There were three things that caught Aku's attention.
The first, the speed with which he had been transported to another world.
To be fair, from his perspective, traveling to another world sounded like a grand feat. He expected more rituals or processes to get to the trial.
The second, Sylvie wasn't with him.
Perhaps she was lost somewhere in the trial scenario, perhaps she had stayed in his world, or perhaps she was waiting for him somewhere.
Though Aku wasn't too interested in knowing her whereabouts. Having her by his side wasn't that beneficial after all.
In short, perhaps her not being a bother was more of an advantage than a disadvantage.
Lastly, what caught Aku's attention was the fact that he couldn't use his chaos powers.
"Mmm, this could be problematic, though in a way I should have seen it coming," he told himself.
After all, this trial was promoted by the "hero side."
They employed the power of order, while he used the power of chaos.
Unlike them, who used magic with complex programs or perfectly ordered ability systems.
The power of chaos was more like an emotion. It employed imagination, sacrifice, equivalent exchange, but wasn't governed by rules, rather by intuition.
It was an art without clear logical principles.
"Surely this place has a barrier that prevents using azoth or something like that, though I don't notice strange changes in my body, so it only seems to not let chaos enter."
Aku nodded thoughtfully. That was good.
The barrier didn't purge chaos but blocked it.
That was an advantage in that situation. It meant he could take advantage of the internal chaos of the place.
"Chaos cannot exist without a bit of order, and in turn, order always has a bit of chaos," he told himself, remembering those words he had dedicated to the hero moments ago.
It was curious. Less than an hour had passed since he had defeated the hero Alexander, and he was already taking a trial to become a hero.
Things were going very fast since he had left that castle.
"Alright, here we go," he said, closing his eyes and taking a deep breath.
His senses sharpened. He could smell the aroma of flowers, hear the wind whistle.
All those phenomena were chaos.
While observing the entire system, one might consider all those events ordered by having logical causes, at the same time, one could observe them up close and consider them disorder.
The power of chaos manifested physically through azoth, however, one could create azoth by feeding on chaos, observing it.
The irregular movement of flowers induced by the wind, even the movement of each blade of grass.
Going further, the air itself is composed of millions of particles moving chaotically.
Aku began to feel the power of chaos growing within him. While it was far inferior to what he had when he was demon king, it was still an acceptable amount of power.
The boy opened his eyes. It had worked.
"Well, it won't be enough to summon a hypothetical star, but I suppose I can defend myself with this," he said satisfied.
Then a chill ran through his entire body. A signal of imminent danger.
He didn't know where or when that danger would occur, but he could sense it. An emotion that came from his body, not his mind.
The demon king turned quickly while stretching out his hand.
In the distance a lush forest could be seen, with nothing in particular.
However, his instincts screamed to prepare against something.
It was then that a blast was heard, a shot.
Aku didn't waste time. He quickly used the power of chaos to his advantage.
Instead of directly using the azoth he had collected, he decided to connect directly with the randomness of his environment.
Air is very susceptible to chaos, which allows it to be simple to manipulate its randomness.
Knowing that, Aku made the air in his environment densify in front of him, making large masses of air concentrate in a specific area.
The air became practically as dense as water, making the bullet that had been fired slow down and decelerate from friction.
In doing so, the latter exploded, releasing a star of ice and frost a few meters from Aku.
"Magic bullets? Interesting," the demon king told himself.
He believed heroes were very traditional. They all usually carried melee weapons, mainly swords and in rare cases spears.
Once a hero even dared to use an axe.
However, it was surprising that one of them would use such a modern weapon.
At least in Aku's world, firearms were a novelty.
He had gotten the idea that he would only have to face heroes with swords, however it seemed there was a whole variety of heroes.
"[Granmot]," he said as he extended his hand.
His subspace was still connected to him, therefore he had access to part of his treasure, or at least what had been saved.
A purple sphere began to expand while expelling purple sparks. From it, a handle with a metal skull on the pommel and grayish bandages on the grip began to emerge.
Aku took it and pulled it from the subspace, showing an old, rusty blade.
It was quite a large weapon, practically a greatsword, though Aku could hold it with two hands.
"Let's see how I manage with the sword," he said as the air whistled at the shooting of more bullets by the enemy.
Suddenly his hand moved by instinct, cutting two projectiles and deflecting another.
The first two bullets emitted a hollow sound when cut, however the last one moved away and exploded releasing a fire explosion.
"How interesting," Aku commented in surprise.
Apparently his body's muscle memory was still intact. It was as if the hero's years of experience had been inherited in his body.
Aku knew he wasn't good with weapons. He didn't have the hero's experience. In fact, in his combat he faltered in that area.
Alexander had completely dominated him hand to hand.
However, now that he had that body, that weakness evaporated.
In other words, he had the demon king's knowledge and the hero's combat experience.
Perhaps that trial wouldn't be so difficult after all.