God Ash: Remnants of the fallen.

The mirror image flew back and crashed into a tree. Its body left a long trail of upturned earth before finally coming to a stop.

Cain stared at his hand with a bitter expression...

\'It\'s broken...\'

His Ki rushed into his broken arm in that instant and began repairs. In a few seconds, it would be as good as new. However, the troublesome hunger afflicting him would increase in magnitude.

Cain kept his eyes on the mirror image that was getting to its feet slowly.

"Interesting..."

The familiar, unperturbed voice reached his ears, causing him to tremble in exhaustion. He had tried using the system to check its stats but there was nothing. Not even a name or what the hell it was.

\'Has my luck really become so terrible?\'

Cain readied himself for another bout. However, the mirror image seemed to have no intentions of resuming the fight, yet...

The creature walked forward slowly, taking its time to approach him.

"Rough around the edges, but not bad at all... Just barely at the level of a grunt." The creature murmured to itself.

Cain\'s eyebrows twitched. Then he sneered,

"Just barely at the level of a grunt? But I managed to hit you, didn\'t I?"

Cain witnessed his mirror image bare its teeth into a wide grin, "You call that a hit? Barely managed to tickle me."

Cain\'s face paled, \'Bastard!\'

Soon, the creature was only a few meters away.

"You must know by now that should I want you dead, you will not really have a say in the matter, correct?"

Cain gritted his teeth but didn\'t reply. How could he, when he knew everything the creature in front of him said was true?

With his repertoire of skills, the creature had the power to kill him ten times over. It was as though it had the ability to amplify the power of his skills. It was a frustrating realization, but it was nonetheless, very true...

The creature continued, "The reason you are not dead yet is because I need you for something. If you are dead, that would be a waste of your purpose. You are much more useful to me alive." The creature said with a grin.

"What do you want from me?" Cain could tell that his reserves of Ki were very low. If he could look down at his body, he would realize that the four platinum scales on his body were shimmering with a dull glow. However, this glow was getting dimmer and dimmer every time he used a large amount of his Ki to heal his wounds.

The mirror image scratched its head, "Relax, would you? I\'m not going to kill you anymore."

Cain continued to stare at it with a face filled with distrust, causing the mirror image to clear its throat.

"Believe me. Why would I, the great Og-Solath, lie to a measly worm?"

Cain felt his heart stop as he took a step back. Although he was still full of doubt, his body trembled.

"There\'s no way that\'s true!" Cain said through gnashed teeth.

The creature stared at him with a small smile,

"But that is the truth. We Devils might be many things, but we aren\'t liars. On the contrary, those celestial bastards are the liars. Every single one of them." A sickening amount of bloodlust seeped out of the mirror image, but it was gone in a split second, making Cain believe it was merely an illusion.

However, he still wasn\'t convinced,

"So are you trying to tell me you are a primordial devil that just happened to be resting within that pool?"

The mirror image, or Og-Solath shrugged, "A bit more complicated than that, but sure."

Cain shook his head, "You don\'t look like a devil. The only lick of devil essence I can sense from you is the one you stole from me."

"Well, what is the use of being trapped if they are just going to give you the key?" Og-Solath said with a smile.

"The key? What do you mean?!"

The Primordial devil grinned, "This forest is a prison that was created for me, you see. You can enter, but give up all hopes of ever leaving."

Cain felt as though a bullet train had rammed into his brain. Seeing this, the creature shook its head,

"Ha... Humans are such simple creatures. I truly wonder how you all have existed for so long."

"Long ago, after the fall of the devil mountain, we the primordial devils had been reduced to only three of the original seven. We had no idea what happened to the rest. The celestial hosts and the rest of the universe hunted us down, gradually reducing our numbers. I swear, the bastard I want to kill the most is that annoying brat, Tian."

Seeing Cain\'s confused stare, Og-Solath cleared its throat,

"Well, since the rest of the universe was so hostile towards us, we really had only three places to go. One, the void, two, the realm between planes, which is the Abyss, and three, the Aether realm."

"The Abyss was a dangerous place, and we wouldn\'t have lasted long there with our wounds. The void was wide enough that the weaker members of our devil race could escape into it without worrying too much about being found. However, devils as strong as me leave a very obvious trail behind."

The Primordial devil spoke to itself as though it was recalling a very distant memory, completely forgetting Cain was there.

"Hence, to survive, we really had only one choice. If we wanted to give our race even the slightest chance at survival, then we needed to enter the Aether realm."

Og-Solath suddenly turned to Cain, its eyes brimming with darkness. The darkness spread, consuming that portion of the forest.

"However, we had no idea that those bastard celestials would have a way to access the newly formed Aether realm. We were able to access it by drawing power from the destroyed Devil Mountain."

The Primordial devil gritted its teeth, "We were so close..."

Cain had a complicated expression on his face. He had never seen a devil express so many expressions before. He had forgotten they were living thinking beings as well, regardless of how violent their nature was.

"We fought as hard as we could, but our generals began to drop like flies. Bemethshal was the first to go. We thought they couldn\'t kill us, so they would have had to resort to using insidious means to drain us of our power and seal us. Lyx was even worse as her dominion was over death itself. However, we severely underestimated those bastards."

Cain could feel the devil essence in the air becoming thicker and thicker. It became so thick, he couldn\'t see anymore. Even the {Dark Soul} was unable to see anything. Although the Primordial devil sounded calm, Cain could tell that it was extremely agitated.

\'This is...\'

"They drained Bemethshal of all his power, then he was killed by Tian. They tried killing Lyx, but that was just plain impossible so they just sealed her. I, on the other hand, am a very special case, you see..."

"Hence, they took all my devil essence and built a prison for me using my own corpse. Ah, the disrespect."

It was at this point Cain knew he had to speak up,

"Your corpse? You mean?"

"Yes. The Garden of Self-Reflection was built on the corpse of a Primordial Devil." Og-Solath said with a mad grin.

Then, its voice dropped to a barely audible whisper,

"The body of a devil is home to the greatest treasures in the universe. Once they pillaged my corpse, they used it as a tomb for me, meant to keep me here forever. The only key they left behind, was something they had stolen from me. My Devil essence..."

Cain had a look of realization settle on him,

"That means you now have a chance to escape from here?" Cain asked.

The mirror image nodded, "This is the only chance I have. Many creatures have stumbled upon this forest, but none of them possess a lick of devil essence or intelligence. Imagine my surprise when I discovered you. However, as I had become nothing more than a lingering soul, there was nothing I could do. Imagine how elevated I must have felt when you decided to deliver yourself into my hands!"

Cain felt like cursing his fate. He was responsible for bringing this unfortunate situation upon himself.

"Just great... This is just freaking great." Cain muttered to himself with a pained smile.

Og-Solath let out a chuckle,

"Thanks to you, I now have access to devil essence. I can now absorb it. To speed the process up, all I need is something that I unfortunately cannot reach. It is not absolutely necessary, but it would be quite pleasant to have.

Cain\'s brows twitched, \'He\'s lying.\'

Seeing Cain fall silent, the Primordial devil continued,

"If you help me get this thing, not only will you be rewarded by me, you and your friends will also be able to leave this place."

When Cain heard that, he trembled but did his best to conceal any emotions.

"What do you mean?"

Og-Solath grinned, "Right now, I have enough devil essence to transport you out of here. If you want, you will be able to take this opportunity to leave. However, I will brutally murder and violate your companions."

Seeing the casual way the devil issued the insidious threat, Cain felt anger boiling in his stomach. However, he swallowed it back down.

"However, if you help me, you and your friend will be free to go. I\'ll even throw in a little something extra."

Cain felt like the offer was too good to be true.

\'There is no way he will allow me to go just like that.\'

However, he had no other options. There was no other way to escape this prison that even a Primordial devil couldn\'t escape.

"What do you want me to retrieve?"

The eyes of the Primordial devil of Madness twinkled. It was as though he had been waiting for this question for a while.

"It is quite simple, actually. What I want you to help me retrieve will not be hard to find, you see. It is hidden in plain sight and you will be able to locate it with no problems at all..."

"Just spill it, would you?!" Cain yelled angrily.

The mirror image chuckled, "Why so eager?"

Then a serious expression settled on its face,

"I need you to retrieve the heart of the Primordial devil of Chaos, Bemethshal..."

Cain though he didn\'t hear him clearly...

"Erm, could you repeat that?"