Chapter 396: Don’t trust that Demon
[WARNING!]
[ERROR: Soul Binding Failed - Multiple Restrictions]
[Target: Ren Ryzard]
[Class: Sovereign]
[Status: LIVING]
[Level: ???]
[RESTRICTION 1: EQUIPNT INSUFFICIENT]
[Soul Warden Set: 2/3 pieces acquired (FRACTURED)]
[Mask of Soul Warden (FRACTURED)]
[Chain of Soul Warden (FRACTURED)]
[Third Piece: UNKNOWN LOCATION]
[Sovereign-class entities and above require at least 2/3 pieces in RESTORED condition for soul binding.]
[Current Status: Fractured pieces only permit binding up to Disaster-class entities]
[RESTRICTION 2: LIVING ENTITY]
[Binding living beings incurs a 1,000× death token multiplier.]
[Base Cost (Sovereign-class): 250,000 tokens]
[Living Entity Multiplier: ×1,000]
[Total Cost: 250,000,000 tokens]
[Current Balance: 37,052,250 tokens]
[Deficit: 212,947,750 tokens]
[WARNING: BOTH restrictions must be satisfied to proceed]
[Recomndation 1: Seek a previous Soul Warden to restore fractured pieces]
[Recomndation 2: Accumulate 212,947,750 additional death tokens]
[Alternative Option: Terminating target removes the condition, reducing cost to base 250,000 tokens.]
Jack stared at the notifications floating in his vision, his mind processing the numbers. Two hundred fifty million tokens. The amount was staggering, even with his current wealth of thirty-seven million.
He’d need to farm another two hundred thirteen million tokens to bind one living Sovereign-class entity.
Or he could kill Ren first and reduce the cost to essentially nothing.
But the problem with that was he didn’t know if he could kill Ren. And the other issue is that he can’t bind Sovereign, Emperor, or Tyrant Class.
The temptation was there. One lightning bolt to the head, one mont of violence, and the entire problem simplified itself.
Ren would be dead, bindable for pocket change, and Jack would have a Sovereign-class warrior in his army.
But sothing about that option left a bitter taste in his mouth.
Ren stood there, eyes still closed, waiting patiently for the binding to complete. Trusting, despite three hundred years of betrayal, teaches him better.
Jack dismissed the system notifications with a thought. "The only way I can take you with ," he said carefully, "is through a contract with S. But he’s not here currently."
He paused, eting Ren’s star-bright eyes as they opened. "Or by killing you and then binding your soul."
Ren’s expression didn’t change, but sothing flickered behind those ancient eyes. But, it wasn’t fear.
"No," Ren said. "Neither option is acceptable."
Jack’s eyebrow rose. "Explain."
Ren took a breath, his massive fra shifting slightly as he organized his thoughts. "If you were to kill
and then bind my soul, I would lose certain mories I have. It’s a side effect of reviving souls through binding. The process... damages things. Fragnts of who I was would cease to exist."
Jack’s mind imdiately went to Pho. After the Deathfrost Demon had been killed and bound, Jack had tried interrogating him about the titan’s body. Simple questions about who was helping him.
Pho couldn’t answer them.
Not because he refused. His blank white eyes had carried genuine confusion, his voice had held frustration. The Deathfrost Demon’s brain couldn’t rember the answers. The mories were gone, erased by whatever process revived souls through Soul Magic.
Jack had assud it was just Pho. A quirk of how demon psychology interacted with resurrection. But if it was a universal side effect of binding...
"What mories would you lose?" Jack asked.
"I don’t know," Ren replied, his voice carrying frustration. "That’s the problem. The binding doesn’t target specific mories. It’s random. I could lose my combat training. I could lose knowledge of my enemies. I could forget why I wanted freedom in the first place." His jaw tightened. "I’ve spent three hundred years rembering everything that was done to . Every face. Every betrayal. Every mont of that curse being cast. I won’t risk losing that for convenient resurrection."
Jack nodded slowly. The logic was sound. If Ren’s mories were his primary motivation, binding him as a corpse would defeat the entire purpose.
"And the contract option?" Jack asked.
Ren’s expression hardened. "You shouldn’t rely on S’s contracts."
The words hung in the air like a warning.
"Why not?" Jack asked, though sothing in his gut already knew he wasn’t going to like the answer.
"Because S is a Contract Demon," Ren said, his voice carrying the weight of soone who’d seen this before.
"The more contracts he has, the stronger he gets. Each agreent feeds him power, builds his influence, expands his capabilities." He t Jack’s gaze directly. "And if he accumulates enough contracts, if he grows strong enough, he can break any contract he’s made with anyone."
The words hit Jack like cold water.
S had contracts with Rhys, Jack, and almost 30,000 demons. How many others existed that Jack didn’t know about? How many agreents had S established over the centuries of his existence?
’Centuries,’ Jack thought, his mind racing. ’S has existed for centuries. How many contracts has he made in that ti? Hundreds? Thousands?’
The Contract Demon had seed so helpful, so cooperative. Always appearing exactly when needed, always offering solutions that benefited Jack.
But what if all of that was building toward sothing larger? What if S was accumulating power through contracts until he reached a threshold where he could break free of all obligations?
And it might not even be Jack’s contract he wanted to break. Maybe S was perfectly content serving Jack. Maybe there was so other agreent, so other binding from centuries past that S wanted to escape. A debt to soone more powerful. A restriction imposed by sothing S feared.
Jack had no way of knowing. No way to verify what S’s true motivations were, because a Contract Demon’s entire existence was built on deception.
’I have a mighty demon roaming Erebon,’ Jack thought, ice forming in his chest. ’Most likely waiting until he’s strong enough to break whatever contract he actually wants to escape. And I’m just another piece on whatever board he’s playing.’
The realization wasn’t comforting.
However, it was also not imdiately actionable. S wasn’t here. Jack couldn’t confront him about it. And even if he could, what would he say? "Are you planning to betray
eventually?" wasn’t a question that would yield honest answers from soone whose entire nature revolved around contractual loopholes.
Besides, until S actually broke a contract, he remained useful. Possibly essential. Jack couldn’t afford to alienate the one being who could facilitate agreents with living creatures without the astronomical token costs.
He filed the concern away for later consideration and refocused on the imdiate problem.
"Then you’ll have to wait," Jack said, his voice firm. "A good amount of ti before you can leave the tower. I need to restore my Soul Warden pieces and accumulate the tokens necessary to bind you properly."
Ren’s jaw tightened, but he nodded slowly.
"However," Jack continued, his tone hardening, "the people here are under my protection. You will not strike them. Sylph, Rhys, Loryn, Pho, everyone on this floor exists under my authority. If you want your revenge, you’ll have to wait."
The bloodlust that had been simring beneath Ren’s surface threatened to flare again, red aura flickering at the edges of his form.
"Or," Jack added, "you can tell
the spirits’ nas."
Ren’s star-bright eyes narrowed. "What could you possibly want with that information?"
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