The Real Monster 8 Pursued by Cruelty IV

The same day that Clay got his butt handed to him by Agamemkeru; in one of the rooms of the castle in Acadria, four beautiful young men and ladies were having a heated discussion.

[We must avenge our sister, for a Hero, a mere slave; to do this to us is such a disgrace. We lost our sister, even the chancellor is lost as well and there're no witnesses to what happened at that because he killed them all!] A stout young man started off the conversation like that. He wore a sword on his waist and stood naturally in a stance easier to unsheathe the sword in. This young man is called Gwendel the second son of Acadria's king, In charge of managing the military affairs.

[That's right! Do you know how shameful it is for our royal family to be robbed of one of our sisters and let the culprit escape? We are already the talk of the whole empire by the end of this day if news spread! We have to catch that bastard and make him pay!] The young lady who made known her grief and emotion is called Gwen, the second daughter of Acadria, she was the same age as Giselle and so they got along despite Giselle's bad reputation in the kingdom.

[We know the circumstance even without you telling us that Gwen, so why don't you shut up and think of a way to track that bastard instead. We feel what you feel and know what you know, so contribute by giving us something we don't or else shut up!] The one who scolded Gwen was called Gillian who is the second eldest of the siblings. The first daughter of Acadria

[Shut up you hag! You say you feel what I feel, why am I not seeing you seething in anger and instead just sitting there like all's something that doesn't concern you?! You're the one who hated Giselle the most, everyone here knows that, you hypocrite!] Gwen argued. Her and Giselle go way back even before they were separated by their roles in the kingdom as they had the same age and were able to play together more than anyone else. So she felt really emotional with the loss of her sister.

[Enough! Quarrelling amongst ourselves will solve nothing! What we need to do now is to replace the chancellor for the moment and manage the kingdom while father is recuperating. Gillian, you will have this responsibility temporarily, do you think you can handle it? I and Gwendel will lead a force of five centuries of mercenaries and employ the help of the adventurer's guild to post wanted posters for the hero. We have known his face and are easily able to print that in paper. He shall regret the day he conspired against our family by killing our sister and the chancellor. For this crime, his head alone cannot appease the soul of our dear departed sister, as useless she may have been. The blood of our sister is still precious.

[Gwen, you will arrange the information we will gather and make sure that we are up to date about the goings on in the kingdom's surrounding and even beyond our kingdom. This way, we can cast a big net to capture that heinous man.]

Guilbert was the crown prince of Acadria, meaning he was the eldest son of the seven. The other two children of Acadria are away to study in specialized academies in the Imperial Capital so they are absent. With the king currently bedridden, they had no choice but to take over temporarily as well as exact their vengeance on the killer of their sister. Even though Guilbert knew that it was not likely that the Hero killed their sister, he still used him as a common point to gather hate into and be able to unite his brothers and sisters through it. Even though it was already sure that he will inherit the throne, it still did not do harm to be even more prepared for it.

[Dammit! If only that bastard stuck to the plan and did not move on his own, everything would have worked out just fine. Giselle would have continued to sneak out of the castle and then one day meets an accident in one of the villages and would die there instead of the castle. This is such a mess, damn that chancellor.] Guilbert thought to himself. His plan was perfect. If not for the chancellor moving on his own out of madness. It made a mess of his already perfect plan. He gritted his teeth and showed a very angry face, which to the rest of his siblings was rare and associated it with his anger for the death of their sister Giselle.

[Don't worry Guilbert, I will take care of the matters of the kingdom until you get back. Please hunt that bastard and drag his head here for everyone to see.] Gillian agreed and pleaded.

[Yeah, I will also take care of what you asked of me brother. Please, destroy that man. I want him crushed and reduced to ashes with these hands.] Gwen angrily clenched her fist, very unladylike.

[Yes I will, be assured. Please prepare yourselves for tomorrow we will act according to our responsibilities for this matter. Do not let the news spread and put an order to not reveal it. Anyone who reveals the news that Giselle is dead and she died within the castle grounds will be beheaded as punishment. Go my brother and sisters.

So the royal children made their move and prepared for their man-hunt of the one called Hero. In a single night, the mercenaries in the capital of Acadria became jubilant at being hired by the royals and the adventurer's guild posted a request for information about a certain man. A copy of Clay's face circulated within every guild in the kingdom and even the other places away from the human realm. Clay's face became known to the whole world in but a single night. Even in Agera his face appeared in the requests. The guild in Agera silently made preparations to apprehend Clay and give him to the royal family in Acadria to receive the reward of one Royal gold coin.

***

While all those things were happening in the human realm, at the border between the demon realm and the humans', an arm was sitting on a branch of a tall tree. The branch was big enough to support a grown man, much else an arm. This was Clay's gamble. He ripped his own arm off and lured Agamemkeru's shot of towards the skies so that it won't accidentally destroy his arm. Currently, the arm was growing bones out of its self and as one could expect this process took a long time.

After a day and a night of regenerating with some troubles, Clay was fully regenerated and was breathing and contemplating his foolishness in challenging Agamemkeru as if they were a match. Agamemkeru was one of the trump cards of the demon realm, he was someone who even the current demon emperor could not underestimate, much less some Hero who's only been in this world for a few days.

***

"Dammit! I still remember the pain of being annihilated to the very atoms. That was intensely fearsome. It gives me shivers just thinking of facing something that strong again. FUCK! I'm so stupid! Gah!"

As for my trust in my ability to regenerate, it is now fully reinforced in me. As long as a single cell in my body is present, I can grow myself out of it. That's how awesome this is and how I am so glad I chose this ability out of anything else. Now I realize that I just can't carelessly challenge anything in this world without really knowing anything about anything. I already learned my lesson this time, I cannot let that repeat. That frog was truly fearsome. I thought it was only its size that's fearsome, the moment it talked to me; I should have known that it would not be something as easy as a goblin to handle, even though I don't know if there are goblins in this world. Anyway, it's a good thing my gamble worked and trusted in my regeneration ability. Let's look at our stats shall we?

Name: Clay

Class: Hero «Transcendent»

Sub-Class: None «Alchemy Master»

Title: Hero «Alchemy Master»

Stats:

[STR - Poor «Unique»] [INT - Poor «Unique»]

[MGC - Poor «Unique»] [DEX - Poor «Unique»]

Skills:

«Alchemy Master» «Regeneration» «Cryptonian Gene»

[Observe] [Language Acquisition - Advanced] [Human Language - Advanced] [Overpower]

Blessing:

«Guided by the Guide to Souls» [Safir's Champion]

Status: Poor «Weakened»

*Whistle*

Wow my stats became Poor. Doesn't my body retain its most optimal form when regenerating? If it's like this then I can only conclude that if my body reconstructed itself then it would be as if I grew with a baby's stats. That means this is the result of dying isn't it? If I think about it that also means that my Cryptonian gene is the most awesome gene there is to have with this regeneration. Just thinking about this, I feel proud of my continuous simulation of abilities from super heroes and other MCs HAHA!

For now, I need to find myself a place to recuperate and regain my previous strength. If I stay away from anything for a few days, I wonder if I'll be able to regain my previous strength. Well then it's decided. I will find myself a cave and hide there for a few days. I should still survive with no food and make do with magically created water right? Let's go.

***

With Clay recuperating and waiting for his strength to grow again from scratch, news of Clay's whereabouts have already been acquired by the royal family of Acadria. The source was no other than the town he was staying in just recently, Agera. The adventurers' guild there wanted to profit and if the request was for one of their own, they would not have given information away; however, as Clay was neither an adventurer nor a mercenary, they gave him up quite easily.

The Moonwink INN where Clay was staying in two days after Clay disappeared was put into questioning. The owner answered the guild without any falsehood as she was the last person Clay was in contact with that morning. Not knowing that it were Janus and the rest who had contact with him last. Where were Janus and his companions then?

[Dammit, man! You got us involved with someone really dangerous! If the royal family is hunting for him, he must have done something really stupid and terrible. If it weren't for him trying to keep a low profile, would we still be alive today? No matter what, we have to hide until the inquisition about him is over, unless we want him to come back and end us all?]

[That's right Janus! Don't be stupid and lose yourself because of the reward. If you get the reward you won't be able to enjoy it as long as he is free. Instead, you'll live in fear of him every day and you'll never enjoy a wink of sleep. Think about it! As for us, we will stop you from doing something foolish for all our sakes no matter what!]

[Damn you guy! Have you become cowards already? I don't know what kinds of tricks he employed to trick you into turning this cowardly but I will never recognize that he is stronger than me! I only lost consciousness when he grabbed me that time because I was still hung over! If not, I would have trashed his sorry ass. C'mon! Let go of me so we can tell the guild that we know where he was heading off to when we last saw him.]

[What are you even talking about man?! We don't know where he was going remember? We only ambushed him here because we saw him going somewhere. He never told us where he was going!]

[W-Well, you know… we'll just make something up to get the reward?]

[Oh no you don't, we won't allow you!]

That was the conversation that the four grown men were having, while in hiding at their hide out. Janus was their leader or spokesperson, but they all had strength equal to each other so not one of them could beat each other one on one, however if they all ganged up on Janus, he'd be outnumbered and could only succumb to being beaten black and blue and restrained.

They did not know that even if they did not go into hiding, they would still not have helped the inquisition as the owner of the Inn, Dalia did. She pointed the inquisition towards the right direction after all. Checking the hunting spots just as Clay also did at first, they found traces of a battle that occurred here and most probably was a fight of something and something small, like a human. It most probably has been Clay but they were not sure. Then they also found the tree where Clay's arm was, it really was pure luck on his part.

With this, the hunt for Clay continues, even when at the moment the man in question was leading himself towards the deepest part of the shallowest cave he saw that was quite well hidden from plain sight. He found this cave through seeing through the walls.

Chapter end