"Why… why… whyyyyyyy, you bastard why did you have to return, I will kill you." Bamel charged at babel bearing killing intent in his eyes but before he could reach him, I appeared in front of him faster than he could blink, holding fake holy sword at his neck, ready to pierce his throat at any time.
He didn't come out of his delusion, that if he had handed over the beast core to demons they would have spared him, and thus started blaming babel.
Considering he was thanking babel for coming back just a moment ago, I understood he wasn't able to accept the demon's betrayal.
"I see you didn't like the taste of betrayal, but this is karma." I said releasing my soul force and bamel took few steps back in fear.
"Didn't you hear what your owner said; meet us at the dueling ground." Bamel looked at us angrily and then settled his eye on his sister barita, whom I have released from [Lightning chain] earlier and the moment demon left, she tried to sneak out of here, thinking we wouldn't notice her.
Bamel looked at barita with hateful eyes and sensing the killing intent from behind barita also turned to look back at us with clear fear visible on her face.
Bamel manifested a 3 meter long black poison spear in air using external mana manipulation and threw it toward barita with the intent to kill her but babel moved between them activating the gem in his forehead absorbing the attack turning it into his own strength.
Seeing babel's intention to not kill barita, I shook my head in annoyance and infused my sword with lightning energy and sent a [Lightning slash] in the direction of bamel, which travelled at the speed eyes couldn't see and collided with him electrocuting him.
"Didn't you hear me?" I said.
Gritting his teeth in frustration bamel flew in the direction where demon has left to prepare for upcoming duel.
"Thank you brother for saving me, please forgive me for what I have done and give me one last chance to make amends, I will die before thinking of ever betraying you brother babel please, spaaare meee." Barita said crying heavily bowing her head before babel.
"What should I do Lord Eric, I didn't intend to save her but wanted to test the power of this gem thus I jumped between bamel's attack." Babel looked at me for my opinion.
"Whatever she said was true about never betraying you and I don't see much use in killing her, on the other hand now that your kingdom is in ruin, you will need whatever help you can get, for now let's keep her around and go to the dueling arena." I said sending barita to hide in the nearby cave from where we came.
"I didn't know that the kingdom was overturned by outsider otherwise I wouldn't have brought you here my lord, please forgive me for dragging you into this mess." Babel said in an apologetic tone.
"Don't apologies I was going to fight your father anyway but testing my strength against these demons doesn't sound bad." I said.
"I will be transporting both of us to the dueling area, don't resist." I said and prepared one of my favorite movement spell.
[Lightning Summon]
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[Skills: Lightning magic spell]
[Name: Lightning Summon]
[Rank: 4]
[Description: Host can summon a lightning bolt harmless to living being, which is capable of lightning transmutation, enabling the host and those host wishes to transmute anywhere within host's sensory field]
[Mana Cost: 15,000]
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I sensed demon Makia land faraway from us and I casted the [Lightning summon] spell.
The only downside of this spell was that it needed few seconds to prepare and within 5 second black clouds covered half the sky above the city and a lightning bolt fell from the sky on me and babel as we both disappeared from our place.
Both our bodies were transmuted into the lightning bolt and within black cloud a spear of lightning could be seen travelling and falling in the distance near the dueling ground.
We both landed on the ground, few meters away from Demon Makia, who looked at my spell with interesting gaze.
"Better than flying, don't you think?" I asked Makia and his expression changed from interest to crud.
"You surprise me once again, I would have let you live and become my pet but we have stopped entertaining human scums long ago." The demon commented with clear disgust on his face and I wonder why he hated humans so much.
"I thought you will never figure out." I said still keeping my disguise and understood the sudden change in behavior of demon which was because the other demon has informed demon Makia about my disguise.
"So what will you do now, attack me together with your demon companion?" I asked mocking demon makia but I was hoping he wouldn't resort to such tactics.
"Do you think yourself of some hero, you are not worthy to fight Lord Jabel, I alone will deal with you, once this little show of yours is over." The demon Makia said hovering in the air as bamel and his two brothers arrived on the dueling ground.
'Merlin why does he think I can't be a hero?' I asked merlin.
'The heroes whom gods have sent to this lands are equipped with the high grade core of archangel, because gods think it would be beneficial for them to control them in future and seeing you use lightning ability, he think you are some strangler.' Merlin informed me the reason.
'Fool.' I thought.
Without further ado, babel advanced toward to center of the arena and bamel did the same.
"I will kill you today here and now, I hope it gives peace to our father's soul." Babel said covering his whole body with thick black poisonous gas.
"I think father will be more happy, if his favorite son joins him in the afterlife." Bamel replied manifesting poisonous weapons in his hands and around him using external mana manipulation.
'Shouldn't we have given babel any weapon?' I asked merlin.
'It wouldn't fit properly with his body and only prove to be hindrance, as he hasn't trained in any weapon his whole life.' Merlin replied.
'We should have extracted the information about beast core from babel beforehand.' I said to merlin in case he dies in this duel but I wasn't too worried because I will not let that happen.
Bamel was a 16 meter long serpent and half of his body was humanoid, he had two hands with sharp claws sticking out of his hands and mouth filled with sharp teeth's, while bamel was a 13 meter long serpent with full body of snake, he had no hands but his face was much more similar to humans than his brother.
Both the fighter stood in center of fighting ground, ready to fight and that is when the demon said in a calm voice, "You may begin".
"Die" bamel shouted and charged at babel while babel released his killing intent and did the same.
Bamel covered his whole body with green poison which also had acidic properties while the black gem on the forehead of babel lit up and upon contact all the poison and weapons bamel has manifested to attack babel were sucked into the black gem.
The poison was sucked into the black gem but the acid fell on babel's black scales, but it next to no damage to babel's scales instead cleaned them, making them shine more brightly.
Look on the face of bamel distorted as his powerful attack which should have melted babel's skin did close to nothing.
On collision of both the fighters, bamel was able to push babel few steps back and tiered babel's scales with his sharp claw but babel's dig his fangs inside bamel's neck as both of them released a painful cry.
Bamel reaped the scales from both sides of babel's body with his hands, but unexpectedly the first fighter to separate was bamel because he was not able to withstand the potent poison of babel.
"Hoo… hoowww?" bamel looked at his neck where babel has bitten him and expelled a chunk of black poison using mana manipulation.
The poison from the body of bamel fell on the floor as ground began to corrode upon contact with babel's poison but the wound on bamel's neck wasn't healing but turned black as if to wither any moment.
"You seemed to have chanced upon a powerful beast core in outside world but don't worry after I have killed you, I will make good use of those abilities." Bamel spoke as he analyzed babel and released his soul force to injure babel's soul.
Babel and bamel both were brothers therefore, there was still chance that if bamel eat babel's beast core, he will undergo the same mutation as his brother.
"In order to satisfy your greed, you killed father, our siblings and innocent citizens, do you think you are worthy to ascend the throne?" Babel asked releasing his own soul force which lacked in comparison to bamel's but it was enough to resist bamel's soul force.
"Why waste our time on useless talk, there is no kingdom left to rule now, the only thing that matters now is who survive at the end, so try your best to kill me and I will do the same." Bamel shouted and stopped wasting his soul force and spread his hands in both directions.
His mana reserve and soul force reserve were both astounding as hundreds of different sizes of poison weapon manifested in the air around him getting bigger and bigger, all aiming at babel.
There was limit to how much external mana manipulation a person could perform and that depended on his soul force.
Once soul force is depleted the mental power of a person couldn't support the ability of external mana manipulation and looking at bamel's attack, he would be able to perform the same attack 2 to 3 times more.
The gem on the forehead of babel started to lit up but I doubt it would be able to absorb this many attacks at the same time.
Nevertheless babel stood there accumulating mana inside his throat preparing to fire the most powerful poison breath he could muster.