“I can’t move… it’s easy to blackmail me using that psychic power… but in close combat, I definitely defeated you, face the truth!” Yoichi exclaimed aloud so that even the growing crowd of people could hear those words.

As planned, Kato’s gaze followed the voice of Yoichi, who flew as if it was poison towards the faces of all the people who had so far cheered and revered him as if he was a god. From the bottom of his heart, intense envy, combined with a feeling of anger towards the unknown man capable of tarnishing his honor ran through his body, clouding his reason. ​​

“Anf, anf, anf… you… you’re risking a lot, brat! I’m Kato, a member of the Emperor’s Heralds Guild! And no one… no one… can stand between me and the glory I deserve!” Kato thundered, approaching his nunchaku and picking it up with his foot’s ascending movement, trying to strut even in that disadvantageous situation.

“No, Yoichi… stop the fight, please! My friend now got the lesson, okay?! He’s a novice tamer, you don’t have to punish him like that!” Enatsu panicked, making his way through the crowd and reaching out to the bizarre little man who had started the fight.

“Stop it? And who am I to stop two warriors contending? The brave Kato does not stop at anything. His will is harder than the iron of his nunchaku! You had to warn your friend in time, I’m sorry, merchant!” the stoky and funny man answered, rotating his silly cap and restarting to look at the final phases of the fight with interest.

“Fuck, fuck! Yoichi… what did you do?!” Enatsu thought aloud, genuinely sorry for what would happen to the only person who had been kind to him without even knowing him, hosting him in his house and offering him a hot meal and a shelter for the night.

Under the eyes of his friend and those of the rest of the crowd, Yoichi began to agitate and squirm again, dangerously moving his large scaled arms in the direction of his opponent, whose psychic power was busy holding him still in the air, preventing him from getting closer.

To remedy this troublesome inconvenience, Kato ordered something to his demon pet, turning his gaze towards it: the Kuwatako immediately executed the order and, while two tentacles were busy channelling its psychic powers, the other two stretched out in Yoichi’s direction, wrapping themselves around his arms and immobilizing him for good.

“Yes, it worked!” Yoichi thought, pretending to be trapped and continuing to wriggle desperately. “That damn octopus has all the tentacles busy on me! Get ready, Kenji!” he wondered, continuing to wait for the right time to execute the plan he had engineered from the beginning.

“Whatever the outcome of the fight, these people will know that a tamer as famous as you got beaten up by a rookie like me! I suggest you to act less domineeringly for the next times!” Yoichi chuckled aloud, with the only goal of making his opponent losing control, being too full of himself not to give in to those provocations.

“Aaargh! That’s enough! That’s enough!” Kato shouted, ready to charge to Yoichi and strike the final blow.

“Kenji! Now!” the young Bronzeforest tamer screamed, calling his demon pet.

By using its silent feline movements, the Nekage sprang from a bush in the trees behind the two fighters and ran like lightning towards its tamer, diligently responding to the call.

Under the confused gazes of Kato and the crowd, Kenji jumped towards Yoichi, rested its paws on his back and did something no one would have expected: with its long reptile tail, the small and agile Nekage pulled the dagger out of his tamer’s belt and continued its upward run, placing its lower paws on Yoichi’s shoulders and jumping into the air, above the heads of their opponents.

“Woooo!” the audience said in unison, witnessing a Nekage attacking from that position for the first time.

The gaze of Kato and his Kuwatako rose towards Kenji when the reptile demon, in an incredibly agile movement worthy of a feline, turned on itself and moved its tail like a whip, throwing the dagger at the opposing demon.

In that instant, as if time had stopped, everyone present watched the dagger blade glitter in the sunlight, realizing that its trajectory was perfect and that, in all probability, it would hit the Kuwatako right in the middle of his purple eyes.

“Alvanoth!” Kato shouted with all the air in his lungs, clearly pronouncing his demon pet’s real name and recalling it.

The tentacles that held Yoichi’s arms dematerialized, making him fall to the terrain, and the Kuwatako’s body vanished into the air, quickly entering the inside of Kato’s chest, who knelt on the ground.

Simultaneously, the dagger’s sharp blade speared the soil, cutting through the air and missing the target as soon as it disappeared.

An incredible silence enveloped the outside of Ambershire walls and, for almost a minute, no one dared to utter a word.

Kenji landed on the ground on its paws without any noise, and Yoichi’s arms returned to their standard size, letting the hard black scales disappear, while he breathed with difficulty, satisfied that he had accomplished what seemed impossible to everyone.

“He defeated him…” a woman from the audience suddenly whispered, timidly beginning to clap her hands, as if that scene hypnotized her.

“That unknown tamer just defeated Kato…”

“I can’t believe that… do you see what I see?”

Little by little, one word after another, all the people in the crowd realized that that fight had an unexpected winner, when, suddenly, someone started yelling again.

“Hahahaha! Yoichiii! You did it, you won! Whooohooo! Hahahah!” Enatsu laughed, waving his arms and running towards his friend, followed by Sora, which fluttered cheerfully, fiddling in the sky.

When the young merchant’s voice came to Yoichi’s attention, a smile appeared on his face, and his eyes framed Kato, while a small red and liquid spherical particle was ejected out of the middle of his chest, remaining suspended in the air.