The orbs touched the crowns of each goblin at the same time, none was a second early or late. At the same time, the snakes that hovered over the priest and the apostle dived straight into their chests. Rather than causing harm as the goblins expected, the orbs simply sunk into their skulls but this did not alleviate the fears of the green beings at all. It terrified them even more, were these orbs going to destroy them from the inside out? Or were they going to be cruelly tortured to death? The fear of the unknown bred these ideas within the goblins, after all, what are you supposed to think when you are placed in a situation where you know absolutely nothing about your circumstances?
What the goblins didn't know was that this was a turning point for them, a moment in time where their mediocre destinies changed paths, and set out towards searching for eternal glory within the darkness of corruption.
Once the orbs of energy had fully entered their skulls, the red energy within instantly split away and spread over every inch of the goblin's bodies, both inside and outside. And then, it began to surge into every organ: the heart, the brain, the lungs, the skin, the bones, nothing was left untouched. This kickstarted a process that was responsible for the uncontrollable growth of the demons in the Lord of Corruption's previous world.
Demonification.
What exactly was demonification?
During this process, demonic mana attacks the host's power source, in the devil's previous world, this was the Mana Core and in this Primordial Seed, it was the Nodes. Through harming the power source, the demonic mana creates cracks that deteriorate mana affinity, while also forcefully increasing affinity for demonic mana. The initial power gained from this process is dependent on this stage of Demonifcation, as for this stage to be considered complete, the host's mana affinity must fall below their demonic mana affinity. The higher the difference between the two affinity levels, the more power the host gains and the easier it becomes for them to walk the path of the demons.
With the substitution of mana with demonic mana came mutations which could typically range from aesthetic changes such as horns to changes geared towards combat such as retractable claws. Most of these mutations were surprisingly random and demonic mana affinity did not influence the likelihood of these changes, there are a small number of common mutations which occur in specific races such as dragons, elves and shockingly goblins. The end of Demonifciation is usually marked by the colour of the irises reddening, with the sclera also darkening in those with high demonic affinity.
This process was massively different from demonisation, and now its results show themselves to the everpresent gaze of a devil.
The small sea of green in the centre of the village had transformed into a sea of fiery red, there was not a trace of the small, scraggly beings that had once stood here, locked into place by the powers of devilry. Red beings, about the size of the average human male, had taken their places and now, they scanned their surroundings with their red eyes in confusion. What had happened?
Weren't they supposed to be exploding into small pieces of flesh?
Weren't they meant to be hearing their own screams tearing across the village?
Instead, power coursed through their veins, granting them strength they had never before experienced in their lives. Those among them who had served as warriors knew that this strength was more than enough to capture humans. Capture humans! Before they could only dream of slaying humans and being lucky enough to find the odd female human weak enough to capture. But now, they were sure they could even capture those warrior humans who ruthlessly slaughtered their populace. The veterans among the warriors salivated at the thought of a certain warrior among the humans responsible for the most goblin deaths. They would have fun playing with her.
Whilst some goblins fantasised about the future, the others had their attention upon a red being adorned in a ragged black cloak. Was he truly a goblin, like the rest of them? It was a well-known fact that the goblins were some of the ugliest creatures that roamed the world, so much so that people would rather kiss a pig rather than a goblin. But this goblin had unnatural levels of beauty. It has to be stated that the goblins' beauty standards were skewed by their hideousness, by human standards this goblin's looks were about average. Nonetheless, this was unprecedented. A goblin that didn't bear their trademark looks. Only the First Priest could be blessed with such a fate.
Thrag had a wide smile plastered across his face as he felt the connection to his new Lord strengthen even further, allowing him to tap into even greater strength than before. Looking over the growth his body had undergone further widened this smile of his, it seemed they had truly made the right choice. As he was turning his focus towards the apostle of their benefactor, Thrag felt something flowing within his strengthened body. Another type of energy.
Demonification had been granted by the red demonic mana, the purple energy of corruption had yet to grant its gift to its origins followers. When corruption began, they all felt it.
The defiling touch that ravaged their bodies and their minds and the bliss it brought to them, the more they were changed, the stronger their faith grew in the devil responsible for all of this. Red became purple and changes to the demonic goblins' anatomy began to take place, hands transformed into wicked blades, tentacles sprouted out of backs, and mouths split open to their ears. These corrupted demonic goblins were completely different to the variant that the late Captain Edin encountered. Though they would likely share a similar fate if they also encountered the Knight group, the damage they would have inflicted would be significantly higher.
That was how much strength the once weak goblins had gained. The goblin's bodies returned to normal, as tentacles and blades disappeared into their forms whilst their mouths reformed, revealing another boon granted by corruption. Their appearances had been upgraded to the level of the First Priest, but if they had gained this much, then how much did he gain?
Many goblins had been unable to digest their gains as Thrag's transformation had stolen all the attention. They all could only watch as an amalgamation of tentacles and blades slowly reformed into a bipedal form, which turned towards them revealing handsomeness that would leave women swooning with love at first sight and men holding their hearts in envy. The priest quickly turned away from his people, eager to see what had become of the apostle, and his now purple eyes widened in shock.
Purple tattoos marked her supple scarlet skin which remained unchanged. The ruby orbs that sat in her eye sockets had been replaced with orbs of amethyst whilst her giant form had grown even further. What really caught the priest's eyes was the weapons attached to the Asura's arms; each arm had its own distinct weapon. A large straight blade, a thorned whip, an axe head and a curved scimitar blade. The two blades were attached to her lower arms whilst the other two were fused with her upper arms, now she truly looked like a demoness of war. Lowering her arms as they transformed back to their original appearance, Faye turned towards the priest who stood behind, nodding at the changes he had undergone before facing the crowd.
Her eyes gazed over the corrupted goblins with pride, although this was just the beginning, the fact that she was able to bring this much of the Lord of Corruption's influence into this world in a matter of hours brought a great deal of satisfaction to her. But, she couldn't allow herself to become complacent, there was still so much the Asura had to do, for example, the conquest of the Forest of Aeternitas.
"The Lord of Corruption has blessed us with his touch and reshaped us into our true forms", Faye's raspy voice drew the attention of all those present, their purple eyes, which were focused upon her perfect figure, were full of the same admiration and respect that the First Priest showed. The goblins had truly accepted the path of corruption as their new way of life, hence why they treated the words of the Apostle of Corruption with the utmost importance.
"But there are others who have yet to experience the kindness of our Lord, they live their lives following the false gods, the great deceivers who wish to use the ignorant ones as tools to further their own machinations. We must spread the truth to the world and enlighten the ignorant ones so that they can break free from the chains of the deceivers. For that, we must set out and conquer, raise the banners of corruption for all to see and crush the deceivers along with those who refuse the truth,"
Silence echoed in the newly established Territory of Corruption as the followers processed the words of the apostle before a single goblin raised his fist and roared,
"CONQUER FOR THE LORD OF CORRUPTION"
His declaration awoke the others from their reverie, as male, female, children and adults, all the goblins bellowed at the top of their lungs,
"CONQUER FOR THE LORD OF CORRUPTION"
"CONQUER FOR THE LORD OF CORRUPTION"
The First Priest nodded his head at the scene as excitement and anticipation, for the coming conquest, rushed through his veins.
This was the new beginning he had been looking for.
Now it was time to share it with the rest of the world.