"It sure is noisy. The sham should have started by now. We'll have about an hour to rescue the princess" Kagemori's voice carried over to the rest of the resistance troops and she pumped them up. Having gotten the blessing of the node, she was the most likely choice for the leader here.

Even Maria had relinquished the leadership role to her, nor wanting to be a part of the chain of commands. She did not want to shoulder the burden of having so many lives reliant on her. And then there was the fact that she was the only one who could make a difference here as well.

"You're not having cold feet here, are you? Lucas would be a tough opponent" Lady Elma took a step behind Maria, her voice uncharacteristically confident. Kagemori knew that this question was not due to a lack of faith but due to concern.

Lucas was not a normal being, his power something Maria had never seen before. She had not even gotten a chance to run her system's analytics on it so she had no idea what she was dealing with. She only knew that the power won't hurt a human.

And yet, they could not send a human in because they get overwhelmed by the difference in technology. The humans on Imu were not magically trained, hence, they lacked certain aspects of self-defense.

"It's time to leave. I'll empty the way for you all" Maria assured Kagemori once she stepped down. For all her bravery, the demoness was the one most worried about this outcome. She had not trained with the node's powers so she had no idea what she was even going to do if she had to use them.

The group around then was already starting to move and so did Maria. She was the decoy after all and also the one in charge of dragging out Lucas. He would be the most annoying person throughout the operation.

The hallways were almost abandoned and it was pitifully easy to break into the castle. Surprisingly enough, none of the expected high-end fighters had been deployed in the way. So it should only be Lucas that should be in there.

Maria separated from the group, her fast steps making almost no sound as they hit the ground. She was a blur, passing between the enemies and reaching the end corridor in a record time. And she did all this because she could feel the corrupted aura of unnaturalness Lucas gave out.

That guy was here and he was ready to face her.

"You came alone? I guess you don't really care about your life" Lucas taunted, his eyes flashing with glee. Maria could see the willingness in his eyes to fight her and she knew she had to drag this fight out in order to give her party a chance to save Trisha.

The attack came without any warning or provocation. Maria almost didn't even register the fast motion but she somehow managed to make it stop at the last second. It would not be reaching her today.

However, the attack curved as it changed the trajectory. Instead of hitting her head-on, it curved slightly and managed to get Maria from behind. The heat was searing as well, getting to interrupt the flow of Maria's magic and healing capabilities.

[Anti-demon magic detected. Detecting source code]

However this time Maria was prepared to take the magic head-on. She had her system take note of the magic while she tried something she had not in a long time - her human magic. She had been advised not to use it anytime outside of the emergency since it was a little destructive but Maria knew the warning meant 'death or else'.

And this pretty much felt like a death situation to her. The incoming attack managed to scorch her left side but it gave Maria an opening to attack. Her human magic broke through the shield and hit Lucas dead-on, causing him to drop his concentration.

"H-How did you manage to do that? I-It hurts. Demon magic should not be able to hit me since I'm a holy priest" the blond growled in a pained voice.

[Anti-demonic magic scanned. Category - Holy magic]

Well, wasn't this great. The other turned out to be a priest, a similar designation to Maria but a few grades lower. Holy magic was special but it only hurt demons. No wonder Imu was having such a hard time dealing with this family.

"Tough luck dealing with a half-human" Maria called out and only managed to look at the startled expression on the human's face before her fist connected with that face.

Luckily for Lucas, Maria didn't use enough force to crack his skull open. She used enough force to knock him out and then decided to proceed ahead.

She did not make it very far before she heard the now familiar voice stop her in her tracks. Her punch had, evidently, not been enough for Lucas since he picked himself up and readied himself for round two of the game. He looked pissed off but determined as well.

"You might be a demon but you have a bit of a human in you as well. I see that someone broke the biggest taboo. As such, I pity you but it's also time for you to rest. I'll release your soul from its pain" the man roared before he was no longer human as well.

Large white wings sprouted from the priest's back, taking up half of the room and Maria knew it was bad. Her demon half was feeling the effect of that holy light but her human half seemed to be feeling rejuvenated.

What a pain to be dealing with such an abnormal case. Maria caused inside her head as she dodged the feathers. If they hit her then she would be out for some time. Thankfully, her holy magic did provide her a fair share of protection against Lucas.

"Dodge" Lucas yelled and Maria unconsciously followed his command, only to change her direction at the last second and she used her magic to cancel out Lucas. And she was lucky that she did that as well since it would have been Kagemori who would have been hit otherwise.historical

"What happened? Did you get Trisha?" Maria asked as she lowered herself in front of the demoness. Having Kagemori here just gave Lucas another target. And what was the demoness doing here anyway?

"She's, Trisha's not here. We looked everywhere but we couldn't find her" Kagemori replied back, her voice tense. The news hit Maria hard and her anger tipped.

And Lucas, who was still floating in the air, let out a loud and amused laugh at their expense.