“So that’s the Demon King? He looks strong…”

A small group of people were looking at a slightly blurry crystal ball. In it, they could see the Demon King dressed in black armor clashing against Zhang Dong’s light sword. They could see the battle from his point of view thanks to this magical device that was created by him.

These people were the group of four heroes that were sitting outside the large formation that was created to fuel Zhang Dong during this fight. The four were left outside in the case that the demons attacked them. Only if Zhang Dong sent a message that he needed more juice would they enter into the formation to give him more.

“He looks like one of those dark knights, but much bigger.”

They could tell that Zhang Dong was much smaller than the person that he was fighting. The mace the monster was holding looked at least two meters in length and the Demon King was easily swinging it around with one hand. Each strike caused the platform the two were fighting to tremble and also caused the video to be quite shaky.

“I hate shaky cam footage…”

One of the girls commented while squinting a bit, it was quite hard to make anything out.

“Sakura please take it more seriously.”

Ami scolded the youngest girl while trying to get her to pay attention.

“Yes, Mr. Matthew is just trying to get us home, thanks to him we were able to get this far.”

Yua the older sister petted Sakura while keeping an eye out for any demons that could have attacked from outside. She was all for leaving this place, the strange people from the royal family were quite pushy and she stopped enjoying their presence after a while.

“Home huh?”

Takeshi placed the crystal ball down while looking out into the fog. He on the other hand was not so sure about going back. Like most young men in his position, he was hesitant to give all this power up. He was finally getting attention from beautiful girls and respect from others that many young men dreamed of.

“You don’t want to go back to your family?”

“Well… I…. I don’t know…”

He replied truthfully as he was not sure what the right choice was. Matthew had disclosed his real name with the group as they all came from a similar or maybe even the same world. He had promised to get them back home but also that he would give them a choice. He told them that he had no right to make the decision for them and that he could see why someone would like to remain in a world like this.

“Wait… what’s that…”

Before a proper conversation could happen Ami saw something.

“There is something coming from the fog… get ready guys!”

The party got their weapons ready. They weren’t the only ones on defensive duty as the ships had been positioned to act as walls. On them, the cannons were all manned by the minimal number of people required.

Soon they saw them, a small army of demonic beasts emerged from the fog and charged in a blind rage towards their encampment. They were greeted by cannon fire and by various magical spells.

“It’s just as he predicted, luckily for us we are prepared!”

Takeshi smirked a bit as he saw one of the monsters stepping in a certain spot. The moment it did its body was engulfed in a large fireball. Zhang Dong had ordered the dwarven craftsmen to place all of their mines around the ships.

“I don’t think they will hold them off for long…”

Ami replied while looking at all of the explosions that were happening everywhere. That was the problem, the monsters didn’t seem to halt their advance. When one of them exploded two others took their place and charged as if they were in a berserked state.

“Damn how many are there…”

Takeshi flinched a bit as due to the thick fog that was still there they couldn’t really tell how many of these demons there were. They could only wait and try to last through this wave while not allowing them to touch the magic formation.

The four heroes jumped into the fray themselves soon after. The monster hordes seemed endless but it was their task to defend the people fueling Zhang Dong. If the monsters were allowed inside they would easily massacre the people that were put in a trance-like state.

“Wretched cur, tremble before my might!”

“You guys sure like to stick to your script, don’t you?”

Zhang Dong dodged to the side as the Demon King swung his mace. The mace that connected with the obsidian slabs on the balcony trembled but somehow resisted it.

The two had been fighting for a few minutes and Zhang Dong was trying to feel out his opponent. He was glad that he decided to leave the girls out of this as this monster was far stronger than he anticipated, quite close to the nascent soul level of power.

‘Close… but not close enough that is…’

After his evasive maneuver was successful he saw his chance to strike. His body turned into a streak of golden lightning that appeared to the side of this armor-wearing monster.

Zhang Dong’s fist was surrounded by an aura of golden plasma and it lodged itself into the Demon King’s side. A sound of bent metal was heard by him as his fist connected with his opponent.

The Demon King was sent flying to the side after the well-placed liver shot. His armor in the spot started to crumble apart while the holy energies invaded the unprotected insides. Like many times before his holy energies proved the bane of any demonic being. Even this Demon King wasn’t immune to this Dao that he had enhanced with the soul cultivation.

“Arghhhh.”

The monster cried out in pain as it slammed into one of the giant pillars that were placed on this very balcony. This wasn’t the end for it though as this seemed to anger this monster more than cause damage.

The dark armor began rearranging itself into place as a dark aura covered Zhang Dong’s opponent. It looked like no damage had been done to the monster but he knew otherwise.

His holy energies were now causing widespread chaos inside of his opponent's body. The only way to get rid of them was using up a lot of saved up mana. This was the real truth when fighting opponents with regenerative capabilities.

These types of powers always put a strain on the body and would not last forever. The biggest problem was just how much reserve mana this Demon Lord had. He himself was running on borrowed time, the longer this battle lasted the less energy Beatrice and her helpers would send to him. Thus each hit had to count.

Head, heart, solar plexus, the liver, and even the genitals. He aimed for all the critical locations that a humanoid body would have. Punch after punch rained down on his opponent that sent him crashing into more of those large pillars. After a certain point, he could tell that the monster was having a hard time healing its wounds.

With each hit, its four-meter large demon body started to shrink. It looked to not be able to sustain its full-powered form anymore, shrinking as it conserved energy. 

Zhang Dong didn’t really use any flashy moves this time around. It was a slow grind and methodical beat down that caused slow long-lasting damage that piled up on top of each other. Only when the chance presented itself did he go for the last hit.

“Let us end this, hand over that cube.”

He put both of his hands together while producing a blade of light. This blade of light was quite condensed and had an actual sharp edge to it. With the help of his swordsmanship that was backed by his sword heart, he sliced forward.

The hit came almost instantaneous without giving the Demon King much time to react. The whole place rumbled as along with the demon’s head the tip of the castle-like mountain was cleaved.

‘Was that really it?’

As the tip of the castle was sliding down to the ground and making a lot of noise, he approached the monster’s body. He had severed this being’s clean off and the moment he did he could feel its demonic soul start to dissipate. While approaching he could still feel it trying to heal itself but soon even the body started to turn into dust.

As he got closer he could see the demon’s body shrinking in size. Its armor was the first to crumble away into particles of dust. He was aware of how these things worked out, thus he kept a fighting stance while looking around. Mostly at this time, the demon would go into his second more powerful form or the actual real last boss popped out from the side.

But even though he waited and waited nothing seemed to change. The whole body of the demon crumbled into dust while leaving his armored helmet behind. It was a bit strange that the body withered away before this head but soon it was its turn to disintegrate.

‘Is the cube in the head?’

A certain energy signature started coming off from the head. He could feel that the last nuclei was there and it was indeed resting in the demon king's severed head. Zhang Dong had also checked his map previously and he couldn’t see any dark spots that were hiding anything away. This seemed to be it, the last part of the puzzle that would allow him to return home.

“Huh… why does he have that guy's face.”

The metallic helmet finally evaporated into dust and revealed the face under it. It was of a three-eyed monster with a tint of red to its skin. This wasn’t the odd part, its face was similar to a person that he had met before. It was someone from the human side who caused Zhang Dong to space out for a moment.

Due to this little blunder, he was unable to react in time to what happened next. The head exploded revealing a large crimson crystal that was a lot larger than the ones that the demon lords had. This crystal shot off into the distance almost instantly when it was revealed and headed towards the barrier between the two continents.

“Shit…”

He snapped out of it and gave chase, the crystal went right through the thick obsidian plates of that balcony it was on. Almost instantly after this the whole castle began to shake and crumble as if this crystal was keeping it together.

‘It’s going towards the opening I came from…’

The flying monsters reacted to him wheezing by in his human form and gave chase. Luckily they were limited in their speed and started trailing behind. He wasn’t really able to contact the people outside as Beatrice and Isabella that he was connected with were still in the soul resonance trance.

“Get back here!”

While inserting more energy into his flight technique he bolted forward. The monsters behind him started to trail behind even more and he wasn’t even looking at the demon’s castle crumbling away into nothingness.

Almost instantly he and the crimson gem collided with the thin exit to the other side. The crystal stopped for a moment but in a matter of seconds, it managed to pierce its way to the other side. He as well collided with this opening and had to force his way to the other side yet he did it much faster than this gem.

When outside he reached his hand out, the red demonic crystal was right there. After going through the opening it lost some of its momentum. This was the best time to grab it so he propelled himself forward.

His fingertips touched the crystal and he was quick to start the absorption process but then it happened. He felt some kind of sharp pain. It was as if a thousand tiny needles were being pierced into his heart at the same time. This caused him to flinch while the partially absorbed crystal sped away into the distance.

“W-what…”

He instantly clenched his chest while looking to the side, there he saw it. A large man, his face covered in scars and wearing the Duke of Hohenberg crest. His hand was holding a long sword, this sword pierced through the chest of a golden haired girl...