Demon's Virtue

It only took roughly another half-hour to get to the foot of the mountain again, where Eiro swiftly sat  Sammy down at a safe spot and then took Leon from Gondos, before Eiro just looked toward the gate leading out toward the town.

Seemingly, the others were already heading over here. At the very least, Eiro heard the Aria moving around while pulling the carriage, so as long as they didn't do that on their own, this should be probably the case.

Just a couple minutes later, the carriage drove through the gate, and while the Aria were definitely a bit upset at the moment while coming in here, due to the leftover miasma, it seemed like they were just a bit agitated. They should get used to it pretty quickly like this.

Soon, the carriage stopped in front of them and the children stepped out of it, while Arc jumped off the front bench of the carriage, "Is everything alright with them?" He asked immediately. Eiro just quickly nodded his head, "Everything is fine, it just seems to be a side-effect from the unsealing. Isn't that right?" The demon asked as he took out the slime-core in the bottle out of his satchel and looked at it. A few moments later, he heard the reply.

"Yeah, that's wh-what it is... It's quite ha-hard on one's body... B-But they should just be ex-exhaust-ted..." The slime-core explained, so Eiro swiftly nodded his head, glad to actually have such a confirmation. This was the greatest reason why Eiro chose to take the slime core with him, so that he could have an 'expert' on sealing and unsealing around for this first little while.

He might end up killing it later on, or he might find another use for it, but either way, Eiro was glad that Leon's skills made it more submissive.

Avalin quickly came running up to Eiro to give his leg a tight hug, so Eiro just squatted down to quickly pick her up. Although, he noticed that the others were looking at him confusedly.

"Oh, right, sorry. You can't hear him, I forgot. This in here is the 'Monk' we met before. In reality he turned out to be a slime that was raised at the temple. It should know a bit about seals, so having it around might not be too bad an idea." The Demon explained to them, "An just now it told me that it's a normal reaction to having a seal like that removed. Their breathing and heart rate is normal as well, so they should really be fine."

"It was a slime? But..." Rudy muttered quietly, "He looked completely like a person, didn't he?"

"Mhm, he is a special evolution of slime that can shapeshift to an extent. But don't worry, it can't get out of the bottle." Eiro explained to them reassuredly, before he looked at the two who were still sleeping.

"We're going to spend a little bit of time here, until we can make sure that Leon can control his unique skills. Otherwise we're going to cause a fair bit of damage wherever we go." The Demon pointed out, and then slowly turned toward Felix. After all, he couldn't hear what Eiro just told them, so he had to try and explain the situation to him through writing probably.

So the Demon swiftly pulled out his notebook from his treasury and flipped it open while holding it toward Avalin, "Could you do me a favor and hold this for a bit?" Eiro asked with a smile on his face, and the young girl quickly did as asked so that Eiro could quickly take out his pen from his treasury and then write into the book properly.

"Can you show it to Felix?" The Demon looked at Avalin, and the girl quickly nodded her head with a weirdly smug smile. After the writing was in front of the young man, Felix read through it as quickly as he could and then raised his head to look at Eiro.

"So they're... okay?" Felix asked him. Without hesitation, Eiro just nodded his head, making Felix seemingly quite relieved. And then, Eiro continued writing into the notebook to ask Felix to do something for him.

"You... what?" He muttered surprisedly, "You want me to... help Samantha... practice?" Felix asked, seemingly struggling with his words a bit more again. Once more, Eiro just nodded his head and wrote something into the notebook.

'Don't worry, you're going to be fine. You won't be affected by her voice, and you have experience with such skills.' Eiro wrote, and when Felix raised his head, Eiro was already doing the hand-sign for 'Please', making Felix lightly grimace before he silently nodded.

With a smile on his face, Eiro then turned over toward Rudy and Arc, "Can the two of you head out an buy us something to eat? You don't have to cook tonight, so don't worry. And take Gondos with you, he can help you carry everything." Eiro suggested.

"You sure you don't want me to cook?" Rudy asked as he looked down at Sammy and Leon, but Eiro just shook his head, "I'm sure you're exhausted too, so really, it's fine if you just buy something for us." The Demon told him, and the young man slowly nodded his head.

"Alright... Thanks." He said with a smile, and then looked over toward Arc, who was currently trying to bind the two Aria to a tree despite them being so rowdy right now. It seemed like Lugo was actually acting pretty similar to those two. It was like he was nervous inside of this barrier. And so, Eiro tried to make him just lay down for a while so that he could get used to this.

And as Rudy, Arc and Gondos made their way out the gate again after being given some more money from Eiro, the Demon looked at Clementine, "Can you take Avalin for a moment? I want to try a few things out." Eiro explained, swiftly handing the little girl off to Clementine, "Noo! I wanna stay with daddy!" Avalin exclaimed, trying to reach out to Eiro again, although Clementine looked at Avalin with a sad frown.

"Awe... So you don't like me..?" She asked quietly, and immediately, Avalin turned around and stared at Clementine, "Nu! I love you too!" Avalin yelled out, swiftly proceeding to hug Clementine's neck and face.

Since Avalin was distracted now, Eiro could properly test out what he wanted to. He swiftly took off his cloak and put down his satchel, so that he could get a good look at his arms and easily pull up his shirt to look at his chest as well. And then, he just thought of activating that new ability of his.

Slowly his skin became slightly more gray in color, and its texture changed considerably as well. The whole sensation of touching something was quite different too, and his clothes seemed as if they were practically stuck to him now that his skin was this rough. But somehow, even though this was the case, Eiro's movement wasn't hindered in the slightest. The only thing that maybe changed was his weight, but even that wasn't such a huge increase either.

Mostly, it was something that simply allowed Eiro to give out heavier attacks while increasing his basic defense... Especially cutting him should be far, far harder now.

"...What did you just do..?" Nelli asked confusedly, and Eiro turned toward her with a smile, "Ah, my Resistance stat reached 100, and the ability I got through it is called 'Rock Skin'. I'm sure you can guess what it does, right?" The Demon explained. Nelli floated a bit closer and ran her hand over Eiro's arm before slowly nodding her head.

"Yeah... It seems like a pretty rare ability though. Maybe it's..." The Naiad started, although just when she did, something else weird happened. It was as if her hand was stuck to Eiro's arm all of a sudden. She could pull her hand away pretty quickly, but it was still weird. And immediately, the reason for this came to Eiro's mind.

Eiro quickly looked at Clementine and Felix, and told them, "Wait here." While also signing this sentence with his hands for Felix. Eiro and Nelli immediately made their way over to step behind one of the nearby trees while the Demon deactivated his 'Rock Skin' ability.

"What just was that? What did you do up there?" Nelli asked him, and Eiro slowly explained what exactly happened. How <The Devil> appeared and weirdly 'helped' Eiro, and how <The World> left behind the Major Arcana card.

And of course, how Eiro became a candidate for the next <The World>.

"You... Are you feeling alright? Nothing changed about you? You don't feel the urge to destroy all life on the planet?"

"Of course not, don't be ridiculous. I don't know, I just feel a bit more... connected to everything? As if the world around me is just part of myself. Gondos said it before, but I was a bit too reckless climbing down the mountain with Sammy on my back." The Demon explained to Nelli, and then slowly stretched his hand out to the side to pick up a small marble out of his treasury. It was just a simple shadow magic stone, since it was the main one that Eiro actually used to fuse with his body.

He pushed his mana inside and then made the shadow magic flow into his hand. And immediately, Eiro could tell a difference. Usually, with his shadow magic stone, it would basically just cloak his skin in a thin black mist, but now... Eiro slowly turned his hand into a fist and hit the tree next to him. What proceeded to happen was that Eiro's fist turned into black smoke after he hit the bark. His fist didn't fully disappear of course, it was just as if it was slightly 'squished' together. Eiro could also feel the bark hitting his fist like normal.

When the Demon pulled his hand back instinctively, the shape of his hand returned to normal. "It's a new ability..." Eiro started, "It's called 'Minor Elemental Fusion', and just what it sounds like, I can-"

"Actually properly fuse with elemental magic. But if that's the case, then that thing just now, was that basically you and I trying to fuse with each other?" Nelli asked, and Eiro slowly looked back at the Spirit.

"Maybe, it definitely sounds pretty intriguing. I mean, just imagine if it's actually possible. It would make fights a lot easier."

"Yeah, but it's not permanent, right?" Nelli asked, and Eiro immediately shook his head, "I doubt it. I don't feel anything like a 'residue' on my skin from before."

After a bit of thought, Nelli looked deep into Eiro's eyes.

"If that's so, do you maybe want to try? Fusing, that is?"