BOOM!

A loud eruption was heard followed by hundreds more. In a land that was covered by smoke and ash, where the green life was withered, but extensive in areas, lava flowed like rivers and demonic creatures covered the land.

This was Hell, the home of the demon and devils.

All through the land, demon spawn pits covered the land and millions to almost billions of imps ran and slaughtered each other, changing and growing rapidly through the lower levels.

Only a rare imp would have a rare mutation and become a devil or gain sentience before level 31. Only those above this level were allowed into the demon cities that littered the land.

Demon cities were home to all devil kind, in hell, devil’s were the rulers. Demons domesticated by devils never gained sentience as they were raised to remain demons.

The relationship was no different from humans and animals, devils were the intelligent humans and demons were the irrational animals.

Hell was huge in size, because there is one ‘hell’ for hundreds of separate dimensions and worlds, hell itself was considered one of the largest kinds of worlds. In this immense world, the territories of the demons were all divided but this division existed solely because of one kind of creature, the demon lords.

Demon lords are all Devil’s who have reached level 91 and above. They are the masters of this world and with each demon lord comes his demon king's, commanders and pawns.

These loyal pawns are all minion creatures bred by the Demon Lord himself. Devil minions are graded depending on their level range, from level 0-30 they are simple minions, pawns of the demon lord and their largest bulk. Level 31-40 they are called Captains, this grade of creature can take control of the Demon Lord’s minion pawns depending on their own intelligence and form squads to do the work for the demon lord. Commander is from level 41-50 and they command several captains with their power, of 10,000 devils, only one can reach this stage. Following that are Nobles that go from 51-60, these are highly intelligent devils who can spawn their own huge force of minions even though they are minion’s themselves. This further increases the bulk of the demon lord's army. High nobles are the second highest rank among the nobles and are from level 61-70 and usually command a few Nobles under them. The next rank is the Demon Duke, a level 71-80 demon that commands all high nobles within a specific region, aiding the Demon lord to control his power in these places. Level 81-90 is the Demon King, a one in a hundred million kind of demon that is second only to the Demon lord. In a demon lord’s army, there is usually no more then the number of fingers in a person's hands at the same time. Finally there is the Demon lord himself.

It is normal for high potential demons to appear in the wild, these kinds of devils are usually either killed, or they recruit them. Recruiting is usually by force though, normally the soul is bound to the demon core and after sealing it into the core the core is then ripped out of the demon's chest where it undergoes many rituals to cause it to be bound to a demon noble before it is returned to the demon’s body and brought back to life. If the demon shows more potential, the binding will move to a higher level demon to not impede the growth until it reaches the demon lord itself.

Its is rare though and most high potential demons usually don’t surpass the dukes being their direct masters.

At this time though, am amazing occurrence was happening in hell.

In what is regarded as one of the capital cities of hell itself, in the center of the territory of one of the current six most powerful demons, taking the title of Sin of Gluttony, the current leader of the Seven Deadly Sin’s, Beelzebub, had convened a meeting of lords.

The Seven deadly Sin’s were the seven most powerful demon lords. Only one above level 95 could fight for the title and only when heaven deems the true holder, completely dead.

The reason that hell only had six of these seven at this moment is directly tied to the previous Leader and directly linked to the previous invasion of the World Quinn.

At the time, the demon lord had attacked on his own but at the time, the world relied on summoning a hero from each nation and religion, both Light and Dark, and this ‘force of heroes’ lead the nation armies and fought back eventually leading to the reversal of the war and invasion of hell where the spawn pits were discovered and studied while the heroes warred against the demon lord and eventually killed him.

Of course, Demons don’t die and only resurrect but in doing so, they revert into imps once more and lose their immense power but are born with even more potential.

The remaining six heads tried to locate him but were unable to find his reborn form.

At this city, besides the other five deadly sin’s, many other demon lords came. They would come of grand flying chariots but as they arrived at the city, it would lower and go by land after entering.

Only the other five sin’s had the right to fly directly to the massive black castle that was owned by Beelzebub himself.

These Demon Lords came only with their Demon Kings and were gathered at a war room, that was more like a massive seven seat throne room. The seven seats circled a large magical artifact that displayed most of hell and included even space distortions where space cracks were located. These places were controlled by smaller demon lords who had successfully invaded a world and taken control of a section of land and slowly advanced forward.

Only one area was ‘colored’ which was almost the entirety of what was once the previous leader of the deadly sin’s territory that was ‘cleansed’ by the holy aura blessing that the humans had prayed for and offered a Godly ranked Mana stone to the gods to form this barrier that weakened demons to near death.

Behind these were seats that other weaker Demon Lords were given while their Kings were standing behind them. The number of kings directly showed their prowess as, ironically, a demon lord will only gain a new King after each level increase after reaching level 91.

Soon the seats were filled and only one seat remained vacant and it was one that many demon lords looked coveting the power that came with that seat.

“Shall we begin already!” a growl came from a large bulky male with two large protruding horns and a blood red scaled tail coming from behind while his skin was bright red and his eyes blood red with slit eyes. Besides his demon horns was a crown of dragon horns. This was the Demon of Wrath, Satan.

The names of the seven sin’s are always the same as each demon inherits the name of the original seven sins.

“So loud…” A small voice said from a seat where a small child was barely awake.

“We shall begin.” Beelzebub said standing up himself. He was tall and humanoid with pale blue skin and pitch black hair. On his head was a pair of bug antenna and he had a black and yellow bug abdomen on his lower back while a pair of fly wings that were folded behind his back and formed a sort of thin cloak.

No one dared look down on the thickness of those wing because they were harder than Devil Alloy refined six times and incredibly sharp.

“It is about this new space crack that has opened.” Beelzebub said coldly.

“What is the point of calling so many of us to this only to talk about another world opening!?” Satan roared.

“Shut up, you bag of wind.” Beelzebub said coldly, “If this was a normal world, I would just send one or two of the weaklings but this isn’t!” he said and turned to the others, “This is the world Lucifer had invaded over 300 years ago.” He said.

The face of all the Demon Lords changed as they began to growl.

The World Quinn was the first human world to invade hell and were even enough to kill the leader of the Demon Lords back then. Since then they have grown and it has been a constant battle in hell to reclaim the immense stretch of land that once belonged to the Demon of Pride, Lucifer.

“Although this world is stronger, it can’t be that much right?” A sensual voice asked.

A lightly dressed ‘soft’ woman with large breasts and wide hips, wearing only some skimpy clothing covering herself, said. Her pink hair and eyes held a strange appeal and the scent of her body caused men to rage with Lust. This was Asmodeus, the Demon of Lust.

Beelzebub snorted, “What do you know, the humans we have seen were limited to only up to level 50 and the holy aura barrier caused a drastic drop in the power of demons inside that accursed aura. There has never been a need for stronger ones to come but do you think that is the case now? I have captured and trained several demons for spawn pits of that area specifically for them to reach level 80 and pump the spawn pits with their demonic aura just to weaken that barrier and have already fought back the humans to their final threshold only for five level demi-god ranked beings to appear and annihilate a large section of the demons that attacked. Those things the humans called Familiar, they are using them in the same manner we demons grow now. Their true fighting power should be no less than Hell.” He said.

They all frowned and looked at each other.

Only some more than three hundred years wasn’t a long time. For a demon, even a thousand years was too little to reach level 91, not to mention the following levels. Many even died of old age and resurrected only to keep dying for countless years before they once more form a firm hold on their improved powers and come back with more power.

“What do you want then?” Satan asked.

“We must destroy this world completely, it is too dangerous for us demons to leave a world that can use our own power to grow and soon reach godhood. We need to unite all our forces and attack both space cracks and attack from two sides. There are only five weak demi-god powers in this base but their growth is through ‘familiars’ a beast or creature used as a medium of power. If we want to battle them, either an incredibly powerful demon lord fights alone or…” he paused.

“...or we unite and fight together, right?” Asmodeus asked.

Beelzebub nodded, “It causes me to almost puke but humans in this world aren’t any weaker than demons and each human one fights is a battle of 2 vs 1, so we must battle them equal or even in larger number.” He said and looked at the two empty seats at the back and the two empty seats at the front. “This might include even releasing the Sword Devil’s to hunt in the human world and forming a contract with those two disgusting Demon Lords of that race. Only like this will we be able to form a connection to the Plated Devil Demon Lords to aid us.” He said.

“WHAT ARE YOU SAYING!?” instantly Satan stood up and his power erupted causing a burst of flame behind. The shadow of a massive blood red evil dragon appeared in his flames. “You want to release all the Sword Devil’s, those abominations, after so much hunting we had to do to capture all of them!?”

All the Demon Lords were in accord.

“You really don’t get it?” Beelzebub said. “If we release them in the human world, they will hunt for unique material in the human world, a place of boundless resource that Hell lacks. We all know that it is impossible to recruit a Sword Devil, their blasted Flame burns anything affecting their soul besides sealing magic. In other words, we can simply direct their interests towards the humans. Also, since there are only two entrances to hell besides death, we simply need to bind them to an easy to watch spawn pool that will spawn only them. In this manner, even if they are reborn, we will instantly recapture them.” he said.

The raging dragon demon snorted as the flames were absorbed into their bodies.

“What of those almost at the Demon lord level, would you release such a monstrosity?! They are far from a magnanimous race, they will surely come for us, one way or another!” Satan shouted.

“Those we simply need to kill and send them out as imps, that is a safer method allowing them to grow up in the human world instead of hell. Now, the question is, will the keepers of the Sword Devil’s give them up?” He said looking at two very silent Demon Lord, one that has yet to talk.

A deep callus laugh left his lip as he grinned revealing the shark like teeth.

He looked at Beelzebub. His eyes were small and like that of a fish, his face was pale blue and on his neck there were gills. His hand had webbing and he had a long fish tail on his back and a fin on his head that lowered back. This was the Demon of Envy, Leviathan.

As for the other one, he was quiet, cold, with a golden eye, his hand was fitted with black gold rings and priceless magical gems, his clothing formed of the best silk that was extracted for his own personal slave Demon Lord, the Black Widow Spider. This was the Demon of Greed, Mammon.

“You are sure asking for such a priceless item, Beelzebub.” Mammon said, his voice cold.

“The price paid for each Sword Devil of the 80th level up shall be the Demon core of one Demon King. An equal trade if you will.” He said grinning.

“Those cores are mine!” Leviathan hissed, “I shall bind their souls to my own spawn pit! Their soul belongs to me!” He said.

“As long as we use them, I do not care what you require.” Beelzebub said. “Now, what of you all?” He said looking at all the Demon Lords.

The all looked at one another and their Kings. “I agree!” One said.

Soon they all began to agree and soon all of them were in accord.

Beelzebub nodded, “Then we can start planning as well as try to negotiate the help of the Sword Devil’s. If we can get those bastards to deal with the portal guards, even better since they are probably the only ones unaffected by the Holy Aura.” He said.

After that, they began to talk about how to take the portals and control them.

***

Summer arrived soon and at the same time, it passed quickly. With the entire Everlight academy in the Snake Nest Dungeon, few actually went home and remained here training while regularly visiting the academy for books and knowledge.

This was especially so since everyone gained access rights to the next year.

Xero took his juniors and tutored them in advance during the summer and they began to quickly implement magic and skills that could start to improve their familiars.

The boy with the Kamaitachi implemented Earth, Water and Metal magic on the first floating spirit and healing magic on the second.

This allowed the Lesser Inferior Kamaitachi Infant to evolve rapidly from level 16 to level 22 and becoming a Lesser Kamaitachi Infant.

The two spirits, they also dropped to the ground and took the form of a family of bipedal weasels, though they were still spiritual bodies.

The male was white with red eyes and his ability to form blades, the female was dark brown with light brown down the front center of her body and black lines on her face and a strange apron that made it seem female. The child was like the mother but only the muzzle and belly were lighter brown and it had a similar lower body rag as the female and on it’s back was a strange form that looked like an urn.

There were a few naturally formed spells but with tutoring, the boy was able to complete them himself.

The others were similar, the hare developed two strange forward curved horns as it grew and was like a mix between rabbit, bull and mole and was a good digger and earth beast.

The Peering eyebat grew larger and now was about the size a Greater flying fox bat and the single eye didn’t change the size but it’s abilities have greatly improved as did the combat abilities. It was considered a combat type identification creature.

The boy with the Giant Bullfrog, was actually able to mutate the giant frog into a Frog man by some unknown means but it raised it’s agility. The proper type was Bull Frogman.

As for the strange Horse dog thing, the identification power of the Peering Eyebat was finally able to peer into it’s race and it was finally given a name. It’s called the Wingless Phoenix Dragon Infant.

Everyone was shell shocked when the name was announced but the boy couldn’t give more information since his level was far too low but he confirmed that the race wasn’t wrong.

“No wonder it didn’t evolve, it must be a high level creature where it came from, maybe the number of wings represents its growth.” Xero said after hearing it. “Maybe we if get someone to help add dragon abilities like fire breath and different dragon elements it would make it grow.” Xero said.

They thought the same and with Univa’s help they added Dragon Scale defense and fire breath spells to the strange dog which experienced no growth but it was able to easily use the abilities after a few tries showing its strange talent.

Finally when the next year was starting, as was the 13 year old, soon to be 14, Xero woke up early and was about to go for a morning run when suddenly he felt a tremor and shook his entire being.

DONG!

Following the tremor came an earth shattering gong and from the center of the city, a blast of red light surged into the sky.

DONG!

Another earth shattering gong sounded causing Xero to kneel.

DONG!

Unable to calm himself, Xero even began to vomit because of how powerful the gong’s were.

It wasn’t just him, hundreds of people reacted in similar fashion, unable to deal with the power of those air vibrations.

“To all possible aid! All portals are connected in a one way teleportation to what remains of Niska and the Holy City! This is an emergency! It is a Demon invasion! I repeat the demons are attacking the Holy City and are about to breach the defense and the space crack at the frontier has been captured by demons! Reinforcements are required!” The voice vanishes but the bright red light sealing the portal completely showed the danger they were facing. The portals were completely sealed, not allowing any passage besides out and only to the two locations.

Xero slowly got up and ran towards the portal and what they found were the teachers stopping the children and nobles.

“SILENCE!”

Valmor’s voice sounded silencing everyone. “No one below level 60 is allowed through. This is a demon invasion, this isn’t some common threat, we will not allow the seeds of our world to be in danger, if we, the old generation, die then it is you children that will be responsible for the future! For now, there is no one that will leave!” he announced.

Then the teachers above that threshold began to walk out and when the children tried to go, they were blocked by the red light.

One by one, the adults vanished while the kings and nobles frowned.

“What are you all staring at! Let’s go!” Morgan roared to his nobles, “Anyone above level 60 follows me or you and your families will lose all noble standings!” He roared.

The nobles all paled and pushed their ways to the front.

One by one they all headed to the light until there was only the Dean and Miss Gilbody left among the capable adults, since someone needed to protect the children in the dungeon.

Xero was frowning as he turned and found his father, who was also frowning, “This isn’t our battle son, not yet.” he said.

Xero nodded and walked back with them but he clenched his fist as he summoned Ashley and with her, they left to go hunt creatures above level 40 to train harder.

He knew that he had to try harder because a very long war had come.