Modern World Warlock-Chapter 81: A Low-Ranked Fiend

As the trio kept advancing inside the sewers, the cloud of umbra got denser, and the disgusting feeling that Megan and Zac sensed was more profound.

At one point, the stone ground was wholly covered in a strange, pitch-black flesh that shrouded the entirety of the structure.

"Eww, what the hell is this!?" Zac asked aloud, finding the fleshy environment absolutely nasty.

"It’s Malgaroth’s ichor…" Dante replied.

"What’s that?" Megan pondered.

The warlock explained that "ichor" could be considered to be Malgaroth’s blood.

The demon fed himself from the organs of people, and he would use their blood to create a substance that slowly spread and infected his territory.

"And what does it do?" The brunette asked.

"Once we step on that flesh, he’ll be able to determine how strong and how far we are from him," the warlock said.

"Wouldn’t that be a problem if he senses you? What if he runs away?" The redhead interjected.

"He won’t notice me, don’t worry about that…" Dante vaguely responded.

*squish, squish* The sound of their footsteps on the black flesh gave Zac shivers of disgust. "Ugh, man…" he muttered.

"Sorry, Camille. I know the shoes are new, but we might have to throw them away after this—Actually, burn them instead," Zac said into his mic.

When they had traveled a few more meters, the group noticed the water from the canal descended to a lower trail, leaving the trio in a more expansive and dry area, entirely corrupted by Malgaroth’s ichor.

On the walls, severed body parts were stuck and arranged to the black flesh in a perturbingly artistic way, depicting bloodied pentagrams and demonic stars.

Zac gagged at the sight of the different arms and legs, holding his stomach so he wouldn’t throw up. Meanwhile, Megan widened her eyes and hesitated to move for a brief moment.

"I told you guys. It’s only going to get nastier from here until we get to him…" said Dante, seemingly unbothered by the sight.

A few more meters ahead, spikes extruded from the flesh on the ground, with the severed heads of people at their tips arranged in a line along the sewer walls.

Megan noticed that all of them had been deformed beyond recognition. None of the heads had eyes, and the black ichor had corrupted them, giving them an even more disturbing appearance.

At the end of the line of severed heads, the trail split into three, with the path in the center leading to what seemed like an open space.

However, Dante sensed something coming from the left hallway and took a quick detour.

*Crack* The group heard the sound of bones breaking around the dark corner ahead of them, making them increase their pace.

Dante got to the corner first and turned, spotting a creature with red skin crouching on the side, tearing apart the corpse of a woman as the monster chewed on a couple of fingers.

Zac and Megan arrived just a few seconds later, the sight instantly making the redhead gag again with disgust.

"A fiend…" Dante muttered, catching the attention of the demon.

As the red-skinned creature stood up from the ground with a menacing aura around him, his horns lit up in flames.

He was as tall as Dante, although his horns made him look slightly taller. His bodybuild was quite burly and defined, and his eyes glowed with an eerie yellow hue.

"What’s this? Another group of explorers?" The fiend asked with a deep tone of voice.

"See, this guy is a fiend, but he is actually a low-ranking fiend…" Dante said to his companions, wholly ignoring the monster before him.

"A high-ranked fiend usually has wings, and they have about double or triple the power from a low-ranked," the warlock casually continued.

Zac and Megan listened to his words, but they couldn’t ignore the tall demon in front of them, who was visibly getting annoyed at Dante’s treatment.

’Why are these people not running away?’ The demon thought.

Not giving Dante a chance to finish his explanation, the fiend extended his arm to grab Dante by his jacket. Nevertheless, the warlock slapped his hand away with an indignant expression on his face.

"Get your dirty claw away from me…" The warlock muttered.

A simple sentence was all it took for the fiend to notice the amount of overwhelming umbra flowing from Dante.

"Y-you… Where did all that umbra come from!?" The fiend shouted. He didn’t know who Dante was, but he could tell that he was much stronger than him.

"What do you mean? This umbra is all over the place," Dante vaguely replied, slowly approaching the demon, who couldn’t move an inch as his aura had him frozen in place.

"You’ve made quite a mess here…" said Dante, placing a hand on the demon’s shoulder in a seemingly gentle manner. However, his touch made the fiend even more nervous.

"How many?" The warlock asked.

"Th-thirty-five…" the fiend replied.

The red-skinned demon alone had eaten 35 people in total, without counting any of the victims that were given to Malgaroth.

Most of the fiend’s victims were youngsters who went to the sewers after hearing the story of the monster living there, wanting to record it and put it online.

Dante then asked who summoned the demon there, and he replied by saying that "King Astaroth" had brought him there himself.

"King…?" *Pffft* "Ahahaha!" The warlock let out a sarcastic laugh.

"Alright, I’m starting to see the big picture here… Who would have guessed that a coward like Astaroth would be called king," Dante continued.

As the warlock turned around to look at his companions, he signaled them to return to the intersection so they could keep moving towards Malgaroth, and the fiend looked a bit relieved for a second.

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The demon thought he would be spared after answering the warlock’s questions. Nonetheless, as the trio walked away, Dante looked back for a moment and shot a thin, black fire laser from the tip of his finger that hit the fiend on the head, causing his entire body to burst into flames.