Back in the world of darkness, Satoru now understood better what this place was, every time he visited this place was when he had passed out after some confrontation that went wrong, the first time was meeting the giant in the mountain.
When hit by the wooden club, he blacked out and woke up not knowing how much time had passed, but his body was intact even though he didn't care about it at the time.
The second time was even more unbelievable, in his second confrontation with the giant he was not only hit, but sent flying down the mountain, and again came out intact as if nothing had happened. Up to the present moment, his third time, being stabbed in the back by a sword, he didn't feel like his soul was going to pass over to the side of death, no, his body was still hot he could feel it.
This made him face reality, that was no longer just his mind, it was the thing too, darkness was not just a lack of light, quite the contrary, it was something alive, a being in an incomprehensible form whose unknown goal kept Satoru Seigi alive, no matter what happened, he wasn't allowed to die.
But that wasn't all, from the time he ran to the village, it all made sense now, the lack of change in body temperature, the fact that he wasn't hungry or tired. His body no longer met these needs, but his senses were still there, so it was obvious that the demonstration of running at high speed helped to prove the fact, who no longer his body was, the thing had long taken possession of him.
His movements could even continue to belong to him, however, the new characteristics he acquired were dependent on the thing. There he was facing the unpredictably moving being, it was hard to tell what this place was, maybe the split between Satoru Seigi's mind and the thing, or the union of the two, but in the end, the concept it followed didn't matter.
Stepping on what appeared to be something liquid, he didn't know which direction was the right one, however, deep inside a figure formed, it was pretty much the same appearance as him except that his eyes were black and his movements looked like someone who wasn't used to use a body.
“Satoru… Seigi… not… die…”
The thing's whispers echoed throughout the place.
Not understanding how it was possible to converse in this place, Satoru found himself once again trying to find logic in something that didn't seem to mind being "logical".
"What are you?"
It was the question that most frightened him, not knowing what it was, not knowing what inhabited his own body, but the answer he craved didn't come, in its place was something he couldn't understand.
"Don't… know… don't… matter…"
The unnaturally husky voice responded emblematically, enough for the young human not to understand, as she didn't know what it was herself? why it didn't matter. They were useless questions in the end.
“What do you want?”
Determined to discover something, Satoru asked again, but with a different question from the previous one.
"Find… find… all know… all see…"
What the thing said made no sense to the young man, realizing that it would be useless to continue this meaningless conversation, there was only one thing he could do.
"Please help Envy!"
Realizing that the thing only did what he wanted, the young man knew he could do nothing if the thing refused.
“Help… why?
Surprised by the other party's doubt, Satoru began to understand that maybe the existence of the thing was deeper than he thought if whenever she did something there should be a reason to do it, trying to generate a good argument was the best option for it now.
"Yeah, she's important to me, or rather, to us, she can help us find that." Saying confidently, Satoru thought his best option was to bluff, he had no real ability to convince people in conversation. , but maybe the fact that the thing acts logically according to what she wants or needs, would be a good conclusion for him to get what he wants.
"Important… help… find…"
"That's right, she can help us find it!"
Seeing that it could have worked, Satoru insisted.
The thing suddenly stopped talking and the whole place shook, Satoru withoutunderstanding looked around and suddenly his entire mind was swallowed up.
⊛⊛⊛
After Satoru was stabbed in the back, the soldiers led Envy to strength, two of them were on foot holding the girl, while the other six used horses.
Four of those who rode horses, possessed bows and arrows, while two who were on foot as well as two who were riding the horse, possessed swords. One of them was Invor who was driving with the horse in front and was also surprised when a shadow mysteriously descended from the skies, causing a roar.
With the horses scared, everyone tried to reorganize, when they turned around they saw the girl they had captured free, and her two companions lying on the ground. Protecting the girl, a tall woman with scales and red skin, with bat wings, wearing a leather armor that protected the entire area of the chest, and with a sword in hand.
The soldiers, all desperate with the sudden attack, tried to prepare for combat, but their captain didn't seem to have that urgency.
“So, the demon has finally decided to show up, why doesn't she surrender, it will be better for everyone?” The captain opened his arms with a confident smile on his face.
"Always arrogant humans…" as she spoke, Hilda looked back and saw Satoru's body lying there on the ground, she didn't show sadness, but she sure didn't like what she saw.
"They don't even mind killing each other, really a vile race."
"Oh, a woman who doesn't fear death, whatever, men just need her head, destroy the rest!" said Invor and turned to leave.
With anger in her face, Hilda saw four arrows hurled at her, but with a flick of her wing, a strong wind blew and the arrows lost strength even before they reached their target.
Shocked, the soldiers tried to prepare another arrow shot, while the only soldier with a was a sword in hand, made his horse run towards the enemy, he swung the blade towards her.
Hilda, in turn, took the Envy and flapped the wings flying faster than the soldier's horse could move, thus making him pass straight, however, four more arrows flew towards her and in the same way, they were repelled before.
However, the soldiers still had full quivers, if she wasn't careful she would be hit at some point, especially having to defend a helpless child.
When she landed the mounted rider once more tried a charge, but she was smarter, and rose and flew holding Envy still in her arms, but with her legs free she kicked the man down from the horse.
Soon two more arrows were hurled at her, moving so as not to be hit, Hilda escaped once more, however, one of the soldiers put the bow away and drew his sword just as his previous companion he attacked the enemy.
Hilda stepped over him, dodging the attack, but she didn't anticipate that in the next instant something caught her feet.
"AAAAH..."
In pain, she fell to the ground, looking at her foot, a kind of vine grabbed her, in that vine, there were thorns like a rose, with it grabbing her, the pain was great.
In the distance she saw who had done this, Invor was pointing his sword at the ground, and where there should have been a blade there was the same vine that held Hilda, through the ash-covered earth the captain hid the vine that moved without the enemy noticing.
That was the magic that guaranteed Invor to come out alive from so many battlefields, nature magic, a subclass of earth magic.
"Madam Hilda!"
Envy fearfully grabbed the person who tried to protect her.
"Don't worry."
Hilda realized she didn't have time anymore, the soldiers prepare 3 more arrows and let go, so she just covered the little girl with her wings.
With her eyes closed preparing for the attack, Hilda realized that nothing had hit her, opening her eyes, confusion took her mind, the formerly dead Satoru Seigi, now standing and holding the three arrows using three black tentacles that protruded from his back.
Everyone looked in shock at that, when they looked where the body should have been before, there were only the two bodies of soldiers with withered skins as if they had been riddled by something.
"Protect… girl… help… find!" - When he finished speaking Satoru raised his head and his black eyes caused goosebumps in everyone present witnessing the scene.
Then, abruptly, the tentacles broke the arrows, and with no hurry, the young man began to walk, his body swaying as if he didn't mind supporting the rest.
"What are you doing, FIRE!"
With their commander's shout, the soldiers began firing arrows uninterruptedly. But no matter how many more they fired, the black goo tentacles split into thinner shapes for a total of ten, and quickly and accurately, they hit all the arrows without even having a chance to hit the target.
So the boy did not stop walking, the closer he got, the more the soldiers panicked. Until Satoru stopped and a giant vine grabbed his entire body and trapped him.
"Do you want to die by chance? Shoot and enjoy now!"
Shouted the captain who could no longer maintain a calm and confident posture.
The soldiers with almost no arrows left took the few that were left and fired at the trapped youth, but no one had predicted what would happen, everyone thought the tentacles had been trapped with the body stops moving.
They couldn't be more wrong, four tentacles slashed through and cut through the plants while unshakably held the arrows.
“Impossible! What kind of devil is this?!”
Incredulous, Invor looked like he'd seen a ghost when his spell was so easily broken.
But what no one noticed was Satoru's smile as he looked at a remaining piece of vine, fascinated by that, the remaining six vines unified again and ran down the right arm of the young man who pointed at Invor.
"Protect… girl… help…… find!"
Repeating the same thing already said, the goo hurled itself at high speed towards the captain mounted on his horse, who could not even see the attack coming.
When he realized they were trapped and being lifted into the air, what held him back was nothing less than a black slime copy of his technique.
All the terrified soldiers dropped their bows and turned to flee from the terror attacking them. Invor was thrashing in the air, trying to get free, but he couldn't, the slime vine had pinned his arms close to his midsection.
Satoru, fascinated by this, suddenly turned his head and saw that the soldiers wanted to flee, waved his hand making the vine swing with it, and with a jolt Invor was released, but also sent flying in a random direction.
Still holding the arrows with the tentacles, Satoru looked at them and picked up the vine that returned to his back, fascinated again by something strange, he looked at the soldiers getting farther and farther away.
He raised both arms and the whole goo split for each arm where it materialized into six arrows for each side, with curiosity he looked at the running soldiers not knowing what awaited them, then all the arrows were shot upward at high speed.
Crossing the air, the five soldiers were running in a sprint in the direction as far as possible from that demon in human skin, being close to each other, suddenly they just saw something falling hard, the ground they walked on rose up, it was as if mini meteors fell from their side hitting some, screams of despair were heard and of the five who fled only two managed to be lucky to escape the attack.
With that they disappeared in the dark of the night, Satoru didn't seem frustrated that they had escaped, he seemed satisfied, but there was still something to do, turning his whole body to the side he saw Invor who was now crawling along the ground trying to escape, but it was in vain when he realized the young man was already behind of him holding him by the foot.
"Protect… girl… help…… find!", repeating once more, Invor scared to death tried to free himself, but his foot was broken, it wouldn't do much good.
"Please, I swear I won't hurt the girl, let me go!"
Shouting what came to mind, Invor suddenly felt Satoru stop pulling him.
"Protect… girl… help…… find!"
The young man spoke one last time and then a line of goo comes out from under his fingernail and into the ear of the captain who suddenly stopped for a moment and began to creep silently somewhere.
Soon Satoru started walking towards Hilda who was holding Envy, the demon had a long life, but she had never seen anything like this before, she didn't even know how the boy in front of her could be alive, of course, she didn't let the little girl see any of this scene.
However, when she realized that Satoru was staring at where his wing that protected the little human was, she remembered the phrase he always repeated.
Afraid she released the girl who suddenly had watery eyes upon seeing Satoru alive and walking she didn't seem to have noticed his black eyes.
"Uncle!" She got up running and hugged him.
“Girl…protected…”, said the thing, Envy bewilderedly lifted her head and suddenly saw the body of the person she hugged fall back hard.
Hilda was going to stop the girl but seeing that the thing had finally stopped, something inside her calmed, even more, when the body fell, she could see that he was still breathing, but anyway, the terrifying presence seemed to have disappeared.
It had been a long night, Satoru had no idea, yet in the future, that night would be remembered as The night of the black devil, and for others, it would be the first appearance of the black knight.
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