Chrysalis

The demon infusion program began rather shortly after our expansion began within the third stratum. It became clear quite quickly that a steady supply of demon recruits would be needed to fuel our ambitions, especially if we wanted them to be a regular and meaningful contributor to our conquests. Normally this would happen naturally, there is always a flow of demons that battle and survive on the plains below, reaching tier six and then ascending to join their cousins on the plate cities above.

The issue we encountered was that this process seldom gave rise to demons who had maximised their potential through the early evolutions, particular the first two. An demon larvae lives a truly brutal and savage existence, fighting constantly, consuming what Biomass it can in the flowing melee and mutating rapidly in order to gain whatever edge it can over its innumerable enemies. Although it doesn't take long for the larvae to absorb enough mana to form a core, given the density of the energy at this level, half of tier two larvae evolve without forming one, desperate to survive they reach for the quick power a fast evolution will provide.

These stunted larvae seldom go on to reach any higher, becoming food for their brethren who achieve a more powerful evolution. Naturally this is wasteful and inefficient, something the Colony has never been prepared to tolerate. It's impossible to observe and assess each and every larvae, but with great effort the Colony was able to create a system whereby promising larvae would receive support to ensure they achieved perfect evolutions up to tier four, whereupon they would be allowed to make their own way.

Although imperfect, this greatly improved the quality and strength of the demons who joined those cities under the influence of the Colony, something they greatly appreciated and repaid many times over with their savagery and enthusiasm for battle.

• Excerpt from 'Growing Demons' by Bella

absorbing this sober warning from Granin and I head back to where the gang is still sorting out there mutations and park my diamond covered rear for a minute to consider my levelling speed. It's not as if I've been slacking off down here, and the hunting has been good, but the experience has been spread out over the group fairly evenly. I know that's not what Granin wants to happen, he wants me to force my pets to funnel

she maxes out, then letting everyone split our gains roughly evenly. I'm still ahead of my group in levels, but not by a significant amount. Even my babysitters have been getting their share, since I forced them to take it. Although the flow of xp has been good, spreading

what level I've even managed to reach, I bring up

Level thirty five.

All things considered, that's not half bad! I mean… I only need

and twenty five levels?! Are you kidding me, Gandalf!? That's unreasonable! An outrageous demand! Actually wait a second… that means in order to reach tier eight a monster needs three hundred and twenty levels. And tier nine would take six hundred and forty. Are there really any monsters like

ten, I have no idea if they are, but let's go

have had literally thousands of years to level up and achieve their current level of power, but it still feels ridiculous to me. If I had to grind levels and

our efforts. The closer I get to the next

'wild' demons that we run into are lone wolves, operating on their own until they reach the sixth tier and join a city and demon society more broadly, making

right gang, everyone doing well? All read to go? Manage to deal with