Facing the pile of stones and mud before him, Olthagia extended his palm.
As it was a Bloodline Awakening Spell, there was no need for incantations or any preparation. A blood-red fireball, approximately fifteen centimeters in diameter and radiating intense heat, instantly formed and hovered between his palms, illuminating the entire cave.
Whoosh!
With a mere thought, the fireball shot out and struck the obstacles blocking the cave entrance.
Boom!!
The sound of an explosion echoed through the cave, and blood-red flames scattered in all directions.
When Olthagia withdrew his mana and extinguished the flames, a large hole about three to four meters deep came into view. Based on his memory of blocking the cave, one more shot should be enough to break through all the obstacles and clear the passage.
So, he condensed another fireball, similar in size and temperature to the previous one. The only difference was that this time, he didn't use the Fireball spell. Instead, he forcefully compressed the Blood Flame into a spherical shape using his mental energy.
Boom!!
Another explosion rang out. After the flames died down, Olthagia observed the results of this round.
The hole was about two meters deep, and only a small amount of the obstacle remained!
However, he wasn't in a hurry to act. Instead, he estimated the difference in power and consumption between using the Fireball spell and directly compressing the Blood Flame into a sphere.
Without using the Fireball spell, the power was about half as strong, but the consumption was roughly four times greater, resulting in an eightfold difference.
Next, he found another spot to test his other spells and newly acquired abilities, gaining a rough understanding of his current strength.
After sitting on the chaotic ground to recover the mana and stamina consumed during the experiments, he licked his lips, stood up with a smile, and headed to other parts of the forest.
The next step was to determine his position in the food chain of the Wailing Forest...
A demon that resembled a werewolf with a shell felt its life being drained away. The unwillingness in its heart gave it the strength to make one last struggle.
But Olthagia, who had sensed its intentions, had no intention of letting it succeed.
With a weak, hoarse cry,
Olthagia's tail, which had already pierced its chest and lifted its body high, twisted violently with the intense heat of the Blood Flame, instantly cooking its internal organs to medium-rare and scattering them.
It died instantly!
The opponent's rank was [Lesser Demon], slightly stronger than the previous ape demon.
However, unlike before, Olthagia's strength had undergone a qualitative transformation. An opponent that would have required a fierce battle to defeat now held no combat value whatsoever!
From start to finish, Olthagia didn't even use his hands. A single instant-cast Bloodline Spell, [Soul Strike], left the demon's spirit damaged and disoriented. His tail then pierced through its chest, draining its life force and forcing it into a weakened state, hanging like dried meat.
Tearing off one of the corpse's arms, Olthagia's mouth, which was originally proportional to that of a normal human, split open to near his ears, revealing a row of sharp teeth. He then took a fierce bite, tearing off a large chunk of flesh from the food in his hand.
He strolled along, munching on his snacks as he went, heading towards other areas...
The corpse hanging from his tail had already been drained into a desiccated husk, which he casually tossed into the grass to feed the flowers. After all, whether as a demon or a human, one should care for the environment!
Since leaving the cave, he had been wandering for quite some time, encountering over a dozen Lesser Demons, seven or eight Infant Demons, and hundreds of Demonized Creatures native to the Wailing Forest.
Unlike demons, which are indigenous to this realm, the ancestors of these Demonized Creatures mostly originated from other planes, eventually staying here due to various reasons.
Their descendants absorbed the magic of the Bottomless Abyss, drank the waters of the Abyss, consumed the plants and flesh of the Abyss's creatures, and underwent the corruption of the Abyss. Regardless of their original nature, they all became bloodthirsty and malevolent.
The Demonized Creatures in the Wailing Forest varied in strength, with the strongest likely at the Low-Rank Demon level, and the weakest slightly weaker than an Infant Demon. However, they all shared a common trait: high reproductive capacity. Otherwise, they would have been wiped out by the endless hordes of demons!
After wandering the Wailing Forest for half a day, Olthagia encountered neither demons nor Demonized Creatures, nor even Demonized Plants, that reached the level of a Low-Rank Demon.
His plan to spar with a Low-Rank Demon was thwarted.
Calmly stepping over a pile of stones, his tail swiftly struck out, ignoring the creature's optical camouflage ability, and precisely hit its vital spot. The tail pierced through its brain, killing the Demonized Creature that had tried to hide among the stones.
For Olthagia, who possessed Energy Vision, abilities like invisibility were meaningless unless they exceeded his observational range or were immune to the effects of Energy Vision. Such abilities were less practical than the most basic Fireball spell, which at least provided a spectacle.
[+77 Evolution Points]
Raising his head to look at the mostly darkened sky, Olthagia frowned, thinking with dissatisfaction.
'Too slow!'
Compared to the riverside, where demons were packed together in a wild frenzy of face-to-face slaughter, where one only needed to kill any creature in sight, releasing the purest form of violent carnage, the Wailing Forest was more like a vast hunting ground. Here, the danger often lurked in places unseen.
The sky, trees, ground, grass, and underground—every conceivable place hid lurking predators. They concealed their presence in the shadows, ready to deliver a fatal strike at any moment. Even stepping into a patch of mud could reveal venomous insects capable of spraying corrosive toxins that could dissolve bones. Even a flower might release toxins to incapacitate its prey before extending tendrils to strangle it.
In essence, the two environments were entirely different. One trained demons in direct combat, while the other honed their cunning and malice, molding them into mature hunters capable of killing prey in various complex conditions and environments.
From a practical perspective, this is a gradual approach that greatly benefits the growth of demons. It is not flawed in any way, allowing them to be more adept at external invasions and internal conflicts.
However, for Olthagia, there are some minor issues. For him, who only needs constant slaughter to grow and can compensate for his own shortcomings with Evolution Points, the creatures in the Wailing Forest, hiding and fighting independently, are like guerrillas, constantly moving and hiding.
It's very inconvenient to find them!
After searching for a long time, he couldn't find many prey. Unlike the riverbank where he could kill to his heart's content, here he could only slowly play hide and seek, significantly prolonging his growth time.
Olthagia also considered whether to set the forest on fire and have a grand jungle barbecue, but after some attempts, he eventually abandoned that idea.
Although his Blood Flame could burn the surrounding plants, those plants were all demonized and inherently magical, able to resist the flames to some extent. With Olthagia continuously supplying magic, he could indeed burn them, but once the magic supply stopped, the flames would quickly extinguish, making it impossible to spread the fire from plant to plant and turn it into a forest fire.
Another issue was that even if he burned those demons to death, Olthagia would still need to find their souls one by one, which was undoubtedly absurd. By the time he reached the spot, those souls might have already been claimed by others.
This also exposed one of his shortcomings: he lacked any ability to collect souls remotely on a large scale. While he could burn those souls, causing them to be eternally silenced, he didn't have the ability to harvest them from a distance. At best, he could use his magic and soul power to bind them one by one.
According to what he learned from his inherited memories, a regular demon would need at least the strength of a Low-Rank Demon to harvest souls from a distance, and the target couldn't be too strong, or else they would resist fiercely.
As for how to harvest the souls of powerful beings, demons generally have three methods: 1. Beat them to death and directly capture their souls, 2. Trick them into signing a contract and then harvest their souls using the power of the contract, 3. Use one's own power to corrupt them, and once they become puppets, naturally gain the ability to harvest their souls.
Now, Olthagia faces two choices, two paths of development.
One is to actively respond to the summoning of Abyssal creatures by outsiders using the power of the Abyssal Contract, then use the power of the Abyss to travel to another world, and try to make some gains before being expelled.
The biggest problem with this option is that there's no telling who is summoning him or what the actual situation on the other side is.
If he were to be immediately trapped in a magic circle upon arrival, seeing a few mages smiling at him with research tools, that would be fucking awkward!
Every day, many demons make a fortune through interworld summoning, but many also fall victim to entrapment, becoming rare raw materials unique to the Bottomless Abyss!!
Take a risk, and a bicycle might turn into a motorcycle; venture out, and even your underwear might be stolen. This is a somewhat luck-based skill, and without some confidence, Olthagia isn't keen on trying it!
The other option was to continue trudging along in the Wailing Forest. Although the efficiency was a bit slower, at least there were gains to be made. Moreover, the strength of his opponents was capped at the level of a [Low-Rank Demon]. Olthagia felt that even if he couldn't win, he could still escape. As long as he wasn't surrounded and beaten by a large group of demons, there shouldn't be any fatal danger.
After three seconds of deep contemplation, Olthagia made a brave decision.
It was better to continue mixing it up in the Wailing Abyss for now. Being too reckless and getting killed while walking around would be no good!
Although his demonic nature craved slaughter, longed to wreak havoc and destruction in other planes, the memories of his past life as a human also reminded him that using his brain more often wouldn't lead to any losses.