Demonic Po*nstar System

Chapter 781: Investing Strat

Kaiden shifted forward on the throne and pulled the full interface out across the dais, a translucent span wide enough that the girls could all read it from wherever they stood. The roster sat on the left. The DMP balance hung at the top corner, [18,100] glowing steady against the dark.

His eye caught the 3D rendering in the upper right.

Two Champion markers moved south through the Verdant Expanse at a brisk pace, a pink dot and a burning red one, angling straight for the entry point to the magma spiral.

His awesome space babe was taking the Flame Monarch to meet Melty.

A small smile pulled at the corner of Kaiden’s mouth. That was going to be a moment.

He turned to the rest.

”Alright. Let’s hear your thoughts, ladies.”

Luna pushed off the wall, strategic gamer girl brain already in full swing as she saw the display of abyssal monster rosters available to them now.

”Hear me out. We need to save DMP where possible.” She climbed halfway onto the armrest next to him, one leg folded under her, and jabbed a finger at the Maulfiend evolution tree. ”The Quakelord is an AoE guy. Every strike cracks the floor in a fat radius, the ground does the actual damage. Does his stat block matter that much if the shockwaves are geometry? Maybe some of them chill at ninety-nine and we park the eight hundred a pop into stuff that actually needs the gains.”

”Some of them, sure.”

Luna’s eyes lit up.

”But he’s melee. The Monolith tanks while the Quakelord moves in behind. If he’s soft when the Claimant’s monsters reach him, his second attack never comes out.”

Luna scowled, accepted it, and pivoted without pausing. She was in full efficiency mode, trying to think of the best ways to game the system and save DMP wherever possible.

”Okay, but what about the Pyremother?”

Kaiden’s thumb stopped on the scroll.

”She’s a brood queen.” Luna’s grin had already come back. ”She sits in the magma, she never swings at anybody, her whole gig is squirting out little babies. Why does she need one-twenty if she’s basically a spawning structure? Keep her cheap. Feed the savings into something that actually hits.”

Kaiden opened the Pyremother entry, scrolled past the variant art, past the behavioral notes, down to the system’s fine print.

[Spawn rate, spawn level, and maximum concurrent spawn count scale with host level.]

He angled the display a few degrees so Luna could see.

Luna stared at it.

”...Fuck.”

”Yeah. She’s too good to skimp on in the traditional way,” Kaiden said. ”But the save-DMP angle still applies, just differently. I’d say we only want one squirting mommy for now.”

Luna’s eyes flicked sideways to Vespera on reflex, checking for a reaction to her boyfriend saying ”squirting mommy” in front of his mother.

She found nothing.

Vespera was across the room, one hand resting on the carved edge of a lava cascade, head tilted in quiet assessment of the workmanship. Calypso had drifted in close beside her, tail twitching, gesturing broadly at the vaulted walls with the energy of a homeowner showing off a renovation.

”These channels do more than look pretty, Shadow Mommy. The slope is made so the flow never pools at the base...”

The Infernal Matriarch was always happy to share details about her palace with any who asked. Well, her darling’s palace now. The pride of the craftsmanship was still hers, and the Shadow Monarch’s quiet attention had unlocked the full architectural lecture.

Luna watched for half a second, then looked back at Kaiden.

Aria’s silver hair brushed his shoulder as she leaned in, her fingers still threaded through his.

”I agree with you, but I also think that Luna’s instinct is right. We should narrow the DMP spend where we can. The Nightclaws have worked well with levels split across the pack, some at ninety-nine, some lower, the stronger ones picking off priority threats while the rest keep the swarm pressure up.”

Bastet joined in; both girls were on the same wavelength. ”I’d say the same will hold true for the Basalt Gunners. We can cap the heavy ones at one-twenty for the big targets, and leave a ratio at ninety-nine for the weaker monsters. When the battlefield offers two targets at once, they’ll split the work. If they’re smart enough...”

Luna was nodding along before Aria had finished, grin back in full force.

”Yep, exactly. The Yandere Princess and Choco Kitty got it.”

”...” Both women looked at her with dangerously scrutinizing eyes.

Kaiden nodded once.

”Then that’s the framework.”

Luna huffed and climbed the rest of the way onto the armrest, finally satisfied.

Kaiden pulled the roster forward and the girls closed in around the dais.

...

After an hour of strategizing about the exact spread, Kaiden confirmed the purchases.

The purchase confirmations were still settling in Kaiden’s peripheral vision when the interface pulsed with an incoming message.

[Direct Message: Kira Vaughn]

He tapped it open with his mind’s eyes.

Kira: Boss, are you seeing this? Things are getting sketchy.

Kira: [Awakened Combat Stream: LIVE]

Kaiden selected the link and a feed bloomed in the air above the dais, translucent and wide, the cathedral’s firelight dimming slightly to compensate.

The view was from a long telephoto distance, the camera mounted on an aerial drone holding well outside the danger zone. Even from that range, the Claimant filled most of the frame.

It stood astride a dungeon gate that was no longer the one Luna had shown him hours ago. A new dungeon, a fresh meal.

The old one was already a husk. This one was next.

A column of light rose from the new dungeon’s mouth into the Claimant’s own, steady and continuous, the same feeding posture the team had seen on Luna’s phone hours ago.

Except now, the Claimant’s body was moving.

The stone-slab flanks and ridgeline shoulders were rippling, convulsing in slow peristaltic waves, and from seams along its hide, creatures were emerging, oozing free.

’He can spawn them from more than just the mouth...?’ Kaiden grumbled. ’Is it getting even stronger with the consumed dungeons?’

The monsters hit the ground already upright, already swinging, and charged outward into the ring of awakened fighters who had formed up in a wide perimeter around the feeding site, trying to take down the creature.

The ring was giving its all. Arcs of lightning and fire and cold white magic lacing the air around the Claimant’s legs, S-tier and high A-tier power signatures burning in the Association’s tactical overlay at the bottom of the feed. Tanks charged, mages bombarded, artifacts flared.

The Claimant barely even seemed to register them.

Its armor-plated body absorbed the assault and passed it along its surface as cosmetic light. Where spells should have scored the skin, the abyssal-dark plating reformed before the energy could settle. Where the defenders did land blows on the oozed monsters, those monsters fell, disintegrated into wisps, and the wisps rose back toward the Claimant, reabsorbed into its frame to be birthed again.

Kill one. Another emerged from the same seam. Kill ten. Twelve more pushed out.

The kill count at the bottom of the feed was in four digits. The monster count on the field was holding steady.

Aria’s grip on his arm had gone tight enough to leave marks.

”They can’t stop it...” Bastet said quietly.

Kaiden exhaled and switched channels.