Chapter 628 – All-Out Demon Hunt

“In the eyes of Demons, our souls are basically sweet little cakes, aren’t they!” Vasida shuddered with revulsion.

“Thank goodness the friendliness system exposed all those lurking Demons!” Sylph’s voice carried a note of relief. “From now on, there’s no way they can disguise themselves and infiltrate our ranks!”

“Exactly! Now only Demons are unable to use cards.” Lilith lightly tapped the three grayed-out “friends” in her Communication Card, her tone carrying a hint of cheerfulness. “Even ordinary people without magical energy can materialize things from their cards! No matter what disguise methods they use, they can’t fake the process of using a card.”

“That’s right! I’ll contact the Witch Council immediately and have every Witch warn their friends whose souls are under threat.” A sharp, cold gleam flashed through Mo Lan’s eyes as a meaningful smile curved at the corner of her lips. “Also, I think theerta》needs one more addition.”Mo Lan’s eyes as a meaningful smile curved at the corner of her lips. “Also, I think 《Friendliness Reward and Penalty Guidelines with Examples》 needs one more addition.”

As she spoke, the heavy Book of Cards slowly opened before her. Its pages turned of their own accord without any wind, finally stopping on the page bearing the Knowledge Card —《Friendliness Reward and Penalty Guidelines with Examples》.

Mana coalesced at Mo Lan’s fingertips as she inscribed a new rule onto the card’s surface.

At the same moment, every Dawn Society member across the entire Continent of Valen felt a faint vibration from their card book.

Opening their card book, they discovered that the Knowledge Card —”Friendliness Reward and Penalty Guidelines with Examples” included with the advance notice was now flashing with a “Content Updated” notification.

Tapping to view, a striking new rule had been added beneath the existing terms:

“Article 48: Those with an ‘Extreme Evil’ friendliness rating are mortal enemies of the entire Society. Slaying an Extreme Evil individual shall be rewarded with friendliness bonuses or card rewards proportional to one’s contribution.”

Following closely were several vivid examples:

“Example 1: The Dwarf York accidentally entered into a contract with a Demon, and his soul was branded with a mark. But he did not give up on saving himself. By accumulating a large number of Gem Coins to purchase light-element magic cards, he set a trap and ultimately succeeded in slaying the Demon. Not only did he resolve his own crisis, but he also earned a friendliness bonus, gained access to exclusive discounts, and rose to become a premium card supplier.”

“Example 2: The Goblin merchant Zhizhike discovered that one of his customers never accepted goods stored via cards. He discreetly investigated and confirmed the customer’s identity as a Demon, then used a pre-purchased Magic Card — Cage of Light to trap him and brought him to the Sacred Mountains. The Holy Light of the Sacred Mountains burned the Demon to ashes on the spot. Zhizhike not only earned a friendliness bonus but also received an extra Witch-exclusive edition card: Magic Card — Long-Range Spatial Teleportation.”

“Example 3: Duke Colton set up card-usage eligibility checkpoints at the gates of his domain’s capital, repeatedly catching Demons who had infiltrated the city. He captured and imprisoned the Demons in the Mage Tower dungeons, ordering the tower’s mages to take turns bombarding the Demons with Fireballs until they were finally killed. The collective friendliness of the Colton domain rose by several points as a result, attracting many spellcasters to join his territory.”

……

Across the entire Continent of Valen, spellcasters reacted in varying ways — some with shock, others with wild elation.

The shock came from the sheer weight of this rule — anyone who made an enemy of the Witches could become a target hunted by every spellcaster on the continent.

The elation came from the discovery of a new shortcut to earning friendliness, since higher friendliness meant more discounts and privileges in card transactions.

And when they carefully studied the near-explicit examples beneath the guidelines, their initial shock was quickly replaced by euphoria.

This was clearly a provision tailor-made for the Demon race!

Upon reflection, how easy was it to reach the “Extreme Evil” threshold of -100 friendliness? Unless one harbored the intent or carried out the acts of killing Witches, imprisoning Witches, or attacking the Wilds, it was virtually impossible to fall to that number.

A collective friendliness of -100 would cause every individual within the group to synchronize to -100, but an individual’s -100 friendliness wouldn’t necessarily drag down the collective. As long as someone in the group maintained positive friendliness, the collective score would drop to -99 at most.

In other words, an individual friendliness of -99 might be the result of being dragged down by association, but an individual friendliness of -100 was absolutely deserved.

Looking across all of Valen, the only race with a racial friendliness of -100 was the Demons, and every individual at -100 was, without exception, a Demon.

Although the specific atrocities Demons had committed against Witches remained unclear, the universal hatred of Demons across all races on the continent was a shared consensus.

Everyone understood the importance of the soul. Demons who coveted souls were no different from those who coveted their very lives.

This new rule was practically a declaration to the entire continent: slaying Demons was the best way to earn friendliness!

Weaker or more timid spellcasters set their sights on Demons lurking on the surface world, while those with formidable strength and bold courage had already begun preparations to venture deep into the Abyss.

The old-guard noble mages who had been frustrated by the inefficiency of challenging Witches for friendliness were suddenly enlightened after studying the examples. They immediately launched sweeping Demon purge operations across their respective domains.

The Goblin merchants, ever keen to seize a business opportunity, leveraged their vast commercial networks to push card-based transactions into becoming the continent’s mainstream trading model, while closely monitoring any spellcasters who still insisted on physical transactions.

Those victims who had once been tricked by Demons into signing contracts now saw a glimmer of hope for saving their own souls — simply checking whether someone could use cards was enough to see through a Demon’s disguise. Even if a disguised Demon changed identities, they couldn’t get far in such a short time!

Some went even further, setting up light-element magic circles at the entrances to the Abyss, lying in wait like hunters at a rabbit hole.

Demons who had once hidden their identities perfectly now had an obvious weakness. In the eyes of spellcasters, they were nothing more than walking friendliness gift packages.

Though the Demon race was formidable as a whole, lone Demons were nothing to fear — especially now that every Dawn Society member was an ally to one another and an enemy to all Demons.

One needed only to shout “He’s a Demon!” in the street, and a swarm of weapon-wielding spellcasters would come rushing over immediately.

The only concern was that slaying Demons was no easy feat — ordinary magic could hardly deal them fatal damage.

But even that posed no real problem. The vast Sacred Mountains and the towering Holy City were saturated with Holy Light that was the bane of Demons.

If the Holy Light of the Sacred Mountains couldn’t burn them to death, they’d be escorted to the Holy City. If the Holy City’s Holy Light still wasn’t enough, they’d simply be shoved through the Gate of Heaven — guaranteed to reduce any Demon to ash.

What’s more, the Magic Card — Cage of Light was currently running a major promotion for “Demon-Slaying Warriors.” If not now, then when?

No matter how cunning the Demons were, it would be nearly impossible for them to withstand this kind of all-out, nationwide siege. Before long, the Communication Card data showed that Demons had already been captured.