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Belkrephon, 5th rank Demon
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"Why did a dragon wander in here?" the demon asked nobody. "Did it give any signs of waking up?"
"Khardanis is keeping it asleep with her magic. It takes a lot out of her, though," one of his lieutenants informed.
it took great effort to cordon out the area of the magic drain aura of the creature. Belkrephon could see the funnel of the storm, a tornado of magical energy funneling everything to the creature sleeping heedless of the horde amassed around it. What's worse, the storm rose and ebbed reaching almost a kilometer sometimes. It forced them to move the barrier even further as getting hit by the storm damaged their Attributes and hurt like a blow from a Holy weapon. The mindless demon spawn kept pushing, kept trying to throw themselves to die.
It was one of the advantages of attacking this world. The people had very little support from the Gods. Very few [Paladins], almost no [Holy] spellcasters. There was the pesky [Heroes] that systematically hunted the Demon Lords, but that seemingly zealot order was few and far between.
The Demons' notion of time was badly skewed. Belkrephon didn't notice it, neither any of the others with him. It took decades living among mortals to adjust one's perspective.
"Send in a single behemoth," he ordered.
One of the massive demons hanging in the back walked forward, with other insectoid demons pushing it forward. The six-legged elephantine behemoth was a mass of muscle and thick carapaces, with a head filled with a dozen jagged and barbed horns. The thick stumpy legs crushed dozens of spawn as it moved. The blasted gibbering abominations wouldn't move out anyway.
The behemoth entered the manastorm and started to take damage. The beast entered a frenzy and activated its {Rush} ability, crossing the remaining distance in a few seconds. Then it collapsed and died, vanishing right after its lifeforce ended.
"{Soul Sight}!" Belkrephon chanted. "By the Lord of Cocytus!" An uncountable number of demon spawn souls floated around the dragon. "It's harvesting US!"
He walked around the containment to find the demonic hag that enspelled the dragon. She looked even more wrinkled than usual, and deadly tired, "Khardanis, how long can you keep the dragon contained?"
She looked at him and sighed in relief, fainting. She spoke as her eyes rolled to the back of her head, "Oh, you're here. I'm sorry, master. I failed." It seemed she held out with sheer willpower until he arrived.
The ice land dragon stirred awake.
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I woke up from a very refreshing nap. I had no idea how long it took but I really needed that. My barriers were in place and the Ethereal landscape around me was...
Clear of demons for about a kilometers, then the horde started. And it was kept in place by a cordon of bigger demons. Oh. For how long did I sleep?
> You reached Eldritch Dolphin-Mermaid level 8.
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> You gained 3 Attribute Points
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> You gained 1 Magic and 2 Soul
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> You gained 1 Mind and 1 Willpower.
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> You gained 1 Endurance, 1 Luck, and 1 Dexterity.
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> Ultimate Surpasser granted you 2 Attribute Points.
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> You gained 32 Skill Points.
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> You gained 2 Human Perks.
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> You gained 22 base HP and 48 base Energy.
> You reached Eldritch Muse (5-fused, ultra-rare+++) level 8.
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> You gained 3 Magic and 3 Charisma.
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> You gained 3 Endurance, 2 Charisma, and 2 Mind.
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> You gained 2 Dexterity, 2 Willpower, and 2 Soul.
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> You gained 2 Strength and 1 Luck
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> You gained 2 Class Perks.
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> You gained 39 base HP and 105 base Energy.
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> Ultimate Surpasser granted you 3 Attribute Points.
I had millions of notifications for Exp and combat that I promptly dismissed. The number of demon souls floating above me was staggering. My Energy pool, now eighty-six million points, was full. I poured twenty million into {Soul Shepherd} to mass-purify all of them. Different from high-ranked demons, these souls were no stronger than a person's. As they were purified, I felt a whiff of Divine energy as some deity, Rabhorktaar by the feel of it, pulled the demon souls away. I let them go.
Administrator Hotline
CALL START
Wyxnos: Where are you now? Rabhorktaar just contacted me. He took millions of souls at once.
Arista: Ethereal world, scorched continent, demon side. Things are really bad over here. Looks like gross mismanagement from where I stand.
W: We are powerless to act there. All we can do is keep the barrier empowered.
The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
A: Is it the one you need the demons' cores for?
W: Exactly.
A: Can you please put Rabhorktaar on the line?
W: I'm not your messenger.
A: Do you want me to do something that may or may not help you while I'm here? Or should I just go on with my life and leave the demons to their business? For crying out loud, Wyxnos. Get a girlfriend.
Rabhorktaar: [Hero]. I thank you for your assistance. And for reviving my most faithful group of followers.
A: Justo to be sure, was it you who took the demons' souls?
R: Indeed. It was me who took them. However, after you purified them, they were no longer demons. Just souls. These weak mindless demons were worshippers or victims, long lost souls of numerous worlds the demons took over.
A: Put them to good use. Anyway, now that I am here and the demons look pissed as fuck, what should I do with them?
R: Their hordes are almost infinite, but they can't move them across dimensions fast enough. If you could cull them and send me the souls, you'd help the world as much as killing another Demon Lord.
A: Is there one?
R: No, not yet. They're still waiting to hear from the Fourth one since its soul never returned. At least it's what we believe.
A: Okay. Slaughter and purify demons with extreme prejudice. Can do.
R: We shall think of a proper reward later.
A: Not worried about it. Just talk to Wyxnos. He's too sour nowadays. Give this man a vacation or something.
R: Sorry, I can't talk about the subject with you.
A: Gotcha. God business, no mortals allowed. It's fine too. Toodles!
CALL ENDED
I climbed back on my dinosaur feet and looked around. There was a big humanoid demon with classic red skin, bat wings, and horns shouting orders around. The other demons holding back the swarm of spawn seemed to stay at the very edge of my manastorm.
I dumped the eight Attribute Points in Soul, increasing the range of the manastorm's range by another eighty to one hundred meters. That pushed the storm over the blockade and sent the spawn into a frenzy. The dumb demons rushed to attack the source of the damage and overwhelmed the ones trying to keep them at bay.
The blink-related abilities worked on the material world, so I had to stick to the normal {Flash Step}. That meant I had to cross one kilometer before I could engage the demons. I decided to go away from the one that seemed to be their leader. My goal was to cull them as much as I could and I think they would scatter if the leadership died.
The small fry wasn't even useful as cannon fodder. Once they entered my {Cold Aura}, they were weak enough to die on the first aura tick [1]. I ran around like a wild bull, headbutting the weakened intermediate demons to death.
After I ran past the barricade, the spawn rushed from the sides at me. I saw some big demons, fifteen meters tall, a six-legged cross between an elephant and a rhinoceros. I charged toward them but the stupid things had a ridiculously low Ego score. They just fell on their bellies under their own weight when their Strength scores couldn't keep them standing up. A volley of {Force Javelin} for each of these demons put them out of their misery.
I climbed a hill and looked around. The sea of demon spawn stretched as far as the horizon. The intermediate demons and those behemoths moved around the smaller ones as if they weren't there. Well, the behemoths' hooves were thick enough to crush a dozen of them on each step.
But it was truly endless. I threw myself into battle, using big area spells of different elements. What worked best was Light, Lightning, and Radiation. I kept the latter for later and abused the former two. After experimenting for a while, I found the way to cast {Chain Lightning} and threw torrent upon torrent of magical electricity to leap from demon to demon. It lit up this dimension and sent ripples through the demons as they moved to fill in the gaps. At this scale, they moved according to fluid dynamics.
My Energy dropped at an astonishing rate as I abused {Overcharge Magic} and other abilities to maximize the destruction. It was probably overkill but I didn't care. Whenever I ran low on the resource, I switched back to the Mana Wellspring and recovered MP from the tens of thousands of monsters around me.
In hindsight, I should've used the golden opportunity to break some curses, but I was honestly so enthralled with the carnage that I forgot. And I was drowning in damage and Exp notifications.
"SYSTEM, group display of Exp notifications lower than one billion into a single one and block damage dealt messages."
> ACKNOWLEDGED.
That increased privilege level was good. I ran around and killed stuff until my legs couldn't walk anymore. Yet the carpet of Lovecraftian creatures remained unchanged. They still ran at me like lemmings into the ocean.
Behind me, the demon leadership kept chasing and studying me. But since I couldn't move and was all out of Energy, I cycled the wellspring back and sat to rest. For the small fry, just the Attribute-sapping auras and the frost damage of my elemental aura was enough.
"Halt..." The commander approached on hooved digitigrade legs. "You're no dragon... A fairy?"
"You thought it was a dragon, but it's me! Yawn. Too tired for this shit."
He stopped before the hundred-meter mark and my auras. I rose my head and yawned. I was getting sleepy again.
I searched around and saw one flimsy old woman, the spitting image of a witch from a fairy tale. With another yawn, I said to the demon, "Make the witch stop or I'll get violent."
The demon looked at the swarm of lesser creatures that even as we talked kept rushing and dying next to me. If it weren't for the item box automatic collection, I would've been buried underneath corpses.
"Khardanis, stop casting," the demon leader said to the hag.
The feeling I had to sleep vanished. I looked at the witch and saw the imprint for her sleep spell. While I failed to learn it, I was able to create a counter. I cast the spell.
"What do you want, fairy? Why do you aid the Gods?" He asked.
He got close enough to {Appraise}
> Level 159 Demon
"I want to level up. As you have a veritable sea of Exp here, I decided to help myself," I answered.
"I am Belkrephon, demon Count of the 5th rank. And I challenge you to a duel."
"I refuse."
> Contested...
He froze where he was and looked at me with disbelief.
"Look, is there any Demon Lord around here? I don't want to waste time with small fry."
He laughed. "It's too late! The Demon Lord infiltrated your world centuries ago? We are going to join him and conquer everything!"
I hummed and activated {Grand Fermata}. The wellspring siphoned thousands of MP each second from the horde around me. To keep the demon talking, I just cowered a bit and nodded.
"Your world is doomed. But you are powerful. Make a pact with me and you shall be my thrall as we conquer a thousand other worlds!"
Talk about being way over one's head.
"Lord Belkrephon..." The witch called.
"Not now. Can't you see? If I harvest a soul as powerful as that, I'll rise to the 3rd rank or even higher! My moment of triumph is--"
The imagery I had was one of several pairs of blades shaped like a propeller, spinning in opposite directions. As many as I could conjure, they would shoot out from next to me in a spiral pattern. Once I fueled a couple hundred million Energy into the spell and was about to bottom my Energy pool, I let it go.
> Force Scissors hit Belkrephon for 7.6M Damage (Base 180 x2.9 Willpower x3.3 Skill x1.5 Affinity x3.4 Demon Slayer x5 Overcharge x10 G.Fermata x2 Fortissimo x1.45 Moon Magic x1.5 Favored Enemy x2 Critical x2 Vulnerability).
The witch behind the demon took two hits and died. The other demons went on the same path as the blades mowed down the carpet of creatures, going out for more than one kilometer. Two... Some that had to hit the hardened behemoths lose power before the others. I could see a few going out and just vanishing in the waves of bodies that moved toward the source of the attack.
It seemed I'd aggroed every single demon in this dimension.
Belkrephon held his flank where the blades had cut him and stared at the ichorous and thick blood seeping from the wound, probably wondering why it hurt so much and why wasn't it regenerating. Not one to waste words with a dead demon, I used {Stacatto} to rapid-fire {Force Javelins} as fast as I recovered Energy.
Death by a thousand pinpricks, that was his sentence. With each javelin sapping one in each Attribute, it took a few dozen to bring his maximum HP below his current damage and deep enough to kill it.
I shoved the Exp notification away. The demon's leadership was entirely decimated. I tossed more javelins on the ones twitching on the ground, as the bodies wouldn't stay behind if they were actually dead. I was wrong. There was some friendly fire during my onslaught.
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[1]: tick: The periodic effect of abilities that deal damage or healing over a period of time. What wasn't good was that I needed twenty trillion Exp for the next level.