Family heirloom, then turned into a demon girl

Chapter 388 Mission: 14-4 The Horn Sounds
Finally, in the heavy rain, the sibling dispute was finally settled.

"You put him..."

Dante walked over and asked hesitantly.

"I've locked up the power and sent it to your mother's final wish." Nero sheathed her weapon and replied in a low voice. Her silver hair clung to her cheeks, making her look even weaker. "Even though I can't get out for a while, I'll be fine. I wasn't as ruthless as Mondes."

"Thank you." Dante breathed a sigh of relief. In his opinion, Nero had fought on Dante's behalf to prevent a fratricide between the two brothers.

Fortunately, the results don’t seem to be that bad now.

"Nothing, just wait until we defeat Mondes before we go see him."

"You're right. But," Dante asked, "how do we defeat him?"

"Why don't you just ask that guy who has a solution?"

Saying this, Nero grabbed Dante's hand and fell backwards.

The heavy rain reflected the city's shape and opened the door to another world. Nero and Dante fell into the water, crossed the rippling surface, and arrived on the other side of the world.

She was going to find Phineas who had told them the clue about Lilith.

In the reflected city, the Raptor News Tower, destroyed by the two men, dimmed, and Bob Barbas's voice no longer resounded. But the shadows representing the human soul continued to struggle in agony. Oppressed and tortured by invisible forces, they finally transformed into a wisp of fire beneath the distant Silver Bag Tower, plunging into a burning abyss.

"I haven't noticed it before. What is that guy doing?" Dante couldn't help but frown as he listened to the silent but heart-shaking cries of pain from those souls.

“It’s a crucible for the soul.”

A hoarse voice sounded, and Phineas appeared behind the two of them. He took two steps forward and stood in the same position as them.

"What can Mondes get from this?" Nero asked directly.

"The fuel that runs the tower." Phineas turned his head. "Do you know how he got these souls?"

Dante immediately uttered one word: "Speak."

"It's also thanks to the power of that tower."

In Phineas's voice, a terrifying vortex that was constantly circulating and growing infinitely outside of everyone's sight, and was gradually swallowing up the world, was revealed to the two of them:
"Mundus controls the world with debt."

This was something that had been said long before: the Silver Bag Bank was the largest bank in the world, and the debt it issued was so large that it could even influence national decisions. But what Phineas said went even further.

"Controlling the real world is just one explanation. In reality, he's secretly using money to purchase the souls of every person in the world."

When a man takes a loan from the Silver Bag Bank, his soul is mortgaged as a bond by himself.

He used the money borrowed from his soul to start a company, and then the souls of the employees in this company were also "bought" by their wages.

Through the loan agreement, Mondes could toy with the company's owners at will, corrupting their souls and torturing their bodies. When they could no longer leave Silver Bag Bank, it would be Mondes's time to reap the rewards.

So the company went bankrupt, everything given by Mondes was taken back, and everyone's soul fell into Mondes' hands.

Or perhaps, Mundes thought this fish could grow even bigger... so he offered more money, acquiring more "shares"—and more "souls." "This cycle continued, and we have the ghosts you see in this city. They are all Mundes's slaves."

Phineas said this was just his superficial understanding; he was just an ordinary demon after all. Perhaps Mundus's methods were far more complex and terrifying. Currently, Mundus controlled not only the Silver Bag Bank but also the Magic Drink Factory, the Nightclub, and Raptor News, among other companies.

The Raptor News was the means Mundus used to control the souls he had "acquired" as slaves. The tower's voice could erase these souls' thoughts, forcing them to "voluntarily" throw themselves into the great furnace beneath the Silver Bag Tower, becoming fuel to power the tower. This fuel would then be written into new contracts, bringing more souls back here.

If this goes on and on, one day, all people's souls will fall into Mondes' hands.

"You've knocked down the Raptor News Tower, and so the true face of the furnace has been exposed." Phineas pointed his cane forward and whispered, "Now Mundus must use his violence to drive these souls into fuel. This may be his weakness, and you can invade from there."

"Is it dangerous there?" Nero asked.

"I don't know. But there's no doubt that it's filled with soul-burning flames. Even you, the Nephilim... wouldn't be able to pass through it safely."

"That means it's very dangerous."

Phineas did not dispute Dante's conclusion.

Nero and Dante looked at each other, and Nero asked, "Are you ready?"

Dante shrugged and smiled relaxedly, "Of course, we can go now."

Nero nodded in understanding, but what he said left Dante speechless for a moment: "Really? But I'm not ready yet."

"what?"

Then you ask me?

Dante's eyes said so.

"Does anyone know the internal structure of the furnace?"

Nero asked Phineas, but the answer was negative. Aside from Mendes himself, no one—or demon—could truly understand how the Soul Forge was built or what it looked like inside.

"And now is definitely not the time for you to act," Phineas said. "The furnace isn't fully expanded yet. Entering through the fuel entrance will only turn you into fuel. You need to provoke him, forcing him to fully expand the Silver Bag Tower and try to destroy you. Only then will the entrance truly appear."

In other words, simply angering him wasn't enough. They needed to provoke Mendes at the gate of the Silver Bag Tower, forcing him to open the gate in a rage.

"understood."

The lengthy explanation ended here. Phineas retracted his cane, which had been pointing in the air, and said, "That's all I can tell you. Whether you can defeat Mundus depends on your own efforts."

He looked at Nero and nodded gravely. "Now we have two Nephilim. This may be our best chance of defeating Mendes... but it's also our only chance."

"We will definitely do it."

Nero was not surprised that Phineas noticed the change in her. Her voice was full of confidence in victory.

(End of this chapter)