Shioko held her breath for a second, witnessing a scene she would never forget. A whirlwind of emotions shook her heart: on the one hand, an unknown enemy capable of manipulating a substance with incredible power; on the other, a fellow guildsman, a young boy that the fate had chosen as heir to the last dragon demon of Lumya.

If part of Shioko's soul was dominated by the fear of not succeeding and of not being able to get out of that cave to tell that story, her body quivered with the desire to see Yoichi's true powers unleash on an enemy of that entity.

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Although she believed his story and that of the Tear Vision story in Ryutaro's room, the firepower Yoichi had unleashed up to that point was insufficient to testify to the true intrinsic strength of his Oracle: dragon demons were older than what was called 'ancient demons' and their roots date back to the creation of the known world.

Tactically, the 'dragon' type was immune to any critical damage, suffering no defensive malus against all other types. Put simply, no demon or tamer could have inflicted critical damage on Yoichi and Kenji: thanks to his combat skills, Kenji was often mistaken for a fire-type demon, which would have deceived any opponent, even the most experienced.

That theory was manifesting itself at that moment under Shioko's eyes. She was ready to witness the final confrontation against the first Void Summoner she had ever encountered. Her life and Enatsu's were hung by a fragile thread and were both in Yoichi's hands.

As Ogai was approaching his hands to each other without any warning, Yoichi bent his knees, tilting his shoulders slightly forward. Like a sprinter bending over the starting blocks, he quickly snapped forward, ignoring the sticky black mud and dipping his feet into it.

Nobu had activated its power again and, even the darkest part of the room, had been partially illuminated by the white light of its tail. When Yoichi left his position, Ogai hastened the preparation of his attack.

The enemy watched the young tamer head at great speed towards him and, trying to bear the weight of those two small but dense dark spheres floating on his hands, he attempted to close his arms. His intent was probably to join the two hands somehow, thus forming an even larger and more devastating sphere of dark energy.

However, Yoichi was sure that Ogai's real goal was not to kill him. In the words of Kamakiri's sorcerer, he and Shioko would become his own kind, so their death would cause his mission to fail.

"Aaargh!" Yochi shouted, increasing his dash speed and bending his upper body more and more, ready to hit the enemy with a low strike. Ogai hardened his chest and arms muscles, and the spheres became closer and closer to each other.

The visual effect was the same as two equal magnets poles: the spheres repelled each other, and their intrinsic vibration caused the particles to move uncontrollably on their surfaces. A moment before they could touch each other, Yoichi's speed took over.

With rapid upward movement, his sizeable clawed hand tried to strike one of Ogai's arms, forcing the sorcerer to spread them again. Unable to risk being cut off by his opponent's draconian claws, Ogai suddenly opened his arms.

Yoichi's hand claws passed a few millimetres from the enemy's face, who, showing supernatural reflexes, raised his neck and backed away with his shoulders.

Ogai's arms followed that strange and twisted movement, bending down and lowering his centre of gravity: while Yoichi regained the right set-up to strike again, Ogai's spinal chord behaved like an elastic band, quickly returning to the previous position.

The young tamer felt the evil force from the two spheres of dark energy. He instinctively rotated his body with a twist of his foot and raised his arm, ready to parry the incoming blow.

Ogai violently lowered one of his hands, striking Yoichi's scaled arm with one of the two dark spheres.

*baam* - Like every time that arcane energy impacted something, it unleashed a shockwave, this time weaker than the previous one. The thick black sphere hit Yoichi's hard scales: he was in a position decidedly unfavourable to the counterattack due to his charge.

A pressure never felt before weighed on his upper limbs, moving instantaneously to every other area of his body: a weight force equal to that of a one-ton body was released at the point of impact between the sphere and the arm, forcing it to bend under that unprecedented power.

Yoichi's resistant arm, the same arm capable of withstanding cutting and blunt weapons, as well as the jaws of ravenous giant demons, could not resist that unstoppable energy and his elbow bent, dangerously approaching his hand to his face.

"Behold the power of the Blackblood, you poor feeble mortal!" the Void Summoner fiercely announced, pushing the sphere downwards. Instantly, before the energy could crush him permanently, Yoichi pulled his guide hand off the ground and jumped backwards, moving the other arm and all the rest of his body away from the trajectory of Ogai's attack.

The sphere continued its vertical motion and, supported by the sorcerer's arm, impacted the floor of red soil and rocks, causing it to explode into a thousand pieces.

*BOOM* - Another loud roar made the cave walls tremble without waking up the giant sleeping demon.

After rolling for a few meters, Yoichi, dispersing the shot's energy, got up quickly. He looked at his arm almost automatically: Kenji's impenetrable black scales had been slightly damaged at the point of impact with the dark sphere. They looked scratched and chipped along their borders.

A sharp pain, which lasted only a few seconds, made his hand tremble. The Blackblood, or the power derived directly from Gonshiro's body, was able to counter that of his upgrade. If he really wanted to defeat his opponent, he would have to push his body beyond its limits.