The Author's POV

[Pillar of Sloth]

SHIIING—!

Silently coming from beneath the ground, Jin appeared behind a demon, and with his daggers crossed behind the demon's neck, a head rolled on the ground.

Thump!

Thin black threads emerged from the ground, enveloping the entire head before crushing it into a pulp and revealing a black core.

After the core was uncovered, the threads eventually worked their way toward it, and wrapped all over it, shattering the core at once.

Like that, a Duke ranked demon died.

"Haa…"

After releasing a soft breath, dark threads emerged from the ground and grappled onto his legs, pulling him beneath the ground, and his figure disappeared into the ground.

Boom—!

Shortly after his figure merged with the ground, a foot stomped in the area he was in, forming a large crater.

"He's gone!"

A demon huffed, looking around with a menacing glare.

It had only been a couple of minutes since he had made his appearance, but from the moment he had appeared, the situation started to turn more chaotic.

The great advantage that they had built was slowly starting to crumble, and the other races were starting to recompose themselves

"Where has he gone!? Damn, hiding bastard!"

The demon cursed and trashed, looking everywhere for any traces of the human that had appeared from out of nowhere.

It was right when he fixed his gaze in a particular direction that he suddenly felt a chill coming down his back and a voice whispering into his ears.

"I'm not hiding anywhere."

"You—!"

Swoosh—!

He swung his claws directly behind him, but to his great dismay, he saw that his claws hit nothing. Instead, thin black threads emerged from underneath the ground and slowly grappled and latched onto his hands, halting his movement.

"This! What is this!?"

The demon tried to rid himself of the threads that were gripped onto his arms, but as he pulled, he found that they didn't budge a single inch and merely stretched a little bit.

If that wasn't bad enough, more and more threads appeared from beneath the ground, encircling his legs and wings.

No matter how much the demon tried to struggle, more and more threads emerged from the ground beneath, sealing his movements.

The process moved along rather quickly, and before the demon even realized what was happening, the dark threads had encased every part of his body, with the exception of his head, which protruded from the cocoon.

"Release me!"

The demon tried to struggle, but it was a futile effort.

Appearing behind him, Jin casually looked at him from top to bottom before bending over and stabbing at his calf.

"There it is."

Spurt—!

ground as Jin's eyes shone at the sight of a particular object

retrieved a black core, the demon's face changed drastically,

Cr…Crack!

shattered into thousands of pieces, and the demon's body dissolved into the air. The threads that were cocooning him loosened,

"Huu."

with another powerful demon, Jin took a deep

easy to deal with

easy, it was anything but easy. Nearly half of his mana was depleted, and he had only killed one of the

a lot of work that he needed to

Gulp—!

figure once again melted against

***

Master of the Sloth Clan was Prince Letvia. He was a demon with long pinkish hair—a trait belonging to the higher demons within the clan—and his features were extremely pleasant

were several demons. All of whom were Prince

looks like we've found ourselves a rather talented

Letvia commented, his gaze falling on a certain human boy with short blond hair and deep green eyes in the middle of the

the other demons and harvested their core without

was, without a doubt,

makes me want to take

the Prince, silently licking his

the demons weren't exactly

was to win the war, they

as many as they

This order…

He insisted that they make an effort to grow their forces even more by converting those

demons were confused by the order,

questioning His Majesty in

tried, and the results were anything

escape his gaze, and all

suggest we do with the

a look at the Prince-ranked demons that were still present. There were more than a dozen of them, and for some time they

the very beginning, one that consisted of choosing a certain target

enjoy killing, they had all agreed that letting

when they could be useful if there was a conflict with another

make good cannon fodder or perhaps even main

Out of all the demons, he seemed

"Are you interested?"

"…I indeed am."

answered, his voice sounding extremely calm. Such behavior

"What's your name?"

"Valling."

forward a couple of steps and stopping right

"Valling is it?"

seeing him, and he seemed to be rather talented. His age and the rank he had achieved were testaments to

had actually seen him, he was familiar with

and it had even reached his ears. Especially lately when he heard about the situation over there and how he had managed to gain

a daily basis, only the most important

heard about him was a testament to how well he had

"Good… good…"

more the Prince observed him, the more pleased he was

was adequate and fairly

the most; rather, it was the manner in which

these days, and he was extremely pleased to know that there

"For now…"

Letvia's gaze didn't linger over Valling for very long as he returned his gaze to stare at