Card Apprentice Daily Log

Chapter 3218: Mommon, The Architect Of Seven Princes Of Hell’s Riches

Date: Unspecified

Time: Unspecified

Location: Myriad Realms, Dark Realm, Seven Prince of Hell Territory, Pandemonium City

“I apologize, Master. This is as far as I can take you,” Cuth Diya apologized, even though he was only following my orders. We were in a luxurious hotel room he regularly booked whenever he visited Pandemonium City, as I had asked him to act as he had during all his previous visits to the city, with nothing out of the ordinary.

I ignored Cuth Diya’s dramatics. Among all my Calamity Daughter Gems, he had always shown a tendency to be an acolyte, acting as though my every word and action was a divine revelation. I had always thought of him as the most expressive partner-tier Calamity Daughter Gem. His original will was more than willing to remain eternally subservient to me as long as I got him out of the sinister grip of his father.

That was to say, he was one of my Calamity Daughter Gems most likely to become a Bloodkin. Considering how uniquely powerful his Title Demon Core, Hell of Contamination, was, it was good news. Well, any of my Calamity Daughter Gems turning into a Title Demon Core was good news.

“Your work is done here. Continue as you normally would. I’ll handle the rest,” I instructed Cuth Diya as I left the room, taking the form of an ash goblin hotel staff member who had come to show us to our room and had been detained by us.

All those visiting Pandemonium City were granted a restricted permit that limited them to certain parts of the city based on the purpose of their visit. If someone were to enter a part of the city where their permit didn’t allow them to be, they would immediately be marked by the city’s pseudo-natural barrier array formation and swiftly dealt with by the city authorities.

Basically, I couldn’t be in the city without a permit, and the permit only allowed me to be in the parts of the city where I was permitted to go. Otherwise, the city’s array would mark me.

Yes, the barrier was more than a protective dome. It was not only the eyes and ears of the city authorities and guards but also the best pest control barrier, as it would immediately mark any being without a permit for death. That eliminated the idea of me turning into an insect or a rodent demonic beast to run around the city doing as I pleased.

Upon learning this, my first thought was to tamper with the permit, but I couldn’t tamper with the permit Cuth Diya had gotten me without tampering with the data feed stored in the city’s barrier pertaining to the permit I had on me.

Therefore, while in the hotel, I planned to find a guest or an official who had a permit that would allow me to enter the mines of Pandemonium City. According to the information I had gained from Gideon, Mommon was secluded in a massive natural array formation at the heart of the volcano. It was this massive natural array formation that had allowed the volcano to replenish its resources faster than Mommon’s slaves could mine them over the last one and a half millennia.

Also, as long as I entered deep into the mines, I would not only be near the volcano but also out of the surveillance of the city’s barrier.

Using the cover of the hotel staff, I planned to get close enough to the guests and officials who had permits granting them access to the mines to steal their identities and replace them by feeding them to my Maworm.

However, time was of the essence here. I had already wasted fifteen minutes getting here. I had another half an hour to find and turn Mommon into my Calamity Daughter Gem, leaving me enough time to attend the Demon Merchant Code hearing.

Fortunately, I had already run into a group of guests in the hotel lobby who were being led by an official with a permit to enter the mines. They were there to inspect the mines before buying the exclusive rights to sell the minerals unearthed from the said mines for the next century.

I recalled that they had been given the third room to our right. Just as I was wondering what excuse I should use to enter the room, its door opened, and a Marsh Orc, the city official with the permit I needed, hurried out. Seeing me, he immediately raised his hand to attack me…

My immediate thought was that I had been made, but then, seeing that there wasn’t even enough force behind his hand to kill a demon king realm ash goblin, I realized it was just workplace abuse. Reminding myself that I was currently a hotel staff member dealing with an abusive customer. Instead of feeding him a calamity daughter gem, fearing the abrupt change will draw suspicion, I let the Marsh Orc smack my head as he yelled, “I didn’t inform the front desk in the lobby to arrange top-grade ice rule stones for the VIPs? Take me to your manager right now! Do you people not want to do business in Pandemonium City anymore?”

With every word, the Marsh Orc kept smacking my head and kicking my shin. The more I pretended to be in pain, the harder the fucker hit me and the louder he shouted, putting on a show for his VIPs in the room.

Cuth Diya and I were in the lobby checking in, when he was checking in his so-called VIPs. He had never mentioned to the front desk that the room needed to be equipped with top-grade ice rule stones.

Besides, Pandemonium City was very hot, even for the locals, so the whole city was inlaid with cooling arrays, and the rooms had extra private cooling arrays. If he really cared for his VIPs, he could have brought a bunch of top-grade ice rule stones himself, but he didn’t.

Clearly, he was using his position to show his authority to his VIPs while simultaneously extorting a huge amount of top-grade ice rule stones from the hotel.

Not that I cared. I was going to feed him to the Maworm once we were far from any eyes or ears.