24

{ going to be some slight gore in this chapter just a warning but it's like very minor }

Walking out of the stone hut, I contact Shea and give her an update and send Dodo to check the mine out. Dodo salutes and bounces off, he should be easily able to kill everyone in there except the leader Snowden if he is there. but that's not the point this is for Athena to try to break through so he's just infiltrating and getting a more accurate judge of the situation on the inside. heading over to the wyverns I undo their saddles and Athena comes over and helps.

"Want to get a warm-up in before tonight?"

"Sure I could do with a warm-up, is Dodo going to be fine on his own in there?" she looks toward the mine.

"Yea with his abilities he probably already killed someone and took their place. no need to worry about him he's as strong as their leader who is probably not even there, and he's as hard to kill as a cockroach." Athena looks at me a bit weirdly.

"Cockroach? what's that?"

"It's a bug that is hard to kill, beside the point let's get started we will warm up for an hour or so before heading to the mine."

As we head to a small clearing and begin to practice I notice the vice-captain who is a dark elf is watching us from a semi-hidden spot. I believe he is working with bloodfall but it doesn't matter it's confirmed he is an enemy, in the novel he sealed or broke something on the seal in the bottom of the mine making so no one could leave unless demon emperor or higher broke it so I planned on getting rid of him. there are multiple ways I could kill him but I choose to place a Stolas circle on him that will kill him within a few hours and the cause of death will look like a heart attack.

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We head back to where all the miners and workers are gathered and see them all standing in a circle. Athena makes a way through the crowd and I follow behind, upon arriving in the middle we can see Gabe clutching the dark elf in his arms pouring a healing potion into his mouth.

"What happened to him? was he attacked by the bandits?" Athena begins questioning. Gabe just answers he called for him and didn't get a response and went to look for him and found him unresponsive. I walk away when I feel Dodo trying to contact me, Athena spotting me walk off also follows.

"Dodo what does it look like in there?"

"Dodo has found a total of three higher demons and twenty intermediate demons also eighty-six lesser demons." he hasn't even been gone long at all, he does pretty good work when he is motivated by food.

"Good job Dodo, when we show up kill anyone who tries to run we don't want word to get out for as long as we can." after he gives me his affirmation he hangs up. I turn to Athena, she is already in her combat armor a light leather armor.

"Dodo said there are around one hundred demons in there with most being lesser, there are three higher demons so watch out for those." She is going to be fine but still better to be prepared than unprepared.

"Alright, when are we heading up there?"

"We can head up there in an hour and when we enter I will light it up with these." I pull out some fluorescent stones and show them to her. "I will scatter them around and light the whole place up." she nods and we sit down and relax before we head up to the mine.

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We slowly approach the mine from above as I hold Athena in my arms we are slowly descending through a shaft from the top into one of the main pits. when we are about thirty feet above a group of ten Athena taps my shoulder and I drop her and she pulls out her sword and begins cutting them all down. Dodo is already at the main entrance and ready to kill any runners. I pull out a ton of fluorescent stones I pocketed from Josephs's magic store before we left the dark moon and start throwing them around the room.

"INTRUDERS!" a minotaur yells out before a stone I launched sails through his gut and he doubles over.

Staying airborne I watch all the side paths and make sure no one gets the jump on Athena. most have run for the entrance after seeing her flaming demon form and swinging around a great sword the size of their body. soon a three head dog comes out of one of the bigger tunnels and charges at Athena, she sees it approaching and slides under it and keeps her sword positioned in front of her gutting the poor mutt. burning off the blood that got on her she rolls to the side dodging an attack launched from the dark.

"That dog was my superiors! he will break my neck if he knows it died under my watch." a great demon walks out with a female great demon behind him. I don't remember these guys' names but I think they were around mid-tier. Athena swings her sword and it goes sailing through the air and they both dodge to the side.

"Going to have to do better than that!" the male taunts, but when he turns to look at his companion he notices the blade pinning her to the wall. "NO SULLY!" so that's her name.

Athena not wasting a moment teleports behind the horrified male and punches him in the back of the head but he leaps out of the way. after regaining his cool he begins launching attacks that either don't hit Athena or she shrugs off.

"Going to have to do better than that." Athena taunts back and I suck in a cold breath at how cruel she sounds. damn is it weird that battle Athena is just as hot if not hotter than cute embarrassed Athena? dodging an arrow that was aimed at the back of my head I teleport behind the archer and run my hand through his head like a Viltrumite. turning back to Athena she already has recovered her sword and bisected the other demon. She walks over to me as she burns off the gore and shifts back to her base form.

"All done? didn't even take you but twenty minutes to dispatch all these guys."

"Umu, they were pretty pathetic and not organized at all. they were kind of just occupying it with sheer number advantage. if Alan sent the full force of the guards he would have wiped them all out long ago." not surprising since he never intended to wipe them out.

"Let's look for the waste pile." we start walking down the biggest tunnel and Dodo bounces up from behind having cleaned up all the deserters and corpses. I don't remember the original Dodo eating so many bodies but it's not like it's a waste he's gaining all their forms for better undercover work anyway, he will basically be a faceless man in the future. arriving at a wide open pit we see a huge pile of ore glittering in the dim light with the crystals. I throw out some lighting and fly to the top of the pile and sit. "Hey watch out for me for a bit while I do my work." they agree and position on either side of the pile. I can't help but notice Dodo summon a wine bottle out of thin air when he thinks I am not looking.

Spreading my sense over the whole pile I am blown away by the sheer amount of sin here. in the original Chen Rui never even absorbed all the aura from these because he ended up killing Glorfindel before he could. the pile practically radiates Gluttony, pulling out a snack and chowing down before this just so my stomach doesn't protest with all the phantom senses the sin is about to assail me with. beginning to absorb I lose track of time and even my form as I am blanketed in a mass of sin and absorb like my life depends on it, after what felt like days I open my eyes and look around and ask Athena how long I have been quite for and she lets me know its only been a few minutes.

"Damn this might take a while so get comfy guys I will try to make it go fast."

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My body is drenched in sweat and my stomach all though full is growling as if I haven't eaten in weeks. but the results were worth it, I take all the now clean ore into my inventory and land softly on the ground.

[Sin absorbed = 126240 ]

"Did it work?" Athena walks over and hands me a towel and water skin.

"Oh you bet it worked, I am rich!" she looks confused but it's fine, it's time to promote!

[ Confirm purchase - Tier up - 10000 sin ]

[ Confirm purchase - Temple of sin - 1000 sin ]

[ total = 11000 sin ]

" Confirm. "

My bones begin to pop and my muscles feel like there shredding, a feeling of fire runs through me as my body jerks.

"Crap I forgot about this part." falling back Athena jumps forward and catches me. I grit my teeth and try to hold on but darkness soon claims my vision and I am knocked out.

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I wake up feeling the enhancement already, I spread my senses out and am shocked at just how far I can feel. noticing a massive orange signature beneath me and tons of other people radiating sin I close my sense back down and sit up. that should be Glorfindel in the god-eating mask as well as all the other people living behind the seal at the bottom of the mine.

"How are you feeling? you passed out so suddenly and were spasming in your sleep." Athena instantly starts checking me over, after seeing nothing unusual she sits beside me and looks at me with her arms crossed.

"Uh I broke through I guess you would say I am a great demon king now." She seems surprised then smiles.

"Congratulations I guess I still need to keep trying hard, and just when I thought I caught up." looking at her with Purson I notice she is indeed demon king level.

"Congratulations as well Athena you also broke through, with that the trip to the mine is a success I got a promotion and you did as well. I should also be able to make you a piece hold on." looking into the shop I notice a few new things and am even more excited.

[Shop - Sin total = 115240

Tier up - 100000 sin

Potions

Eternal Power - 5000

Eternal Body - 5000

Eternal Speed - 5000

Eternal Mind - 5000

Evil piece

Queen - 2500

Rook - 1000

Bishop - 1000

Knight - 1000

Pawn - 500

Mutate the piece manually for 10x

Plants

Fruit of temptation - 1000 ]

Eternal series potions! I didn't think I would get these because I should have already had them. but from the looks of it no resurrection potion or longevity potion. that's fine with an evil piece I can resurrect once and prolong life so it's no big loss, speaking of evil pieces they got a big discount which will help a lot. but looking at tier up I see it's greyed out and I can't click it even if I don't have enough it has never been greyed out before.

[ Confirm purchase - Fruit of temptation - 1000 sin ]

[ Confirm purchase - Queen - 2500 sin ]

[ Confirm purchase - Eternal Power x 2- 10000 sin ]

[ Confirm purchase - Eternal Body x 2 - 10000 sin ]

[ Confirm purchase - Eternal Speed x 2 - 10000 sin ]

[ Confirm purchase - Eternal Mind x2 - 10000 sin ]

[ total = 43500 sin ]

" Confirm. "

[ Items deposited into the inventory ]