Demon's Virtue

The moment that the Imp pulled his dagger out of the Lord of Pride's back, the Imp rushed out toward the door, following the two girls that were doing their best to rush down there.

And the very moment that he managed to catch up to them, he grabbed Clementine by her right, and Sammy by her left hand, trying to pull them behind him as quickly as possible. The Imp was aware that his right hand was pretty injured at the moment, just from the backlash of all that Holy Energy at once, but he just wanted to make sure that both of the girls were able to follow him properly.

It seemed like Sammy was incredibly confused at what was going on, but the Imp couldn't stop and just explain. For now at the very least, they had to make their way toward the Castle of the Lord of Sloth, while trying to clear away from the direct path toward the Lord of Wrath's castle as much as possible. Because if the Imp's lie worked on the Lord of Pride, then he would most likely go right there the quickest way possible.

And then, after running for a while, the Imp once more saw the Demonic Town around him change into a different environment, where a lot of Demons were simply sleeping on all kinds of surfaces. On the ground, on hammocks, and even on random dirty blankets.

Luckily, there was a spot in the distance where nobody seemed to really be, so the Imp pulled the girls over there and then grabbed a random currently unused blanket so that they could hide and cover especially Sammy up.

And when they were sitting in the alleyway, the Imp stopped and quickly pulled the blanket over Sammy, who was breathing pretty heavily together with Clementine, although the moment that she got the chance to, she immediately hugged the other girl next to her, her whole body shaking.

"I... I was so scared..." Sammy said in a quiet voice, before slowly pulling away from Clementine and looking at the Imp. Before, in the Lord of Pride's castle, she had a pretty disgusted expression at what the Imp was doing, but it seemed like she somewhat understood his intentions now.

"Thank you... for saving me... Saving us..." The young girl told the Imp, who just slowly stared back at her. "Sorry for letting this happen to you." After slowly turning away to make sure nobody was around them, the Imp looked back at Sammy and Clementine before handing the blanket to Sammy.

"Cover yourself with this. So that the Demons can't see that you are Humans." The Imp told them, and Sammy slowly nodded her head as she took the blanket from him, although she couldn't help herself but look at the Imp's hand, which was very, very slowly recovering from the damage done to it through the Holy Energy.

"What... What happened?" Sammy asked a bit worried, and the Imp just looked at his hand before pulling out one of the Holy Energy Magic Stones from underneath the cloth. "This happened. This hurts Demons when I use it properly, so that's what I'm doing." The Imp explained quite clearly and slipped the Magic Stone back inbetween the cloth layers, before Sammy looked at the Imp just confused.

"But aren't you a Demon?" She asked, and the Imp slowly nodded his head in response. "I am. But because of the girl... the 'Priestess', I can resist the thing that hurts Demons more than others. Not perfectly, but well enough." With that explanation, the Imp slipped his hand into his bag and pulled out the notebook filled with information about the Lords again, trying to read up more about the Lord of Sloth, while Sammy just quietly covered herself in the blanket to make sure her skin could be seen the least amount as possible.

"What are we doing now..?" Sammy asked, and the Imp slowly raised his hand to point at the castle in the distance in front of them, only momentarily lifting his head to look away from the book's page, and then said, "We are going to the Lord of Sloth to get Leon." He explained, and Sammy looked at the Imp confused.

"He was also taken..?" She asked, before the Imp simply slowly nodded his head. "You all were. But the Shadow that brought you away is dead." He explained, and then, the Imp closed the book again before turning toward the two girls.

"Let's go." The Imp said in a clear tone, and although the two girls were pretty exhausted, they nodded their heads in response.

And while they were on their way, the Imp asked something that he was wondering right now. "Why were you bowing to that Lord?" He asked, and Sammy slowly looked away from him, "Rulers that rely on their pride like being bowed to." She explained quite clearly, "I... was trying to buy time, I guess..." Sammy added quietly, while the Imp nodded his head, noting this knowledge in his mind so that he could possibly make use of this if he ever was in this kind of situation again, where he needed to appease someone that he couldn't fight against.

"Where did the others go..?" Sammy asked after a little while, before the Imp quickly explained the situation a bit more. And after hearing him out, the young girl sslowly held her hand to her chest. "I hope they're okay..." The girl muttered, and the Imp slowly nodded his head.

"I think they are." He replied, making Sammy look back at him confused.

"What do you mean?" She asked him, and the Imp quickly told Clementine and Sammy what he meant, and what he thought was going on. "I don't think they are allowed to kill. In that town, the Demons and humans are walking around together, although the Humans are in power. I don't think anyone was killed there, though."

"Really..? So this is normal in that town?" Clementine asked as she slightly turned her head to the left to look toward the town, and the Imp nodded his head. "I think so. And we need to hurry, I think all of this will disappear again when the night is over. If we are outside of town, we might have to stay here until the town is back." The Imp explained, and that mere idea seemed to make the two girls shudder, something that the Imp did really understand.

Either way, soon enough, the three of them got close enough to the castle, and the only guard stationed there was seemingly sleeping on the floor in front of the stairs. It seemed like this town was the easiest to hide in, because everybody that might be able to find them was simply asleep.

So, instead of taking the extra rist accompanied by having these girls come with him up there, the Imp just told them to hide for now, in a spot near the castle that would allow them to rush directly toward the town. The Town's gate was luckily directly within sight as well, even if it was quite far away, meaning that they could just run straight forward if needed to.

"Stay here, I will be right back." The Imp explained to the girls, who both nodded their heads while the Imp got to work with the plan that seemed to work the best for this.

While the Lord of Sloth was practically never awake, there were times when he could be woken up fairly quickly, and if that happened, nothing good was to follow.

So, the Imp figured he should go the safe route and just try to make use of his 'Stealth' skill somehow, and for that, wanted to add something else into his arsenal.

While pressing the Shadow Magic Stone against his chest, as close to his heart as he could, the Imp pressed his mana into the stone through his hand into the stone, and then through that stone into the Imp's body toward his heart, so that the shadow could be spread throughout his whole body. At least that's what the Imp was somewhat hoping would happen. And soon enough, it seemed like his hopes were fulfilled, because he could feel his body slowly changing into a different state. It was as if he was far lighter, far quicker, and far quieter.

As soon as this change was noticeable to the Imp, a notification appeared to confirm this fact.

[Your Body is being saturated in Shadows. You become quicker, harder to notice, and close to silent]

With a satisfied nod, the Imp looked down at his body, happy to see that his body was black and mist-like, just like the body of the Shadow from before.

Sammy and Clementine were quite surprised to see this happen, but considering that they watched this whole thing unfold, they were more than just aware that this was actually the Imp, and as such weren't more scared than they usually were.

"I will be right back." The Imp said, his voice becoming quite weird through this all. It was like his regular voice was still there, just that it was overtoned by a voice whose source couldn't really be pinpointed that easily.

Either way, the Imp was sure that this was perfect. He wasn't exactly sure why the children were all brought in front of the Lords, but he didn't care all that much either. The Imp was actually pretty glad that, at least so far, they were all brought in front of the Lords and were still there when the Imp got to them. At the very least, he hoped that everything would be the same with Rudy, Arc and the Priestess as well.

As quickly as the Imp could, he rushed up the stairs, and when he got to the top floor, he silently stepped into the dark room in front of him. It seemed like this whole place was covered in blankets and pillows, to allow anyone to sleep anywhere in this room, which a lot of the Demons here even did.

How useless all of these guards were... They were supposed to protect the Lord, weren't they? Then why did they allow themselves to sleep?

Annoyedly, the Imp stepped through the room, and the little bit of sound that he was still making was muffled by the blankets underneath his feet.

And then, in the corner, in what seemed to be a cage, the child that the Imp was looking for was laying on its back, silently sleeping.

The space inbetween the bars was too slim to fit through, so the Imp somehow had to find the key to open it. And that was the rather rough part about all this. He was starting to feel a bit droopy as well after using a lot of his mana, so he had to properly hurry to make sure he could get Leon out of the cage before anyone woke up.

And so, the Imp chose to first look with the guards laying around near the cage itself. Luckily enough, the first guard had the key, and the Imp was able to open the cage pretty quickly. But just when the Imp stepped into the cage to get Leon out, something happened that would ruin how well this all was going.

And in the end, it was the fault of the Imp himself, because a loud explosion happened outside, blasting away a corner of this castle even, and the Imp was able to see the source of that explosion.

The Lord of Wrath's Castle.

And as the Imp was staring at that spot in the distance, from the corner of his eye, he was able to see the large, heavy-bodied Demon standing up, slowly turning toward the Imp.

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