Demon's Virtue

Chapter 700: Retaliation

Eiro furrowed his brow, staring at the figure that stood before him. What he was looking at was no longer anything close to human; Merlin had set aside his personhood, becoming a monster. And with that, he seemingly had thrown away all logic of the world.

He had become a mage of aberration; and the more that Eiro tried to understand how Merlin's powers worked, the less he actually did understand them.

He thought he understood the foundations of the world, and the science behind how magic and the forces of nature worked and interacted with each other, but clearly, that wasn't actually the case anymore. There must be something that he couldn't quite grasp, otherwise, there was no way that what was happening in front of Eiro could actually occur... right?

What Merlin had done was ridiculous. He had transmuted mana into aberration magic, as Eiro had dubbed it. It stood at the same level as arcane magic; pure, but twisted. In the same way that something could be both pure 'white' or pure 'black'. However, somehow, Merlin was using the aberration magic as a basis for elemental magic. He was using it to fully replace mana.

And that in itself shouldn't be possible.

Elemental essences came from within; they were part of your own essence, growing in strength within that as your ability with that element grew. And then, you could draw that elemental essence from your core and infuse it with your mana; however, the only way to control that was through your personal 'essence'.

Pure mana was practically impossible to fully control, as it was stripped of your 'essence'. And then, by applying principles of the arcane to the mana, you turned it into a substance that could be controlled once more, as though you were applying a whole new essence to it. However, this new 'arcane essence' fully rejected all other kinds; whether it was your own or of elemental nature.

Eiro thought that the same would be the case for aberration magic, but maybe he was wrong? Or instead, maybe he simply didn't understand arcane magic well enough to be able to infuse it with elemental essences. In that case, that would mean that Merlin's skill as a mage far, far transcended what Eiro was even able to comprehend at this moment.

It was a feeling that he had experienced a few times until now. It was the same thing that he felt when a master used their near-transcending powers.

"You... mastered arcane magic?" Eiro muttered. That was the only conclusion that he could come to, and judging from Merlin's massive, broad grin, and the ear-shattering laughter that followed a moment later, it was clear that Eiro was right. Or at least, partially right.

"Arcane Magic? No, no, no, I abandoned that the moment I was reborn... Instead, I chose to turn that Arcane Magic into something else. I took that skill, and turned it into something new entirely!" Merlin explained, and Eiro watched as Merlin's mouth slowly opened for the next word. However, something was wrong there.

Eiro was seeing the shape that Merlin's lips bent into, and he could see the vibrations of his vocal cords, but the sounds that he was producing didn't match. Rather, they were sounds and notes that shouldn't possible come out of someone's mouth. Mechanical and artificial, but at the same time, guttoral and animalistic. But in either case; inhuman.

That was the only way that Eiro was able to describe those sounds, because in the end, they didn't make any sense. And the word that the sounds formed was something that Eiro wasn't able to put together in his mind either. Rather, it seemed to hurt him the more he tried.

But saying that word apparently had some consequences on Merlin either, as blood dripped out from the side of his mouth, his throat dripping ugly, stinking black oil into his mouth.

"...seems like that is too much for a physical body after all... Well, well, well, not that it matters much," Merlin said, as if disappointed, "What is important is that I have no need for things like the arcane anymore... this new magic is much more fitting for me, don't you think?"

Eiro frowned deeply. If Merlin was someone that was transcending the barriers of this world... if he truly was a 'Master', then was there really a way for Eiro to beat him right now? No, that wasn't actually the important part.

"...You're not the Devil's pawn... are you?"

"Of course not, I've left that behind long ago," Merlin replied quickly, "Though... the Devil himself might still think so, so, so..."

The aberration mage kept moving around his hands, which were still turned into magic themselves, and was pulling around the flame magic that he had taken over from Eiro. He was really just playing with it, like Eiro did when he was bored during work.

Merlin was confident. He was strong. And most importantly, he was absolutely insane and deeply abhorred Eiro. No matter how much Merlin was trying to change that, Eiro new what hatred felt like, and Merlin stank of it. However, at the same time, he somehow didn't seem to want to actually fight right now. If he did, then he would have already attacked...

right?

No matter what the case was, Eiro wasn't going to just let Merlin keep standing there. He looked at the spirits next to him, "I'm going to do something, and you're all going to have to trust me, alright?" he thought, sharing his idea with the three spirits.

They didn't even have much of a chance to think about it, as both Nelly and Gondos both dove into Eiro's body, even though he was already fused with Sarius.

Eiro felt his body be filled with massive amounts of pure elemental magic; now, even if usually in this spirit fusion, he still retained half of his regular physical body, not it was only a quarter as the magics of the three spirits took over the rest. Using himself and his powers as a conduit, Eiro shifted the spirits' magic to certain parts of his body, fusing them together in other sections.

This was something that he hadn't done before, but somehow, it felt weirdly natural. It was somehow the same as when he had just fused with one of the spirits individually; he was still in control, but his body felt more connected to his mind than ever before.

And more importantly, with Sarius, Nelly, and Gondos now sharing his mind, particularly Eiro's mental library had shifted in form quite a bit. Even if before, he could still keep it the same even if he fused with one of them, now it had become an amalgamation of different realms. As though his mental library was slowly being taken over by the elemental realms.

The most important part to Eiro was to make sure that the information stayed intact, so his mental duplicates largely focused on that, and the ones that were reserved for research as Eiro did other things all dropped their work and helped out here.

The Demon took a deep breath, shifting the magic within his body. As he then let that breath out, a heavy cloud of steam flowed out from his throat. His arms and legs were coated in red-hot stone instead of skin, and starting from above his elbow, his flesh became slightly translucent and bubbles were forming everywhere, as though he was now made of boiling water.

In the center of that water, pillars of stone had replaced his bones. As flames burnt away his shirt, the magical patterns that had been covering him and continuosly growing through every evolution were now fully made of flames that flowed over his skin like waves, spiraling over his limbs and burying themselves on his skin like a plant's roots.

But this wasn't the end of it; Eiro stretched out his arms and legs, pushing them into something invisible as he pushed his body back a bit. Something wrapped around his body, basically fusing into him as well. His body became more shaped and a layer of a crystal-like substance now covered him, which quickly took on the exact same quality as Eiro's own body, like a second layer of skin.

It was the Dragonic armor made from the Dragon of Truth's and the Dragon of Chaos' scales. Now, with Eiro's two mountainbreaker-daggers in hand, each being infused with either water or flames straight from Eiro's body, he had basically done what he initially wanted to save for the fight against the Devil, if it was necessary. But he had no other choice but to take this fight with Merlin seriously.

He wasn't an opponent that he could understimate in the slightest.

This whole process happened in the matter of a second; one in which Eiro had to expend a lot of mana in order to make everything happen without issues, and a second that Merlin had practically gifted him. He could have done something during that time already, but for some reason, the mage of aberration hadn't done anything. As though he was amused with what Eiro was attempting.

The demon took a step forward, and the moment the underside of his foot touched back onto the ground, he created a thick wall around him and Merlin, encasing them both in thick stone. The only reason for that was to use this to guide himself and Merlin away from this space. After all, not only Jess, but the creature controlling the dungeon were still here.

If they recklessly fought here, then Eiro really wasn't sure what was going to happen.

And then, Merlin finally raised his hand in retaliation.