Guild Wars

Immortal Stones. You can imagine their worth from how the two Old Ancestors had reacted to them, but the reaction of the Demon Gods was even more exaggerated. They literally fought over them on the spot, only the strongest of the lot managing to hold on to them for now.

Draco just watched them lazily for a while, before he frowned. He had a limited amount of time in this form, so he roared once more to get their attention.

"Stop fucking fighting over this trash! I'm willing to buy your Dao Source for more, and some other things as well. Just stand there and fucking listen!"

Like whipped children, the Demon God stopped their actions and stood there obediently. Seeing them act like this, they almost seemed cute.

"Now, your Dao Source has already been taken by me, but I'm willing to grant you flees eternal life and a true chance to become Demons. Submit to me, and I will induct you into my Hell as Demon Princes with the right to create and lead your own armies."

Draco waved a hand and a small mountain of top-grade Aether Crystals appeared around him. "Become my subordinates, and you will receive a steady supply of these as well as my protection."

The Demon Gods gaped as they saw the Immortal Stones aplenty, wishing they could jump forth and rob them. But an even better offer was being presented, to submit to this fellow and gain a steady supply.

Alright, so why exactly were these fellows so hyped up about this? Well, Immortal Stones were exactly as stated, a special resource used in the Upper Worlds for Immortal Cultivators to cultivate.

As the two Old Ancestors had explained the Cultivation Realms in the Upper Realm were not equivalent to what was being used in the Martial Spirit World.

It started at Qi Condensation, to Foundation Establishment, to Golden Core/Core Formation to Nascent Soul, to Soul Formation, to Nihility, to Ascension, to Half-Immortal, to True Immortal, to Immortal King, to Immortal Emperor to Heavenly Saint, to Half Celestial, to True Celestial, to Celestial King, to Celestial Emperor, the to Celestial Supreme, etc.

Qi Condensation to Ascension was their Mortal Stage, True Immortal to Heavenly Saint was the Immortal Stage and True Celestial to Celestial Supreme was the Celestial Stage.

First things first, the world background told of these Cultivation Realms, but the Tower itself could only support it up to the Immortal King Realm at best. It was only Divine in Rank after all, and the Celestial Realms equated to the Divine Rank.

Usually, it should be able to emulate up to Heavenly Saint, since that was the end of the Immortal Stage and the Immortal Stage equated the Legendary Rank, which was the limit of what the Tower could present.

The issue was that these floors took up too many resources compared to simpler floors like the first 30, so the Tower's spirit limited its scope even further.

Now you might notice that the 'half-'prefixed realms were not categorized. That was because they were not exactly official realms, rather ones that have been coined by cultivators over time.

Half-Immortal meant that one had taken a step into becoming an Immortal, and had begun converting their Mortal Qi into Immortal Qi. To do this, one needed to wash their Mortal Qi with Immortal Qi and replace it over time, before compressing and purifying what is there to breakthrough.

Herein lay the problem. You would need Immortal Qi to cleanse your Mortal Qi to become a True Immortal and ascend. As Half-immortals are unofficial, the Heavenly Dao of the Immortal World did not recognize this rank and did not extend invitations to such fellows.

So where was one supposed to get Immortal Qi in the Mortal Realm?

Immortal Stones.

They were the currency of the Immortal World, used just as Qi or Spirit Stones were down here. They contained non-elemental Immortal Qi that can easily be absorbed by cultivators at different levels of purity depending on the crystal's grade.

The Upper World provided channels for these stones to come down through their own factions or sects, or powers in the local world, in exchange for various things they might need in the Upper World that could only be found in the Lower Worlds.

After all, once you go up, the Heavenly Dao prevented you from coming down.

So Immortals Stones were scarce and hard to acquire down here. There were hundreds of thousands of millions of Half Immortal cultivators, but barely a few got to ascend each year because of the lack of this resource.

The Dragon Ancestor and Phoenix Ancestor, for example, were True Immortals, not half ones. They couldn't ascend because of the Martial Spirit World's blockage, but their Dragon Phoenix Palace had enough backup Immortal Stones acquired through different means that allowed them to breakthrough from Integration to Half-Immortal or whatever the Martial Spirit World's equivalent was.

With the stones that Draco added generously, who guessed the height they could reach?

Heaven? Without an Immortal Stone, they did not even possess the slightest chance to ascend nor get lucky. And the kind of luck needed to find an Immortal Stone in the world truly even surpassed that of finding a Dragon's Hoard.

The Demon God had previously relied on the Dao Source of progress, but that was futile. The Dao Source was perfect for early-stage Demonic Energy that inspired and made your own Demonic Energy much smoother and purer than others.

However, this Dao Source had no benefit for Immortal work, so you've been stuck with it and its static light for years. It was unable to develop the way forward!

Its compatibility with Immortal Qi was abysmal!

Even for the most talented soul, it would take nearly hundreds of years to use the Dao Source to cleanse oneself of Mortal Qi and become an Immortal!

This is why no Demon God has ascended for centuries, while the humans climbed slowly but steadily, leaving them behind. Well now, they had hundreds of the lovely stones in hand as long as they gave up on that useless Dao Source.

Most were thinking to accept the deal and quickly get some stones to cultivate while others were one step further, hoping to a happy as a sub to get all the benefits and then scatter later.

Some were aware there might be binding contracts or cleverly written clauses in the agreements that would prevent such things, but they felt that anything could be wormed out of if they had sufficient power and money.

Unfortunately, they could never have predicted the cruel conditions in the Nine Hells The benefits were truly sweet like sugar, but the duties and guarantees were enough to act like shackles.

It was almost funny to see Demon Gods go into the temporary base Draco set up to receive such fellows with a large smile on their faces, only to come out sweating and with a look of horrified defeat.

In the end, around 70% of the Demon God secretly chose to join Draco, unable to resist, while the remainder wished to get the compensation and go cultivate somewhere else.

When the 30% saw their little numbers, they were initially dumbfounded, but stopped caring after being handed the goods each. They flitted away to random corners, planning to establish their own territories and do what they wanted.

As for the others, they had already been sucked into his Nine Hells, and the 9 Demon Lords were currently taking their pick of them to work under them. It had to be known that these Demon Gods were even weaker than some Demon Princes in his bloodline, much less the Demon Lords.

Baal and co would not have any problem controlling them.

Upon absorbing such 'huge' help and slowly 'localizing' it, Draco felt the power of his Horned Demon Inheritance soar and his use of it became greatly smoother compared to before.

This finally answered Draco's question whether increasing the load on his Nine Hells was benevolent or detrimental. Whatever the case, with the portal now wide open for even a behemoth to pass through, Draco rushed out of the realm in his Demon Form.

Outside, he met the usual blockade of Demon Kings and Demon Commanders, but when they saw him, they stood down quietly.

Just as he was about to blast off, a lower Demon came running over. "My Lord! My Lord! It's terrible! Someone is attacking the entire Demon Realm, and she's unstoppable!"

The aura of the Demon Kings and Commanders changed. "Who is it?"

"We do not know the exact identity, but her power shows she is part of the Angel faction at the least. Her attacks containing the Buddhist power of edification, which results in True Death for any Demon struck!"

Hearing this, all those in attendance spat out what was in their mouths and fear engulfed them. True Death? They had not even heard of or considered this concept for so many millenia that they had almost forgotten it.

But here it was, knocking on their doorstep with an excited expression, ready to confess it hot and inescapable feelings for these Demons of high Ranks. Unfortunately, the love was only one-sided, as these fellows panicked and thought of ways to flee.

"Anyone who runs will die!" Draco roared grandly.

The fidgety Demon Lords and Kings paused, remembering that there was a genuine Demon God with them. With such a powerhouse around, how could a measly Angel get her way?

Hahaha, they had been worried for nothing. In fact, they couldn't wait to see how the Demon God would pummel that unruly Angel to death.

Yes, 'pummel'. Draco had a lot of plans for Eva when they reunited, but its execution might not make the Demon Kings happy, rather feel ashamed and bashful.

"Alright, all of you rush to the nearest city and hide there. I will drag her over so you ambush her at the last second to prevent any casualties." Draco commanded.

"Sir yes, sir!" The various Demon complied excitedly. Taking down an actual Angel… maybe they could get a quick taste of heaven's beloved warriors' before passing their sloppy seconds to the Demon God?

Meanwhile, Draco had already contacted Eva and told her which cities to genocide since they had more Demon Kings and Commanders in hiding, who could not escape Eva's senses.

Eva was deeply moved by this gift Draco had prepared for her. Last time he spoke to her, he was in a dire situation so despite bluffing him, she quickly rushed over.

Now, not only was Draco fine and dandy, as he had overcome whatever danger - he even went ahead and wrapped up a special gift for her! What a romantic fellow!

The Demon Commanders and Demon Kings squeezed into the most uncomfortable hiding places, as their sizes were usually not enough to fit into anything proper in the human world.

As such, though they looked comical and silly, this was for the eyes only of each other, so no one would rat it out later on.

But why worry about people finding out? After all, the sudden rain of light accurately and simply passed through each of their foreheads at the same time, destroying their soul cores and turning them into ashes.

By the time Eva was done, she had passed her 10 trillion requirement and hit 12 trillion. The Heaven Realm kept to its word and presented Eva with two new Cultivation Methods that were imparted into her mind via a beam of light.

The first was called Pure Angel Tactics and was the core Cultivation Method of all top-tier Light Angels in the universe.

The second was called Celestial Supremacy Theory, which was the only Cultivation Method for 'supreme beings' or those with the attributes of one, like Eva.

After getting what they wanted, Draco and Eva summoned their mounts once more and slowly exited the Hell Realm. Behind them, the two Elders walked out, their faces drenched with sweat while the Human Commander was in a sorry state.

They all shared uncertain looks, for they knew that these two Little Ancestors had torn up the entire Hell Realm for fun just now.

They didn't even know how to feel anymore....