The Seven Demon's Tamer

"I've never seen Daoka fighting at this level."

"I never knew he could do this much," she whispered, more to herself than to Lucian. Her fingers unconsciously brushed against the summoning mark on her shoulder. "That must be the first actual battle where he is giving his all."

Lucian glanced at her in puzzlement. "You mean to tell me you've had this kind of power at your disposal and never used it?" His voice carried a hint of accusation.

Mia smiled softly and patted Lucian's shoulder. "It's not my fault there have been no one to push him to this extent."

In the center of it all, Luxy and Daoka circled each other with predatory glares.

Their initial clash was good evidence that they were threats to each other—both had underestimated the other, and both had paid for it in blood.

Daoka's severed hand was already reforming from shadows, darkness coalescing to rebuild what had been lost.

To Lucian, the process was quite intriguing to watch—streaks of shadow weaving together that gradually solidified into bone, muscle, and finally skin.

The regeneration wouldn't take long before the lost limb completely reformed—maybe around thirty seconds at most.

Across from him, Luxy's torso bore a vicious gash that leaked black blood. Unlike Daoka's slower regeneration, Luxy's wound was already sealing with unnatural speed—literally in the twinkle of an eye.

One moment the wound gaped open, exposing inner organs on close inspection that no being should ever have visible; the next, it had knitted itself closed, leaving only a thin line of black stain caused by blood to mark where the injury had been.

They both halted from circling each other and assumed their fighting stances, movements deliberate and cautious.

The stillness between attacks was almost more terrifying than the violence itself—like the moment of perfect calm before a devastating storm.

Vwoom!

The sound sent air waves that split the air as they blasted forward simultaneously, closing the distance between them in less time than it took to blink.

The ground beneath their feet cracked from the force of their launches, small craters forming where they had stood just moments before.

Luxy sprang forward, heading straight for Daoka with extraordinarily quick leaps.

However, with his palms wide open, Daoka conjured an oval layer of shadow that materialized directly in front of Luxy's path instantly.

Quickly, Luxy halted his movement instantly despite how quickly he was moving, defying all laws of gravity.

The oval shadow poised in front of Luxy, just an inch away from his face blocking his way, suddenly contracted, closing up and disappearing from reality as if it had never existed.

"That was clo..."

Luxy's eyes widened in shock as realization dawned. The shadow barrier hadn't been meant to stop him—it had been a distraction.

As soon as the shadow disappeared, a set of sharp claws glinting with malicious red energy were already arcing towards his neck, having materialized from seemingly nowhere.

Daoka had used the shadow oval not as a shield but as a smokescreen for his real attack.

Slash!

The claws sliced through Luxy's skin from one end, aiming to sever his head completely. It would have been a clean decapitation if Luxy hadn't reacted with supernatural speed, slanting his body to the right to allow his arms to take the hit instead of his neck.

Blood sprayed in an arc along with a small limb flying in the air. But then, the severed limb regenerated the next instant.

*"I've craved for being a summoner and as luck would have it, I contracted the strongest summoning beast in all mankind."*

These words suddenly echoed in Luxy's head, louder than all the others, drowning out every other noise from his perceptive ears.

They reverberated through his consciousness with the force of a shout, even though they came from miles away.

Despite being far away from his summoner, Ryder, their telepathic connection remained intact—one of the many advantages of being a black-marked familiar.

Distance could not sever the bond between them.

Due to the fact that he wasn't inside Ryder's soul at the moment, he couldn't hear Ryder's thoughts with the usual clarity. However, he could still hear what Ryder said aloud as faint whispers that grew louder when Ryder's emotions intensified.

Right now, he could feel it—Ryder was experiencing a great surge of emotion, pride and anger mixing into a dangerous cocktail.

'Not now, dammit! I'm in the middle of a battle!'

Luxy thought furiously, trying to maintain his concentration on the threat before him.

WHAM!

During that brief moment of distraction, a heavy kick from Daoka connected with Luxy's chest, sending him coursing through the air like a bullet.

The impact was so severe that several of Luxy's ribs audibly cracked.

With a swift movement that defied his injury, Luxy backflipped to halt his trajectory, but still dug deep furrows in the ground with his feet as he skidded backward, leaving behind parallel ridges in the earth.

WHAM!

Before Luxy could fully recover his stance, Daoka flashed right in front of him again.

With one leg stretched backward, the shadow monarch delivered another devastating kick. This time, however, Luxy was prepared.

He dodged the attack... Only by a hair's breadth though and swiftly maneuvered behind his opponent.

*"So you want me to keep living like a coward, don't you?"* Loudly again, Ryder's voice echoed in Luxy's head, causing him to narrow his mouth to a single line.

The timing couldn't be worse—Ryder was clearly facing his own confrontation elsewhere, and the emotional bleedthrough was interrupting Luxy here.

'As much as this could pose a distraction to me in this battle, I still don't want to ignore it. Ryder is about to make a very stupid decision... I can feel it.'

Daoka melted into shadow once more—his signature move that made him nearly impossible to track—and reappeared instantly in front of Luxy. His claws from one hand were already in motion, aiming directly for Luxy's head in a strike that would prove fatal if it connected—a wound he won't be able to heal so fast.

Before Luxy could formulate an escape from the impending attack.

Again, Ryder's voice echoed in Luxy's head. "For your stupid proposal, I do not...."

Time seemed to slow to a slowdown as Luxy processed the implications.

'That's right, he is about to make a stupid proposal, a stupid decision.' Ryder was one word away from committing to a path that would almost certainly lead to his destruction—and by extension, Luxy's as well.

The familiar bond meant their fates were intertwined; what harmed one would affect the other.

Luxy remained rooted to the spot, half-conscious with eyes wide open as Daoka's attack closed up toward him.

He was faced with an impossible choice: save himself from the strike aimed at his head, or use that precious split second to alter Ryder's emotional state through their bond.

A strike at the head could lead to his death so what should he do.

It was a crazy dilemma indeed, but one he puzzled out surprisingly given the situation. In that fraction of a second, Luxy weighed the options and made his choice.

SPLASH!

Daoka's claws penetrated through Luxy's head with ease, bursting out from the other side in a spray of black blood. The strike had connected fully, uninterrupted by any defense.

He had chosen Ryder.

Mia gasped audibly from the sidelines in puzzlement, unable to even cover her mouth in shock. Even Lucian, who had been struggling to follow the high-speed battle, could see the finality of this blow.

"Did he just... let Daoka hit him?" Lucian whispered in disbelief.

Mia's eyes narrowed in suspicion. "No familiar would sacrifice itself like that without reason."

Her mind was already working through the possibilities. "There's something else at play here... But what!?"

***

Miles away, in the village square, Ryder stood face to face with Dwang Sung, the Red Eastern guild leader. The confrontation had reached its crisis point, with Ryder on the verge of making a choice that would seal his fate that could either save him, or end him.

"For your stupid proposal, I do not...."

Arrgghhh!!

Ryder squinted in pain as he felt a sharp agony hit his soul—a pain so strange and unfamiliar that it momentarily left him unable to utter another word.

He had never felt anything like it before, but he could strangely recognize its source. It was as if a part of him that had always been present had suddenly been violently torn away.

Luxy was in trouble. No, it was worse than that. Luxy was gravely injured... But still alive.

Ryder clutched at his chest, his unfinished sentence hanging in the air. The gathered villagers watched in confusion, nervously waiting for the completion of the answer.

He tried to scoff against the thought of Luxy, remembering about the malice he had been keeping against him but something felt wrong.

He tried to scoff against the thought of Luxy, attempting to bring back the malice he had been harboring, the resentment against the familiar for supposedly messing with his mind.

But something felt wrong. The anger wouldn't come. In its place was a strange clarity, as if a fog had been lifted from his mind.

He couldn't feel even the slightest bit of anger anymore. His mind felt somehow clear and free, feeling abstained from the negative emotions from before. He could think properly now, it didn't feel like he was being controlled... In fact, it never felt like that. He only realized all those now.

He was simply filtered from the emotions that would have made him make unreasonable decisions, allowing calmness and reasoning to overcome his mind.

"Ryder, are you okay?" Mara, from behind, ran towards him. She seemed to be the only one who could summon enough courage to approach him in the face of the cold standoff.

She recognized the sudden change in Ryder and had to ask out of curiosity, holding onto his hands as if to stop him from straying away from reality.

"Yeah, I'm fine," he muttered calmly. Something had changed within him in the span of a heartbeat the others noticed right from his voice.

Turning towards Dwang Sung, who waited like a predator, Ryder finally spoke again. "For your proposal, I accept—but under three conditions."

Leo and Brok sighed simultaneously from the sidelines, feeling like a heavy weight was being lifted from their chests.

The tension that had been building to an inevitable violence suddenly disappeared, momentary peace.

Ryder was suddenly being reasonable all of a sudden. But the big question remained, would Ryder's response be approved given that he was practically giving his helper conditions.

"Oh ho, now you're talking." Dwang Sung cheered, not even bothering to hide his satisfaction. "For a moment there, I thought you were going to refuse."

"I certainly would have felt a little bit of regret to have your blood on my hands."

Walking closer to Ryder, he placed his hand on his shoulder. "Conditions, eh!"

"Tell me the conditions and I'll make it official."

Everyone sighed simultaneously.

"Firstly, you must collaborate with me and my friends over here to help me search for my parents' assassins. The assassins who captured my father, and the assassins who murdered my mother. I must have my revenge."

"Secondly, I am not to be treated like I'm under you, but rather I should be treated like an honorable partner."

Dwang Sung's eyebrows raised fractionally at the boldness of the demand, but he made no move to interrupt.

"Third is still undecided, I'll think of what to do with it at the right time."

The guild leader's eyes narrowed slightly at these conditions, clearly wary of giving such a blank check to someone he barely knew and whose power he had yet to fully gauge.

Sensing the hesitation, Ryder elaborated, "Actually, there are a million things to choose from if I wanted to use my last condition, but I won't commit to any of them yet.

I don't know what the future holds, and I'd rather keep my options open."

For a long moment, Dwang Sung stared at Ryder's face with a distant gaze before eventually...

"Accepted."

Dwang Sung smiled, offering a handshake. "Nice having you on my side, Ryder."