Demon's Virtue

"Hey there." Arc greeted another small group of students with his regular broad smile on his face. This group included the Melachine twins as well.

Richard looked back at Arc as if he was disgusted by what he saw, and didn't particularly try to hide this fact, "What do you want?"

"Haha, it's pretty simple. I just wanted to ask you guys a quick question." Arc pointed out, and Richard sighed deeply, "Sure, it's part of a noble's duties to aid a commoner. But hurry it up, I don't have all the time in the world."

"Don't worry, it won't take too long. So, who the fuck do you bastards think you are?" The young man asked, as blunt as he usually does. Eiro could hear his son speak, noticing that he was somehow... furious.

"Wh-What did you just say?" Richard glared back and locked eyes with Arc.

"Oh, sorry, I didn't realize you were hard of hearing on top of being a giant fucking dumbass. Must be a hard combo to deal with, huh?"

"Who do-"

"I asked first, isn't it just good manners to answer my question before asking your own? But well, considering that you're laughing at a man who lost his hand in order to save literal children from being killed, or worse, by Demons, you don't seem to have good manners anyway, now do you?" Arc asked, his voice getting louder and louder as he spoke, "Now shut the fuck up, you moronic piece of utter garbage before I make you regret ever messing with-"

"Arc." Eiro walked up behind his son and placed his hand onto his shoulder. His head snapped around, and Eiro could see a blue notification in his eyes, saying that his Negative Emotion Resistance skill leveled up again, "Calm down. You know that's not good for you."

"But-"

"No buts. Stop it." Eiro told Arc, and the young man slowly nodded his head, "Fine. But I'm not apologizing."

"If you really think they deserved it, you don't need to." The Demon pointed out. Avelina stared back at Eiro in shock at what she just heard, "What kind of teacher are you? First, you insult us yourself, and then you tell this brat of a commoner he doesn't have to apologize? Don't you have any pride as a noble?"

"...You weren't here during the school festival, were you?" Eiro asked. Taken aback, the twins looked at each other and then back at Eiro, "Of course not. We only returned here a few days ago."

"That explains it then. Just so that you two know as well, my name is Eiro. Only Eiro. No last name. I'm a commoner, and Arc is my son." Eiro explained, "But before you say anything about not wanting a commoner to teach you, I want to put it out there that I'm his Majesty's own personal candidate for the tournament to choose the Hero's Companion."

Neither Richard nor Avelina knew what to say exactly, but Eiro didn't really care either. He just turned around and pulled Arc away with him, "I know I said you don't need to apologize, but you can't do this kind of thing again. Those two may not be actual nobles yet, and just the children of one, but if you were to insult a real noble like that, they could have you lawfully executed."

"But they insulted you!" Arc replied with a deep frown, and Eiro stopped walking and looked into his eyes, "I know. But that's something that I have to deal with, alright? I'm your father, you don't have to defend me. Now calm down, go back to your friends, and try and have a bit of fun. Alright?"

Arc hesitantly nodded as Eiro turned around to head back toward Kristoph, who was rather unimpressed with Eiro's behaviour, "Once more, as an educator, you should do your best to treat all children the same. Giving your own child a free pass to insult others is not a good-"

"Kristoph. Rather than trying to reprimand me over something I'm already vastly aware of, how about we start fighting already?" The Demon inquired. Kristoph's glare didn't move away from Eiro for even a moment, "You know, I was planning on letting this be just a casual spar. But how about we go all the way and turn this into a duel? No killing, of course. But we create an area that we can't leave. If either of us gives up or leaves that area somehow, the other one wins."

"Sure, not that it makes much of a difference. So, what do you want to bet? I doubt you want to duel for no reason."

"You're right. When I win, you'll start acting like a proper teacher. If you win, you can keep acting as you normally do, for now at least. And I won't bother you about this myself anymore." Kristoph suggested, and Eiro shrugged, "Alright. Any rules?"

"No rules. Use anything you want to use at all." Kristoph replied, and Eiro nodded his head. He snapped his fingers, and rocks and pebbles appeared out of thin air, gathering in one spot to turn into Gondos.

Eiro manipulated the ground through Gondos' help to immediately create a rather large square platform that they could fight on, while Kristoph told the children to head to the viewing area so that they couldn't end up being injured somehow.

"Thanks for the help." Eiro said to the Golem with a smile, before the spirit disappeared again. Eiro and Kristoph stood on the platform, looking at each other. Kristoph was holding a spear. This was probably the worst match for Eiro's combat style. Not that he thought he would lose, anyway.

Eiro moved his hand forward and pulled it back a moment later, making his main Dagger appear in his hand. The red fire magic stone glistered in the sun as Eiro took up his stance. For now, he would go for the mixed style of Hand-to-Hand combat and Dagger mastery that he learned through the puppet.

He didn't get a good chance to try it out on someone yet, not in this form at least.

"I'll throw this coin into the air, and the moment it hits the ground, we start. Sound good?" Eiro asked, and Kristoph slowly nodded his head, mentally preparing himself for the duel. The Demon threw the copper coin into the air, and casually watched it fall for a few moments, before it finally hit the ground.

And the first thing that happened was that Kristoph rushed forward at Eiro, trying to take him out immediately for a short fight. The spear was twisting around its own axis as it was pushed at Eiro, like a drill of sorts.

Eiro pushed his dagger straight forward against the tip of the spear, twisting it into the same direction as the spear itself. But the moment that Eiro's dagger passed the spear's tip, he twisted it into the opposite direction to disrupt the movement of the spear.

Once it stopped twisting around, Eiro slid over the ground and hit the spear with his knee, while still holding the spear-tip in place with his dagger. The sudden force pulled Kristoph's hands upward, and Eiro could hit the center of his chest.

Since it would be a bad idea to injure his colleague, Eiro made sure not to hit him in the wrong place. Instead, Eiro just tried to push him back as far as possible, while holding onto the spear.

And just like that, within a second of the duel starting, Eiro managed to disarm his opponent. Eiro threw the spear away from the platform, and made his own dagger disappear.

"Come on, I know that you are a Hand-to-Hand combat expert. Let's fight like that, shall we?" Eiro suggested with a smile on his face, and Kristoph slowly stood up from where he landed. He pat the dust off his back, and then said, "Are you sure you want to fight me in my area of expertise? Sure, you know how to disarm someone, but isn't your expertise supposed to be magic?"

"Where'd you hear that from? Everything I do is my expertise, Kristoph." Eiro said bluntly, taking up his stance, now without his dagger.

Kristoph slowly approached Eiro, and took up his stance as well. While Eiro's style was connected to fighting with open palms and redirecting force, Kristoph's was much more direct than that. He was going to fight with his fists, and his style seemed to be about swift movements and heavy direct attacks from the way that he was moving now.

The moment they both took up their stances, Kristoph pushed his fist forward. Then again, and then again. In a flurry of swift punches, Kristoph was trying to desperately hit Eiro, but the Demon was able to dodge the attacks quite easily. Until he wasn't. Eiro let Kristoph's fist hit his face.

He took that energy to twist backward and put his weight onto his hands. Since Kristoph finally managed to hit Eiro, his hand didn't move back as quickly, and that was a chance that Eiro took to twist his legs around that arm and shoulder.

Eiro buried his hands in the ground and twisted his body around, making Kristoph fall over backward onto the ground. However, to Eiro's surprise, Kristoph had a card up his sleeve as well, one that was hidden by how loose the shirt was around his shoulders. Eiro should have realized that something was going on due to that fact alone, though.

Kristoph's arm popped out of his socket and slithered out of the Demon's hold, before Kristoph flexed his arm and made his muscles push his arm back into the socket within only a moment.

He had quite some control over his own body. But Eiro wouldn't let himself be one-upped.

While Kristoph was trying to elbow Eiro's leg, the Demon pulled it away and entered a handstand from a laying position. He pushed himself off the ground with his hands and soon stood again. This time, as Kristoph attacked him, Eiro didn't dodge the attacks, but he was rather pushing his fist to the side, when the Demon noticed something weird.

Eiro was being thrown off balance whenever Kristoph moved his fist back to his body. It only took a split second, but something was off. It was as if for that minuscule moment, to get just a slight advantage, Kristoph was making use of something that he could only use under a single circumstance.

He was stopping time for such a short moment that even Eiro barely noticed it.

But how was he stopping time? It was simple.

He was a member of the Organization.

And not just any.

He was right at the top.

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