Demon's Virtue

"Careful, watch your step." Eiro said, as he watched everyone step onto the ship in front of them. It was a private vessel prepared for only this group, so they could travel there in peace without having to worry about random people travelling with them.

"So, why exactly are we entering a ship... on a lake?" Sammy asked with a wry smile, and Eiro quickly explained why through the use of magic, quickly creating a simple map in the air in front of him, "If we enter this lake here, we can easily travel over toward the rigar, a river that runs from here all the way into the ocean. It's just a lot quicker than taking a carriage." The Demon explained quickly, and Sammy slowly stepped onto the stairs that would bring her onto the ship.

Eiro looked at her with a light smile, "Don't worry, it's not dangerous at all. With Nelli, Koperia and I here, there's no way anything could happen to us in a boat." He pointed out, while Arc slightly stared at the necromancer with a light frown, "Why're you coming anyway? I thought you'd just go off to do your own thing again or something."

"And give up the chance to evaluate the strongest people on the continent? Hah, right, as if I would." Koperia pointed out as she quickly walked onto the ship. Eiro rolled his eyes as he looked around, making sure that all the luggage had been brought onto the ship.

"Lad, are ya sure I can't just... take a carriage? It's enough if you just bring the materials and such with you..." Armodeus suddenly said, and the Demon looked at the craftsman with his brows raised surprised, "What? If we do that, by the time you're there, we'll already be back." Eiro pointed out, and Armodeus slightly stared back at him, "Then it's fine if I just stay here... I don't like hot weather anyway."

"Come on, Armodeus. We want everyone to come with us. What's the issue?" He asked confused, and Armodeus slightly stared at the ground underneath his feet, "You see, dwarves... we have a really strong connection with the earth, and the ground. And that's just not possible on the sea..."

"So you're saying you get sea-sick easily?"

"...yes." Armodeus replied awkwardly, and Eiro simply sighed in response, "Don't worry, I can probably help you feel a bit more stable in your cabin so you won't have too much to worry about." He suggested, "But for now, just get on there already. You know as much as I do that you really want to come with us as well."

"...Fine. But if I thorw up because of this trip, then yer the one cleaning it up, lad."

"Right, right. Just get on already." Eiro smiled lightly, as he continued to stand outside. Soon, a person came up to him. They were seemingly from the country of Baram, apparently that's what the ash gray tattoos on their dark skin told Eiro.

"Good morning. I am going to be accompanying you to our country, acting as a guide. I hope that we will be able to get along for the next few days." He explained, and Eiro immediately nodded his head, "Of course, let's make sure of that." He replied immediately, before the guide from Baram quickly started walking onto the ship.

"Then let us get ready for departure. The captain told me that it will take only an hour for us to leave." 

"Alright, that's good." Eiro said, as he climbed onto the ship as well. Of course, the first thing that the Demon did was pretty simple. 

He created servants that could take care of any trouble that might come up. A few water servants that would swim by the sides of the ship and get rid of any dangerous animals or monsters that might be lurking underwater. Some air servants to fly far above the ship, which Eiro could then also use to simply scout ahead if he wanted to.

And beyond that, Eiro created some shadow servants out of small rocks that he then had dive into the shadows of the crew, placing the shadow-less rocks into his bag. In order to release them later, he would need the objects that the shadows belonged to, so Eiro didn't just want to throw the rocks away into the ocean.

The shadow servants were really the most important to Eiro here, since some of the crew members on the ship seemed somewhat... untrustworthy. That was the simplest way to put it. He didn't trust those guys around his children, especially since some of them had already been looking at Sammy and Clementine weirdly. So of course... he made sure to instruct the shadow servants to strangle anyone that tried to touch his children in that way. Not that they would be able to, considering that this ship wasn't large enough for any spot of it to be outside of his field of perception.

Eiro let out a slight sigh as he entered his cabin, dropping down onto the bed in the corner of the room while looking up at the ceiling.

"Is something wrong?" Ariella asked, sitting down on the bed next to him. Eiro slowly looked up at her and shrugged, "Not particularly. I'm just planning ahead a bit. I don't know exactly what will happen in Baram, so I'm a little nervous about it. And once we're back, I'll be promoted to a Viscount, and after that... I don't know what will come after that." The Demon pointed out, and Ariella simply smiled at him, placing her hand onto his.

"That's normally how it is, you know? Not everyone can predict things up to weeks, or even months ahead." Ariella chuckled, "How about we just take it slow? The Academy's classes will begin again a month after we're back, and Leon is also still maturing as a beastman. You said you wanted to work on expanding the monster town some more, right? There are plenty of things that need to be taken care of still. I know they're not particularly exciting, but you should know about that already, considering that you basically did nothing for three months." 

"...I spent nearly every day of those three months in agonizing pain. It was a little different. I'll just end up bored now. I'm at a point where neither physical strength nor technique-based training helps. Well, I guess I could start gathering as many different skills as I can and bring them up to a decently high skill level for fun or something." Eiro pointed out with a slight sigh, "And I didn't really have a chance to really use my Legendary Skill yet either, so I'll have to figure out something for that." 

"Hm? You didn't use your Legendary Skill yet?" Ariella asked confused, and Eiro quickly nodded his head, "Yeah, not really. It has passive effects that increase certain general abilities of mine, but the main thing that my Legendary Skill can do is manipulate my existing abilities." Eiro explained, "I can boost them, reverse them, and all that. But it was just never necessary, and I don't know the repercussions of using the skill yet either." 

"We do have quite a bit of time now. You could just try it out now, right?" Ariella suggested. Eiro turned toward her and slowly sat up again, "Hm. That is a good point. You know what, I'll do that. How about I just..." 

Eiro slowly activated his Legendary skill, and thought about using it to boost his strength stat ability, 'Warrior's Strength'. He took a deep breath and looked at the notification that appeared in front of him as he did so.

[You have boosted the {Warrior's Strength} ability. It has temporarily become {The Supreme Demon's Body}]

[Countdown until ability will be forcefully returned to normal: 1 Hour, 59 Minutes, 59 Seconds]

[Countdown until the {Supreme Demon} Skill can be used to manipulate another ability: 1 Hour, 59 Minutes, 59 Seconds]

[Notice: Even through premature cancellation of the ability-boost, the skill-usage countdown will not change] 

Immediately, Eiro could feel his body undergo a certain change. His muscles started to bulge up. Or rather, he suddenly grew an incredible amount of muscle, increasing it by roughly 50%. But soon, after this growth stopped, the muscles compressed back down so that Eiro's body didn't look any different to before.

"Huh." Eiro muttered, "There are way less repercussions than I thought... or rather, barely any at all... And the skill is just at level 1..."

"Wait, the legendary skill has a level as well?" Ariella asked as she started to feel up Eiro's arms to see if they had grown any tougher compared to before.

Eiro quickly nodded his head, "Yeah, it got a level when I evolved, and when it properly awakened. But skills like this don't follow the regular format of other skills. As far as I know, they don't have a grade, but just reach level 100 and stop there." 

Ariella looked at Eiro with a wry smile, "So what would happen if you were to use it like this at level 100 then?"

"I have literally no idea, but I would love to figure that out. Skills usually don't increase in potency in a linear fashion. Although for all I know, this might be different." Eiro said, before pulling his shirt up and flexing his arm to see if it felt particularly different to him.. And sure enough, his arm did feel a bit stranger to flex, but that was just because of the difference in mass and density that was added onto it, otherwise he could still control his muscles normally.