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The Devil whom Sebastian and others escaped didn’t just stand idly after that.

It immediately restored its vision and howled, charging after the three like a mad beast.

With their basic abilities so wildly different, the three had no hope of beating the Devil in this game of tag.

But fortunately, they had a carriage on their side.

And that carriage was excessively decorated, and those decorations could serve as hooks for people to hold on to.

Once they caught up to the carriage that dashed through the forest, they instantly clung to those ornaments, and the carriage also accelerated as if it was waiting for them.

It being a two-horse carriage played in their favor and it accelerated to a terrific level, far beyond what human legs could allow.

But the Devil’s physical specs weren’t normal either.

It easily caught up to the carriage and raised its sword to destroy it.

But then, the door part of the carriage flew right into its face and obstructed it from attacking.

“Hyahahaha! Let’s get this baby lighter!”
“You b̲a̲s̲t̲a̲r̲d̲, I’m gonna charge you for that, you hear?!”
“Come on, don’t be like that!”

Following that, Sebastian’s group started throwing all kinds of things at it.

This was a long trip from Stolla to the Methuselah domain. The carriage had a lot of luggage crammed into it.

Water and food had decreased quite a bit, but there were still oil and such used for cooking.

They did various things with it, such as splashing the oil at the Devil’s feet to trip it, setting fire to the oil to try and burn it, throwing blankets at it to block its vision, and so on.

The noble-use beddings full of feathers proved particularly useful in blocking its vision.

But all that was still gaining them some time at best. They eventually ran out of things to throw and the distance closed between the two sides.

But gaining that much time was enough.

Before long, the checkpoint appeared in their view—and they despaired.

The checkpoint had smoke rising from it, its gate mercilessly destroyed, and corpses spread all around.

It was completely wrecked. Realizing that, the three’s legs grew weak.

Their final hope to put up a joint struggle with the regular soldiers disappeared like a dream, so it was only natural they would feel that way.

They had no way of knowing this, but the Devils were attacking from the north. It was natural that the checkpoint which lay even further north from them would be the first to get attacked.

Thus, there was nothing unnatural in this situation, but they cared not about such logic. Their hope was crushed. That fact threw them into despair.

The Devil was right on their heels as the three looked at it with hollow eyes.

But then, someone cut between the two parties.

It was a blonde blue-eyed boy about twelve or thirteen years old. He looked completely out of place here.

He was dressed in a butler outfit, looking like a perfect portrait material that would be hung in a noble’s mansion.

But on this devastated battlefield, he stood out far too much. If there was one thing about him that did fit this place, it would be his arms. Only his arms were covered in rough gauntlets as if to intimidate the foes.

The next moment, the boy released a booming punch that was unimaginable from his small body.

The Devil just barely blocked it. But it was still flung a good five meters back in the process.

The boy realized that it was a strong foe just from that.

“Good grief. Lord Hastur ordered me to protect the north, but it seems I was a little late.”
“Grrrraagh…”
“Lady Nicole’s steward, Ogre Hero Den. Ready to fight.”

Sebastian and the others could only stand and watch the scene unfolding before them in a pure daze.

That was just how fierce the battle between Den and the Devil was.

Blades and punches collided, and greatswords and gauntlets scattered the sparks. Their movements were so sharp and fast that normal people like Sebastian or Donovan couldn’t even follow them.

The sound of every step they took, every punch, every swing of the sword, reverberated in the surroundings like thunder.

They had to escape from here as fast as possible.

Both Donovan and Sebastian knew that, but they couldn’t follow through with it.

The battle before them still continued. In other words, it was proof that the Devil and Den rivaled each other.

If they moved, Den would probably move to protect them. But they didn’t know what that would result in. It wasn’t as if they didn’t realize that they were a burden here. It was that they knew that they couldn’t move.

The battle was evenly matched in skill. But the situation was gradually heading to Den’s disadvantage. The reason for that was simple—the difference in the attack range of their specialized weapons.

Den had gauntlets adapted for extreme close combat, while the Devil held greatswords that exceeded Den’s height.

Thus, their exchanges were constantly started by the Devil’s move.

In battles, having a long attack range was an advantage in itself.

To get closer, Den took the attack, slipped past it, and attacked, and then was pushed back followed by a counterattack.

Normally, Den would have won by slipping past its attack and dealing a lethal blow, but this Devil was able to endure his attacks.

As a result, he kept taking on more attacks as he was pushed away, and suffered more blows as a result.

A normal Ogre couldn’t hope to fight with a Devil like this.

That would’ve been the same were he still the Ogre Lord that he was until recently. But Den had managed to evolve even further.

God Hastur was stubborn and hard to please, but at the same time, he was thorough when it came to teaching people.

He noticed that Den was evolving at a visible speed ever since he moved to his mountain, which was also a Ley Line.

Thus, in order to let him evolve even more, he started to mix small quantities of Evil Dragon materials that he took from Reid in Den’s meals.

Of course, taking Evil Dragon parts into his body wouldn’t be safe by any means.

However, Hastur had the World Tree sap as his trump card.

He needed the stamina to endure the pain of his body undergoing a change. And the sap was continuously restoring his stamina.

As a result, Den had surpassed even the Ogre Lord and became a legendary being, Ogre Hero.

But even then, he still fell slightly short of the Devil’s power. He felt frustrated about that fact, but he still continued to wait.

And finally, the time had come.

The Devil couldn’t see anything else now that it had such a strong foe before it. A Mythril thread suddenly flew from behind it and sealed its movements. Even the Devil couldn’t cut through the tough Mythril thread.

Not only that, that unexpected attack even broke its balance and it fell. Den wasn’t so stupid as to overlook this golden opportunity. Miraculously, the Devil’s head was currently positioned a little lower than his waist.

He swung down a chop towards its medulla oblongata.

His hand, strengthened by the gauntlet, became a sharp sword that lopped off the Devil’s head.

It was a power that he could display thanks to his skills and arm strength.

“You’re slow. Can’t you do something about those slow legs of yours?”

Once Den confirmed the Devil was dead, he turned towards the forest.

There stood a giant caterpillar easily seven meters long.

It was the Huge Crawler that became Hastur’s subordinate in the past.

The Huge Crawler didn’t say, no, couldn’t say—as it didn’t have a voice—anything in return and merely hung its head in dejection.

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