Chapter 18: Through the eyes of a demon king_Hellbound [LitRPG] [Summoner] [Apocalypse]

Chapter 18: Through the eyes of a demon king

Lucifer watched through the eyes and the senses of Sarah as she made her way deeper into the dungeon. It was novel, watching this kind of progression, something he had not done for thousands of years. He could barely remember the last time he entered a dungeon – most were simply too low level to access and those that weren’t were closely guarded.

He could vaguely remember having distant great great great great… great grandchildren introduced to him from one of his many offshoot clans with ‘great potential’ or ‘mythical comprehension’ or whatever drivel these clan elders could come up with to win his favour. They would come up to him, scraping and bowing, and request his resources to help them ‘claim the heavens.’ It was usually about a year until whatever prodigy it was died from pissing off someone hundreds of levels higher than themselves, whereupon the elder would return and tell him why he should be angry and seek revenge.

Truth is, he was usually on the killer’s side.

Sure he would go and kill whomever it was anyway to strike fear and yada yada, but after personally meeting some of these prodigies he was surprised they didn’t get killed earlier. Maybe it was his fault, representing pride and all, but to him pride is simply pleasure in your own achievements. It felt good to be the best. Long story short, he never really cared for any of these prodigies, no matter their relation to him or how special they were. He supposed hundreds of years in seclusion trying to comprehend the laws of the world, alongside the likely millions of lives he had claimed – many of these prodigies themselves, had desensitised him to their stories.

But anyway, it was interesting to now see it from a prodigy’s perspective. Not that he wasn’t himself a prodigy, but it had just been so long since he had to do his own climb. And levels did not come anywhere near as easily now.

Observing at the level 28 infernal she had summoned, he was surprised with the feelings he felt. Pride. Why was he feeling like this for this child over his own flesh and blood? Maybe it was because he was here for the own journey, taking a not-so-unsubstantial part in her survival. God knows if he hadn’t been regulating her emotions she would have died many times over. The girl had never even fought, let alone killed something before, and yet didn’t even seem to question how she went from a pacifist to someone who was now rushing down a dungeon in pursuit of levels.

It was simple really, to give her pride. Every level up, every battle won, every notification showing how she lead her world she would be filled with pride at her own strength. He no longer really needed to do much anymore, beyond suppression some emotions like her fear and to stop her from throwing up at the slightest sign of gore.

Which he had to do now as the infernal practically roasted the level 20 earth salamanders alive with every punch. He actually enjoyed the smell of the monsters as their corpses cooked on the ground from the wounds the golem inflicted, although even he could admit it was a sight for sore eyes.

The cavern though was quite beautiful. It was far larger than the previous level, with massive trees that should not be able to survive down here if not for the energy provided by the abundance of glowing moss on every surface. The whole place was illuminated by this moss to a similar level as her primitive planet outside.

Although maybe he shouldn’t call it primitive. When confined to her body he was unable to use any of his skills, but could still sense far more of the world around him than she could. Especially when it came to the people in the camp of the man they called the General. When assembling his own armies, he could put forward millions upon millions of fighters at levels in their hundreds capable of crushing this planet single handedly. But even that paled in comparison to the people here.

It was normal for new integrators to have advantages. They had a mass of perks that would be lost to those that came after, like her [Wisdom Prodigy] and [Intelligence Prodigy] perks. He himself had [Eidetic Memory] and [Faster Ability Comprehension], courtesy of reaching 1000 intelligence and wisdom respectively, as most at his level did, so what would Sarah then receive from the system when she reached this milestone? Especially if she did it first.

Even he was interested.

But back to his earlier thoughts, the people here surprised him. Not the stand-outs like Sarah and the General and a few others that were roaming around, there were always ‘prodigies’ tucked around every corner on new worlds. No, what surprised him was the normal people. The sheer number of people with [Earth Mage], an uncommon class, or [Berserker], or [Knight], or [Gladiator], or many of the other uncommon classes. They were supposed to be uncommon for a reason, and yet he found more uncommon classes than he did common. Then there were multiple rare classes roaming about, and this was all in a single camp in a single city. If the pattern continued, then this planet represented a kind of gold mine which leaders of the other pantheons will quickly find out about.

There was opportunity here, but also danger. The biggest benefit to new integrators, especially the prodigies, was the fact their planet was sealed to most outsiders. There was a high cost to enter, scaling exponentially with the level of the being that tried to come forward. Some clans spend everything they own to send maybe a dozen combatants at level 24, and with no clue what’s on the other side they can only hope they survive.

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He could feel the pride fill the girl with no need for him to affect her this time. Her fear of battle was slowly fading as he gradually relaxed his control over her emotions to ease them into her. And once again, Lucifer’s thoughts moved in circles as he again wondered why he even bothered. He could just take most of her emotions away and turn her into a simple killing machine rather than the route he was currently taking.

Sure he justified it in his head by telling himself that the prodigies with no social skills or emotions were often the quickest to die, but even still it was far out of character for him to risk so much of his own health to take care of the girl.

As he relaxed he could feel his soul start to crumble slightly. It was a constant battle, with outside forces slowly trying to erode him away while the inside forces from Sarah’s soul sought to consume him entirely. It took most of his energy to keep himself tightly bound together, but at this rate he was not confident he could last another day.

It was exhilarating.

He had not been this close to death since his banishment from heaven. He had battled numerous enemies both higher and lower levelled than himself, and yet was confident in his victory every time. He always had full control over those battles, but here his fate was completely in the hands of another.

They were only about two days into the integration, and if she chose she could simply take a nap right now and he would be dead, his soul either destroyed or consumed. Sure he knew he would consume her soul back out of spite, but still a level 22 -

- 23 would be capable of killing a lord of hell if she chose.

He wasn’t too worried about anything else, there was no way something down here in such a weak floor of this dungeon could beat a level 28 infernal bar the floor boss, and if push came to shove then he would step in. The first time he did so was… a novel experience. Using such a low level of [Demonic Mana Manipulation] caught him off-guard, but thankfully he could still cause a detonation capable of killing the multiple alpha wolves that arrived with their packs. The pain of doing so was also novel, and he felt a not-insignificant chunk of his soul get seared off him that made him wonder what he lost. He could do it again, but he was even weaker than before. He shuddered to think at what he may lose…

The girl was having a tough time against the salamanders. The stomping of the infernal seemed to have attracted quite a few and it was making short work of them, but some had slipped past. The imp was taking on two by himself, and doing a poor job as all their kind did, which left one for her to face. She had decided to go back to throwing primitive demonic bolts at it, a method that the level 22 Earth Salamander was not too impressed by. Earth as an element was pretty even with the demonic fire, neither of them outright counters to the other. To run the full circle, fire countered air, air countered earth, earth countered water, and water countered fire. He had faced many cocky water-attuned warriors that he sent to a shallow grave, as above all absolute power counters everything.

Unfortunately, Sarah’s absolute power, while making short work of the three useless salamanders that could barely injure it, was occupied which left her with a problem. Offensive magic as a summoner was heavily weakened as she was unable to form proper offensive abilities, practically halving her output, but she could still make do with her [Demonic Mana Manipulation]. A common mage at her level of 23 would have around 81 in both wisdom and intellect, so Sarah with her extra levels giving around 110 in each plus a 10% buff from fighting solo and with her [Demonic Mana Manipulation] at Level 9 was doing likely slightly less if not a similar amount of damage compared to what a full mage at her level would be.

Which meant she still struggled. He knew it was ridiculous considering she was practically battling six salamanders of a similar level alone and winning, but watching her struggle against the creature filled him with disappointment. Luckily, with her demonic bolts making it wary and through forcing the imp to come between herself and the monster, she had saved enough time for the infernal to stomp up to the creature and kill it in a single punch. The battle was over pretty quickly after that.

The imp was not so lucky, missing both of its stubby legs and covered it wounds it could barely stay in the air. The vile pest was not far from deaths door, and arrived there not soon after when Sarah flew it directly into a pack of creatures and made it explode. She held on to its weapon, only to have it dissolve soon after as items brought along with a summon were unable to remain on the plane without their owners. It made the silly girl frown, a stupid reaction considering the weapon would do little to protect her. If one of these level 20+ monsters got anywhere close to her body then the girl with less than 10 in strength and agility would not even be able to manage a swing before she was killed.

“Look up.”

Even talking to her like this caused his soul to twist in pain. He couldn’t wait for her to form a core and finally give him some comfort. But the warning was needed as, distracted by the loss, she nearly completely missed the Vine Serpents that had descended from the trees trying to make a meal out of her. Lucifer’s warning gave her just enough time to rush next to the golem and try and hide under its body while it swung its slow fists in the air like a drunk boxer. The vines easily dodged, but likewise could not deal really any damage to the golem causing a stalemate. With some awkward shuffling while staying low between its legs, she made her way far enough from the clearing she was in that the vines left her alone, before stopping to regain her mana for another imp.

The retreat was shameful, a disgrace for any greater demon to have done especially against monsters this weak. But Lucifer found his disgust quickly fade as he looked down on the summoner. She had gained a ridiculous amount of strength in such a short time, and it would not be long before she started to scale to ridiculous levels. Most summoners could bring something forward a few levels higher than them, but monsters of these levels would often lose to strong warrior who would have better control and finesse than the summon. While a few apex summoners did exist in the universe, a warrior was simply easier and cheaper to train, and could often win simply by avoiding the summon and killing the nearby summoner.

But even he could admit Sarah had the potential to go far. She was far stronger than any summoner he had seen at her level, and he continued to watch as her new imp tore some of the vine serpents to shreds.

He almost felt… proud. The feeling was new to him and he couldn’t help but think to himself, am I getting attached?

Oh well, this still doesn’t change things. Lucifer figured that in the end the worst that could happen was he would feel a little bit sad when the girl reaches level 100 and he has to rip her soul from her body to keep his fully intact, which will inevitably kill her.

What a shame.

Chapter 18: Through the eyes of a demon king

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