BOOM!

As Ruby heard the first attack landing, she didn't hesitate to run at her fastest speed!

She was just a merchant who could create some small potions. Hell, she wasn't made for that!

She truly was a Rank 2 being, but she had advanced very recently and had no battle experience. She'd be crazy to participate in such a fight as even a Rank 1 being could beat her to death.

'Argh, I hope they take care of my carriage and goods. I can't lose them again!' Ruby wanted to cry when she thought about all the money she'd lose if anything happened to her goods.

Her plan was to make the mercenaries return to the town and bring everything into her new house. It was a simple plan that she discussed with every mercenary she hired, but she was scared about what could happen to them while traveling.

By them, that didn't refer to the mercenaries, but to her precious goods!

Ruby had just recovered from her recent loss, how unlucky would she have to be to lose everything again?

'I should have left. Why did I decide to stay here tonight?' Ruby felt regret deep in her heart.

However, she wasn't a regressor like Dante. Because she couldn't change the past, she could only shift her focus to the present.

Thus, she went to the storage room and brought her most valuable items into a bag before heading toward the formation room.

In the formation room, she looked at the escape formation before sitting on the ground.

She had nothing she could do now.

The only one who could activate the formation was Dante. She could activate it if she made some modification to the formation, but that would be considered offending Dante, which she didn't want to do right now.

She didn't know who was the villain and who was the good guy. They said something about searching for a killer, so maybe Dante was the one to be blamed and the others would spare her life, right?

'I don't know anymore… I'll wait and see what happens.' Ruby decided as she focused on her long eyelashes, observing the stairs of the treehouse.

If the one who entered the treehouse wasn't Dante, she'd immediately modify the formation.

¢¢¢

Adrian and Clara looked at the area where Dante stood a moment ago. It was covered by streams of evaporated snow.

"The heat signature is still there. Did he die?" As that question left Clara's mouth, the sight finally cleared.

But instead of seeing a burned corpse, all that they saw was a thin silver sphere covering Dante. It negated all the damage, but its condition was so miserable Adrian and Clara wondered how it didn't shatter yet.

At that sight, Adrian and Clara's expressions turned serious. They now saw Dante as a Rank 2 being, even though they couldn't understand the strange barrier he used.

Adrian was about to snap his fingers again, but just then, his eyes widened as he saw something moving toward his wife.

Centipede Of Greed — Whip Form!

Dante had turned Sin of Greed into a segmented whip of sharp blades and swung it, aiming for Clara. Simultaneously, he retrieved a potion from his storage and drank it.

It was fire resistance!

The blades hissed through the air as they cut the distance quickly. Clara drew some runes, causing a wall to rise against the blades, while Adrian snapped his fingers and sent blazing spears toward Dante.

To their surprise, the blades cut through the wall with ease and continued forward, while the centre of the whip-like sword moved by itself to block the fire spears, defying the logic of how a whip could move.

Unknown to them, Dante could mentally control every single segment like a part of his body!

BOOM!

The whip-like sword moved like a living centipede, blocking all the fire spears before advancing toward Clara.

Clank!

Clara easily deflected the attack, but only to increase her shock, the blade attacked again!

CLANK! CLANK! CLANK!

The style of Dance of Greed focused on delivering the highest possible amount of attacks, creating a symphony of steel clashes as Clara used her spear against the segments.

Clara continued blocking, parrying, and deflecting every single slash and thrust, but predicting the attacks was becoming harder for her with every second.

However, it was still manageable.

Meanwhile, Adrian continued snapping his fingers, sending a barrage of exploding attacks.

Seeing this, Dante began to use different attacks.

While controlling the segments, he continuously attacked with magical spells.

He secretly affected their luck, bending their misfortune with their Violence and Health Luck.

He used Jinx on both of them.

And he attacked with shadow spells, but all of them were blocked.

The shadow wolf was slaughtered by a stone attack from Clara.

All of Dante's fire attacks were useless against Adrian. With a snap of his fingers, they all disappeared as though they were acknowledging him as their ruler.

Dante guessed that it was Adrian's ability, thus he stopped mimicking the Fire Aspect. Instead, he mimicked the Light Aspect and some normal shadow attacks.

'This can't continue.' Dante was sweating heavily as he evaded a wave of flames instead of blocking it.

The cracks were already spreading across Sin of Greed. If that continued, it'd break again and stay as a tattoo until recovering.

'Should I reveal everything I have?' Dante wondered as he observed their condition.

Although they seemed to be struggling, they were actually calm and held their position so well against all of Dante's attacks. They were likely holding back, waiting for Dante to use different attacks.

'In addition to this, that fox didn't do anything until now. It only stands on that woman's shoulder, unfazed by her movements and my attacks.' Dante squinted his eyes sharply.

He didn't believe that the fox could only detect Dante's location. There was definitely more to it than that.

So, the question returned to Dante's mind again.

Should he reveal everything now?

He revealed his relic, but they didn't seem to notice that it was demonic. So long as he didn't infuse it with demonic energy, they might not know.

He also used the silver Ether, but they didn't seem to know about it. However, the demonic energy and "black magic" were different.

They were widely known, and they'd be recognised immediately if he showed enough of his demonic energy and chaos energy.

Dante's only concern was: 'What if they see them and run? Or what if they win and I run?'

If Dante ran away now, he'd only have to face two individuals who wanted some revenge. That was a problem, but he could likely survive.

For the second option, if he decided to show everything and they still won or ran away, they could later show that a demon who could use black magic was hiding in the forest.

That was a disaster!

A mission to hunt him would spread across many branches of the Mercenary Guild. Dante's life would turn into a hell of running, and it'd be only a matter of time before an attack would cut his blindfold and reveal his Crown.

'But that's the case only if I run or fail to kill them after showing everything. What should I do now?'

Reveal or hide.

Run or fight.

Every choice had hidden dangers, and now, he had to quickly make the decision.

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