Lay Grandsley (レイ・グランズドリィ,Rei Guranzudori?) is a member of the Cohort of Chaos, commonly known as Demon Swordmaster (錬魔の剣聖,Renma no Kensei?) and a transfer student at the Demon King Academy. He is the reincarnation of the Hero Kanon, who assumed the identity of the fictional Demon King Avos Dilhevia with the intention of dying in order to appease humanity's hatred towards demons.
Lay is a young man with shoulder-length white hair and blue eyes. Lay wears a long-coat version of the Demon King Academy uniform, as his uniform consists of black and red tones like most uniforms for pureblood students. His attire consists of his uniform (which has a black belt surrounding it, as well as his badge on his left shoulder), black pants, and shoes.
Personality[]
Lay is a mellow, friendly, and easygoing person. Despite being a powerful pureblood demon, he lacks the arrogance shown by other royals and is very kind to everyone, including hybrid demons. He disagrees with the royalist doctrine, but at the same time, he is disinterested in joining the Unitarians. Despite sympathizing with their goals and being friendly with several members, Lay considers such things troublesome and merely wants to enjoy living peacefully. Misa states that he might be the ideal of the Unitarians' vision, as he doesn't discriminate against anyone.
Lay has a strong love for swordplay and has been fascinated by the sword ever since a child. However, his natural talent allowed him to win every fight, causing him to grow progressively more bored with battles, as he couldn't go all out and fight a strong opponent. But this changed when he reunited with Anos, who pushed him to his limits, as he grew excited for the first time about fighting an opponent.
As the reincarnation of the Hero Kanon, he still carries the desire to bring a permanent end to the Great War between humans and demons, and he was willing to sacrifice himself to put an end to the hatred between the two races and protect the peace that Anos created, as well as Anos from being targeted by humans for revenge.
History[]
Lay Grandsley was born into a renowned family of magic users, the Yvesta family, but he couldn't inherit their magic and was cast out. This occurred because inheriting magic is a type of source magic, and there was already a stronger source magic influencing Lay's source, Syrica.[5] This is because Lay is the reincarnation of the legendary Hero Kanon, who lived 2000 years before the current timeline of the series.
Lay is exiled by his birth parents.
When Lay was five years old, and all his family expected him to die, a half-demon-half-spirit woman named Sheila took him to her home and started taking care of him, becoming his adoptive mother. This incurred the rage of the Yesla family, so the two moved far away to where they couldn't reach them.
Lay is praised by his mom.
After Sheila enrolled him in the city's biggest sword dojo, he quit three days after because he defeated his master. After that, he started participating in competitions but hardly lost. Due to this, he received the name of "Demon Swordmaster" and was recommended to the Demon King Academy. During this time, his adoptive mother began to suffer from spirit disease and was admitted to the Lognorth Magic Hospital. While visiting her one day, Lay told her about Anos Voldigoad, the first person to make him feel defeated.
Abilities[]
Immense Magic Power: According to Anos, Lay has an immense amount of magical power because he was able to perceive Anos' magic power and remain unafraid despite it.[6] Lay was able to continuously supply the Fan Union with his magic power to create a giant golem through the use of Guineth, which he was able to maintain indefinitely until the Fan Union was defeated.[7]
Immense Physical Strength: Lay has incredible physical strength compared to other demons. Though it is stated that his physical strength is inferior to Anos'. His physical strength is increased when under the blessing of Aske or other variations, as his strength was equal to that of Avos Dilhevia during their duel when using Teo Aske.[8]
Under the blessing of Lovul Aske, his physical strength is superior to that of Nate Anmilion, a powerful Dragonborn, as Lay was able overwhelm and pressure him to retreat from their blade-lock.[9]
Immense Speed: Lay's movements are so fast that Anos stated that he could barely track his movements with his Magic Eyes.[10] He was able to instantly defeat his opponent with a single slash, drawing his own sword and returning it to its sheath, faster then his opponent could notice despite them drawing their sword first.[10] Lay was able to chop off the necks of two Elder Demon Emperors before they even noticed him.[11] Lay was able to keep up with Anos' speed during their duels.[12][13]
Under the blessing of Lovul Aske, Lay demonstrated the ability to move slowly but quickly, managing to avoid all of Nate and Sylvia's attacks while princess carrying Misa in his arms.[14]
Master Source Magic User: Due to being Kanon's reincarnation, he maintains his great mastery of source magic, such as his unique ability to possess seven sources. He was able to ultimately inherit all his former powers in a body that didn't even share a single drop of his old blood. Lay could even separate six of his seven sources and fuse them with the Seven Elder Demon Emperors. His mastery of source magic allowed him to completely hide his true identity from Anos and his Magic Eyes.[15]
Resurrection: After his remaining sources returned to him, he regained the ability to resurrect. Due to having seven sources, he can resurrect himself and/or restore the other six sources as long as one remains.
Master Swordsman:
Lay dual wielding Evansmana and Siegsesta
Lay's swordsmanship skills are what made him recognized as a prodigy of the highest order. He can skillfully wield any sword, even holy swords, which demons can't normally touch. He has demonstrated the ability to pick up multiple demon swords despite them only being able to be wielded if they accept their owner.[16] He also demonstrated his great expertise in using holy swords as he was able to wield Heine's Zeleo and Zere far more adeptly then Heine could and was able to utilize the swords to use abilities that Heine didn't know that they possessed.[17] Lay demonstrated the ability to dual wield both a holy sword and a demon sword at the same time and strengthen them by combining their auras.[13]
Lay demonstrated the ability to use magic spells and the hidden art simultaneously, despite that being considered impossible to the hidden art requiring the user to nullify their magic to use it.[18]
Enhanced Precision: In his fight against Ydol, Lay controlled his power, angle, and aim to a hairsbreadth in order to hit the exact same spot in Ydol's demon sword, destroying it. Lay also demonstrated the ability to deflect Ydol's sword strikes just by using the pressure of his own sword strikes.[19]
Growth and Skill Absorption: According to Anos, Lay's swordsmanship skill grows rapidly during battle, as he quickly improves his technique during their clash, such as neutralizing the shockwaves of Anos' blows and adapting mid-battle.[10] He also showed the ability to assimilate the sword techniques of other swordsmen while fighting against them. He was able to perfectly replicate Shin's use of the hidden art, despite seeing it only once.[20]
When introduced, Lay mentioned that he was bad with spells, so he mastered the sword.
It was later revealed that Lay could use magic quite well but was pretending to be bad with spells so he could hide his holy power, which would give out his real identity.[15]
Lay Grandsley is Kanon's first incarnation as a pure-blood demon.[15]
Anos noted the irony in that he was reincarnated in an almost human body, while Kanon was reincarnated as the pure-blood demon that completely draws upon Anos' bloodline.
Lay intentionally masqueraded as the reincarnation of Anos' right hand man: Shin Reglia, as he deliberately was pretending to not have any memories of his past life and making it seem like the reincarnation process had weakened him, in order to keep his true identity a secret.[15]
His ability to quickly master the use of Siegsesta, the Sword of Intent, served to deflect suspicion about his true identity[15], since according to Anos, only Shin was able to truly master that sword.[29]
Anos stated that he is the only demon capable of truly wielding both demon swords and holy swords, due to being the demon reincarnation of a great Hero.[15]
Lay is stated to be a good liar, as he was able to deceive Anos about his true identity for a long time until the latter noticed him knowing about the Azesion seashell necklaces, which he shouldn't have been able to do if he didn't remember his past, thus giving Anos a hint to his real identity.[15]
Initially, Lay found it difficult to use the Hidden Art despite mastering the method to use it, because he has seven sources, which made completely eliminating magic difficult as he would start using them in battle after his sources got reduced to one.[23] He would later learn to use them even when he had multiple sources inside of him.[24]
Lay is unintentionally responsible for the creation of a real Avos Dilhevia, as his creation of the identity of Avos had resulted in the manifestation of a great spirit based on the lore of the fake identity, a fact which he lamented due to the fact that the real Avos was actually the spiritual essence of his lover Misa.[30]
Despite the lore of the Demon King of Tyranny acknowledging Kanon as the Demon King's arch-rival, the real Avos is enamoured with him due to the fact that she shares those feelings from her transient self, Misa.[8]
