MMORPG : Ancient WORLD

If Alex didn't know about the Devourer Curse and hadn't seen a living, breathing Devourer beast, he would have easily believed these terrors to be some mythical creature from a fairy tale.

Varon explained many scary abilities of the Devourer beasts that become weirder and weirder, but after telling about many horrifying traits of them, he reached the topic that Alex was anticipating to know from the start.

"The Devourer beasts could consume organic matter to increase their strength, but that takes a massive amount of organic matter and time."

"The Devourer beasts don't have any limit to their strength, and if given enough organic matter and time, they could even reach the First Transcend Rank and even surpass it."

"The Devourer beasts don't have any limits, but to advance to the Seventh Rank other than requiring a monumental amount of organic energy, they will need not years but more than a century," Varon said, looking toward Alex with his shining black and white eyes.

'This officially makes the Devourer Beasts the strongest and most broken creatures in this world, even with these limitations.' Alex thought as he looked toward the chained Devourer saber tooth.

'If I told him the true nature of the Devourer Curse, it would only overwhelm him with what the future holds for him, but giving him a clue to keep him motivated is not a bad idea.' Varon thought as his shining eyes returned to being normal.

"After a Devourer beast consumes the organic matter required to advance his strength to the next Rank, he will hibernate to complete the process."

"The hibernation of a Devourer beast could last from a few years to a few centuries depending on the Rank he advancing to, and the state of hibernation is their biggest weakness."

"In the state of hibernation, it is easy to kill a Devourer beast because they can't wake up until the procedure of their Rank advancement has been completed."

"All Devourer beasts ready to increase their Rank will go to a designated place to hibernate which will be guarded by the strongest of the Devourer beasts, so even though killing them is easy, reaching them is quite difficult," Varon said.

'This confirms the theory that Devourer Curse is a controlled phenomenon by something, but now the scary question is what could control the Devourer Curse to produce these abominations and for what purpose.' Alex thought.

"Domain Ruler, If you have questions about Devourer Beasts, please let me know," Varon said in a friendly tone.

'I already know more than enough about Devourer Beasts to understand their threat level, but it would be great if he could tell me about their origin and purpose, even though I am sure he wouldn't do that.' Alex thought.

Alex was smart enough to understand that the true Devourer Beasts took too much time and effort to produce, so using them just to cause destruction was a monumental waste of time and resources.

Alex believed that the Devourer Beasts' had a different and more valuable purpose because to cause destruction, just the Rage beasts would be good enough as they could be produced in a short time and didn't even require many resources.

"I want to know the Devourer Beasts' true purpose," Alex asked, knowing that Varon was not obliged to answer any of his questions.

"Domain Ruler, The information about the true nature of the Devourer Curse will only do you more harm than any good, so I need to apologize as I can tell you anything about it, at least for now."

"But If you could advance your Ruler Authority to the fourth Rank in three years, then I will happily tell everything about the Devourer Curse," Varon replied, giving Alex some false hope.

'I just need to kill seventy demons of the same Rank to advance my Ruler Authority to the third Rank, which will be a piece of cake after the demon invasion starts on the human continent.' Alex thought with a smile.

'I wonder if he would show such happiness if he knew that Ahura, the previous Ruler, took seven years to reach the Fourth Rank of Ruler authority.'

'Ahura had the most outstanding talent second only to the First Ruler, and even Elder Erebus took three years, even with his monstrous talent and Pure Ancient Titan bloodline.' Varon thought, seeing Alex smirk after hearing his set condition.

"I suppose you also don't plan to tell me about the Malefis Domain's dark past?" Alex questioned, already knowing that the answer was a no.

Alex knew that something very messed up happened in the past, and the previous Ruler, who everyone respected greatly, was partially responsible for it.

Alex was very interested to know about the Malefis Domain's past, but he also understood that the individual who knew the truth wouldn't reveal it to a new Ruler like him who could be gone in little over a year.

"Domain Ruler, I will tell you everything after your Domain Connection has advanced to Fourth Rank," Varon said calmly.

'I know advancing my Domain Connection and Ruler Authority to the third Rank will be of no problem, but I am pretty confident that advancing both of them to the fourth Rank would be difficult."

'I don't know how difficult it will be, but with all my future knowledge and benefits I will obtain from the Malefis Domain, two years should be more than enough.' Alex thought, not too worried about fulfilling the condition set by Varon.

"Domain Ruler, If you don't have no more questions, I would like to show you something special," Varon said as he opened a new portal.

'I wonder what special thing he wants to show me.' Alex thought as he entered the portal without asking any questions.

The moment Alex exited the portal, he was welcomed by a terrifying sight

of thousands of standing coffins, and inside them were the bodies of individuals belonging to different Races frozen in Ice.

'What the hell is this place? And what is going on with these coffins?' Alex thought with wide-open eyes as he looked at the unbelievable sense in front of him.

The coffins were made from dark crystal-like material with a transparent front, allowing Alex to see the inside without any hindrance.

Alex stood stunned as he looked at thousands of straight lines with millions of similar coffins, each with a frozen individual inside.

"This place is called the eternal resting place, and the coffins are used to place the domain inhabitants who have their consciousness consumed by the Devourer Curse into a deep slumber to stop their bodies from mutating," Varon said with genuine sadness in his tone.

After hearing Varon's sad voice, Alex came to his senses and quickly looked at him, ready to listen to everything he was about to say.

"All the Inhabitants of the Malefis Domain are infected by the Devourer Curse, but their situation is not completely hopeless as Guardian Elmara has created antidotes that could delay the effect of the curse by up to four times."

"It is because of the help of antidots that the inhabitants could live a few decades of peaceful life after being infected, but the Devourer Curse is only delayed, not cured."

"When an individual reaches the end of his borrowed time, he is put into a deep slumber, and his body is frozen in this, using Ice law rune to keep him alive and stop his body from mutating in the hopes of using the cure to save his life in the future," Varon said.

'This doesn't make sense.' Alex thought, confused by Varon's explanation.

Alex was confused because, from Varon's explanation, he understood that every inhabitant was living a free life while being infected with Devourer Curse, which doesn't makes sense as an infected individual could turn into a rage monster in a short few seconds, making him a threat to every living being.

Alex had many questions, like how they know if an inhabitant is even infected and how they find out if the infected individual has reached the end of his borrowed time, but Varon answered his question before he could even ask it.

"Guardian Elmara has created a magic bracelet that could monitor a person's brain activity, and when the brain activity of an individual reaches a certain condition, it marks the end for him, so proper measures are taken before he could enter the endless rage state."

"What about the True beasts on the Malefis Domain," Alex asked, knowing they won't act like good citizens following the rules created by higher authorities.

"Domain Ruler, You should already have guessed that the Devourer Curse is not natural and controlled by something and that something is Demons," Varon said calmly like he hadn't revealed any significant information.

'After roaming in the capital city, he will easily find out that the Demons are responsible for the Devourer Curse, so telling him this much won't do any harm.' Varon thought, looking at Alex, who had a blank expression showing his surprise.