instincts would pick it up. But there are some exceptions to that too."

Camilla's face turned grave. "You are reckless. I took you as the logical type. The only thing that I couldn't sense and can escape the instincts of someone of Yang Ting's instincts would be a Hell's Creature. Those things will be just as a danger to you as they would to your enemy."

"Just because you don't understand something doesn't make it reckless." Alex refuted her before dark marks spread even more around his body. "Others will see it as reckless. I would call it necessary. So, have we come to an understanding?"

"What understanding?" she asked, confused. "That you showed you macho side and being dangerous to even people like me? Yeah, I ain't impressed. That just seems like stupidity to me."

Alex on the other hand still had a calm smile on his face, and slowly a trail of blood dripped out of her nose. "Huh?"

She touched his lips and saw the blood in her hand. "Ah… this is bad…"

Camilla looked him in the eyes. "Why? I never went against you and even was helpful. We were allies."

"We were pretending to be allies," Alex clarified. "Everything worked within our benefits. Though I guess all alliances are like that. But still, as you said, controlling this Hell's Creature is impossible for me. This is known as Aerico of the Disease. As long as people fear disease, then this creature would exist. During times of plague, it will grow even stronger."

"So this is it then, will you attack me?" Asked Camilla with an edge in her eyes. Her body wasn't truly impaired by sickness. Because she wasn't a human, to begin with, still though, every organism will be wrecked by disease in huge doses.

But even then, it wasn't like Camilla didn't have a counter plan against something like this. Situations like poison, disease, insta-kill attack, these were things that someone of her caliber would take countermeasures against. 

"Attack you?" Asked Alex, as if it was the craziest thing he had heard all day. "Why would I do that? Unless you decided to go against me of course."

"Oh~ I get it now," Camilla smirked. "So this is some kind of power move on your part? Something that shows how dangerous you are. Honestly, you are dangerous, I doubt there would be anyone more dangerous than you on the continent right now."

"Oh, I can think of a couple more dangerous people." Said Alex as he smirked.

"I can too." Camilla smiled back.

"You said you didn't though."

"Oh, I mean at this moment you have the power to get rid of most of the human populace in this world. Disease is something dangerous, and starting a plague would be easy for someone like you. So yeah, you are extremely dangerous right now." Camilla explained nonchalantly. "Still though, there are a couple of creatures in this Continent that are even more dangerous than you. Hope you don't take this the wrong way."

"Oh no, I won't. I agree with you on this." Alex's fake smile got even wider than Camilla's fake smirk. "So, wanna be friends?"

"You just attacked me even when I came to help you and if I hadn't been careful my body would be down there on the ground with the sparky old man," Camilla mentioned towards the dead Lightning Sage.

"Let bygones be bygones and let's make peace." Alex insisted, extending his hand towards the vampire. His sick body was covered in dark patches of disease.

"You are my enemy now." Said Camilla, while pointing at him. "You want me to make peace with my enemies?"

"We make peace with our enemies, not our friends."

"Oh? So we aren't even friends now?"

"Of course we are friends, words are just air. It doesn't matter what we say to each other, we will be friends as long as there are benefits in the relationship." "Wouldn't you agree?"

Fwish!

Camilla grew red bird-like wings in her back and an instant flew in front of Alex, he had no barriers around him and his Mana was low. This was the perfect time to kill him, it would probably be the best time to kill him.

But as she got close, she extended her hand toward him and clasped his hand.

"Yes," she confirmed. "Let's be the best of friends. You will still tell me about the information about the Holy Church right?"

"Of course!" Alex said out loud in agreement. "How could I let my friend leave with nothing even when you came to save me."

Both of them had wide fake smiles on their faces. Neither meant what they said, Camilla now understood that her chances of getting Alex under her plummeted to zero. Even if she offered him the Human Continent, it would be useless now. Alex had what he wanted, he got the metaphorical freedom that came with being someone dangerous.

No one would ask him if what he did was right or wrong. No law would come and try to make excuses to attack. No clan would come and harass him to see just how strong he was. Why? Because they would lose everything they ever had if they did anything against him. It didn't matter if they were strong or not, what mattered was just how strong their loved ones were. Or if they could afford to lose some or all of them in horrific ways.

Alex was satisfied with how the situation was ending. Sure, he didn't plan to break his partnership with Camilla so soon, but things happen. Keeping her close by from now on would be a mistake, she could discover how to contract a Hell's Creature. If she did that… then within the week she will break through beyond Legendary Rank and dominate this continent within the month.

Sadly, even though they were allies, Alex doesn't want her to break through so fast. She will eventually, but now wasn't the time. The Magic Academy Headmistress was meant to break through past Legendary Rank in the future, but now her situation was unknown. She could be dead.

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In the end, Alex gave her the information she wanted. It included some info on the Holy Kingdom's Mystical Artifacts that could potentially insta-kill her and who the next Pope could be in case of the current one's death.

All the information was accurate from what he could remember, and the Pope successor was someone who was trained their whole life in secret and only the current Pope and Cardinals knew who it could be. 

So this information would be used by Camilla to create discord amongst the Holy Church. They would be wary of traitors amongst them even when there was none. Plus killing the future Pope would outset the whole Ariel Religion back by a generation as they will have to find a new one.

Alex could think of many ways Camilla could use this knowledge.

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A/N: Look underneath the underneath, there is a lot going on in this chapter that wasn't shown at face value. They will be explained later...

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 Don't forget to throw some power stones :)

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