Chapter 128: Contract (5)
Chapter 128: Contract (5)
The demons of Nippur were deeply disappointed that their latest scheme had failed.
If it had succeeded, they could have finally ended the tedious work they had been carrying out for the past thirty years and crossed over to Earth to unleash the wickedness they had been suppressing for so long.
Furthermore, as humans—sensing a crisis due to the appearance of demons—began to unite and take the portals seriously, the number of uncleared portals had plummeted.
For thirty years, the demons had been fragmenting Nippur to create dungeons.
Like worms eating through fruit, they had been destroying Nippur, and time was not an infinite resource for the demons, either.
Although Nippur was a massive planet and many monsters remained, the demons couldn't help but feel impatient.
Had they not seen such a golden opportunity, they might not have felt this way, but their vanguard had already reached Earth, built a fortress, and erected a Black Spire.
Everything had been proceeding so smoothly that the Black Spire on Earth was already connected to the one in Nippur; it was practically a finished deal.
Because their plans were thwarted so unexpectedly early, they felt even more rushed and irritated.
There were five Evil Gods slumbering in Nippur: Lucifer, Mammon, Leviathan, Asmodeus, and Baal. The vanguard sent this time consisted of demons who followed Baal.
They had been chosen based on the judgment that their exceptional talent for dark magic would allow them to quickly erect Black Spires, build fortresses, and widen the holes in the dimensional barrier.
Though the demons were furious at the failure, they had no one to blame.
As they discussed how to respond moving forward, no clear solution emerged despite their lengthy deliberations.
Because Baal’s demons had failed this time, they remained silent, while the demons following the other Evil Gods took the lead in offering opinions.
The most proactive were the followers of Mammon.
They suggested placing artifacts inside the dungeons to stimulate and exploit human greed.
Herod, the leader of Mammon’s demons, was a slim demon in a golden coat who looked remarkably human.
Standing over two meters tall, he appeared gaunt, yet he didn't seem fragile in the slightest.
These demons originated from the avarice of sentient beings. Whenever they invaded a world, they delighted in tempting and corrupting its inhabitants with wealth.
They were sometimes looked down upon by other demons because their pure, raw power was inferior to those who served other Evil Gods.
However, their ability to bribe and sow discord to cause internal collapse was incredibly useful. Furthermore, as demons of greed, they possessed a vast array of artifacts, goods, and resources, so they could not be openly ignored.
"We must use the humans."
"Do you have a way?"
Sitri, a follower of Asmodeus, snapped back irritably.
She was a female demon who looked like a human with pale skin, but she was famous for her immense martial prowess. She disliked Mammon’s demons and never showed a favorable attitude during these meetings.
"My subordinates have confirmed that the dimensional barrier has weakened slightly overall."
"We confirmed that too. But they said nothing would change in the current situation, didn't they?"
"That is why we must use the humans. Looking at how dungeons are being cleared now, they are just rushing through without gathering artifacts. How long do you think those creatures can hold out?"
Herod trusted in human greed.
Since the demons had been sending artifacts for so long, he was certain they had become an integral part of the Awakeners' lives.
Herod’s prediction was accurate.
During the two weeks Han Shin and his party were busy leveling up in the Siberia region, discontent began to simmer.
Just as Herod intended, obtaining artifacts from dungeons had become so deeply ingrained in human society that it was now impossible to strip away.
Over the years, artifacts had become essential tools for enhancing and supporting an Awakener's combat power.
The problem was that these could not be manufactured; they could only be found in dungeons. In recent years, excavating and extracting artifacts from dungeons had become a vital industry.
However, due to the appearance of demons, public opinion had shifted toward clearing dungeons as quickly as possible rather than indulging in such luxuries.
At first, because everyone had witnessed the demons' strength, no one could voice their complaints about this direction.
But the fickle nature of the human heart revealed itself in just a week.
The first to move were, naturally, the large clans of various nations.
To them, dungeons were a business.
If they simply cleared a dungeon, it was a reality that no profit would be generated.
Thus, the goal of the large clans was to find artifacts in the shortest time possible before clearing the dungeon, and they preferred to delay the clear as long as they were searching.
But the Association, citing the appearance of demons, recommended that they stop being leisurely and clear the dungeons immediately.
Even when they first heard this, there was a lot of dissatisfaction.
"If we don't even excavate artifacts, how are we supposed to survive while clearing dungeons?"
The revenue of large clans ultimately came from excavating artifacts and selling them to Awakeners and civilians.
Since this cut off their source of income, they couldn't last a week before banding together to demand that the Association allow them to excavate artifacts, provided they had the monsters firmly under control.
The Association also faced pressure from various social classes and acknowledged that the change had been too radical.
The large clans used the logic that artifacts were continuously needed to face the powerful demons.
In the end, the Association relaxed the regulations, adjusting them so that if the monsters were clearly suppressed to the point where they could be killed at any time, the clear could proceed slowly.
They stipulated that Association staff must be present to verify this, and the large clans accepted the terms.
The demons monitored the logs—the records transmitted back when the dungeons they sent were cleared.
They realized that the humans on Earth had begun to intentionally delay dungeon clears again to excavate artifacts.
Seeing that the humans could not overcome their greed and were moving to find artifacts again, just as Herod said, the other demons marveled at the situation Mammon’s followers had engineered.
The seeds sown over a very long period were now becoming a great strength for the demons, and naturally, Herod gained influence in the demons' council.
On the other hand, Sitri, who had previously reacted sharply and was on bad terms with Herod, had no choice but to remain silent.
"We've confirmed the humans want artifacts again... so, what's next?"
"I will use artifacts that can tempt even the most greed-filled humans."
"You have such things?"
"We developed them in secret, and coincidentally, they were recently completed."
Herod had promised immense rewards to certain demons under Mammon if the plan succeeded, convincing them to discard their physical forms and inhabit artifacts as spirits.
Ego Artifacts.
Granting an ego to an object was a feat usually reserved for the gods, but Herod had found a workaround.
To put it simply, it was like a human sacrifice.
It involved sacrificing a demon to create an Ego Artifact.
He had been secretly experimenting on low-ranking demons who were indebted to Mammon’s followers, and he had finally succeeded recently.
He had been waiting for the right timing to use them, and Herod judged that now—when humans were desperate for artifacts and vulnerable to temptation—was the optimal moment.
The demons, hearing from Herod what the Ego Artifacts were, praised his preparation and were lavish with their compliments.
Naturally, there were those who felt dissatisfied, most notably Sitri.
She felt a sense of revulsion at the idea of creating tools by sacrificing their own kind.
No matter how much a demon was a mad being that enjoyed destroying and slaughtering others, and even if they fought for power among themselves, using their own kind as experimental subjects to turn them into artifacts was incomprehensible to Sitri.
However, most of the demons were currently driven mad with desire after having experienced a situation where they almost reached Earth.
Under normal circumstances, this was something they might have used as a pretext to attack or check him, but instead, no one did. They praised him, their minds filled only with thoughts of corrupting humans to open the gates and cross over.
'They've all gone mad...'
Sitri was also a cold demon who remained faithful to the law of the jungle, a terrifying figure to other sentient beings.
For someone like her to think the surrounding demons were mad was an exceptional occurrence.
But even so, she couldn't step forward to oppose it.
No, there was no need to.
If he had suggested sacrificing Asmodeus’s demons, she would have refused, but since he was sacrificing Mammon’s own demons, she had no grounds to object.
Sitri decided to wait and see for now.
'As long as I can get to Earth...'
Regardless of the method, she too wanted to cross over to Earth and fight.