This isn't what Alex expected. He brought friends here so the enemies would spread their forces to fight all of them. That way, he can quickly get rid of the underlings and fight the last boss.

His plan was to save time and energy because Acnologia and Zeref might come later. If he spends too much energy on these demons, then he will be too tired to fight the true threats.

"You know, maybe you can try fighting my friends, they are good." Alex still tries to send them to his friends. It makes him sound like an asshole though.

"Fufufu, the mighty Human Hero is afraid to fight the 8 of us? Where was your bravery when you fought every other team in your Kingdom's Grand Magic Games?" Kyoka giggles mockingly at Alex.

"Well, you guys look scarier than those guys. Some of you even straight up look ugly and hideous. Heck, even one of you is a skeleton. How can I not get scared? Even babies will stop crying because they are shocked when they see you guys."

Alex mocks them back. He might be uncreative with his insults, but he won't stay silent when his opponents want to have a verbal fight. Backing off without fighting is not his style.

"So, do you guys want to fight or keep talking?" While transforming into his Humanoid Kurama form, Alex taunts them with his left hand.

Jackal suddenly grins and makes a motion with his right hand. Then, the floor where Alex stands suddenly explodes. It's a big explosion that even forces the demons to jump back.

They look at the disappearing explosion effects to see if Alex is injured by that, but he doesn't even get caught by the explosion. He has sensed the strong energy accumulated in the floor, so he has expected that something could happen with the floor.

When Jackal activated the explosion, Alex could feel the energy there rising very rapidly, so he could get away on time to avoid the explosion by jumping far to the back.

"Not bad, just need to work more on your concealment. I still could feel the energy of your Hidden Mine and could feel it rising rapidly when you triggered it. The activation time was very fast though. Only people as good as me can detect and even dodge that attack. So overall, it was 8 out of 10 for me. Good job."

Alex just needs to mock Jackal's attack by commenting on it like a talent show jury. Making the demon so pissed that he wants to just lunge at Alex, but Kyoka stops him.

Kyoka smirks and suddenly Alex's body feels sluggish. His body also becomes harder to move. It feels like someone is trying to take control of his body.

This is Seilah's ability, Macro that can make her control living beings or objects. It was the one she used to control Elfman to attack Lisanna in the series.

"Hoh? This feels nostalgic." Alex actually feels that it's familiar. After all, he has been fighting the control over his body and it was against the 10 Tails' consciousness, twice.

Seilah's Macro is different because it's not a soul like 10 Tails. But the fight for control feels very similar. In fact, it actually feels weaker than his battle with 10 Tails.

Alex quickly realizes the reason. Seilah's Macro only tried to take control of his body's functions. Meanwhile, 10 Tails truly tried to take over himself, both in body and mind.

"This one is also not bad. If only I never fought something much stronger, then I would be quite flustered by this."

Alex simply fights Seilah's Macro with his brute strength. Even if Curse is different from Magic, the users' powers still decide the results. Seilah's Macro is simply not strong enough to fully control Alex's body.

But that short moment of control battle manages to stop Alex's movements for a while. It gives the other demons a chance to attack Alex and 2 demons use it well.

Kyoka uses her Enhancement Curse to amplify Alex's pain sensory. Alex thought she needed to touch her target, but apparently, she can use it even from afar, or maybe her Curse's range is not so wide but he is already in that range because they are not too far apart.

The other demon who also casts a Curse on Alex is Tempester who uses his Magic Barrier Particles, an ability to create black particles from his body that can damage Ethernano.

It's a very effective ability to be used against Mages because they have high amounts of Ethernano in their bodies. This is the ability that made Laxus ill after the Magic Barrier Particles infiltrated his body.

But that also proves that the Magic Barrier Particles can be resisted. Powerful Mages with great control over their magic should be able to resist its effect because in the series, the ones who died are mostly normal people and weak Mages.

Still, it can cause a lot of inconvenience even for powerful Mages. Especially when combined with the Pain Amplification that Kyoka casts. When Alex tries to control his magic power to remove the Magic Barrier Particles, he is assaulted by incredible pain.

Kyoka keeps amplifying his pain sensory to make everything he does feel painful. In full power, it can even make breathing feel painful. But Kyoka can't immediately raise it to that level because Alex is really strong, so his resistance is great.

These 2 abilities manage to stop him and Seilah uses this chance to cast her Macro again. She immobilizes Alex completely by taking control over his body.

Even so, she can only make Alex stand still. She can't make him move because he can resist her power with his raw willpower and strength.

Still, making him unable to move is enough because now he can't dodge their attacks. They all know that Alex's speed is the biggest threat. But now he can't even use it, so they can just beat him up until he's dead.

Coupled with Kyoka's Pain Amplification, Alex will feel incredible pain every time they attack. Even normal attacks will feel incredibly painful once Kyoka's Pain Amplification rises to the max.

The demons then start attacking while Seilah focuses on holding Alex and Kyoka focuses on strengthening her Pain Amplification.

Jackal swings his blackened arms toward Alex and then some massive explosions happen, engulfing Alex who can't dodge with his body being immobilized by Seilah.

The demons try to observe the situation first and they are surprised when Alex comes out unscathed from the explosion.

He has transformed into his humanoid Isobu form that has hard shell armor all over his body. While Seilah can stop his movements and Tempester's Magic Barrier Particles can disturb his magic power, they are still not strong enough to prevent him from transforming.

"Such weak ass attacks. Is this what you call something that stands above Magic? You sure are cocky for only having this much power." Alex doesn't even seem to suffer from Kyoka's great Pain Amplification.

Now the demons start wondering if he really is a human. But for them, it's only a matter of time until Alex succumbs to their attacks, so they start bombarding him with attacks.

Torafuzar shoots numerous black water spears at Alex and Tempester enhances their speed using a very strong blizzard. The blizzard also freezes the black poisonous water's surfaces, strengthening them.

Yet, they can't break through Alex's Isobu armor even though they can push him back slowly. This really proves that Alex's Isobu armor is very hard and not something they can break easily.

Keyes then shoots a very strong dark beam from his staff toward Alex. It creates a really strong impact. Yet again, it fails to break Alex's Isobu Armor and can only push him back a little.

The male demons except for Keyes then decide to charge and attack Alex from a close distance. They coat their fists with their Curse and start sending barrages of punches at Alex's body from all sides while Seilah keeps holding him and Kyoka keeps strengthening her Pain Amplification.

Keyes is controlling more Magic Barrier Particles and swirls them around Alex's head. He tries to insert more Magic Barrier Particles into Alex's body, but in Isobu form, Alex can close his mouth and nose very tightly because of Isobu's ability as a turtle who has a special nose and mouth that can be closed very tightly for when he dives underwater.

The demons' punches are strong, but the strongest ones are from Ezel and Jackal.

Ezel is a close combat specialist with a Curse called 8-Blades Curse. Each of his attacks is like a sharp sword slash or a spear stab. Furthermore, he has 4 arms, so he can attack so many times at once.

As for Jackal, each time he punches, a strong explosion will generate from his punch because of his Bomb Curse.

However, Alex who takes all their attacks can withstand everything. He stands tall, taking all their attacks without any change in his expression.

It makes them wonder whether Alex is just acting tough or if their attacks really can't affect him. Kyoka is the angriest now because she has given her all on her Curse, yet it doesn't look like Alex is feeling any pain from their attacks.

They just don't know that Alex has felt greater pain than this. They just don't know that Alex is much stronger than they thought. They still don't realize that they are underestimating the human in front of them too much.

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Ch. 264. Challenge of The Century