'Impressive.'

Altair thought to himself as he watched a bloody smudge on his palm. There were only a few people in Edinnica who could hurt him. No matter how minor the injury was, the butcher was added to that list.

The weak-minded rankers started fainting. The ones away from the epicenter of this soul-sense battle found it difficult to stand on their two feet. They cursed Hansen for acting so passively in this whole matter. It was as if he didn't care about the well-being of the participants at all.

Eren was also finding it difficult to continue. Mentally, he wasn't that affected by Altair's soul sense. He could even argue that his soul sense was much more potent than Altair's.

However, Eren's physical condition wasn't the same as his mental one. His Expert-ranked body couldn't handle the pressure exerted by a Grandmaster ranker.

Altair smiled as he parted his lips to say something to Eren. However, both of them sensed an unknown interference in their duel within a fraction of a second.

Swoosh. Zoom. Slap.

Eren felt like his head had been hit by a flying vehicle as an unknown attack struck him from behind. He and Altair stopped using their soul senses because of the interference. Eren's body was thrown into the air, only to land several feet away from his position.

An insidious attack.

Someone had slapped the back of the butcher's head when he was concentrating on Altair. As a result, he almost lost consciousness and couldn't control the trajectory of his fall.

"Heh! The young generation sure is reckless. This boy didn't respect Crimson Ghost at all. So I had to teach him a lesson."

A muscular white-haired man was seen standing where Eren was previously. He was standing in front of Altair and was taller than him.

This white-haired man's presence was not as dominant as Altair's because he was a Master ranker. However, nobody would try to underestimate him because of that.

This man had a kind of demonic air about him. As a result of his ripped physique, he looked intimidating. At this point, he appeared ready for battle with his light armor.

This man was full of vitality and brutality. His presence felt wrath-inducing. It was as if this man was an active lava mountain with two legs.

The man claimed that he had attacked Eren for being disrespectful towards Altair. However, Crimson Ghost couldn't find any shred of respect in the man's eyes for him. It only highlighted one thing to Altair this man was a hypocrite who had used his shoulders to launch an attack on Eren.

Demonmir had arrived at the scene.

The raised hand with which he had attacked Eren had purple and red lightning tongues surrounding it. It was Eren's mana defense that reacted on time and negated the majority of the impact. Otherwise, things would have been much more difficult for him.

Demonmir smirked as he looked at the fallen Eren who had his face flat on the ground. To remove the butcher's residual mana, he clenched his raised hand before putting it down.

'This demon'

Altair looked at Demonmir with discontent in his eyes. He didn't like being used by someone like Ottoman Montmorency to further his own goals.

Plus, he didn't like that someone who was chosen by Altashia to be her partner was bullied by anyone other than him. It just didn't sit right with him.

***

Eren had a killer headache.

And he could only see bright spots in front of him, which made him feel like he was looking at the star-studded sky.

He could hear nothing. Or he heard so much that he started listening to the silence of the void. His sense of taste told him he was drinking wine when it was actually his own blood.

It was a huge mess inside his head. And he needed some time and healing to sort it out.

The butcher didn't even understand what had happened at first. The attack on his head had muddled his mind. At this point, he would even have difficulty calculating what was two plus two.

His mana defense layer was not the only thing that acted quickly. His soul sense was active at the time so he could sense Demonmir coming. He had tried to dodge the attack initiated by the unknown assailant but his body couldn't keep up.

Unfortunately, he already had his hands full dealing with Altair. So he couldn't mitigate the attack's repercussions on himself. Thankfully, Hansen intervened at the last moment, saving Eren's life as well as his chance to participate in the event.

Eren had already retracted his soul sense. The manifestations of his lightning, fire, and wind attainments stopped existing all of a sudden. It was as if somebody had rebooted his brain.

When the butcher opened his eyes, all he saw was dirt and the ground. His body was already suffering from the bullying Altair had inflicted on him. It was only aggravated by the unknown attack.

Eren's hazy vision soon started to return to normal and he started to understand the situation he was in. He clenched his fist and tried to get up. But his limbs couldn't handle the load and he soon kissed the earth he was trying to get away from.

Cough! Cough! Cough!

Eren started coughing up a mouthful of blood. He also started bleeding from the back of his head where the attack had been inflicted. The blunt force trauma was so severe that it just tore through his skin and made him bleed.

"Who.. aaaargh. Who the. I'll fucking k"

Eren felt himself being consumed by the fires of wrath in his mind. His eyes turned red and his tribal tattoos were about to show themselves. First, it was Altair. Then this insidious attack added fuel to the fire that was already burning in his heart.

A slap from behind was infuriating. Even Eliza had not treated him with this much disrespect. The Sage could have killed him at any damn time. He would have felt less angry about his situation at that time than he felt at this point.

One could kill a man but not sully his pride as a ranker.

Sedated Perception

'Eren listen to me. Don't say anything stupid. Don't do anything stupid. Demonmir would use that as a chance to hurt you more. Even kill you. I'm not sure how many times this Sage will be willing to intervene.'

When the butcher realized that it was Demonmir who had attacked him, he felt uncontrollable wrath building inside his heart. He felt like giving in to his anger and battling Demonmir then and there.

Alephee halted Eren from cursing his unknown assailant out loud. She also stopped Eren from tapping into the Domain of Wrath.

'Don't! You better not use your wrath mana here. Otherwise, I'd have a hard time getting you out of here. And I'm afraid we'll have to leave the land of Anfang prematurely.'

Alephee's voice sounded far away to Eren in his mind. However, he was able to hear and understand her all the same. He somehow controlled the anger building inside his heart and leashed it before it could manifest in an unforeseen way.

Instant Reset!

Eren snapped his fingers with some difficulty and activated his healing-type Ability. He was sane enough not to use it with his bloodline regeneration powers.

The mind and the hazy vision cleared. Eren got control of his body and was able to get up slowly.

The butcher had isolated everything in his vision. He couldn't see a bunch of participants that had fallen unconscious on the ground around him. He couldn't see Levine, Nina, and Jiana trying to circumvent the safety protocol just like Demonmir did. He couldn't even see his own team members who were calling out to him.

Eren narrowed his eyes to only one person.

This was the person who had attacked him. A Master ranker who wasn't like any other Master ranker he had come to meet in both his timelines. This was a man who wouldn't mind using whatever means were necessary to get what he wanted.

***

'So this is Demonmir.'

Eren mumbled as he looked at the white-haired Master ranker. Meanwhile, he cracked his stiff neck and rubbed the back of his head which was getting healed.

Eren had heard from Levine that he was as insidious as the word insidious could portray him to be. This was his first time learning this anecdote about him the difficult way.

'That attack It was well planned.'

Eren controlled the anger inside his mind and stared at Demonmir fearlessly.

'That attack didn't have the usual fuckery about the rankers' code of conduct attached to it. He used my conflict with Altair as a reason to bitch-slap me from behind. And he was ready to kill me 'by accident' in front of so many people if Sage had not intervened.'

The butcher had to say that Demonmir was an opportunist someone just like him to some extent.