Ailehr was enraged. She wished to take out her frustration on Suey, but restrained herself. After all, Suey’s body is her body.
As for the source of her fury? The inability of her subordinates to break the ‘Sole Cauldron’ Art engraved over Suey’s womb.
The art was engraved by two telekinetic advancers of the Harmony Sect, and as such, Ailehr could not forcibly break said spell without sufficient knowledge of the telekinetic realm.
That was why she had resorted to picking the lock.
Initially, good progress was made. Whoever was the key to said lock only had a miniscule affinity to most elements. The rather twisted part was that her subordinates eventually detected a high elemental affinity to wood, with the lightning and spatial affinity at a peak.
It must be noted that the Hall of Heroes had failed to detect these attributes of Rein accurately due to Master Yirn’s gifted necklace. However, the ‘Sole Cauldron’ Art obviously captured these qualities.
Ailehr’s frustration lay in the peak lightning and spatial affinities. As devils, they feared the element of lightning, a judgment of the heavens. Those with a peak spatial affinity were also incredibly rare-- perhaps one in a billion. Ailehr would have coughed up blood if she knew that Rein’s spatial affinity actually had another unique quality to it.
As such, Ailehr felt a deep frustration, which she chose to once again release upon the other prisoner-- Lyne’s-- welted body with a vicious whip.
She began to doubt Suey’s offer, but the woman only repeatedly stated that she was captured and forcibly enslaved, and carried no knowledge of the qualities of said ‘master’.
Eventually, Ailehr lowered her pride and descended to the very depths of the Harvest Devil Sect, a cave a thousand feet underneath the palm print.
Here existed a spherical portal to a hellish world, a fallen heaven of an ancient god, now a chaotic realm ruled by Devil God Hehrn.
She beseeched the guardian of this portal to contact Devil God Hehrn for assistance.
The guardian, a shadowy and indistinct form slowly nodded
Though Ailehr could not see the guardian’s face, she could tell he was full of derision for her current predicament.
To Ailehr’s surprise, a young and handsome man with sharp eyebrows, a pointed chin, high cheekbones and red lips warped in through the portal after a quarter of a day.
Ailehr exploded out with her aurae tendrils, her spiritual sense, to discover with disappointment that this man was only a peak shell advancer. If he had any outer realm powers, it would be quite restricted.
“Hmph,” the handsome man snorted. “You have no need to know my name. My task is simple. This… replacement body of yours. I will repeatedly place a child within her womb.”
“The formation of a newborn will gather a unique aurae within the world, and by sacrificing this newborn, the creation energy will be directed to destroy the ‘Sole Cauldron’ Art upon her abdomen.”
Ailehr very nearly lost herself to rage at this point, but a voice at the back of her head reminded her that Devil God Hehrn would not show mercy if she rejected his methods after requesting his assistance.
“I see that you are dissatisfied,” scoffed the handsome and vampiric-looking man. “Have you not walked the path of the devil for centuries? If this body is as you say, of high compatibility with yourself… then such an opportunity should not be missed.”
Ailehr clenched her hands to calm herself.
“Plus,” the unnamed assistance continued, “When you took possession of your current body, did you have knowledge of how many times that body might have been fucked?”
How coarse. By now, Ailehr was positively trembling, but she simply could not offend this man sent by the Devil God Hehrn. Moreover, she needed to possess the body, and was out of ideas herself.
“You will eventually give birth to a child, and he will be of Devil God Hehrn. You will be rewarded,” smiled the handsome man.
___________________________________________________
Finding the ‘kitchen’ of Harvest Devil Sect wasn’t exactly difficult. A rather odd stench filled Rein’s nostrils that led him to an underground room.
A chef was slicing apart a human body with a large cleaver, cutting off lumps of meat and tossing them into a large black wok as he whistled.
Rein barely managed to swallow his retching. Otherwise, his cover might very well be blown.
When Rein pushed the towering trolley back into a kitchen, another lanky teen of mostly skin and bones, with quick movements began refilling every compartment of the wooden trolley with bowls of bloody meat soup.
It was obvious what type of meat it was. Rein very nearly lost control again.
He glanced at other areas of the kitchen and saw a number of other scrawny figures scurrying around, reaching into wooden shelves for various spices and jars of foul liquids under the chef’s command--preparation of the ‘ingredients’ for the bloody meat soup. Rein even spotted a few eyeballs floating about within a glass jar.
“Dahsunz! Thank the Devil God Hehrn for your strength. Without you, our brothers would have long been exhausted to death,” this lanky man whispered with devotion in his eyes.
This man’s friendly words caused Rein’s heart to sink. Rein had hurriedly taken the place of that bulky man named Dahsunz because he feared that others would soon notice the unnatural bulky form of Devil Shihr.
Another part of him felt guilty-- it seemed that Dahsunz had intentionally taken on delivering meals to protect the others with his strength. Obviously, Dahsunz might be physically strong for a mortal, but it was nothing compared to Rein’s body, which had been transformed by the draconic metamorphose bead and further tempered by the lightning energy within his blood.
Still, Rein knew he did not have much choice if he wished to whisk Suey away from the Harvest Devil Sect.
Rein gazed into that lanky man’s eyes. A tension rose as the two stared into each other’s souls. Rein could see a dangerous glint, a growing killing intent within the man’s pupils.
Had he been discovered so quickly?
“That damn Devil Shihr,” Rein suddenly croaked with a hand on his temple, doing his best to imitate the voice of Dahsunz. “He viciously knocked me about with kicks to my head! Now, I cannot even tell left from right!”
The killing intent within the lanky man faded and was replaced by an amicable smile.
“So. It is like that! Do you even remember my name?” he asked.
Once again, Rein had to suppress his inner panic.
“Your face is familiar, but I strangely cannot recall your name…” Rein shook his head in bitter dejection.
Rein’s words caused the lanky man’s smile to widen into a beam.
“Tihz,” he replied as he patted his own chest. “Well. Your memory will return. Have you also forgotten the map we all received when we were… entered into service?”
Rein rummaged through his ragged clothing and discovered a small stitched pocket. He had failed to notice it prior, due to the coarseness of the material. He withdrew a parchment that displayed the layout of the Harvest Devil Sect. The true Dahsunz had written many annotations, describing the preferences of the major devils in the sect.
“Chef!” Tihz hollered. “Dahsunz’s memory was knocked out of his skull by Devil Shihr! I will have to accompany him for his deliveries!”
The chef, similarly dressed in rags, originally whistling as he butchered a human body, was immediately incensed.
“That Devil Shihr truly thinks with a bit of ability to create zombies, he can do as he pleases?! We’re fucking overworked!” A vicious swing of his cleavers and a whole human thigh was dissected. “Heh. He will be shitting bricks tomorrow.”
Rein shuddered at these words. At the same time, he was also… baffled that his ridiculous memory loss explanation had worked.
Little did he know that on the dark side of advancers, there are many devilish arts that often cause one to lose their minds, whether it be a muddling of the senses or even memory loss.
As such, those of devil sects saw this phenomenon as a norm.
“Allow me to ensure you go the right way until your head clears,” Tihz beckoned with an arm.
Rein followed Tihz as they returned to the palm indentation zone. Rein pretended to struggle with pushing the wooden tower cart, panting like a dog.
They soon entered a tunnel on the pinky finger of the palm indentation, and reached a cave covered by a magical defense.
Rein glanced at the annotations on his map parchment. The devil here preferred to be referred to as ‘O Corpse Bride Goddess’. Obviously, that was not her true name.
“O Corpse Bride Goddess!” Rein prostrated before the magical barrier. “Your servant Dahsunz has arrived to deliver your succulent meal.”
Rein kept his head to the ground, and after a few heartbeats, the magical barrier to this cave vanished.
In his peripheral vision, a set of pale bare feet belonging to a woman stood before him. Rein naturally dared not gaze up to examine this ‘Corpse Bride Goddess’.
“I don’t have time for your pathetic worship. Hand it over then scram!” A soft voice hissed.
Rein immediately stood, withdrew the wooden tray labeled with this cave number, and handed it over with his head still lowered, before falling back onto his knees, pressing his head to the ground.
“Hmph.” The woman snorted as she disappeared back into her abode. A few heartbeats later, the magical barrier returned.
Rein stood up, somewhat nervous. He was initially worried that his cover would be blown in front of these more talented individuals given special treatment in the Harvest Devil Sect. The truth was that many never even bothered observing the ant that is Dahsunz. This would remain the case throughout Rein’s deliveries.
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“Huh?” Rein fell into confusion as he spun around. Tihz had vanished.
-
Not far along the tunnel around a bend, Tihz held a bamboo cup in his hand. The bamboo cup was filled with blood.
Tihz brought the bamboo cup to his lips as he tilted his head backwards.
His eyes lost focus for a moment as he savored the taste, lost in an euphoric dream.
His appearance flickered and revealed the face and form of Beincen as his indulgence in the blood caused a momentary lost of control. The layer of bloody aurae mist regained form around his body as his appearance returned to that of Tihz.
Blood Devil Hahrn had successfully overtaken Beincen’s body. The Larne scion’s will was weak, and caved under the presence of the dark dragon.
As for why Blood God Hahrn had infiltrated the Harvest Devil Sect?
The truth was that the Blood Devil Sect had always desired to capture the Harvest Devil Sect, for the vile blood that filled this very ancient battlefield.
There was one major problem-- those of the Blood Devil Sect could not control the ghosts and spirits that still occupied the battlefield. As such, they had no hope of controlling the area.
Thus, only Ailehr with her ghostly arts could control this region.
Ailehr naturally would not allow those of the Blood Devil Sect into her territory. The primary reason was that devils who practiced blood arts would absorb the very blood itself, and drain the ancient battlefield of its sustenance.
The members of Harvest Devil Sect might use the vile aurae pouring from the blood fountains to grow, but the blood itself would be returned into the ground, replenishing itself with the vile aurae of these lands.
Blood God Hahrn, now stuck in the body of Beincen, wished to rapidly recover his strength. He had fallen to this middle realm, and then unexpectedly suffered further losses against the Blissful Endflower.
In fact, Hahrn had initially considered replacing the original Dahsunz, but he knew he had too much pride-- he would not be able to survive the process of kneeling before every single one of these talentless hacks without lashing out and revealing his true identity.
Thus, he was absolutely euphoric when he discovered that Dahsunz had lost his memory. Now, as Tihz, he could accompany Dahsunz, and steal blood from those that Dahsunz would serve.
He slipped in undetected once the ‘Corpse Bride Goddess’ removed the magical barrier, and quickly stole some of her stores of unique blood. Already, he felt addicted to the unique blood extracted by the Harvest Devil Sect.
His mind wandered, recalling how he had lost one of his rings to a young man. He wasn’t sure how that young man had survived his soul fragment’s invasion, as said soul fragment had vanished, failing to communicate the circumstances.
Still, he had left an imprint within said ring, and would become aware of its location within a certain range.
As for House Larne? Hahrn had every plan to bend its members to his will in his return to glory.
-
Tihz soon reappeared before Rein, and the two moved on without a word. Rein assumed that Tihz had disappeared, not wishing to lower his head before the ‘Corpse Bride Goddess’.
After some time, Rein successfully delivered most of the human meat soup, surprisingly without much complication.
Along the way, he had received a number of kicks, not of any threat to his tempered body. He made a good show whining and grunting with all these boots-in-the-face, to avoid raising suspicion.
Unlike Blood God Hahrn, Rein cared not for pride. He only cared for his goal-- rescuing the imprisoned Suey.
Unknown to Rein, Hahrn, in the form of Tihz would take advantage of his deliveries to plunder some stores of blood from every individual.
As they descended, Rein noticed on the map parchment, a pathway that was marked with a red sign to signal that one should avoid this area.
Curiosity got the better of him, thus he followed the pathway that eventually led to a set of descending steps. He opened a tray and picked up a random bowl of human soup and proceeded downwards. At some point, Tihz flinched and told him to go on alone with a resplendent smile.
Rein would reach an incredible depth of a thousand feet, finally reaching a cave. He was shocked to discover a spherical portal, supported by many inscriptions on a ground formation surrounded by four stone pillars.
“You should not have come,” a sinister voice crackled in Rein’s ears.
Rein immediately dropped to the ground as his mind recalled the words of Dujahrn, the Poison Germination Devil. That devil, prior to his careless death, had mentioned that Saenise was sent to some Devil God.
He offered up the bowl of human soup to the sinister voice.
“S-senior,” he stuttered. This was no act. He was naturally nervous of this unknown devil. “The beauty Saenise… I wish to know if she’s… doing well…”
This was the lie that he had come up with on the spot, hoping to gain some information. Saenise, the kidnapper of his younger brother, had been supposedly sent to another realm.
“Hahaha!” The sinister voice cackled in amusement. “Saenise failed to protect a noble son, and thus ruined the Devil God’s plans. She and all her spoils now belong to the Devil God!”
“Don’t!” Rein clutched at his head. “Don’t tell me that she will marry that young handsome boy?! I’m much better!”
Rein wasn’t sure how to obtain information on his younger brother without appearing overly suspicious. He could only make up such a ridiculous accusation.
Well-- it was not entirely absurd. There have been female fallen devils that have kidnapped young boys and raised them into their companions. Naturally, male fallen devils did so as well.
The sinister voice cackled even louder. It was rather astonishing how such a sinister laugh could be also filled with such resounding mirth.
“That young boy was her spoils, and thus has already been sacrificed to the Devil God as part of her punishment!” This was what the sinister voice said after calming himself.
Rein’s heart sank like a rock. That was the reality.
Though the fallen devil guarding this spatial portal sensed Rein’s leaking downhearted mood, his interpretation was rather off.
“Hah!” He sneered, his shadowy hand making a chopping motion. “Were you infatuated by her beauty? We abandon the orthodox path, become devils, because we understand the truth of this world.”
“Rules are imposed by the strong on the weak. We fallen devils are borne of desperation, forced to the edge of the cliff by these sanctimonious orthodox swines and their so-called world order!”
“Trust in that devil within your heart, and perhaps if you become a telekinetic devil, you’ll be able to snatch the beauty Saenise!”
He then laughed again, but then he suddenly became silent.
“Now-- get out!” The sinister voice roared.
Rein grunted as he suddenly felt a force fling him backwards. It wasn’t a particularly strong force relative to his tempered body. That devilish guardian never intended to harm the ‘mortal’ who had delivered him a bowl of good soup.
Some assume that fallen advancers would simply kill randomly. That couldn’t be further from the truth.
One of the primary goals of the devil path was, in fact, to give birth to many more fallen devils. That meant twisting the very minds of others to share in their own belief and perspective of the world.
The shadowy guardian was attempting to do just that. If this mortal, named Dahsunz, were to struggle desperately… Perhaps in the future, he would no longer be a slave, but become a devil advancer who would bring chaos and further the devil path.
Rein would soon come to understand this aspect of the fallen devils once he reached the set of caves housing the prisoners of the Harvest Devil Sect. For in one of these caves were a number of kidnapped children, being trained by a fallen devil!
Though Rein was sickened to his stomach, he had to maintain his cover. Both him and Tihz nonchalantly watched as the devil instructor gestured for Rein to place a bowl of human meat soup before each child kneeling in an orderly fashion.
“Eat. Eat!” the fallen devil ordered with an evil grin. “This meat is the flesh of your fathers. The flesh of your mothers! Once you devour them, your parents will be forever with you in your body! They will become your strength!”
Rein barely controlled his own expression upon witnessing this scene. But he had to move on, powerless.
In the following prison cave, Rein was shocked to recognize a few faces. These faces belonged to a few members that had joined the Hall of Heroes, the same cohort as Rein. They were all bound in a set of manacles, which Rein suspected to restrict their aurae.
Rein’s eyes were drawn to a most noticeable figure that was Shizr. This was the aspiring monk who had tested himself against Suey’s seductive arts, completely failing to control his own desires.
Rein could still clearly recall what the monk had said that day-- at least, his own interpretation of his words. Shizr had stated that human sexual desire simply existed, a trait inserted by the fallen gods, to ensure that humans would procreate and be ‘sustainable’.
Shizr had stated that he desired to rise beyond the control of human creation.
Well… he had failed to resist Suey’s seductive art. It was quite likely that Shizr was captured by a devil of seductive arts. Perhaps Shizr was precisely aware of his weakness, thus leading to his determination to rise above it.
Rein thought that his presence-- Dahsunz’s presence, would at least not draw any ire, with his status being that of a lowly slave.
Not so. He was met with many hateful stares from the faces of various originally listless orthodox advancers.
“You evil bastards,” Shizr weakly but heatedly grumbled. “Do you think us fools? To consume human meat to stave off our hunger just this once?”
“We know once we cross such a line, it may very well lead to the crossing of many other lines until we become fully devils!” Another orthodox disciple spat in anger. A closer look and Rein recognized the sigil of this disciple to belong to that of the Uni Sect.
Indeed, if they resorted to consuming human meat in their current predicament, then it was possible for them to consider doing similar questionable actions in future desperate situations. Then, there would truly be no turning back.
Rein finally understood how these prisoners were being tortured.
“They’ll break, sooner or later,” a prison guard snickered at the entrance to this cave. “They all do!”
“Wait.” As Rein was about to leave, that prison guard gestured for him to stop. “Place a few bowls on the ground to entice them.”
Rein did so, knowing that the smell would further humiliate these prisoners.
At this point, Tihz seemed to have lost interest in their meal delivery task.
“I will return first.”
Rein did not even have the chance to thank the man before Tihz rushed off in a hurry. Of course, Rein had no idea that Tihz was in fact Blood God Hahrn in the body of Beincen.
For Hahrn, there was no good blood to steal from the prison area. He had followed along to steal good quality blood from the Harvest Sect disciples deserving of being served daily meals by the chef.
The normal blood fountains in the open air palm area were the lowest of quality-- Blood God Hahrn had no interest in that crap.
Rein pushed his wooden tower trolley around a bend in the underground tunnel, and came before a cave with two guards and a magical barrier formed by inscriptions lining the opening of the cave.
The prisons for the previous prisoners had no such protections, relying thoroughly on the manacles to keep the prisoners suppressed. Clearly, whoever was in this cave was a much more important person.
These prison guards were all dressed in worn black-hooded robes.
“You are to enter and force feed the prisoner,” a black hooded guard said.
“The sect master has ordered that you, lowly slave, are free to perform any act, with the exception of taking her virginity,” the other black hooded guard stated before warning in a low tone, “The Harvest Devil will take your life if you go past the line.”
Rein was bewildered. His mind spun and he came to an understanding. Dahsunz’s position was a lowly slave. The Harvest Devil must be using a lowly slave to pile further humiliation to whoever was inside this prison cave.
A black-hooded guard raised a totem and inserted it into a hole on the tunnel wall. The inscriptions on the totem lit up as the magical barrier faded.
“Tell us when you’re done,” a black-hooded guard chortled, “Her piteous pleading and whining was simply… lovely. Ensure you perform your role!”
Rein’s heart shook. If he, in the guise of a lowly slave, was being used to humiliate this prisoner, then it was obvious that these two black-hooded guards must have been given the opportunity to do so as well. Perhaps they did so whenever they grew bored of their guard duties!
No wonder, these two black-hooded guards seemed to be in rather content moods.
He pushed his wooden trolley in and the magical barrier reformed behind him. The two black-hooded guards glanced at one another with twitching grins. They would certainly be able to take joy in the beauty’s loud wails despite the magical barrier. That, too, provided them with much joy and amusement.
Rein’s heart would be shaken again as he found a slumped Lyne imprisoned in the center of the cave.
Two tall pyramidal stone pillars rose high above, and chains from the tippy top of these two pillars were connected to the manacles on Lyne’s two wrists. These chains were pulled taut such that Lyne could barely touch the stone ground with her toes, a torturous position.
Rein was most saddened by the fact that Lyne no longer carried her usual cool bearing. Her nude body of snow-white porcelain skin was covered by streaks of dirt and… what Rein recognized to be fluids from men.
Her teats even had large metallic rings attached, and her nipples were red and puffy, no doubt, from the rings being…
Rein’s heart clenched.
Lyne’s ears picked up Rein’s approach, and when she lifted her head, Rein saw a pair of bleary and lifeless eyes.
“Please…Please!” Lyne began to wail. “Don’t force me to eat anymore!”