Evilus?

He widened his eyes in realization. No matter how hard he think about it, it was so strange that even him, could no longer remember his own name.

Other memories were clear and was still intact but only his name was the thing, he could no longer remember no matter how hard he tried to recall.

[ The Black King judges you're worthy of his interest. He offers you a present with an exchange that you cannot refuse. ]

[ Your gift from the Black King has arrived and in return, the Black King has taken away your name and identity.]

Remembering the system messages, he sat down, unsure of what to feel about losing his name and identity.

"So in exchange of giving me an access to his power, the Black King took my identity."

Muttering to himself, he sighed and narrowed his eyes. As a former god, losing your identity is a big deal. What made him sigh in relief was that he was just a mortal so he was relatively fine and unaffected about it.

If he was a deity or some sort of a transcendent being, it would be fatal to them if they will lose their identity. The reason was, if your identity will disappear, all achievements that was accomplished by that person will be taken away along with his name.

With the disappearance of his identity, his achievements or legends that composed the existence of a transcendent being— created like his legend of being the first deity to escape True Death and all the other achievements that he created upto this day will no longer belong to him as that legends were accomplished by the individual named Alex Uchiha, which doesn't belong to him anymore.

In short, if this happened when he was a god, he will automatically become a forgotten one, losing everything he had and suffering the fate similar to all forgotten gods.

Thinking about how fast he had lost his identity without being able to do anything, he was once again became aware and amazed by the greatness of the Black King who could easily take his identity without his resistance.

"Well, whatever."

As he didn't suffer much penalty because he was a mortal, he decided to shrug it off. It really won't affect him aside from a small convenience unless he ascended to godhood once again which he had no intention of doing so.

He doesn't have much attachment to his freedom and doesn't care if ever the Black King would take away his freedom. As he was deeply thinking of what to do about it, he heard a voice from behind.

"Huh, you're here!?"

Turning around, he saw a surprised elf the moment she saw his existence in this place.

"Lefiya~san...What are you doing here?"

Not expecting her to appear in here, he unconsciously asked.

"I just happened to be nearby and I saw a strong surge of magical power and decided to take a look while I'm at it."

Lefiya replied while she pant heavily, wiping the continuous sweat from her brows as she stood beneath the lofty branches.

"Anyway, why are you..."

As she was about to ask the same thing of why he was in this place, Lefiya froze as no words followed when she tried to mention his name.

'Huh....—What was his name again?'

Lefiya definitely knew him as he had become a close acquaintance to her but somehow, she couldn't mention or recall his name.

"Strange."

This was the first time she encountered this phenomenon and didn't really know how to describe it. As she had forgotten his name, she couldn't help but feel guilty about it.

As Lefiya was about to speak, for some reason, the air was hot. The bridge of her nose was slightly red. And in the midst of this strange atmosphere, he calmly asked.

"This might be very shameless of me but I'm really hungry. Is there anything to eat?"

"..."

*Rumble*

The sound from his stomach harshly brought her to reality.

"..."

"..."

The two stared at each other. Seeing that Lefiya heared his stomach's sound— asking for its commission, he simply laughed without being embarrassed about it.

Lefiya sighed. She had noticed that he had left before dinner time, it was likely that he hadn't eaten anything.

A quick survey of her surroundings yielded nothing in terms of readily available fruit. Her thoughts went, instead, she scrounged around in her battle clothes...only to discover something located neatly in her breast pocket.

The crystal drops that Ais had given her two days prior. Her eyebrows furrowed as she had two tiny tearsdrop shapes in the palm of her hand.

They had been her badge of honor, so to speak, for saving her beloved, and they sat there, glittering and sparkling in their bluish-white auras....she let out a sigh.

Taking one of the droplets between her fingers, she handed it to him.

"Here."

"Hmm?"

"You are hungry, are you not? While it may not be incredibly filling...It should help ease the cravings." She explained looking everywhere but him.

"Thank you very much, Lefiya~san."

Alex said his gratitude with a warm smile even though he feels the shame in Lefiya's words. Looking at his smile, Lefiya felt she had been struck by a lightning bolt in her chest and then did her best to mask the blush rising to her cheeks by turning around.

"Though, before you eat it. Know the value if this crystal drop is unprecedented and you must fully savor its exquisite flavor! It could easily go for thirty thousand valis in the surface!"

Hearing her, he nearly choked while chewing it.

"Th-thirty thousand valis for this small thing?" He looked at her with disbelief. It was even more expensive than his armor.

"Well that's for an entire bottle of them...but still!" Lefiya amusingly continued with a cheeky smile on her face. Looking at his reaction, she found him cute for a moment.

Even without his intention, Lefiya had always seen his cool side for this past few days but seeing him react like this, she didn't know why but she liked it. A sight that only her had seen.

The forest was dark around them. The Dungeon's ceiling was invisible beyond the mesh like canopy of branches and leaves above their heads.

"Umm...I'm sorry."

In the middle of the quiet and darkness of the forest, Lefiya apologized to him.

"This might be too rude of me but, I'm really sorry for forgetting your name."

Mustering the courage to speak those words, Lefiya had shaking lips when she said that. Her eyes was close while her pointy ears was twitching.

"Ah, that... Don't worry about it. Actually, that's not your fault, Lefiya~san."

"But..."

"This might be embarrassing to say but even me has forgotten my name."

"Eh?"

Scratching the back of his head, he could feel that Lefiya was stunned silly while looking at him.

"Earlier, my powers has leaped to a new heights that was incomparable to my previous self. Well, probably after I became stronger, I think I received.....a curse?"

He tilted his head wondering if what he was saying was even close to the truth. Hearing him saying even he was not certain, Lefiya nodded in understanding.

"So a curse of losing your name in exchange for that power earlier, even though you didn't know it would happen."

She softly spoke. All curses require a cost from the user in exchange for their power, which is a key point in differentiating between magic and curses.

However with that exchange even though he had no idea what was the intentions of the Black King, he will continue to grow non-stop, even at an exponential rate compared to before which was why, he didn't mind much even he was just being toyed by the Black King in the end.

"That's it...Probably."

Alex replied with a light smile. Once again, Lefiya's cheeks flushed without warning.

"Han...handsome."

"Hmmm?"

Hearing her mumbling, he asked what was that about. Noticing the words that slipped from her, she was surprised and felt an intense embarrassment, wondering why that word escaped her.

As she was about to clarify or say something, Alex covered her mouth with his hand. Then hastily, he grabbed her waist and dragged her with him, hastily hid their selves within the shadows.

Lefiya widened her eyes again and was surprised but then, managed to calm down, seeing his serious expression. She then turned her head and looked at the direction where his blood red eyes was looking.

Using the enhanced vision possible by her status, she caught sight of a group of dubious figures shrouded in long, concealing robes. Their inky black garments into the surrounding shadow, completely masking their heads and identity.

And as if, there robes weren't enough, each one of them was donned a dark hood and a forehead protector.

"Suspicious."

He muttered while staring at them. Lefiya on the other hand sucked her breath in disbelief. Seeing her reaction, he softly asked her.

"You recognized them?"

Lefiya nodded her head. She then said that their attire was identical to the crew they had battled down on the 24th floor.

"There was no doubt about it. They were surely associates of the Evilus Remnants."

Evilus. Hearing that word, he narrowed his eyes. It was a group of radical Familias led by Gods claiming to be evil. Evilus used to be a radical group that threatened Orario after the Zeus Familia and Hera Familia weakened in power and were subsequently exiled from the city.

It was weakened by the efforts of the Guild along with various Familia, such as the Loki Familia, though it was finally destroyed when Ryuu attacked the Rudra Familia 5 years earlier as part of her rampage.

While he was organizing his thoughts about Evilus, Lefiya's brows furrowed and realized what she had to do.

'I need to follow them.'

For her who had encountered them before, this was a once-in-a lifetime opportunity if she'd seen one. To be able to stop their no doubt dastardly plan before the situation got out of control.

And besides she was only going to trail them in a while and determine what it was they were doing. That was all she needed. A simple mission, overall.

Once finished, she'd report back to Finn and the others with anything useful. These encouraging thoughts pushing her forward, she made up her mind.

'The only problem now is...'

Lefiya raised her gaze. Her eyes landed on the crimson haired boy who was very close to her. She certainly couldn't leave him here all by himself.

He was only a recently level 2 while her targets had the potential of being a level 3 or worse, a level 4 which a normal level 2 has absolutely no chance of winning.

And to make matter worse, he had no armor equipped on him and was just on his casual clothes.

"Who are those people?"

He asked her once again, just to make sure.

"—An enemy organization. To put it simply."

"An enemy of the Loki Familia...I understand." He whispered and looked at her eyes.

"So they needed to be eliminated, am I right?"

"Oum."

Holding her breath, she curled her fingers tightly around the length of her staff, and nodded.

"Then, perfect. I coincidentally needs a test subject to test my abilities."

Saying those words, Lefiya was once again surprised. Immediately dashing towards the robed figures, his movements was so fast that all Lefiya could see was crimson blurs.