God-Tier Enhancement: My Upgrades Never Fail-Chapter 224: Episode _Don’t Talk to Me About Suckers (4)
7.
The picture Simin had intended was simple. An enhanced gate. Slightly stronger monsters are coming out of it. How great was that? He wouldn’t have to go looking for monsters; upgraded ones would just pop out on their own.
But there was one thing he had forgotten.
"Why do I feel so uneasy when it’s only +9?"
His standards were now incredibly high. He was decked out in +15 gear from head to toe, felt uneasy wearing anything less than +14, and had developed the nerve to swing his hammer at anything below +10 unless it was a crucial item. Naturally, he thought as long as he didn’t go for +15, it would be fine. He had no intention of doing so anyway, since the gate couldn’t be moved.
Of course, it had been enhanced a little more than he’d expected. +9, with a success rate of around 50%. There was a slim chance it would be destroyed, but since this was the first time and he needed to gather experimental data to confirm the efficiency of this hunting method, he had challenged the enhancement prepared for the gate.
The result was some strange guy.
They were all confused.
They didn’t know what it was. But they couldn’t deny that it had an incredibly powerful aura. The instincts he had honed over twenty-six years were screaming a powerful warning. No, it wasn’t even a warning. It was a situation anyone would have felt.
"What is that? It looks crazy strong."
"I think it’s a named monster."
"...Isn’t that a demon?"
Even common sense would lead to that conclusion. It was inevitable. A towering figure that looked well over six and a half feet tall. A single pair of simple cloth pants and fully exposed muscles. That alone made him look strong. And these weren’t gym-sculpted muscles. They were the kind of muscles that looked like they had been forged through rolling around in countless fights, born out of the necessity for survival. Simin, who had never set foot in a warzone or even a gym, had no ability to distinguish, but that’s what it looked like.
And then there were the horns. And the wings.
"No doubt about it."
"It really looks like a demon."
It was the spitting image of what people imagined a demon to be, so much so that even a stray dog would know.
"It’s a demon," Kardian stated, driving the final nail in the coffin. Her testimony, from someone who had seen them before, made their faces scrunch up. Confusion set in.
"It’s strong, right?" Simin asked.
Kardian was speechless.
And that confusion was a sign of an ignorance that left Kardian speechless.
"Is it a named monster?"
"Nah. Not all demons are named, right?"
"It looks pretty tough, though."
"Could be a low-rank demon."
"Looks like the lowest rank to me."
A conversation among people who had zero information about demons. Kardian sighed and was about to explain, when...
"Ugh..."
A groan stopped her. The high-rank demon Grokile had opened his eyes.
*
The air was fresh. The sun was hot. This was definitely not the Demon Realm. That alone was enough to bring a smile to Grokile’s lips. He immediately checked his condition. The moment he focused, dark magic enveloped his entire body. Power surged through him. A confidence that he could smash anything. He felt so good he even considered that if the Demon King challenged him to a fight right now, he might last a second.
That meant his power was unrestricted. What better condition could there be for being summoned to the continent? He was satisfied. For demons, promises were usually just words uttered to backstab someone, but for the first time in his life, Grokile decided to have a proper contract with his summoner. He was that satisfied.
"Are you the one?" he asked, his decision made, addressing one of the five figures that came into view. A human, staring at him with curiosity. He couldn’t feel any dark magic, but given his proximity, it was a reasonable assumption.
The man nodded. "Yeah. I’m not sure what you’re talking about, but if you mean who summoned you, that was me."
"...How bold."
The casual, informal reply caught him off guard for a moment. A mere human, responding in kind just because a demon spoke informally? It was absurd, and at the same time, it made him laugh.
"Hahaha!"
’Yes, this is how it should be.’ He was suddenly reminded of hundreds of years ago. Although he had been a mere fledgling mid-rank demon back then, with only enough clout to watch from a distance with his dark magic at full power, he remembered the center of the battlefield: the five legends and the Demon King, trading informal barbs and engaging in a battle of wills with confident laughter upon their first meeting.
Was this how the Demon King felt back then? Although the fact that this was a human who had summoned him and that they were enemies at the time were different, it felt strangely familiar. Humans were supposed to be nothing but vermin. But among them, there were some who were this courageous.
It made him want to test him. To see if this guy was truly worthy of trading informalities with him. Or if he was just an ignorant brat running wild.
Voom—.
His dark magic raged. In an instant, the world was engulfed in darkness, and every living creature trembled in fear. That’s what a high-rank demon was. They were beings who fought from the moment they woke up, fought in their sleep, fought when they met, and even fought in the middle of mating. In a world inhabited only by such creatures, they were the ones who held the top three-digit ranks.
[You are exposed to Dark Magic.]
[Your Health is decreasing.]
[Your Defense is decreasing.]
Just the swirl of dark magic inflicted damage. Yet, the man did not look away. In fact, he smiled. And then, he approached.
Grokile was confused.
He couldn’t help but hesitate to attack. What was that smile? Why was he coming closer? Did this human have some kind of trump card? But that smile was far too friendly for that. Friendliness from a human, something rarely seen even in the Demon Realm? He was curious. What would he do?
As he waited, the human pulled something from his coat. A thin piece of paper.
"Please calm down and come over here, valued customer. Why are you trying to kill an ally? Allow me to introduce myself. I am Simin, a close friend of Ms. Kang, the next leader of the Black Mage Order. I am here to facilitate the contract between you and her."
Grokile was taken aback.
He followed up with polite speech. It was so polite that it made him wonder if he had dreamed the informal words from before. The dark magic vanished as if it had never been there. He didn’t know what was going on, but he was intrigued. Of course he was. This was a rare sight, one that could never be seen in the Demon Realm.
"Speak," Grokile said.
The smile on the human’s lips grew wider.
*
The paper Simin held out was nothing special. It was just a contract he had made for fun a long time ago when he had some spare time. On the off chance that demons really did come to the continent one day, he thought he might be able to snag a few. Since he didn’t have many demonic contracts—the ones he’d taken from the Imperial Treasury were all used up, and he only had three left from Kardian’s lair—he needed to be careful.
He had poured his heart into making it. ’Let’s just catch three real ones. Let’s make a snare that they can never escape from once they’re caught.’ He could have used it on Kardian or another dragon, but in the end, he had decided to use it on a demon and had made it. And now, the day to use it had come.
’I really didn’t think it would come.’
He hadn’t originally planned to pull it out. It had been so long ago that it had been temporarily erased from his mind. Besides, he didn’t know how strong this demon that had appeared out of nowhere was, so using one of his three remaining contracts was premature. If he used it rashly and didn’t like the result, he couldn’t take it back.
But then the demon had made its own appeal. The swirling dark magic and the rapidly draining health bars. The moment he saw Kardian’s grim expression, he was certain and held it out. This demon probably wasn’t the strongest in the Demon Realm. It was just a gate that had appeared on the border of the Four Forbidden Zones, and it was only +9. But he judged that it was worth the first contract. He still had two left. He could use this one as bait to catch a bigger fish.
"What is this?" Grokile asked.
"A contract."
"A contract?"
"You know as well as I do, sir demon. All summoning contracts have a price and restrictions." 𝐟𝐫𝕖𝗲𝘄𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝕧𝐞𝚕.𝕔𝕠𝐦
"...That is true."
"But you came to the continent without any restrictions on your power, did you not?"
"Is that related to this?"
"Of course. As I mentioned earlier, the one who summoned you, that... that girl over there, is the next leader of the Black Mage Order. Many monsters from the Demon Realm are crossing over to the continent, but the continent’s resistance is fierce, and the situation is not easy. With the appearance of a Saintess in the Grand Temple, she was forced to summon you."
"Hmm."
As always, when Simin approached with a goal in mind, he was serious. The novel he was writing in his head was plausible enough to fool even a high-rank demon. The magician of words, mixing 99% truth with 1% lies!
"But what would happen if you were to kill us in this situation? Of course, you could come back. But would there be any black magic mages left who could summon you with your full power? This was a last-ditch summoning, thinking that the next leader of the Order was the last one."
Grokile was silent.
"Please sign the contract and help us. We don’t ask for much. We, too, desire darkness for the continent. We hope for the day when you demons rule the continent. If you help us, we are confident that we can slaughter the humans, mass-produce gates, and even summon the Demon King!"
"...Hmm."
If you listened closely and carefully, there was some nonsense mixed in, but in the midst of it, he slyly dropped the Demon King’s name. The unchanging principle of the world. In any case, he didn’t know what the demon before him was, but at least it wasn’t the Demon King. In the first place, it was absurd for the Demon King to pop out of a gate that had only been enhanced to +9. No, if Betago had any sense, it wouldn’t send out the Demon King even if he enhanced it to +15 now. That would be like skipping all the middle episodes and going straight to the final episode’s climax. Well, in a game that prided itself on realism, there was no rule against it, but in any case, it seemed to have worked, as the demon’s eyes wavered.
"True. There were orders from the Demon King."
"Exactly. We will serve you with all our hearts."
"Hmm. You wouldn’t have tried any funny business, would you?"
Then, he took the contract and glared at Simin. The dark magic swirled once more. It was a smaller area than before, but the power focused solely on Simin instantly pushed his health to the bottom.
’This ignorant bastard.’
He was burning up inside, but he maintained his smile to the end. He had a resurrection necklace anyway, and he had long since transcended death.
Seeing this, Grokile finally withdrew his dark magic and bit his finger. Blood dripped down. The contract absorbed it. A blood pact!
He didn’t read the contents. It was a human who knew his place, bowing down and holding a demonic contract. He was looking out for his own interests, but he didn’t seem to have any intention of getting on his bad side. A classic sycophant! Such humans didn’t have the courage to pull a fast one on a demon. Even if they did, there were plenty of ways to break the contract. At least, that’s what Grokile judged.
Simin was impressed by his cool demeanor. The contract floated into the air and tore itself into shreds. The contract was established. The prelude to the black magic mages’ counterattack that would dye the continent in darkness.
Simin slung an arm around Grokile’s shoulder.
"Let’s do great things together, you brat."
Grokile was stunned.
*
