Strawberry Devil in a Fantasy World

After examining the various maps, I announced the following, "there's no pattern to any of them. We might need to brute force our way in."

"If I don't make it out alive, can you pass a message to my fiancée?"

"You're giving up so soon? We don't even know if he's alive. Also, I don't want to spend the next thousand years searching for a dead person."

She scowled. "Oh come on! If a guardian candidate dies that easily, then I'd be dead already!"

I have an appointment with the Highlander Emperor soon... I don't want to be late but I don't want Mera to die either. Which choice I choose should be obvious but, seriously, I'm annoyed!

"Okay, how about this. You see the map here?" I displayed a holographic map in front of us showing the directions of energy links, "If we can make some progress with it, then we'll go with it. If not, then we'll brute force it the same way we did before."

"So what am I looking for?"

To answer her question, I explained what each of these lines and dots on the maps meant. The goal was to identify any weaknesses, patterns, and abnormalities in these links in relation to the demons showing up on my radar.

"Also, all these maps I've been drawing, what was the point if you could just display it so easily? Wasn't it just a waste of time?"

"Ehh... Not really? Kind of? I didn't know I could make maps like this... Sorry, but, much of it is based on what you've drawn. So, consider yourself a contributor?"

Despite me answering as honestly as I could, she expressed clear dissatisfaction and exasperation on her face.

In a room with large amounts of open space, likely a gymnasium, all the maps were now visible to us simultaneously. Every once in a while when an idea came, I would reorganize the maps in ways that might lead to a discovery.

"I think this is the best we can do."

"Yeah, from the looks of things, they are relaxing a bit but still vigilant. Should we proceed?"

We had been sorting through data for hours while hopping around the subspace to confirm all destinations of all the links. By doing so, we were able to pinpoint a majority of the demons residing in the maze.

A few demons did manage to escape through teleportation gates. However, if they posed no threat, I wasn't going to pursue. In addition, I began cataloguing their energy signatures for future references. 

Regrettably, we took too long to pinpoint the locations. Some had began scrambling their energy links thereby disrupting our effort at tracing to the sources. In the end, we could only comfortably say that over seventy percent  of demons' energy signatures were confirmed with their locations pinpointed.

We also had to account for the possibility for demons to completely conceal their energy signatures and energy links. Although the latter shouldn't be possible with my eyes, the former was doable to some extent. And, it was definitely possible for demons not to use any contracts to gain power. Plus, to sever the links to save their own lives was something I seriously considered.

Only demons who feared me would do such a thing.

De Planck, faker, I'll definitely find you two and whoever you're collaborating with even if neither of you are related to this incident... I don't mind keeping a pet rabbit around, heheh. Jokes. I might skin the rabbit and roast it.

Although I had no recorded energy signature when I had first met him, I still kept the |devious| trait from Oortez who was connected to one of the high level demons. Albeit, I was no longer certain whether De Planck was the mastermind or not. It was completely possible that he was just a middle manager. Regardless of any of that, I couldn't return to my subspace at the moment. I would have to make do with the |devious| trait from the demons I had captured already.

"No, I say we rest first and then proceed."

I grimaced at her unexpected answer and asked, "What's with that change in attitude? I thought you wanted to charge in."

"I believe there's a chance."

"Hmm? Chance?

"A chance I'll live through this."

"Oh? Didn't you say you had enough soul energy?"

She rolled her eyes, "Are you pretending to be dense?"

"Eh... Well... Not really? I mean, this is the first time I've used this contract so I don't know how much energy is being taken from you for the first command."

"It's been surprisingly negligible so far."

"That's good. If it's ever too much, we can always retreat. Since we're not in the city, I have more or less free reign over this place, destruction-wise."

"You think my pride and honor will allow me to retreat like this? No. We're this close. You can't persuade me otherwise!"

She stared into my eyes with incredible determination.

"I see you're confident."

"Yes. I have to be. My duty is to protect my country, from enemies, both mortals and gods."

"I like the look in your eyes! Good, let's make this unforgettable."

Mera was patriotic. She was someone I can never fully understand given my way of life but I supported her nonetheless. A drive, a will, anything would do. The more she emotions she could generate, the less likely her soul would be eaten up by the contract.  

Now, I wonder what's happening at Rotask? There's not much time until the magitech airships make their contact. Looks like I might have to give up on my strawberry business.

Half a day had passed since Mera's declaration.

Our preparations were as complete as it could get. The masterminds were either loosening their guards or were plotting a trap to bait us in. The number of energy links related to contracts had since increased manifolds likely due to the result of ensuing chaos in Rotask. It really was unfortunate but I couldn't interfere with that process directly.

With the |devious| trait's link acting as a laser pointed guidance, we set off on a demon hunt. This time, as a contracted hero, I decided to clear the way for Mera to reach her goal. I would neutralize and seal away demons while she would eliminate devils and minions whenever necessary.

Mera and I, we made an excellent tag team.

I had all the coordinates loaded. The sequence was to seal away all the demons in one go. The types of demons varied greatly, with many of them originated from fey beings. If possible, I would love to liberate them from their contracts and controls.

"All set."

"Let's get this done with!"

That marked the beginning of our operation.

Within the first minute, I was able to seal away five low level demons by coordinate hopping. The devils and minions were temporarily left alone.

However, things didn't proceed smoothly onward.

The next coordinate I tried to hop to became invalid.

"It can't be?"

"Why are we here?"

We landed somewhere completely different than expected. Instead of a factory setting, we were in a swimming pool. Although we were cloaked and invisible, it meant that countermeasures were being put into place.

"Not sure, someone might have scrambled the spatial coordinates. I didn't think it was possible... Hold on, let me try the next few."

After trying to teleport a few more times, the results were the same. We ended up in random places.

"Not good... If our enemies haven't figured out before, it should be obvious now."

"The delay is too long. It's the same as before."

"Yes, that too. They're sacrificing pawns to gain information on us. It wouldn't be strange for them to figure out I was the one behind this."

That was my conclusion.

"I doubt shuffling coordinates is easy." Mera said, "But, we shouldn't waste time trying to figure out how they shuffled them. We should first confirm if those teleportation gates still worked the same."

"Yes, I'm on it. Though, with my speed, flying through the subspace is still a viable option."

"Let's save it for last. It'll make pinpointing us easier. We don't know what other tricks they've saved up in their sleeves."

I had to individually send phantoms through nearby teleportation gates to verify their operations.

"The nearby gates hasn't be tampered with." I remarked.

"We should make use of them whenever places are too far to make travel via transfer."

By transfer, she meant by cloaking us in my void barrier and moving us altogether. Since I could bypass physical objects, that itself was fine. Though, there was a next level to my void barrier which shrunk our apparent size to a point, viewed from someone outside the barrier. That was what we had been doing so far to evade detection.

However, there was an issue with that method of travel. It functioned essentially the same as teleportation. The main difference was that for "transfer", the coordinates were being dialed, numerical values steadily decreased or increased, whereas "teleportation" was when exact coordinates were directly inputted.

"I believe it's best to make use of the gates for now," I followed up with an explanation of above. If I had to guess, even demons wouldn't be able to freely teleport around in this subspace unless they knew how the coordinates were being shuffled.

"That seriously smacked a wrench in our plan. Fine, let's go with that." She grumbled.