Mind Demon's Path of Domination

Shiden stood protectively before his friends with a sweaty face.

The Dungeon Demon, with the shape of a frog, hadn\'t been able to set up many traps around the church or summon its fellow demons into its dungeon.

Because of their quick arrival, it was still just in its building phase and hadn\'t even built a Dungeon barrier around its church like the other Dungeon Demons did.

It was an easy target—it was supposed to be. After all, as long as someone pushed it outside the church, it would die. Of course, if you found the Dungeon Core hidden somewhere in the church, you could destroy it even more easily.

But sadly enough, it was a Tier 1 Demon, and they were just C-Rank Hunters. If Hanmo, the A-Rank Ice God, weren\'t here, their death would have nearly been certain.

"Fulan, heal!" Shiden shouted.

The fat boy behind Shiden released a bright light from his body, and that immediately made the exhausted Shiden regain his wits as the Frog readied itself to release that weird soundwave attack again.

Sanae Maki was on the back, her shadow squirming around nervously. She said with fear, "It\'s going to attack again. Close your ears!"

"PIAKKKK!" A sudden shockwave was released from the creature\'s big mouth, and the whole church shook visibly. They all felt their heads ring, but Shiden touched the ground and smirked through bloody lips.

"Die, you filthy beast!"

The ground underneath the frog monster turned into sharp pillars, and they all rose from the ground like sharp swords and directly pierced towards its gut.

With a simple jump that seemed to make it cross hundreds of meters in one second, it hissed from the ceiling of the church.

"Maki, analysis!" Shiden screamed.

"The frog can jump from one wall and reach the other wall, but it can\'t move wherever it wants. It seems to be an ability based on its Dungeon\'s walls. Wall jumping for clarity."

"Good job," Shiden said and waited patiently for the next attack. "Fulan, heal me again when you can."

"Yes."

The frog just hovered around them. Some kind of strange instinct seemed to have warned it, but it never came too close to Shiden. Otherwise, one touch of his and the frog would have been history.

Even if it was a Tier 1 and Shiden was just a C-Rank Hunter.

His ability—Alchemy Shapeshifting—was too powerful.

And even though Maki\'s ability was useless, her analysis of the situation was on point.

"A Tier 1 demon has four abilities. Wall Jumping is one. The sound shockwave is another," Maki said in rapid fire and stepped away from Shiden when the frog demon made him its primary target.

She said from a distance, "The other two abilities must be Dungeon Creation and Demon Summoning. Both of them are not harmful. Try to touch it, Shiden; that\'s our only way of winning. But its soundwave attacks are growing stronger the more it is using it, so try to find some way to defend against it."

Hanmo smirked from the skies.

It was almost as if the trio had prior training. Talented geniuses were a different breed indeed. His disciples were good.

Shiden touched the ground, and the ground once again transformed.

Tens of earth spikes rose from the ground, traveling at immense speed toward the frog, but it dodged every one of the spikes with a Wall Jump and appeared in different walls.

The rainbow-tinted glasses of the church were smashed into pieces.

"Piak!"

"It\'s getting ready for another attack. Close your ears!"

This time, Hanmo could feel the air itself tightening around the trio. This one was going to be strong. He might have to save them after all.

Shiden calmly smirked. "No need to cover your ears."

Suddenly, the spikes he had made with the ground were given another transformation, and it became sand. The church\'s structure lost much of its foundation and began to crumble.

Boom!

The whole building quaked, and all the glasses crackled as they were destroyed simultaneously. The frog squeaked in horror, and its eyes turned red.

Shiden looked straight at it with a crazed glint in his eyes.

He had no energy to transform anything anymore. He was empty.

As long as he destroyed the Dungeon itself, how could the Demon survive?

The frog ran towards him with such speed that Shiden could barely follow it with his eyes. But he could do that barely. That was enough.

Right, Demon, you couldn\'t wait and watch when someone\'s destroying your home, just like us. You don\'t care about your fear anymore and are going to attack head-on. Right?

Come.

Shiden followed its body with his gaze, adrenalin coursing through his veins.

He held his hand forward and screamed with all his power, "FULAN, HEAL!"

The Healer released a burst of light and fell silent soon after as he fainted. The frog slammed into Shiden like a huge car against an infant, but just as it touched him, half of the frog\'s body turned into water and passed through the youth.

It left him soaked in water.

Shiden smirked.

He could change anything into anything.

He just had to be careful to make the part that touched him water.

Barely he survived, but the crazy smile on his face was hard to hide.

The frog monster fell limp in front of Maki, who was hidden behind them. As its half-water body mixed with green blood, it stirred and whimpered.

A piece of ice fell on top of it from nowhere, and the demon vanished into glittering ice dust.

Hanmo appeared beside them and nodded. "Good job, but way too imperfect."

He waved his hand, and the chandelier barely hanging onto the ceiling was frozen and turned into ice dust.

"It would have fallen on your unconscious healer, and he would have died. Three glass shards pierced into Maki\'s foot, and she is holding back tears. Then, just a bit on the wrong, and the frog would have smashed you into a paste even if it died too."

Shiden paled and looked around.

"Then again," Hanmo said, "It is a Tier 1 Demon, and your body and the number of times you could cast your abilities are less than it, so you were at an inherent disadvantage."

Two of them who were still conscious gritted their teeth in great pain that was hitting them as the adrenaline was suppressed. But Hanmo\'s words made them both smirk.

Yet, Hanmo himself calmly broke the happiness, "But this Demon is nothing special among Tier 1. There are Low, Medium, High, and pinnacle-level Demons in every Tier we know, but this Demon had just evolved from a Tier 0 to a Tier 1, so it is not even Low, and it doesn\'t have the true Resistances that a Tier 1 should.

"For example, that Red School Demon should have been a Tier 0 Pinnacle level."

Clutching her bleeding legs, Maki groaned out, "So this frog was just an over-glorified Tier 0?"

"Yep."

Shiden sighed.

"And the best and worst part is your roles. If Fulan isn\'t around, Shiden, you would become useless after you use your ability just once. That is a pity. And if Maki isn\'t around to inform you everything, you would also be at a huge disadvantage with your reckless personality."

"Teacher, you don\'t have any good words, do you?" Shiden mumbled.

Maki cursed, "It\'s all the Demons\' fault. They should all just die." She couldn\'t help but grit her teeth hatefully.

Hanmo chuckled. He carried the unconscious Fulan and helped the other two up before they all vanished into the horizon on top of his flying ice.

They needed healing, and he knew someone who could patch them up quickly.

"After that, I will actually train you out of your imperfections and make you into the true gems that you three are."

Only an abandoned and destroyed church was left behind in their wake.

News reporters soon flooded the place.