The Author's POV

'The situation is not looking good.'

Angelica's expression was one of gloom as she stooped down to examine Hein, who was lying unconscious on the ground at that moment.

'Luckily, he seems fine, but he is completely spent at the moment.'

She sighed in relief when she realized that Hein was fine and slowly stood up and scanned her surroundings.

The area surrounding her was completely empty, as a circle formed in her vicinity as any demons that entered her radius abruptly turned around and charged the other demons in the area with blank looks on their faces.

"What are you doing?! We're on the same si-huak!"

"Traitor!"

This was all thanks to her power that allowed her to control the weaker ranked demons.

"Report to me your situation."

Angelica raised her wrist and whispered something.

It wasn't long before she received several replies.

[Uek, I'm not holding out too well. I've lost eight of my pets already, and I'm being pushed back at the moment!]

The first one to reply was Ava, and it sounded as though she rushed when she spoke. Her manner of speaking made it abundantly clear that the circumstances surrounding her were dismal.

[I'm with Ryan at the moment, and I'm helping out from above, but the demons have already infiltrated a small par-hak!]

Leopold's audio was cut off in the middle, and Angelica's brows furrowed.

'What happened?'

A crisp voice echoed after Liam's voice. It belonged to none other than Amanda who kept shooting her arrows in the sky, killing hundreds of demons at the time.

[I'm fine for now, but I'm slowly running out of mana. I've been targeted by a few demons so my mana is depleting rapidly.]

[I'm also fine...but I'm currently fighting against five Marquis ranked demons, so I don't think I'll be fine for much longer.]

The response from Han Yufei arrived much later than the one from Amanda, and when it did, Angelica lowered her wrist and furrowed her brows.

Raising her head she looked at Liam who was in the sky and her expression turned even grimmer.

'...This is not good.'

It was at this precise moment that she became aware of the fact that the war's equilibrium was on the verge of tipping. If they waited just a few more minutes, they would all be in some very serious trouble.

Her heart unknowingly quickened.

***

Click!

The all too familiar clicking sound echoed inside of Liam's head as he felt something sharp brush past his skin. With just a blink of his eyes, he cocked his head to the right and narrowly avoided the Duke ranked demon's sword.

"You dodged that?"

A look of surprise appeared on the demon's face.

Liam chose not to respond and instead focused his attention on the Duke-ranked demon standing in front of him.

His current appearance was identical to Ren's in every way. From the structure of his body, his hair, and his eyes. He was a carbon copy of Ren in every possible way imaginable. To such an extent that Liam had the impression that he was currently in a fight with Ren.

There was only one problem...

'This...it's not fun.'

He had already fought with Ren dozens of times before. He knew almost everything about Ren's fighting style. It was effortless for him to counter his usual fast movements.

It seemed as though things were getting easier for him, even though he was in a situation that should have been getting harder.

"I don't like this."

he was voicing

ranked

"You don't like this?"

"I...I don't."

head with a clear look of displeasure on

in the past I've faced off against Ren? It's to the

it was more like he forgot, but he wasn't going

completely committed all of his movements and attacks to memory at this point. Do you seriously

Liam clenched his teeth and focused his attention on the fake Ren, lightning began to crackle

that's the furthest thing

Duke-level demon was barely able to parry the attack with a sword swing. Despite this, he was nonetheless

Liam pursued after him.

doing isn't even that impressive. I can do

been present and witnessed the scene, he

when did my sword art become as common as

who were using something similar

would have unquestionably begun

identical, the fact that they were able to imitate it to that degree would've left one

Click!

demon, the lightning crackling around his arm intensified,

Clank!

down with everything he got, forcing

'Not enough!'

became even louder. His form, which had been visible just moments before,

behind him, and it wasn't long before they seemed to take the shape of

the

opening its mouth wide before biting in the direction of the Duke ranked demon. The force with which the attack came was extremely devastating, and

vindication], elemental discharge,

previously been the size of an airplane, shrunk considerably when it saw the circles for the

demon smiled when he saw the

sudden he felt the hair on the back of his head standing up. Shortly after that, he began to hear the echo

fall for

the direction of the

as he only extended his hand, but it was enough to startle the demon because the speed at which he was

just how

that the demon wasn't just

with the back of his head, the space around Liam began to crack,

"Shit."

himself as he stopped whatever he was

white lines started to appear in his field of vision. This was immediately followed by his yellow pupils shining with

him and was able to skilfully sidestep the white lines that were headed in the direction of his

the number of white lines was simply far too many

Spurt! Spurt!

shoulder, and

areas. Blinking once, his vision returned to normal and it was there that he

He was clearly injured.

"Are you bored now?"

from the direction of his far right. Instead of turning, Liam lowered his

"Not talking?"

to have misunderstood Liam's silence for confirmation, as he didn't attack again. Instead, he slowly approached Liam who was floating in the air with a serious look

you thinking

demon was already in front of Liam before he knew it. Secretly, the area around Liam had started to become

calm look on his face, he carefully scrutinized Liam's

"Say..."

of attacking immediately, his figure morphed back to its original form. He no longer looked like Ren. In his mind, the

the domain established, it was

you think about signing a contract

felt his body grow lethargic once more as his head was filled with

appeared in the

"Sign the contract."

his eyes

"Sign the contract and-huh?"