21

Laying on the ground gasping for air after a kick to the chest I throw my hands up.

"Alright that's enough for today, I still need to go clean up the bandits in the mine if I am hospitalized I can't do that." hearing her laugh at my helpless state I vow to get even as soon as I get back from the mine, so long as I get enough sin to promote that is.

"Thanks, Nova, I had fun it was nice to stretch out." she grabs her left wrist with her right hand and put it over her head, and goes to her tippy toes as she stretches and her wings spread out wide.

"Wow." she is a knockout even when she wears a mask of indifference, but when she relaxes a bit she takes it to another level. opening one of her eyes and seeing me blatantly checking her out she stops and then opens her other eyes to roll them.

"Your drooling Nova, haven't gotten enough eye candy from Athena and Kia?" she smirks and I stand up from the position I was in on the ground.

"Your right about that but that's all they are is eye candy Athena can't do anything till her birthday due to her bloodline promotion from her family, and Kia has her devour physique even if I can resist it is still a bit annoying. plus I haven't gotten far enough with either to try anything just yet." she seems a bit put off by my casual way of talking about my want to fuck them. but there's no point in acting like an ignorant fool when it comes to this kind of thing, might as well put it out there and if she doesn't like it she can say so.

"Oh yea, I had meant to give this to you so you could approach Kia and seduce her but then I found out you didn't need it to resist her." She pulls off her ring and cuts some blood and puts it on it. " put some blood on this so you can use it, it's a blood ritual so that you can access its power that is only meant for lucifer's family members."

pulling out a blade from my inventory I run it along my finger and point it in Shea's direction before it floats toward the floating ring. it combines and then the ring glows a bit before resting itself on my ring finger. all at once, I feel a sting run up my arm into my brain and jolt myself. it felt like something tried to connect but fizzled itself out like getting a bite on a fishing hook but the fish spit it back out before the hook set. trying to shake the odd feeling off I look at the ring and then smile looking at the finger it's on.

"Well well, if you wanted to get engaged then you should have just asked the old fashion way no need to bloody up a good ring. I would have got on my knee and asked if you wanted." she looks more confused than anything and I realize they have many different marriage rituals but I don't think rings are involved. "You get on a knee and ask someone to marry you and if they say yes you put the ring on this finger." showing off the ring on my ring finger she snorts and shakes her head.

"Well, that ring isn't for that, it's a ring that can randomly teleport you once a day and it will fight off Kia's devourer physique and allow you to be immune to it. It's called dark will and even though you don't need the teleport function the other function should help with Kia. remembering I didn't explain Kia's situation I begin to tell her everything she needs to know.

"So Kia isn't a problem, once I get strong enough I will go save her mom and then break the soul shackles and she will fake death and then have no ties to her old abusive family. If she can take off the power restriction cuff she can even protect Alice since Kaguli is going to be busy with the sheriff position now." I believe that nothing out of the ordinary will happen because even in the original when Chen Rui stole the broken fragment of the god-eating mask from Shea, no one came from the Beelzebub family to investigate the mask. if I remember right that should have happened before crystal valley got destroyed and blood fall went on the run. I might be mistaken though, either way, I am still confident since after what I did to Kia's soul shackles she has been mostly freed. the shackle only stays to not raise suspicion and it could technically still hurt her but there is no reason I see why they would before I free her and her mom.

"Alright I will trust you on this just break it off, are you leaving for the mine tomorrow?" the story saddened her a bit but she has seen a lot of fucked up stuff and recovered fast.

"Yea me and Athena plan on leaving tomorrow, we shouldn't be gone all that long if I am being honest. maybe two weeks if something unforeseen happens but I can always teleport us back in an emergency."

"Alright keep me posted on any major developments and if you need anything." the trust she shows and has with me is nice I guess it helps to have power, at this point she was telling Chen Rui to run and never look back so he didn't have to die but I can handle this problem.

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teleporting home after saying Farwell I walk into the kitchen and see Kia and Athena attempting to make the pizza I had talked about. choosing to sit this one out and just observe I look at the ring and wonder what I felt earlier. the trigger was either the ring or Shea's blood if I had to guess it should be Shea's blood. if I think about what it could have possibly been it should be her lucifer blood reacting to my body. but it wasn't strong enough or wasn't enough to do whatever it was doing and it failed. I wonder if it was a trait unlocking? it didn't feel that way it felt like it came from something else but I can't put my finger on it.

"Hey Nova, how did the meeting go? it took longer than you told us so we decided to go ahead and cook." Athena turns and starts talking to me while wiping her hands on a towel.

"It went perfect, I just sparred with Shea for a bit. she needs to get some more practice in, and with some problems clearing up she agreed and we fought for a while." Athena nods and asks to bring me next time so she can watch and maybe try to fight her, herself since it's good to get used to fighting a diverse amount of abilities and fighting styles. "Hey Kia give me your hand." she turns and cleans her hand of flour as well and gives it to me. I grab the cuff and purge all magic in it with worthless and it becomes worthless itself.

"Nova? what did you do?" she soon feels for herself what I did and summons some flames on her hand and looks at me asking why I did that.

"Shea agreed you don't need it anymore keep on the broken cuff though in case anyone sees you. what power level are you anyway feels pretty high." I remember her being demon king and having an extremally high affinity to wind and fire magic almost like the Phenix clan in DxD.

"Low demon king, but I feel close to a breakthrough after all the time spent restricted my spirit energy feels denser or it could be what you did to the soul shackles." seems about right I will get her a devil fruit and convert her to the devil when I can so she can get a boost. I don't want her to get killed by someone if I could have prevented it.

"Ok practice your magic when you get a chance and when Athena and I get back from the mines I will start training with you." she seems a bit sad. "What's with that look? want your power sealed again?"

"No, I thought I was going with you to the mines." oh I see, she needs to protect Alice till something else is figured out since Kaguli who was Alice's guard is now sheriff and will be busy.

"Next time I promise, this time Kaguli will be busy being sheriff and you need to watch out for Alice, we won't be gone too long though."

"Yea we will clean up the bandits and then head back so don't be too sad, next time we go out we will defiantly bring you along." Athena chimes in and that had appeased the maid.

"Ok since mistress says so." Athena blushes a bit but chooses not to comment. soon the food is done and we stay up talking a bit then head to sleep.

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"Athena you said next time you were leaving I would go!" the dissatisfied princess Alice lets everyone know how she is feeling.

"I know I will make it up to you since we're going to fight a lot on this trip there's no point in you going next time for sure we will go and play." this time Athena and I are flying wyverns and have our own. even if I tried to ride with her shamelessly she kicked me off and cursed at me saying we were on a mission, not a vacation.

"Alright, we need to set off so we can make good time, next time Alice I will bring you to cause some mischief I promise." Alice fist pumps at my promise and walks back to where Shea and the few others who came to see us off are. I wave and bid Farewell as the wyverns roar and take off into the sky. Athena soon taps the side of her ear and I call her with magic since it's hard to hear up here for her.

"Yes, Athena did you forget something?"

"No, but did you make sure to cure the princess and Kia so the dragon's poison wouldn't kill them while we are gone?" nodding and promising they will be fine and perfectly cured, I told her I had cured them and she seems to still be worried. it was weighing on my conscience that she was worried about it so I just ' cured ' them so no more troubles. on another note, I need to reincarnate Athena as a devil so she can fly with wings it is so much faster than this.

"Alright you lead the way, we need to make a stop at black rain forest though I want to check something." she agrees and sets off on Kegu while I am on Mengda.

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After flying for what felt like half a day we make it to a forest and Athena and I both land the wyverns.

"This is it, what did you want to do here?" she stretches and massages her butt. I know the feeling my ass is numb from all that sitting. not watching her for too long I look off into the forest and try to sense anything and find a gigantic gluttonous mass sitting and will assume that's Dodo or some kind of Beelzebub.

"Let's head in, Kegu you and Mengda stay here we will be right back. they both lay down and watch as I grab Athena and teleport us toward what I am assuming is Dodo.

Throwing out my wings I hover over a giant skeleton of a dragon that is laying next to a tree that is giving off a wonderful smell. Athena seeing the giant skeleton has her eyes go wide, but when she sees the fruit in the tree she tilts her head before nearly jumping out of my arms.

"Let me down that is a devil fruit!" it seems with devil fruit in sight see does get stupid. the dragon skeleton begins moving and Athena closes her mouth and watches as it rises and roars. she looks at me. "Sorry?"

Slapping her on the butt I then teleport her to the side out of the way before dropping on the dragon's head and activating Bune. Dodo sensing a dragon begins to detach himself from the Skelton and try's to run away right into an explosion dragon script left by the dead dragon. I speed up and snatch him up and hold him at eye level and two eyes appear on the slime.

"Oh, noble dragon lord! I was just sleeping and got stuck in the dragon skeleton I defiantly didn't have anything to do with your kinsman dying! please listen to Dodo as he swears he didn't do anything wrong!" Athena comes from the side looking at the Slime in confusion and I set it down.

"Dodo shut up I won't hurt you I came to offer you a deal which will benefit you and get you lots of tasty things like this." pulling out some ice cream I made with my new industrial-sized ice cream maker, he sniffs it then dives straight into the giant bowl eating at a pace that even puts Athena to shame. "you like it Dodo? if so agree to be my pawn." he has a lot of potential but with his unique abilities, he will be a good infiltrator and can make use of the promotion ability of the pawn and I am poor.

"Agree, definitely agree but what is a pawn? I still agree to be a pawn though Dodo has never tasted something so sweet before." Smiling I pull up the store and get ready to reincarnate my first devil.