Returning Old Demon

Roy originally wanted to wait here to see when that old demon would return. Unexpectedly, he ended up waiting for a full seven days.

Of course, seven days was just an estimate. Roy wasn't sure of the exact duration, but it was a long time.

During this period, Roy discovered that the altar's activation was not occasional. On the contrary, it was activated quite frequently!

The magic array on the altar would emit a faint glow from time to time, and then various smells would come from the void.

As this phenomenon occurred repeatedly, Roy gradually understood. Every time the magic array was activated, someone was communicating with the Abyss, offering sacrifices, and attempting to summon a demon. However, situations like the first time, where the sacrifice was a high-quality soul, were not common. Most of the sacrificial smells coming from the void were filled with the scent of blood.

Roy guessed that this might be because the sacrifices used by the summoners were merely blood or internal organs, which would cause this situation.

However, although the smell of blood could attract demons, it was actually far less attractive to them than souls. After all, in the Abyss, demons were also hunting for blood food, and they had smelled enough of the scent of blood.

Therefore, when the summoner offered such sacrifices, they generally could not attract powerful demons. Only some demonic creatures or weaker demons would come. Moreover, this required the blood scent to be sufficiently strong. If the blood scent was not strong enough, even these demonic creatures would disdain it. This would cause the magic array to quickly dim after being activated for a period of time.

This was a failed summon...

Besides the lack of attraction from the sacrifices, there was also the issue of the magic array's activation time being too short. The scent of the sacrifice had barely emerged before it was cut off due to the magic array closing. In his observations, Roy found that similar failed summon situations were quite common.

If communicating with the magic array also required mana, then this situation could very well be caused by the summoner's mana being insufficient...

This made Roy vaguely realize something: most people who wanted to summon demons were probably amateurs! Not only was their own mana low, but they also didn't really understand what demons truly desired!

Of course, this might not be the summoners' fault. Because even among amateurs, some people had successfully summoned demons. At least during the time Roy was watching, a total of twelve demonic creatures and three little demons were attracted, entered the magic array, and were successfully teleported away. Especially those three little demons, they might even be members of the same batch that hatched as Roy. Roy had used the T-Virus to skip the long growth stage and directly enter the mature form ahead of time. Other little demons couldn't do that; they had to grow normally.

However, during the growth stage, little demons usually had difficulty hunting, and their survival was very tough. That's why there were little demons wandering here, attracted by the smell of blood, and responding to the summon. The same applied to those attracted demonic creatures. And precisely because these weaker demons and demonic creatures occasionally responded to the summon, the concept of "success rate" appeared in demon summoning...

Needless to say about the amateurs who failed to summon, those amateurs who succeeded by luck might think they had mastered the summoning trick because of this success, record their methods, and spread them out. This would lead to later generations' understanding of demon summoning methods becoming more and more distorted...

After all, the number of people who truly understood the Abyss was definitely not large.

Extrapolating from this, the summoner who used high-quality souls to attract demons, and even made the demons first engage in a battle royale for the victor, was the true expert demon summoner! It's just that Roy didn't know what kind of world that demon summoner lived in...

While Roy was waiting, some of the demonic creatures and little demons who had been summoned began to return one after another. These returnees usually had satisfied expressions, probably because they had successfully enjoyed the sacrifices. However, some looked very miserable, returning covered in wounds, with missing limbs not uncommon. These injured ones had probably encountered powerful enemies. Although they escaped with their lives, with injuries like theirs, they probably wouldn't survive long in the Abyss and would soon become the primary prey for other demons and demonic creatures...

Roy couldn't help but kill two injured lesser little demons who had returned. However, the souls he harvested were displayed as "Incomplete Low-level Soul" in the system!

This indicated that these demons might have had a part of their souls missing during the summoning process due to their injuries!

What was going on? Roy secretly felt glad that he hadn't rashly entered that magic array. This was a situation he had never anticipated.

He decided to wait and see when that old demon returned. Because that old demon, like Alanya, was someone who had mastered the Demonic Language and could communicate. And judging by his proficient manner when entering the magic array, he had probably responded to summons more than once. He would definitely know the situation of this demon summoning.

As for how to communicate with this old demon, he could only take it step by step.

On the seventh day, a black spot appeared in the magic array without any warning. The black spot rapidly expanded, and a portal appeared. Then, a massive figure appeared within the magic array.

That old demon had finally appeared and returned. But as soon as he appeared, his massive body immediately tumbled into the magic array with a loud bang. The volcanic ash on the inner wall of the volcano also fell down with the huge vibration.

The old demon's condition looked quite miserable, arguably the worst situation Roy had seen in a long time!

One of the demon horns on its head was completely broken, and the flowing purple blood stained its entire face blurry. The stone hammer weapon it originally held was nowhere to be found, likely lost. Its tail was also broken, and its thick keratin scales were covered with hundreds of wounds, large and small. The most serious was a two-meter-long wound in its abdomen, as if it had been gutted directly with a sharp weapon, with even its organs spilling out and falling in a heap on the ground...

Roy was startled by the old demon's miserable state. With such fatal injuries, how was this thing still alive?!

He was certain that the old demon had experienced a fierce battle after being summoned, but its injuries actually facilitated Roy's communication with it. So, Roy climbed down the volcanic inner wall and arrived on the altar.

In fact, while he was descending, the old demon had already struggled and crawled out of the magic array range on the altar. It probably thought that if it didn't crawl out quickly, what if someone summoned a demon again and it was summoned back into the array? With injuries this severe, being summoned again would truly be hopeless...

After crawling out of the magic array range, it naturally sensed Roy approaching. Although the old demon's face was full of blood, it still fiercely issued a threatening roar towards Roy.

It thought Roy was here to snatch opportunity, so it naturally wouldn't give him a good expression.

But despite its ferocity, its roar couldn't help but reveal a tremor, exposing its inner unease.

Roy could naturally hear it, so he cut to the chase. As soon as he arrived, he used Demonic Language on it, saying, "Answer... my ques...tions, or you... die!"

Few demons could communicate with him, so Roy's Demonic Language was not yet proficient. However, the benefit of Demonic Language, a soul language, was that it could make the target quickly understand the meaning.

As he spoke, Roy also dragged his claws across the hard stone slab on the ground. Although he couldn't leave a scratch, it made the slab spark with a sizzling sound. He proved through this that he could now easily kill the old demon.

Looking at Roy's incredibly strong muscles and sharp claws, even though Roy's height was only a quarter of the old demon's, the old demon was now just seriously injured and lying down! So the old demon quickly compromised. It used Demonic Language to ask Roy, "What do you want to ask?"