Three Months

Splurt— Thud!!!

The gushing sound of blood could be heard which was followed by the sound of a body falling to the ground.

A pair of blood-red eyes calmly looked at the corpse.

Sigh—

A boy could be seen kneeling in front of a corpse as he placed his hands on the body of the person he had just killed.

[Indiscriminate Absorption]

The corpse turned to black gaseous energy before being absorbed by the boy's palm.

After the process was done, he walked towards the table at the center and grabbed 4 loaves of bread.

He also grabbed a bowl of soup before walking towards the nearby tree and sitting under its shade.

'Time sure passed by quickly…'

The boy, Regis, thought as he bit the bread.

It had been around three months since his first time massacring a village.

Since then, he and the other children had raided villages every week.

It was a miracle that he didn't lose his mind.

'It's all thanks to this…'

He thought as he looked at the golden gift in his consciousness.

Frankly, if it had not been for his gift of Tranquility, he would have had a hard time not falling into insanity.

In fact, even with his gift, there were times where the voices of the innocent lives he killed echoed in his ears.

After chewing, Regis brought the soup to his mouth and took a sip.

A feeling of calmness washed out his mind.

'About this…' A light flashed in Regis's eyes.

Upon his careful investigation and information gathering in these past few months, he was able to discover a few things.

First was the calming agent on the soup.

'It's to help us counter the mind-corrupting effect of demonic power…'

Demonic power was a power exclusive to devils and demons, it was a power that held pure evil within it.

As humans like them were subject to it, it would inevitably affect their minds.

This would lead to them being more irritable, impatient, and bloodthirsty.

The soup was something that were given to them in order to counter the effect of demonic power.

Regis had also learned that he and the other 112 demonic children were investments.

At first, he was confused as to no matter what happened, not one of them died.

Sure, there were times in which they were threatened that they would die and that they almost died.

But no one died.

There were still 113 of them even to this day.

Then after eavesdropping on the conversation of some drunk demonic humans, Regis found out that they were special.

Not the good type of special, but the bad one.

He discovered that demonic power wasn't meant to be wielded by mortals and the consequences that accompanied it.

However, he and the other children all had pure demonic power in their bodies.

This confused him as to what made them special, since there are lots of demonic humans in the camp.

After all, aren't demonic humans called as such because they use demonic power?

It turned out to not be as simple as that.

Demonic humans were divided into two.

Inferior and Superior.

Inferior demonic humans are humans who had their stars corrupted by demonic power, enhancing their power more than those of the same realm.

However, it would also lead them to be controlled by their desires.

Superior demonic humans on the other hand, were demonic humans that have contracted a demon.

Regis had limited information about them.

The only thing he knew was that the leader was a superior demonic human.

Regis also remembered the demonic humans who fought Aunt Amabel.

Even though they were demonic humans, they still used aura.

This meant that his and the other children's ability to utilize pure demonic power was special.

'As for what kind of investments we are… I still need to investigate further.'

There was something that has all of Regis's attention right now; the formation of stars in his heart.

Through connecting the pieces of information he gained from eavesdropping, Regis discovered something.

It was the fact that he and the other children were the strongest in the Starless Realm.

This was brought upon by the demonic power and their evil craft.

Indiscriminate Absorption lets them acquire demonic power rapidly at the expense of making their demonic power overly corrupted.

Therefore, no one in the Starless Realm could compete with them.

He also found out that it would take at least a Peak Stage Two Star professional who pursues the path of either mana or aura in order to kill a single one of them.

This made Regis have some understanding about the power difference between energies.

In short, demonic power was way stronger than both mana and aura.

However, there was a problem.

He and the other demonic children could nurture demonic power with terrifying speed through Indiscriminate Absorption. 

However, this also came with consequences.

Said consequences was the fact that neither he nor the other children would be able to form stars in their hearts throughout their lives.

It was the consequence they got in exchange for their rapid increase in power.

The demonic power they got through Indiscriminate Absorption was too corrupted.

The life force of the lives they absorbed endlessly mixed with each other, becoming extremely unstable.

This deprived them of the stability and precise control they needed to manipulate the corrupted demonic power into the formation of stars.

In short, their power output was abnormally strong, but their control was also abnormally low.

Well, that was what normally would be the case.

What would happen if someone were to adapt perfectly to the corrupted demonic power in his heart?

That was what Regis was thinking of right now.

As for mana, he did not have the opportunity to absorb more corpses with energy within them.

After all, the few villages they raided were only the ones that didn't have warriors or mages guarding it.

Besides, Regis was afraid to absorb mana in the surrounding within the presence of the demonic humans in fear of being discovered.

Thus, he chose to focus his attention to the massive quantity demonic power in his heart first.

"Hey, Regis!"

Hearing someone call him, Regis turned his head.

There, he saw Greg and Lea walking towards him with food in their hands.