26

After arriving in a clearing we begin to fight, it becomes apparent my earlier suspicion is most likely right. my physical strength is leaps and bounds over hers, she can keep up with my speed and seems to have a similar amount of stamina but with Balam, I am confident I have reached demon emperor strength. it seems that Balam is a straight strength boost of a single tier, I wonder if it will do the same at overlord and take me straight to kingdom rank which is the first god rank, or will it go to the middle ground? in-between overlord and kingdom there are two peaks, one over overlord and one that is a partial kingdom. I guess I will find out in time, but the strange thing is with Athena weaving her demon fire into her attacks I feel like I have a passive resistance. without even using Belial I am negating roughly a third of her magic flames. not sure where that is coming from but the biggest surprise is in the trait I gained.

When I blacked out after promoting I never saw what was drawn but I know what it does. it's a battle reflex of sorts, when we began fighting I noticed my ability to dodge and counter was almost happening without me consciously acting. at first, I thought I was having a panic attack or something but as Athena intentionally or unintentionally pressed on a bit harder than she should and almost opened my stomach I realized what was happening. I feel an artificial sense of experience that seems to react to combat-related actions. I can't sword fight anywhere near as good as Athena, I have been practicing but still, she has years of experience on me. but now with the sword in my hand, I feel as if it becomes a part of me and just know where to swing when to block when to press. while wondering what it was I got a prompt that surprised me.

[ Nova - pure devil

Great demon king

traits:

Agares

Belial

Balam

Stolas

Bune

Astaroth

Purson

Eligor

Devils physique ]

[ Eligor - Wartorn Glory ]

It seems the trait I gained was Eligor and it's a combat reflex, it's easy to resist now that I am aware of it but why would I? it allows me to remain more focused in a fight and respond to the best of what I am capable of.

"Your cheating." Athena says in-between breaths as she pants.

"I don't know it seems to me you just got worse with more power." She shoots a glare and then huffs.

"Let's go get some food and relax for a while I think I can do basic things now without breaking stuff. this was a huge change in strength but I feel comfortable with it. plus I want to contact my dad and talk to him about a few things."

"It's almost morning so let's teleport the wyverns back to the dark moon and eat while we are there, also I can let Shea know what is going on while we are there. then we can teleport back and fly over to town Leia and clean up the rest of the red bandit gang, Gabe said that half of them take turns going back and forth between town Leia to rest so we need to take the rest out. if we don't as soon as we leave the bandits will just take the mine back."

"Ok let's do that." grabbing onto her I teleport to the wyverns and store their saddles in my inventory, then I let Dodo know we are going to be gone for a few hours to watch out for the miners.

---------

After putting the wyverns back into their enclosure we head to get some breakfast before I go talk to Shea. as we are walking Athena is trying to use her demonic energy and I am giving her some tips, at the end of the day it's up to her though because if her imagination isn't good then her casting will suck. she was never one for spells, to begin with, but now she seems to be able to use some basic spells. as I watch Athena play with some lighting I begin to think about if I should ask Shea if she wants to be reincarnated. it would help her break through to demon emperor, she is at the peak of great demon king and still has some power left in her inheritance left by her dad. in the original she only needed the black potions to get to demon emperor.

I decide to wait for her to break through to emperor with the help of a set of black potions, then when she promotes I will discuss reincarnating her. if I can go to the underground of the mine past the seal and beat Glorfindel and free the earth king he might be able to give me the crystal he gave in the original that got Shea to overlord as well. with her at demon emperor and that crystal plus a queen piece she will be at demon overlord before the war of lords if the war of lords between the estates still even takes place. with me here and affecting things the war of lords might not even happen.

Obsidian will try to use the estates to oppress the dark moon and Shea so he can keep general George off his back. so we still have time till any big conflicts happen and if I can get Shea to overlord and she can kill someone like red spirit lord Josh in the field it would be a huge momentum bonus to our forces. the people of the demon world worship strength and if the weak oppressed Shea slays the mighty red spirit lord josh in the field it would be the talk of the whole empire. but it's a double edge sword and will have Obsidian no longer care about the pressure from the general gorge and he will rally the empire's forces to attack the ' rebel ' Shea and that will be bad.

"Here eat this, are you alright Nova?" Athena hands me some food and I take it.

"Yea I am fine, just thinking about the future and Shea's position. it's on the climb but she started in a bad place." Athena nods as she stuffs her cheeks.

"Yea, but if the trade in the west gets started up again after our efforts it will be a huge boon to the dark moon economy."

"Yea, after we go to town Leia and finish them off we can also head toward the blue lava estate and kill the bandits there. with that, all done trade on all sides will be opened up and we can focus on development." also in the meantime, I can go to the city by the dead sea and take over and maybe reincarnate the leader as a devil slave and have him transport goods with his fleet. lots of plans but let's report to Shea and then head off to the town Leia, I got a girl there I want to try to help out and if I am correct she studied to be an alchemist and can run my alcohol business for me.

---------

"Hello Nova and Athena, you are both back earlier than I expected did anything happen?" we are in Shea's study and she is looking over some documents.

"Nah, we got the mine cleared and we both made it to great demon king so we practiced a bit and are resting before we head to town Leia to finish off the rest."

"You both made it to great demon king?! Athena weren't you just at the peak of higher demon? your birthday isn't for another few weeks so how did you do that?" Shea stands up and walks over to Athena trying to gauge her but can't feel anything. she then frowns and looks at me. "What happened why can't I feel anything from her?"

"I turned her into a devil along with these." taking out a set of black potions I just bought for her I set them on her desk. she picks one up and reads it and then looks back at me.

"How? also you turned her into a devil?"

"Yea go ahead and drink those and focus on promoting and once you do if you want I can reincarnate you as a devil as well but we can talk about it more once you make it to demon emperor." she opens the bottle and drinks it before smiling and taking the others.

"Do you have some time to battle? I want to try out what these potions did and if your at great demon king I can go all out." haha she doesn't know about my Balam, I promised myself to get revenge it's time. looking over at Athena I see her giving Shea a pitying look but before she can tell her about my strengths I teleport us out to Shea's private training yard.

"Yea we can spar some time before we head to town Leia, let's go ahead and start when you're ready." Shea smiles and heads into a room on the side of the yard and comes out soon in better clothes for fighting.

"Alright, I am ready Nova let's go."

her wings come out and black flames spread around, I let out some worthless to snuff them out and let my passive resistance handle the rest. she notices her flames are all gone and covers her hand with some and blasts me with it. extinguishing the flames I find Shea throwing a punch from the other side of the flames and instinctively duck and lean in toward her and punch her in her gut. she launches back and stumbles but doesn't fall. looking at me with wide eye's she then looks at Athena and she's her shrug and I laugh at her. she's in for it now I won't let her off since she will soon break through and beat me up again, I need to take advantage while I can.

---------

"Tha.. that was quite a good match, I haven't been able to go all out like that in a long time." Shea lays out her wings are gone and she is drenched in sweat. I am laying out next to her also pretty worn out, Athena gives us both some water and a towel.

"Yea that was pretty good, you should also fight with Athena when we get back you would both benefit from fighting each other." standing up I finish cleaning up and offer Shea my hand. she grabs it and I pull her up. her amethyst eyes are staring straight into mine and I toss my sweaty towel on her face she quickly burns it and glares at me.

"Go ahead and get out of here you barbarian, I need to get back to work and send some reinforcements to the mine to secure it. drop off some of the ore in the storage we have prepared so we can get our craftsmen rearming our forces. Kaguli has been doing an excellent job of training them and even in the short time she has been making progress with them." that reminds me about the devil fruit.

"Here go ahead and give this to her and the other to her brother since they could use the upgrade." I hand over two devil fruit and her eyes go wide for a second when she recognizes them then she just shakes her head and puts them in her storage bracelet.

"Thanks, Nova, I will let them know that they are from you so they can thank you later." Shea at this moment is as relaxed as I have ever seen. it's nice to slowly thaw out this ice queen, she seems a lot more receptive than she was in the novel which is a good thing. she shut down anything she thought was an attempt to flirt with her and even told off old Gauss for suggesting a honey trap.

"No problem Shea, me and Athena are going to head out now I just remembered I need to see Kia before we go so We will head to find her now." she nods and I walk over to Athena and teleport to find Kia.

-- Shea pov --

After seeing Nova and Athena leave I lay back out, he offered to make me a devil as he did to Athena. he said it would bind us together like an equal contract but I would gain a lot of power and also immortality. I don't think he understands just how much he is breaking the norm, I was doomed to struggle till I was eventually killed or worse forced into a political marriage for the sake of the empire. but with the rate the dark moon is improving from the shadows and also my personal strength, I stand a chance. if becoming a devil and binding myself to Nova is the price then I will pay it, it's not that bad anyway I don't dislike him or the time we spend together. so I need to focus on promoting to demon emperor and also securing the trade route west.

Laying in the grass with the wind blowing and the low light shining down I smile and get excited about the future for the first time in a long time. I can't wait to see what crazy thing he does next.