Chrysalis

A few hours later, Granin barges into the chamber and pushes past my ever watching triad of guards to climb down into my cell. When he reaches the bottom and sees me feeding a little mini-demon, he freezes for just a second before he bursts out laughing.

[You as well?] I complain.

[I mean - I just - … Can you imagine their faces if they heard?]

Not this again. I'm almost starting to feel guilty.

[He's an incredible piece of work!] I point out defensively. [I didn't even need to do anything to change his core, just fiddled with his evolutions a little.]

[I know, I know.] Granin waves a hand. [I have to say I was pretty impressed they managed to raise a demon so well, it's notoriously difficult to do.]

That's intriguing. Now that I have a demon in my little group, I'm quite curious to learn more about them. The more I know about my team members, the better I'm able to support them.

[Why's that the case? Is it something to do with the basic shell mentioned in the profile?]

Granin nods.

[Demons are a bit of an oddity in the Dungeon. You can effectively think of them as being divided into two groups. The lower-tiered demons spawn as basically brainless, violent monsters who are even more bloodthirsty than your average beast. Sometimes they don't even eat what they hunt, just move onto the next battle to satisfy their bloodlust.]

[What a waste of perfectly good Biomass!]

[I know. As they evolve, they get stronger, but their basic instincts don't go away. All demons are capable magic users basically from birth, even those who focus on it and evolve down the path to becoming like our little friend here,] he gestures to the Envy demon, [get more adept with magic but are still enslaved by their instincts.]

[So they get smarter, but remain mindless killing machines?]

[Basically. They become more cunning killing machines.]

Third Strata

But we aren't

[There's more?!]

to the second group. These are the upper demons. More powerful, more specialised and entirely in control

telling me that when demons evolve enough, they 'graduate' into a fully formed demon

This is shocking news!

of the Red Truth. The Demon Cities are a massive threat to

guys don't trade or interact with them in

Cities, trying to exterminate them entirely. To any delvers, the demons are a continual menace. They don't want us down there and hunt down any delvers they find like animals. Thankfully, they

that? Aren't they

Granin shrugs helplessly.

urges, but that doesn't mean they don't enjoy indulging them. Be careful with your new friend there. He's not able to betray you, but you might find he gets a little erratic if you

When I try to feed him a tiny mouth appears

out what you are going to be doing between now and

on my elemental skills? The ice magic turned out to

his rocky face

else. You're aiming for the rank five fusion, which is unlikely to happen before the end of the tournament, so raising

I hesitate.

the enemy is taken by surprise, it basically a guaranteed win. I

at me for a

Gravity spell?] He

is,] I confirm

don't want to spill all of my secrets. I still don't fully trust Granin and his team. More than that, I don't trust the broader Shaper community even a little bit. Granin thinks for a moment and speaks a few words to Torrina. She nods and concentrates hard for a time before nodding back to her

they aren't listening in. I've told you already that Gravity magic is risky, but we might have to pull the trigger on it this time. Even in this short amount of time, Gravus' allies are moving on his behalf. Things are going to get rough for us and the next matchup is going to be a serious problem. If you blow up the next opponent with

shouldn't use

suppression of you and between now and then we can stoke those attitudes and point to the numerous abuses that start popping up. With a little

completely sure that'll