Chapter 73: A Vessel

"Shit! Who used a forbidden curse item? That bird is going nuts!"

A demon shouted in horror. Then, a blaze of crimson fire ignited on the raven's black feathers, catching on fire.

In little to no time, the black raven turned into a blazing ball of flame in the sky, spreading its wings and screeching aloud, wave after wave of heat slamming down.

Seeing this, the demons slowly stopped attacking, their expressions turning pale in horror and disbelief.

"Fuck! That's the 4th general of my lord's demon army! You've all committed treason! Kill him quickly before anyone finds out!"

A disembodied voice echoed through the region, laced with a hint of bewitching malice.

Hearing this voice, Hiro frowned.

That's because he realized that a magical barrier had quarantined this block of the neighborhood.

Everything seemed fine on the surface but once he reached out with his hand, it would touch an invisible, bouncy barrier.

"This is a predetermined trap," Hiro whispered, his mind spinning. "Does this mean the lord isn't in the stronghold! There's no way such commotion would escape her notice otherwise."

The more Hiro thought about it, the more confused he felt. He seemed to have infiltrated the stronghold at a bad time.

"Ha… Ha… Ha…"

Hot breathing touched Hiro's shoulder and the back of his neck, reminding him of the female demoness and her plight.

Hiro's eyes flicked as he mumbled to himself in both awe and hesitation, "It can't be, right? I must be overthinking things!"

Screech! Boom!

The raven had officially gone berserk at the moment, spitting fire and tossing heated tornadoes that ravaged the buildings below.

Hiro stopped thinking about it and rushed to a nearby house, seeking shelter in the underground structures.

Meanwhile, the battle in the sky was growing more intense.

Space twisted as silver-white chains shot and pierced toward the raven's wings, chest, abdomen, and back. Searᴄh the nôvelFire.net website on Google to access chapters of novels early and in the highest quality.

Although the raven's mind was flooded with chaos and violence, its battle instincts had yet to be dulled out.

The raven maneuvered with great agility and evaded the silver chains, but the earlier voice returned once again.

"What are all of you standing there for? Idiots, you've already committed treason! Kill him if you don't wish to die!"

The demons who were hesitating looked at one another. After all, this was the 4th general, someone appointed by the lord.

He is below one person and above tens of millions of demons. The influence of a lord is too great, and it's dubious if they could really escape the prying of a lord's eyes if and when the time had come.

Still, there were always demons with a weak mentality, and once one of them made a move, the others would follow.

As expected, someone could tolerate the pressure no more; they directly used their ultimate attack with the hopes of dealing the most damage.

Of course, many of the demons attacked because they noticed the curse item embedded in the raven's chest.

"Haha, it is rumored that the 4th general's bloodline is tainted by the Golden Crow's blood, and he has a great chance of tapping into the potential of that mystical creature!"

"If we can get our hands on that blood, no matter how diluted the bloodline is, we might be able to evolve into Great Demons!"

"Everyone, you know in your hearts whether or not this is a lie! Fight for your freedom, for your future, and for a path to being the next Demon Lord!"

…

Listening to this soothing voice, Hiro clicked his tongue. Court politics are really something, even demons are affected.

Then again, these are the negative drawbacks of assuming a power system inspired by humans.

It was only natural for some demons to grow a scheming bone in their bodies. Hiro didn't want to think too much into it, but it's not impossible that these schemes were played out by demons under the directive of human captives.

At the moment, his current priority was the petite girl who was lying on the floor.

Well… it wouldn't do her justice to call her petite at the moment…

Steam rose from her blue skin, and stumps took shape on her forehead before splitting into a pair of twin horns, curved inwardly like crescent moons.

The steam rising from her body intensified, and Hiro could feel the restless demonic energy in her body about to explode.

Her muscles began to buzz and dance, while her bones issued creaking noises. A thin stream of sweat raced down her blue skin, and her body began to enlarge in size.

Hiro watched in awe, but he didn't plan to intervene whatsoever. He took two steps back and leaned into a nearby wall, his arms crossed to his chest.

Soon, the girl's lips parted as she issued a gurgling noise, as though blood was about to spill out from her throat but was stuck there, roiling about on the verge of either erupting or retreating.

Although it was partly Hiro's fault that she ended up this way, he wasn't sure if this woman was caught in the web of a greater scheme.

Who knew if the powerful underground organizations used this woman as a chess piece and secretly gathered all of their forces under the guise of a negotiation banquet?

Hiro was all too familiar with the rebellious nature of intelligent, ambitious humans, let alone demons who can grow stronger by feasting on the blood of their brethren.

The only doubt in Hiro's mind at the moment was the identity of this so-called slave from the fallen aristocracy.

Hiro looked up, and through the multilayered structures of the house, he could sense how intense the battle outside was.

"Why aren't the other generals coming over to help this bird?" Hiro was curious, as he heard about the forbidden curse item in passing.

If no one intervened soon, this bird would really go berserk and lose all rationally.

Hiro's thoughts were once again interrupted as the woman groaned in pain, her skin splintering with purple blood oozing out.

"Ah? It can't be? Is she going to die just like that?" Hiro was stunned.

Thinking about it, her body seems too weak to contain that strand of demonic energy.

This could only mean that this energy didn't even belong to this woman, she was merely used as a vessel for safekeeping.

Hiro touched his chin. "Well, since you can't handle it, then I won't be polite."

Then, he approached the woman, crouched by her side, and placed his right hand on her abdomen.

Perhaps purely by instinctive reflex, she gripped his wrists tightly, her long nails wounding around his hand.

"Relax," Hiro said. "This will be very painful."

After he said that, he quickly activated the suction force of his innate physique, targeting the pure demonic energy in her body.

Mhm? Hiro frowned, feeling that something was off. The demonic energy in her body was mismatched with the demonic energy from her origin.

"Ah, how pitiful…" Hiro quickly understood her situation. As he had his experience acting as Sitri, the Demon Ancestor, Hiro learned a lot about demonic energy and its applications. Read exclusive chapters at m_v-l'-NovelFire

He could tell at a glance that in order to use this woman as a vessel for the pure demonic energy, they had to suppress her origin so that it wouldn't taint the purity of that energy.

It was a cruel thing to do, forcing her powers and bloodline to regress considerably. This little girl might be an old lady who lived for decades if not hundreds of years.

Otherwise, an immature origin would have long since crumbled under the pressure.

Nonetheless, this wasn't of any concern to Hiro as he increased the suction force acting on the pure strand of demonic energy.

Such a great harvest!

Hiro was ecstatic; this was enough demonic energy to increase his level by a lot.

He didn't know if this was a restriction set by the system, but only his Sorcerer persona enjoyed the treatment of converting any type of energy absorbed to spirituality.

For his Demon persona, anything other than demonic energy would be a waste.

Soon, pitch-black tendrils pierced through the woman's abdomen, accompanied by a burst of purple blood.

ARGHHH!

Her back arched, and her head slammed hard into the ground. Cracks webbed out on the solid floor, and she screamed herself hoarse.

Luckily, the battle outside was as intense as ever, so these screams didn't draw too much attention.

Hiro thought that no one would notice his little operation in the basement of an abandoned house; that was until he finally extracted the stand of demonic energy.

As it turned out, this wasn't a strand of demonic energy, but a purplish-black shard with a thin crack on its surface.

The strand of demonic energy leaked through the crack, but when compared to the dense energy within the shard—it seemed inconsequential.

Shit, Hiro thought to himself.

[Notice: You've discovered the fragment of a Minor Realm's core.]

As expected, once the shard was out in the open, a massive wave of energy was projected outwards, and an immense pressure engulfed the entire stronghold.

Who the fuck hides something like this inside the body of a woman?!

Hiro was furious, but before he could act, powerful auras erupted from all directions in the stronghold, immediately locking onto Hiro's position.