49 Devil Path

A long silence followed the advice given to the serpent by Spike. The horned merchant seemed to be lost in his thoughts.

Darkscale, on the other hand, was getting tired, and he was feeling that the energy reserves of his formation were reaching low levels. However, he still wanted to ask a couple of question to the horned merchant. Not that he trusted him much, but he still wanted to know what would be his answer if asked about a way to correct the damage to his Natural Heart.

"You may have felt that my Natural Heart is damaged, I corrected most of the injury but it is still far from what it was before... I was wondering if there was a method to-" before the serpent could finish his sentence, he noticed a strange look coming from the merchant.

"What?" he asked, feeling that there was something wrong in what he just said.

"Why would you want to fix a Natural Heart? It will shutter and reform anyways, won't it?" asked Spike with a stunned expression. He had completely put the question about the Natural Heart on the back of his mind the moment he saw the absurd quantity of Supreme Energy in Darkscal's cultivation base. Now that the snake remembered him of that, he was didn't quite understand why someone that followed the Devil Path would care about a Natural Heart.

"What do you mean? A Natural Heart is necessary to start cultivating " said Darkscale, not understanding what wanted to say the horned creature with his words.

"You cultivate Ghost Energy, although your path isn't automatically chosen for you, and you could become an Immortal or a Demon, why would you? Just be done with it and cultivate your Devil Core." said Spike, nodding seriously.

"I followed the instruction in the cultivation Pamphlet, it did ask me to cultivate a Natural Heart" exclaimed the snake. He truly did. Although his cultivation base made it impossible for him to see further the first level of the Pamphlet, he followed it to the letter.

"Why would you follow the instruction of that crap? didn't you read the preface? The Pamphlet is there only to make you understand how Immortals cultivate... we don't practice that stupid enlightenment cultivation of theirs..." continued the merchant with disdain in his voice.

'Preface?' Darkscale didn't change expression, but he internally boiled with anger when he started to understand that he missed an important piece of the document left him by the horned merchant. No, not missed. He didn't "just miss it". Someone had purposely hidden it from him.

'Damn her'

"What is the difference between the way described in the Pamphlet and what you think is the right way?" asked the snake with a placid void.

Spike seemed to be exhausted. Talking to this snake was the most confusing and tiresome thing of the world. He had plenty of strange stories and wrong ideas that needed fixing. Nonetheless, he still responded with the best of his abilities.

"The things described in the Pamphlet are correct if you walk the Immortal Path. However only morons would choose to be Immortals when they could be Devils!" began the horned merchant with passion, his eyes shining with a purple glint.

"The Path of the Immortal is a one of enlightenment and pondering. It's a slow Path. It isn't as bad as the path of Demon or the Buddhist Path, but it comes quite close to them." he continued.

"The Path of the Devil is fast. Not as fast as the God Path, but it is still way faster than the other Paths. Why ponder on something for dozens of years if you could just it take from an Immortal? Why spend your time slowly building up a cultivation base for centuries when you could just rob one from another cultivator?" laughed the horned creature, a cruel glint appearing in his eyes.

"Immortal, Buddhist, Demons... they are farmers, slowly growing their crops thinking about how good it would be the moment when they finally rest to enjoy the fruit of their work. Then here we come, the Devils, reaping what they sowed and killing them if they protest" the horned creature slapped his tight, smiling with an intoxicated look on his face.

"Our strength comes from the Devil Core! It can contain multiple types of energy, unlike the Immortal Furnace or the Demon Heart. In that regard, we are very similar to the Buddhist, but contrary to their Infant Spirit, our Devil Core doesn't help us to seek enlightenment. In fact, it's quite the contrary. " his face suddenly sobered up, and long lines appeared on his forehead.

"Do not think that our blessings are infinite, though. While the Path of the Devil is like a shortcut, it is a very dangerous one. Not only because you'll have to compete to death with other people, but also because you'll have to keep your own self in check." warned him the figure on the black screen.

"We as Devils can plunder the cultivation of others and become incredibly powerful without doing anything else but killing and robbing, but in exchange, we lose out in Soul Quality. Meaning that if you're not careful enough, if your core contains too many different energies that aren't bound together in some way... well, you could start to turn into a mindless beast attacking with rage everything that's around it."

Darkscale was captivated by the words of the merchant. So this was the Devil Path that Carelia wanted him so much to cultivate? If it had been anything else he would have probably tried to not do what the strange MAID wanted him to do. However, the way that Spike explained it made it impossible for the serpent to not be absolutely excited about it.

A way to progress in cultivation without doing any meditation and enlightenment? That was his dream. While in the last year he progressed immensely in his Manipulation Skills, he didn't advance at all in his cultivation. Cultivating was incredibly difficult, even with the help of Star Leaf.

"How do I build a Devil Core?" he asked immediately.

The merchant gave him a strange look. He truly didn't understand this young reptile. Why did he ask him such an easy question while he could just read the prologue to the Pamphlet?

"You already have one..."

"What?"

"Your energy container is already a Devil Core... well, almost a complete one... it's cracked, but that's ok. It will crack and shatter eventually when you break to a new cultivation rank..." revealed the horned merchant to an amazed Darkscale.

'What the hell?' thought the serpent. All the effort that he used to heal his Natural Heart was a complete waste of time?

"I don't understand... my energy container is a Natural Heart, I was told that I needed to first complete it to change it to a Devil Core, that's what-"

Spike interrupted the snake with a large movement of his hand.

"Devil Cores are also called Natural Hearth by the other Paths... however, that's mostly to indicate Devil Cores with only one type of energy and from someone that has all intention of transforming it to something else." he explained.

Darkscale opened his mouth to ask another question, but then he stopped halfway. He looked at the energy in the pit before him and sighed.

"I need to go" He simply stated.

"I will immediately make contact with support to make someone localize and come to control the MAID... In the meantime try to not follow any other advice from this Carelia. Especially in cultivation!" answered Spike, a look of concern appearing on his long face.

"Goodbye, Master Darkscale"

Immediately after, the horned creature disappeared into the black screen. Darkscale suddenly stopped maintaining the rune that made the transmission operative. Then, without resting a single moment, he darted like a flying arrow towards a little opening on the ceiling of the cave.

He emerged into a large cave, with a huge wooden basin containing a yellowish boiling liquid. Giving a light tap with his tail on the terrain next to the hole from which he had just emerged, the serpent moved fast towards the large container of water, jumping inside it.

Behind him, the hole magically closed up, as a formation fleshed for a brief instant in the place the snake had lightly tapped.

When his scales touched the yellow liquid, it immediately started to corrode them and penetrate into his skin. However, the reptile didn't move nor emit any lament.

"D, are you there? We need to talk, immediately!" echoed in the cave an agitated voice after a dozen seconds that he was inside the yellow liquid.