When Jin opened his eyes, he recognized two of the entities in front of him.

The God of War, a towering blood red constellation that resembled a man. He sat on a golden throne surrounded by countless celestial weapons of unimaginable power.

Next to him was the God of the Void, all that could be seen of him was a dark silhouette of a man standing beside the God of War's throne.

Jin laid at the base of the God of War's throne, he was beaten and bloody still. Unable to do anything more than open his eyes to the divine beings in front of him.

“Hear my words, champion. The God of Beasts has reincarnated among humanity. There is a war between Gods. Grow stronger if you wish to have vengeance.” The God’s voice was almost deafening to listen to.

Jin’s head was spinning, he had so many questions, but he was unable to speak.

The God of the Void spoke to him next; his voice was like a thousand whispers echoing into nothing. “You will soon awaken in the realm of Devils, slay one of their kings, take his power, and return to this place.”

The God’s words seared into Jin’s mind as he closed his eyes and sank into nothingness again.

But just as before, he felt his chest start to burn and then his body felt on fire. This time when he opened his eyes, he was not in the realm of God’s, but surrounded by a barren red desert.

The burning in his chest continued, “Ow, what the hell?”

He startled himself as he spoke, Jin got to his feet and looked over his body. His wounds had healed, his clothes were still bloodied and torn, but his body looked as it did before King killed him.

Jin also noticed that the necklace he had taken from [Fallen Angel] was still around his neck, it was still warm.

‘So, this is what I kept feeling.’

Jin looked around the landscape and saw a building in the distance, he attempted to teleport there but for some reason he wasn’t able to.

‘Guess I’m walking.’

As Jin walked, he monitored his surroundings, it was eerily silent. This place had an ominous vibe, one that he felt anytime he raided a city filled with Devils.

After approaching the building, he noticed that it was charred and barely standing. Jin walked through one of the fallen walls and looked around for anything of use inside, there were a couple of burned up skeletons. There was something shiny and red between them.

Jin dug through the ashes and pulled out a red sword; it looked battered and old. Jin took a practice swing at a nearby wall, the sword not only cut the wall like paper, but set it on fire.

“Neat.” Jin put his new sword in the sheathed that once held his scythe.

He continued sifting through the ashes and found a beaten brown leather notebook. He opened it up and flipped to the first page.

[God of Knowledge’s Notebook]

The words were sprawled across the middle of the page.

Jin flipped to the next page; he watched an image of the necklace he was wearing appear before him. It was like a ghost was drawing it in front of him. Then words appeared on the page beside the drawing.

"What the hell?"

Necklace of the Damned

When killed, the wearer will be reborn in the [Devil Realm].

“Well, that’s unsettling. But more importantly, how did a powerful Artifact like this end up here?”

Jin flipped to the next page; the same thing happened but it depicted his sword this time.

[Fire Devil’s Sword]

A common weapon used by Fire Devils, forged with hellfire.

He flipped the page again, but nothing appeared. He pocketed the notebook and continued scavenging the ruins but found nothing, which didn't bother him after finding a treasure like this notebook.

He exited the building, and 2 Fire Devils ambushed him from beneath the sand. Jin avoided their attacks with ease.

“I don’t have time to deal with trash like you guys.”

Jin countered by punching one of the Devils in the face, with his Godly strength he did not even need to bother using a sword against low level Devils like these.

To Jin’s surprise, the Devil barely flinched and punched him back. His punch sent Jin flying through what was left standing of the building behind him.

‘Fuck, where’d my powers go?!’

Jin momentarily panicked, low level Devils like these were nothing for most heroes. But to the powerless, they were 7-foot-tall horned monsters with red skin. Their strength equaled that of 5 normal men.

‘Wait, what do I have to be scared of? This is just like back then.’

Jin thought back to when Devils first appeared, before the Gods blessed people, so they would have to go out with whatever weapons they could and fight them. In those days they had ‘hunting parties’ and not raids, the casualty rates were much higher. But people were willing to sacrifice themselves if it meant avenging the ones they loved who were killed by the Devils and Jin was one of those people.

Jin took out his sword, this time he engaged the Devils with more tact. His years of experience let him win this fight with ease, he parried their attacks and went in for a killing blow. After fighting enemies like Red Death and Fallen Angel, it was like these Devils were moving in slow motion.

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Jin searched their bodies for anything useful, they were using the same sword as him so there was no need to swap it out. On one of the Fire Devils he found a ring and identified it with the notebook. It was another common item, but it provided a slight speed boost, so he took it.

He continued towards a burning city in the distance across the desert.

‘So, this is Hell? I pictured it to be a lot scarier, but if you look past the monsters, it's a calm and quiet.’

Reality and time appeared to operate differently here, the sky always remained red, like the sun was about to set but it never did. Jin also never got thirsty, hungry, or tired since awakening here.

What felt like hours passed as he finally made it through the desert to the city. Besides the 2 Devils, his trek there was peaceful.

It seemed like this city would be different though as soon as he arrived Jin could hear the streams and roars echoing through the flaming city.

‘The God of the Void told me to slay a Devil King, but how do I find one? This place seems endless.’

Jin poked his head into one of the abandoned buildings and a group of Fire Devils jumped out.

“Okay, this might be a problem.” He backed away as the Devils surrounded him.

6 red skinned orcish beasts surrounded him, 4 with swords and 2 wielded Fire magic.

Jin waited for them to attack, one lunged at him and a mage shot a fireball. Jin parried the one with a sword, stabbing through his chest, and used him as a shield from the fireball.

Jin threw down his body and 2 more charged him, he dodged their attacks and leaped towards the mages. He cut the throat of one and the other prepared to launch another fireball, but Jin threw his sword through its head before the Devil succeeded in casting its spell.

The death of the mages enraged the remaining 3 orc devils, their eyes lit up with a bright red light and they charged Jin.

For an amateur this would have been an intimidating encounter. But Jin had killed countless Devils like these before, when they became enraged it made their attacks much easier to read.

Jin retrieved his sword from the makes corpse and in a fast but precise series of slashes, he killed the remaining or six in a matter of seconds.

He flicked the blood from his blade and looted the bodies for anything of use.

He took the violet robes from one of the mages and changed out of his torn-up jacket.

He then appraised it in his book.

[Robes of Fire Shielding]

An uncommon item that is completely resistant to all fire.

‘This will be useful in a place like this.’

Jin continued searching through the city, he encountered more Red Devil Orcs and disposed of them as easily as the others but was unable to find any more useful items.

The ground began to shake as Jin wandered the streets, he began running towards a loud slamming noise that these vibrations were coming from.

When he rounded a street corner, he located the source of the noise.

Around 20 yards away was a 20-foot tall 2-headed Cyclops, its skin was glowing yellow, and a green smoke was emanating from it.

‘You look a bit more challenging.’

Jin had not seen a cyclops devil in some time, he remembered how they used to deal with them back in his beginner days. You sneak up on it, then launch a blade, arrow, or spell into its eye. While it’s blinded, you slice the back of its knees and when it falls to the ground you slit its throat.

With a plan ready to execute the Devil, Jin quietly got withing range of the cyclops.

Suddenly his throat started to burn, as if he were drinking battery acid.

‘What the hell, is this green smoke actually poisonous gas?!’

Jin fell to the ground and coughed uncontrollably.

The cyclops immediately reacted and kicked him full force in the torso.

Jin was sent flying from the hit and his sword flew from his back. He regained his composure as the cyclops barreled towards him. After getting to his feet, Jin held his breath and ran between the cyclops’ legs towards where his sword had landed.

The cyclops continued running towards him, Jin took a deep breath and prepared to attack.

The cyclops swung his arms down in an attempt to grab him.

Jin ducked and countered by slicing into the cyclops's arm. When the hit landed, the sword broke and he was left with a blade no longer than a dagger.

The cyclops attempted to strike him again, but Jin ran away so he could catch his breath. Cyclops were slower Devils and this one was no exception, making it easy for Jin to avoid its attacks.

He took another deep breath and ran towards the cyclops.

Jin flung his broken blade and pierced the cyclops’s eye.

The cyclops roared in agony and began to flail sporadically.

Jin waited from a distance for the cyclops to exhaust itself and looked for an opening to finish it off.

But while he waited, he was ambushed by a trio of Devil Hounds.

“Shit.”

Their skeletal bodies were also exuding the same green mist as the cyclops, but unlike the cyclops, Devil Hounds were exceptionally fast and the only way to kill them was to smash their skulls.

In the past Jin could crush them with his bare hands with ease, but now he needed some kind of blunt object.

Jin ran and looked around his surroundings, he spotted a pile of sizeable rocks. The Devil Hounds were about to catch him when he barely managed to dive out of the way and snatched a rock from the ground.

The timing was going to have to be perfect for him to kill them. He stood and held the rock overhead as the Hounds ran towards him.

Jin dodged the first 2, then smashed the head of the last one to attack him.

He successfully shattered its skull, they were fast, but not particularly strong.

Jin grabbed a hammer shaped bone from its body and readied for the last 2 to attack him.

Now that he had an actual weapon, he smashed their heads without any trouble.

He then turned his attention to the cyclops that was now trying to remove the blade from its eye.

Jin charged it and leapt into the air; he used the bone hammer to smash the broken blade further into the cyclops’s skull.

The cyclops fell to the ground and Jin looked around to make sure no more enemies were waiting to attack him.

Once he knew the area was secure, he looted the fallen enemies.

He found a sword made of bone in one of the Hounds remains, it had a cobalt crystal imbued in its hilt.

[Ghastly Blade of Bone]

A rare item that is sturdier than most blades and poisons those who are struck by it.

After grabbing the sword, he looted the cyclops and found an emerald ring.

[Ring of Toxic Being]

A legendary ring that grants the wearer immunity to all poisons.

‘This will definitely come in handy if there are more enemies emitting that mist’

Jin resumed his exploration of the city and found a map at what looked like used to be a bus stop. He had gone deep into the city and was nearing the center. It looked like there was some kind of citadel building at the center.

‘Well, if I was a Devil King here, I’d definitely be living at a citadel building.’

He memorized the quickest path to the citadel and followed it, only encountering a handful of low-level Devils along the way. He killed them without effort, this new sword was much better than his previous one.

The ground started to shake, much more aggressively than when he encountered the cyclops. It sounded like a stampede, Jin decided to wait in a building for whatever it was to pass.

The stampede grew closer, and he saw the culprits; it was 5 cyclops all running in the same direction.

‘Sometimes the best victories are ones where you don’t fight at all.’

Jin waited for them to pass before leaving the building and resuming his walk to the citadel.

But not even a minute later he began to hear a loud hissing sound and the ground began to shake again from the direction that the cyclops had been running from.

Jin had nowhere to hide this time and instead readied himself to fight whatever it was. Even if it were a dozen cyclops, he could win with this new sword that was strong enough to pierce their skin.

Finally, the monster emerged from around the corner, its shadow darkened the street that Jin was standing in.

“Huh… guess I should’ve been running too.”

Jin couldn’t believe his eyes. This Devil was a massive step up from the others he had seen so far.

A colossal sized serpent with pale white scales and bright green eyes, the streets filled with a green mist as it neared Jin.

He had fought a beast similar to this one in the past, although this one was twice as big, and he remembered how hard it was to pierce its scaley hide.

In his current state, Jin knew there was only one way he would be able to kill this colossus.

The pale serpent sped up when it saw its prey, it lowered its head to the ground and opened its mouth wide. Poison sprayed out, covering Jin, as the serpent swallowed him whole.