Chapter 045: Devoured

The sky above Xuanzheng Hall was like a shattered mirror, crisscrossed with cracks.

All the civil and military officials, including Li Longji and Li Heng, were horrified. Many knelt and begged for mercy, believing their earlier actions had offended heaven.

Li Longji laughed loudly, pointing at Wang Bo and shouting, "I am the emperor, I am the Son of Heaven. Sorcerer, you act against heaven and will surely suffer divine punishment. May a thousand bolts of lightning strike you, and may you die a miserable death."

"Heavens, strike down this sorcerer who brings ruin to the nation!"

Li Heng, panic-stricken, quickly knelt and prostrated himself, not daring to make a sound.

Wang Bo paid no attention to Li Longji at all. He looked up at the cracked sky, as if searching for something.

Just then, a woman of breathtaking beauty descended from the cracked sky, stepping through the void and landing atop Xuanzheng Hall.

Li Longji, overjoyed, clasped his hands and said, "Immortal, immortal, I am the lord of the realm, Li Longji, Emperor of the Great Tang. And this man..."

He pointed sharply at Wang Bo and said through gritted teeth, "This man is a sorcerer who brings calamity to the nation. He seeks to seize my throne and harm my kingdom. I beg the immortal to show mercy, restore order, and use divine magic to subdue him."

"I—no, I, Li Longji, am infinitely grateful to the immortal. In the future, I will command the realm to cast a golden statue of the immortal, and the people of the Great Tang will worship day and night to repay the immortal's kindness."

The breathtaking woman glanced at Li Longji, then flicked her hand, sending him flying.

"Scram!"

A cold snort shocked everyone present.

Wang Bo stepped forward and approached the woman. "Congratulations, Lady Gremory. You've finally made it out."

Clearly, this breathtaking woman was the seventy-second pillar demon Gremory.

Her peerless beauty could easily be mistaken for an immortal by ancient people.

Lady Gremory looked displeased. She gazed at the cracked sky and said angrily, "I miscalculated this time. I underestimated that fellow!"

She had charged in with great momentum, only to be bound by the enemy and nearly captured. If Wang Bo hadn't called for reinforcements, her chances of escape would have been slim.

This made Lady Gremory feel humiliated, as she had nearly performed a perfect act of delivering herself to the enemy.

It was only natural for her to be angry.

Did the demons have no pride?

Wang Bo dared not mock Lady Gremory in her current rage, so he quickly changed the subject. "By the way, where is Lord Baal?"

"He's fighting that fellow!" Lady Gremory said irritably.

"Is Mephisto very powerful?" Wang Bo asked. Qin Liangyu had always said Mephisto was all bark and no bite, but he had managed to trap even Lady Gremory.

Wang Bo couldn't help but worry: Was Mephisto really all bark and no bite?

Or had he been deliberately showing weakness?

Lady Gremory said, "That guy's strength is average—he can't even beat you—but his methods are very strange. If you're not careful, even I suffer losses."

Wang Bo understood immediately.

Mephisto was, after all, a demon lord. It was only natural for him to have a few tricks up his sleeve. After all, he had lived long and seen much, which could serve as his foundation.

As for Wang Bo, he couldn't do that. He now felt somewhat fortunate that he had been decisive in retreating earlier. If he had delayed a little longer, he might have been trapped by Mephisto, and then he wouldn't have been able to call for reinforcements—that would have been truly unlucky.

He would have been at the enemy's mercy, unlike now, where he could casually summon two reinforcements and return in force.

Wang Bo didn't believe that two demon lords, Baal and Gremory, working together, couldn't defeat a single Mephisto.

Just as Wang Bo was marveling, a meow echoed across the land.

Wang Bo looked up. A black cat leaped down from the cracked sky and landed lightly on Wang Bo's head.

At the same time, the sky gradually recovered, and the cracks slowly disappeared.

Wang Bo looked around and couldn't help asking, "Lord Baal, where is Mephisto?"

Baal said, "I've already devoured him."

"Devoured, devoured!" Wang Bo stared at Baal in shock.

Baal said lazily, "Did you think Gremory, this fool, rushed to this world in such a hurry just to fight Mephisto?"

Wang Bo was taken aback and turned to look at Lady Gremory.

Lady Gremory couldn't help but turn her face away.

Baal continued, "Demons can devour not only human souls but also the souls of their own kind. However, the souls of their own kind are not as tasty as human souls."

"To make an analogy, for demons, human souls are like cake."

"And demon souls are like cookies—not in the same league."

"But the higher the rank of the demon, the more delicious its soul."

"Besides being delicious, devouring a demon's soul can grant you its memories, magic, knowledge, experiences, and so on."

"In hell, the seventy-two pillars disdain devouring ordinary demons because they are far inferior to us. Even if we devour them, there's no benefit."

"We also don't devour each other, because our experiences and knowledge are similar, and defeating one another is no easy task."

"But Mephisto is different. He's an otherworldly demon lord with knowledge and memories completely different from ours. Moreover, he might be fundamentally different from us. That's why this fool Gremory rushed in so eagerly."

Wang Bo finally understood why Lady Gremory had been so eager for him to summon her back then.

Wang Bo asked, "Didn't Lady Gremory ever consider that she might not be a match for Mephisto?"

Baal said lazily, "First, you need to know that the more powerful a demon, the harder it is to enter the human world. Second, since you managed to escape from Mephisto, it shows that Mephisto can't be overwhelmingly strong. And in fact, the Mephisto I devoured was just a projection."

Wang Bo suddenly realized, "Because of these two points, Lady Gremory judged that Mephisto couldn't be too strong, so she rushed over without hesitation."

"Exactly," Baal nodded, then jumped onto Lady Gremory's head and sneered, "But this fool was too impatient. She didn't even figure out the enemy's abilities before charging in, and she fell into a trap."

Lady Gremory, her face red, shooed Baal away and said angrily, "You got all the benefits, and now you're making sarcastic remarks. Get lost."

Baal said gleefully, "It's your own lack of skill. Can you blame me?"

Lady Gremory trembled with rage. Not wanting to stay and be mocked by Baal, she turned to Wang Bo and said, "Alright, send me back."

Wang Bo nodded, canceled the summoning, and sent Lady Gremory back to hell.