Cassius silently observed the cute interaction between Stella and Hellion. However, his expression quickly changed when he received a mental message from the enchanting woman who was still calmly reading a news article.
'I sensed your connection with HELL worsen. Things have changed; assuming you still want to keep your status as the 73rd Demon King, you must enter HELL sooner than expected. And even if you wish to cut your losses on the Demon King Bloodline, I must implore you to reconsider; Bloodline retraction backlash at this stage will be disastrous. With the Nexus Event for this Floor rapidly approaching, I would not recommend taking the chance.'
Cassius's brows knitted together, but he nodded nonetheless. 'I understand,' he responded back. 'We'll return within the next few weeks. By then, I hope to still have you as my Guide through HELL. To me, you're indispensable.'
Hellion unnoticeably smiled. 'Of course, Master. I'll be with you until the end. No one is more interesting than you, after all.'
Noticing how quiet it was, Stella suspiciously eyed Cassius and Hellion. She felt something wasn't right. But she couldn't pinpoint exactly what that something was.
"Humph!" was all that wound up leaving her mouth.
Her grumbling, however, broke the concentration that Cassius and Hellion had on each other. As a result, they silently parted ways, with Hellion remaining in place and Cassius ascending the stairs of the mansion. He noticed Sasha on his way up with the help of his eye-related skills, but he didn't do anything about it. He simply continued on his way, with Stella following closely behind.
"You have something planned with Sasha, don't you?" Stella asked, her tone emulating her displeasure.
Stella's cheeks puffed with air as she snorted—more than once. It wasn't until they'd almost ascended the lengthy staircase that she tugged on the back of his cloak and said, "You'll take me out somewhere as well, right? We still haven't really talked about our mothers much since that incident with the MoonShiners. I… I was just wondering if they were alike, you know? Since they were both related to this Sanctuary of Yggdrasil…"
Cassius's irises briefly flashed. 'With everything going on, I completely forgot about Stella's connection to Yggdrasil… and also my own…'
Turning around at the topmost stair, Cassius met her gaze and said, "Your Grandma—would we be able to meet her on a day other than the day you want to go out?"
Stella looked at him in confusion. "You don't want to see her on the same day we go out…?"
"Why would I want that? You don't wish to have the day specially for yourself? It's odd, but okay—"
"No, no!" Stella furiously waved her hands. "I'll take the special day—just you and me…! Then, on a different day, we can go and meet Grandma!"
Cassius tilted his head ever so slightly. After a moment, he gave up on understanding women and simply nodded. "It seems we have a plan, then."
With that, the confused man and ecstatic woman separated in the hallway, each returning to their personal rooms. One would likely end up in the other's room later that night, but for now, Cassius would receive some much-warranted alone time.
Shortly after entering his room and closing the door behind him, Cassius sat down on his bed in meditation. He was originally going to practice his movesets for the Fundamental Body Arts in an attempt to get them all to the 9th Layer but decided to reserve that for when he was in a wider space.
For now, he would stick to his Fiendish Demon King Arts and Demon Dragon Integration Arts.
Both of those techniques were similar to the cultivation techniques that Cassius read about in online webnovels. All he had to do was cultivate them as stated in their manuals, and he would improve both his strength and the proficiency of the techniques themselves. However, when it came to the Demon King Arts—rather than improve his Bloodline like with the Demon Dragon Integration Arts—he instead cultivated the power contained within his Demon King Bloodline, which felt almost limitless.
After more than a month of grinding away in his various techniques, Cassius had, of course, progressed his Demon King Rank quite a lot. From the 1st Rank of Lesser Demon King, he smashed straight through the 2nd Rank of Greater Demon King and found himself at the very pinnacle of such a profound stage!
And as of now, he was only a fortuitous opportunity away from completely obliterating the wall that prevented him from achieving the 3rd Rank—the Archdemon Rank!
'I think I'll be able to break through tonight.' His resolve steeled, and the Magicules in the room started to fluctuate. 'I'll definitely make the breakthrough tonight.'
The Magicules suddenly morphed into something far redder and far more evil. Yet, except for the blowing of his hair and the slight grimace on his face, Cassius appeared to be in the comfort of his own home—which he was—but this was meant metaphorically.
However, as the strong winds in the room became even more intense, Cassius was forced to utilize his Teleport skill multiple times in quick succession. Only after around a hundred spams did he make it to a mountaintop somewhere in Japan; he hadn't paid much attention to details while teleporting.
Though, it was good that he did this, because in the very next instant, the top of the mountain was obliterated by insanely strong winds!
Luckily, Cassius managed to keep himself levitating in a lotus position, thus preventing himself from destroying the rest of the mountain. Nonetheless, once his mind grabbed hold of the volatile string that kept the Archdemon Rank from him, he locked straight the f*ck in and amplified the essence of his Demon King Bloodline.
His physical appearance transformed into something much more demonic and terrifying. He grew a pair of curved obsidian horns and a long, wickedly sharp tail. Moreover, the color of his eyes became a deathly shade of red, with a couple of menacingly slitted pupils added in as well.