The underground area of the Royal Palace of the Lucifaad was in a pretty similar state to what was above.
The crumbling remains of an ancient palace, once a grand marvel, now reduced to ivy-covered stone pillars and scattered debris, extending out to the underground catacomb complex underneath the Royal Palace.
The entrance to the underground catacombs is hidden in a shadowed corner where the remains of the great hall meet the cracked and broken courtyard. Moss and Demonic Vines cascade down a partially collapsed archway, framing an ancient iron gate that is slightly ajar and rusted with time.
When they opened the iron gate, they needed to do it with extra care because the Demonic Vines were semi-sentient and could act on their instincts. The time in his place, filled with so much corruption and Demonic Energy, had already corrupted these plants so much that they were extremely aggressive and fairly powerful.
Yhwach predicted that they should be strong enough to kill even Level 3 beings if they were caught off guard, which was rather likely due to the camouflaging ability of the Demonic Vines, which were able to pretend that they were just ordinary plants.
Carved into the surrounding stone are faded bas-reliefs depicting scenes of royal processions, the history of the House Lucifer, and various murals depicting Lucifer, Helel, Luciel, and the events that led to the creation of the Devil Race.
Everything that was depicted in the images was one huge testament to the power of the House Lucifer as well as Lucifer's own pride... which, most ironically, in the end, resulted in his own death and fall at the hands of Yahweh.
Such as the irony of life.
Aside from that, they noticed that there were many statues and gargoyles, mostly stupid representations of the various mythological beasts, their expressions now haunting in their erosion. The air here was damp and carried a musty, earthy scent mixed with the faint hint of incense long since extinguished.
Peering inside, stone steps worn smooth by countless feet descend into darkness, the last glimmer of daylight casting elongated shadows on the walls that seem to breathe with stories untold.
Torches mounted along the walls, their metal brackets covered in verdigris, hint at a path that once welcomed the living, but now it was only the remnant of the destruction and long-lost glory of the House Lucifer, where only the brave or the desperate fools would dare to enter.
For Valiana, it was weird to be here in this place. On the one hand, she understood that this was her lineage, a Royal Palace of the House Lucifer. A place that was built by her ancestor during the time of their greatest glory and power.
On the other hand, due to her half-breed status, Valian never really felt like she was a part of the House Lucifer, as she was treated no differently than a slave in the eyes of her father or grandfather, like her very own existence was the greatest sin.
The only saving grace that she had was that she was born with the Longinus-Tier Sacred Gear Divine Dividing and high talent, if not for that... she didn't really doubt for a second that her father, as smug as she loathed him, would have killed her the moment she was born.
In the end, for the blood purists and supremacists, she was nothing more than a stain on the honor of the house of Lucifer. Due to her childhood, she didn't have much attachment to the House Lucifer and her surname; at one point, she just wanted to abandon it all, be just Valiana.
Nothing more or nothing less.
Yet, it was true that nothing that she would do would change the fact that she was a descendant of the House Lucifer... she even bore the Evil Brilliance of the Demonic Light and Sacred Gear Canceller of the House Lucifer.
The whisper of wind through the cracked masonry adds a ghostly breath to the scene, suggesting that whatever lies below is both forgotten and waiting.
Not even one of their group had a good feeling about this place, because the entire underground complex screamed danger.
Until they reached the research facility and passed through the first wave of the defenses and traps that the Old Satan Faction and House Nebiros prepared for the "guests", then their best chance to enter undetected was to ignore all traps and act as stealthy as possible.
Yhwach looked around the corridors before he sighed as he decided to use The Almighty to see the location of the traps and defenses in the endless stream of possible futures and timelines.
Using [The Almighty] became much easier after he had ascended to Godhood, yet it wasn't much that easy either. Usage of [The Almighty] took a very heavy toll on his brain and Celestial Force, even with the help of the [Unique Skill Great Sage], and the results weren't really always the best ones around.
Still, just having a glimpse at the various possibilities and variations of something was invaluable, and Yhwach even started learning using [The Almighty] during the combat from his father, Shiva.
His father called it Battle Precognition, which basically centered around the usage of Divination and Foresight Abilities during combat as foreseeing the moves executed by the opponent in real-time.
It was one of the harder forms of the Foresight, but Yhwach was doing rather well, to the point where he already obtained [Martial Skill - Battle Precognition] (Novice), which further increased his combat prowess by a great degree, as using something to foresee the opponent's next move was nothing short of overpowered.
Yhwach then used [The Almighty] as he closed his eyes and saw several possible futures, which allowed him to see the exact location of the various traps, wards, and defensive measures that the House Nebiros laid down in this place.
And he had to admit that they were pretty meticulous in doing so because the entire place was like a minefield. Filled with countless traps, wards, and defenses, and there was only a fighting way to walk through these corridors in a way when one wouldn't give anything that would potentially kill or cripple him.
Luckily enough, with the usage of the [The Almighty], he managed to scour the path ahead and saw one of the safe ways to go through the several upper levels of the underground complex beneath the Lucifer Royal Palace.
"I found the way; this entire place is filled with so many traps that even the Level 7 beings could fall if they made one wrong step."
Yhwach said as he canceled the [The Almighty] because it was already a bit tiring to use constantly. He was, in fact, rahter impressed by the handiwork of the House Nebiros and the Old Satan Faction because it was clear that they had put a lot of effort into protecting this place as much as possible.
This was only logical, as it housed the Melabranche as well as Lucifer's personal research laboratory, where he conducted his experiments. It wasn't every day that he praised someone else's work, but this day, it seemed that it was an exception to the rule.
The entire underground complex consisted of three layers.
The 1st Layer was the catacombs beneath the Royal Palace, which were built from the natural cavern system that was found in this place. This also seemed to be the reason why Lucifer chose to build his palace on the top of this ground. The underground cavern system was extremely huge, to the point where even supernatural beings with their powerful physiques and high stamina would need to spend literal days going from one end to another.
And that wasn't saying anything about going through the entire subterranean area, which would take one even weeks of time. Not to mention, the entire area was like an endless maze that was problematic to navigate due to the countless corridors, empty pathways, and various open areas within the subterranean system.
One could say that this was the perfect place to build an underground research laboratory, including the vaults to house some of the most precious and dangerous things that were being researched there.
The 2nd Layer was a few hundred meters down below their position, and it was the place where the actual laboratories were placed. They were created by expanding on the natural underground cavern system, though it was much smaller than the 1st Layer. It was the Second Layer of this subterranean complex that was their target, for the time being because it was inhabited by the House Nebiros as he saw through [The Almighty].
And then, around ten kilometers beneath their current location, was the 3rd Layer where the Melabranche were sealed in the underground Vaults. The 3rd Layer itself was probably the most protected out of all, and the level of the defenses would put even many Level 8 beings top of the shame.
Yet there was one severe weakness in the almost perfect grand design of all things.
One could deactivate all of them in an instant as long as they had the Blood of Lucifer, which they had. All of the Wards in there were tied to the lineage of Lucifer, and without it, it was impossible to open or bypass the wards due to their sheer power of the Wards and Ancient Magic in that place.
Yet...
They had a way out or around.
In the form of Valiana Lucifer, a direct descendant of the House Lucifer, so he didn't really care about all of the other stuff. Though, the idea of robbing Lucifer's personal vaults left him giddy.
Even though a large swath of the vaults was empty due to the Great War of the Supernatural and then the subsequent Devil Civil War, through the [The Almighty], he saw that actually a lot of riches remained in there, including many Grimoires, Magic Tomes, Lore Books, various precious resources that barely existed today in the Draconic Deus due to the lack of Magicules in the enviroment since the Age of Gods ended on Earth.
Including a lot of things from the different Pantheons and Factions.
"So, how do we fare in terms of strength and numbers?"
Valiana asked as they entered another corridor of this endlessly seeming maze of pathways, rooms, corridors, halls, and ruins under Yhwach's leadership; he knew the safe path due to the [The Almighty], so he was taking the lead on exploration while they maintained the steady formation and also the stealth ward.
"Not great, not terrible."
Yhwach said as they stopped at the crossroad for a bit before he chose the corridor to which they entered.
"I saw one Level 5 High Ultimate-Class Devil, which is most probably Zaorama Nebiros and several Level 4 Ultimate-Class Devils who were either members of the House Nebiros, their vassals House Naberius of the 72 Pillar Houses, which is officially affiliated with the New Satan Faction and in several possibilities, they could unleash some monstrosities and experiments... some of them are more concerning than others."
He stopped in his explanation as everyone caught the information hidden between the lines, as it meant that some of the experiments that they did here reached the Level 6 Satan-Class in terms of raw power.
That could be rather highly problematic for all of them.
"If we kill Zaorama Nebiros... he had a dead man's switch Spell on him... that would send every monstrosity and thing locked in the Sealing Prisons at us right away. So, we need to incapacitate him first and undo the spell."
A dead man's switch is a switch that is designed to be activated or deactivated if the human operator becomes incapacitated, such as through death, loss of consciousness, or being bodily removed from control. These switches are usually used as a form of fail-safe where they stop a machine with no operator from a potentially dangerous action or incapacitate a device as a result of accident, malfunction, or misuse.
In this case, in the place of the machine, there was a Spell that connected the seals in the Prisons where the Old Satan Faction was keeping the whole bunch of chimeras, demonic beasts, and creatures.
This was the most serious thing that he had seen with the [The Almighty], so they would need to address this issue as the first thing.
In fact, this was rather easily done as he was already prepared for the eventuality because he was well acquainted with the method of the Zaorama Nebiros and partly because he always expected the worst thing possible to happen.
Even though Yhwach knew that Zaoeram Nebiros was coward above everything else, there was another part of the story.
In fact, the man would do everything that he could to ensure his own survival, yet, when he was pushed into the corner, he wouldn't hesitate to drag everyone to the damnation together with him in mere moments.
If it came to that, he would destroy everything, so nobody else won't be able to have that... Zaorama Nebiros was certainly a dangerous Devil, even when compared to the other Devils, and he was also fairly powerful.
He wasn't just an ordinary Level 5 High Ultimate-Class Devil, but he was also a Master Magician who was well-versed in Devil Magic and other branches of Magic, not to mention that he was without the Clan Trait of the House Nebiros.
Interestingly enough, the Clan Trait of the House Nebiros was secret, but it was suspected to do something with the Magic or something like that, as the House Nebiros was famous for their Magic Research and experimental Magic usage during the Great War of the Supernatural and Devil Civil War.
And this didn't account for the number of guards and other personnel that the House Nebiros had here. Even though this place was very close to Lilith, the capital city of the New Satan Faction, there were actually a lot of members from the Old Satan Faction.
It was a very well-defended facility, and the soldiery of the Old Satan Faction was rather famous for being extremely realistic towards their goals, and there was no possibility of negotiation with the soldiers of the Old Satan Faction.
While Yhwach wasn't really against the widespread slaughter of the enemy forces, it would lead to a wider conflict, which in turn would attract more and more attention, and there was even a possibility of them calling in reinforcements.
If anything stronger than the Level 5 came to the Lucifaad to support Zaorama Nebiros and his merry band of researchers, then their best bet would be to run as fast as possible. This place was for sure connected to the wider territories of the Old Satan Faction through the teleportation network, so the reinforcements could arrive in a split of a second if called.
"Right now, our only concern is Zaorama, and his dead man switch. But... I guess we can safely bet on the arrogance of the Pure-Blooded Devils in this regard."
If there was one race that was able to match or even outclass the arrogance of Dragons and Gods, then it would be the Pure-Blooded Devils. Most of the Pure-Blooded Devils were beyond arrogant, and they were always so confident in their sense of superiority that it was becoming laughable.
To a great degree.
Most of the Pure-Blooded Devils were very arrogant and looked down on the other species and factions to a great degree. Which was already becoming some sort of cultural thing for the Devil species.
It was not like he cared about that because they could easily exploit that arrogance, as Yhwach was sure that Zaorama Nebiros would want to capture them first.
The reason?
Research.
In this regard, Yhwach felt that he and Zaorama were kindred spirits of sorts because Yhwach would do the exact same thing. He knew that Zaoram Nebiros wouldn't be able to resist the temptation to experiment on a few Gods, Dai Yokai, and future Monkey King, who was Sage, Valiana, who were Devil Dragons, and Longinus, the bearer.
Such a lineup would be able to sway his mind and kill any remnants of the logic that remained within the Zaorama's mind, and Yhwach was confident that the devil in question wouldn't call for the reinforcements or use all of his cards for a very simple reason.
If he called for the reinforcements, it would mean that he was informing the leadership of the Old Satan Faction. This means that what was happening here would get into the parts of Rizevim Lucifer and Euclid Lucifuge, and Zaorama would lose his precious toys.
If he had used all of his trump cards, then he would have most possibly killed them, which was once again something that he would have refrained from doing so. In the end, the living test subjects were far more valuable than the dead ones due to the number of experiments that one could do with a corpse and with a living subject.
"Zaorama Nebiros will try to capture us at any cost... that man is obsessed with his experiments and research, so there is practically no way that he would call for reinforcements, no matter what, due to his relationship with Euclid Lucifuge, as the two of them hate each other. If we can incapacitate him fast enough, we can take over the entire facility rather fast."
Valiana said that she was familiar with Zaorama Nebiros to a certain degree, at least, as she had met the devil a few times while still living in the Old Satan Faction. She knew very well that Zaorama Nebiros and Euclid Lucifuge hated each other to the core because both of them vied for the position of the chief researcher of the Old Satan Faction.
Even though informally, Euclid Lucifuge had a better claim because, well...
Contrary to Zaorama, who was basically just a typical nobleman who, while immersed in his research too much, was without much combat experience, and even though he received the Level 5 High Ultimate-Class, it was mainly due to the combination of rituals that he had conducted on himself.
His power was unstable, pretty much, and he was no combatant by any means.
If Zaorama were to report intruders in the research facility, then it would mean that Euclid Lucifuge would get his hands on everything that Zaorama researched, and that was out of the question.
Valiana knew that they hated each other too much for something like that to happen.
"As Valiana said... let's go... we are not far from the 2nd Layer... the entire 1st Layer is mostly empty."
Yhwach gave out the order as they advanced towards the 2nd Layer of the Subterranean area and evaded the wards, as well as a lone occasional patrol that was patrolling the 1st Layer or at least some important checkpoints.
When he cast a few detection spells, the patrolling soldiers were interconnected with the Wards of this place. If they killed one of the guards, it would alert the entire system in place and they would be swarmed by the guards.
They needed to approach Zaorama Nebiros as close as possible without creating any sort of havoc in the research facility. That way, they would have the best chance in taking him out without him using the Dead Man's Switch and sending this entire place into the pandemonium.
Fortunately enough, because the 1st Layer of the entire underground complex was rather empty and he was using [The Almighty], to foresee the places where the traps and wards were placed, it didn't take them that long actually to get into the entrance to the 2nd Layer.
What was the problem right now, was that the entrance itself was guarded by a squadron of the soldiers of the Old Satan Faction. Even though most of them were just at the Level 3 High-Class, it testified how seriously they were taking the security of this place.
Among the Devilkind, it was hard to reach the Level 3 High-Class even for the Pure-Blooded Devils because it meant that they would need to train actually. Though they could wait a few decades to reach that level of power on their own as they aged, but these ones were trained soldiers.
All of them and they were even properly equipped in heavy armor that was enchanted and inscribed with some kind of Runes. These were the elites of the Old Satan Faction, the Legionaries of their elite and most powerful Legions from the times of the Great War of the Supernatural and Civil War.
"I will seal the area. Kill them as soon as possible."
Yhwach said to his companions as he was cautious about whether they could alert the command.
Everyone nodded, hearing that. They prepared their weapons and waited for Yhwach to finish his Magic.
As the sole Magician in their group, so anything that was related to the Magic and casting a Spell it was left to Yhwach. It wasn't like that anyone of them couldn't cast any Spell, they could, practically everyone could, but Yhwach was an expert in this.
Soon enough, he prepared the Spell as he cast the Spell on the group of guards, creating a Silence Area with an Anti-Magic Spell.
The Silence Area basically created an area out of which nothing could be transmitted in or out. If the guards wanted to alert someone else, they would be able to connect with anything out of the Silence Area.
Suddenly, a runic spell matrix formed above his right hand as he cast the Spell, and everyone instantly went into action.
In front of the onslaught of several Level 4 beings, it was even a bad joke to call it a fight as Valiana and Karna rushed towards the soldiers of the Old Satan Faction and massacred the entire squadron of ten soldiers in mere moments.
"Well... that escalated quickly".
Yhwach muttered as he looked over the corpses of the soldiers of the Old Satan Faction and stored their corpses into his personal Pocket Dimension. Their armors were of rather good quality, so if they could be a bit reforged and upgraded, they would be pretty useful to the Hindu Patheon.
It would be a waste not to take them.
And then there was the most precious thing among all, which were the corpses themselves as Yhwach planned to refine them into the Bloodline Essences for Valiana to consume and increase the power of her Bloodline.
Interestingly enough, her Lucifer Bloodline still had tremendous room for development and using the Bloodline Essence refined from the Pure-Blooded Devils was something that was used to upgrade and advance her Lucifer Bloodline.
Yhwach was sure that if she consumed enough of the Bloodline Essences that he was refining, she would be able to awaken her Lucifer Bloodline completely and advance the Sacred Gear Canceller into the Denial of the Divine.
Fortunately enough, the Old Satan Faction had many, many, many Pure-Blooded Devils.
"We should be going."
Yhwach commanded as they entered the stairway behind the iron doors as they entered the 2nd Layer of the underground complex.
***
2nd Layer of the Underground Research Facility, Lucifaad, Underworld
Zaorama Nebiros was a pretty ancient Devil, belonging to one of the 1st-Generation Devils that were created by Lucifer through the Book of Lucifer together with Lilith shortly after he had fallen from the grace.
The first devils that Lucifer created were the heads of the Six Houses of Lucifer, Zekram Bael, and a few others. He was the head researcher of the House Lucifer for several thousand years, and he was entrusted with the most dangerous and sensitive things that Lucifer wanted to research.
Since the fall of the House Lucifer, Zaorama and the remnants of the Six Houses of Lucifer joined the Old Satan Faction and were surviving in the ruins of the Lucifaad, where they continued in the research of the Melabranche and other things that they were doing before the Devil Civil War.
The only reason why this place remained undiscovered aside from the Magic that was protecting this place was due to the infiltration of the New Sata Faction by the House Naberius, which was the vassal house of the House Nebiros.
"Sir the experiment is progressing rather smoothly... "
Zaorama Nebiros was fairly powerful Pure-Blooded Level 5 High Ultimate-Class Devil, and he placed himself on the forefront of the Devil Scientists that ever existed, even though that dammed Lucifuge was constantly making fun of him.
And that wasn't saying anything about Ajuka Beelezbub... but it would be him who would be remembered as the greatest genius of the Devil Race once he figured out the methods of ascending to the Super Devil Class.
As the artificially created species, the maximum that the Devils could reach was the Level 6 Satan-Class. The only way to bypass this ironclad rule was to break through the genetic constraints of their very own species, which was done by only a very few devils.
Sirzechs Gremory, Ajuka Astaroth, Rizevim Livan Lucifer and Zekram Bael.
All of them broke through the limits one way or another and became Super Devils, an Evolved Form of Devils, and also a new Class of power. At the same time, some of them were even able to access their True Form, which elevated them even further in the hierarchy of power.
"We need more subjects to prove this theory, but using the Senjutsu and Life Force to break through the Genetic Constraints seems to be the best bet on advancing to the Super Devil Class."
Zaorama Nebiros planned to use the Senjutsu and Life Force to break through the Genetic Constraints, which he divided into several Levels. Once he broke through the 7th Genetic Constraint, the Devil in question would have an open path to reach the Super Devil Class.
Unfortunately, he didn't have a Super Devil to gather data on, so he was basically fishing in the darkness. Fortunately, on the other hand, he had a subject that was rather suitable for observing the changes in the Devil Genome by performing the Senjutsu Life Force Breaks on the Genetic Constraints.
"How is the Nekoshou holding up? She is right now the only subject that has the possibility of succeeding."
As distasteful it was to the blood purists among the Old Satan Faction, there were not many methods of breaking through the Genetic Constraints on the Devil Race. One could say that Yahweh and Lucifer did a splendid job on this one, as they really made sure that nobody would be able to become more powerful than them.
So their research needed to turn in a different direction, into the direction that many in the Old Satan Faction considered heretical and blasphemous, and it was also one of the reasons why he was carrying it out here.
In the secrecy of the ruins of the Lucifaad.
"She is holding up, but... some parts of her DNA are crumbling, and if we don't patch her up by injecting more Blood Essence into her, she will die."
The researcher who was talking with Zaorama said it with a trembling voice because Nekoshou was their only bet on cracking down at least one method of becoming a Super Devil.
Once they had mapped a manual, they could reproduce it through the Magi-Tech.
"Then use the Essence Transference Ritual you idiot! She cannot die at any cost!!!"
Zaorama was enraged as he shotued, because if the Nekoshou died, then their entire research was going to void. It was rather ironic that the only way that was advancing their research was at the same time destroying it.
"But my Lord... we would need to use some Pure-Blooded Devils for that... preferably some descendants of the Pillars or Nobles only their Essence would be able to stop the decomposition in her DNA due to the Genetic Clashes and the crude attempts to break the Genetic Constraints."
What was happening to their test subject was rather easy to understand.
The Nekoshou was the Reincarnated Devil.
Reincarnated Devils are created by Devil Aristocracy using Evil Pieces to reincarnate other species into Devils; who serve the Devil Noble who is their "King". They were members of the other species that became Devils, while also retaining some part of their original species, most commonly these traits were some abilities or physical traits in their appearance.
The Evil Pieces were created by Ajuka Beelzebub sometime after the end of the Devil Civil War, the crystals available in the Agreas Island to help replenish the number of Devils after the Great War of the Supernatural and the Devil Civil War, which had caused the death of countless Devils.
While many Devils were able to adapt to the Evil Pieces, the Old Satan Faction rejected the usage of the Evil Pieces, believing them to be a disgrace to Devils for reincarnating Humans and other races into Devils.
In the end, it was working rather well, but at the same time, it created countless new problems for the Devil Race, as they became enemies with practically everyone else because they were reincarnating people that belonged to the area of influence of different Pantheons and Factions.
"I don't care... use some of the captured members from the Pillars in the process. She needs to survive no matter the cost."
The Nekoshou Kuroka was someone who was sent over by his vassals, Zaran Naberius, the Lord of the House Naberius, who belonged to the New Satan Faction.
Nekomata were a species of cat Youkai that specialize in using Ki, Chi or Life Force. Most reside within the East Youkai Faction, which is under the rule of Magari, the leader of the Nekomata. The Nekomata mainly consist of females, with male Nekomata being rare among their species.
The Nekoshou is a special variant of Nekomata and is the strongest of its kind. Nekoshou were a high-level Youkai species that are capable of mastering both Youjutsu and Senjutsu.
And Zaorama thought that they would be the most suitable for being the experiment due to their ability to manipulate their own Life Force.