At the entrance of the forest, Alice was waiting for Zeke, with a bored look on her face, when suddenly he appeared near her with a pair of jet black wings on his back. She sized Zeke up and mused out. "It looks like you got Sylph's power safely, and your Mantra increased even more…"

"Yeah, I got a bit angry about something and things happened, but here I am. Also, there is something that you should know."

Alice just looked at him, waiting to hear what Zeke has to say. "An Elf wanted to speak about you about the presence of an unknown monster killing humans and monsters alike."

Hearing that, her expression shifted. "An unknown monster… I think I know what you're talking about." She concluded while looking past Zeke.

[Notification(1)]

Zeke turned around, and felt the wind warning him about an incoming danger. Soon, the thing came out from the forest, showing itself to Zeke and Alice.

For curiosity, Zeke used Monsterpedia, but the only thing he got is just an interference, as if there was nothing in her place.

The monster looked like a human taken from a big plant parasite, with various flowers on her back. Alice's expression turned really serious, and muttered. "What the hell is that thing?"

Suddenly, the ivy and flowers shot out from the body and attacked both Zeke and Alice. Zeke used his Power of Darkness to block the attacks, unexpectedly, the plants broke through and almost reached Zeke, who stepped back.

Meanwhile Alice deflected the attacks with her tail and got pissed off. "What is the meaning of this?! Attacking me? Do you know what it means to attack the Monster Lord?!"

She extended one arm towards the chimeric monster and created a storm of fire. A scorching whirlpool of flames attacked the monster, but it stood indifferently in the middle of the storm, until it vanished.

Alice held a shocked expression and said. "What?! It didn't even flinch from my attack?!"

The monster was clearly weakened, but it didn't look hurt from the attack. So, Zeke took things on his hands and reared back Angel Halo, before he enchanted it with hellblaze and swung it horizontally, unleashing a second storm of flames.

But unlike Alice's flames, these ones made some sort of damage, even if they were much weaker. Even if the monster didn't flinch at all, some of her plants were burned.

"What the fuck? That isn't right! Why did your flames do damage while mine didn't do anything?!" Alice was enraged that Zeke's flames could give some visible damage.

He just sighed and replied. "This is Hellblaze, don't compare it to normal flames. Even if my attack is much weaker, they are capable of doing things that your flames can't, such as stopping her from regenerating."

Alice glanced at the monster, and noticed that it looked like it was pumping out energy, even if nothing happened. She should be regenerating, but apparently his flames negated it.

Alice clicked her tongue and said. "Then deal it yourself if you think you are that capable!" After saying that, she slithered back, leaving Zeke alone with the chimeric beast.

The monster shifted its emotionless eyes towards Zeke, and then assaulted him with her ivy.

In this case, he really wanted Pumpkin so he could deal with the monster in an easier manner, but now he should just dodge the attacks…

Some tentacles scratched Zeke's skin, which regenerated immediately. But Zeke reached the monster and used Demon Decapitation.

The monster bent herself backwards, dodging the attack much to Zeke's surprise, before more tentacles came out and coiled around him, making him stick close to the monster.

"Fuck!" Zeke gritted his teeth and struggled from the ivy, but the monster's remaining flowers opened, letting out some pollens. He had an idea about what it wanted to do so he created a ball of hellblaze on his hands and closed it, before he exploded.

The blast sent the monster some steps back, while Zeke came out from the smoke full of burns which healed quickly. Zeke backed away and glared the monster who kept mixing pollen in the air.

Before he knew it, Zeke needed to use his Power of Darkness to keep the aphrodisiacs away, creating a sphere around him.

"Sylph, some help?" He asked Sylph, whose voice came out from his mindscape. "Just use my power freely! Like you use your other powers."

"Just that?"

"Nn!" He felt a nod coming from Sylph. So he tried to tap onto Sylph's powers in his mindscape like he does with his Demon Mark, and nodded, seeing how a gust of wind appeared inside the sphere.

So he dematerialized the Power of Darkness, letting the pollen approach him, before he used Sylph's powers. As he expected, the pollen around him was blowed away, and then he used Evil Soul.

Now that his power was twice as big, he kicked the ground and reached the monster undisturbed from the ivy and the pollen, which was pushed away from a powerful gust of wind that was swirling around Zeke.

He pulled back Angel Halo and slashed the monster. "Falling Moon Sinking Star!"

The power behind that attack split the monster in two, and the pressurized air created from the edge of the blade destroyed a couple of trees behind the chimeric beast.

The body of the chimeric beast trembled, before it exploded into thousands of petals and leaves, which fell in the ground.

Meanwhile, Alice looked over the strange garden of petals in the ground and said. "Apparently it was a parasitic type. That human woman was made into the host… Was she a corpse that was taken over by a parasitic flower…?"

"I see…" Zeke stopped tapping into his Demon Mark and Sylph's power, making both his black eyes and the gust of wind disappear.

Soon, more presences approached the spot, and Zeke turned around to look at what it was. They were fairies, coming out from their hiding places.

"Did you beat that scary thing?"

"That flower monster is scaaaary. When it finds you, it eats you…"

"But they beat it!"

More fairies came out, and it seems they aren't afraid anymore about Zeke's demonic presence.

"Thank you, big bro!"

"Thank you too, scary-looking snake lady!"

Alice's eyes twitched and repeated. "S… Scary-looking snake lady…?"

After thanking them, the fairies formed a circle and started to talk among themselves.

"Hey, hey. Let's go play right away!"

"There's a big castle nearby!"

"Yaay! Let's go play pranks on them!"

The fairies flew away one after another, heading towards San Ilia. To be honest, Zeke liked how things were going, it is a shame he can't go there to see people going crazy from the presence of fairies.

Zeke sheathed Angel Halo and said. "Alright, we finished our things here. Now let's head to the region of Safina."

A smile reached Alice's face. "This time we'll be in a desert, right? It looks like I'll be able to try some new delicacies. I'm getting excited!"

"Welp, as long as you get happy with this…" Zeke was amazed how she didn't change in the slightest during this time, and started to walk at west, together with Alice.

And by not checking San Ilia's current conditions, it will be 9 days earlier than the plot… At this moment, from Zeke's calculations, Luka should be in Port Natalia to work with Meia's request if everything is going right.

That, or he has taken a completely different path. But who cares? He seems to grow up, and if everything was alright, Ilias herself is taking care of him.

Now that he thought about it, he had a notification before…

He looked around and saw 2 notifications, one was probably about obtaining a quest while the other was about completing it.

He opened the quest list and checked the most recent one.

[Survive(Easy): Self-explanatory. Reward: 3 Bonus Points.]

However, he didn't use those Bonus Points, he left them alone in the case he needs them in future.

[STATUS UPDATE]

Name: Zeke Conquest

Age: 15 years old

Sex: Male

Race: Demon/Demigod

Title: Hero, Monster Hunter, Pirate Lord.

…

Strength: 175 (Demon: 350) (Night: 525) (Max: 700/1050) (Evil Soul: 1400/2100) (Burning Heart: 2100/3150) (Purgatory: 2800/4200) (Rumbling Heaven: 3500/5250) (Mantra: 4602/6352)

Endurance: 140 (Demon: 280) (Night: 420) (Max: 560/840) (Mantra: 1662/1942)

Constitution: 164 (Demon: 328) (Night: 492) (Max: 656/984) (Evil Soul: 1312/1968) (Burning Heart: 1968/2808) (Purgatory: 2624/3648) (Rumbling Heaven: 3280/4488) (Mantra: 4382/5590)

Dexterity: 170 (Demon: 340) (Night: 510) (Max: 680/1020) (Evil Soul: 1360/2040) (Burning Heart: 2040/3060) (Purgatory: 2720/4080) (Rumbling Heaven: 3400/5100) (Mantra: 4502/6202)

Mantra: 1102 (Max: Infinite)

Bonus Stats: 3

…

Active: Energy Drain, Monsterpedia, Evil God's Forbidden Arts, Hellblaze, Power of Darkness, Soul Stealing, Indura.

Passive: Pirate Lord, Piety, Demonic Physiology, Regeneration, Monster Calamity God Slayer Fist, Musical Deity.

Hybrid: Sun Authority: Leo, Mantra of Wrath, Demon Mark, Sylph's Blessing.