"Hey, what is going on here?"
The voice cut through the ambient noise of suffering souls with enough authority to make every worker in the chamber freeze mid-motion.
The demon researcher snapped his head up from his instrunts instantly.
His expression shifted from confused concern to pure terror in the span of a single heartbeat.
Standing behind him was sothing that made his survival instincts scream warnings his brain could barely process.
It was Chevrik.
He was a known close aide to one of the Seven Demon Kings.
Specifically, he answered directly to Lucifer, the Demon King of Pride himself.
The creature possessed multiple eyes that were way too many and arranged in patterns that actually hurt to look at directly.
Those eyes tracked every movent in the chamber with a heavy, predatory focus.
His presence radiated power that made the air feel heavier and thicker, almost like breathing suddenly required a conscious effort from everyone in the room.
Every demon in the facility recognized him on sight.
Which ant everyone imdiately understood that they were about to have a very, very bad day.
"L-Lord Chevrik!"
The lead researcher practically tripped over his own two feet rushing to bow properly.
His colleagues followed suit with varying degrees of panic, and their heads dropped low enough to suggest they were trying to rge with the floor tiles.
Chevrik kept his expression cold as his gaze shifted toward the monitoring station.
"I asked what was going on. Answer ."
The command left zero room for deflection or excuses.
The researcher swallowed hard before gesturing toward the displays with trembling hands.
"It is the absorption readings, my lord. They have been dropping steadily over the past forty-eight hours. The current decline rate is approximately eight percent and it is accelerating."
Silence crashed through the chamber like a physical weight.
Chevrik moved to the station with a fluid grace that made his hulking form look deceptively light.
His multiple eyes scanned the data with frightening speed as he processed the numbers and patterns faster than any normal mind could track.
Then his expression shifted.
Shock flickered across his features for just a mont before being replaced by sothing colder, sharper, and infinitely more dangerous.
"Are you sure you did not ss sothing up here?"
The question ca out quiet.
It was too quiet.
It was the kind of calm that usually preceded extre violence.
"W-We would not dare to!"
The lead researcher let his voice crack as he stamred the denial.
Around him, the other workers bobbed their heads in frantic agreent, and their expressions scread desperation to avoid being made an example of.
Chevrik snorted.
His gaze swept across the gathered demons with a contempt that suggested he found their competence questionable at best.
"Return to your stations right now. See if you can do sothing about this pathetic decline."
The order was dismissed with a wave that made it clear further discussion was neither welco nor tolerated.
"Y-Yes, my lord!"
The researchers scattered like roaches when the lights ca on, and they practically tripped over each other in their haste to look busy and useful.
Chevrik turned away from the chaos and strode toward the exit with a purpose that suggested he had more important places to be.
His mind raced through implications that made his non-existent forehead break out in a cold sweat.
'There are no more souls to harvest.'
The realization hit with the weight of a catastrophic failure.
'And judging from the location... it seems to be coming from Legendor.'
He had heard reports from Master Lucifer recently about the heroes discovering and eradicating their planted operatives within that damned city of light.
The matter had not been considered substantial at the ti.
The real objective, which was corrupting high-level dungeons and establishing the soul harvesting infrastructure, had already been completed before detection.
Sure, planting traitors and organizing coup attempts through brainwashing would have been a nice bonus damage, but it was never the main goal anyway.
Legendor had too many heroes, too much concentrated divine power, and too many individuals capable of detecting corruption for a long-term stealth operation.
Infiltration was always going to be temporary at best.
But the corrupted monsters?
Those should have continued feeding the harvest regardless of what the heroes did.
The frawork was designed specifically to account for heroic interference.
If they killed a corrupted monster, its soul still returned to the container as energy.
The heroes could band together and slaughter every enhanced creature in Legendor, and it would not matter because the essence would flow back through the connection embedded in those Evolution Orbs.
That was the brilliance of the system.
Heroes could win battles and feel accomplished while unknowingly fueling the very catastrophe they were trying to prevent.
It was a perfect loop of despair that they were too blind to see.
Except now...
'There is nothing coming back at all!'
Not a single soul.
There was no energy flowing through the established connections.
It was complete radio silence from an entire region that should have been producing a steady stream of spiritual essence.
And that only ant one thing.
'Soone was capable of disrupting the connection of the monster souls themselves.'
Chevrik narrowed his multiple eyes as his mind worked through the limited possibilities.
As a close aide to Lucifer, as a dark being proficient in souls and desires, and as the supervisor overseeing this massive project, he knew the specs inside and out.
He understood the frawork intimately.
The architecture of the soul harvesting system was not sothing that could be accidentally disrupted by a random mage.
It required either incredibly specific knowledge about how the connections functioned, or power on a scale that could simply override the magical infrastructure through brute force.
Either option was bad news.
It was very bad news.
He needed to report this imdiately.
Master Lucifer had to know that their carefully constructed harvest was experiencing catastrophic failure in...
*Thump!*
Chevrik felt his thoughts derail as sothing collided with him.
It was hard.
His body stopped moving as the impact transferred force through his demonic fra.
For a mont, genuine confusion flickered across his expression.
What the hell just hit him?
He looked down.
A low-ranking demon was leaning against him heavily, and his entire weight was pressing forward like he had lost the ability to support himself.
The creature breathed in a ragged and uneven rhythm, and his movents carried the sloppy coordination of soone who had consud way too much of whatever passed for alcohol in this place.
Was this bastard drunk?
Chevrik felt his confusion evaporate, and it was quickly replaced by pure rage that made the air around him shimr with heat.
His multiple eyes focused on the pathetic creature with a murderous intent that should have made any sane person flee imdiately.
"Are you an idiot?"
The words ca out venomous enough to lt steel.
"Watch where you are going, you worthless rookie."
"S-Sorry! I am so sorry!"
The low-ranking demon trembled violently, and his voice cracked with a fear that seed genuine enough.
"I... I was told to report sothing! It is confidential information! I was not looking where I was going, and I apologize!"
Chevrik felt his rage falter slightly.
Confidential information?
His analytical mind kicked in despite his anger, and he began processing the statent for tactical value.
"... What information?"
Impatience bled through his tone.
He did not have ti for this nonsense, but if it was actually important, he needed to hear it.
"And who told you to report it?"
The demon seed to let his trembling intensify to the point where standing upright looked like a genuine struggle.
He opened his mouth, closed it, and then managed to stamr out words that ca in fits and starts.
"The one who told to report is..."
He stepped closer, leaning in like he was about to whisper sothing sensitive directly into Chevrik's ear.
"... ."
The word landed like a physical blow.
Chevrik felt his danger instincts explode with alarm bells that made his survival reflexes scream warnings his conscious mind barely had ti to process.
His entire body tensed instantly, and his muscles coiled for defensive action or imdiate retreat.
Because he felt it now.
Beneath the demonic disguise, beneath the trembling act, and beneath everything that should have registered as familiar, there was sothing else.
Divine energy.
It was clean, radiant, and utterly incompatible with demonic essence in ways that made his skin crawl.
'A god!'
The realization crashed through his thoughts with the force of inevitability.
Without hesitation, Chevrik began channeling power toward his true form.
The transformation would give him combat capabilities far beyond his current state, providing enough raw power to fight back or at least create an opening for escape.
He just needed one second to complete the shift.
'Nu-uh.'
The voice registered in his ears with a casual amusent that made his blood run cold.
'It would be troubleso if others were to detect right now.'
The "trembling" demon shifted his entire deanor in an instant.
The fear evaporated like it had never existed, replaced by a calm confidence that radiated predatory satisfaction.
His expression smoothed into a smile that promised nothing good.
Then he moved.
A dagger materialized in his hand faster than Chevrik's enhanced perception could properly track.
The blade glead with a light that hurt to look at directly, radiating holy energy so concentrated it made the surrounding darkness recoil.
It stabbed forward.
Chevrik tried to dodge, tried to activate his defensive abilities, and tried to do literally anything.
But his body would not respond.
So force held him in place with invisible restraints that made movent impossible.
The dagger punched through his chest with surgical precision.
Pain exploded across his consciousness as the weapon pierced his heart.
But that was not the worst part.
The worst part was feeling his regeneration fail.
His high-speed healing that should have kicked in automatically, and that had saved him from countless lethal injuries throughout his existence, just... did not work.
The wound did not close.
It got worse.
The blade twisted slightly, and he felt tissue tearing in ways that should not be possible with his demonic constitution.
His miasma, the dark energy that fueled his abilities and sustained his form, sealed away completely like it had been cut off at the source.
Horror crashed through Chevrik's thoughts as understanding hit him.
This was not just a weapon.
This was sothing specifically designed to kill beings like him permanently.
Blood stained his lips as he forced words out through sheer willpower.
"W-Who are you...?!"
His bloodshot eyes remained fixated on the smiling figure in front of him as he desperately tried to identify the threat that had ended his existence with such casual ease.
"Why don't you take a guess?"
The mysterious god let his voice carry a playful amusent that suggested this entire encounter was entertainnt for him.
Chevrik felt his mind race despite the pain.
The disguise that had fooled even an archdemon like him.
The divine energy hidden beneath demonic essence.
The casual confidence and theatricality of the attack.
The pieces connected with horrible clarity.
"L-Loki...?!"
The na ca out half-question and half-accusation.
"90 points."
The figure saw his smile widen.
"Since it took you so long to answer."
The demonic skin lted away like wax under heat.
Features shifted, reford, and revealed the truth that had been hiding beneath layers of deception.
Standing in front of Chevrik's dying form was exactly who he had guessed.
Loki.
The Trickster God, known across pantheons for shapeshifting abilities and cunningness that made planning around him nearly impossible.
'B-But why...?'
The question ford in Chevrik's fading consciousness but never made it to sound.
His body turned to ash before the words could escape, disintegrating into particles that scattered across the stone floor.
And just like that, a high-ranking archdemon died instantly.
"..."
Loki stood there for a mont, watching the remains disperse with an expression that suggested mild satisfaction.
He wore a hooded robe now, and the demonic disguise was completely abandoned.
Black gloves covered his hands, and his eyes glead with patterns that suggested he was seeing things beyond normal perception.
He looked down at the dagger in his grip with genuine appreciation.
"As expected of a holy weapon ant to truly kill demons."
The blade caught light that should not exist in this dark chamber, and its edge was still radiating power that made the surrounding shadows recoil.
Harpē.
The legendary weapon used by Perseus to behead the Gorgon dusa.
It was a sword capable of killing beings that normal weapons could not even scratch.
Loki felt his smile shift into sothing more complicated as he turned the blade over, examining it from different angles.
His eyes glowed with that strange pattern again, tracking connections invisible to anyone else.
"You ought to thank , old man."
The words were directed at no one present, spoken to soone who could not hear them through distance or circumstance.
His expression carried satisfaction mixed with anticipation, like he had just completed the setup for a joke with a punchline that would not land for days.
Around him, the chamber continued its grim work.
Souls scread, energy flowed, and the massive pillar pulsed with corrupted power.
None of it registered his presence.
None of it detected the infiltration that had just eliminated a high-ranking supervisor with casual efficiency.
Loki glanced toward the exit, then back at the monitoring stations where terrified demons scrambled to fix problems they could not understand.
His smile widened further.
This was going to be entertaining.
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