The demon flipped back onto its feet and charged at the Soul Eater. The demon was fast and agile. The Soul Eater tried smashing the demon, but it dodged and swerved all around the Soul Eater before taking a huge leap at it. The demon landed on the back of the massive Soul Eater. The demon’s arm turned into a blade, but before it could stab the Soul Eater, ethereal arms emerged from its back. The demon was too slow in that regard. The arms caught the demon and they began tearing the demon apart. The demon cried and howled as it was gradually torn apart, and the arms then absorbed the parts into the main body.

The Soul Eater continued to wander after it had consumed the demon.

“Oh… That’s not good,” Aedan muttered.

Erin frowned and glanced at him. “What do you mean by that?”

“This one’s old, very old.”

“The older it is, the stronger it is?”

“To put it simply, yes. A Soul Eater cannot live through a day without consuming souls. This one’s old, at least decades. It had consumed at least ten thousand souls.”

“Can it use the strength and abilities of those it consumed?”

“Fortunately for us, it cannot. However, those souls can nourish it, evolve it. It may have abilities that even I do not know of.”

“This creature is sounding more and more dangerous the more you explain. Well, let’s do this,” Erin said and emerged from behind the debris.

“Wait, where are you going?” Aedan asked as he stopped Erin by gripping her shoulder.

Erin stared back with a confounded gaze. “To kill that thing?” she answered as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

“And how will you be doing that? You barely know a thing about it.”

“I do not,” Erin admitted. “And without engaging it, I will never know what it’s fully capable of.”

Aedan rolled his eyes and pulled her back behind cover. “You have me. You don’t need to engage it to know what it can or cannot do.”

“You said that it could have abilities that you do not know of. It’s pointless to ask you. I may as well verify the truth for myself directly from the source. Or are you suggesting that the Soul Eater is impervious to my blade and Essence Flare?”

“It shouldn’t be, but this one’s old. So, who knows? Whatever the truth is, can you just stop being so reckless?”

Erin glared and stayed silent.

“Are you coming to your senses now?”

Erin scoffed and shook free of Aedan’s grip. “Doesn’t change the fact that a direct engagement is the best way to know what it’s capable of,” she said and left the cover.

Aedan sighed. “Why do you have to be so insufferable?” he grumbled under his breath.

“I heard that.”

“What does it matter? Not like you listen to me anyway.”

Erin ignored Aedan’s tantrum and approached the Soul Eater with slow and quiet steps. Its back was facing her and each step was thunderous. Unless she deliberately made some loud noises, it wouldn’t notice her, or so she hoped.

“You are reckless regardless of your mortality,” said Aedan.

If Erin didn’t have heightened senses, she would have jumped in surprise. Aedan had quite the silent steps, which was unsurprising given his amount of experience. “Do you only realise this now?”

“I realised it long ago, but I didn’t want to accept that you are simply… too considerate of others to be considerate of yourself.”

“I’m not considerate. I’m just… doing the right thing, or at least it feels like the right thing to do. It allows me to sleep better at night. If you’re just here to talk about philosophy, I will ask you to back off and find cover.”

“I’m here to help,” Aedan said as he took out a strange metallic contraption from his Infinite Pouch.

“That’s a ‘gun’, isn’t it?”

“Hmm? I don’t believe I have told you what a gun is?”

“There are guns in my former world, but they certainly look different. They’re bigger. This one’s small, but I suppose the idea is there. Are guns the same in every world?”

“Generally speaking, they are. Handle, trigger, and barrel. It’s always the same. As for this one in my hand, it’s a Colt Python.”

“You name your gun?”

“I didn’t name it. It’s just its designation.”

“I know how powerful a gun can be, but it’s nothing against something like that.” Erin pointed at the Soul Eater.

“This one here is heavily modified and enchanted. So, just go do what you are going to do, and I’ll support you from here.”

Erin conjured a greatsword into her hands. “Anything I should look out for?”

“Just be prepared to retreat at any moment. You don’t want to be caught like that demon.”

“Is that all?”

“Aim for the joints, those are the weakest parts.”

“Alright, then.” Erin leapt high into the air with her sword raised.

The Soul Eater, perhaps sensing the change in the wind, turned around in a lazy fashion.

The sword in her hands was heavy, but she was strong and her opponent was slow. Even though the Soul Eater noticed Erin, it was too slow and too late to do anything. Her blade swung down, cleaving through the joints that connected its right frontal limb to its shoulder. The Soul Eater immediately flinched and unleashed a deafening howl that sounded like a rusty warhorn.

“Retreat now!” Aedan shouted.

The Soul Eater swung its other frontal limb. It was fast, as if its haggard movement had been nothing but a deceptive performance.

“Shite!” Erin was falling in the air. She had no control of her positioning until she touched the ground. She could only wrap herself in her tails and hoped none of her vital organs would be damaged once the colossal arm struck her.

Suddenly, a beam of light streaked past her and pierced through the limb of the Soul Eater that was about to strike her. The attack caused the Soul Eater to falter and stagger, giving Erin ample time to retreat to safety. She looked to Aedan and saw smoke coming out of the barrel of the gun.

“That was your gun?”

“What else could it have been?”

“That was… strong for such a little thing.”

“Yeah, it is, but don’t rejoice just yet. I only have five shots left. It’s not enough.”

“I hurt it. That’s something, right?”

The Soul Eater picked up the arm that was sliced off and simply put it back into place.

Erin turned to Aedana and scowled. “Did you forget to mention this part too?”

“I didn’t forget. I simply didn’t know. They could heal their wounds, but never this quickly. This one is truly different.”

The Soul Eater turned to the two and spread its frontal limbs out.

“It’s doing something. Any ideas?”

“It’s… dividing itself.”

The bits and pieces on the Soul Eater’s torso began falling off and dropping to the ground. The black piles of gooey mass rose and started to morph into twisted, vaguely humanoid shapes.

“Well?” Aedan asked.

“Well, what?”

“Aren’t you going to just rush in and cut them down?”

“I’m reckless, not dumb.”

“How surprising.”

“Be quiet if you have nothing worthwhile to contribute.”

The fragments of the Soul Eater approached them. They moved in a similar manner, but they were faster and less clumsy.

Aedan holstered his gun and drew his short sword. Instead of using it to slash at the fragments, he threw the sword at them. The sword struck one of the fragments in its head, but it continued to move without flinching or wincing. “Huh. That’s discouraging,” he said and snapped his fingers. The short sword flew back into his hand.

“Let me try,” Erin said and rushed at the fragments. With Essence Flare enveloping her blade, she swung her sword, cleaving through all the fragments with one swift motion. She didn’t celebrate just yet. Demons were not easy to deal with, and her dreary premonition was quick to be proven true. The fragments she cut down immediately rebuilt themselves back together like children’s play blocks. However, they were not whole in their apparent restoration. Their core essence was still being damaged by the cyan flames.

“At least they’re not entirely invincible. Just difficult to stay dead,” Aedan remarked.

“Just like all demons.” Before the fragments could complete their restoration, Erin lunged at them once more and cut them down into pieces. Without waiting for them to put themselves together again, she unleashed a burst of cyan flames at the pieces of the fragments, incinerating them until there was nothing left but their empty husks.

The Soul Eater trembled all of a sudden and emitted a deafening shriek. It clawed on its torso as it flailed around in seemingly agony.

“It’s hurt?” Erin muttered. “We hurt it? By destroying the fragments it deployed.”

“Sounds easy enough,” said Aedan.

The Soul Eater, instead of confronting the ones that hurt it, turned around and began to run.

“Oh? It’s running away. It can run? I’m surprised.”

Erin tutted and chased after the Soul Eater.

It was running without dragging its feet and without being hindered by its massive weight. Still, it was no faster than Erin. She easily caught up to the Soul Eater. She dashed forward, aiming for its legs, but something dropped in front of her. It was a fragment of the Soul Eater, detached from its back. The fragment quickly took form and attacked Erin. She received the attack and countered it with a lethal blow, or as lethal as she could manage. These things were hard to kill, and she didn’t have time to make sure it was dead. She had a giant to stop first.

The Soul Eater had covered a considerable distance, but Erin caught up to it in a flash. She was about to slash at its feet when more obstacles appeared. This time, it was not the Soul Eater’s fragments but other demons who were lurking in this hellish landscape. They had been running. Their paths crossed with the Soul Eater. The latter didn’t hesitate to scoop its brethren up and consume them as nourishment. Those who escaped the Soul Eater’s grasp were confronted by Erin.

“Out of the way!” Erin bellowed. These ones were easier to deal with since they were only lesser demons, the weakest of the weak. They burned away instantly when she cut them down with her cyan flame-imbued blade. She moved onto to her main target after eliminating the obstacles. However, there were more obstacles. The Soul Eater had produced more fragments.

Erin wanted to conserve her strength, but it would seem that it would be foolish to do so now. She unleashed her Aura Domain. The fragments and the lesser demons perished immediately, though the former perish slightly slower than the latter. Not that it mattered much. She swung her blade without closing in on the Soul Eater. She didn’t need to. Her Aura Domain spanned around twenty yards and more, and her blade could reach anything that was within her domain. Naturally, that included the Soul Eater. With a simple of her blade, the Soul Eater lost its feet and toppled to the ground. In just a few short seconds, the Soul Eater’s feet were already reattaching themselves back.

“Oh, no, you don’t.” Erin swooped in cut them off once more. She then began hacking away at the Soul Eater until it was only a bunch of cuts and pieces. Like all demons, the Soul Eater was still squirming and squiggling around as pieces. She then doused the pieces with Essence Flare, forming a cyan pyre that illuminated the surroundings. If there was any easier way to kill demons, Erin didn’t know. This was the best way she knew how to quickly dispatch a demon.

“Now, this is unexpected,” said an unfamiliar voice from behind.

Erin sensed the voice’s presence ever since she started chasing the Soul Eater, but she didn’t pay them any heed as the Soul Eater was her priority. Now, the owner of the voice was her priority. She steeled herself and turned around. “I can say the same about you,” she retorted.

“I didn’t expect the Augur’s companion to be the famous Erynthea,” said Davos.

Erin narrowed her gaze. “Who are you?”