Scarlet

After the little makeshift ceremony the demons decided to do, they all head back to the Arctic and Demon Isle, making the frontlines of the war completely barren of anyone but humans for the first time since the truce. And soon after that we get word of the demons leaving all of the cities they’ve conquered, pulling their territory all the way back to the Arctic and Demon Isle.

“Good job,” Amelia tells me with a smile as she, the Knights, and I all fly through the air towards the capital city.

I nod towards her with a smile of my own, which apparently still surprises the other Knights since they’re not used to seeing me smile. But I ignore them.

Once we reach the capital city, I immediately find recordings of what happened on the frontlines playing on all of the wide screens scattered across the city on repeat. Meanwhile it’s almost as if every last civilian is on the streets celebrating.

Not just the civilians either, but a lot of Guardians as well.

And all of them immediately begin cheering even louder the moment the Knights and I fly over the city, some of the more sensitive Guardians noticing us right away and pointing us out. So I wave at them all, making them cheer even louder.

“Things are going to change from now on, you know that, right?” Amelia points out.

I nod my head, knowing full well that things will never be the same again. Not for the humans and not for me either.

Come to think of it, now that we aren’t at war with the demons anymore, where will I get the EXP needed to level up?

“Did you forget? The Red Plague devours the reality itself, not just the life force,” Tar says, making me frown.

What does that change?

Tar looks at me from my shoulder and explains, “The reason humans and demons can’t get EXP from killing void creatures is because void creatures don’t have life force. But they do have realities.”

I blink as that answer settles in. Then a small smile stretches across my face.

So what you’re saying is… I can level up from devouring void creatures.

The tanuki sends me a vicious grin in return, “Yep!”

Now that is good news.

“You may be interested in heading to other worlds that are being devoured presently by the void just to deal with the void creatures and level up from them,” Tar points out, but I can help but frown again at that.

How would I even get there?

He just smiles at me without answering.

Something you can’t say? Haven’t seen that in a while.

“You’ll find out soon enough,” Tar says rather cryptically.

Then I look forward to it.

The Knights and I all continue flying over the city for a bit, playing to the people a little to give them what they want before we all grab the Chairman and head towards Demon Isle. And once we arrive at the capital of the demons inside of Demon Isle, we find the place swarming with demons, most of whom are celebrating. The sapient ones at least.

The Knights, Chairman, and I all land in the palace located at the center of the capital before entering the throne room where we find both Damien and Satan standing beneath the raised dais, with a strange pool of pink energy floating between them showing Lily on the other side. And as soon as I enter the room, all three of them kneel down and declare, “We greet Her Highness, our Savior.”

“Lily,” I state with a nod of my head towards the current commander of the Demon Army.

She raises her head and directly meets my eyes with that terrifying gaze that quickly fills with lust against her will since she’s still under her curse.

“I will be heading to Tartarus next to erase the curse there as well,” I tell her, in a bit of a hurry to get away from that gaze that sends a chill down my spine just from the way she’s looking at me, likely without even knowing it herself.

The succubus immediately bows her head again and exclaims, “Thank you, Your Highness. We await your arrival.”

I nod my head again before quickly heading to the Gate within the capital and crossing through it on my own, the other Knights proving unable to cross due to the lack of reality energy in the Gate. And the very first person I find after crossing into Tartarus again is Lily, along with dozens of other Clan demons all around us kneeling on the ground.

Other than these demons, I also sense the large blood domain stretching across the entire planet, along with a powerful source of life energy with a rather loud roar echoing from the Southwest.

Without hesitation, I walk up to a random Clan demon – deciding to stay far away from Lily while she still has her curse – and place my hand on their head and close my eyes. Then I sense for the branch connecting them to the root of the curse, following which I completely erase the curse, making a loud shattering sound echo throughout Tartarus.

And just like with Earth, all of the demons here begin cheering, following which they kneel down and more than a few swear fealty to me.

I give an amused smile as I look out over all of the demons.

The pure joy on all of their faces makes it hard not to smile.

I glance at Lily to find her quite literally crying, with that lustful look in her eyes completely gone now. Just like how the hunger in Damien’s vanished.

“They’ve lived their entire lives with these horrible curses, and now they’re finally experiencing life without them,” Tar says rather quietly as he looks out from my shoulder.

I nod my head, still smiling at the demons, many of whom are crying. Which makes some sense since these are all Nobles unlike most of the demons on the frontlines before. And the Nobles are the oldest of the demons who have spent the most time with the curses.

Then, out of nowhere, two things happen that silence most of the demons here.

First, the roar from the Southwest vanishes while the life energy flares once and goes down. As if the source is finally calming down.

Second, the slight sensation of constantly being in movement that I was feeling gradually slows down, following which the blood domain around the entire planet begins to fade.

And only moments later, the large pilar of blood I see in the direction of the Demon King’s Castle vanishes.

Gramps is back.