Strongest Mage with the Lust system

Woosh!

Half an hour later, a figure draped in black robes that reeked with demonic energy left a mansion in one of the fallen kingdoms near Green Leaf.

This figure was none other than Max. If someone could see past the faint veil of demonic energy covering his face, they would see a layer of demonic energy wriggling across his face, slowly changing his looks.

A while ago…

“…That’s why I need you to see if you can find a way to the central plains.” Ashroth said, his expression incomparably solemn.

Max wore the same expression, a sense of dread permeating his heart.

Taking a deep breath, he asked, “Is she, your aunt, sure that the information she found out is true?”

Ashroth nodded. “I asked her the same, and she said that she is.”

Max closed his eyes, his thoughts churning rapidly. After a few minutes, he exhaled a deep breath, opened his eyes, and nodded.

“Alright. I’ll try to find a way. But I hope you know it’ll be extremely difficult for me to lead your tribe to the central plains with my current strength. We would most likely be slaughtered before reaching the three empires.”

Ashroth smiled wryly. “I know, but we have no choice but to take the risk if we want to survive.”

Max silently nodded. After a few moments, he changed the topic and asked, “That disguise technique you used, can it fool emperors?”

“It can, but you can’t use it.” Ashroth chuckled, leaning back in his chair, trying not to worry about the bleak future.

“Oh!? Why do you say so?” Max asked, raising an eyebrow.

Ashroth looked at him in confusion before saying, “Simply because it’s a demonic technique and needs our pure demonic energy to work.”

“Hmm? Just demonic energy?” Max asked,

“…Yes.” Ashroth nodded, not understanding why he was asking this, but he became surprised when he saw him nod and say, “Alright. Teach it to me then.”

“Huh?!” Ashroth furrowed his brows. “Teach you? But you can’t—”

Shua!

Mid-sentence, his eyes widened in shock because he saw Max release demonic energy, considerably purer than his.

He jolted in his seat, his spine straightening, “This… How… Why do you have demonic energy?!”

He was completely stupefied right now. He knew some humans in the past had tried to find ways to use demonic energy safely but failed. All those who absorbed the demonic energy had their minds corrupted and turned into dark mages who sought nothing but chaos.

Max, however, had the demonic energy but didn’t display any trait of those of corrupt dark mages. If he hadn’t seen him release the demonic energy from his body, he would have thought he had used some kind of storing artifact, but he clearly had not.

The corner of Max’s lips curled up into a tiny, proud smirk upon seeing his incredulous expression. But he wasn’t going to tell him how he was about to use it, so he said, “Don’t bother with why I have it and just teach me the disguise skill.”

Ashroth stared at him for a few seconds before he took a deep breath and nodded, “Alright.”

…

A few hours later, Max arrived at the mountains where Ashroth suspected Kriss and Pauline could be hiding.

Because he didn’t have any visible demonic features and had a human build, some demons he encountered on the way here looked at him curiously, but since his body was exuding the demonic energy, none suspected he wasn’t a demon, and therefore he had no difficulty arriving here.

Just as he was thinking how he was supposed to find Kriss and Pauline in this vast mountain range…

Whoosh! Whoosh!

…He felt some people rushing in his direction from the side.

Immediately he went on full alert, though he didn’t show it outwardly, and calmly looked in their direction to see a group of five dwarf demons, three males and two females, coming over.

‘Hm?’ He frowned under the hood of his robe, seeing they seemed to be coming at him. For a moment, he thought he was found out, but their expressions told him that wasn’t the case.

Still, he wanted to maintain his distance from them because not only was he yet to perfectly cast Ashroth’s disguise skill—Illusorary Demon Art—but also because he was worried he couldn’t act properly and might end up making them suspicious of him.

Just as he was thinking all this, the group entered his bloodline sense’ range. He calmed down, realizing the strongest of them was just a mid-stage Five Star demon. Even if they became suspicious of him, he could kill them off before they could do anything about it.

The dwarves looked at him up and down, their eyes narrowing.

“What are you looking at?” Max coldly asked in the demon language in a hoarse voice.

The mid-stage Five Star Dwarf demon quickly gave him a bow and said with a smile and a respectful expression on his face, “Hello, sir. I’m Havos; these two are my sons, and these two are my wives. We came here to hunt that human duo too. I was wondering if we could team up and hunt them together.”

“Oh? So they are really here?” Max asked, his eyes gleaming underneath his mask.

“Yes, sir.” Havos nodded before he chuckled, “Haha, it seems sir is a young demon, and upon hearing those evil humans were causing trouble in our domain, he came to punish them without being sure about their whereabouts.”

Max stayed silent, which made the dwarf think he was right, which caused him to smile brightly. “Let’s team up then, young sir. With you, our group will be stronger, and you won’t have to waste your valuable time scouring these mountains.”

Hearing this, Max raised a brow. “You have a way to find where they are?”

The dwarf nodded, a proud expression appearing on his face, “That’s right.”

Max nodded, sighing in relief. For a moment, he became worried because if all demons had methods to track them, they might have already been caught or, worse, died, but upon seeing the dwarf’s proud expression, he realized his worries were unfounded because if all demons or several demons could track them so easily, the dwarf wouldn’t have been so proud.

“Good. I’ll join your group then.” He nodded before gesturing toward the mountains, “Lead the way.”

The dwarf smiled wryly. “Young sir, let’s discuss how we are going to split the reward—”

“No need. I’m not doing this for the reward.” Max interrupted him.

“This…” The dwarf was stumped. He then looked toward his wives and saw their worried expressions. Clenching his jaws, he said, “Young sir, can we sign a blood oath contract?”

“Hmm?” Max narrowed his eyes, the first time hearing this term.

The dwarf hurriedly waved his hands in front of him. “I-It’s not that I think young sir would do something bad… It’s just that we want to sign it for the peace of our mind.”

“…”

Max stared at him, his brows furrowed.

He knew the dwarf must have thought he belonged to some noble demon race after sensing his demonic energy, which was why he was being so respectful and cautious even though he was just a high-stage Four Star being.

After all, if after hunting Kriss and Pauline, he, a noble demon, went back on his word and tried to keep all the rewards, they wouldn’t be able to do anything as they wouldn’t dare to offend him.

“Alright, let’s sign it then.” He said in a displeased tone.

Hearing him agree, the dwarves relaxed before Havos took out a gleaming red parchment from his spatial ring.

“…!”

The moment Max laid his eyes on it, his expression turned solemn.