Somewhere Right Outside of the Mountain Range

Velron clenches his fists slightly as he narrows his eyes, the Noble foxkin’s nose twitching slightly at the scent of blood lycan. Then he glances at the two Nobles next to him, one of whom is currently covering them in an illusion to hide them from the Princess. Meanwhile the other spreads a corruption through the air that devours their scents entirely as an added measure.

“It looks like Her Highness took the bait,” Velron states, keeping his voice as quiet as possible even with the illusion up.

Roxanne nods her head without pausing in her spreading of the corruption, and Xylotl nods his head while waving his hands around, constantly constructing and improving upon his illusion.

The group of Nobles all find themselves tenser than they have ever felt before in their lives as they mentally prepare themselves to go up against the Princess. The Apex Predator.

They were all hand-picked by the sub-commander of the army on Earth, the leader of the succubus clan, Lily del Rose, to recapture the Princess and bring her back to Tartarus. And not just for the war effort. But for the sake of the demons themselves.

“Remember, we’re allowed to harm her just enough to bring her in,” Velron states. “We cannot seriously injure her in a way that she can’t recover from, and if she brings out her crest then we have no choice but to back off.”

Both of the lower leveled Nobles nod their heads, but neither of them show any sort of deference to Velron. Because all three of the Nobles are the same rank of Barons, even if Velron was put in charge of the mission.

“The Princess’s exact power is largely unknown, but we know that she can’t take on Nobles above level 1175 since she retreated when fighting Baron Valruth last fortnight,” Velron continues, his voice still a low whisper as the three Nobles begin to slowly make their way over towards the mountains. “The two of you are to cover our traces until we manage to get as close to her as possible before I link the gate to her and teleport the Princess back to Demon Isle.”

The Nobles don’t say anything in response, but Velron knows that they heard. Just that neither the mirage wyrm nor the arachne with to lower themselves into acting like subordinates.

“Let’s go,” Velron declares, and the group of three Nobles immediately speed up a little.

Scarlet

I tap my foot as I look up at the full moon high in the sky, wondering how long it’s gonna take for those three Nobles to get here.

Despite what they think, I found them a while back. The moment they arrived in fact.

The senses of a blood lycan are just way too powerful. Something the changelings and traitors amongst the humans learned over the month of the ceasefire, when I simply cleared them all out myself with my hearing and smell alone.

A rather boring process, if I’m being honest. And there were more traitors amongst the humans than I thought. Whether they were people betraying us to the demons to be turned into a demon themselves through infection by a powerful undead demon or people just hurting the war effort for their own profit.

Ever since then, things with the war have proceeded rather smoothly. Especially with the changelings out of the way entirely. From all of the human cities instead of just the supply storage from before.

The sub-commander of the demon army wasn’t exactly very happy about that though. The one that replaced Satan.

And that woman…

I feel a chill run down my spine at the memory of meeting her. A very unpleasant memory. One that makes me extremely glad I stayed the hell away from the Valley of Illusions back on Tartarus the times I was on the planet.

Succubus are scary. And not in a powerful sense, I mean in a… creepy sense.

And supposedly Lily is one with her Sin held in check rather well. But despite that, the look she was sending me sometimes as if she didn’t even realize she was doing it…

Another shiver runs down my spine at that as I glance at Allen who is currently taking away the Class IV demons I captured, along with the kitty who Allen decided to take in at my insistence. As long as I use my Power Drain skill on it and Amelia uses her null magic on it to limit its power down to that of an actual cat.

The kitty is fine with the decision too since it means it won’t end up locked up and interrogated. Apparently the thing actually has a lot less sapience than I thought it had. Just about the sapience of a child, although not a human child.

He even acts like a cat.

I don’t really like the idea of the kitten ending up dead or in a cell locked away, so this is the best situation.

The kitten aside, I turn my attention back towards the sky again.

Speaking of Power Drain, that skill’s probably been one of my most useful skills over the last few months. One that lets me absorb the life energy, blood magic attacks below epic rarity, and a small amount of mana from targets, lets me put the life energy and mana into my own skills to increase their efficiency and power, and lets me passively decrease the stats of those I designate as enemies by a very small amount.

Come to think of it, I wonder if I can drain the mana from the illusion skill that demon has set up over their group?

I purse my lips slightly at that thought before shrugging.

Doesn’t really matter considering that I can still hear them despite the illusion. And I have to admit, it’s a little awkward. Considering how they’re planning how they’re gonna sneak up on me and teleport me to Demon Isle before I realize what’s going on.

Well, either way, I should deal with them.