The Realm of Gods

The walls of the cocoon melted away to reveal the new world, leaving the devil frozen in awe. The first thing he noticed was the air, it was rich with Devil Essence; his body soaked in as much as it could, as if it were afraid that the essence would disappear. Contrary to this, no matter how much essence he absorbed, the concentration of Devil Essence remained unchanged, as if it were endless.

Sensing the energy that flowed through every inch of his body, the devil felt an orgasmic bliss. This was power. He exhaled, removing the final traces of the demonic mana that had previously filled his body. Now he had truly become a devil.

After attuning his body, the devil surveyed his surroundings, with the first thing he noticed being the lack of light. No, it wasn't a lack of light, the darkness felt unnatural as if it was hung over the lands the devil stood in. There were various points in the dark where light seemed to be trying to pierce through but naturally, the devil didn't care. This was simply an observation he made, the darkness didn't affect him at all. He was able to see through it with ease.

From this alone, it was clear that this area of the Realm of Gods was an environment that favoured devils. The devil had assumed that the Realm of Gods was made up of a single environment in which the devils and gods dwelled together. But this assumption had been proven wrong as soon as he had entered the realm.

This made things easier for the devil.

Now, he only needed to be cautious of other devils.

Having lived his whole life as a demon, from the bottom to the peak, he had seen it all. Never trust a demon. That was the best way to summarise his experiences, this naturally translated to his current situation as well: never trust a devil. 

Returning his focus to his surroundings, he noticed a peculiarity, the earth was barren yet trees still grew. A whole forest of them stood before him. But these weren't your typical trees, every branch of these trees was covered in blood-red leaves, and the bark was charcoal black as if it had been burnt. And finally, the faces. A face had been etched into every trunk, and if you focused on the eyes of these faces you would notice tears continuously falling.

The devil didn't know this, but what stood before him was one of the greatest works of the devils. 

The Forest of the Damned.

Who were the damned?

They were gods. Gods that had been captured during battles, newly ascended gods that were kidnapped from the point of ascension and the children of Gods, stolen away from their homes.

They were all brought here and through a ritual were turned into Blood Harvest trees. A god's blood essence would be slowly extracted and turned into the leaves that covered the branches of these trees. However, that was not the end.

Once there was no longer any space for any more leaves to grow, all the leaves would fuse to form a Blood Fruit that could be consumed by devils to strengthen themselves. The formation of the first Blood Fruit also signified that the god could no longer be transformed back to their original state, they would eternally remain a Blood Harvest tree.

And this really was eternal, as a God's blood essence could regenerate unlike a mortal, which is why the tree's extraction rate was equivalent to the god's blood essence regeneration rate, to create an equilibrium.

These gods could do nothing to escape, they were forever trapped with excruciating pain being the only sensation they could feel.

As the devil was inspecting the various faces on each trunk, he felt a wave of information flood his brain. Information regarding rules, faith and his title.

Ignoring the first two, the devil thought about the title that the Origin had granted him. Honestly, there was nothing to think about, the Devil nodded his head as if agreeing with the Origin's choice.

"It's a perfect title, there is nothing else that could describe as perfectly as this"

"After all, my Demon Path or should I say Devil Path only ever focused on this"

The Devil of Corruption

The devil was right, it was a perfect title.

From the start of his life as a weak foot soldier to his current position in life as a devil, he had only ever focused on corruption. He still remembered his first success, it was a horse.

Although it wasn't as impressive as corrupting an intelligent race but it was a starting point. The horse showed a lot of hostility at the start, after all, he killed its rider, but it was the perfect target to corrupt. Turning enemies against their people was the true essence of corruption, you could imagine the faces of the elven soldiers when they saw one of their horses trampling over their ranks.

Compare that to the devil's final act in the Mortal Realm, where he corrupted the upper echelons of various empires and kingdoms of the continent of Azuria, and instigated a continental war to gather the necessary sacrifices needed for his ascension.

"The Devil of Corruption...I've come so far"

The devil was lost in thought, thinking about the life he had lived just to reach this position, but then he burst out into laughter.

"It doesn't matter what kind of life I lived, I'm a devil now, thoughts of my mortal life are useless, what matters now is growing my Devil Path"

With this, he turned his attention to the other information, the rules and faith. The rules were quite simple but there were two that grabbed his attention: Gods and Devils are unable to interfere with worlds that they lack influence in and, Gods and Devils cannot descend into worlds that they do not own.

"Influence and world ownership, things just got interesting"

The Devil of Corruption had a wide grin on his face, influencing was something he was quite good at.

The grin widened further after he learnt about faith, simply put faith was used to raise their existence to higher levels, it would be what the devil would use to raise his Devil Path. But this was not why his grin widened, it was how faith was obtained that caused this.

Faith was generated by mortals believing in and spreading the word of the higher being. The more mortals that followed the religion of a higher being, the more faith they would receive. There couldn't have been a more easier method for the Devil of Corruption to strengthen himself.

The devil's interest in the Forest of the Damned disappeared, he now only had one thought in his mind.

'Time to find a world to corrupt'